My six month celebration, a baptism, and transfer news

Hi :)

I feel like so much has happened this week and I don't even know where to begin. Tuesday I hit my 6 month mark, so I burned my tights on the roof. Since Miron hit 18 months a couple weeks ago she burned a whole outfit. It was so much fun, but now we have a pile of black nastiness chillin outside our window. We'll have to do something about that I guess...

I have 6 months, and Miron has 6 days left (last week obvs)

Miron asked if I wanted to do anything special, I just asked her to sing to me while I showered. Haha so that was fun. We went and visited a family from the ward and they fed us cheesecake. We also played with their new baby puppy named Rex.

Baby Rex

Wednesday we had district meeting. For the second week in a row it was really incredible. Since I've been in Spain I haven't really enjoyed our weekly district meetings. Number one, they're in Spanish, number two, I don't feel very close to anyone in my district, and three I'm always nervous I'll be asked to answer a question when I've decided to drift off in my thoughts. Well this week, since it was the last meeting of the transfer, Elder Foster asked us all to go around and share something we learned during the last six weeks. By the end almost everyone was teary-eyed, some of the elders more than the sisters, and I finally felt close to the elders and sisters I was serving with. It was really cool.

Parla District

 That night we experienced a little miracle. We had a lesson with Carmen, Paola and Jessica. We taught them the 10 commandments and it was really fun. They each picked a commandment they wanted to work on and we set goals for the next week. Afterwards, Carmen asked us to stay for dinner, but we told her we couldn't because we had another commitment that we were about to be late for (celebrating Hermana Coakwell's birthday with Eduardo). But she explained, "No no, my husband has invited you to stay. He wants to get to know you!" This is the same man who made fun of his wife and daughters for investigating the church and who always left when we came over. We were shocked and figured it was important to Carmen that we stay, so we did. She made us fish and rice and it was so yummy. Her husband was super talkative and we even got him to laugh. It was actually really fun, and I feel like from now on he'll be more open-minded and supportive of Carmen and their daughters.

Finally a picture with us and Paola and Jessica!

Friday morning we had a lesson with Victor. He's from Russia and has been coming to church for the last three years or so. He would be baptized by now, but his girlfriend is super hostile towards the church and has threatened to kick him out if he gets baptized. And he can't afford that, because he doesn't have a job and needs a place to live. It's kind of a tricky situation. Anyhow, we watched this movie with him called "How Rare A Possession." If you haven't seen it, I'd check it out. We watched it in Russian so he could understand better. What was amazing to me was that even though I didn't understand a single word, I still felt the Spirit. And afterwards Victor bore powerful testimony of the Book of Mormon. He's read it cover to cover three times and has an incredible testimony. Hopefully we can get Elena to soften up.

Saturday was baptism day! Everything went swimmingly. We sang "I Need Thee Every Hour" and the people Eduardo chose to speak did a really good job. He bore his testimony after the actual baptism and he talked about how before he started talking to the missionaries he'd heard a lot of bad things about Mormons. But that he felt something inside telling him they were wrong. My favorite part was when he said, "This is a very special day for me. I know The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is true. The restored gospel has completely changed me." Ahhhh, it was awesome. Afterwards I went up to him and was like, "Eduardooooo you're Mormon!" and he said, "Hola. Soy Eduardo. Y soy Mormón." It was the best part of my whole week. And to top off our Saturday night, Real Madrid beat Mallorca 5-2 :)

Eduardo's big day!

My newly Mormonized Bolivianos :)

Well! Today is transfer day! Hermana Miron is gone. And I'm staying in Leganés for another 6 weeks, at least. I'm with Hermana Olsen and Hermana Blodgett. Hermana Olsen was living in the piso with us already, and I was in the MTC with her, so I'm comfortable with her. and Hermana Blodgett is freaking hilaaaaarious. I'm not excited about another trio (this is my fourth in 6 months), but I'm happy with who my companions are, so I'll live. Haha and President said our trio won't last for long because we should be getting a visa waiter soon and then it'll go back to being two companionships here, which is better anyways.

Life is good. Tomorrow is my birthday and I can't wait. My birthday is my favorite day of the whole year, besides Christmas of course. And we have a busy day planned! March 19th is Father's Day here in Spain, so everyone has work off today. But tomorrow, we have a lesson with Victor, followed by mediodia with Eduardo at my favorite Bolivian restaurant here, next is cookies and juice with Evelyn and her parents, and then at night Ana's mom is cooking me my favorite food she makes. They're Armenian and she is the best cook in the ward. I'm not suuuuuper excited about eating all day, but that's how people celebrate here, and when they heard it was my birthday, well, they invited me over for food.

Ana and me

I hope everyone is happy and healthy back home! Oh, and I don't think I mentioned this last week. But the First Presidency is changing the Mission Manual and we can now email EVERYONE instead of just immediate family. That means I better get some love!

Love,

Hermana Munden

P.S. Welcome home, Sister Shackelford :)