By the Skinflap of Her Chinny Chin Chin

Mittwoch, 3rd:

So we helped out at our Ausstellung for about 30 minutes, because we needed to get going to an appointment. But in that time, Sister Akre and I gave out 2 copies of the Book of Mormon. I walked up to a guy running an ice cream cart and he was very confused but still took one. We plan on actually buying ice cream from him next time so he doesn't think we're creepers, haha.

We went to Sister Akre's Doctor appointment. He kind of told her he couldn't really help her, but still gave her a list of things to try. So we're going to do those. 

We went finding in Lörrach again, and at the end grabbed a few last ingredients needed to bake a cake for Sister Grundvig's birthday. 

Sister Akre poured much love into the Cake and worked hard to make some fancy decorations for it. 

Donnerstag, 4th:

Sister Akre finished the Birthday cake, and we carried it all the way to the Birthday Girl's apartment. She was so surprised, and her reaction was priceless. Happy Birthday to Sister Grundvig! She goes home next transfer, and I'm sure going to miss her. 

Sister Akre's migraine was pretty bad, so we went straight back to our apartment for her to take a nap. I told her not to set an alarm, and she ended up sleeping for 4 or so hours. In the meantime, I cleaned and rearranged our apartment a little bit, which felt very nice. 

In the evening, we went to the Ausstellung the Elders had been running for several hours. Sister Akre ended up giving out 9 copies of the Book of Mormon in the span of an hour and a half singlehandedly! I was astounded! I watched over the bike/everyone's backpacks, while she would grab a random language, walk off into the crowd of people for a few minutes, and then return empty-handed. Every single time. In grand total, she gave out: 4 in German, 1 in French, 1 in Chinese, 1 in Russian, 1 in Arabic, and 1 in Portuguese. I decided I wanted some of the action at one point, so she stayed by the bike while I grabbed an English one and walked off (still in sight and sound, of course). My success story: I got a bit laughed at for being religious and came back to Sister Akre with the Book still in my hand. But hey, I still tried. It just goes to show that success isn't the same for everyone. 

Freitag, 5th:

We went finding in the early hours of the day so that we could avoid as much heat as possible.

We had an appointment with Lucienne and the Elders came as well so they could give her a blessing. She's had one before, but that was around a year ago, so right before it we asked her what she knew about blessings and the Priesthood, and she was spot on. We were very impressed. :) 

We went by on Véronique's work (a flower shop) to say hi to her. We had a good conversation with her and set up an appointment with her and agreed to fast for/with her, since she's trying to make a big decision in her life right now. At the end, we bought a plant to give to Eutacia as a thank-you, but we still haven't managed to get it to her. We've gone by on her work twice, but she had both days off, so we'll see if this poor plant lasts long enough to make it to its rightful owner! 

Samstag, 6th:

It was Sister Akre's 9-month mark and my 13-month mark. I wrote her a little note and had been gathering little presents to give to her, so I surprised her and almost made her cry when I gave it to her. She said if she wasn't so darn stubborn she would have, so I'm counting that as a success, haha. 

We went by on Eutacia, and she wasn't there. 

We went finding for a bit and ran into the Pratteln Sisters (Sister Grundvig and Sister Frome). They invited us to get some Ice cream to celebrate Sister Akre's 9 months, so about an hour later to take a break from finding, we met them at McDonald's to get shakes (Sister Akre was following orders from the doctor to only "eat" liquids for 3 days, and this was her last day, so we compromised on the ice cream thing by deciding on shakes). It was super sweet of the Pratteln Sisters, and we had some good girl time sitting on a bench in the middle of a city in Switzerland. #friendshipGoals

It also almost rained this day, which felt amazing because it was cloudy and breezy and basically fantastic (it was colder outside than in the stores). 

In the night, it totally thundered. I woke up when there was this extremely loud Crack of thunder, so I got up and closed our balcony door just in case the wind blew the rain inside. I climbed back in bed, but stayed awake a little counting the seconds between the flash of light and the thunder. It was definitely very close, but as far as I can see nothing got damaged so we stayed nice and safe. I miss thunderstorms. ️

Sonntag, 7th:

We had Church, and this week it wasn't canceled. 

