Zima has arrived in the Czech Republic

Ahoj!

Alright well, this past week the winter cold has officially set in. Elder Boyce informed us as we were walking to the building one day that it was a whole 2 degrees! hahaha luckily we have been very blessed to have lessons upon lessons filling up our schedules so we don't have to spend too much time outside contacting. We do walk everywhere though and have some district contacting blocks 3 times a week so we do spend a fair amount of time where the cold bites our noses. ha MOM--There was a winter coat that was left at the apartment that I am taking advantage of! It is a little worn out, but it will do this winter. :)

This past week was a pretty good one. I gave my first talk in church yesterday! yay! I kept it simple--introduced myself, bore my testimony about my mission and shared the scripture in Psalms that's on my mission plaque. I love those verses. I love thinking of God as our sun and our shield. There is great power in that anaolgy. If we remember that and let God into our lives He can protect us from anything!
...

Which includes all of Sister Scerra's admirers here in C-Bud. We ordered pizza one night last week and had it delivered to our home. We know the pizza delievery guy and he totally tried kissing Sister Scerra. Luckily she has cat like reflexes and he was only able to catch her cheek. hahah Then we met a man named Maroslav in the park contacting. He was there selling health insurance so we talked to him a little about Word of Wisdom. He set up for a meeting with us yesterday and as we started to set expectations on why he chose to meet with us he expressed that he was more interested in Sister Scerra then our message. hah just some funnies from the week. Now on to more serious matters...

OUR UKRAINIAN IS GETTING BAPTIZED THIS SATURDAY! 

Vasyl is getting dunked and we are so excited for him. He has been a bit of a tease and a typical 17 year old punk the past couple weeks, but he passed his interview and is ready to make this next step in his life. And! Get this. While we thought that only his dad was a member, it turns out that his mom is too! But he at the last second added his mom as a member to his baptismal interview record, so we have made the hypothesis that Vasyl and his mom started investigating at the same time and she just recently got baptized and that's why he never said anything to us and wrote it on the record last second. That is by no means the real story, just ours. haha we will be asking him about it next time we see him. But if that is the case, then it means that they have been investigating the church together from a far distance and it also means that they get to be an eternal family! It's incredible. Love our Vasyl. More on him and the baptism next week!

Sister Scerra pointed out to me how one way Satan likes to disturb the peace while contacting people and it is through phones. We had a couple instances this past week where the conversation started out bleh, but then the spirit was brought in and they were feeling it when their stinkin' phone goes off. She told me to start keeping count. Ha

Looks like all is well back home! When did Grace decide to play basketball?? Ha I missed that info. I'm glad she did though! I bet she's killin it. The houses are finished too! Yip-ee! Excited for you Crowley's and Freddies that will be moving in to those soon. :)

Shout out to Lauren Pilcher real quick: CONGRATS ON THE MISSION CALL LO. I am so proud of you!!! Love you to pieces!

Welp, that's all for now! Have a happy week, being grateful for all that God gives us!

I am thankful for all of you and the examples and testimonies that you all have a radiate. Keep sharing those with everyone around you.

Loving you from the Czech side of the world:)

Dokud Pristi Tyden!

Sestra Fred

"You can either choose right, choose wrong, or choose to do nothing about it."

Power of Example

Ahoj my sweet family! 

Guess what another week has come and gone. An exciting one it has been!

Okay soooo Romana Měštanova, our recent convert's entire family have all decided that they want to be baptized! Her Mother (Jana), Father (Jirka), brother (Daniel), niece (Lucinka) and then she has her two kids Romanka and Daniček. The past couple of weeks they have all been coming to the activities that we have weekly like english, family home evening, and game night. We had a senior couple come this past Saturday and give us a little presentation on temples and the Měštanovi all came and then told us afterward that they all want to be baptized the last saturday of the transfer! We were STOKED!!!! Jirka (dad) hasn't quite decided that he wants to, but we have decided Jana wears the pants in the relationship and once she gets baptized, Jirka will follow suit. hahah but seriously, this is a christmas miracle! I am completely convinced of the power of example. Romana set the stage for her family and really paved the way for them to follow her example of following the example of Jesus Christ. All it takes is one and Romana was that one for her family. Ahhh it's great! We weill be teaching them lots in the upcoming weeks to get them ready for baptism by the 13th of December! The Měštanovi are fabulous and it has been amazing for me to watch how the Gospel has really impacted and changed their lives. They call me Sestra "Fran" hahah it's pretty funny. Czechs here have a pretty hard time pronouncing Fredrickson. 

