Ups & Downs

Hi! (this exclamation point refers to the happier version of me that is choosing to focus on what my purpose is  here in Valencia and ignore heartbreaking things that happened in football this past weekend)

So this week was fun. It had some high highs and some low lows but overall a ton of miracles.

So to follow up, our family home evening last monday went great. Nube's boyfriend was there and he was so sweet. He asked a lot questions and was really paying attention to the answers. The little girls had a fun time singing to us Las Familias Pueden Ser Eternas (Families Can Be Together Forever) that we taught them and they pretty much all have memorized.

Tuesday I did my first intercambio (companion exchange) as a sister leader. I did it with the girls from my piso (Hmas. Steenblik and Floisand) and it was great! I  feel  so lucky!  I get to learn  so much from so many people as a sister leader and as a trainer. I feel totally spoiled and I just hope that they are learning  something from  me too.

Wednesday was Zone Conference. It was amazing! (no surprise) I got to go to a leadership meeting that morning with the district leaders and zone leaders so it was an early  start but President Pace gave us a great little lecture on reaching our goals and  that success/growth isn't whether or not we reached  the goal but rather  in what we learned  as  we  are reaching. I also got to teach a little part at zone conference about steps to a successful baptism so that was cool to be able to participate. At the end we had a testimony meeting and it was so powerful. I can't think of many places you can feel the spirit stronger than in a group of 30 missionaries sharing their testimonies. 

Then comes the big miracle, Manuel and Rosemary. Manuel was baptized 16 years ago but after a few years he moved to Spain and lost contact with the church. He saw the missionaries  the other day and he stopped them. He and his girlfriend (who is not a member) are wanting to change their lives. He never wants to miss a day of church again and she really wants to be baptized. We taught them a few lessons last week, they came to a baptism on saturday (they sang the hymns louder than anyone, it was so cute they felt  the spirit so strong), and church on Sunday. They love it all. When I introduced Manuel to the bishop  he started  crying as he talked about him finding the missionaries. It was so cute! The only issue is the law of chastity. They have some problems that make it hard  for them to get married so that is currently what we  are trying to figure out but they are AMAZING.

The rest of the week  was a little  rough. A lot of appointments fell through and the hardest part was when Beto called talking about a bunch of anti-mormon stuff he found on the web. Despite our best efforts to explain a little bit about how  the things he read were completely untrue and to testify to him the conversation ended with him saying "it has been a pleasure to get to know you guys, thanks for everything but I'm not interested." He's felt the spirit, I know he has and because of that I know he will find his way back one day. I don't think I will see it but someday he  will read the Book of Mormon and know it is true. Nevertheless, even with a lot of appointments falling through we were still able  to fill  our time. When one door closed another opened. We were very blessed.

I know this email is WAY TOO long already but I HAVE to tell you about what we did today for preparation day. 

First we played a little football with the elders (super hard when you can't even do two hand touch across the genders but it was still  fun) then at The Sciences (really cool buildings that is basically the postcard for Valencia and are surrounded by water) we got into these plastic balls individually and tried to run around the water (it was hard  to even stand up but absolutely hilarious). If you can't picture it no worries, I took lots of pictures but I left my camera at piso so you'll have to wait until next week.

Love you! Do good things! Talk to you next week!

-Hermana Tuttle

Stories

Querida familia,

This last week was seriously just a miracle week. We reached pretty much all of our goals and were busy the entire week. It was great!

We taught Beto (the 18 year old) I believe three lessons this last week. It is super hard because we has so many questions and they are really good but hard to answer especially without giving more background. For example, he asked us if God forgives murder and started talking about David then he asked us if earth names were important and why Gabriel had to tell Maria what to name her child. Things are getting better though, little by little.

We are teaching a family from Ecuador and they came to church yesterday! We taught them a few lessons this last week and we have family home evening with them tonight (we are going to teach them how to make Brownies because the three daughters LOVE them). The mom has made a complete one-eighty. She used to be super closed off and distracted when we would come or just not be there when we showed up but she has been making so many sacrifices to come to activities, to church, and to make time for us to come visit her. She is super busy with four kids one of which is a baby and the others are in school and she totally has her hands full. She really seems to trust us now and she likes that we play with her kids and help her out when we can.

