January 25, 2016

Well, this week was a good week.

We went to Toledo last week to shop and site see. It was fun to see my
friends there.

We "heart attacked" one of our investigators that is trying to quit smoking.

The other picture is our investigator that is getting baptized on
Sunday! We are really excited for that.

This week we had a lot of great lessons, an exchange and world wide
missionary training. It was a great week and I am excited for this
week!

I love you,

Hermana West

January 18, 2016

Hello,

Well this week was a great week full of little miracles. Last pday was
a lot of fun spending time with my companion. She's the greatest. This
pday we are going to Toledo (a town where there's really old castles)
as a district. I'm writing this email on the way there as a matter of
fact.

On Tuesday we had a leadership council at the mission home. That was
really fun. I was able to see Hermana Rossberg and a lot of other
friends who are sister training leaders. It was an inspiring meeting
getting us ready for the world wide missionary training this week. I
was also privileged to give my testimony. It was an amazing meeting
and I'm so grateful I had the privilege of being there.

Anyways Hermana Rossberg and her companion came to stay with us
Tuesday night because they had some residency stuff to do. It was so
fun to go and teach with Hermana Rossberg again! Our Spanish is sooooo
much better now. Then we got a call telling me that the temple is
closed for our programmed temple trip and that if I wanted we could go
with them to the temple Wednesday morning! Well the temple was
amazing, I loved it. It was my last time with my companion and I'm so
grateful I was there with my friends.

We then had a crazy week with a lot of lessons, a lot of people
failing us and a lot of miracles. It was a great week and the people
we teach are amazing. Sonia is having a hard time quitting smoking and
Nicole still hasn't received an answer abound Book of Mormon. Gerardo
and Lenin came to church for the first time yesterday and I am so
excited for all of them. They have all progressed so much since I've
been here!

Love you
Hermana West

January 11, 2016

It was a great week this week, we are working with a ton of amazing people. We are doing some crazy fun things for pday today so I don't have a lot of time. 

This is a traditional "roscon de Reyes " or ring of kings. It is the
dessert the eat for three kings day which is January 6th, this is us
celebrating it with and investigator last week.

It was SO good! 
Hermana West

January 04, 2016

This week I am going to tell you about my week in pictures!

We'll start on the 31st when we had surprise interviews with
president. Well they did us four sisters first and then took us to
Costco! It was great because we got some peanut butter, hummus and
brownie mix. All really nice thing to have! So this is us really
excited with Hermana Pack hanging out in the only Costco in Spain that
only opened a month or two ago. It was so much fun!

Well on the 31st we did the Spanish tradition or eating 12 grapes the
12 seconds counting down until midnight. I mean we did it at 11pm but
it was still fun!

My birthday on Sunday Jan 3. My companion decorated my planner and our
friend Sonia bought me a cake! It was a great day full of lessons and
food!

A continuation of the party Sonia had for me, she's great!

Then the best part, last night my companion made me these, yes they
are orange rolls and yes they are delicious. My companion is the best,
as in amazing. She made them for today because we were fasting
yesterday morning.

Then today we went bowling as a district! As you can see my companion
beat me by 2 points but we smoked the elders! Haha it was a great p
day today and a great week.

December 28, 2015

Hello,

One question, what happened to the rest of 2015? I feel as though this year has just flown by!!

I can't believe it was just Christmas and that January is just around the corner, that's mostly because there's no snow on the ground. In fact it hasn't been very cold at all here. I'm still not wearing tights it's that warm.

It was a busy but slow week this week. With everyone on vacation half of our people haven't answered their phones all week. Where as there are are a few that call us every day and want to meet because they don't have family here. And then there are the extra amazing people that even with their own families they make us dinner, cards presents, and make us feel loved. It was a Christmas that I will always remember and treasure. I am so grateful for everyone that is here and everyone at home who helped me have an amazing Christmas.

This week we were really busy on Monday having lessons because our pday was changed to Christmas Day. It was cool and amazing how blessed we were that day because we had a lot to do. Tuesday was pretty cool because we had an investigator that's 18 come to an activity where we watched "The Best Two Years." That was fun to watch as a missionary! 

