Best Sacrament Meeting of the year

Want to know what the best sacrament meeting of the year is?!  The primary program... :) It was so perfect... I was tearing up, and I don´t cry very easily. The theme was "Families can be Together Forever" and kids are just so darn cute. One of my favorite songs they sang was ´Armies of Helaman´ for the chorus they turned to the audience and had us sing too  ´We will be the Lord´s missionaries´... It was killing me.  Loved it so much.

We had quite a few rainy mornings this week and we made a new tactic (because when there is rain... people don´t really like to stop and talk ...) so we made a few big batches of cookies and have made a new focus on working with members. It was really cool to see the different ways the spirit works on the different members to help us with the missionary work. I´ve thought a lot about how different missionaries have different approaches and strengths with the work... and this week we saw that in the members as well.  Some members were all excited about starting an FHE in their home where we could invite investigators, menos activos and such... other members would go through the ward list-giving us members that we could stop by, some that maybe needed a little extra help, or would have some friends, some members gave us the number of their friends, and some helped us out of the cold and gave us some hot chocolate.  I really like this ward... it was really cool to be more part of the ward and see them work in their own ways according to their own strengths.

Anyway... we were really guided by the Lord this week... haha  I feel like you have to be when it is always raining and there is no one really on the streets. haha but I can just tell that God loves his children, just to see the way he works miracles to make sure everyone is taken care of and gets their needs met. It is the greatest to be on both sides of it... God is always answering my prayers, and He lets me be part of answering the prayers of others.
 

One really cool thing this week: we were meeting with a member that is starting to come back to church... we were teaching the Plan of Salvation and it was really sweet to see her true intention to come back. We started talking a lot about the temple... she got really quiet-really thoughtful and then said ´I miss going to the temple... I want to go back, and I don´t want to go alone- I want to be sealed with my husband´  Her husband isn´t currently a member... so we are working on that but the spirit is so strong in that house. Incredible. True intent at its finest.

Well... one of our investigators has a pet chicken. Like a full fledged, full grown chicken... inside her house. haha  Say what? During the lesson she picked him up, set him on her lap and just started stroking it. I may have thought it was maybe somewhat normal if it didn´t keep trying to peck at me. haha

We went over to an FHE and they were making these cool corn tamales (they weren´t tamales... but I don´t remember what they are called)... so I definitely learned how to make them... and they are super good!

Haha we got dropped by an investigator this week.... haha He invited me to come to his house-without my companion... after explaining that we are missionaries and that I never go anywhere without my comp, he didn´t want much to do with the message. haha dang. The elders keep making fun of us for that one. 

Well that´s basically all :) Cuídense mucho

Hna Fowers

Blue eyed... blue haired... super golden investigator!

So I think I definitely took for granted how wonderful it was to be on an island last winter... because now it is cold... and haha I feel like I´m such a baby but I´m bundling up!

So "M" is just incredible... I´m just going to keep writing that every week because she is like the highlight and miracle of our lives at the moment. So we went over this week and she told us that one day she was thinking about the church and was looking at the Book of Mormon and was wondering ´can this really be true´... so she thought about it for a moment and then turned on the tv (haha she also told us that she probably should´ve picked it up and read it... well at least she knows it).. but when she turned on the tv it was a show about the Mormon church (fancy that) and it was talking about baptism... haha  How perfect is that??!!!!  So we talked a lot about her baptism and she is excited for it! She came to church yesterday for the first time and loved it, she loved the messages, the people, the spirit!! Man I´m sooo excited for her!

Hey guess who else came to church... "R"l!!! You know, super Catholic "R" that didn´t want to come to church because she goes to mass... so last week we had a super fuerte lesson with her about how she needs to come to church to know if it is true... and she didn´t come. Then this week we had another fuerte lesson about how she needs to come to church... and then we were really annoying and kept calling her and walked with her to church, but hey- she came!!!! Woohoo.... that is a victory, let me tell you.

We found an investigator this week that is so legit... we contacted her and started telling her about the church and all...come to find out she has researched all about the church and has read the Book of Mormon... crazy right?  She is also such an interesting person- she has blue hair, blue eyes and is a tattoo artist.  Good thing the gospel is for everyone!

Lots of funny experiences this week...

-we met a guy who quoted Princess Diaries to us and then made an analogy from the movie to the gospel... haha so legit.

-We were teaching this lady who would mid sentence stand up and start dancing with her pillow... we invited her to church and she flat out said no... but hey we got an invite to her church!!! :)

-We found this lady whose son is on a mission, and she isn´t a member, so we went to her house for lunch and she absolutely pampered us... super cute

Well love you lots.  Enjoy the winter and the fact that you don´t have to be outside in the cold :)

Cinderella moments

Things are just going splendidly here! We are starting to see real progress in our investigators and we have some great potential!!! One thing I think I´ve learned on my mission is that sometimes you just have to work and work for awhile without results before the Lord sees fit to bless you with the people that are truly prepared... the best part is that I´ve learned to truly appreciate the miracles because I´ve learned and grown in the process of receiving them.

