Ready to Conquer the World!

December 29, 2014

Sooo this week...was great annnnd awesome and full of Christmas cheer! Skyping was thee best thing ever! I felt so refreshed afterwards, just ready to conquer the whole world! Before I was just like wooo I get to see my family, but now I´m looking forward to Mother´s day like WOOOOO! YEEEEESSSSS!!!!! I GET TO SEE MY FAMILY!!!!!!!!!!!!! Hahaha! Distance really does make the heart grow fonder! 

For the rest of Christmas we attempted to go caroling with some ward members. We met in the centro JAS where we found out that everyone had terrible voices and no one knew any songs so we aborted that plan and just ended up watching the movie and drinking hot choco so a perfect night:) 

Ummm I also forgot my agenda today sooo I can´t really remember what we did this week, but I do know that our Christmas miracle I. is doing fabulous! We actually moved her baptismal date up and she is so excited! And I love you all so much! And I am so sorry this is such a terrible email! I promise the next one will be better! I love you!

Facebook find:)

Hermanas Chavarria and Finch:

Hermanas Finch and Chavarria:

Merry Christmas!

December 24, 2014

One story this week because things on Christmas day are a little crazy! Pues actually two...;)

First: We had the most amazing Christmas miracle this week!!!! Her name is I. She has been coming to our classes of English and is 13 years old. So I basically adopted her as a little sister since mine are currently a little far away. Anyways, I was talking to her before class and she mentioned that her friend had just passed away on Wednesday and started tearing up so I grabbed her and hugged her and she started full out crying. So as she calmed down I told her in her ear that as missionaries we share a very special message that could help her and asked if she could stay after class to talk to us. So after class we talked and the next day and the next day. She is incredible. She is reading everything we give her. The pamphlets, the chapters in the Book of Mormon, everything! She is absolutely incredible! She´s so excited for her baptismal date too and so good. We even brought a Christmas gift to her family so we could meet her mom. Ahh tender mercies!

Second: Christmas has been awesome!!! First we woke us this morning and got ready and made breakfast (Mom! I made CINNAMON ROLLS annnnnd they were GOOD!;)) and then we all ate our breakfast together right in front of the tree and opened our presents and then did our personal study in our Christmas room with all of our new gifts and after personal study we read and sang the last scripture and hymn of the advent calendar Mom sent me and read the Living Christ and the story in Luke 2 and then shared our testimonies of Christ. Ah. So special. So spiritual. It doesn't really feel like Christmas. Not the kind I´m used to. It kinda feels like something new and special. But I like it. I want to have this study and testimony with my family one day. Oh it was so special!!!! I love you all! MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!!

Love, Hna Finch

P.S. Ohhhh yeah so I kept forgetting to tell you all buuut, David Archuleta came Sunday to sing to us. So all of Madrid gathered in the stake center on temple square and my companion and I were in the second row!!! Connections!!! And then Monday all the missionaries had their Christmas devotional and guess who showed up just to sing to us?! Yep that's right. Pictures to come! I forgot my camera at home today! Love you!!!

Spain, Madrid Temple

December 15, 2014

Stalker mom again.  I have to tell you that Hna G's photos are absolutely beautiful!  Here I go again and am going to "borrow" a few pics for Hna McKenna.  I will miss her when she goes home as well later this month!  She is an incredibly talented missionary!

This picture was posted by a missionary couple on facebook.  Elder W.  I hope he doesn't mind either!

Wonderful Week

December 15, 2014

What a wonderful week in Alcalá! One week with a native and my Spanish has definitely improved! Wooo! I don´t have a lot of time today but we had some memorable events happen this week:

1. There are some members in our ward who ever year pick a family who is struggling a little and buy them a ton of food (we´re talking like huge amounts) and they have a set of missionaries deliver this food to the recipients each year. This year we got to and ohh it was beautiful. After we had made our 3 trips taking all the food out of the elevator and to the door of the piso we knocked and the member opened. Then we started bringing the food in. When we first walked in she greeted us with a smile, but then as we kept leaving and coming back in with more food in our arms, her eyes filled with tears and she began sobbing into her hands. I can´t even begin to describe how I felt. I have never been in that position in my life before. I feel as though it is, in some part, what we will feel when we see our Savior again. Knowing he didn't take just one burden from us, but another and another and another. Needless to say- I was bawling too. Gah! I´m bawling right now! Hahaha

