We had our first ever introduction to a Russian post office!  It is a lovely building with a center entry and then you go either left or right.  After standing in line for a while...we discovered that we were in the letter mailing section and had to go across the hall and stand in line in the parcel section.  The missionaries had already prepared us that we would be required to buy postal boxes.  What we weren't prepared for was that we had to weigh each item we were mailing separately, declare the price of each item, and then...

the gal packed (and I might add, not very carefully) and taped the box for us.  Then we were given the boxes to write the mailing address and the return address and then they weighed the boxes again and then we paid for shipping!  Needless to say, it was an ordeal.  We wanted to send our grandchildren a small gift for Christmas and we have already informed them...this will be the one and only package from Russia!  I must admit, the lady that helped us was very patient with our broken Russian.

On the way to the post office, it was still quite dark.  It doesn't get light here until around 9:00 a.m. in the morning.  Postal hours are from 8:00 a.m. until 10:00 p.m!  On our way back to the apartment, we had to smile at all the cars parked in the bike lane!  This must be why you see very few bikes in this city.

My eye immediately caught the English words..."Bakehouse" and we decided we needed to treat ourselves for accomplishing such a feat!  I bet you never thought that going to the post office would be cause for a celebration.

Elder Pocock and I enjoyed a yummy pastry much like a twinkie...but a little more gourmet.

Farther along the route home, we passed this amazing store.  Anyone ever heard of Emporio Armani?
Well, they have one here and believe me, it is extravagant.  Wish I would have had time to go inside...
probably better that I didn't.

About a month ago, my watch died.  It is difficult to get along without a watch when your whole world revolves around an agenda.  We went to a store beneath a family grocery market and there I was able to pick up a nice watch for 260 rubles...which is equivalent to $8.26!  I showed it to one of our Elders and he immediately said, "YOU BOUGHT AN ARMANI WATCH?!  WHAT DID YOU HAVE TO PAY FOR THAT?"  I proudly told him $8.26 and then looked at my watch more closely.  Sure enough, it says "Emporio Armani".  We laughed because he thought I had the real thing instead of a great imitation...just hope it lasts!

For FHE this week, Elders Wimber and Holbrook taught a lesson on the Sermon on the Mount.  We wanted them to bring out the differences in how the world influences our behavior and how the Savior wants us to act.  They divided us into teams and we discussed examples of both, then they did a great demonstration.  Igor stood with one foot on each of the two chairs at the front of the group.

One chair represented the world, the other represented the Savior.  As scenarios were given, we could clearly see how far apart the teachings of the Savior were from the actions the world embraces.  When Igor got spread to the max, Elder Holbrook took his hand and helped him to the chair representing the Savior.  He likened that to the Savior being there to help us in our quest to live Christ-like lives!  The YSA really enjoyed the lesson.

Wednesday afternoon, October 24, Sister Denning, Sister Robins, Elder Pocock and I boarded a train for Yekaterinburg.  President and Sister Rust held a Sister's Conference for all the sister missionaries in the mission.  It was a time of incredible spiritual training and bonding for our sisters.  We have had several new sisters come into the mission so it was great timing for everyone to get to know one another.

Of course, what is a Sister's Conference without good food and we had plenty!

We felt so blessed to be able to be a part of this conference and to get better acquainted with the incredible sisters in this mission.  Here they are in the order that they arrived, with our Sister Denning on the far left...she goes home in two weeks!!!

You've seen our Yulia, (L) before on the blog.  She is now Sister Batalova...serving as a mini missionary for one transfer (6 weeks)  due to sisters going and coming into the mission.  She has been so anxious to serve a full time mission so you can imagine how thrilled she was to hear the news at conference that sisters can now serve at 19.  She has already started to fill out her paperwork.  We truly miss her in our YSA group but she is truly a wonderful missionary and is getting a lot of great experience.  It was a treat to be with her again.

And here we have the "oldies but goodies" senior couples with President and Sister Rust.  The couple on the far left goes home to Pleasant Grove, Utah with Sister Denning in two weeks!  I have to admit, they are a bit trunky!  The couple on the far right are the Mengs from Logan, Utah.  They are now coming in from the field to take the Schows place and be the mission office couple.  Elder Pocock and I are the only senior MLS couple.  We desperately need senior couples to serve in this mission's three additional outlying areas...I'm putting in a plug.  We truly enjoyed a wonderful two days!

