Dos Hermanas in Dos Hermanas!!

Greetings from Dos Hermanas!!! It has been a crazy week! When we got here the Elders were here to pick us up and showed us around our piso and for the last few days they have been taking us around to show us things and to introduce us to members and investigators.

The new ward here is great! It isnt a very big ward. Also, there are Americans in the ward!!!!!!!! It is sooocool to be able totalk with them. We went over to our ward mission leader´s house-- he is half american half spanish, but grew up in america. His wife is spanish but i feel like i amin america in their house!!! he works on the american military base here so they have sooo much american food and stuff in their house!!!! i even for to drink a dr. pepper!!!! haha. it wasreally exciting!! haha

Things aregoing great. my new companion is wonderful! I do not feel overwhelmed like I thought i might. I feel supported by the Lord, bymy companion and by your prayers. It is a bit tough to be in a new place, and have a brand newcompanion, but things are going well so far!!! I amso excited about this challenge! We are basically starting the work fromground 0, and we will work work work until we find a lot of people to teach! This week is when we will actually get started because we wont be with the Elders this week... woo hoo. i am so excited.

Sevilla is soooo different from La Mancha. I feel like I am in Floridasometimes! haha it has that same feel--with palm trees and classic spanish style architecture... there is a big influence here from the arabs that occupied spain many many years ago... the buildings have tiles all over the walls with beautiful artistic designs... i will send photos soon! it is beautiful!

Thanks for allyour letters!!

Hermanas Conference in Malaga

So I am finishing up my last few days here in Ciudad Real. It is such a strange feeling to leave this area. I feel so excited to move on to Dos Hermanas, but at the same time, I am really sad to leave behind all of the people I love here in La Mancha. There is really something special about La Mancha that I do not think I will find anywhere else in the mission. This past few days, as I have started saying my goodbyes, I have realized how much I love these people and how much they love me. They are literally feel like they are family members. The members here are so impoortant to me--I just pray that they will see a baptism here soon so that they can get excited about missionary work again and really have more hope that the branch will grow.

This week we went to Hermana´s Conference in Malaga! It was sooooo fun! We were there for about 2.5 days and it was just great to see my old companions and also to meet all of the hermanas in the mission. President and Hermana Clegg do not have to have an Hermanas conference, they just do it because they want to. They are sooo wonderful! I feel so blessed to be in this mission!

Here are a few pictures from theSpain Malaga Mission Blog!

Twins!!! Valerie and Hermana Clegg have matching Swarovski earrings!

All 20 Hermanas in the Spain Malaga Mission at Hermanas Conference in Malaga.


Hermana Letendre meeting her new companion, Hermana Collett.
Hermana Collett & Val pointing to Dos Hermanas!!! Dos hermanas in Dos Hermanas, Spain!! How very cool!

Dos Hermanas!!

So this week was kind of a normal week, except this week, a LOT of people fallared us... (this means that they stood us up!). although we didnt have a lot of lessons, we had a good week! my companion and I were having a great week, then on saturday morning i received a phone call from President Clegg...............................He told me that I am going to be transferred rom Ciudad Real. I will be leaving Wednesday the 25th. I was not expecting to be transferred--i was thinking i would be here for one more transfer. Ok, so there is more news! President also told me that I will be going to an area that currently doesnt have hermanas--a city called Dos Hermanas!!!!! Right now there are Elders in Dos Hermanas, but the ward there has been asking for a set of hermanas. So, President is granting their wish and he is putting dos hermanas in Dos Hermanas!!! The Elders who are there are going to be moving to a pueblo outside of Dos Hermanas and we will be living in the Elder´s current appartment. Wow!! Dos Hermanas is located outside of Sevilla, so I will be going to Sevilla once a week for district meetings and all! how cool! oh... and that is not all. After President told me that I would be transferred to Dos Hermanas, he also told me that I will be training a new hermana. That´s right.... training! Whatttttt?! I couldnt believe it! This is sooo crazy! I was just barely trained. I only have 3 transfers in the mission, and I am going to train. Usually trainers have much more time in the mission. I felt pretty overwhelmed at first. It is really an interesting situation because I will be moving to a new area AND I will be training. We will have to learn the area together, we wil have to learn everything together! wow! President seems to have a lot of confidence in me, and so does the Lord. I am working on having confidence in myself! This is a pretty big task. I feel like I still need a companion who speaks better spanish then me, i feel like i still need a companion to turn to to ask what to do in certain siutations... but starting next week, I am going to be the one whois turned to.

This is all really unbelieveable. I can´t even believe this it really happened! I have so much to do to prepare myself to train this hermana!!! But, I am so grateful for this situation. It is going to be hard, but hard things always make us stronger--always help us to learn and to grow. Although I question whether I have the ability to do this, I know with all of my heart that with the Lord´s help I can do it. I know already that this is going to be an amazing experience-- that I am going to grow so close to the Lord because I am going to have to rely on Him so much more. I feel so honored that the Lord has so much faith in me and is putting one of his missionaries in my hands--to teach her and to guide her. What an opportunity! wow!! Can you believe it?!!

Working Hard in the Vineyard!

On dia de los reyes, some members took us our for churros and chocolate for breakfast, then we went out to their house in the campo to PICK OLIVES!!!!!!!!! I told them when I first found out that they have olive trees that I really wanted to help them pick them!!!! As you all know this is like a dream of mine!.... well I did it!!
we spent the morning picking 4 huge buckets of olives. Normally people dont pick the olives by hand like this.. but they dont have many trees, so this was the best way to do it. We did it in many different ways.. we also took big sticks and hit the top branches so that the olives would come off! it was soooo fun! it was soooo great!
afterwards, we stayed at their house in the campo to eat lunch! we had a very spanish meal of salad, cheese, pork, and chorizo!! it was sooo good! they have a special barbacue house that they cooked the meat on.. it was cooked on an open fire and was super delicious!!! it was such a wonderful day!!!!

Spain Malaga Mission Picture

Here are two pictures Valerie sent this morning of the missionaries from the Spain Malaga Mission!

Can you find Hermana Letendre.......

There always needs to be a silly one..... ;)

She may have to work on that... ;)

What a great looking bunch!!!!