Email 22 - "I´ve never loved Gijón and the awesome people here more than I have this week."

 

"Some of the benches here have pedals for the old people to exercise. Like, for real. That is their purpose."

 

 

 

 "Look closely and you will find a woman walking her cat..."

  "Our piso has no can opener ;)"

 

"President Florin´s a champ when it comes to branch family home evenings led by the missionaries, haha."

 

 

 

 "The picture you sent is the same one I´ve got on my planner for this transfer! So inspired ;)"

 

 

"First three days of Christmas!"

 

 

 

"I love and miss you guys and I´ll see you soon!!! "

Hi family!!

Thanks for all the recordings and the photos!! I love them. I always take pictures of the computer screen so I can look at them later, haha. The camera and my voice recorder took the files like champs. :) I can´t wait to listen to them!

Brad and Kate look awesome in their band pics! Keep rockin´the trumpet and the sax! (F---- plays the sax, by the way. How cool is that? Too bad we don´t have access to a sax here...)

The plan is to Skype at 4:00pm Gijón time on the 25th. I´ll see you then! :D

And THANK YOU for the package! We are having such an awesome Christmas. Our piso looks amazing and we´re loving the little gifts. I don´t need packages to feel love from you guys, but there´s no denying the love coming out of that box, haha. We got it on Friday, so the 12 days started right on schedule. Thank you thank you thank you! (Oh, I´m sure you already know, but that CD you sent is the same concert that Tommy and I went to! So cool!)

We also finally made that pumpkin bread... and devoured it in 3 days, haha. We tried looking for canned pumpkin to make it again, but apparently Spaniards don´t like canned pumpkin, haha.

 

Ok, first thing first. ----- is totally himself again! We looked for him again without luck on Monday, and finally met with him with the Hermanas and Carmelo on Tuesday. There was a very noticeable change in his countenance as the lesson went on. We´ve met with him everyday since and he´s doing super well again. He loved the Primary Program that they put on yesterday and he even cooked paella for us at Gladys´s house after church yesterday!

 

We also met with M--ú a lot this week. She´s not in a very safe place. There are some crazy things happening in the piso where she lives now (she´s renting a room), but that little room where she lives has become a sacred place. There´s so many bad things all around there, but her room is filled with the spirit, and we always feel safe and very close to our Savior while we´re there. It´s incredible. 

 

There´s a 6-yr-old boy named J--n that lives there with his dad on the weekends, and M--ú said that he usually spends his whole stay with her, reading scriptures with her in her room. Hna Zitting decided to bring her comic-strip version of the Book of Mormon with her to give to him, and you should´ve seen that adorable kid´s reaction! It was so precious. So far he loves the story of Nephi and the broken bow. :)

 

Have I told you about R-----o and G--a and their family? They´re old investigators of the Elders that we´re teaching now. During our last lesson with them, G--a told us that she wants us to teach one of her friends (references from an investigator? And we didn´t even have to ask for it? Heck yes!). We´re teaching her now, too. 

 

And E---n´s getting baptized this weekend!! We´re having the Branch Christmas Dinner this Friday (we´ll finally watch the Christmas Devo!), and then his baptism the next day. The only problem we´re having with him now is that he´s falling in love with one of the JAS in the branch (not A--a, who first brought him to the chapel...), so we´re going to talk to him tonight and make sure he´s getting baptized for the right reasons... although I already know that he is :)

 

Oh, and remember how I told you how in the MTC, we were feeling a little frustrated with ourselves until that teacher gave us a pep-talk about progression? He told us that Matthew 17:20 was what we needed to remember:  "If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed... nothing shall be impossible unto you."

 

And he explained that, to him, this was a scripture explaining how important it is for us to have faith in our abilities to grow and progress- as a seed. That set the pace for the rest of my MTC experience and helped me have patience while I was there. 

Now that I´ve been in the field for a few months and I´ve finished my training, however, focusing on "progression," rather than "perfection" has been a little harder. I think it´s a lot easier to be patient with yourself when you´re just starting something hard and completely new, but that wears off as soon as you start thinking you´ve spent enough time growing and now it´s time to enjoy the fruits!

 

And I´m seeing some of the fruits :) Helping F---- and M--ú has got to be the most rewarding thing I´ve ever done in my life. And Hna Zitting has told me that occaisionally she forgets that, just three weeks ago, I was still a greenie, haha. I guess that means that I still do things to remind her of that ;) (It actually reminds me of one time when I was with the Brooker family, and little Kent Brooker was telling me all about the history and mechanics of the Titanic. I was super surprised at how, after such a mature conversation, he began to cry after his sister came up and grabbed a toy out of his hand. ..."Oh yeah, you´re only like, 5 years old!") 

 

ANYWAY the point of all that was just that even though I knew I´d be doing a lot of growing on the mission, I´ve only learned this week how big of a benefit it is to grow slowly.

Anyone can tell you that cramming for a test does nothing to help you learn/apply material. All it does is help you pass a momentary trial. 

 

And President Packer pointed out that "in the animal kingdom or the plant kingdom, things that mature quickly have very short lives. The mayfly is a good example. It is born, grows to an adult stage, mates, reproduces, and dies before the day is over. It was an adult about the time it was hatched. 

 

Things that grow slowly live longer. You will find that you will acquire the gospel ´line upon line, precept upon precept.´You may grow more slowly in mind and spirit, but you will learn and your learning will stay with you."

 

If we´re working on it- whatever "it" may be- God will bless us. And sometimes the longer it takes for us to learn our lesson, the better off we´ll be because what we´ve learned will stick and become a part of who we are.

 

And then come the fruits :D (Alma 26:31)

 

We may not be having a lot of lessons of much success out in the streets, but we´re working on it. We´re working hard and I´ve never loved Gijón of the awesome people here more than I have this week. 

 

Whoo boy, that was a long one. 

 

I love you guys so much!!! Have a great week and I´ll see you next Wednesday! :D :D :D

 

Love,

 

Hna Grover