You've seen our Ninna before on our blog.  She is our devoted sister that rides the train for 1 1/2 hours one way to get to church.  Here she is demonstrating how she takes cotton and makes it into yarn/thread by dropping and spinning her heavy spindle.  She is at the church for her presentation of short stories that was held Saturday, October 27th.

This sweet sister told a collection of stories that she memorized when she was a young girl.  The stories were those of a famous Russian fableist that she has remembered for years.  She is known for her amazing memory.  She entertained those in attendance for over an hour...never looking at a note except to announce the title of the next story!  Way to go, Ninna.  Thanks for peeking into our week in Russia.

Some habits never die...it's October and I'm thinking about Christmas.  We won't have a tree this year so I wanted to make a little decorative tree from pinecones for our apartment.  We were told of where we could find miniature decorations to put on the tree...so on P-day we set out to find this certain store.  Little did we know how long it would take and where it would lead us.  Elder Pocock's trusty IPhone has been awesome to help us get around this huge city.  We checked out the address and plugged it in to determine the transport to take.  Alas, we were dropped off at the train station with no store in sight!  With our motto, "we can do hard things" in mind...we headed across the train tracks and proceeded to follow the blinking light on the IPhone map that was to lead to our destination...on foot!!!

 Our wanderings took us past this lovely home with a statue of Lenin in the front yard!

Suddenly the sidewalks disappeared and we found ourselves walking a busy road with the hope that THE STORE was just around the corner!

Guess what...we walked and walked and walked struggling to find sidewalks and then when we found some, we couldn't use them for the puddles left from the rain the night before.

We came across a car wash...first one we have ever seen... by this time we wanted to put ourselves through it...we were a muddy sight!

We passed a factory located near the train tracks that makes various tools...and as you can see it had been there a hundred years back in 1978!

As we continued to follow the blinking dot on the map, it lead us off in a very different direction.  Here we passed much humbler living accommodations. 

This shows the addition of a bathroom right by the front entrance.  At least they don't have to walk to an out house anymore.

By this point, I was beginning to doubt the almighty Iphone!  No stores in sight...

The neighborhood well...we found it very unique that in areas of this huge city, people are still using a well to retrieve their water supply.

The phone came through for us and we finally found the Christmas decor and toy store and didn't even get a picture of it!  We were just so excited to actually find it. All that for the little garland and tiny decorations you see here.  What I would give for a Walmart, Target, or Fred Meyer!!!  Gathering the pinecones was a whole other adventure.  We used up all of our pinecones for the little tree shown here and some young women wanted to make one...so we went in search of more pinecones.

On our way to do service, we got off at an earlier bus stop and wandered into a forested area searching for the right fir trees and cones.

We found a ton of pinecones but they were all closed up tight!

We came home, got on the internet and found out that slow heat will open them up.  So we washed them off in the bathtub and roasted them in the oven...

Until we had dozens of beautifully opened cones.

These gals had so much fun creating their own pinecone tree.  Now they want to make a much bigger one!  YIKES...we've got a lot more cones to gather.

The girl's finished project.  As I talked with these gals, they told me that here they do very little decorating for the holidays.  Usually a decorated live tree and maybe some garland strung around the walls or windows.  They were excited to make something themselves to decorate their apartments and to do it so inexpensively and quickly.  Christmas is celebrated on January 7, but the bigger holiday in Russia is New Year's.  This is when gifts are exchanged.  It was really fun to see these young women get excited about being creative.

Elder Pocock and I decided to get some exercise one morning and check out another area of the city before the cold temps are here to stay.  We decided to take a short cut through the amusement park near by.  Many of the rides, concession stands and outdoor restaurants are being disassembled for the winter months.  Children just love this petting zoo, so it will be available until the snow flies!

The ground crew was busy mowing and raking the leaves at the park.  This it LITERALLY the first lawnmower we have seen since we have been in Russia...nearly nine months now!  The majority of the mowing is done with weed-eaters...that's right...weed-eaters.  It doesn't seem very cost effective/energy effective but that is how they mow their parks and the lawns near businesses.  Because most people live in apartment buildings, there aren't yards to care for.

Until there is snow, this little train will keep on running around the park.

Farther into the downtown area, there is an "eternal flame" from WWII in remembrance of their fallen heros.  It burns all year around.

