POWER IN WORDS

FAMILY AND FRIENDS HELLO
I just want to tell you all quickly about this guy we met on the street. 

We stop him. Tell him we teach about god. and he starts talking, and my mind was blown. 

He said two years ago he was in a real rough situation drugs, alcohol, lots of bad things. 

One day he goes to his drug dealer and his dealer says to him "I THINK I FOUND GOD"

He gave it all up. Drugs, alcohol, everything, and he, like his dealer found God. Man, I cannot even tell you the power that people have on other people. This guy changed because his drug dealer found God. 

Friends, remember the power and influence you have on others. 

THE BIGGEST MIRACLE OF THE WEEK

EVA WAS BAPTIZED.

Last thursday Prezident McConkie came to town and on Friday Eva was baptized. 

We then were helping Eva get changed after she was baptized and Sis. Parsons turns to her and says "EVA, You are 100 percent perfect right now" Eva looks up, looks in the mirror with the biggest smile that her smile turned to laughter and she just giggled for a minute. Because SHE REALIZED how truly powerful her decision was. WOW I am just speechless about it all. And on sunday she recieved the Gift of the Holy Ghost. Ahhhhh, I love missionary life. 

LAST SUNDAY,

We met this girl on the streets. We were talking and I could not get the word I was trying to say out of my mouth. So I apologized to her and told her I dont speak very good Slovak. She then asks us where we are from, We answered..

AND SHE FLIPPED

She started rejoicing.

 "YOU SPEAK ENGLISH"

"OH MY GOSH, Do you know how rare it is to find people who speak English here?"

It was really cute. Then we asked her if we could meet this week. 

AND SHE CAME

currently she is living a vegan life so we got hot chocolate and she got ginger ale and we talked. and she came to game night and was just so GREAT!

Well lets just say that yesterday was a MIRACLE. So we have this guy who we are meeting with, and usually we meet him during the week at this cafe, BUT this week he asked if we could meet on Sunday. Trying to keep the Sabbath Day Holy we asked if we could meet somewhere else. Turns out he is afraid of crowds and that cafe is the only place except for a park. So we are planning on a park and we wake up and it is POURING RAIN.
 literally pouring. 

So crap we are going to the cafe. 

So we get there. and the waitress comes out and asks if we need anything.
We told her we were waiting. 

Our friend came. And for the WHOLE HOUR the WAITRESS NEVER CAME BACK! 

Oh yeah. GOD IS SOOO GOOD.

I just LOVE SLOVAKIA. I am so indebted. 

Search for miracles, because they are there and god is just waiting for you to open your eyes. 

Have a great week

S Laskou

Sestra Ratcliffe

 the baptism

EVA 

Studies

My ears were hurting

 me being pretty

 My dear friend

Grocery shopping in 7/11

Okay, So I failed to mention this last week, but we went to this little grocery store right next to our apartment to do our weekly shopping, we get a cart and start shopping, then a rush of teenagers come in, so we patiently wait a little until they are all gone to go buy our groceries. We get up to the counter which is a solid 1 foot long and start putting all of our groceries up. THEN all of a sudden this huge line forms behind us, the most awkward part is all of them have like a chocolate bar or a pastry and we have a weeks worth of groceries! They opened up another check out because the line was so long, it seriously felt like we were shopping in 7/11 for a weeks worth of groceries. Can you all just imagine?

wednesday:

Do you all know that in Slovakia, we celebrate peoples names? 

its a real party, but we don't really know how to celebrate them, but this week we celebrated Martina's name day, we went out to lunch and then we went and got hot chocolate. OH MY HOTCHOCOLATE HERE IS THE BEST. It is literally a melted bar of chocolate in a cup. Seriously SOOOO AMAZING. 

thursday:

