A New Year!

Hello everyone and Happy New Year!

We're looking forward to another great year and hope you are too. I've done a little recap of our last month for your reading enjoyment. Sorry I didn't include pictures in this one. For all of you who don't like to read books without pictures, skim through this (or just delete it). For the rest of you, speed read and it won't be so bad.

We love you all so much and thank you again for your continued love and support. It was a FANTASTIC year for us and we plan on this next one being just as great. We wish you the same.

Love,

The Frosts


December 31, 2011

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!!!!

We left Utah in 2010 and now it’s 2012! Even though we have only been here for one year, it’s amazing how fast that time has gone by and how much we have done, seen and learned. We love our mission, we love serving the Lord, we love being with the missionaries, we love the people of Russia, we love the power of humanitarian service and the joy it brings to so many lives. This has been an incredible year for us, one that we will never forget, and one that has taught us so much about giving, doing, and loving the people around us. I’ve said it before but I think it’s worth repeating that we don’t have to leave the country to serve the Lord and help the poor and the needy. It’s right in our own back yards. It’s where we are, it’s where we go, it’s in our own families. All we have to do is open our eyes and our hearts and we can serve someone every single day. So much peace and joy comes from serving others, I hope you will all take advantage of that precious gift and blessing.

December just F L E W by. We were as busy as we’ve ever been and on the road traveling every single week. I’m thankful for our little 30 passenger plane that takes us from Voronezh to Moscow every week. They give us a piece of hard candy and a cup of water and by the time we put our seats back and close our eyes, we’re there. I didn’t mention this to most of you, but last September we were told by the Humanitarian Director that we needed to move to Moscow. They wanted us to go right then, but President Woolley needed enough time to request another Senior Couple to take our place here in Voronezh, so the plan was for that couple to come in February and that’s when we would find a new apartment and move to Moscow. We did tell our missionaries and our some of our Branch members, but the thought of leaving them both was becoming more and more traumatic for me. I love it here, and even though we would have a great experience in Moscow with other Senior Couples, we wouldn’t have the association with our missionaries like we do now. There are no Moscow West missionaries in Moscow. I was also dreading packing and trying to divide the things in the apartment here that belong to the Humanitarian Department and the things that belong to the Missionary Department. We spent about three weeks emailing with the new couple who are coming to replace us giving them as much advice and information as we could and trying to explain what we were taking with us and what we were leaving. Well, two days before Christmas we got a call from our Humanitarian Director who told us that plans have changed, a different couple is coming to Moscow to be the Country Directors and we will stay in Voronezh, still being the Country Directors, until the end of our mission. I guess we will spend about four months training them instead of four days. We were right in the middle of a District Meeting with our missionaries when the call came and we all shouted for joy! The BEST news ever!!!!!

I’m sure all kinds of things will change from now until we finish our mission, but at least we get to stay here so we will deal with the rest. We still don’t know where the couple that was coming here is going, but I’ll keep you posted as things progress.

This month in our Humanitarian work we were able to get our first order of 300 wheelchairs delivered to four different cities in Russia. It was a miracle! We found a manufacturing company to make the wheelchairs to the Church’s specifications, found four
organizations who wanted and needed our wheelchairs, got them all safely delivered and most of them have been dispersed to their new owners. Norm and I went to a hospital who got four of the wheelchairs for a closing (thank you) ceremony and Irina and I got our picture in the local newspaper. (I will attach a copy of the article and picture). It’s written in Russian but it basically says that an American couple, the Frosts, donated the wheelchairs through a foreign humanitarian organization. No mention of the Church at all, but at least it’s a step. Getting the Wheelchair project going here is a HUGE step and it took us a whole year to do it, but – we did it!

We also started the Employment Program in Moscow. The first week we taught all of the Ward Employment Specialists who were then supposed to teach the members in their Stake but they didn’t feel comfortable doing it yet so we flew there every Friday to teach another part of the Career Workshop. We tried teaching over skype the first time but we found it was very impersonal and we couldn’t feel or see feedback or reactions from the people in the class, so we decided to travel there instead. After four weeks of that, we called it quits, and told them that they would have to continue teaching the course on their own. They were very excited about the program just not very confident in their ability to teach it, but that will come with practice.
We have also continued to work on many small projects here in Voronezh and in other cities. It’s harder to work through other people who don’t know how to do all the paper work and get us the pictures and information that we need, but somehow it manages to get done.

Now, so you don’t think that we are these super great missionaries that can do anything, I want you to know that none of this would be possible if it weren’t for Irina. She is one of the greatest blessings we have had here on our mission. She’s an absolute angel and a miracle worker in getting all these things done. She completely manages the NRT (neo-natal resuscitation) program here in Russia, she deals directly with all of our humanitarian project organizations, she dealt with EVERY problem that we had with the wheelchairs and basically she does it all. Everyone calls her for answers to problems, it would do not good for them to call us. If she can’t answer the question she will call us but basically she knows the job as well as we do so she takes care of most of it. All we have to do is show up, smile for the pictures and take all the praise. We give her all the credit she deserves, but she lets the Church take the praise. She’s the best and we love her.

Christmas day was a wonderful, long, day with all 10 of our missionaries calling or skyping home with their families. We were able to meet their families and listen to the excitement of the missionaries as they talked. We had a Christmas dinner after Church, opened a few presents and then played games and had fun while they each took turns at the computer. Then we got to talk on a conference call with Eddie in Africa. Every time we talk to him it gets harder and harder to understand him. His accent is pretty thick. But he sounds great, loves his mission and is trying his hardest to be the best District Leader that he can be. We also got to talk with our own children and my parents, but we talk with them so much anyway that it wasn’t quite as critical as the missionary calls. Not that we don’t love them, Norm talks with at least one of his kids every day, and I talk with mine at least once a month so we keep pretty current on their lives. They are all counting down the days for our return and we are excited for that too, but we still have a lot to do before that happens. Sometime in May we, and Eddie, will return home but we don’t have any definite dates yet. The days, the weeks, and the months are zipping by so fast it will be here before we know it but until then, we will keep working as hard as we can here to serve and share the Gospel with as many people as we can.

I can’t say enough about how wonderful this experience is and still want to encourage any and all of you who are in the “Senior Couple” stage of your life to give this some serious thought. The Church NEEDS couples all over the world to serve and the missionaries who serve with senior couples have a much more positive experience. Whatever the reasons are that are holding you back, ask the Lord to bless you with the answers and solutions to make it possible and it will happen. Miracle after miracle happens here every day because the Lord is guiding our hands.
We love you family, we love you friends! We hope this is a wonderful year for all of you and that you will feel the Lords love and blessings in your homes.

Happy New Year!

Love,

The Frosts