Another Blessed Week

Dear Family,

Thank you so much for your wonderful emails this week! It has been
quite the week full of change and new things and it was wonderful to
read your testimonies and feel of your love. Tell William good luck
with finals! I can't believe he is going to be a junior, that's so
crazy. I probably won't even recognize him when I get back. I loved
the picture of Tyler and Lisa they look so good and so happy. They'll
be great parents, please send them my love. Tell everyone in the ward
I love them! I can't believe the Austins are moving! That's exciting
for their family but boy will they be missed. Haha thank goodness
with the gospel we are all never too far apart.

So it has been a growing week for me! The Lord is good at giving me
experiences I need to grow and helping me out so much. Zuster
Gulliver left on Wednesday and it was a lot sadder than I thought it
would be. She really became one of my best friends haha and I cried
when she left. There I go loving people too much again. Haha no, it
was great to work with her, but I am happy for her to go home and see
her family and all that. And now I have my wonderful new companion
Zuster Fritz. She is an incredible sister! She has been out for
almost a year now and has gone through so much and is such an amazing
missionary. She was a German major before she came out so she's
really good with Dutch. She's very enthusiastic about the work and
has been wanting to serve here in Antwerpen her whole mission. I love
her already and I think we make a good team. Look out Antwerpen! :)

It has been interesting taking over the city and being the one who
knows the people and where she is going and all of that. The Lord has
definitely been helping me out with the map! Haha I am happy to say I
can now get around with the metro and the map pretty well...who
would've thought? It's been great fun.

So everyone has been asking about the city and the food and all of
that. Let's see. Antwerpen is a really big city but we (in my
opinion) have the best of both worlds because while there is the
bigger city part with all of the beautiful architecture, there are
also the parts outside of the city with gorgeous parks and what not.
We live in Deurne which is a small little down about 15 minutes on the
Tram from Central Station. We do a lot of finding in our area but
other good spots are just outside of central station, the Grote
Maarkt, and Groenplaats. You should Google Image Antwerpen; I bet
there are a lot of pretty pictures. I promise to send some home
soon. I seriously have taken so many!

Hmmm what food do we eat? A lot of food from all over the world
actually. Goulash is one of the most popular things here. Marie
Therese made us some the other night before Zuster Gulliver left and
it was so good. People also make a lot of Indian food. Anything
spicy they love! The funny thing is everyone ALWAYS gives us orange
juice to drink with it which is the worst thing to drink with spicy
food. And it's funny because I don't even like orange juice... I am
learning to. Oh and herbal tea is very big over here and I love it!
Hmmm so nice after a long rainy day. I'm trying to think of some more
things but it's hard off the top of my head. Friets of course are
delicious.

So a little bit about the people. We have 6 progressing investigators
right now who are all amazing! William is doing very well, but we had
to push his date back a week because of some work issues. He has so
much enthusiasm though and his way of feeling the Spirit and talking
about it is so sweet. He loves the hymns of the Church. Haha he says
that when I sing them it gives him chills. Haha hopefully good ones
since we all know I don't have the best voice. We always sing at his
appointments though and he loves it.

Enok and Marie Christine and their 2 sons are another family I think I
have told you about. We had a wonderful 2nd lesson with them and it
led right to baptism. Before we even committed them Bob, the youngest
son said, "So wait, I have to get baptized if I want to live with
God?" We said yes, and he said, "Well then I have to get baptized!"
Haha YES. It was great. There are some complications but we should
be hopefully setting a date with them soon.

We also had the opportunity to help Marie Christine in her garden this
week. It was quite hilarious considering how bad I am in the garden.
I was totally trying to pull a weed out and fell backwards into a
rosebush. Talk about funny but painful! Haha oh I love this work.

I love you all so much! I pray for you all the time. I pray we can
all be better missionaries. I'm so proud of your for going out with
the Elders! Way to go, members make all the difference!

Tot volgenda keer, met veel liefde
Zuster Holbein