hello beautifuls

Happy Wednesday!

Dad I'm so excited to be in the same time zone! I vote you buy a cool folding bike even if it is stupid expensive, I love them. There are so many cool old bikes here that I always want to buy and take home with me. Not logical/feasable/possible. Purtroppo.

It's been another beautiful week, surprise surprise. We've been listening to the Italian EFY CD all week and there's this line that says Io mai avrei potuto immaginare che avrei vissuto gironi cosi stupendi and I thought "Hey! that's me." I really have been blown away at how with every new person or expereince the Lord grows my capacity to love and find joy in every moment... which I thought were my strengths before.  Now it's out of control. I love Varese more than I ever thought I could/would/would want to.

A few beautiful things that have happened. Itala is progressing nicely. She's 44, Italian, has had a hard life and needs the gospel (like everyone really, but yeah) She came to church for the second time on Sunday, is reading the Book of Mormon and loves being with us and in church. We had a beautiful lesson about the plan of salvation with her yesterday morning with a member Agusta and it was perfect. Itala is pretty chatty (surprising for an Italian, I know) but everytime she listens better and is more focused. She calls me Boosh and it always makes me laugh.

Funny side note, the first time she came to church she brought her friend Giuseppe with her. The next week when I was chatting on the phone with her setting up an appointment, she said "Oh, hey you remember my friend Giuseppe? We were talking after church and he said Ma che carina quella Boosh, and was wondering if you could go have dinner with him sometime." I explained that being a missionary limits one's social life but thanks anyway. Ha.

This week we've set some really specific goals to improve our finding, quantitative and qualitative. We kept track of how many people we talked to last week and are going to talk to a third more and then everyday we have a person that we have to talk to when we see them. Yesterday we had to talk to every girl in her 20s with brown hair and glasses. I'll skip over the complicated series of events leading up to us getting on a bus and just say that on this bus there were maybe three people, one of which was our girl. So I pulled the awkward missionary and we sat by her and started talking. Turns out she works by the church and as chatted with the missionaries before but never heard of the Book of Mormon. So we're meeting with her Saturday night before she works to give her a copy and offer her a more beautiful life.

We've had so many baby miracles these days just when I need them, just when I need to be reminded that God is guiding us or listening to my prayers of pleased with my work. It's rad. I feel like I'm not doing anything drastically different but I feel more full of the spirit these days. I feel like I'm being more honest when I speak, not saying the same things and it's lovely. Gina is another rad girl we're teaching. I think I told you about her, 21, from Albania, lived here since she was 4. Wanted to know more about the purpose of life. We brought a member to her lesson on Monday and it went so well. I was kind of a rambling monster but she wants to see us again anyway, with the same member, 23 year old Diletta, our go to YSA, who's working on her mission papes.

We had a funny conversation about tu and lei, because we're asked to always use formal with peeps unless the ask us to use informal, in which case it's more respectful to do as they ask. They said "Yeah, no one ever uses lei with us, it makes me feel old." And I was like meno male! I'm so sick of feeling so formal and lontana to these people that I love.

Sunday (after church where we had 5 investigators and 4 less actives we're working with come (it's fun to fill up the back rows with our peeps in a branch of maybe 36 people)), we had a beautiful lunch at our Branch President's house with Luca. I ate lots of cheese, improved my chit chat abilities and had a lovely time. Less than a month til Luca takes the plunge! I literally can.not.wait for him to start over and get the Holy Ghost. GAH!

We went up to his house (which is pretty much a dream up almost in Switzerland on Lago Maggiore) last P-day to just hang and eat good food and it was the first chill P-day I've had in ages. It felt so nice to just be chopping away at things in the kitchen with Norah Jones in the background—mamma mia, troppo bello.  Then risotto with gorgonzola and pears.

Today we're off to Milano to see the Duomo and eat pizza with the sorelle there. Random thoughts of the week (some of them aren't too new, just what's stewing in my brain these days): What have I inherited from my first estate? To abandon sins, vs. leave of any other verb...Cleave to covenants Damned= stopped progression, subtle damnation in immediate blessings from good actions and immediate punishment from sin...we would obey out of ease and therefore not progress? Prayer is literally how we can conquer Satan...the phrase lift up your heart...Diligence is an expression of love for the Lord...

Sorella Beutler is incredible. The most frustrating thing is when she refuses to believe me when I tell her she's improving and that she really is doing so well for being here only three weeks. Plus it's beautiful to see how her imperfect Italian brings such a strong spirit and people listen when she tells them what she knows. Maybe she'll believe me in six months or so...

Vi voglio beneeeeeeee! Fate il bravo!

Happy working and schooling and kiss Alice on top of the head for me.

xoxo

sorella bush