So thus begins my list of the investigators I´m sooo grateful for: (we made thankful leaves this week and I might be on a thankful kick :)

-"M".... continues to be incredible! We sit down to teach her and she begins to tell us about the dream she had... the dream that we were in. She said that in her dream we approached her and were telling her that she needed to keep meeting with us (good to see that our persistence seeps into her subconscious as well)... and when we said that she just felt overwhelmingly peaceful about learning about the church. :) woohoo! Then she goes on to explain how her faith right now is like a seed and how it needs to grow... (I was thinking this was too good to be true) turns out we had given her Alma 32 to read and she had really applied it to her life. Man oh man she is so incredible. We taught her the Plan of Salvation and the spirit was so strong... she told us that she loves when we come over because she feels so good, and she wants to come to church and feel this feeling more in her life!!! Woooohooooo.  She is incredible!!

-"W"... he is new as of this week but super prepared as well... we contacted him in the streets like a month ago and he never could meet. We were calling some of our old numbers this week and set something up. He has so much faith and he loved the message of the Restoration. His point of view is that all the churches that talk of God and Jesus are good and true... so we taught about the importance of the Book of Mormon, how we can truly come to know if this is true. He has a super strong testimony of prayer- how God answers prayers... so it was fun to apply his story to the story of Joseph Smith- how we can receive our answers when we pray with faith. Since that lesson we have run into him every day on the streets. :) It is just meant to be.  He wants to get baptized too!

-"A" has been coming to church! which is a big deal for him because he has some doubts and doesn´t really believe in the organization of churches... but he keeps coming, and he loves it... his heart is softening. (and he brought us chocolate when he came to church... not complaining :)

-"R"... "R", "R", "R"... she is super Catholic... we´ve been meeting with her every single week... she always reads and she always prays but she is still very Catholic and won´t come to church. It has been getting to the point that she can´t really progress anymore unless she comes to church. So we had a pretty fuerte (strong) lesson with her. We focused on Christ. . . bore testimony of Christ, the spirit was there, and then we explained our purpose here is to bring people unto Christ... and the only thing she was lacking to know if the church is true, if we truly are bring people to Christ is by attending the church.  It was pretty powerful. She committed to come... haha.. well she didn´t end up coming but I´m holding out that there was a pretty good excuse :)

So yeah, things are just going super well right now!! I´m super excited to see these miracles continue to unfold! :)

Ready for some funny moments of the week...

-We were talking to this man in the street.. in the middle of my comps testimony I see this man taking a picture of us... haha  It was a member that works in the MTC and is used to taking pictures of the MTC missionaries who contact in retiro park... it was just super weird to see... but anyway this contact had a little bit of time so we sat on a bench and talked about the gospel for a bit, and then he insisted on buying us Halloween cookies! :) It was probably one of the most ´rewarding´ contacts... in the sugar aspect at least. 

-Some members wanted us to make them some American food... and their request was French toast :) haha.. the irony!  So we were making French toast and the member thinks they would be good rolled in cinnamon and sugar. haha ...so we had very very dessert like ´American´ French toast. 

-For all those who don´t know... we have a curfew as missionaries... so we were at a lesson and we needed to run to get home on time.... some of the investigators were confused why we were in such a hurry. One of them compared us to Cinderella... so to them we are now the Cinderella girls that will turn into a pumpkin past curfew. Such a grand life we lead! :)

Lots of loves... 

Hna Fowers

Also here are some pictures of "M", who got baptized in Barrio 6 right after I left!

To be clean...

Good week good week.

"M"... she is super prepared... we share the gospel with a lot of people, and there are some that are just so prepared to hear it it is ridiculous. You can really feel their desire to learn in the lesson and that ´real intent´ brings the spirit so much. Well "M" is one of those chosen few. We go to teach her and we could just sense that there is something different about her. She loves to hear the word of God and recognizes that there is something currently missing in her life. So we teach her about the Restoration of the Gospel... how through Joseph Smith the priesthood authority was restored to the earth. Very few people realize the importance of this concept- but she did. I could see it in her eyes- that she truly understood and had even more interest to learn more. As we were explaining the Book of Mormon and how we can receive an answer through prayer she made such a profound comment: "I think the answer we receive depends on our faith too, if we have real desire to receive an answer then God will give us that answer more readily"... haha I couldn´t believe that came from an investigator's mouth and not from the mouth of a missionary.   ´Exactly... actually there is a scripture just about that... Moroni 10:3-5´. She is incredible and I´m sooo excited for her! We set a baptismal date and I truly believe that it will go through... she is just that awesome!!!! :) Woohoo!!!

We also have this awesome investigator named "A"!! We met him on the streets a few weeks ago and haven´t been able to teach him again for a while.. but this week we taught him and had an awesome lesson! :) He kind of came into the lesson with his mind set that he wasn´t really a church-going type of guy. So we started to read with him from the Book of Mormon and he had kind of surface level questions-like he just really wanted to learn but not really apply anything. So then we had a detour in the lesson and we both bore really powerful testimonies about why we know the church is true and what the church has done for us in our lives. After that he was like a completely different person- he was more open not only to learn, but to apply as well. and something stuck with him because he came to church yesterday and loved it! :) The members were so awesome with him and he made some pretty great friends. I´m excited for him too! 

"D"... so this is investigator "D" number 3.... I´m fairly positive the Lord wants us to baptize a "D"... because "Ds" just keep popping up. :) So this "D" has had a hard life... and it shows... but the gospel is for everyone and so we were sharing... actually we started with the Word of Wisdom... it just seemed right in the moment.  Well the next lesson we taught him he looked like he had shaped up at least a little.... we taught about the Restoration and were very specific about what the requirements are for baptism... haha I started out by telling him that he had to be completely clean and that required him to give up some of the things he is doing at the moment. .. haha and my companion is hilarious, she took the clean comment to the next level and told him he had to be clean physically too and shower everyday. hahaahahahahah  I guess that´s what happens when you are sitting closer to a smelly man.:)  I was trying so hard not to laugh :)

We carved pumpkins last Monday!! in honor of Halloween!!! (which they totally celebrate here in Madrid... I guess it was just an island thing that they didn´t celebrate it). but haha it is super humid here I guess because within 4 days the pumpkins were all molded over... very Halloweeny :)

Well we're going to walk to church now...

Ok want to hear a crazy, cool story. Ok dokey then...

So yesterday there was a baptism at 7... and our lesson failed right before so we were doing a little bit of contacting and ran into an old investigator, "D" (another "D" :).  We were talking to him for a while and invited him to come to the baptism. To which he told us he wasn´t really interested in learning anymore so he didn´t really want to come. So it got to be time for us to start walking to the chapel and we asked him if he wanted to walk and talk with us. To which he agreed. :)  We are sneaky.  So by the time we were close to the church I asked him again if he was sure he didn´t want to go to the baptism... ´well I´m already basically here´ :) Turns out he´s always passed by the church and always wondered what it was like inside... so we gave him a tour of the church.  He loved all the paintings and was specifically interested in the paintings of Joseph Smith- like the first vision and when he got the priesthood... and as it turns out, all the paintings in a chapel make it really easy to teach and testify of the Restoration of the gospel and the Book of Mormon. :) So he was loving it, ended up staying for the baptism- and loved that too! At the end he told us that he felt really good- that whenever he would pass by the church he would always feel something special and he felt that feeling again as he watched the baptism. He´s done quite a bit of research on the church and was convinced that it wasn´t for him, but just being in the church and feeling the spirit of the baptism opened his heart and now we have a lesson set up on Tuesday! :) Woohoo gotta love it!

Last Monday we were on a baking kick and made a very delicious fall cake. In fact it was so delicious that we ate a little too much and decided we should probably give it away before we ate anymore. So we packaged it all up and on Tuesday we stopped by the houses of investigators, menos activos, members- anyone that normally wouldn´t ´have time´ to see us... but funny how time becomes irrelevant when you come bringing cake! :)  It was such a productive day and we were able to teach some awesome lessons! :)

We also met with some really cool new people this week!! :) We were contacting one day and stopped this man with his daughter. Come to find out this man is a member- got baptized when he was 10 in Columbia and then when he moved to Spain his family just never found the church and he really doesn´t remember anything- so he had a ton of questions... the one thing he remembers is that there are these awesome parties called Noche do Hogares (FHE).. where there is really yummy food. haha.  So we set up an fhe and we´re going to meet his wife.  This is going to be an incredible family... his 10 year old daughter is hilarious and super spunky and sassy... love it!