There is also a woman named Nadia who is as golden of an investigator as there is! (the only problem is that we might have to give her over to other missionaries but we are still figuring that out) She was a metro contact (meaning we gave her a card while we were on our way to our area) and she was interested in English class. Not only did she come on Saturday to our English class but she brought 4 friends this last week. We had a really good class and then Elder Perez and I talked a little about the Book of Mormon and gave each of them a copy. They were all super nice and a few of them are really looking for a way to change their lives around because they are tired of partying.

Then there is Armando. He isn't our investigator but a few months ago he wandered into the church drunk wanting to know what it was. I remember inviting him into sacrament meeting and then afterwards to gospel principles. He started coming every week but in gospel principles he was also drunk and was disrespectful. The elders started teaching him and the next week he came to church sober, I called him by his name and he was shocked that I remembered it and embarrassed he didn't remember mine. Ever since then whenever I have seen him I have gone up to shake hands with him (he always kisses mine). Anyway, he just got baptized this last Saturday and I choked up! He began crying as the man who baptized him told him how much we all love him and how he is part of a family now. He was in and out of institutions his entire childhood and has never had a family. This gospel changes lives. What we are doing as missionaries (whether full-time or member missionaries) is real and it's right.

One more cute story and I swear I will be down with this super long email, we were eating with an older member. She was telling us about how she and her children all joined the church but that her husband never did. Shortly after he died a few years ago, her daughter who was not active anymore told Vicenta (her mom) about a dream she had where she saw her dad and he said "go tell your mom not to worry about me, I am doing well and I am happy." then a few days later she had the same dream but there was a young man sitting next to him on the bench talking with him. The daughter asked Vicenta "do you know who that was?" and Vicenta said "yes, it was a missionary." Not going to lie, I choked up at that too.

Well I love you so much and hope you have such a great week! Sorry no pictures this week but we are in a sketchy locutorio and I don't want to take a risk with my pictures.

-Hermana Tuttle

P.S. We found a lizard in our piso, we named it Jorge then I tried to catch it to release it into the wild but he dropped his tail (coolest/grossest thing in the world, it would not stop moving!) and ran out of the apartment. Now he is just chilling on the ceiling. Probably starving :(

Three's a Party

Dear loved ones and liked ones,

So may I just start off by thanking all of you? I am always touched by how many people actually read this and are supporting me all of the way back home in the states. I know I'm not a writer and that most of the people I talk about chances are none of you will ever meet but yet every week I find out that more people are reading  this. I just wanted to make sure you all know how nice that is. Thank you for  reading :)

So last Monday after emailing, we  went over to a family's house for a family home evening and birthday party. The whole family (part of which isn't active)  came for  the birthday party but said that we could go one with the family home evening  but they didn't want to participate. The 16 year old boy that was in charge of the lesson had planned to do a testimony meeting. So we all went around the table and bore our testimonies. It was  so  powerful as  3 people who used to be inactive but have since come back bore their testimonies. To finish off the oldest sister (who was with her non member partner) began to cry and bear her testimony which inspired her little sister (who is probably the least interested in  the church in the  whole family) to share her testimony. They both cried and testified that Jesus lives, that they know the church is true and they know God hears and answers their prayers, that when times get tough they will kneel down and  pray and they feel an overwhelming  sense of peace. The spirit was so strong as I saw, for however brief a moment, this whole family who I have to come to love so much in tears because of the spirit that was in the room  that night.

A brief overview of some of the highlight lessons this week:

2  Lessons  with an 18 year old kid from Argentina who is so sweet! He is  very popular in Orrioles and goes to parties often. He said he drinks a little bit but mostly just to escape from his hard life  for  a while and to be social but after our lesson last night he asked us if we would include his  family in his prayers and then he added "and me too, I really want to know what is the right thing for me to do  right now in my  life"  it was so cute! He's great. He asks questions like: "what has your prophet said or done recently to make you know that he is a prophet?"

We had  a  really good  family  home  evening  with a less active  family and we made delicious empanadas. I am so excited  to come home and cook south american and spanish  food!

We taught a member's friend named Jose, he's from here, smokes everything, drinks, tattoos, dreads, you name it but the lesson went surprisingly well. He  said he loves  learning and that he  would  like to read the book of  Mormon and  come to church. Such a blessing!