We had a ride both to and from church, so we got home pretty quickly and started making dinner (which, because of when our church is meant around 4:30-5 in the afternoon). It was the end of Sister Akre's juice torture, so she was very excited to eat solid food again.

We also did Weekly planning. 

Montag, 8th:

We had Distrikt meeting. 

It was our turn for making lunch, so I sliced veggies and Sister Akre rocked making fried rice. It was a hit! So were the brownies at the end. ;) 

We met with Emma, a friend of ours who has been vacationing and is going to continue to vacation. But it was good that I got to meet her, and she's super sweet. 

We did our studies in the botanical gardens, because it's free entrance and quite peaceful. 

We met with Véronique and taught a lesson on the word of wisdom, and answered a couple questions she had, both relating and not relating to it. She also brought us a snack and that was precious. 

Dienstag, 9th:

Today we went to Reigoldswil and took a gondola up a mountain, hiked around on the various hills there and took many pictures, then rode scooters back down the mountain. The views were gorgeous! We thought the scooters were going to be pretty tame, considering we didn't even have to sign any forms about our lives or anything. I guess we forgot that Switzerland literally gives knives to small children and counts on the responsibility of common sense or something. But basically, three out of the nine of us biffed it going down (we had some members with us, too), with only one injury dramatic enough to require medical attention. Sister Grundvig, bless her soul, is going to have a legit scar on her chin. Everyone was going at their own speeds (I was at the very back, because I'm a #wuss and had a healthy amount of fear), and I turned the corner and saw Sister Grundvig walking her scooter to the side of the road. I slowed down to a stop as she was sitting down and Jennika (a member) whipped out a first-aid kit and some essential oils. We both did our best to patch her up before making our way down the rest of the mountain, which wasn't too long. Then we did some first-aid clean up in the bathroom of the bottom gondola bit with some disinfectant spray, and called our mission nurse. She'll be getting stitches, because that gash was pretty legit. I felt sooo bad for her, but everyone could tell I was thoroughly enjoying myself, which I think provided some entertainment for Sister Grundvig while we were trying to keep her mind off the pain. But she's a trooper. [I will refrain from any gory details for your benefit]. I look forward to seeing her stitches in the near future. Her scar is going to be a nice mission souvenir! 

Favorite new word: Souverän - Sovereign/confident/commanding

Favorite funny story: So, our Distrikt leader has some flaming orange hair (#Scotland), and he takes teasing really well, so we've had fun joking around with him. One of his short-lived nicknames was Ginger Boy. But I think the best bit was when we met with Véronique, we were talking about how Sister Akre looovvveeeesssss spicy food, and how the Elders literally can't handle any amount of spice. Véronique smiled and said with a wink, "Of course Elder Gilmour can't eat spice. It would just make his hair even redder!" We thoroughly enjoyed relaying this to the red-haired, feiry man himself. 

Favorite spiritual thought: I read something this week that really helped me to understand the Atonement. Sadly, I won't be able to describe it well in short. However, in short: Christ's suffering caused such an outpouring of mercy from everything in our space, that it created this proverbial well of mercy. So much so, that whatever Christ requests of everything in space, it'll happen because of the mercy He caused. And that's why we're saved by Grace after all we can do. Because Christ's Atonement was enough to cover everything because He will be our advocate, and we do everything we can to show Christ how grateful we are for Him and what He's done. I wish I could explain it better. But I've truly gained such an appreciation for the Atonement and the Creation, and for myself as who I am. I'm so grateful for God and Christ. ️

TLDR: Basically a normal week, with a minor casualty and a strengthened testimony. 

Love and goopies!

Sister Hamilton

Pics: not very many this week, since most of the pics we took today were on other phones, so I'll attach some next week. But the pics I do have: S. Akre in her new sun hat on a day where I looked sick, S. Grundvig and I pre-scrape, some crazy bang pics in front of an Austrian flag on our finding bridge!, and a train headed to Frick (a pretty lit place, from what I've heard)