June 10th- A Special Day

June 10th is usually a pretty special day around our house. It happens to be, not only Elder Davis's birthday, but also his mother-in-law's birthday.  Happy Birthday MOM! 

But this June 10th, was a little different.

Hey, we are on a mission,  what else could you expect? 

Elder and Sister Flake came from Lithuania to stay with us for a few days.  

On Saturday June 9th,  Sister Davis was out shopping with "the girls".  Sisters Millet, Segeberg and Flake wanted to shop while the men were attending a special 4 hour priesthood leadership meeting.

Four HOURS!!!

 What an opportunity... Sister Davis  knows Riga shopping nearly as well as the natives and everyone else needed a guide. Sister Davis took those Sisters to every discount store around and to two Humana Thrift Stores.  

And come to find out,  it was Elder Segebergs birthday on June 10th  also! Sister Segeberg and Sister Davis were both trying to find some unique gift for their husbands and neither of us was successful. Of course, it's not like we made it a priority....

And that night we had dinner at the Segebergs place (they are staying in the mission home until their Bulgarian visa comes through).  We had lasagna and Sister Davis was in charge of dessert so she made shortcake to go with some red, juicy strawberries that came from Spain.

We sang Happy Birthday to Elders Davis and Segeberg a day early.  Elder Davis would be turning 60 years old the next day but for that night, he was still 59.

The Adams joined in the fun. They are helping the Millets in the mission office right now and will be working with the young married couples in Riga.

And Sunday, June 10th was District Conference for Latvia! So where do you hold District Conference when there  isn't any church building big enough to hold all the Latvian Latter-day Saints?  Why the World Trade Center of course!  And it turned out to be a beautiful day...a nice day to walk since this building is a 10 minute walk from our apartment.

 The church rented a room on the bottom floor.  Bishop Stevenson, Presiding Bishop of the Church, and his wife came all the way from Utah to meet with the saints in Latvia. President & Sister Bennet, from Europe East Area, also came to speak. The meeting was great...especially because we got to hear from Eva, the new YSA member.  She did a fantastic job speaking in front of a large audience.  Way to go, Eva!

News FLASH!   Now you may not know (we have been pretty hush-hush about this) but our sweet red-haired Eva is in a relationship with the wonderful YSA,  Dainis. We wouldn't normally tell you that but we found out it it is on facebook, so it's not like you are the first to know. In fact, last week Dainis called up one evening and asked if he and Eva could stop by to eat some food they bought...."Well, of course!"  So they came by to eat and ended up having a date night at our apartment. We popped some popcorn while they watched a movie.  And now they are the cutest couple in Riga! Keep your fingers crossed that it continues to work out for them.

After conference was over (3:00pm),   we ended up with a houseful of YSA's...and it's funny but we don't know quite how that happened. You see,  at FHE we told several YSA's who had a long way to go home, they could come over after conference, bring a sack lunch and stay at our apartment before choir practice at 5:00.  But communication isn't always the way it should be in Latvia. Everyone came and no one brought any food. Sister Davis quickly got some tortillas out and made cheese quesadillas to satisfy the hungry crowd.  She was grateful for the help of Elder & Sister Adams who were invited over.
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And 10 mintues after the last quesadilla was done cooking, Elder & Sister Davis were headed up to the church along with all the YSA's.  We had 1 hour to practice before the devotional that Bishop Stevenson would be speaking at..
La, la, la, la....warm up those voices! Elder Davis was praying the choir wouldn't be too "off key".

And then the YSA's from Estonia showed up... and we quickly discovered they sang like angels. They joined our choir and WOW! the blend of voices was good!  It just goes to show you that the Lord does answer prayers.

Rihard, Juris, Elder Bennet, Roman & Maksims

(The thumbs up were because of a talk Sister Stevenson gave)

The picture below is of the whole group. In the front are Pres. & Sister Boswell,  Bishop & Sister Stevenson, Elder & Sister Bennet, Elder & Sister Senkans.

June 11th was also special...it was the first time every missionary in the whole mission was in the same place at the same time! What a good looking bunch! Can you find Elder & Sister Davis?  Sister Davis seems to have grown a little on her mission....actually she got a small stool to stand on for the picture and didn't realize how short Elder Bonner would look next to her!

The missionaries from Estonia and Lithuania rode in chartered buses to get to Riga for a morning with the Presiding Bishop.  It was a wonderful meeting.

And then E/S Davis headed out  to shop for food for FHE.
After all, it was Monday night!