2. You know in the movies how the cars pass in a dark, cold, rainy night and splash a wave of water onto the hero of the story? Yeah. That totally happened to us last night. The wave of dirty puddle water crashed over us and we just slowly turned to each other, not even believing what had just happened and cracked up! Oh my! Hahaha how many people can say that´s actually happened to them! Good thing we were on our way home!

3. The ward Christmas party Saturday night was bomb! I loved it! Annnnd here´s the kicker instead of Santa coming at the end the Reyes Magos (3 Wise Men) came to bring individually wrapped and addressed presents to all the Children. Cutest thing ever! Spanish tradition dictates that the 3 wise men bring the presents (Santa´s a little pagan for this Catholic nation) on January 6. Now they´re a little more Americanized and they also celebrate Christmas too. 

Investigators:

J. - He´s awesome. He knows the book of Mormon is true and he´s reading and praying, but he´s going to spend the Christmas holidays with his brother in Barcelona! Noooo! So we were going to have his baptism soon, but now! Ugh! He won´t be coming back until the end of the transfer in like 5 weeks and that´s just so much time for Satan to work upon a person.

C. -  He is from Nigeria and actually stopped Hna Fowers in the street. he was living in Malága and met the missionaries there, even had Thanksgiving with them, so he was pretty excited when he met us. He´s really great! The only difficult thing is that he only speaks English and my companion doesn't, buuuut it was fun translating for her and the member in the lessons we had with him! 

CPdE: Ok sooo let´s talk about weird. I think we hit the jackpot this week! His name was P. and he was from Yugoslavia. So we stop him and he did not believe in God. In fact what he does believe in is reptiles. Yep that´s right the reptiles are ruling the world. Bom, bom, boooooomm! So they live under the earth and they control the Masonics (I think he meant free masons) who control the Illuminati who control the actors who control the TV. Annnnd they´re also poisoning our food so that´s why we all die at like 70, 80 cause they´re poisoning our food and there´s only a few types of alcohol that aren't poisoned (I think we know where all the crazy is coming from now). Also the reptiles are shape shifters and Dick Chaney is actually a reptile. Sooo that´s what I learned this week! ;)

I love you alllll sooooo much! And MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!!! MUAH!!!!

5 Questions:

1.  Who is your new companion!  What is her name!

      My new companion is Sandy Chavarria and she´s from Bolivia ( don´t let the name fool you. Her mom really liked Grease)

2.  What things do you have in common with her?

      Our height.....Hahahaha we both love chocolate, clothes, and after walking in the rain all day our feet both stink;)

3.  What do you usually eat for breakfast?

      For breakfast I usually eat muesli. It´s basically this type of granola. Honestly its not really good, but that keeps me from eating 10 bowls of it;)

4.  If you have time - what is your favorite breakfast meal to make or cook?

      French toast. We don´t have measuring cups in our apartment and you don´t really need measuring cups for french toast so I´m pretty pro now;)

5.  What time do you usually leave the apartment?

      We leave the apartment every day at 11 on punto a trabajar en el obra del Señor!

Back To Short Emails!

December 8, 2014

Soooo let´s be honest....I have a terrible memory and it´s a new transfer so I forgot my old transfer at our piso and my trusty reliable Hermana Fowers is gone so I can´t borrow her sticky note of what she´s writing to her family this week...

Well, I guess first things first! A tribute to Herman Fowers. Cause she is gone :( Like gone for good. She´s leaving to go back home to Utah tomorrow.  How weird is that? My companion´s going home! She was such a great companion and we had so many great experiences together and I´m so grateful for the mission bringing together people like it does. 

