Su Sventom Kaledom!

Here is our district before Sister Argyle left. Sister Brown is now with us

Merry Christmas!

This has to be the best time of the year! I love celebrating the birth of Christ and His life for us. It is such a great time to remember Him and Heavenly Father's gift to each of us.

We had a week full of lots of miracles. Our sort of investigator that I mentioned last time has committed to be baptized in January! He received an answer from the spirit that this is Jesus Christ's restored gospel. We had nothing to do with his conversion, he simply read the Book of Mormon and the spirit did the rest. He knows that this will help him so much and wanted to be baptized earlier but needs to quit smoking first. It truly has been a miracle. We are meeting with him tonight with the elders because he lives in their area. So it sounds like we will pass him over to them, but are grateful for the opportunity that we had to meet with him. We pray that he can quite smoking soon.

We also had a girl from China come to church yesterday. She is a student here and was interested in learning more. She even came to the branch Christmas party. She doesn't believe that God is an actual person because she has no religious background. But we hope to keep working with her because she is willing to come to everything. We know that if she also reads the Book of Mormon and feels the spirit that she will know of its truthfulness. These experiences just show me how powerful and essential the spirit is in our lives. I know that God is a God of miracles. 

The Branch Christmas party was very cool because it was done by the Lithuanians and not the missionaries :) Members put on cute plays about the importance of giving to others and remembering Christ. We were able to sing and also listen to the unexpected choir of older ladies sing too. Then we ate some delicious Lithuanian food, like chicken bone soup and potatoes and cheese bread and fruit.

This is at our Branch Christmas party. An investigator brought a choir for us, so she played the acordian while they sang. It was quite a treat.

We also had our Christmas Devotional with all the missionaries. We had a white elephant exchange, saw a picture slideshow of us all, and then learned about Christ. It was a great experience.

Here is our Christmas Conference picture

This picture is much better :) Our Christmas Devotional Conference

All of the sisters at the conference, Merry Christmas. The new sister is on the end, the last one by me. Her name is sister Hodson

They are doing some sort of pose - Sister Madison style :)

Santa Claus came too with the Assistants

 Afterwards, I traveled to Kaunas to be with Sister Hubert on exchange. It was so cool! We were able to meet with a recent convert, and she is so amazing! One of the coolest people ever. I loved hearing her conversion story and strong testimony of the gospel. She says she has changed so much because of the gospel. It was very inspiring. 

This week has just been super awesome. It's also been pretty humid. It is cool to walk outside without seeing any rain or snow, but getting soaked nonetheless. It's like walking through a mister all day long. Pretty cool.

I just want to testify of Jesus Christ. I know that He lives and loves each of us. Because He does, He died for us and then rose from the dead. He overcame all of our trials and sins. He is the gift to each of us. I encourage us all to accept the gift and then give it to someone else. I know that He is our redeemer and the reason for Christmas. Su Sventom Kaledom! Love you all.

Love Sese Dzerman

Sister Madison wrote -  "Thank you for the christmas package! you'd be so proud of me- i was very obedient and didn't open any of the wrapped gifts, but i did already eat most of the candy. it just doesn't get better than christmas-tree shaped Reese's. And poor sister jerman is going without sugar for the time-being, so i'm also eating her candy as well hahaha. You might catch me on The Biggest Loser next season."

All the Lithuanian missionaries after a conference.

Here are some cool things, I don't know what they are

Here is the TV tower that we visited and went up. We ate dinner at the top

It is pretty tall :)

This is the view from our table

Here is the city

This is what we attempted to eat, but it was pretty gross. I think I prefer peanut butter and syrup on my waffle

Another picture of the city from the tv tower

Here is where the Christmas market and tree were

This is the market

It was right by the huge white cathedral

There was also this cool life size nativity

This is the cool decorated streets in old towne.

We made tongans! Top ramen noodles cooked in an egg with veggies and salami inside. And then two pieces of bread... pretty full of carbs

We ate chicken hearts! They taste just like chicken but have a weird texture

This is Rachel Merril's cousin who taught English in Vilnius. This is the Sunday before they left to go home.

We got stat dogs! It is french bread with a hole inside for the hot dog. Pretty good.