We had an incredible district meeting this week... we focused on Elder Anderson´s talk about Joseph Smith... and how to strengthen your own testimony of Joseph Smith you can 1. share your favorite scriptures from the Book of Mormon 2. Bear testimony of the Restoration 3. Record yourself telling the story of Joseph Smith and bearing testimony. So we did all of that as a district- including recording each of us bear testimony of the prophet Joseph Smith. It was really cool... it is something that we do everyday, but the spirit was so strong and just put more emphasis on bearing testimony and bringing the spirit of the Restoration of the gospel every time we share this message!! :)

Random story. so there is this man that sells corn, as we were passing he flagged us down and asked for a pass a long card of Jesus... so we give him a card.  He didn´t want to listen to us... just to get the card.  We walked by later that night, the card was hanging up in his little stand for all the world to see!! haha

Well have a great week!! :)

Hna Fowers

I live in a Medieval world

Fun fact: The largest Medieval festival in Europe happens in Alcalá... this last week. :) AND IT WAS SOOO LEGIT!!!!  So just imagine this... you are walking down the already very European streets and plazas... and then you add little stores lining the streets selling all sorts of Medieval-Spanish trinkets and (most importantly) lots of really yummy food!!! :) and to add on to that- all the shopkeepers are dressed in medieval clothing talking like they would in the medieval days. I was loving every second of it!  So the festival was only going from Tuesday to Sunday.... meaning we couldn´t go for p-day... but we conveniently have a 2 hour medio dia from 2-4 that we have to eat-when we aren´t eating with members. haha  It just so happens that this week we were eating with members every day. I went through withdrawals about not being able to go to this festival... but luckily our appointment on Thursday fell through and we were able to go!!! YAY!!! 

Haha there was a thunderstorm on Thursday...we decided that we just didn´t care and we wanted to see the festival. So we make our way down to Plaza Cervantes in the pouring rain. All the little craft and trinket shops are all tarped closed... but the food shops were open! :)  We ate ´the original´ kebabs under a tarp on miniature tables and chairs and watched as the rain poured down around us. :) Super cute, right?  Happy ending- the rain cleared up a bit and we were able to walk around, get some yummy desserts and see some of the cool stores. I was very content! :)

Well turns out having a famous Medieval festival in the middle of your area kind of puts a damper on the missionary work... but we still had a good week!:)

We were contacting in a park and started talking to this lady... we introduce ourselves and share a little bit about our message and she tells us that she has some friends that are Mormon... and her son has gone to the church a few times. We ask a few questions and come to find out her son is our investigator that we have been trying to get a hold of for some time!! Woohoo.. so we set up a time to go see them. It was a really good lesson, they have a lot of faith and a lot of really good questions. 

We were teaching a recent convert about tithing again and we watched a talk by Elder Bednar. The whole talk she was nodding her head and agreeing with everything he said... at the end of the talk she just goes off on how she has a testimony of tithing and how everything Elder Bednar said was so true.  That made the lesson really easy. I really like it when people have testimonies.

Last week we met with "J" on the streets... he told us that he had met with missionaries before and it was all the same as the other churches... we taught him a little bit of the Restoration on the streets and talked about the Book of Mormon- and he agreed to meet with us and learn more. So we went and taught him lesson one and how through reading the Book of Mormon he can know that we have the truth... that there is only one church that has all the truth. He really liked that... and now is reading the Book of Mormon! :)

Yeah well that is basically my life now!  I loved the festival... haha but I´m glad it is done :) I bought one thing. a Harry Potter time turner :) haha so I guess if I really wanted I could turn back time and visit it again... I´ll let you know how that goes for me :)  Peace out!

The dungeons

We started out this week by cleaning the dungeons... and that is not a far fetched explanation... haha

A recent convert asks for our help cleaning.  Sweet!   So I put on jeans and a t-shirt (which is the first time in over a year, and I think I might be crazy but I like skirts better haha) and head over to her house. So she leads us to the very basement of the building... like the very basement where there are no lights and dirt floors. Sketchy.  Well then she leads us to her storage room which literally looks like either a tomb or a dungeon... (and definitely the mixture of the two)  She creaks open the big metal door and we go to work- first moving everything out, then scraping the first layer of dirt off the floor, then sweeping, then scraping the second layer of dirt, then sweeping (repeated about 10 times:)  Grand old fun! :)  but the best part was when we started taking all the junk out to the garbage cans... so here is some background about Spain-everyone dumpster dives, like it is a normal thing here... so as we are making our way to the dumpsters we had people stop us and ask if they could have some things- my favorite was probably a 7 year old boy who asked for the bird cage.   haha   Totally made his day :)

Ok we met with "D" for the first time and he is absolutely incredible!!! So he is the friend of a member and we met with him at his friend's house and it was an absolutely fabulous lesson- some people are just ready and he is one of those people. So we had just finished explaining the Restoration and the First Vision - ´Do you believe that this is possible, that God restored His church to the earth again?´... ´I don´t know... but I truly hope that this is true´... dang the spirit was so strong! :)  He is great, and to add on to it... he cooked lamb for us and it was SOOOO GOOD!!!! I have such high hopes for him!

"L" came to conference with us and it was awesome!  She brought her little boy and everything! I just love conference so much!!!!!!
 

Also one more thing- we go to eat at a members house and they have Harry Potter wands. I think I freaked out a little... but I loved it so much... don´t worry pictures will be included :)