Speaking of bringing people together. My new companion is......Hermana Chavarria!!!! If you think that´s an unusual last name you would be right. She´s from Bolivia, but has lived in Spain since she was 10 so she´s got a legit Spain accent. There´s a tiny bit of a language and cultural difference, but she´s got such great desires and I am so excited to have her as my companion! Wow! I just can´t get over it!

This week was awesome! We´ve got a really great investigator J.....he´s totally getting baptized. We also had M., another investigator come with her husband to church. She started working interna (basically living at home with old people taking care of them 24/7) and wasn´t able to meet with us much. But we pulled the Hna Fowers is leaving and we want to meet with you one last time card and when we were there we finally got to meet her husband as well. He is....AWESOME! He agreed to come to church yesterday and she´d been a little flojo about it, but once he was in she was in with both feet. Yeeeeees! So hopefully we´ll be making some more progress with them!

Also I love you all. So much. I´m so grateful for your examples and love. There´s a new Christmas video you guys have all probably seen, but it´s a huge movement the Church is trying to do. I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas discovering the gift, accepting the gift, and sharing the gift. I love you!  Here is the site:  http://www.mormon.org/christmas?cid=HPFR112814529

Five Questions:

1.  Do you have a goal set for this week?  Tell me about it!

     Ummmm I don´t have a goal for this week.....I´m a terrible missionary....but I´ll make one for next week!

2.  Do you study one topic for a week in companion study or a different topic each day?

     President gave us the challenge to read the whole book of Mormon by Christmas so I do that for 30 minutes (it´s a little harder when it´s in Spanish;)) and then I study for what ever we´re teaching our investigators that day. Looking up scriptures, studying the chapter, etc. I want to make lesson plans for each lesson and then modify them for each investigator so I think I´m gonna start on that this week.

3.  How do you decide what to study for companion study?

     In companion study we call people and we decide what we´re gonna study based off what we´re teaching our investigators that week. We actually just made a new lesson! It´s super cool! I´ll show you when I get home! 

4.  What is your favorite scripture currently?

     My favorite scripture is 1 Nephi 11:17 because I don´t know all things but I do know that God loves his children!

5.  How do you do your laundry?

     We have a washer and then we have drying racks for our clothes in a little room off the kitchen. 

The last email I received was forwarded from the dear sister who has a missionary son but isn't a member herself!  I love her!  Not sure who the other sister is in between McKenna and her companion.  That girl of ours!  But she sure is happy!  

Facebook Find

December 2, 2014

Blog Thief

December 2, 2014

 As I was updating McKenna's blog today I browsed through some other Madrid Mission blogs.  And I found these!  Hahahaha!  It's official!  I am now a stalker missionary mom!  These were posted by Hermana Grover!  So I basically thieved them!  They were from a zone conference they recently had.  You can see McKenna in the first one in the middle and slightly off to the right in the background.  I guess this is a traditional push up contest they do after each zone conference.  President Jackson even gets in on it!  The next two I included because this dear sister is an amazing photographer and I just loved her pictures of the Madrid Temple!  Beautiful!  

Happy Thanksgiving!

​December 1, 2014

First​ I want start off and say....Guess where I'm sending this email? Not a locotorio like usual! A house! Well an apartment of some of the temple missionaries (the Waites) who invited us over to eat Thanksgiving dinner with all the temple missionaries and now we're getting babied. Emailing on laptops and everything! The people here are so wonderful!

This week was fabulous! It was missionary week here in Alcala and all the seminary students got their calls to their countries and everything.  Then they also were able to go out and help the missionaries this week as well. Awesome! So incredible! We have such wonderful youth here! One of the mornings we also woke up at 5:30 (versus the normal 7:30 we wake up at) to go talk to the students in seminary.

My miracle this week: Came in the form of a bus. When we were going to the seminary Tuesday morning we were a little behind.  The buses don't run very frequently in the mornings and we waited for our bus for 30 minutes, there were 5 more minutes left before we were supposed to get there. I was panicking. You know how much I hate being late (huh, Dad;) ). So I said a prayer and I looked up from saying it and boom! The bus was coming right around the corner! 

