Weekly

 (Elder Putnam)

Sveiks yalll!! ok so I wrote up like half of this last week and didn’t have time to finish it. but I’m getting more structured with me after 9 activities so that’s solid.

Ok so for FB finding we go around and message a ton of people as soon as they accept our friend requests. So, I messaged this dude named Jānis and just said I liked one of the things he reposted (I added some deep thoughts to the mix as well) and he responded with a ton of messages. He opened up like so much talking about his mental health struggles, alcoholism and how much he hated living in the UK. He has some interesting spiritual takes that kinda line up with the gospel, especially the plan of salvation, but some that don’t at all. We have some interesting messages back and forth about twice a day but the message chains are like 12+ messages long. It’s crazy. He likes to swear and I’m honestly certain he’s on something every time he messages me, but I don’t have anything that points to that. It’s a very fun situation.

Tuesday: we made soap. Art night is on Tuesday nights at 6. So this week we made soap. We melted it then added some coloring and scent to it. it actually turned out pretty well. we each ended up with five pieces and I gave out two to some random teenagers on the bus. they thought it was kinda weird but also mad funny for us and the māsas.

Thursday: we had an awesome English night and it snowed. We invited tons of people and a lot of random people showed up too. Of course, Vlad was there. We also had Saša and his notgirlfriend, and one other person who’s chillin in Latvia and hiding from Russia :). All of them were Russian.

Friday we went to Lasmas house with the sisters for dinner. It was Latvias birthday so everything was themed red. It was so good. We had this raspberry juice that slapped, like a rice and chicken curry almost - but Latvian, and Honey Cake. All Latvian foods that were so good. We heard about her life in and out of the church and she gave us some solid pointers on how to help find people, and also help bring members back to activity. I didn't realize how big a branch Liepāja was. Like 20 years ago they probably had 15-20 youth and now we have like 5. Its wack. So that’s something we’re gonna work on.

Saturday: So Saturday is Game Night. We decided to go all out and invite everyone on our friends list and have snacks, herbal teas, ping pong, and even spikeball, to add to the board games. We played all of them in the Relief society and Primary rooms combined. It was wonderful. We got Nekyta (who also helped us clean the church), Kristian’s (the most elect person we found Big Book of Mormon finding in literally my first week) and his son Kristian’s (who is awesome). Lasma came to that as well and Kail and Sai showed up too (they’ve been friends with the sisters for a long time).

Sunday: Gosh I love the youth. Ok so the Birkenfeldi are a big family. Their oldest is 13, and their youngest is like 2. So during the middle of sacrament meeting the youngest will come running up to the piano and try to accompany alongside me. He is a fun little dude. We had a bunch of people

Other thoughts: The youth we have are so solid. I’m making handshakes with each of them and their lowkey dope love Emīls. He’s a new member and he helps pass the sacrament every week. He always comes up to me when I’m playing prelude and says hi. I’m so happy to see him every time. Then we got Jazeps. Jazeps is the backbone of the youth. He was, for a time, the only youth in the ward and he’s so strong. He also has a calling to put the hymn numbers up before church. Love the dude, so spiritual and reverent. Then there’s Lukas. That’s lasmas son. I’m not quite sure how to describe him. He dresses like a "roadman" whatever that means, except for when he’s at church where he’s so good. And were also about to get Sebastian’s Tomass in Deacons Quorum too. I’m so excited. There are some other youth were gonna work with to bring back from inactivity. Ya so that’s the young men. I don’t really interact with the young women as much.

that’s all for a week ago

see yall