Our Ukrainian Investigator Vasyl is also on date for baptism. His date is for next Friday! 

The Elders also have about 2-3 on date for baptism so if all goes well we will have 10 baptisms between the two companionships here in our little town of Ceske Budejovice! It is miraculous. The Lord is hastening the work! 

So today we got to go on a vylet (a trip) with the Elders to a castle called "Hluboka" It was soooooo COOOLLLLL. So unreal! It was a replica of Bowzers castle in Mario Kart combined with the Beauty and the Beast. ha We toured the grounds and then for about 4 dollars we got to go on a tour of some of the castle rooms. The family that lived in the Hluboka Zamek were obsessed with hunting, so there were deer heads EVERYWHERE. Everywhere inside and everywhere outside!!! The ones outside though are made out of cement or whatever and just have the real antlers. ha Its something else. I took some pics, but we don't have enough time again today. I'm so sorry, be patient with me. pictures will come sooner or later! haha Also, today was a very important holiday for the Czech Republic. It marks the anniversary of the "Velvet Revolution" I don't want to butcher the history so I am going to suggest that you go look that one up on google. ha but the city was a ghost town today. Everyone was inside enjoying their day off to remember those who sacraficed so much to gain freedom from communism.

We have been very busy teaching and planning for our upcoming concert. We sing a loottttt. Sestra Scerra has been so gracious to help train my vocals. Ha our concert will be more christmas based but we are doing it the last Sunday of November so we can catch more people and families to come. Once December hits everyone and their dog are busy busy preparing for Christmas. It should be good! :)

Alright that's all I got time for today! Looks like all of you are doing so good! Glad to hear the mail arrived. :) Thank you for all of your love and support. Keep being great and know that you are in my prayers! 

Dokud pristi tydenn. 

S Laskou

Sestra Fredrickson 

Beauty All Around

Ahoj ahoj ahoj!

Wow, can I just say that I am theeee absolute most LUCKIEST missionary in the entire world! I have not even hit my month mark yet and I have gotten to be a part of so many amazing things, including a baptism. We had Romana Mestanova's baptism this pastSaturday. There was quite a bit of holding our breath until Saturday though. Romana had the addiction of smoking and in order for her to make her baptismal date she had no "whoops days" to work with. So we were over there every day checking up on her and we had to lay down the law for her family and ask them to not smoke in the house and around Romana. We even took away all of their cigarettes and ashtrays. ha ha. Sister Scerra and I don't mess around. We had a scare Thursday night with Romana... She had gone to take her little girl to the doctor and when we went for our appointment she wasn't there. Jana Romana's mother, was highly concerned and was convinced that Romana hadn't come home because she had gone to smoke or drink. So, Sister Scerra and I treked alllll over C-Bud to find Romana. We checked the Doctor, places that she use to go drink at and we couldn't find her ANYHWERE. After searching and praying, we finally got a phone call from her. She had gone to visit some family in a place called the Mijes so all was well. But while she was there, she was offered coffee, alcohol anddd cigarettes but she didn't accept any of it! She is solid! 

To say the least, it was quite the week. There was a lot of opposition in preparing Romana for her baptism, but she made it and the smile on her face after she came up out of the water was priceless. Afterward she said her heart was beating so fast, and had me feel it. Ha she is just incredible. She is an example to me of courage, diligence, and just pure faith. We are hoping that her family will follow her example and choose to accept the gospel as well.

Our Ukrainian gator is on date to be baptized in two weeks so if things go well we will be having another baptism! Keep him and our other investigators in your prayers for us!

Here are some fun little facts about our life here in C-Bud. 

We have about a 20 minute walk to the church building. Mom we walk along cobble stones the entire way. :)

We jog in a park almost every morning along the river and it is beautiful. Big tall trees with orange leaves. It's great. Everyday I am in awe of the beauty here. It has even warmed up a bit too which has been so nice! 

