A New Assignment

This week, I am grateful that we were able to tell people about our upcoming change of assignment. We have known for several weeks that we will be moving to Madrid in May, to be the office couple. We have accepted this new assignment with mixed feelings.  We enjoy our work here, and have gotten to know lots of wonderful people.  It has been a great experience to be involved in so many different activities here on the island.  But, we are needed in Madrid, because the Chapples, the current couple, are going home in May, and there is no one being sent to replace them.  There are things that we will enjoy in Madrid, such as the opportunity to attend the temple on a regular basis. We will also get to see the missionaries that we have gotten to know while they were serving here on the island.  Of course, we will miss our young adults, our institute and English class members, and my piano students.  I am hoping that my piano students will work extra hard these next few months and make as much progress as possible before we leave.  It is always hard to say goodbye to people that we love, but we are willing to serve where we are needed.  

Last Saturday was Hermana West's birthday.  She wanted to celebrate on Monday, and chose to come to our house and have pancakes with her "Real Canadian Maple Syrup." If you look at the center picture you can see her precious bottles.  In the background, you can see the syrup we made with maple flavoring.  Not nearly as good!  We also splurged on real Oscar Meyer Bacon.  Expensive, but worth it!  

Afterwards we made peanut butters cookies for Hermana West.

Elder Larsen had to take our zone leaders to the airport, so he dropped us off at San Telmo to go to a craft fair.  We each bought a ceramic plaque to remind of our time on the island.  I loved this one because it reminds me of Santa Brígida with its narrow roads, mountains, and palm trees.  Someday, this will look lovely on the wall of my "Spain" room.

While we were there, we saw a beautiful Belén, which is a Spanish Nativity.  I saw several this year, but this was the first time that I had my camera with me.  Spanish Nativities are amazing.  They are very large and include the entire town of Bethlehem.  Besides the usual manager scene, there are caves, houses, temples, rocks, cliffs, streams, and mountains.  In one scene you might see Joseph and Mary entering into Bethlehem.  

There is always a manger scene and there is one of the wise men in the foreground.

There are scenes that depict daily life.

And there are Roman soldiers, sometimes with their swords drawn, in search of the baby Jesus.

I love these Spanish Nativities and the reminder of the real reason we celebrate Christmas.

After our shopping, we ended Hermana West's birthday celebration with one of her favorite things, ice cream, which is always a good thing.

As we were leaving, I saw these little ones sliding down this concrete embankment.  Having just seen pictures of my grandchildren sledding, from a distance, this white concrete looked like snow.  Here on the island, with 65°F, this is about as close as children can get to sledding.  

Día de los Reyes, January 6th, is another Spanish Christmas tradition.  On the evening of December 5th, there is a parade with the Three Wise Men.  Apparently on our island, the wise men arrived by boat and then paraded through the streets.  There are bands, floats, and the wise men on camels.  The young children can give their letters to the wise men, because they are the ones who bring the gifts. Some people have incorporated Santa Claus, or Papa Noel, for Christmas Eve, but their big gift-giving is on January 6th.  Every town has their own parade.  And then the next morning, the Three Wise Men drive in convertibles, up and down the streets.  As families hear the horns honking, the children to look out the windows and thank the wise men for their gifts.  We did not attend the parade this year, but I plan to have this cultural experience next year.  

 This is a picture the hermanas took on the way to an appointment.

Wednesday, all the holidays were over and we were back to our regular schedule.  We had a zone training and enjoyed being together with all the missionaries.  We had honey-lime enchiladas, with ingredients that were shipped from the United States. Yummy!

                                     

And with marshmallow brownies for dessert, the missionaries were happy.

Hermana West, Elders Maxfield and Priest, Hermana Trone, Elder Hansen

Elder Bybee, Elder Nash, Elder Norrell

This was only part of our group who attended on Institute on Friday night.  The missionaries were happy to join us for a piece of chocolate cake.

Elder Bybee, Josué, Kimberly, Elder Moreland, Fran

Saturday we had a young adult activity with our Las Palmas group.  We watched a devotional talk by Elder Hallstrom about having a firm foundation in Christ.  He shared the Mormon Tabernacle Choir singing one of my favorite hymns, "How Firm a Foundation."  I have included the words to the 3rd and 7th verses:

                                                  Fear not I am with thee; oh, be not dismayed,

                                                  For I am thy God and will still give thee aid.

