11 years after our son Nathan took a photo at the top of Avaz Twist Tower during his mission when he served in Sarajevo, we stood in the same spot and snap the same picture.
Crazy to think we’re serving in the same city, just over a decade apart.
It was a beautiful view of the city
Bosnia has faced some serious flooding recently two major floods just in the past year. We were grateful to be able to help both times. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints worked with the Red Cross and a local NGO, MFS Emmaus, to provide supplies like shovels, sandbags, drinking water, dryers to help dry out homes, and new flooring.
The water level got really high about 4 feet in some places. Charles and the woman in green are showing just how high it reached.
One family's greenhouse, their main source of income, was destroyed in the flood. She was so thankful for the help she received, and she gifted us a delicious watermelon.
Zone conference lets us know another 6 weeks have passed! Time is flying by.
We love serving with all these amazing people.
The Sisters of the Belgrade and Sarajevo/ Montenegro Zones
We had a chef (yes, a real one!) serving with her husband in our mission for the past 18 months, cooking for the Adriatic North Mission for all the zone conferances and MLC. They returned home a few weeks ago. Rumor has it, they never made the same meal twice! Big shoes to fill. I jumped in with a few others to help cook for the Belgrade Zone Conference for 60 people, two lunches, and three snacks. We served Sloppy Joes one day, chicken and rice the next, plus trail mix, candy, fruit, veggies, and cookies for dessert.
After a long day in the kitchen cooking for Zone Conference, we treated ourselves to a delicious dinner with some amazing senior missionaries. One of the sweetest blessings of serving a mission is getting to meet and serve alongside such wonderful people.
One of the best parts of our mission is being able to support and spend time with our
younger missionaries. We had 2 of them over for dinner along with a friend who’s been
attending our small branch with his two adorable kids. After we ate, I got to play with
the little ones while Charles joined the missionaries in teaching a lesson on the Plan of Salvation. It was a wonderful evening!
I was recently called as the Primary President in our little branch here in Bosnia. We don’t currently have any children (or youth), but I’m always ready in case any come to visit! I used ChatGPT to help create this cute coloring page for these two for when they came to church with their dad. I tried to teach them the words to song “I Am a Child of God” which is what the Bosnian words at the top of the page say. I taught them the words to the song in Bosnian. I did have some help from a local member.
We had another fun day with bees! If you’ve been following my blog or emails, you know we’re helping 31 families start their own honey businesses. As part of the project, the participants receive monthly training and we’ve been lucky enough to attend some of them. The most recent training showed us how to extract honey straight from the honeycomb.
First, you scrape off the wax capping the thin layer of beeswax the bees use to seal each cell once it’s filled with honey to keep it fresh. Sticky work that is oddly satisfying.
The honeycomb is placed in a drum that spins like a giant salad spinner, flinging the honey out against the sides. From there, the honey flows out through a spigot and is strained to remove any bits of wax fresh, golden, and ready to enjoy!
Meet my new sweet friend, Fatima! She doesn’t speak English, but with my limited Bosnian and a little help from Google Translate, we had a lovely conversation. She lives with her son and they have their own beehives, where we learned all about the honey extraction process. After the honey is extracted, it’s tested for moisture content. If there’s too much water, they use an evaporation method to fix it. Charles is using a refractometer, it looks like a tiny telescope and shows exactly how much moisture is in the honey.
After our hands-on training, we joined a class with 10 of the beneficiaries, where they learned the entire honey extraction process from start to finish. It was inspiring to see their excitement and dedication
After a morning of bee training, our good friend Admir, our bee expert and partner from Muslim Aid, took us on a tour of the city. One of the true highlights of our mission is meeting and becoming friends with incredible people like Admir, who dedicate their lives to helping others build better futures. He also went out of his way to spend extra time with us, making sure Charles, who hopes to have his own beehives one day learns all the ins and outs of beekeeping. And as if that wasn’t enough, he treated us to some sightseeing.
We had some Senior Missionaries come see us in Sarajevo. We love all our new friends
We had a linger longer after church to celebrate 5 birthdays in our branch.
We have a talented baker in our branch, Iris, who made these 2 amazing cakes.
We had the chance to visit our sweet new friend, Mira, a longtime and faithful member of the Church. She lives in the beautiful countryside outside Sarajevo, but due to health challenges, she hasn't been able to attend church. So we brought church to her and some soup! We had a nice visit, and time spent together (alongside her 17 friendly cats!)
We had a visit from a fellow missionary, We served with Ashlee Chugg on our last mission. She brought some friends to tour the Adriatic North Mission with. I am so glad she stopped in Sarajevo.
For our P-day today, we had a special outing with our amazing missionaries to the spot where Elder Russell M. Nelson dedicated the Church in Bosnia back in 2010. It’s a peaceful park on a hill, home to an old fortress that dates all the way back to the 1500ss.
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