This email was sent by Sister Welker on April 17th.  We received it on April 16th.

Week 36: I want to be like Nephi, Mongolian Meal, and Happy Easter!!

So sad!  Today the library is closed ,and I have to email at the internet cafe, which means no photos this week.

But it's been a great week!!

I did my 1st exchanges this week with the Mountford Sisters.  Our theme was "How to Make Decisions like Nephi."  I thought it went perfectly with the message Thomas S. Monson gave in General Conference on focusing more on the Book of Mormon.  I was with Sister Yuson in my area while Sister C was with Sister Ventyan (I might have spelled that wrong) in their area.  I felt kind of guilty since that day it was POURING rain outside and we were blessed to have the car, but my companion and Sister Ventyan had to walk.  Anyway, we read an article called "Firm in the Faith" written by someone in the 70.  It went into detail about how Nephi makes decisions, and how prayers are answered.  I highly recommend reading it, it's brilliant!!  During our personal study, we could chose any story to read about Nephi.  Then we looked at his decision making skills and how he handled his situation.  I choose to read about when Nephi broke his bow.  Which 1st of all, I'm glad Nephi chose to even write about that experience, 'cause if it were me, I wouldn't want millions of people to know that I broke a bow.  But I think I chose to read this story, because it proves that Nephi is human and he made mistakes too.  I tried to relate this story to me, and how when I make a mistake or when Plan A doesn't work, what do I do?  For Nephi, he's the man and he improvises and tries to find a solution to his problem.  Then he goes to the Lord and tells him his plans and asks for God's advice.  So lesson learned--be like Nephi, and when things don't go as planned, improvise with what you have and move on to a plan B.

My companion was finally able to make me a Mongolian meal!!  We had bought the ingredients last Monday, but we always had something come up or a last minute dinner that ended up pushing our Mongolian meal farther and farther away.  So 7 days after we had bought all the ingredients, we finally had our Mongolian meal. :D AND IT WAS SOOOOO YUMMY!!!!  When I describe the meal it doesn't sound super flash, but it was so delicious!!  It's basically beef with vegetables like purple and spring onions, red and green peppers, and carrots all thrown into a pot.  Then she made some dough from scratch and she rolled it out like a pizza, but then cut it into long strips and cooked it with the rest of the meal.  So it looked like pasta with vegetables, but it tasted much, much better.  I'm going to have her teach me so I can hopefully make some on my own.  :)

And lastly, I just wanted to wish everyone a Happy Easter!! Hope you all took some time to remember our Savior Jesus Christ and all he has done for us.  And for those of you who haven't seen the Prince of Peace Easter video, I highly recommend it.  It does a great job of illustrating the peace that can be offered only through our Savior Jesus Christ.

Love you all and hope to talk to you again next week.

Sister Mandy Welker

(I've attached the video Sister Welker talked about above.  Enjoy!)