Well, this week has been the weirdest week ever! One day this week I was literally wearing ALL the warm clothes i have here because it was raining and freezing cold and now here I am 2 days later dying from heat! The sun today is so hot! I´m pretty sure a sunburn is coming on. 

This week has been a week of growth and understanding. Growth because we´ve done a lot of this wrong this week, taken wrong turns, listened to wrong directions, used the wrong words and well you get the point. Anyways the truth is that I definitely have learned a lot from the wrong. Because now I know of a lot of things I shouldn´t do again. Also understanding, it´s crazy how much Hermana Trone and I understand each other, there´s something to being with someone for 3 months that you just wind up understanding they way they think, talk and feel. For both of us all we need is a certain look on the face from the other to know what our next step should be. I love it! But for new investigators there are a LOT of misunderstandings. I mean a lot, I just don´t even know how somethings can be so misunderstood, but I know the Lord is at the head of this work and what I need to do will happen.

Right now as a mission we´re preparing for our mission tour in February with Elder Dyches. As a Stake here in the Canary Islands we´re preparing for stake Conference ni March! 2 really exciting events in little time. The coolest part about the stake conference is that it´s only the 2nd stake conference ever here! The stake was only organized last year. I will most likely be here for that, I´m excited.

Love Hermana West

When I got the maple syrup for Christmas.... best day ever!

The beautiful city of Las Palmas.

Ice cream with Hna Trone and Hna Larsen for my bday.

Part of the Reyes Mago cabulgata!

Canary islands coat of arms has dogs on it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So it's the beginning of my 3rd transfer i the field so that means... training is OVER! No more extra hour of studying in the morning is basically all it comes down to. But I'm still with Hermana Trone so that's really exciting! It's her last transfer so she'll be going home the beginning of march and that's when I'll get a new comp.

Right now we're having so much fun though! I'm glad I get to have Hermana Trone as my companion I learn so much from her every day! Also she's pretty funny I laugh my guts out every day! Haha it's going to be a fun 6 weeks

This week we've been working a lot on updating our ward list. There are about 1000 names on it but only 130 come to church so we went on a quest to discover the lost sheep and check to see if people live at the recorded address and if not update the list and if they do still live there invite them to partake of the blessings of church attendance. 

We also got to paint the piso (apartment) of an investigator of the Elders. All 6 of us missionaries were working hard! It was fun because we don't do service very often.

We also had a baptism on Saturday. She was... an area book find/member referece. So her story is so cool. She is from the Dominican republic and has 3 daughters. She was taught by missionaries about a year ago until 1 month before I made it to this area. Anyways we called her and she wouldn't set up an appointment with us BUT she came to church the next sunday. (Side note is her husbands parents are members and have been bringing her 3 kids to church the whole time) Anyways she came up to us and was like your call was from God, I want to get baptised and be an example for my kids. So we taught her 3 times making sure she knew everything and she was baptised. Just another testament that it's God's timing and people's agency that's most important in this work.  She's so happy and is such a great example for her children and her husband.

One other really great blessing I received this week was being able to see 2 less active members that we've been working with at church! I love it! 

It was a great week I love this work and I'm grateful for everyone that supports me.

Hermana West

My week has been really good! Felizes Reyes! January 6th was the day when the 3 Wise men came to Spain to bring everyone presents! It was a fun day and we got to see the parade where they came in on... CAMELS! Haha it was epic and the whole city was on the street to see them that night! The coolest was the next day when they drove around on the back of pickup trucks waving goodbye to everyone! We saw them 3 times they really work hard! 

We had Zone training this week which is always awesome because we Skype in the other 3 islands for the meeting. It's really fun and I learned a lot about how to use an Area Book more effectively. 

We taught a lot of cool lessons this week where the spirit was so strong. I just want to say that the gift of tongues is real, there's no way I could say anything in Spanish without it! 

We went on splits for the first time this week, I taught with Sister Larsen (our mission couple) and my companion Hna Trone taught with a member. It was crazy because Hna Larsen and I are both pretty new to Spanish but it went really well! We explained Lehi's vision in 3rd Nephi and he really understood it by the end! 

It's the last week of my training and of the transfer, we're not sure if hna Trone will stay on the islands for her last transfer or if she'll go but we're going to work hard this week so we  can get ready for whatever comes! 

The last few weeks there have been problems at church with investigators either misunderstanding teachers or when teachers bring up opinions that some people take as doctrine. It's hard but I know that testimonies can stand through a lot if we build them up strong enough! 

Love you so much 

Hermana West

A picture from Hermana Trone's and my walk on PDay!

(sorry it's late, Charissa's mom got overwhelmed this week)

From Jan. 5, 2015
This week was fantastic! Thanks to everyone who wrote me for my birthday! It made my day today! I love you all so much! I hope this blog helps you feel a part of the spirit I get to feel while I'm here serving. It's the best feeling in the world. I wish everyone could feel it! And they can! If we follow the commandments we have a promise from God that we will feel the comfort of the spirit!

This week was awesome! We met with a couple really great less active members, I hope that they'll begin to feel the blessings of the gospel again by participating! 

Since it was New Years it was kind of hard to meet with people but it was a lot of fun with the few people we did meet with. 

We had a really great district meeting this week about the power the Book of Mormon has in conversion, it's so key and so wonderfully true!! I love that book so much. It helps me feel the spirit and know that we really have the priesthood on the earth!

So basically even though this week was slow my birthday did not disappoint, mainly because I have the best companion in the world but... also because the members here are honestly AMAZING! So in the morning I received a lot of phone calls from friends from the MTC and from President and Sister Jackson, it was so great to hear from all of them. Then we had a medio dia meal appointment with a member named Annie, she made an awesome cheesecake and we had a ton of fun! Then we had a lesson with Monica about how we have a living prophet. Then we had a lesson with our recent convert (the baptism from December) and she bought me a cake!!!!! Oh man it was the sweetest thing ever! Then we had an appointment fall through so we gua gua contacted for a bit.

This week church was really good we had a wonderful fast and testimony meeting and I really felt the spirit and learned a lot. 

This week is "Reyes" aka the day that only Spain celebrates when the 3 wise men come to bring presents... it's a bigger deal than papa noel. So it might be a couple days of no appointments and no people on the streets again but that's okay. I love this work!

I hope you all are doing well and staying safe and warm! 

Love 

Hermana West