Week 66 in Italy

Hey guys. No real email this week. Sorry.

Great baptism on Sunday. Great week. Saw the duomo and hung out with all our favorite people in Cimiano!

Love you all.

Oh btw. I'm staying in Cimiano for a record 6 transfers and my companion is going to Pordenone! Surprise! So excited. Also, my new comp's name is Sorella Nilsen. She will be my STL companion. So that's cool. Have a great week!

Week 65 in Italy

The allergies were a lie. My throat has been KILLING all month and finally last wednesday night I looked and found major white pussy spots. (TMI?) (Oh well) Turns out I've really just been sick the last month with a sinus infection and a bad viral infection. THAT'S why I've been so tired. We got put on house arrest for like 5 days and literally couldn't leave. IT WAS THE WORST THING EVER. I just had to lay there. And my companion hasn't been feeling very well either so we basically just laid there all day long. Sang way too much (and it wasn't pretty). Then night time would come and we couldn't sleep. So we would practice doing headstands on our beds. But that was no good with a sinus infection. My companion painted my nails while I slept during the day. All completely different. We almost lost our minds. BUT. My health is much better. I always struggle with minor health issues. It just seems to be my constant trial in life. The even bigger trial was having to be obedient and stay inside. It was killing me to not go out and work and teach and find. But after several days of good rest, I am doing much better and am SO ready to get back to working hard.

We got our iPads this past monday. We are excited to start using them to enhance our lessons and give us greater access to gospel content and messages. It will make things a lot easier and a lot more convenient. No facebook yet. Not to that phase. But that will come soon. I secretly hope that it won't happen while I'm still here. Vediamo un po.

Marcella will be baptized this Sunday! She is SO excited!!!!!!!!! She is best friends with all of the young women and just fits in perfectly.

Katia is doing so well! She is really integrated into the ward and they love her. She loves to learn and wants to be able to teach in the church someday. We are suggesting and hoping that she will receive a calling very soon!

Cristina is also doing well. She is happy and knows she made the right choice. She has a deep understanding of the scriptures and loves to share things that she is learning with us!

MIRACLE. 3 months ago I found a young man on the metro. He informed me that he had a family here and that we could stop by. After several attempts of finding his home and calling his cell phone that apparently was broken, we thought we'd never run into him again and the chance was lost. A month later, I found another woman on the metro. IT WAS HIS MOM. She is a less active member from the Philippines. She has two sons and a husband. All nonmembers. We have begun to teach her family and she and her youngest son Christopher (14 years old) came to church this past sunday. Christopher expressed his desire to be baptized and said that he felt he had finally found his church! He will be baptized VERY soon. We will be seeing him on saturday. He is on a field trip all week.

Things are just great and I am so happy to be a full time servant of the Lord.

Have a great week!!

Love,

Sorella Tokarski

Week 64 in Italy

Milano is like a snow globe of cotton and stuff. It's like Christmas. But the Christmas that makes you sick. My companion and I are both MAJORLY struggling with allergies. It looks like it's snowing all day long. It's just not nearly as enjoyable as the snow.

Needless to say we are a bit under the weather. Or maybe we just took a colpa d'aria or something. Very possible considering that we haven't been covering our necks for like a couple of weeks. The heat is starting to come. We are feeling it. That's for sure.

We talked a lot about repentance and forgiveness this past week. I am grateful for the atonement and for the ability that I have each day to repent for the stupid little things I do every day. I know I'm not perfect. And so does God. I am grateful that He sent Jesus Christ to atone for me and to make it possible to repent.

The baptisms were WONDERFUL. Katia was dunked twice and Cristina was dunked about 6 times. Everyone was holding their breath by the 4th. It was great though! They both were so happy and so excited and all they could say was that they knew it was the right choice and they felt reborn. I LOVE THEM. They really have such sweet testimonies and they will continue to grow and be wonderful disciples of Jesus Christ.

Marcella passed her baptismal interview! (I attached a picture of her with me:) She will be baptized on may 24th! She is sooo excited and seeing Cristina and Katia's baptism made her even more excited. I keep learning more and more Spanish. I'd love to actually study it and learn more one day! It's been so fun getting to teach her and really let the spirit work to teach her what we can't say. Luckily we usually have either one of her aunts or another member there that can help us translate. But she really gets it. She's awesome.

It was a good week. I am exhausted. Absolutely wiped. But it's great. I love it.

Have a great week! I love you all!

Love,

Sorella Tokarski

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Parent note; we had the blessing of 45 minutes over Skype with Sonja for Mother's Day. She absolutely radiates peace, joy and sense of purpose. Incredible that we will be in Milan in 8 weeks to reunite with her. We are looking forward to spending nine days with her touring her mission, seeing what she saw and meeting the people she has grown to love. To say we miss her and are proud of her doesn't begin to articulate the depth of feeling associated with seeing her "walk in truth". I am grateful beyond measure to a loving Heavenly Father who has blessed us to have Sonja as a daughter and to know her as "an example of the believers."   

Week 63 in Italy

So tons happened this past week. Katia will be baptized on sunday the 10th. AND. So will Cristina! Cristina is a girl that we were teaching when I first got to Milano, but she stopped progressing and actually walked out of a lesson one day and never responded to us again. Recently she has been coming to church and we always say hello. I finally asked her last last sunday if she wanted to start meeting with us again. She said yes and that she actually wanted to be baptized. We met with her during the week and in meeting with her, we realized that she is SO ready to be baptized. She was interviewed and all went well! The difference in her is night and day. So she will be joining Katia on sunday in being baptized and we are SOOOO happy for both of them. Both of them are friends of members. DO YOUR MISSIONARY WORK. PLEASE AND THANK YOU.

The cimiano church is officially closed for the next 13 weeks and we are making the trek out to Lampugnano for any and all church events. Most of our activities will just unfortunately be canceled for the next couple of months. BUMMER.

We went and did a double scambio in Muggio yesterday and worked our bums off.

Then yesterday we had two people that we don't know call us because one of them we contacted on the metro and the other found a pass along card and was interested. MIRACLES. Does that ever even happen in real life? Yes.

That's basically all that I can even think of to say.

Have a great week!

Love,

Sorella Tokarski