                                                  I'll strengthen thee, help thee, and cause thee to stand,

                                                  Upheld by my righteous, omnipotent hand

                                                 The soul that on Jesus hath leaned for repose

                                                 I will not, I cannot, desert to his foes;

                                                 That soul though all hell should endeavor to shake,

                                                 I'll never, no never, no never forsake.

I want to always make sure that I have my foundation in my Savior, Jesus Christ.  Sheri Dew gave a talk at BYU Women's Conference in May.  I am inspired by these words:

If we constantly immerse ourselves in a fallen world, how far can we really expect to progress in

this life? Now I am not suggesting that there aren’t fun and even inspiring opportunities all

around us. I love ballgames, including a whole lot of ballgames played right here, and 4-wheelers

and travel and snowshoeing, and Broadway plays with the best of them. But mortality is a shortterm

proposition. None of us are going to stay here very long. Doesn’t it make sense to devote

as much energy as possible to things we can actually take with us into the eternities? To

covenants, eternal relationships, our knowledge of truth, and to the blessings that come from devotion to the Lord?

Today, Elder Larsen gave a talk at the Telde Branch.  He did a great job and his Spanish has really improved since the talk he gave there 8 months ago.  Elder Maxfield also gave a talk and his Spanish has improved so much in the time that he has been here.  This is his first area and he has picked up the language so quickly.  If only I could remember things the way I did when I was 18.  My Spanish is better, but I have a long, long way to go.  

   

Elder Norrell and Elder Maxfield

Life Goes On

This week I am grateful for a knowledge that life goes on after death.  This beautiful lady, Tiffany Janis, passed away this week.  She was a dear friend of mine, who taught me so much by the way that she lived and the faith that she had.  She is the mother of five children, and the wife of an amazing man.  I know that she will be missed terribly by them.  But I also know that their knowledge that they have been sealed as a family for eternity will give them peace and comfort.  Throughout Tiffany's almost 1 1/2 year battle with cancer, she exhibited her great faith in her Savior.  These are the words from a talk she gave in church a few months ago, "I have a very strong testimony that turning to God and holding fast to our covenants, even if we don’t understand everything, is really the best way to live our life because the blessings that come from that are amazing."  She truly understood the words of 2 Corinthians 12:9-10:
       My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness.  Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.  Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ's sake: for when I am weak, then I am strong.

Tiffany was an angel in this life, and now she is an angel in heaven.  We love you Tiffany.

Monday we had a very enjoyable day off.  We spent the afternoon in Puerto Mogan with Hakan and Barbro Palm.

They are a Swedish couple who live here during the winter months.  We have been able to get to know them because they speak wonderful English.  We enjoyed sitting out by their pool and visiting, getting to know more about their family.  Then we enjoyed a lovely snack on their deck, and took some pictures of a beautiful sunset.  I have limited myself to just three of the many that we took.

Hakan has recently written a book, Surviving Hitler.  It is the story of his mother, a Jewish woman who survived Auschwitz-Birkenau,  and his father, who was an SS soldier.  He signed and gave me a copy of the book.  What an amazing story!  I was so grateful that because of the holidays, we had a slower week, because I couldn't put the book down.  This is a story of the faith and courage of two people and their willingness to forgive.  After reading a book like this, I tell myself that I will never complain again, because my life has been so easy.

After watching the sunset, we enjoyed a delicious dinner at a restaurant where the waitresses were dressed in typical Canarian Folk Dress.

 The food was delicious.  Elder Larsen made the best choice with his Rib eye steak.

Barbro and Hakan are a delightful couple. We thoroughly enjoyed visiting with them today and hope to have this opportunity again sometime soon.

On Tuesday night, Elder Priest was asked to direct the music for the opening song.  Let's just say that it was a little bit of a challenge for him, but he did it with a smile on his face.

 Here is a very serious-looking Las Palmas District.  Actually they were happy and  full of chicken pasta salad, Jewish sweet bread, and flourless chocolate cake, but they look quite stern here.

Hermana West, Elder Bybee, Hermana Trone, Elders Moreland, Priest, and Hansen

This situation looks a little dangerous, but I guess Elder Moreland likes having his back popped.  

New Year's is a very big deal here.  This is confetti that was strewn all over the floor in the grocery store as part of their decorations.  All of the workers were dressed up as well.  

