This week was truly a beautiful one. For starters- it snowed. A lot.

Dearest family, whom I love so much-
It sounds like your week was pretty much fantastic. Sarah's party sounds like it was LEGENDARY!! Ha I can imagine Spencer just standing there, wanting to be Super Wedgie Man or something. I love that Dad had to play too! I know he loved it :) You all just sound amazing. Annie's play by play was so good- thanks sugar :) And Spencer I'm so glad you gave it your all on your school work as well as in other areas. It's the only way to go. Suck the marrow out of life, or don't suck at all...:P ha. That so doesn't work, but I'm leaving it :P I just wish I could see your faces right now to see how darn well your doing. I didn't get to see the flash card yet cos it didn't work on my camera, but I will soon :) Very excited to see it. You're going to have such a great time on thanksgiving! I love thanksgiving with you all - but no worries- I will be eating TURKEY and GRAVY and other AMERICAN DISHES at this famiies home from the ward. They're AMERICAN and invited us over FOR dinner! ONLY CAPITAL LETTERS CAN EXPRESS MY JOY!!! :) It certainly doesn't even begin to replace Thanksgiving with the family, home and xbox, but it's start ;)
This week was truly a beautiful one. For starters- it snowed. A lot. It's stayed Autumn for so long, but the Winter finally conquired and it conquered hard. lol. It's beautiful though. It snowed Saturday afternoon and than BLIZZARDED all Sunday morning during church. It was great :) We had a meeting Saturday night at the church with the missionaries in our district/area (8 of us) and then we when came out, these little kids who live in the same building started throwing snow balls at us. So we threw them back. And than a giant snow ball fight broke out at like 9 at night and it was the greatest. These little kids threw their hearts out - the littlest one was like 4 and he was determined to DESTROY Elder Whipple (who is a beast of a man). I laughed my heart out and it was just fun. Maybe they will come to church with their Parents :)
We are determined to get the Standard of Excellence here in our little district. We are so close! - we're all trying so hard and we know that we can do it. We just have to push a little harder all around - with our work and our investigators. At district meeting, Elder McRae and I prepared a motivational speech - I played inspiring music and helped him write the speech. It was a major success - Elder McRae delivered with power and he had some good material - one of the line was "Rocky Balboa once said, ' Yo Adrian!' and then he said..." haha. The district was laughing , but more so they were phsyched to get the Standard :) I honestly feel like I've been blessed with the best district ever. I love every single missionary in it - everyone wants to work hard and are so down to Earth and make me want to work harder and do better. It's a blessing to say the least - I would be satisfied knowing my entire mission would be filled with very very similar districts. Zobaczymy (we'll see ) :)
On Wednesday we had Zone Conference. Elder Kerr- a member of the 70, came and spoke to us. Elder Engbjerg and he had served in the same mission - He trained at just 2 months while President was an AP. Nuts eh? He was an incredibly charismatic man who was just full of the Spirit and he truly inspired us all to work hard - plan hard and to me he was a prime example of somebody who the POlish people would want to listen to. I know I can muster up that charisma somewhere in my body ha :) I think I do a decent job, but there's always room for more. He talked about planning a lot and how meticulous planning leaves for few mistakes and greater success and It was all around amazing. I sang in a musical number with a few other missionaries- way fun :) I also got the CD ma and the Package. Thank you so very much :) It was perfect. THe gold fish was SUCH a good call. MMMM. Pop tarts and Mac and Cheese are so appreciated. And hot cocoa has been thoroughly enjoyed :) Thank you mother and family also for the awesome letters :) I loved them :)
Our investigators are doing so well, but we've been struggling with finding time to meet with them. We stay in contact by phone- but that doesn't leave a lot of room for teaching, which needs to happen! They are so golden and ready for baptism, they just need to be taught a little bit more. We think we're giving Edyta a baptismal date very soon, on wednesday if we can :) We're meeting with Irina at President's house this next Sunday. I know it'll all go well :) We found a couple new people who are looking quite promising- we'll be meeting with them this week as well. Brat Herman's daughter- the older one- said that she would love to come to English class and even dinner afterword (we make as missionaries with a couple of the menbers who come to English) so that was a break through. At the end of our meeting this weel (which ended with family prayer) he again expressed how grateful he was and how happy he was. It's priceless to see his reaction.
We gave three blessings this week. I actually gave one to a sister - Sister Castleton who speaks Polish wicked good and is just an amazing missionary, reminds me of Sarah - and then we participated in one for Asia and then another one for a man named Krzystof (which is a normal Polish name :P) who is a member. I had to annoint the oil in Polis h lol. That was a trip, McRae had to give the actualy blessing in Polish though - talk about a major butt-pucker moment ha. It was truly a blessing though to be able to particpate in all of these, I particularly felt blessed with words to say for Sister Castleton.
Elder McRae is from Idaho, has a farm and is a very hard worker- was before the mission and is still now. Really nice and goofy kid - i have no doubt you all would love him. He has an Older brother who got back from Russia on his mission and he gave his Homecoming the same day Elder McRae gave his farewell. I am so glad I have a year to hang out with you little brother. Goodness. But he is the man. We cook and eat SOOO GOOD! And work out so hard too. I'm a very happy human being. We made scones and this muffin cake and chocolate chip cookes and those brownies you sent ma (SO APPRECIATED) and it is just the best. We're making home made chicken noodel soup this week and some other crazy desert. Cookings a blast and it's so fun making random things. Love it.
Pop, in terms of staying warm, I'm doing pretty good. My upper body is aces - I just need some good warm socks and some good gloves, which I will buy very soon. I wear thermal garments, a sweater, suit coat, scarf, beanie and huge coat jacket. It's pretty warm :) The mesquitos are frozen to death now and everything else is way good. OOOO I could definitely use some whitening strips ma. That would be a good thing for the christmas pack. Preferably ones I can do in 5 or ten minutes and not a half hour....but either way is definitely possible. O and my retainers if you want to send those. Who knows if they'll fit :/ It's worth a shot though. My teeth still look way good and healthy. Just trying to preserve them lol.
Well I think that is pretty much everything amazing that happened this week. Life is so good. I love serving with Elder McRae and I am truly happy as could be. I love you all so much and i Can't tell you that enough. Please be safe and take care of yourselves and have so much fun this week with thanksgiving. I think about you often and love you so much. Remember the Lord in all you do, remember how blessed you are to have what you have. Remember how much your Father in Heaven loves you and please remember the people of Poland in your prayers. I can't tell you how much I love being a missionary- preaching to people and telling them that I know this message is true- that God loves us and has given us so much and simply wants us to be happy- that he has a plan for us that has been revealed. It's amazing. Once again, I love you :)
-Starszy Michael Joseph Rushton Jr.

p.s. Christmas package- Cheeze itz, pop tarts, chocolate chips, CD's, anything you can think of :) A1 sauce? ha i don't know/ Brown sugar would be great too. Lol So random. Anything is so greatly appreciated. Love you :)