My question to you: Are you sick of me sending pictures of glasshouses (~greenhouses~) every week? If not, or even if so,....don't expect them to stop anytime soon! OK. I JUST HAVE TO SAY, FIRST AND FOREMOST:: I SAW PRESIDENT AND SISTER MACDONALD YESTERDAY! Almost cried honestly. It's been almost 5 months! I haven't seen them since the day I stepped foot on the Emerald Isle for the first time. That was a while ago. I mean, I have an Irish accent now! Who am I kidding, no I don't, I've been quarantined since I got here! They social-distancing threw us Tunnock's Carmel wafer bars, and that was the moment I almost cried. Those things are SO GOOD and a Scotland novelty. They sell 6 million a day and President said 1 million of those are to him. I love them dearly. They will be staying here in Ireland for the rest of the month, and plan on having a “Dublin mission home” of sorts that they come stay at often! That means I'd better start being on my best behavior I guess. This week was beautiful! On Tuesday, Elder Farrant from England brough blueberry muffins to District Council! My first blueberries eaten in the month of August, YAY. We went to parks almost every day, to teach and to find and to marvel at God's creations. It was all in the name of productivity, mind you, and I must say, there's something very special about adding strangers on FB on the shores of a wee loch while eating wild blackberries. Especially with my new favorite Spainard, Sister Perez! Seconds after taking the Glasshouse Picture Of The Week™️ we sat down on a wooden bench to talk about desires. I have a testimony that God ALWAYS grants us the desires of our hearts. The only variable is when. Too often, he DOES grant us the desires of our hearts, we just aren't honest with ourselves about what those desires really are. A good way to assess what our honest desires really are is our actions. We have to constantly assess and adjust, otherwise we will be....DEPRESSED! I told Sister Perez that one of the honest desires of my heart is to find and eat wild berries at some point on my mission, and not 5 minutes later, WE FOUND SOME! God is good! Then we assessed that we desired to find and teach people, and somebody asked if we could call and tell them more about the Book of Mormon at that very moment! GOD IS GOOD! The Tralee Three + 1 were reunited this week during exchanges! I don't know if I've already spilled this tea in this chat, but Sister Francis and Sister Boss are companions AGAIN! But now in Clondalkin, just across the Liffey from our home in Smithfield. We taught the sweetest old woman named Sheila who wants us to come read her Book of Mormon stories every week since she can't see the pages herself. Yesterday was a testimony builder to me that if Sister Macdonald, our mission president's wife, has time to do Come, Follow Me, ALL OF US DO! NO EXCUSES. This morning in my studies I read about the 2,000 stripling warriors, aka Helaman's “Little Army” and I think I stumbled across their superpower in Alma 57:27! “Now this was the faith of these of whom I have spoken; they are young, and their minds are firm, and they do put their trust in God continually.” I looked up the definition of “mind” and it refers to our thoughts, feelings, and conscious brain functions. Meaning of course, that we really do make up our mind! It's our choice to have a firm mind that is centered on Christ and the good things of this world. When we take that initiative, anything in the whole wide universe is possible. Start dreamin'! Apologies, this is long. Brevity is power and therefore this is not a powerful email. But eh, maybe it's fluffy enough you can use your phone as a pillow if you fall asleep in class this week. HAVE FUN AT SCHOOL! Please pray for our friend David, who is getting baptized next week! The answers you are looking for are in the scriptures, Sister Allen PS. This is a gluten-free sugar-free waffle that I made this morning! If you can guess every single ingredient in it, I'll send you the video of me eating a 4-leaf clover. There are 9 ingredients. 1. Danilo's baptism last week!
2.Our faces during Significant Tech Problems in the middle of Songs For The Soul
3.BRAZILIAN CAKE
4.Blackberries + Sister Perez
5.Blackberries pt 2
6.Glasshouse with grapevines inside
7.When Sister Blatter found the first 4 leaf clover of her life
8.BLUEBERRY MUFFIN!
9.Bluebrrry Waffle
10.Me while experiencing Significant Tech Problems during sacrament meeting that were defintely my fault
