Oh, I'm halfway there. Oh! Living on a Prayer!

Never have lyrics been so true!

First, Thanks Mom for the package! It was like Christmas for Hrmna Brown and I. The cookies are delicious/the clothes much needed...not like I don't have enough! Seriously...there have been a few moments of embarassement at how much clothes I actually do have. Hrmna Brown only packed not even a suitcase full and I was busting out of 2 haha. I'll need a lot more layers though in Chicago than she will in Cali. though.


Language:
So The language is coming...but I'm definitely freaking that I only have a month left until I join the real world of fast/native Spanish speakers. This last Friday we had an English fast. I was so envigorated that I knew more than I thought I knew...but we still didn't know enough to get through a planning session for a lesson we had to teach. H. Brown and I speant 20 minutes trying to get to the same idea...but we didn't know we were on the same page all along because of our limited Spanish. It was frustrating. We are doing every other day this week of English fasts and then hopefully by next week we will be Spanish all day/every day!

Chicago:
I don't remember if I told you-this winter is supposed to be the worst on record for record,...scary! Look up Hrmna Alverez who should have a video up of her entering the mission. The sisters from Utah that I knew were coming in the same day ended up getting their assignments changed. They were put on the pilot program of 6 week training. They will go through the same spanish/teaching training that I have for the first 6 weeks and skip out on the last 3 we have review. So they came when I was already 3 weeks in and will be leaving with me to Chicago still. Crazy! I haven't decided yet if I would rather be in and out of here in 6 weeks-that sounds both glorious and terrifying.

This week we add 2 new investigators so we will be up to 4 we teach. We went from having 1.5 hrs for comp study/only teaching one person a day to teaching 1-3 people every day. There is a never a moment of security here in the MTC. Always changing and always improving. I guess if we didin't have things to stretch us we would never improve, but a break here or there could be nice! haha. I'm so grateful for Sundays though. They are such a bright spot. Although we are busy, I get to take the Sacrament and to be made clean again...to have that opportunity to improve. Everything in all of our meetings this last week had so much personal relevance to me-loved it!

A. Elder Scott came as our Tuesday night devo. He talked about writing down all of our revelation. When we treat all of our promptings as sacred then the Lord will bless us with more...and as always-he talked about the importance of dating and not hanging out when we get home. haha. I love him and agree 100%

B. Awesome RS and Sacrament meeting talks that talked about difficulties in the mission that lead to knowing that they were exactly where they needed to be-exactly where the Lord wanted them to be.

C. The thought that I may not see the light at the end of the tunnel, but God does. He is the light and the tunnel aka the way. I love that imagery.

D. Motherhood is beauty -Stephanie Nielson. I love that I get to train for this oneday...and that I have such great examples of wonderful mothers in my life. I really have been born of goodly parents.

E. All of D&C 25. Study it and apply it. Music/supporting your companion. Great thoughts to apply. (this is what our fireside last night was on from Bro. Stephen Allen)

I make the MTC sound like its so difficult...but really there are so many fun times along with the difficulty. Hermana Brown and I are always laughing...and trying to find the fine line of having a little fun and "putting away childish things." Probably acting like Jim Carrey as the dinosaur from Series of Unfortunate Events isn't always appropriate...but sometimes very needed. haha.

hug hug, kiss kiss, little hug, big kiss

Hermana Moffat