A similar thing happened with Miguel Angel who also loves to learn and read so he  has invited us to start  teaching him regularly.

Thursday all of the trainers and the people getting  transferred had to leave  to go up to Barcelona super early. You  seriously wouldn't believe how many people there were at those training meetings! It was packed. I believe there were 44 missionaries and 42 trainers or  something it was crazy! That's two zones and a third of what the mission was when I got  here. My new companion's name is Hermana Barker, she is from  San Francisco, California and is seriously a doll! She joined the 5'3 and under club we have going on right now and I still haven't had a companion who is younger than me or from Utah (super odd). Transfers was also very fun because I got to see a lot of old friends.

Well I love you all like crazy and hope everything is going fantastic back at home. Let me know if there is anything I can include in my prayers. 

My invitation: Cheer super loud for BYU football  for me  and go to the temple this month...not in that  order?? 

Disfruten la vida! Les quiero!

Hermana Tuttle

Ummm...¿Que?

Sooo that awkward moment when you realize you never sent your long email from the week before... here it is, better late than never!

Familia, Amigos, y los demas,

Wow, already time to email again? Weeks are definitely going by faster and faster.

Sooo...I can finally tell you what President told all of the Sister Leaders last week in Leadership council. We are all training a new missionary from the new group that comes in this week and be in trios which means: I will be training Hermana Walker and a brand new missionary... I'm kind of freaking out. I feel like I've been in the field for just a couple of weeks and that I am so under qualified to be responsible for two missionaries before I've even hit my sixth month mark but I'll be honest, as stressed out as I get when I think about it, all of you (or at least those who know me well) know that I love a challenge so a part of me is super stoked (p.s. they say "stoked every other word in Spain so consider this your fair warning that I'm going to come home and probably say it all of the time...feel free to beat that out of me)

So I'm afraid this week might be a little boring since I was up in Barcelona for four days of it (for leadership training and to get Hermana Walker's residency card) but whatever, I'll do my best :)

Okay but before I get too far, can we please just freak out for a second that it is already September (almost my mom's birthday! please spoil her for me!)

Alright so when we last communicated I was just about to leave to Barcelona. You'll be happy to know we arrived safely but at like 10:45. We didn't get to Hermana Shaffer's piso, where we were staying that night, until about 11 or a little later, I felt super rebellious! ;) ...no idea why I am in such an emoticon mood right now but I totally am. Anyway, super great as always to catch up with Hermana Shaffer oh and fun fact, her companion (a friend of mine from the MTC) is coming down to Valencia this transfer which will be awesome! Wednesday we picked up the residency card then hung out in the office until our train left with the office elders and President and Hermana Pace (things have been super hectic there because they have 44 missionaries coming in this week! that's like a third of what we have now. Transfers are going to take three days! It's crazy but they are super prepared).

Then we got home from Barcelona and visited a sweet older lady in our ward. Afterwards, we ran into a member who I absolutely love but who out of nowhere left his family a couple of weeks ago and who no one had heard from since. It was such a tender mercy to see him again. He has returned home and we are visiting with his family tomorrow night for a family home evening and I am very excited. I don't know what happened but I'm so glad that it's fixed and that he has invited us over!

We had a few really good less active lessons but I'd say the best lesson we had this week was with a man named Isdi. Every time we teach him he is so interested and asks so many questions. He really wants to understand what we are teaching and when we answer his questions he always says "ahhh" or "oh I never knew that before"

We taught a few other lessons but unfortunately nothing really worth documenting but we are determined that we are going to have a really good week.

Today for preparation day we toured The Mestalla (The Valencia C.F. stadium) it was fun (not nearly as nice as Madrids but still super cool) and then we had a big lunch and played uno in the capilla. Just enjoying our last day together before transfers (there were only I think two companionship in the whole zone that aren't changing, it's super sad, I'm going to miss a lot of the people who are leaving but I know I'm going to love all of the people who are coming). It was a super fun day and then tonight we are having a family home evening/birthday party with the Mambos (the family we eat with every Sunday). It'll be great.

Well I love you! Have a great week! 

Hermana Tuttle