My regret for this week: Man I wish I had stuck with the piano. Thank you Rachelle Holbrook for doing your best. I can read the notes, but having my fingers play them would just be so nice right about now. Every time we go anywhere with a piano I immediately start practicing!

My sharing moment: Mom, I shared that missionary CD you sent me with a lady in our ward whose son is leaving in a week or so to go serve his mission in Ogden, Utah and we listen to the "We Want To Thank You Mom" song when I brought it over to her house. She cried. I cried. We all cried!

Our Thanksgiving with the temple workers today brought our grand total of Thanksgiving dinners to a solid FOUR. Holidays are so much better on the mission. Except the missing family part. BUT... I wasn't even homesick on Thanksgiving day! We ate with all the 4 companionships and 2 matrimony couples in Alcala and right after we ran to an appointment. There wasn't even time to be homesick!

CPoE: This week the crazy person of Espana is me. Yep... we were chasing down this man who we thought was our 11 am appointment and finally I hollered his name "Immanuel!" He turns looks at us (at this point I've realized he's not our investigator), and says "How do you know my name?" Us: "......O.o......Uhhh we've got a very important message for you. Can we get your number and share it with you one day?" It worked! Booom!

Investigator: J.  He's awesome and can meet with us as often as we like almost! Lemme tell you how much I love that! He's got some awesome questions too. He's from El Salvador and is attending the university in Alcala right now and I am sooo excited for him! 

I love you all soooo much! 

Un besito,

Hna Finch

PS....Annnnd we decorated for Christmas! Yay!

So, McKenna's Mom here.  I decided to start asking 5 questions a week that McKenna can respond to.  Just to help us here at home get a better idea for what she is really doing on her mission.  I love that girl, but for being an English Sterling Scholar...she doesn't really say much!  

1.  What has been your biggest challenge this week?

     Biggest challenge this week...well ya see....It's been super rainy lately and I had bought some boots a couple months ago and they've been great, but they aren't really holding up with all this rain and walking so the soles and tops have started to separate and let just say that the water hasn't just been staying on the streets. I got so sick of wearing wet boot (and we haven't had time to go buy new ones that I've started wearing my flats again). So it's been a little cold the last week, but hopefully sometime during medio dia this week we'll be able to go get some rain boots.

2.  Where do you do your shopping for groceries?
     Most of our shopping for groceries we do at Mercadona. It's kinda like Joe's back home, just with Spanish food and the makeup section is huuuuge!!!!! There's also cute little fruterias everywhere that have a bunch of fresh fruit and veggies. I still can't decide if the food there is FDA approved or not.... 

3.  What is the most common food you are fed?

     Most common food....right now it's cocida and I can totally see Grandma Schmutz making it. It's basically chunks of meat and bone and garbonzo beans and noodle thrown into a stew and cooked. Also Spanish tortillas. I've got the recipe and I'll try to make it for you guys when I get back from my mission. But if you don't wanna wait I bet you can find a recipe for it online too!

4.  Do you set your alarm clock or wake up on your own?  What time do you get up?

      Since there's four girls living together right now...First Hna John's alarm goes off 5 minutes early and then mine goes off right on time at 7:00 and we go to bed at 11:00.  Later than we could stay up on school nights, but oh how I wish we could sleep in later! In the summer we would wake up at 7:30 and go to bed at 11:30. Almost midnight!dnig

5.  What do you love about where you are living?

     Alcala is bomb. Seriously! This is the most amazing area! It has a ton of history and isn't just some new city, but it dates back to the time of the Romans! There are plazas with stories of how the Romans beheaded 2 children who wouldn't deny God and the Cathedral here holds their decapitated skeletons.  There's also an arch bishop or bishop or something in Alcala and there's only a few of those all over the world so that's another thing I need to do some research on!

​Mer​ica!

What I do to avoid puddles....

also my umbrella broke...:)

ONE of the temple workers' huge turkeys!!!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving morning I (Rachel) received these pictures of one of McKenna's Thanksgiving dinners with the Senior Couples!  

These other pictures of Thanksgiving are from McKenna's companion.

Christmas!!!!

Seminary Students and Missionaries!

Hermanas Finch and Fowers: