White Milk & Bucket Showers

Hola!

I am in Mexico!

The flight there was a bit long. Our plane to Veracruz got delayed an hour, so we didn't arrive until about 12. President Treviño met us there with his assistants.

Fun fact. Which is also quite cool. I am the first Canadian President has had. And I'm the fourth generation of non-Latina hermanas. I don't really know what that means. But it's new, I guess.

Missions. From this first week already, they are hard. I remember just after I received my call I was talking with Jessie and Brandon  Tanner. Brandon was saying that there were some days where you just wanted to cry. It has already happened for me. But, I know it is all worth it. I don't know Spanish and I just want to share the gospel with everyone, but it's hard when I don't know everything that everyone is saying.  Anyone who has thought of a mission but have doubted yourself. Stop it. I say that to myself as well.   Stop doubting. I don't speak Spanish well. But let's remember the prophets like Moses and Joshua. They didn't think they were powerful enough to lead God's people. They had doubts. Even the greatest people have doubts. But God will provide a way. He will give you the gift of tongues, whether that be in a different language or your own language.

I will speak Spanish better. I just have to remember that it takes time.

So I missed a lot. First night, the Hermanas slept in a hotel 5 minutes away from the mission home. It was so hot and humid! I didn't sleep with a blanket that night. The next day we had meetings with the assistants and secretaries of the president, Hermana Treviño, and we met our trainers.

Mine is Hermana Orduña. She's from another place in Mexico, I forget where. She barely knows any English, so it can be a little difficult to communicate. But I know this is where I will learn lots. Hna. DeFriez said that when her dad had a Mexican companion (he served in Mexico), he learned more Spanish than with his previous companion who was from the USA.

I'm in the Cordoba Zone. It's inner Mexico so it's not as humid and apparently one of the coldest places in the mission. Perfect for me. Speaking of zone, we had a zone conference my second day. I barely understood a thing. Funny thing, in my zone is Elder Dial. I found his blog and looked through it a little bit after I received my call.

My District: My trainer and me, Elder Boyd who is from Idaho,  and Elder Lopez (who is a huge joker and trickster) ...I forget where he's from. And two other Hermanas. Hna. Ledek, from the US and Hermana Zarate from Bolivia. So it's nice to have two English speakers in my district.

We go to members houses for lunch and to share a scripture. They are all so nice and the food is all good. I don't always know everything that I eat, but most times I do. The grossest thing I've had is white milk. Yuck. Last house I shared a scripture. Mosiah 4:9. I encourage everyone to read it.

I don't know too many of the investigators yet. When we planned to visit them, it almost never happened. But we had some investigators that got baptized on Sunday-- that's the day we have baptisms. They are so sweet! They said that they felt so happy after their baptisms. 

I've also met some less actives. One house has dogs and they are so cute.

My house. It does not have an oven so I can't make cookies. We have a hot plate though. We also use buckets for our showers. I actually love it. We heat the water in the buckets with some heater things. ... with that you can tell my English is really going down the drain.

For our Pday today, we went to this place that was part craft fair and part taking fun pictures. And I know I'm supposed to lock my heart, but today I fell for Superman. I hope this isn't too disjointed.

Love,

Hermana Jones

The Hermanas and two of their teachers at the MTC

The only picture we got from Mexico...

I Still Hiccup

Hola todas las personas quien leer mis cartas,

Last week in the CCM. Less than a week. Wow. This week itself has been going by super fast. Are we ready? We're a little worried. We know enough Spanish to try to get a point across in our lessons. But we have SOOO much more to learn. I guess that's going to have to happen in the field. Remember before I left I was feeling every emotion? It's kind of like that. But I feel it more. So... I just have to put my trust in the Lord and remember that with Him I can do all things. Everyone should read Alma 26:12. It is my favourite scripture because it reminds me that our Heavenly Father strengthens us and with Him we can see miracles happen. Read the whole chapter. It's fantastic.

I've loved my time at the MTC...or the CCM as we call it here at the West Campus. Assuming that Devon Healey  is coming to the CCM, he is in for a treat. I remember one of the Elders back home said the CCM is a weird campus. It's not, it's the best. There are so many things here that you can't experience at the MTC main campus. You get to know the cafeteria staff a little better. The cafeteria is small here, whereas it's huge at the main campus. When I was in Vegas, one of the staff noticed and asked where I had been that day. You also get to say thank you when you hand your tray to the dish pit. It's all automatic at the main MTC.  You get to see the mountains every day when you walk from your residence to the classrooms.

You get the ducks. I love the ducks at this campus.  You ride The Ryde (the bus) to go to the temple and you have awesome drivers. Our favourite is Logan. He's an awesome hipster.  The teachers here are awesome.   Espeically mine.

Conference was amazing. We watched it at the main MTC so we were there for two days. I forgot my notebook in my classroom. But I am grateful for Elder Ballard's talk, the importance of follow up. We've been learning about making important committments lately. I try to do the committments that we extend to our investigators and see what I learn.

For our Sunday Night devotional, a 9 man acapella group from BYU came to sing to us. Vocal Point. They were so good! They had inspiring messages as well. To remember our purpose.

 On Monday I was in Vegas all day. It was tiring. It wasn't as exciting as it sounds. When we were outside taking a break at this institute, this guy came up to us Hermanas and started talking to us. I think it's because he saw a bunch of pretty girls from the distance. We told him we were missionaries, and he when he went back to his friends he basically told them 'never mind, they're missionaries'. We went to the consulate to take fingerprints for our visas as well as another picture and we got dropped off at the airport after. We were there at about 2:00pm. There were 11 of us. We ate our lunch/dinner at California Pizza Kitchen at the airport and I got a thai chicken pizza -- it was really yummy. Our flight was supposed to come at 6:40 but it got delayed until 8:25. So.... we didn't get back to residence until about 12:00. When I got home, I brushed my teeth and just went to sleep in my dress.  I didn't wake either of my companions up :).  I missed learning and being in the MTC that day.

Tuesday morning my zone was happy to see me, and I was happy to see them.  I hiccuped when Hna. Orr walked into the classroom and she said "I missed those hiccups."

We all LOVE our district. They are awesome. We both have our study periods at night, and they like to invite us to their classroom so that we can have a closing prayer together. I feel closer with them than I have the previous districts, so I'm excited for the missionaries that come in our zone after them.

I'm sorry that this letter is shorter than my previous ones. Sometimes it takes longer for me to collect everything that I want to say.  And I never get to say everything that I want to.

I'll end with this:

My companions needed a pep talk last night because of all the stress right now. As Senior companion, I took the lead in that. There are days that are awesome and that we love. There are also days that are so hard and we just want to go home and cry. But every day we grow a little more. We may not recognize it at that moment, but it happens. Think of your favourite scripture and why it inspires you, and each time you have a hard day, read that scripture and remind yourself why it means so much to you. I have grown a lot this past month, and I'm excited to see the growth that happens throughout my mission. One reason we are here on this earth is to grow and be perfected.

Until Mexico.

I love you all.

Hermana Jones

Just for you, Al. The candy cane skirt.

One of our elders and another elder from main we thought looked like him.

On the way back from to residence. Listening to Christmas music. I
actually liked listening to it.

I just needed chocolate.  It was a stressful night of language.

Guess Who We Saw?!

Hola Familia y Amigos!

So . . . a lot happened this past week. Where do I begin?!

So Hna. Furner's foot/ankle might be broken. On Friday we were late in getting out for gym, so people were trying to rush out of the doors. The doors to the gym are revolving doors. Hna. Furner was behind Hna. Fletcher, but she didn't know that. And Hna. Furner's foot got caught in the door. We're hoping it's nothing too serious and that she can come if not with us, if not then shortly after.

Speaking of going places, I'm going to Vegas on Monday for my visa stuff. Hermana. Bullock is going on that trip as well and we're excited about that. I love seeing her around campus! If we're not in earshot, we always wave to each other.

One thing I forgot to mention is that we have devotionals on Tuesday and Sunday nights.

We've been hearing from the quorum of the 70, and people that work with the MTC & missionaries. They're really good. There was this hustle about Sunday night, so we thought that maybe a general authority was coming. So... we made sure to get good seats. Like 20 feet away. However the screen showed that the speaker was Richard Elliot. We were disappointed it wasn't an apostle.  The name sounded familiar.  We figured out that he plays the organ for MoTab.  When he walked in, alongside him was David Archeleta. True Story. Not joking. Our district had a little fan-girl moment.  He barely got off his mission from Chile. He bore his testimony and sang a few songs. Voice of an angel. Be Still My Soul, Come Come Ye Saints. I didn't write down the last song. But, he sang the first 3 verses of it, and we sang the fourth verse with him. So...I have sung with David Archeleta. Along with a another few hundred people.

