"Tiny" miracle?

In my mission statement that I read almost every day, it says that I find joy and rejoice in the golden moments, the drops of awesome, the tiny miracles that make up my life.

As I was reading it this morning, I remembered one of those miracles, that at first was discguised as a frustration.

Before we go home, there are a few places we want to take the kids here in Hungary that are close and accessible.  We are not panicked about seeing everywhere we can, as, first of all, the list would be endless :), and, second of all, that is not the reason we came, so we can go home content with seeing some things locally.

This week we are going to Lake Balaton, a castle near there, then over to Egér (castle), Miskolc (castle), and then an abbey in those mountains from the 13th century.  Q-dawg and I had decided to rent a car, one big enough for all of us, since that will be more direct, easier to transport our camping stuff, and perhaps even less expensive than the buszek and all the transfers.  We signed up and had it all ready to go, when Q-dawg read that you couldn't use your bank card with that company,...it had to be a credit card.  It didn't matter what funds were available,...it just had to be a credit card.  Well, our only credit card was currently in transistion and we were planning on picking it up in the United States after getting home.  Hmmmmm...plan B?

Q-dawg is a quick thinker and looked into local transporation.   The company he looked at didn't have a van, but we could rent two of them, and it would be more than half as expensive!  Woohoo! I don't know if that qualifies as a tiny miracle or a huge one, but I felt like I needed to make a record of it in gratitude. The only down-side is that I will be driving in Hungary (yikes :S!!!!), but I'll just follow Q-dawg, right?

We picked up a couple tents for the trip, since finding a place for all of us to sleep was equally problematic.  We will just throw in our bedding, a bunch of clothes and a few supplies, pick up food at local markets, and hope we stay dry enough to be able to enjoy things :)! 

Castles, here we come!

Blessings!

I think it is amazing how Heavenly Father can bless us in specific ways!

Over the last few months, there have been a few that have stood out that I want to record:
-Running low on crayons...a woman at church said, "hey, I have a bunch of crayons I am done using...do you want them?"  Sure!

-Lek wanted a suit.  We had missed a killer sale, so had kind of put it on the back-burner for a bit.  A man at church brought a nice suit coat that perfectly accented Lek's pants and fit him perfectly. In fact, I kept not recognizing him a church when he had it on, it made him look so grown up!

-I am almost out of those cool hair elastics for my little girls and randomly thought, "hmmm, should get some of those."  However, since store trips are a little different here, put that thought on the back-burner.  Last week a woman at church said, "hey, I was cleaning out my stuff and found a bunch of hair elastics that are brand new that I never used and don't use now.  Could your girls use some?"  Awesome!

-I hadn't called one of my friends back in America since I have been here in Hungary and on Monday thought, "Hmmm...it would be nice to talk to Angie right now."  I called her and she "happened" to be carrying the phone outside, juggling it "needlessly" with the task she had at hand, and getting frustrated.  "Why in the world do I still have this phone in my hand?!"  Ring, ring!

-I was finishing up a long email to a dear sister and thought, "Oh!  It would be so nice to talk to Shara on skype soon, but this weekend looks so busy!"  I clicked "send" on the email, and then saw the little indicator pop up telling me that Shara was on skype!  She had been washing dishes, her iPad had been in her purse next to her, and she hadn't even turned it on.

Random?  I don't think so :).  The hand of God is there in our lives...we just need to know how to look for it! :)

Lek's Spiritual Spree!

Lek just did four days of Seminary and is now doing his Friday live session.  Right before doing the session, he leaned back on his chair, sighed contentedly and said, "I am just on a spiritual spree!"

He sure is!  For instance, for Young Men's this week, his class (aka he and his Dad) decided to tackle their home teaching assignment...16 households.  The families are spread out in quite the range, too, so the two of them have been planning for a couple of weeks, including a foray by Q-dawg last Saturday to get a map of the area so they could mark down where they need to go.

To add some extra excitement, on Monday or Tuesday they got a call from the missionaries.  Apparently, the missionaries accidentally scheduled two English classes at the same time in two different locations, and wanted two people to cover their class in Erd.  Cool!  Lek was not so sure, and sooooo nervous, but he was willing.  There was no class plan, but he still faced it and went.  I am continually amazed at the strength I see in this maturing young man while we are here.  He really steps up to the challenges!

Q-dawg and Lek left around 1:30 pm on Wednesday.  The game plan was to meet the missionaries after they got off the bus in Erd, find out more about the class, and then borrow the missionaries' bikes to bike to their furthest house and then make their way back.  Here are a couple pics of the path...you just can't see how steep the path is behind Lek in the first one.  Apparently, Q-dawg rode his brakes and the slid down half way, even with the brakes on.  Whew!

The first stop took so long to get there, and took so long, they ended up having to come right back after that one visit.

One down, 15 to go! :)

Upside, the man they visited makes his own sausages, and gave us some.  They smell pretty strong and now everything in our fridge has the hint of sausage flavor, but at least it is a yummy flavor :).  Oh, and they are not blood sausages or csipos (hot), thankfully :).

Lek ended up playing 20 questions with the advanced English class as a way to practice their English, and Q-dawg taught the beginning class.  Gonda Elnok (President Gonda) gave them a ride home that evening, so they made it home by a little after 9 pm, and not after 10 pm, which is when the bus would have had them back.

Cool experience:  On the way there, the bus Q-dawg and Lek were on was running late...7 minutes, to be exact, which is just how much time they have between the scheduled drop-off of that bus and the pick up of the next one on the other side of the freeway.  As the bus they were on pulled up on one side of the freeway, Lek was praying feverishly that they would make it on time to the next bus, and, therefore, on time to meet the missionaries.   He was thinking about how Nephi in the book of Helaman in the Book of Mormon prayed with faith, doubting nothing, and was able to move mountains.  Lek kept trying to convince himself to not have a doubt...that it would happen and they wouldn't miss the bus.

When they pulled up to the curb, they looked across the freeway and could see their bus already at the other stop.  Q-dawg turned to Lek and asked, "Do we run for it?"  Lek thought about that "faith, nothing doubting" and answered, "Yes!"  

They dashed over the sky-bridge, and came up to the bus that was still there, trying to find a break in the busy rush of traffic so it could pull away.  Q-dawg rapped on the door, and they made it!

Faith to move mountains, son!  Faith to move mountains.

(Lek has just identified that the snow that has been falling for the past 24 hours is perfect.  Time for a new snowman?)