I know I'm supposed to be here without a doubt. Just last night as I called Irina, one of her last sentences was "thank you for taking care of my fam

Hej family :)
Sweet e-mail time, how I love it so. You all sound too amazing. Spencer that is SOO rad about your victory (aka the sound trash kicking) of Vista. I love it ha. Thank you for writing me brother, I love you kid. Sarah, you sound so busy but I can only imagine how well your doing with everything. You are so amazing- as you always have and will be, thank you so much for the letter, I love you siostra . Annie I can only imagine how well you are doing! How is you play going? GIve me some news sista! Love you sugar. Parents your Hawaii trip sounds and looks SO amazing. The Spoks as we would say here in Poland :P I loved the pictures and descriptions so much. Ha my favorite pictures were of you swimming in that little waterfall whole deal. You looked like you were enjoying yourself so much and ah it was so good. I especially enjoyed the very attractive man in the back of the picture where dad is lifting up his fists in the victory dad pose (haha I loved that so much). I want a body just like that. :P
It's so strange to see you swimming to lol cos the very thought of getting in any body of water right now sounds like a quick and imminent death, it is getting so cold now- it's supposed to snow in the next couple of days lol. Elder McRae is counting down the days so he doesn't get eaten by the mesquitos in our house (we live so close to the river we get a decent amount. My record is 11 bites in one night, now that's a hard one to beat :P) But regardless of the cold, life is so good here in Polska. This week in particular has just been amazing. It was my first week with Elder McRae and I just love being around him. He's so easy to be around - I loved Elder Henrie, but McRae and my personalities, interests, everything, just meshes. It's great :) We've been cooking up a wicked storm, we made our own maple syrups and have been having the equivialent to a McGriddle from mickey d's every other morning for breakfast. And smoothies. Cuz he has a blender ha. I LOVE it!! On Saturday we made fried bread with grilled chicken and cheese sauce. Life changing. It's so good to eat good :P And what's even better is that we work out hard core every morning. I feel like I have my own personal trainer now ha. So the companionship is definitely enjoyable in the Home life sense.
It definitely stretches to missionary work to though. We have set some lofty goals, but we know that we can reach them as we continue to try and work dilligently. He is such a hard worker and I'm greatful for that. It was difficult a little bit this week, because we worked SO hard I felt like, but our numbers didn't exactly reflect it completely. We had at least 9 meetings set up with investigators and I think we got flaked every single time. But the Lord completely blessed us for our dilligence yesterday as we had all three of our progressing investigators at church (Irina, her son Arthur and Edyta) and it could not have gone more smooth- all of them left with the deep intent to return the next week. I was happy to say the least :)
One of the major highlights of our week was a meeting with a member named Jan Herman. He is in his early 50's i would say and the father of 2 daughters (11 and 17) and has a wife, but he is the only Member. He is smart, nice and has been a member for the past two years. He is very energetic and has an obvious love for life and the church - he plays the guitar and loves music. Elder Henrie and I had been meeting with him every friday for the past three weeks and then Elder McRae and I went to visit him this Friday again. Usually we go in, sit down, drink some tea and give a short spiritual lesson and talk about different things and it's always so enjoyable for us and him. His family is always there, and one time his wife actually talked with us - she was soooo darn kind and amazing, but is a catholic, like all the Polish-born people are. This time we came in and it was just us and Brat Herman for awhile, but then, his wife and youngest daughter came in. And then his older daughter. His wife prepared open-faced sandwhiches for us and we ate and talked and I even played the guitar for them and the feeling of love and the spirit was so strong. I was in blissful peace being there. I could tell this wasn't something that happened terribly often, even in their little mieszkanie. When we finally left, Brat Herman walked us to the Tramwaj, and told us how thankful he was for that meeting. That his family hadn't been together like that with the missionaries or any other time for quite awhile and that he feels we are the key to opening his family up and even to the gospel. Just seeing how happy he was gave me so much joy and I just felt so much love for them. It was amazing. He insists we come back every friday and this next time he wants to have a little concert ha :) I love it. Yesterday at church, Brat Herman was ordained and sustained as Second Counceler in the Branch Presidency. I almost cried, I think just cos I was so happy for him and have so much hope for his amazing family.
Another major activity of the week was less active work. We have a list of 40 + less actives who we need to contact and we spent a lot of time on that - on Saturday we went with Richard from the ward and tracked down quite a few of them. To see if they even exsisted, etc. Yah lol. It was good though. The less actives are so important here- they knew what it was like to feel the gospel once, we just need to remind them. On Sunday, one of the less actives came up to elder McRae and said, "Elder McRae, I came to church because you Called me." How RAD is that? It's ridonkulous. That's what it is. The Lord has certainly blessed us this week :)
Mom, about the Atonement, it's been really neat having the chance to study it more. Just studying the Book of Mormon every morning and PMG is such a strength. I can so obvioiusly feel the Book of Mormons power as I read it, it's there- undeniably there. But as I studied the Atonement I truly gained a greater understanding for what Christ suffered and how important it is to take advantage of it. I wrote an entire paper to presidnet about it, but one thing that really struck me was how truly amazing it is what he did for me and I grateful i am that I simply have to take advantage of it. I think of favors people have done for me that I could not have done for myself- like mom turning in a paper for me, dad consoling and talking with me, Jake or John or Jimmy at school selflessly doing something for me that I could not have done for myself, with a smile on their face. And I know how immeasurably my gratitude is when these things occur. And then I think of Jesus paying for my sins, so he could know what I've felt and so that I can be clean from them. So that i don't have to remain in sin or wallow in my sadness, but I can be free- because of what he did for me. He has done something for me that no one else could have done and he did it willingly and all I have to do is take advantage of it and repent. It's truly amazing it me when I think about it in this sense.
Well life is so good here, I can't even tell you. A few things to answer...the package from Joni did come!! I didn't get yours yet ma, or the cd, but I should this wednesday at Zone Conference. For Christmas stuff, I really do not know lol. Some chocolate chips, brown sugar...that would be amazing ha :) And maybe some money left in here to buy some extra ties and a shirt or something? Peanut butter is beautiful, OOOO!!! My christmas cd that I made up at college last year. The one on my iTunes on the laptop. Titled the greatest christmas mix ever...or something like that. It has relient k singing jingle bells, coldplay singing have yourself a merry little christmas...that Cd. lol Please send a couple copies, it's free game on the Christmas music :) AND JIMMY's Letters!!! please send those. I'm dying to hear how he is doing. And tell Joni how much I love that shirt. IT is the bomb diggidy. ha.
I know I'm supposed to be here without a doubt. Just last night as I called Irina, one of her last sentences was "thank you for taking care of my family" and I thought that I'm not even doing all that much, but we are sharing this gospel, sharing this precious fruit that is "sweet above all others" and I know that that is so important. I pray I get to see her and Arthur get baptized this first week of December- that is what we are pushing for :) I love preaching this gospel and speaking Polish. McRae doesn't speak as well as Henrie, and he doesn't know South Warsaw all that much, so it's forced me to step it up in language and direction senses and it's been sweet :) I feel like I could actually navigate myself through a city in the States now ha.
My family, I love you more than I can say. You fuel me and I appreciate your prayers and thoughts and love. Please pray for Irina Arthur and Edyta and for us as we work out here. It means the world to me. I love you so much. Til next week :)

- Elder Michael Joseph Rushton Jr.