Sunday, said goodbye to the Elders in our zone that were leaving, and our Elder friends from another zone. The ones we played volleyball with. Both districts gave us so much candy. Including a lot of Reese's. Plus some items we're supposed to pass down to the Elders that come. We got them because there were only Hermanas in our district. But we get to sign them. So we're like... honorary Hermanas. Haha. Or something. They're gonna be awesome.

AND WE HAVE A NEW DISTRICT!!!! We found out on Sunday, and we've been so excited! They arrived yesterday. 4 elders and 5 hermanas. Ususally, the zone leaders and sister training leaders come in the Wednesday night for a little orientation. But since we only have an STL*, Hna. DeFriez and I were able to join her. One of the new Hermanas has lived in many different countries, as her dad works in the military. We think this new district is pretty awesome.

So...apparently our district is an example district on this West Campus. I'll explain. So, lately we've been having instructors coming in and observing our class and they are really impressed with us. We are involved in our learning, and we HSI** a lot. We probably speak 70-80% of Spanish in our classes. We were told two days ago that we'll be meeting the American Ambassador for Croatia. The Croation bound missionaries have been off and he's been an ambassador for Spain before, so he knows Spanish. He came in yesterday and told us that ambassadors come in the smooth things over with visas or something. So that they know we're not going on our missions to spread North American culture, but for a purpose. And we get to eat at Main Campus! Which we're also excited about. We're also meeting Elder Hinckley, President Hinckley's son.

Obedience Brings Blessings. Exact Obedience Brings Miracles.

General Conference is this weekend!!!! We are so excited!!!! We're told that as missionaries, through general conference we can receive a lot of revelation. We're also watching the women's broadcast when the Elders watch Priesthood. I encourage everyone, whether you're a member of this church or not... to watch it. For everyone to prepare questions for it and listen to the voice of prophets, seers, and revelators.

I can't believe how  fast time has been. It's already April. It's my birthday this month. What???

Amazing things always happen at the CCM. I love it here!

Love,

Hermana Jones

*We do not know what STL means 

**We do not know what HSI means 

Hermana Bullock!

Missionaries are great at sharing

Dork Dot Day

Tessa's very first day at the MTC

*it appears this video only works on a desktop computer*

It's Raining!

Hola!

It's raining right now.  Last night it snowed a little bit. So from yesterday afternoon to evening to now, rain - snow - rain, little layer of snow.  1 mm or something is my guess. We were in the middle of our companion study last night when we saw the snow.  We went outside as a district and enjoyed it for a minute or two.

Speaking of districts, after this Monday, we are going be the only district in our zone. The last district before us is leaving. We really hope we get a new district on Wednesday. The district leaving is all Elders. Unfortunatley, one of the Elders needs to go back home because his knee is messed up. Our Elder friends from the other zone are leaving Monday as well, the ones we play volleyball and other sports with during gym.

Speaking of sports.... the other day, Hna. DeFriez, and another Hermana were playing speed (a basketball game) with a couple Elders. All good and fun. The last minute of gym, one of the Elders threw a basketball and it hit the side of my face. Not a huge impact. But huge enough to break off the arm of my glasses, and as a result, I now have a war wound on my face. The Elder felt really bad. So...I'm sending my broken glasses home. Good thing I have another pair. I don't think I'll be wearing glasses during gym again.

We have another investigator! We have her during TRC time, everyday after our first block of classes. Some investigators they bring are real, but they never tell us. If she isn't a real one, she is very convincing.

Because there are more teachers than districts right now, ours is getting plenty of help from some of the teachers. One of them is Hna. Osborne. She served her mission is San Francisco. She also studied abroad in Honduras for 4 years. The other day she told me she wanted to help me during Language study.  She told me I have a good vocabulary, I understand how to use the grammar, and she wanted to help me with my pronounciation, which is something I struggle with.  She helped me to understand where you stress the words and how to pronounce the r's and z's, which are a bit different than English. It helped SO MUCH!!! We read scriptures out loud in Spanish. I came back and my companions were like "whoah... you speak so much better now." I'm glad I had that. They want extra help with Hna. Osborne now.

