I am staying in Dortmund for Christmas!!!

I am staying in Dortmund for Christmas!!!  And so is Sister Sprouse!!  It is amazing to be with her again for the 4 1/2 tranfers :)  It is truly a miracle!  I am so happy to be with people that I know, to see people make covenants with the Lord, people coming closer to the Lord, and to see myself grow as well.  And I will be able to experience all 4 seasons here :)  It hasn't snowed here yet but it might be coming, but from looking outside its still far into the distance.  Yesterday was really humid and rainy which is really weird for being in the middle of November!! More good news!!  We received word the other day that there will be just a Sister's Conference next Monday and Tuesday!!!  Usually we have Zone Conferences that include Elders and Missionary Couples but this one is just for us Sisters :)  I literally jumped for joy!!  It was like a sigh of relief because 1) I am TOTAL Kaput!!!  I am so tired lately haha SIster Sprouse always gives me a hard time because of my age (24) but also because of my mission age!!  (Almost a year!) 2) If we were to be transferred, we would be able to see each other again once we went to different areas!!  3)  We Sisters can all see each other again.  I will be able to see Sister Garlick, Sister Nixon from the MTC, and so many other Sisters that I haven't seen since the beginning of my mission!!!  I am so excited!!  Not only do we have a conference of Präsident Schwartz just talking with us, but also we get to spend 2 hours at the temple, hold a dinner together!, stay the night in Frankfurt, and have a Testimony Meeting!!!  Does that sound like heaven or what??!?!?  I think so and I just want to say again I am so excited!!! So I will be able to email home next Monday still I believe :)  AHHH!!! I love life!! Christmas is coming up!!  I am so excited for it!!  The Germans love Christmas and I love their love for it!!  Dortmund has one of the biggest Christmas trees and one of the coolest Christmas Markets in the world!!  And the markets start on my birthday!!!  Sadly Germans do not celebrate Thanksgiving but all will be okay :)  Not many people are out and about like they are now, here in Germany I guess people go inside all day and just spend time with their families so that means for us missionaries, it'll be hard to meet with people.  It should be interesting!!  And we just need a new/creative way to find people :)  Maybe we will go caroling :)  During the Mission call we were informed on how many new missionaries that will be coming into our mission!!  Right now 12000 more missionaries have their call to serve over all the world!!!  That is crazy!!!  And more than half are sisters!!!  And so in the next 3-4 months the Germany Frankfurt Mission will receive 30+ more SISTERS and 50 more Elders!!!  Every sister in the mission will be training and opening up new areas here!!!!!  The work is going to explode!! And also Dortmund will have 8 missionaries!!  Sister Sprouse and I, the Zone Leaders Elders Garlick and Penfold, the McPhersons (missionary couple), and 2 new Elders!!  Elder Shephard (from England!!) and a brand new missionary!!!  I am so excited!! Dortmund really needs more missionaries that are mobile and ready to work.  The works is rolling forth so beautifully :)  Es wirklich freut mich!!! I love this work, I love the Lord, and I love my Heavenly Father :)  Smile more, its helps others more than you think :)  Liebe, Sister Tuschling