Their celebrations and parties start at midnight, and they stay up all night long.  The dance at the church for families, started at midnight.  ¡Increible!  We chose not to participate in that activity.  We stayed home and ate twelve grapes at the stroke of midnight and drank some "Appletizer."  While we were at dinner with the Palms, they asked the waiter if they had Appletizers.  I was confused because their English is very good, and I could not imagine that they couldn't say appetizer.  Then we learned that Appletiser is a yummy sparking apple drink.  We found it at the grocery store and enjoyed it as part of our New Year's Celebration.

New Year's Day we had an activity with the young adults.  We had French Toast, bacon, fruit, and juice.  Then we had a Cellphone Scavenger Hunt.  We had two teams and they had 1 1/2 hours to take pictures of the team in twenty specific situations.  They had to carry their paddle ball racquet with them and show it in every picture.

Were we ever surprised when Team #2 showed up after one hour and they had gotten all of their photos.  But I think Team #1 was even more surprised when they showed up after 1 1/2 hours, without all of the photos, and found out that Team #2 had beat them.  I will say that Team #2 was a little creative with a couple.  Like this one of them in a boat.

You must admit, it is creative!

 The photo on the right is the group with a stranger holding out 50 euros.  

They must have looked honest.

The waddling ducks are very cute!

 This is a mailbox.

This definitely wins the award for the prettiest photo!

We had told the group that there would be prizes for the winning team.  I had some bags of M&Ms for them.  You can buy M&Ms here, but they are very expensive.  The bags weren't very big, so I was afraid that the kids would not be very happy with their prize.  I sent Elder Larsen to buy some Grenadier doughnuts that are beautiful and delicious.  Elder Larsen told me that they would want the M&Ms and he was right.  I let the winning team choose, and they all chose the M&Ms.  But none of the losing team was sad with their doughnuts.

Afterwards, Elder Larsen gave a short message about setting goals for the New Year, and we all shared a goal that we are going to work on.

 We enjoyed our afternoon with these great young people.

This morning we had a meeting with these two wonderful missionaries, Elder Sarango and Elder Nash.  We are grateful for their happy smiles, good attitudes, and their desire to serve.

As we start off a new year, we are grateful to spend this entire year as full-time missionaries.  We love our Savior, Jesus Christ.  We are grateful for the opportunity to share this message with others. We pray that we all might draw closer to our Savior during this coming year.  

Christmas 2014

This week I am so grateful for my wonderful husband.  We had a very busy week, and I couldn't have accomplished all that had to be done, without my sweetheart.  He is an organizer, a worker, and the best dishwasher there ever was.  I am so grateful that he is my companion for the entire mission and for the rest of eternity!  

Tuesday I brought decorated sugar cookies to my English class.  We have been learning words about Christmas.  So, before they could have a cookie, they had to describe the cookie to me.  It was a fun way to motivate them.  

The missionaries did an especially good job of describing their cookies.

The missionaries gave a great lesson for home evening.  They started out by showing part of "Charlie Brown's Christmas."  I love when Charlie Brown said that he would not let commercialism ruin the true meaning of Christmas.  

Elder Bybee and Elder Moreland gave a wonderful Christmas message.

We started Christmas Eve very early.  I was in the kitchen all day, getting ready for our ten missionaries to come and join us for Christmas.  Elder Larsen made the last trip to the grocery store.

Here we have the Las Palmas elders on the bus, headed to our house.  

Don't they look festive with their red ties!

And Hermana Trone and Hermana West looked very festive in their red and green skirts.

I was so grateful for the elders and sisters who came right into the kitchen to help.

They are they best!

And we were so happy to start our evening meal together.

Our Christmas tradition is to have a nibbly dinner on Christmas Eve.  But since almost all of the ingredients I needed were not available here, I decided to use Hermana West's family tradition and have clam chowder, salad, and Jewish Sweet Bread for our Christmas Eve dinner. 

The next part of our evening we had a devotional as a commemoration of finishing the reading challenge that the mission president gave us, to finish reading the Book of Mormon before Christmas. We each took a few minutes to share something special about our reading experience.  Then Elder Larsen gave a wonderful message about the importance of studying and learning from the scriptures.  

After our devotional, I began the reading of The Forgotten Carols.  This was a family tradition that we wanted to share with the missionaries.  It is a story about a nurse whose empty life is changed when a new patient recounts the story of Christ’s birth as told by little known characters in the nativity story. The accounts from the Innkeeper, the Shepherd and others, as well as their forgotten carols, help the nurse discover what the world has forgotten about Christmas, and her heart is opened to the joy of this special season.