I'm not sure if I've clarified about the West Campus, so I'll do that. We are not part the of main MTC. We're actually a five minute drive away.  When we need to get there, or go to the temple, we take a bus. It's a BYU bus. Last P-Day, the bus driver was telling us he served an ASL mission in Los Angeles... I think. Our residences are apartments, which I stay in with my companions. Hna. Fletcher sleeps partially in the hall on the couch cushions since her room only has her as her companion never showed up. We walk outside a lot.  I love it.

Last week, Hna. DeFriez was saying that when she was younger, her dad would recite 2 Nephi 2:25. I told her that it was the same in my household. It's funny... our similarities. She's also terrified of bugs and she loves Reese's Peanut Butter Cups.  Hna. Orr also loves photography, baking, and reading.  Hna. Furner, like me, doesn't know her plan after her mission.  Hna. Fletcher also has polka-dot rain boots, and loves Frozen. She's seen it 6 times in theatre.

As  a district, we love to sing, disney songs included. The other day in our apartment, I started singing the first song in Beauty & The Beast, and Hna. Fletcher and DeFriez joined in at the right moment. We try to revert ourselves back to hymns.

For one of our TRC's, we got to see Hna, Applegate again. She forgot who we were. A funny thing she said is when she prayed, she asked forgiveness for her fish, instead of sins. Fish = pescado. Sin = pecado.

Oh.. I'm the senior companion now.  Hna. Fletcher is the Sister Training Leader.  On Sunday I go to extra meetings. I go to branch council in the morning, and in the afternoon I went to a training meeting . I also conduct the music in our branch. The 3/4 messes me up a little, you'd think it'd be the easiest...

Okay...funny story. Last Thursday when P-Day was over, Hno. Stewart was teaching us. Near the end he said to us "Les Quiero". We were trying to figure out what that meant and Hna. Orr was translasting .... "he wants us".  After 10 seconds of silence,  we all burst out laughing. It actually means I love you, in a platonic kind of way. Yesterday before dinner she was saying "Yo Tengo hombre."  a man instead of the word for hunger. Hno. Stewart said "Yo no tengo mujer" (a women). We all mess up time to time.  With that we laugh at ourselves. Like...with Hna. Applegate and we were talking about the Atonement, I shared John 3:13, but I was trying to share John 3:16. Spanish of course, I don't have everything down yet.

I'm sorry this letter was a little all over the place. Before I had time to write points of what I would plan to write, but that got taken away by us having to take mirror selfies.
I'm learning so much! I love the scriptures! The Gospel is true!

Love,
Hermana Jones

The Ducks are named Lehi and Sariah.

Hola mi familia y mi amigos!

It seems crazy that I've only been here for two weeks. It seems like a lot longer. After gym, we saw the bus coming in with the new missionaries. Throughout the day I kept my eyes peeled for Hermana Bullock. I saw her at dinner in the cafeteria. I came over, gave her a hug and a welcome to the MTC (or CCM, as it is said in Spanish). She seemed to be doing well. I look forward to seeing her the next 4 weeks around the campus.

On P-Day we went to temple, and it was great. I felt like a little kid at Christmas as the Provo temple is so much bigger than the Edmonton temple, and so pretty.

There's this place outside of campus where we're allowed to go on P-Days. It has a few food places. We went there for dinner, and went to this burger place which was yummy. We also went to this ice cream place called Sub-Zero. They make it in front of you, with liquid nitrogen. It's simply milk, your flavour, and topping. Mine was peanut butter and peanut butter cups.

When P-Day was over, we met a new teacher. Hna. Young. We love her! She served her mission in Chile. We also have another new teacher. Hno. Stewart, who served his mission in Paraguay.

We had a birthday! Hna. DeFriez turned 20 on Saturday. Her sister and her brother in law sent a cake that they made. Hna. Fletcher's parents also sent her a birthday present! It was a lovely day! The day before we had a card passed around the zone to wish her a happy birthday.

On Sunday, I got a new assignment. I'm the Music Coordinator. Basically, I pick the hymns that we sing for our branch. Which is now tiny. We went from 4 districts in it, and now there's only one besides our own. A district of Elders.

On our Sunday walk, our Elder friends from another zone couldn't find their district. So we took a volleyball picture together. They share our gym time.

