OK, Here We Go!

October 6, 2020 - Home MTC Week 1 

So much to say!

   This week has been a rollercoaster Learning, Emotions, the spirit, the language, and like 10 other things, but for the sake of sparing you about 10 hours of reading my innermost thoughts, I figured it would be best to give you the rundown. ( I apologize, This might be a little longer than you or I expected:D)

My Companions

   1. A little bit about my day and the people I hang out with. some of you may know I have been taking Home MTC but I am taking it from the Preston, England MTC. This means that all of my teachers are from England and that all of my classes are a little weird. I start my day at a pretty regular time for a missionary, getting up at 5:30 so I have enough time to be ready for class at 7. The biggest difference is I only have an hour break and then I start my(Would technically be called) Evening classes, or at least that's what it is for my teachers.
   Speaking of my teachers, They are Awesome! (Not just because of their cool accents) Sister McCann has lived basically everywhere and is very patient and understanding, which is definitely helpful with the language. Brother Little Is Hilarious! I have only had one lesson with him, but I can tell there will be no problem getting along with him. He's always able to make our district laugh and really inspires me!
    Speaking of my district! (you see what I'm doing here?) I am one of 10 missionaries. 7 elders and 3 sisters. of the elders I am the only one going to Berlin, 2 are going to the Alpine mission and 5 are going to Frankfurt. 2 of the sisters are going to Berlin and 1 is going to Frankfurt. Meine Mitarbeiter(oh...you may have to use google translate...unless you know german then you're probably good:D) consist of two other elders(that's right, I'm in a trio!) they are both so cool! Their names are Elder Stewart and Elder Ingram. I couldn't be luckier to be paired with them! They both know german so well already and they're very helpful in helping me catch up!
    It's a little weird but I feel like I've known my district much longer than a week, it's like they are family! In the beginning, we were all a little nervous and none of us really knew what to say, but I think the big breaker was yesterday. we got together to take a group picture on zoom! and after a couple of failed attempts, we finally got it right and just started talking, turns out the majority of the elders are really into hunting! Almost everyone has some musical ability(Which I definitely think is very cool)(we all decided we needed to start a band:D) almost all of them are from Utah except one sister who is from Virginia. (Shoutout to my Southern cousins!) they are all such cool people and after talking for a while it felt like I was talking to family, we have felt the stress of learning so many things so fast but I think it definitely helped to be able to connect for a little bit. I'm so grateful that I was able to place in the best District in England(Shoutout to the Lehi district!)

My District

   2. Woohoo! I'm officially a week in! and as my companion Elder Stewart would say I'm only about 1/6th of the way through(Don't quote me.)(Or...I guess don't quote Elder Stewart)(here give me a sec...)(Ok I tried to do the math and It turns out I'm still not that great at math...I don't know, use that statistic sparingly:)
   It's so crazy to think how fast this week has gone by, I feel like I have learned so much. A lot of you know that I took one year of german. What you may not know is that I also took one year of Italian and two years of ASL. "So," you ask. "Why is this important?" Why, let me tell you, my imaginary king of questions. As I sat down to do some language study(This was about my third day) I made a goal to set a timer and only study the language I had been having some trouble focusing and retaining the information I was learning. I made sure to say a prayer before my study, and almost immediately after my time went off I did a quick review of everything I went over.
    I realized that I had retained more information than I had ever retained in all of my classes combined(This doesn't mean you were a bad teacher, Frau Covey, it means I'm not good at paying attention AND that the Spirit is a really really good teacher:) I truly believe that when we fully commit ourselves to the lord that he will help us do things we have never been able to do in the past! Although this first week has been really hard, I have truly felt the lord's love confirming to me that I am not alone.

My district in hats

    Just another quick spiritual moment, I hope that you know, Heavenly Father loves you guys! This past week the spirit has hit differently. I have truly felt the love of God support me as I learn the language and study his gospel. one of my favorite stories in the book of Mormon is about the Sons of Mosiah. if you remember, they were with Alma the Younger when an angel appeared to him and said "Hey man, quit destroying the church."(I'm paraphrasing) they were exceedingly wicked, and then we see them in Alma Chapter 17(Give it a study. Especially verse 9!) they had grown strong with the lord becoming the biggest set of powerhouse missionaries in the book of Mormon! They have been such a cool example to me as I have striven to be the best missionary I can be!

Missionary Pics!

     Ich bin sehr Dankbar Für meine Himmlischer Vater und für das liebe Ich fühlen. Ich bin sehr dankbar für Jesus Christus und für die Heiligen Geist. Im namen Jesu Christi. Amen

All Feet are the same!!
(District: say it really fast and you may know what I'm saying.)