I have clipped my toe nails all by myself TWO TIMES now. Dad you should be so proud of me. hahahah

Grocery shopping is a trip. First you have to buy your own grocery sacks and then you have to bag all your groceries yourself. It is a race to the finish line every time. It can be quite stressful sometimes! haha usually I just put everything back into the basket and go over to the side table they have to pack up all the goods. They don't have any chocolate chips or marshmallows here. 

Mommy tell LuAnn that I wear her coat EVERY DAY! I love that thing. It has been such a blessing to have. The pockets are perfect. They are big so I can carry my slovnik and other items around that I need easy access to. It's great. ha 

Okay, so one night this past week we were walking out to the Namesti to find the Zmolkovi who were going to give us a ride home and there was a car that looked very similar to theirs so we went to hop in and when we opened the doors it was definitely not the Zmolkovi. hahahahaa Sister Scerra was just like uhhh.... Pardon and then left. haha It was hysterical.  Don't worry though, we did eventually find the Zmolkovi at the other end of the road. ha! 

We have an English conversation class that we teach that I really enjoy! Clarkie I know you taught some English on your mission and we need some topic ideas!

Something that I am really trying to work on is following the promptings of the spirit. While contacting this past week, I had a feeling to talk to this woman but kind of ignored it and passed her. I had the feeling again and said to S. Scerra I think we should talk to that lady. So we turned around and tracked her down and although she didn't have any interest in what we had to say I still followed the prompting. Something that I am learning is that sometimes the promptings we get to do things aren't going to produce extravagant results every time. It is a test that Heavenly Father is giving us to act on our faith to follow the promptings even when they don't result in anything. As we practice doing so, we will be ready to act when Heavenly Father really needs us to. I think that when we are practicing and learning how to follow the spirit we are also builiding our trust with Heavenly Father.

I love you my family. Thank you for all of your support and prayers. I feel them throughout the week and they help me to keep pushing forward! I hope that you all have a great week. Jake's Baptism is happening soon I would imagine! Ahhhh I am sooo excited for him!! Love you Jake!

That is all for now! Dokud pristi tyden. :)

Láska Vždy,

Sestra Fred 

Quote of the week:

"God loves you because of who God IS. Not because of anything you did or didn't do. 

Dinner at the Elders'

October Zone Training 

Miracles in C-Bud

Dobry Den!

Another week come and gone eh? A lot of neat miracles we had this week! 

Our sweet Romana has gone 4 days now without a cigarett and we announced her baptism at church yesterday to the branch! We are all anxiously looking forward toSaturday see her enter the waters of baptism. She came to church yesterday alllll by herself and at NINE in the morning. Romana is a gem. 

So there is this older lady named Olina. Olina is great. She loves the gospel, loves us missionaries, but she hadn't been to church in foreverrrrr. UNTIL. Sestra Scerra and I went over this past week and read a talk with her about Sacrament being a renewal for the Soul that was just given in Conference. We told her that she needed to come or she would continue to feel in down in the dumps. And, well just like that she agreed, on one condition. That we all wear black. Hahah and she came yesterday and we were all matching. 

It was Fast and Testimony meeting so naturally I got up there and gave a simple czech testimony. :)

We had a full house again which was great!

We had zone conference this past week, and the focus was on families. We contact once a week on Family History and it has made me want to know more about my own family! I don't have a whole lot of extra time to go looking, soooo Mom, Dad, Gma woman, could you pull together a few stories from our ancestors for me and send them to me?? That would be awesome! I am so fascinated with it! One day we will be able to meet all of those who have past before us and be with them forever. And in the meantime we can learn from them and the life experiences they had while on Earth! I am so grateful for the knowledge of eternal families.

When is the big day for Jake Crowley's Baptism??? I am so excited for you Jakie!

Hope Jade had a good Birthday as well!

Can you believe that it is already November?? Before you know it we'll be skyping at Christmas! Wowzers!

Alright I am so sorry, but I have to run. And I still haven't figured out how to send pictures.... ahaha so next week I promise!

Love you all so much!

Laska Vzdy,

Sestra Fredrickson

"Put Him first"