Where am I from?

* Note from Mom,
Sister Peterson sent last weeks pictures today too, so her blog is updated if you're interested in seeing more click here

Dear Friends and Family

I love it here!!

The Donau River- Welcome to Linz

For my entire mission I have been telling people that I am from Texas.  

As I counted up how long I have been on my mission, I realized that I will have almost lived in Europe for longer than I have lived in Texas.  

Another view of Linz

When I got to Linz, I was debating where to tell people I was from, whether I should continue to say that I am from Dallas or to say California 

(or Utah, Arizona, or Minnesota.  whew, have I got a lot of choices!)  

For some reason I stuck with Texas, and the people here could not be more excited :P  

Look... It's a Castle

The Austrians (or at least all of the ones I have talked to) LOVE the TV show 'Dallas', and ask me if my life is just like the TV show, if I ride horses, and if I own a million different pairs of cowgirl boots.  

My new companion, Sister Wunderli

I didn't really realize how much of American life is portrayed on TV until I got here.  

I have people ask if high school is just like in the movies-with football games, prom, rallies, cheerleaders, etc...

"Yes, it is, but everything looks more glamorous on screen! (except Austria and Germany, cameras cant capture how amazing it is here!)

Elder Svoboda

Hauptplatz

I did have a little pang of ''Freiburg Heimweh'' on Thursday.  

President and Sister Miles were in Linz to do interviews, and when Sister Miles came in she saw me and said ''Whoa, it's weird to see you out here in Linz, you have been in Freiburg for so long!'' 

Yup, I was there 6 months, that is crazy to me. That's longer than I was at BYU! lol 

Well, I defined myself there in Freiburg, and now I get to define myself again.

I found mahltaschen in Austria

Training is probably one of the most humbling experiences that I have ever personally experienced. I am constantly finding myself being humbled with Sister Wunderli.  

Sister Wunderli eating out on the patio

For example, I would always get so irritated when Sister Wunderli would ask what I was doing. Whether I was just standing up to get a drink of water or writing down a name of someone I wanted to call later that day, the question always came up 'Sister Peterson, what are you doing?  

What are you doing now?'' and for some reason it was really bothering me.

I had finally written it down so that I could tell her about it during companionship inventory, and of course, the question came 'Sister Peterson, what are you doing?'

Right when I was about to tell her, she finished and said 'I want to know what you are doing so I can follow you.  I want to be like you.' 

I cannot express the humility and guilt of how I felt in that moment. Yeah, at first it feels good to realize that in your companions eyes, you are perfect.  But then you just start praying for the day that they realize that you are NOT perfect and hope that they will still like you. It is a humbling thing to know that your companion is watching your every move, and that every word you say is touching their heart, whether it is building them up or tearing them down.  

I have no idea why President is having me train twice already, maybe he just knows that I need a lot of humbling!

Sister Jeynes left a note on my new desk

Well, guess who finally got to go to a wedding??  This girl!!  Well, it wasn't really a wedding, I guess it was just the wedding reception.  

But it was still way fun. "M", one of our investigators, was there with us and we had a great time. The only hard part about watching cute things like weddings and primary programs is that it makes me really excited to be a mom or get married!  Naja, that will come in 18 months time (at least lol)

The Linz ward Young Women- we taught on Sunday

I did realize something kinda cool. In Freiburg, one of my favorite desserts to buy was a little cake/pastry type of a thing called 'Linzetorte'.  Well, obviously enough, I found out at the wedding that Linzetorte is a special Austrian cake that comes from where? Linz! (Thus Linzetorte being separated means Linz Torte, or Linz cake.)  Was I destined to come here?  I think so!

We had an ''Area Book Finding Day'' on Saturday, and basically what happened is our district assembled in Wels and we all brought our Area Books We just made a bunch of calls for 3 hours. We called all of our potentials, former investigators, and any other people that we normally don't call.  At first I was kind of skeptical as to how everything would work out, but we actually set up a lot of appointments with potentials!  

Which is good, we need more investigators!  The Linz area has only been open to Sisters since May, so we are still a pretty new area and still setting up out foundations and such. In Freiburg, we never really had to do a lot of contacting because of how busy we were, but what's a mission without contacting, gel?

Well that's my life for this week!  I hope everyone back home is doing well.
Tschüssie!

-Sister Peterson