12.02.13

Stag onesie I bought for £7.  (Onesies are like the cool things for missionaries to have now days for some reason.)  They are way comfortable though. 

Away in a Manger

Belfast City Hall

Well, sadly, Neil probably won't make his baptismal date for this Saturday. He still has to overcome some bits of the Word of Wisdom, but he is going stronger and stronger everyday. He loves learning and feels the spirit so strong when we teach. Plus, he has developed friendships with pretty much the whole ward, so we don't really have to do much when he comes to church on Sundays cause other people are always talking to him. It's awesome! We are going to go look around the shops in city centre with him today to help him keep his mind off temptations. 

In other news, we had an awesome stake nativity thingmie. Everyone who wanted to participate set up their nativities all over the church. All the girls in the family would have loved it. Nativities everywhere. I got kind of bored. haha. But, everyone else seemed to be over the moon with looking at nativities for hours on end. Then, they had all the missionaries do a wee concert. All we had to do was sing 6 Christmas songs from the hymn book. I played the piano and did alright if I do say so myself. Except on the last song cause I got complacent and then panicked when I messed up which caused me to mess up a few more times. But, I pulled my act together and finished strong. ha! Lots of people brought their friends and non member family so it was really successful. There were over 100 people in attendance each night. They even had a room for little kids to listen to stories, dress up for the nativity, and make stuff. We may or may not have gone into the story telling room to listen to an old lady tell little kids stories. Alright we did and it was awesome. 

Thanksgiving wasn't too special, to say the least. We did end up getting a dinnger appointment, but they didn't know it was thanksgiving. Don't worry though! On sunday, some members who lived in America for a few years invited us over to have a true Thanksgiving feast and it was glorious. They made all the American things they could with the ingredients they had. Rolls, turkey, ham, stuffing, weird pudding stuff, pumpkin pie, mashed potatoes, roast potatoes and the list goes on. I loved it even though we ate so much that it was painful to walk the rest of the night. ha! I won't lie, I do get a wee bit "trunky" during Thanksgiving. You don't know how awesome our family gatherings are until you can't go to them for awhile. They really are some epic times. Anyway, I'm pretty glad that I won't have to miss anymore Thanksgivings. haha. 

I know you are all wondering what Christmas is like over here so I will tell you. It's pretty similar with things like Santa, presents, Christmas trees and stuff like that. But, everything is on a much smaller scale than in America. Barely anyone puts up Christmas lights, but the feeling of Christmas is definitely here. Plus, it's not your typical Christmas weather. It's just rainy and cold as usual. haha. Everything is smaller because this is just a much smaller place. All the cities were built like a thousand years ago, so they aren't made to have big cars and trucks driving around them or massive building like America. They have to make do with what they have. So, the houses, cars, and buildings are all smaller. Except castles and stuff. 

This Thursday marks exactly 3 months left on my mission, but it also marks exactly 3 months since Elder Stringer left on his mission. We both think that's pretty funny so we will go eat somewhere cool. It's weird how fast time keeps on going. 3 months still feels like quite awhile, which is a good thing. That means I won't be trunky. No matter how long you've been on a mission or how long you have left, it still seems like there's 2 years left. It's just a weird missionary mindset that only missionaries will understand. Missionary life has become my everyday norm and it just feels like that won't change. Well, I will stop ranting now.  ..  hah

I love you and hope you are all enjoying the Holiday season cause it's a great season. Remember the real reason! 

Elder Goodwin