Difficult but not impossible

This week has been the most exhausting week I have ever gone through here on the mission.  It has been go go go right from the start!!  This week was our week to find 10 new people to teach in one week!  I have only seen this done one other time on my mission but other than that, it is extremely difficult to accomplish!  Difficult but not impossible.  On Sunday we asked the ward to pray with us everyday at 8 o'clock to help open people's hearts for the Word of God.  I love our ward :)  They are so excited about missionary work and we truly felt their prayers.  So Sister Sprouse and I made a plan on how to achieve this goal and one by one we started finding people, but not the old fashioned door to door technique.  We went through our records in our Area Book in our apartment.  We prayed and wrote down names of people who other missionaries for some reason or another stopped teaching.  We were able to teach, and make another appointment with at least 3 of those people we found in the book!!!  We are so excited to start bringing these people closer to Christ :)  And I love hearing the stories of how they met the missionaries or how they got to know the church.  As we were going around trying to find these people, we also thought we could teach all of our other people that we teach.  Holy tired Sisters at the end of the day!  We literally dropped every night into bed haha.  As we saw miracles happen with these newbies, we also saw miracles happen with those who we have been working with for a long time.  There is an amazing woman who has not been active in the church since she was 15 and she is half Australian and half German, so when she speaks German it has an Australian accent and it is beautiful to my ears :)  Anyhoo, she was always saying - Until I get an answer from God to not drink coffee and alcohol anymore, I am going to do it.  She has zazz and I like it!!  And the only thing we could do was to pray to Heavenly Father and ask Him to send her a sign or thought or something because she was not going to listen to us haha.  One morning we were running to catch our U-Bahn we get a call from her and she starts the conversation with, "I have something to tell you" and because we can't stop running we eagerly awaited her next comment.  She began to tell us that she was reading that morning in the Book of Mormon and while she was reading she had a feeling and a thought come to her mind that she should not drink any coffee or alcohol anymore.  She said that she couldn't describe what it was exactly but something good came over her and told her, "no, you know you don't need that."  I love Heavenly Father.  I love the Book of Mormon because just by reading it, it changes our thoughts, habits, and us to something better.  I know that the Book of Mormon has a power in it, and that it comes from God and as we read in it is gives us the power to overcome anything :)  As Sunday rolled around we still had 4 people to find!!  Not only that but we had 3 hours at church, one eating appointment, and 2 other appointments that day = not much time to find those who need the Gospel!!  So as we begin thinking about what we need to do, Sister Sprouse and I notice that we didn't count a woman we made an appointment with earlier in the week, and so really we had 3 to find!  We go to an appartment building where we have not been to in awhile and as we got there we felt like we shouldn't go there.  We then stopped and prayed to know where to go and who to talk to.  We then left to go to another building right down the road.  On the road we talked with everyone we saw and as we were talking with one lady who didn't have time, we turned around and there was a girl that we were going to visit and try to get an appointment with.  She was right there!!  Heavenly Father just placed her there for us to talk with her!  We exchange numbers and set up an appointment!!  Great!!  2 more to go!!  But then it was time for our appointment at the church.  So we get there and we wait and wait and wait for him to so show up, and he doesn't :(  So now we only have 1 hour left before our next appointment and the end of our day!  So we make a plan, get on the bus, and for some reason or another we get off at the first station to find a street.  Well right when we saw the bus drive off, we regretted it because there were no people, not one single soul, it was dark, and cold.  We started to lose faith until we saw some runners.  I asked Sister Sprouse if she had ever stopped a runner at full speed, with headphones in to talk to them and she said no, and I hadn't either but we both couldn't find the courage to do it.  So here we are in the middle of no where on a dark, cold street almost to our next appointment until I hear a "bounce."  And I looked to the left and stopped walking.  And then I tried to listen again, and there the sound was again, "bounce bounce bounce" like something rubber was hitting the ground.  I look at Sister Sprouse on my face and I saw, you know what I think that is.  And then the next sound confirmed my theory, "cling clang clang."  I say to her, "That is a basketball!"  The next thing I knew we were walking over to a dark park with barely no light and we saw two figures in the distance.  I don't know what took over my body but the next thing I knew I was taking off my coat and started shooting with two guys in the dark.  They invited us to play a little bit and so we agreed!  After playing a German version of HORSE we were able to talk a little bit about faith, exchange numbers, and set up an appointment!!  Meine Gute!! Not only does Heavenly Father help us with our goals and our wants and needs, but he does it in style!!!!!  I can't tell you the last time I touched a basketball and man did it feel good :)  I hope your week was as good as ours here in Dortmund :)  I pray for you all and I want to let you know that Heavenly Father does care and love us so much.  He knows everything what we are going through, everything and He wants to help, all we have to do is ask!! Liebe, Sister Tuschling

Just waiting to be found...

Sister Sprouse and I got to see so many miracles happen this week :)  Everyday is a miracles the more and more I think about it.  Just the small and simple things are what matter most in life.  We had an awesome lesson with Ana Castro, our newly baptized stud, and she is soooo strong.  Her mom who was very against the church has softened her heart so much that instead of finding Ana's Book of Mormon and hiding it somewhere else, she actually opened it up and tried to read it!!  But the poor thing actually can't read German because she is from Portugal.  But this all started when Ana showed her General Conference and watched Elder Holland's talk "The Great and First Commandment" when he perfectly explains the scripture story about Peter and Jesus Christ.  It is amazing!! If you have time I really recommend to watch it.  So now we have an opportunity to take over a Portuguese Book of Mormon and explain what it is :)  And so now Ana's mom and enjoy it and to read it and feel God's love :)  This week also we haven't had any contact with Petra Henn who is an amazing woman and we have been worried about her a little bit.  Two weeks in missionary life of not seeing someone is a long time haha but out of no where last night, she calls us up and says she wants to meet and that she has been thinking about us and so we made an appointment this week :)  I love when people call us, it makes everything so much easier!  Our main couple that are from Poland right now are so awesome!  They come every week to church and they just love having us over.  They live in a garden and since it is fall, all the apple trees that they have needed to be plucked.  So they sent the elders up on ladders to pluck them and we reaped the benefit of it :)  We have had so much apples in the past month you would think I would be tired of them but really we are just getting super creative with them :)  If you have any apple recipes please send them to Germany!!  We actually made our own apple juice, apple sauce, and own grape juice!! The things you learn on the mission haha I love it!!  New news!!  We were sitting in Sacrament Meeting in church and we see our new Romanian members that moved in about a month ago sit down.  But the coolest part about it was that they brought their neighbors/friends!!  One of them speaks Spanish and he told us through Google Translate!  That his entire family from Romania is moving to Dortmund and since he loved the atmosphere at our church he wants his whole family (all 31 of them) to be a part of our church.  They are moving in next week!!  Oh boy here we go!! I am so grateful for this work and the constant miracles that we receive :)  I love our Heavenly Father and our Brother Jesus Christ more and more everyday!!  I love you all so much!! Stay strong :)  Liebe, Sister Tuschling  Also funny point, last monday running for a bus, somehow along the way my name tag got lost in the mix of things.  I was nametagless for a night and a half but good thing my companion is always on top of things and ready to help :)  I have been Sister Sprouse all week and the funny thing is there has only been about two people the entire week that has noticed!!  A couple days later walking that same path, Sister Sprouse with her hawk eye vision spotted something very dark and black in the middle of gorgeous orange leaves, yup she found Sister Tuschling.  Many runners have trompled on it, and bikers rode on it, but she was still there just waiting to be found!!