We have been told that there are Memorial holidays here.  One in the spring, like our May Memorial Day where they go to the cemeteries and clean up the grave sites and decorate them...then again in the fall...in October, where they return to the cemeteries...remove the old flowers and get the site ready for winter.  This monument was decorated on the October holiday to commemorate the fallen war heros.

This beautiful Russian Orthodox building is located in the financial district of Perm.  It is very small and we are assuming that it is for those who want to visit during their lunch hour but we doubt, due to the size, that services are held.

We loved the look of this unique building!

We have found that there are a lot of artists in this city and they utilize the outside of buildings to display their work.

This is an apartment building that has never been finished, but another artist has used it for his gigantic canvas!  We will probably never see all of Perm in the eighteen months that we are here.  No matter what direction we go...if we walk far enough...we find another area that we have never seen before.

Excitement for the Perm Branch.  This is Stepan Obegan and his new bride, Olga.  His brother is his best man and Susha, is Olga's attendant.  They are required by law to be married by the government first and here they have returned to the branch to have a religious ceremony with family and friends. Stepan has been a former branch president and is loved by all the members of this branch.  He worked as a police officer and then for Interpol (international police department).  He is retired and now works for the church in overseeing all the physical facilities and processing the missionary registrations with their apartments and visas.

He has been waiting a long time for this day and he was thrilled.  Olga made a beautiful bride...she is half his age.  The wedding party pulled up to our little branch in this Hummer limo...our missionaries were more interested in the hummer than the wedding!

Elder Flitton just had to sit behind the wheel of this massive "machine"!  (That is the Russian word for  car.)

We've papered all we can at Olga's apartment.  The fourth wall needs some additional insulation so we will have to wait until Olga saves up for that.  Our next project will be to paint the closet and get a rod and curtain to enclose the area...then Olga can get her clothes on hangers and out of the boxes!  It's getting there and she is thrilled!

Wasn't conference wonderful?!  The branch was able to view conference on October 13 and 14th.  They watched it on the big screen in Russian in the chapel and the missionaries viewed it in the Relief Society room in English.  We loved everything about it...it felt like we were home watching it on television.

Between sessions, the branch puts on a simple luncheon and everyone can bring items to add to the meal.  Saturday, I brought zucchini brownies...and Sunday I served zucchini bread.  Yes, I'm still trying to use up all those zucchinis.

Saturday, October 13th, after the second session of conference, we had a very special baptism for Stanislav. He has been meeting with the missionaries for about four months now.  He was not eighteen, and his parents would not give him permission to be baptized...so he waited until his birthday and is now our newest member.  He is a great young man, we all love him dearly.  Between conference and the baptism...we were on an all-time high!!!

Monday, on P-day, we had Stanislav and the missionaries over for his first new member discussion.  The missionaries talked of the strait and narrow path that he now must walk.  They asked him to draw a picture of his path of life.  Maybe you can see how he has passed through the gate of baptism, next he will get the Holy Ghost, the Priesthood, he has to do his army duty, then he plans on a mission, schooling, marriage and family.  Oh, how we pray that he will be able to reach his goals and stay on the path.  He definitely has great goals in mind!

After the discussion, his friend came over and we introduced them to American pancakes with maple (thanks to mapleine), homemade peach and homemade apple syrups.  Yummy!  Here you have to be resourceful to have things taste like home!

Today, Saturday, October 20 we had another baptism...for TWO SISTERS, Ludmilla and Natalia.  We feel so incredibly blessed to have had three baptisms within seven days!  Ludmilla was taught by Sisters Knoll and Parkinson when they were here.  She had some health problems and had to have open heart surgery.  This put her progress on hold.  Sisters Denning and Robins kept track of her and when her health improved, they continued to teach her and now today she was baptized by Stepan Obegan.  On your left, you see Elders Flitton and Riddle who found Sister Natalia'a name in their area book.  She met with missionaries back in 2007 and wasn't ready for baptism at that point.  They called on her, met with her and have been teaching her for the past two months.  She is now ready for this commitment and we are so thrilled for the goodness of these two women!  It was such a thrill to be a part of this experience.  Due to conference last week,  all three of our newly baptized members will be confirmed this Sunday in Sacrament meeting.  What joy!  Elder Flitton is confirming Natalia.

The Branch gives each new convert a copy of the newly translated Russian triple combination plus a ton of other booklets and manuals to help them further their understanding.  They both decided to take some home tonight and the rest of the books home after church tomorrow since it will be hard to take that pile on a bus!  Life in Perm is absolutely amazing!