Then Wednesday I was able to go on an exchange with Hermana Toone! I love her, and the last time we did an exchange she was the sister training leader. Now she's tearing it up in Toledo and I was privileged to be able to spend a day with her. She's a great missionary that loves the Lord and wants to work hard. I'm grateful for her example and friendship. 

Thursday we switched back companions at the Christmas devotional we had as all the missionaries in Madrid. We had a musical program, a white elephant gift exchange and   We went caroling on the steps of the temple. It was great. 

That night we headed back home to eat at a members home and then make sugar cookies and sleep in our Christmas pajamas. On Christmas Day we opened our presents and then headed to the church for a district breakfast of pancakes, fruit and Christmas candy... 

Then the rest of the day we had a lunch appointment and then we Skype at the home of a member and then we brought our cookies to the house of a member who is a single mom of four and played with her and her kids the rest of the night. It was an amazing Christmas!

The rest of the week has been slow but I am so grateful for my area, my mission, and currently I am most grateful for my companion who loves me even when I'm not perfect and who makes this time here really special, this Christmas wouldn't have been as great without her.

I hope you're all ready to make New Years resolutions!

Love 

Hermana West

Hanging out with an investigator and recent convert in the 26th, she
made us dinner and bought us a Christmas present! She is the sweetest!

The Christmas devotional, hanging out with my favorite mission friends

December 14, 2015

It was another great week here in 3rd ward...

Except that I had a sick companion... She was hit with a pretty bad flu the poor thing. 

But like a trooper we were out most of the week visiting everyone. She did awesome with a body that was not cooperating. We got quite a few lessons in and feel happy with the week. She did infect me a little bit but a cough can't stop me!

Little miracle of last week was that we received a member reference from another ward and he is awesome. He's really interested and is willing to do his part. The only thing is that he is new to the area and doesn't know how to get around very well. So it's hard to get him to church because he is always complaining how he'll get lost, we'll have to take a good 40 minutes one day to teach him how to take the metro to the chapel.

This next week is going to be awesome, with 2 almost healthy missionaries there's nothing in our way!

I hope you know that I know we have a savior who loves us, I know he lives and I know that he was born so that we can live with our Heavenly Father again. 

Merry Christmas! 

Love Hermana west 

December 7, 2015

Well, this week was awesome! We had our friend Calixto get baptized on Saturday and he is sooo happy! It was a great service, one of the people that was going to talk was super late. So I wound up giving the talk about the Holy Ghost. It was cool because last year exactly at this time I gave a talk about the same thing at Loida's baptism. It was a cool experience to see exactly how much I have grown so n the last year!

This week was also transfers, the last one until February. We are staying together and are so excited and happy. The sad part is that they are taking out the other companionship of Hermanas in the ward. They're awesome and we are going to miss them. But it's cool because one is going to the islands and the other to San Sebastián de Los Reyes, they're going to love their new areas. At the end of the day I am probably the most blessed and happiest hermana right now. Seriously though I have an amazing area, a lot of work to do and an amazing companion that is helping me become better every day. I am so happy.

This week we had the leadership council, wow, it was an awesome meeting filled with the spirit. I really enjoyed it and I'm glad I was able to be there. One really cool part of the council was that every sister I started with was there! It was a blessing to be with all my MTC friends at the same time, we got a picture and it was just such a blessing! 

Another miracle from this week, we are teaching a young man that has a less active dad and a mom that is against the church. He is not allowed to get baptized because his mom won't give him permission. It is hard for him to get excited about doing church things but last week we had zone conference and president asked that we now make seminary and institute a priority for the people we teach, invite them, go with them, he knows this will help our friends a lot! So we invited him to go to seminary and he talked to his parents and has permission to go! I'm so excited for him, I think this will show his mom that he's willing to sacrifice for the gospel.

This week looks to be very busy as we are taking over all of the other hermana's people... I hope we'll come out on top!

Have a good week!

Love

Hermana west



My mtc group together again after more than a year!

We are a little excited for Christmas

Calixto's baptism