Thursday, September 5, 2013

Thursday, September 5, 2013 - Week 2

                                          Hermana Woolf on Day 1

                      President and Sister Freestone w/Hermana Woolf


From Left to Right Back Row: Elder Thompson, Elder Morgan, Elder Quesenberry, Elder Anderton, Elder Hamilton, Elder Grigg - From Left to Right Front Row: Hermana Woolf, Hermana DeSpain, Hermana Winger

 
Hi family! I am totally loving the CCM! That first day was soooo long. I didn't think I could go on after that day and do this for 18 months. But after that day, things have FLOWN by. I can't believe it's been over a week already. Our schedule pretty much goes as follows: eat, study, eat, study, exercise, study, eat, study, sleep. Repeat. It is a lot of studying, but so good. The Spirit is always so strong here. My district is AMAZING. I love them. I'll send you a picture of them. It's weird because they are all like 18 except one (elder hamilton) who is 21. But they all seem my age. Very mature. We have a testimony meeting every night together as a district in Spanish which is so cool. The Spanish is coming along. I kinda think in Spanglish right now, so I apologize if there are some random Spanish words in my emails. Haha. They expect you to progress very fast here so it's a little frustrating, but I'm learning so much faster than I thought I would. I learned how to pray and bear my testimony in Spanish by day 3. And we've been teaching an investigator (our teacher) in Spanish every night since Saturday. It is amazing that it's even possible. We teach for like 30 min and none of it is in English. There is an Elder in our district who is struggling a little to learn the language. He can't say very much and doesn't understand much either. But it was one of the most amazing things I have ever witnessed. Our 2nd day, he got up and gave his whole testimony in Spanish. It was incredible. The words just came to his mouth. There are so many experiences like that happening. Miracles truly happen when we have faith. On the 3rd day we all kind of had a melt down because we felt like we couldn't speak any Spanish (3rd day. I know. Obviously it takes longer than 3 days to perfect a language.) but we were already starting our lessons with the investigator and it was very difficult the first time. But it was great. It was an awesome bonding experience for our district. We all cried and then bore testimony of our purpose here and it was just amazing. I love being here so much and am so uplifted by the wonderful missionaries I'm with. So I met a missionary last night that has been out for 17 months and he was trained by Jacob Irrizzary! So cool! The food here is pretty great. We really do have rice for every meal. Haha. Well not breakfast. We get pancakes and eggs and bacon for breakfast. They are feeding us really good. It's weird to have rice every day, but they always make it different so it's good. Sunday night is pizza night!! :) And we get ice cream too! It's a good change. So on Sundays President Freestone asks us to prepare 3-5 min talks each week and then he just calls on people to come up and speak! It's kind of scary, but it will be a good experience. My teachers are amazing! My teacher in the mornings is Hermana Escobores and she is so nice! She's like a mom to me here. She's always coming up to me and giving me hugs and telling me I can do it. In the afternoon we have Hermano Nuñez and he is hilarious! Probably the funnest teacher here. At night we have Hermana Loriano and she is strict, but so kind as well. She is the one we are teaching as our investigator right now. The first day we taught her about the Book of Mormon and how God loves her and the next day we taught her about families being together forever and the ordinances we make in the Temple. Our next lesson is on chastity. Yikes! Kinda scared for that. Haha. But it will be good. We're very prepared for it and we know she needs to hear it. So we have 78 missionaries in total at the CCM. But like 50 of them are leaving on Tuesday. All of the other Americans and the Latinos all go out into the field. But we'll get new ones on Wednesday. It's just crazy that I'm already gonna be one of the oldest by week 2! We've made a ton of friends in the group before us so it will be sad to see them go. We get to take Temple walks almost every day which is great. I can't believe how beautiful it is. I get to go through an endowment session and do sealings after this! I'm so excited! Pdays are going to be wonderful! I get to talk to you guys, go through the Temple, relax and do whatever I want until 6 and then teach my investigator again. Next week we are going to have another investigator and a couple investigator so we'll be teaching 3 lessons some days. It's great! I am so happy here. So the mail is not so good. It goes to Puerto Rico and then someone has to go get it and bring it here so it doesn't come very often. They say I probably won't get any while I'm in the CCM. But it might go to the mission office and I can get it later. So in the DR, they have siesta which is like rest time between 12 and 2 every day so we can't go out and proselyte during that time. They say we just don't even go out until 2 every day when we're in the field and we have to come in at 8 because at night it gets kinda sketchy here and dangerous. We're really going to have to make good use of our time. And we can't eat at anyone's house ever because we don't know how they prepare their food and it could make us sick. So at least everything I eat will be something I like! :) Oreos are HUGE here. They love them. They eat them as much as possible. Oh so next week we get to go contacting at the University! I'm so excited! Hopefully they can understand my Spanish though. Haha. So enough about me. How are you guys? You got a job Jamie!? That was quick! You weren't even looking when I left! How are the glasses Dad? Are you getting used to them? And how is your job? That's awesome that Brother Solomon got called as a counselor. He'll be great! Well I love you so much! I'm praying for each of you each day too! Until next Thursday.

 Hermana Woolf

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