We went to Choir practice on Sunday. And I was chosen to say the closing prayer. It was on our campus, so just the Spanish missionaries. That prayer, I wasn't entirely sure what to say. It was really short and I felt really short of myself because it was so short. But this Hermana behind me, she asked how long I've been here, and said that it was a great prayer. As a native Spanish speaker, she still stumbled across the words and was impressed by me. Heavenly Father knows us! He knows I needed that.

On Monday, we went to TRC, I don't really know what that means. But basically you talk to members of the church in Spanish. There was this one lady, Hna. Applegate, and she was so sweet. She's this grandma, and when we were done speaking with her, she gave us all a great grandma hug. I hope to see her again.

Our lessons we teach are not real investigators. They're roleplays. But they're great! We always evaluate ourselves after and see what we need to work on. I think that for whatever we have in life, we should always have something we want to work on. We are imperfect people, trying to become better. We have two investagators now, and we're picking another one up tomorrow.

I'm learning so much! I know I'm supposed to be here!

The ducks are named Lehi and Sariah.    

Love,

Hermana Jones

*Disclaimer* We have no idea what the ducks are.  Anybody?

Introducing Hermana Jones!

Hola Mi Familia y Amigos!

Crazy to think I´ve been here a little over a week. First question everyone has been asking: my companion! I actually have two here. Hermana DeFriez y Hermana Fletcher. Hrma. Fletcher´s didn´t show up so we are a trio! I love them! They´re both from Utah. Brigham City, and Orem respectively. Hrma Fletcher finds my Canadianisms funny. Especially when I say bag.

First day... very foggy.  It was great to see Uncle Chris and visit with him as he drove me to the MTC. It was so cool to get my badge. Hermana Jones. So after I got everything to my residence ... oh yes, I am on the West Campus. All the Spanish speaking missionaries are there.  I got to my classroom, which is in an apartment. And I met my district. We are all Hermanas and all going to Veracruz. The other companionship in my district is Hermana Orr y Hermana Furner. They´re pretty fantastic as well! 

My teacher is Hermana Ashby. She is the sweetest little thing. She served her mission in California. I forget where.

At dinner, I saw Elder Cruz (instagram), and Hermana Blankmeyer (facebook), so that was really cool too. 

We met our branch presidency and their wives on Thursday. I really like them. One of the counsellors, Brother Liston, served his mission in Edmonton. He remembers the street he lived on. He loves Edmonton! Sister Liston was saying if it wasn´t so cold they would think of living there.

Speaking of weather. It´s quite decent over here. Most days I don´t have to worry too much about a coat. But it´s been a little chillier these past couple of days.

We taught our first investigator on Friday. All in Spanish! We had our last lesson yesterday, which was sad. We really grew to love her. And we sure learned a lot in that experience. The first two lessons I feel we focused more on being worried about Spanish than really teaching her and showing we loved her. But the last two lessons were excellent! We started with her not really knowing a whole lot about God. She grew up in the Catholic church but stopped going as she grew older. Her sister has been a member of our church for 10 years now. We committed her to baptism, so that was really exciting.

Spanish... it´s going well. Taking French has definitely helped. I can see the similarities. I like Spanish because you actually pronounce everything.

I´m gonna skip to Sunday, because it was a bit of a funny day. So we didn´t know the night before that it was daylight savings. So... we missed breakfast. First thing is Relief Society. We go to the chapel on campus and we get a broadcast from main campus. And for sacrament meeting we go on a bus to another chapel and have it separately in our branches. The branch is our zone. We need to prepare a talk for each Sunday. There are two talks by missionaries but we don´t know who until the meeting. Hrma. DeFriez was chosen, she didn´t prep anything, but the talk she gave was wonderful. Also...it has to be in Spanish. One of the wives said it was the first time she´s seen in 1.5 years that a new missionary gave a talk.

Sunday night we have a devotional at main campus. It was someone from the board of something. I forget.

We have gym periods every day except pday and Sunday. I´ve been playing volleyball with my zone and another one. I am bad at it but I have become better. I even spiked the ball over the net once! And we don´t keep score and don´t go by all the rules. 

We also have devotional Tuesday night, Don R. Clarke from the 70. Tuesday I had a different companion for the day since my district but we went to SLC for their visas. She was leaving the next day and her comp left the day before.

Yesterday... that was our last lesson with our investigator. She sent a video to us telling us how she felt when she taught us. It was so weird to hear her in English!

I´m learning lots here. And you can definitely feel a strong spirit here!

Love,

Hermana Jones