We read the first half of the story, and then shared some special desserts.  I had written to each of the missionary's families to get a recipe for a Christmas treat that they would enjoy.  I think we were successful and they were all very surprised.

Elder Hansen's favorite is cherry-a-lets.      Elder Priest wanted cheesecake.

 


                 I made chocolate pretzels for Elder Maxfield and caramel corn for Elder Bybee.

 Hermana West loves orange rolls and Hermana Trone loves cinnamon rolls.

         I made arroz con leche for Elder Nash and I made my first Ecuadorian natilla for Elder Sarango.

I was told that Elder Norrell and Elder Moreland love everything, and they did seem happy
with the choices.  I did get a recipe for a homemade chocolate cake that I am planning to try
the next time we have or district meeting with the Telde elders.

Several of the companionships did matching pajamas.  

Since my companion didn't want to participate, the hermanas included me as a threesome.

Somehow, Santa did not get everything done in advance, and had to stay up late stuffing stockings and wrapping presents.  It's a good thing we don't have the same hours as the regular missionaries.  

The next morning, the missionaries studied for an hour while Elder Larsen and I were getting breakfast ready.  We had real Oscar Meyer Bacon, yum, orange rolls, cinnamon rolls, and cheesy scrambled eggs.

We had drawn names so that we could exchange gifts, but I don't think the missionaries were expecting Santa to bring them a stocking that was filled with things from the United States: lifesavers, Reeses peanut butter cups, Crest toothpaste, peppermint candy canes, and for the hermanas-footies with heel grippers, my favorite.  I did include a large bar of traditional Turron candy.

Everyone seemed to be very happy with their presents.

Hermana West had Elder Maxfield.  He likes gofio, which is a ground flour that most of us are not too found of.  Hermana West got creative and made him gofio pancake mix and also included a coveted bottle of syrup.

We were all impressed with the wrapping job that most of the elders did.  A store plastic bag and duct tape.  Very intersting!

Elder Hansen received a wallet from Elder Sarango.  Elder Sarango was very thoughful and included photos of himself and his companion, Elder Nash.

Elder Hansen was very thoughtful and gave Elder Moreland three packages of mayonnaise.  If you can't tell from the photo, he HATES mayonnaise.  

He was much happier when Elder Hansen pulled out a second package.

Elder Bybee was spot on with my warm wrap blanket.       Hermana Trone loved her fuzzy socks (not                                                                                               pictured), her tiara and her special doll.

Hermana Trone made homemade fudge and caramels for Elder Larsen. Yummy!

 

We gave each companionship a set of measuring spoons and measuring cups.  This might make their baking a little easier.  And they each received a jar of peanut butter and a can of A&W Root beer. We have a British/American store right across the street from the church and Elder Larsen ordered two cases of root beer.  Unfortunately, only one came in, so they will have another treat to look forward to.  We also gave them a roll of summer sausage and hot cocoa mix, but that package arrived the day after Christmas.  

 Hermana Trone had a package arrive at our house the day before Christmas, so was able to open that as well.

                                      

After the present opening, we finished our reading of The Forgotten Carols.   Everyone really enjoyed it.  Only two of the missionaries knew the story.  It was a wonderful experience to share with the missionaries.  It brought back lots of memories of our reading time with our kids when they were at home.  

Because Elder Sarango speaks limited English, I had to type the story into Google Translate and then he was able to read it from the computer.  It seemed to work and he enjoyed the story and the music.

After we finished our story, the kitchen work began.  The missionaries were on the computer writing emails, helping in the kitchen, playing ping pong, and playing basketball outside.  I was so appreciative of all the help.  

 

After hours of cooking, we had a delicious dinner.  We even had cornbread dressing with the cornmeal that Elder Larsen's parents sent us and another pecan pie.

 

But then we did have a small problem after dinner.  No hot water!  After 12 showers and dishes being washed all day long, the hot water was gone.  The dirty dishes were piled up for several hours while we waited.

The missionaries took turns at the computers skyping or facetiming with their families.  I'm sure that was the highlight of their days.  There's nothing like talking to family.

Then we decided that we needed to take a group picture of everybody. 

 Here is our creative tripod.

And here is our wonderful group.  Too bad We can't see much of Elder Maxfield!

Even though we were far away from our families, and we didn't get to see our grandchildren enjoy the excitement of Christmas morning, we did have a wonderful Christmas.  Being with all of these dedicated servants of the Lord really brought a special spirit into our home.  We love the Savior and His gospel.  We are grateful for the opportunity that we have to spend this time in His service.