Tuesday, December 10, 2013
Dear Family!! 

So to start, I did get my packages!! I guess since I'm living here in Buch the office elders didn't bring my packages to transfers cause I would end up at the office eventually. So I got both of them! Plus I also got a package from the ward. We aren't doing the english classes this transfer due to the Christmas and New Year holidays.  We had our zone conference/mission christmas party this past week. It was actually pretty fun! We did a tie exchange, I got to hang out with a lot of missionaries, and also the missionaries who are going to be leaving soon got to go up and bear their testimonies (Elder Knapp and his whole awesome MTC group). It was crazy. This is Elder Knapp's last full week here in Romania. That's crazy!!! 

So speaking of those small sardine fish, I think later today we are going to go to that same place where I had them last year! I might have to get some! :)  So today we were doing our weekly shopping and we decided to get one of those fake little Christmas trees with some decorations. We have to be celebrating Christmas somehow!!! Translating is actually pretty fun. I mean obviously it would be a pain in the neck to go from English to Romanian. Hopefully I'll be able to do that but for now I'll just stick with going from Romanian to English.  Things with Elder Duker have been going good. We have had a lot of just random stuff to do so we haven't had a whole lot of time to be able to do like normal missionary work stuff. We have had bills to pay for multiple apartments, Christmas parties, activities, meetings, and stuff like that. It's great that we are busy though with stuff!!  Hey it was Elder Duker's birthday this past week!! It was on Saturday. I basically had no idea about it until the day before. I guess I just forgot to ask him when his birthday was before figuring it out the day before it happened. So that was pretty fun. I'll be sure to send you a picture this week with Elder Duker and I. One of my goals for this transfer is to take more pictures . . . cause I have been terrible about that. Anywho, Buch is a pretty cool city. It's really big and it's got a metro system. I love the metro. I remember going to New York City (without your permission) and just LOVING the metro system. So yeah Buch is cool. We can't really go into the malls to talk to people about the gospel, so usually we are just on the streets. If it gets too cold then we usually go into a block building with apartments and just try knocking on doors. I can't wait to be able to talk to you guys on Skype and stuff!!! :) 

oh and just so you know momma . . . I haven't unwrapped any of the packages that say "don't open till Christmas"

I love you all so so much!!!