So my companion has had a cold for the past week and has been a real "Snuff-a-lub-agous" so we talked to Sister McConkie and she told us that we have to cancel the rest of our schedule for the day and take a nap. I thought that maybe just sister Parsons would have to take a nap, since she is the sick one, but nope. I had to take a nap too. It was the strangest thing. We literally sat in our beds in the middle of the day, not doing missionary work. It was an obsurd sensation. We both wanted to jump out of bed and hit the streets. Needless to say it took us a little while to fall asleep and was pretty restless, but all is well and we are getting back to normal health!

friday:

we got our ears talked off for 2 HOURS by this man who talked about literally everything. Buddha, Jesus, Meditation the whole works. 

it was fun, I had hot chocolate while he talked. :)

saturday:

another name day celebration!

Sister Van Dalen's! Yay, us and the elders made her lunch in the church building and she was so cute. We had the table all set and we made pasta and salad and garlic bread, because that's basically all we can make, and SHE LOVED. It was so amazing. She was just so grateful and hugged us and sent us cute text messages afterwards. I just love this branch. 

Then for game night we went to this warehouse that is full of badminton courts and we just played badminton with this guy who is so amazing at it. Literally, I never thought I could sweat playing badminton. Boy, was I wrong. 

Well I guess my week wasn't as eventful as I thought it was, but man did we see miracles. Slovakia is so ready to just explode. I am so grateful that I can be a part of it. I love seeing peoples hearts change in front of your eyes. I LOVE BEING A MISSIONARY. 

HAVE A MIRACULOUS WEEK KIDS!

S Laskou,

Sestra Ratcliffe

Trencin project

Last week

Badminton

Lunch for Branch President's wife

Sept 7, 2015

Hey is everyone getting my email, if not let me know. Cause when I select group it is only bringing up 30 people. 

Well this week has just been full of adventures. I know I say that every week, but really mission life is just a non-stop adventure. 

So, on Monday we are going to the mall to get water balloons, because we have on plan to have a water balloon fight with martina and the elders. FUN FACT. Water Balloons don't exist here. But real balloons work just like water balloons so all is well. On the way to the park we are walking down the street and all of a sudden this lady yells "MISSIONARIES" and then her husband was like "They have missionaries in Slovakia?" LOL 

Turns out this couple is from Idaho. they were here for a dirtbike race the wife is a member and the husband is not. We invited them to church and the husband said "I have been to plenty of those" so me being me replied "well have you ever been to one in SLOVAK?" He said no and they both ended up coming to church on Sunday. 

Anyway then we had our water balloon fight lasted a solid five minutes and the Elders were the only ones who got wet. LOL then we are walking back to the building and a police officer on his bike comes over and starts chewing us out telling us that if we leave balloons in the park again that we will be banned from the park. Guys, We cleaned the balloons up, so we walk back and there is one balloon that we missed and a small piece of another balloon. that officer must have taken his bike through the whole area that we were playing. LOL Silly officer. 

tuesday we were street contacting, and really had no sucess until we stopped this guy like an hour into our contacting block and we were talking to him and he was just seriously so cool. 

We are asking him if we would meet and he was like "yeah, but I have training..." and so Sister Parsons asked what kind of training he had, and under his breath he says "ninja" so we were like "WHAT?" and he told us he was a NINJA. it was the best! 

Thursday we went to a girl we teach house for dinner. It was such an amazing experience! He parents don't want her to get baptized, but her parents were out of town so she invited us over for dinner. It was really fun and her house is just adorable. then, She walked us to the bus stop with her dog and then her dog ended up peeing right on sister Parsons leg like she was a tree! Sister Parsons reaction "WOW THAT WAS REALLY WARM!!"

This weekend we went to trencin for a service project. we got rained out in the morning so we went and cleaned a hockey stadium, soaking wet and then in the afternoon we went and painted a Fence! Oh I just love service! 

Well I don't know what is happening with the whole email situation so I am going to let you all go. have a wonderful week! 

Continue to build that testimony! This church is true the book is blue! 

S laskou

Sestra Ratcliffe