Leaving the Spice:'( Awesome last week together!

MAN it has probably been one of the best and longest weeks ever!! So many things have happened  this week, last Monday seems like years ago but it also went by too fast because guess what?! I'll tell you the big news now I think rather than later... I'm getting transferred! Sister Spicer and I are being split up!! :'( But some good news is we had a bomb last week together! Saw so many miracles and had seriously so many moments where I just stopped and realized so HAPPY I am!



So first off, last Monday night was our last time with Alyona! :( She left for Russia Wednesday but luckily we took a lot of prime pictures together that night and we gave her info to the elders there so hopefully everything will be well with her and she'll be able to be baptized when she comes back! Alyona is seriously amazing I love her so much and she's so funny,already miss her! She's seriously just a prime human being.


We had Zone conference again this week and it was great like always! Sis Spicer and I were in charge of getting all the food and drinks for it so that was a little stressful but everything worked out perfectly and everyone loved it so that was good! I learned a lot and so many elders are leaving this week it's crazy. It was really sad but touching to hear the final testimonies of some elders I've served quite a while with. Definitely cried quite a bit.. :/ So powerful to hear their strong testimonies after serving the Lord for two years and hear how much the mission has changed them for the better. I'll miss them! And man, we're going to have so few missionaries here for a bit it's crazy.





We had some really awesome lessons with our investigators this week.We had a lesson about almost everything with Emmanuel but actually was really good and asked him if he wanted to set a goal date of being baptized and he said he would pray about the date and to know if everything we've taught is true because he said " I'm not going to do anything without praying about it first" YES Emmanuel knows how to do it guys haha, I was so happy I was like yes that is awesome, pray about it please, you'll get an answer!

Galina said that after our first lesson with her she said to God " if this is true, I'll get new contract at work" and sure enough the next day she got a new contract! And I asked her if she thinks that was her answer and she said yes! So awesome. Reminded me of Tony's story so I'm so excited for her.

When we were English contacting Saturday I asked this girl if she knows English and she said yes and she had a really good accent. I told her about our practice and she asked if we were from a church or something and she said that she had recently started reading the bible and she was so happy to have met me. She also said I wish i would have met you earlier because a few months ago her and her fiance ( from the USA ) were looking for a christian church here with people who speak English before her fiance had to go back to the states but she's interested in meeting with us and talking about why we're here.

Funniest thing EVER that happened this week! We were at Yulia, our recent convert's house with her perfect little girl Vika and when Yulia went to get a snack we were talking with Vika about the melon party we had and Sister Spicer said that she ate so much honey dew ( Deenya ) that she couldn't feel her tongue! (true story haha) but Vika just stared at her so we thought maybe she didn't understand. But then like 10 minutes later we're eating and then Vika loudly whispers" Mom! I have a secret! " And Yulia says something like secrets aren't good, you can tell everyone. But Vika's like :"Please! " ( keep in mind this is all in Russian in the cutest little Vika's voice " So Yulia leans in and Vika loudly whispers slowly.. "Cectpa Spicer.. ate so much melon.. that she couldn't feel her tongue! " And we all DIED. I don't know if my writing did it justice at all, you had to be there of course but it probably was the best, funniest. moment of my life.



So Sis Spicer and I were actually expecting we would probably be split up but we thought we had at least one more week together, probably one of the worst parts also I want to see the progress of our friends but I trust she'll continue the work well and actually I won't be going very far at all! I'm going back to Left Bank! Serving with Sister Busath!  Y'all know more about that next week. I'm gonna miss my Spice :(  these two transfers have some of the very best ever ! but I'm excited for new and cool adventures:)

Love,

Cectpa Horne

Making my way downtown

Man. This week just FLEW by! Seriously it's crazy. 

What happened...? Good question. Lots of good things! Met some cool people! 

We had a great lesson with our friend Galina. She asked great questions and she even basically asked if people could be baptized and join our church! Of course Galina XD 

We met with this cute babushka, she's a member but can't make it to church. She was so nice but it was so sad because she cried a little when we left:( broke my heart, but we told her not to worry; we'll definitely be back next week!

Oh ya and we might have been scammed by a gypsy! But it's all good, don't y'all worry! Live and learn;)

We had a melon party after church yesterday! Because we're in two branches sometimes we don't stay all three hours for our second branch but yesterday we did, we were there from 9 to 5 .. so we were kind of starving lol but it's ok because we filled ourselves so much melon after:))

So much love, 

Cectpa Horne

Pics:

view from the mission office

Cectpa Lyubov (love )

"making my way down town" lol we've been singing that all week

first time at KFC in Ukraine!

Hello Fam,

Sorry if I'm boring this week, not much new to say.. it was a good week though!

Just super tiring and hard to work in this heat. Man. Like it just drains you, SO HOT. 

We did get a watermelon though! Probably the best one, I've ever had! And we got Sunflowers:) they're so pretty! 

We had a couple really good lessons though. One with Alyona and her Grandma. She left for youth conference in L'viv this week for all the youth in Ukraine, which will be aweosme I'm sure. Unfortuanately we found out that her dad won't let get baptized right now:( BUT she's going to still try to do all she can for the next couple of months ( read scriptures, pray etc, and then her dad might ) It made our hearts break when she said, that the fasting we did didn't work. We made sure she understood though, and I hope you all do too that it definitely did! Prayer and fasting are powerful and Heavenly Father ALWAYS hears them. He loves us and He will always answer our prayers but sometimes they're just not how or when we want, it's in His timing, and infinite wisdom. She's amazing and I think she understands now, and has so much faith, and still pressing forward.

While we were at her house I tried ostrich jerky! So that was cool. It's from Africa, where her aunt lives.

We also stayed with a couple of girls from a different town who came on their way to conference. And I drew the Plan of Salvation on the side walk:)

Lots of Love, 

Pictures from the week of Aug 14th

Again no letter except she was really excited for Alex and Emily's blessing of little Lily. We did get some pictures though and she also commented that she might be putting on a concert which would be very exciting for her.

Pictures from the week of Aug 7

We seem to be having problems with Celine's emails but her pictures are getting through. Here are some pictures from the week ending Aug 7th and maybe from before that.

Chinchilla 

Link to Sister Celine Horne singing at church in Russian

Singing in Russian

SUNFLOWER madness :) - Monday July 24

WASSUP.

Still here guys!! Woohoo! Super happy about that, all the elders were joking that I'd be transferred because I've been here for a while now and I kept telling them NOPE I'm not moving yet and I was right:) although, this transfer there wasn't too much change. What's going to be crazy is in three weeks, some missionaries are leaving half way through the transfer and then two weeks after that so it's going to be craaaaazzzy! All is well for now though. Still me and Sis. Spicer conquering right bank Dnepr:) aha

So this week we did exchanges in Zap again! First time for Sis Spicer and is was really fun! Probably the highlight of the trip though was the drive there and back because guess what we saw?! SUNFLOWERS!! Just fields and fields of them! Millions! We were just freaking out! they were so BEAUTIFUL! AH. it was amazing. I mean that is one of the most famous beauties of Ukraine right there and we finally got to see them! And it never gets old either! I just love it.  (pictures don't do it justice )

Also cool thing happened in the morning when we were just about to go on the bus back to Dneper from Zap we went to buy some breakfast and I wasn't really feeling like much from ATB  (basically the little Walmart of Ukraine ) and I wanted something from the cafe next door so we go in there and classic Celine goes behind a line of people to see the rest of the food options and knocks over a plant with her bulky back-pack! And then clumsy, awkward person that I am but feeling super bad about knocking over this plant cause there was dirt all over the floor so I start picking up the dirt and putting it in the pot hahah it was actually pretty funny but the lady in front of us tells me in English, it's OK, they can do it. lol So while I stop and start choosing what i wanted to buy Sis Spicer starts to talk to her, she's from Ukraine but speaks English and she asks her what's with the badges? And she says we're missionaries for the Church of the Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints and she says, I've been looking for a church! Anyway told her the sisters in Zap could meet with her and tell her more about church and answer her questions and she was super excited! So cool that we could be there at just the right time to meet her! ( sometimes little awkward slip-ups are a good thing:))

We also went out to Lena and Igor's again but this time with the Elders, to do service and it was a good time! We had shashlik! (which is BBQ) and soooo good!

I sang in sacrament yesterday and got my companion to film it for y'all :)

HALF WAY thru?!? (July 31)

Yo

Have y'all heard the song "Workin" by Jamesthemormon and David Archuleta? If you have I would recommend to go YouTube search it when you can;) If you didn't know it's actually about missionary work! .. And I'd like to think that was our theme song for this week hahaha jk idk man , we were way busy all week, booked up with meeting with members and investigators etc, it was awesome! I love it, although it makes time go by even faster!

Speaking of time... oh yeah I freaking had my HALF WAY mark this week!! What?! It's was good day, actually it was spent mostly inside because we did studies and weekly planning ( because it was the only time we had to do it the whole week because we made so many other plans) and we were also fasting lol but that was a good way to spend it tbh and it ended off swell. Also where we went to a sweet member's home, ate a little different honey dew melon (which apparently you can make a honey out of..) and held their chinchilla!! (SO soft , sorry Benny maybe even softer than you! aha ). Also there was a thunderstorm! ( I love thunder storms ) and we celebrated after with homemade Oreo milkshakes:)

SO weird though that I already hit my 9 months!!! Like what the even...?? It's been a great nine months though and the next 9 will be even better!! 

Btw, the reason why were fasting that day was because we've been teaching this 16 year old girl named Alyona who is AMAZING, her babushka (grand mother) is a member and she lives with her in the summer but she goes to school is Russia for the rest of the year and her dad doesn't really want her to be baptized. She really wants to be baptized! And she knows everything because she was taught last summer but didn't get to baptized before she left. She asked us to pray for her and for her Dad's heart to soften so we decided to all fast together on Wednesday. We're still not too sure what's going to happen, especially because she's going to a youth conference next week and then will soon to back to Russia but keep her in your prayers, that she'll be able to be baptized soon! We really want her to be able to because making that covenant and getting the gift of the Holy Ghost will only help her throughout her school year!

Anyway I love you all, keep praying, PRAYERS WORK, I miss you all, the Lord's work is going forth!

сестра хорн

Link to the Workin by JamestheMormon  and David Archuleta on Youtube added by Dad

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tNBwM7iCL4k