5.27.2013

You Can Do This

Hello FAMILY!

I loved reading your email this week! I wish I could have been there to see the birds fly off and Grant ready to fend off any cats with the BB GUN. You are awesome Gee! AHH your quick trip to Vegas sounded like HEAVEN! I am glad you guys got to get away for a bit. I have been thinking about the boys a lot lately and how they are basically done with school! AHH how crazy! The time flew this year! Branson, DOWNTOWN PHILLY! Sounds like your dream job. How you do you like it so far? Cavestock was always a blast. I am glad you went. Also, I can’t believe you are going to be a Senior! Appreciate every day because it goes so fast! Grant! Lagoon day is so bomb. I still remember all the fun we had in ninth grade going there. Glad you had a blast and are ready to conquer high school!! I have been thinking about Avalon a lot today. I told of our experience with her while teaching the Plan of Salvation today and one sister stood up and said "While you bore your testimony of your sister I had the strongest impression to tell you that she is here and helping you with your mission." WOW. That hit me hard and defiantly brought me to tears. The Spirit here is just unbelievable. I can’t believe it has already been 1 month! NOO!!! 18 months is simply not enough time to convert the whole country of Nicaragua. Although, I met someone from Nicaragua today that said “The ppl in Nicaragua are getting Baptized faster than they can build chapels to fit them in!" How incredible is that. I CANT WAIT to get there. I have only been in the CCM but I can already understand why ppl say the mission is 18 months of the hardest yet BEST years of your life. I am making LIFE LONG friends. I never knew I could have so much fun on a mission. I am really SO HAPPY EVERYDAY. I don’t want to say goodbye to these ppl in 2 weeks. I love them too much.

Okay so this week has flown by and been awesome!! Tonight we had chocolate dinner again (we went a little crazy ha! Elder Jolly came up, saw our plates and said "well you guys are happy!" haha) because zones are leaving again tomorrow. NOO! I hate goodbyes. I can’t wait to get the new sisters and elders though because we should get Latins going to our mission! YAY! So my favorite part of this week was SUNDAY. By far my best day here. Sundays here are so incredibly spiritual it is almost overwhelming. We started off the day by watching the Testaments. Ahh so good. All the Sisters looked around and noticed we were all BAWLING so we had a little giggle. Then I had meetings to attend to. It has been kind of crazy this week being a leader because EVERYONE is sick! I wish I knew more about medicine. Oh well good training to become a mother. After meetings we had splits with the Latinas. I was with Hermana De Leon. Oh how I love her. We went to Sacrament together and classes after. Okay let me explain sacrament and classes. So during personal time on Sunday (which I know longer have because of meetings) we write a 5 min talk on a given topic (this week was the APOSTASY) and plan a 15 min lesson with our comp. When you get to sacrament everyone sits down, we pray, sing, have SANTA CENA then wait to hear who speaks in church for the day. Oh and did I mention EVERYTHING has to be in SPANISH. This week I WAS CALLED. I was so grateful I found 15 MINUTES to put together a talk. So, I went up, started reading my talk and just got the impression I needed to say something else. So I looked up and just started talking, IN SPANISH! It was crazy. I sat down by my comp and we just looked at each other in AMAZMENT. I still don’t really know what I said, But everyone came up to me and told me how awesome it was. I am pretty convinced it was to just be nice but I am grateful none the less. After sacrament meeting we had Sunday school. Two companionships in our class were picked to teach. Those two lessons were some of the most powerful I have EVER heard! We seriously have the best district ever! EVERYONE talks about the spirit they feel with our district and how the Spanish going on in our class is awesome. Ahh I am so blessed. Presidente sat in on our class this week and he was even blown away by their lessons. He didn't know what to say. Hermana Nicolysen taught Relief Society and she taught about spiritual gifts. She read the Book You Are Special. One of my favorites. Something she said hit me HARD. She said "I predict you will be the mothers of the Children that will greet the Savior and a mission is the best training to be an outstanding mother." Wow the spirit testified to me that one reason I need to be here is so I can be the best mother possible later on in life. We ended the day by watching a Devotional from Elder Bednar. It was GREAT! My favorite thing he said was “I KNOW Christ wants to hug each of you and say YOU CAN DO THIS." At the end of the devotional all the Elders stood up and sang Elders of Israel in Spanish. AHH the spirit hit me like a WALL. I know they felt silly singing to us since there were about 15 Hermanas in the Audience and that was it BUT we were all in tears. The missionaries here are of the HIGHEST quality. I am so lucky to be amongst them. What a great day.

Okay random things. Last week I bought the COOLEST scriptures cases AHH. I can’t wait to show you guys when I get back. Currently I am trying to learn this snapping thing that ALL the Latinos do. It means HURRY. They do it all the time I can’t truly embrace their culture until I know how to do it. That’s what they say at least. The Rainy season has HIT! Whoa I have never seen so much rain in all my life. It is CONSTANT. Along with the rain came all the BUGS. I am being eaten ALIVE. OH well rather get it over with now. Funny story about bugs. Yesterday Hermana Scott walked outside and 2 seconds later I hear her scream HERMANA KENDALL there are ANTS out here the size of AFRICA! So I ran out and she was right!! The ants here are gigantic. So we went and asked the Latinas what they are called and the said SONPOPOS de Mayo. All the Latinas LOVE THEM. They started picking them up and throwing them. Oh I forgot to mention, the nasties FLY. They said they don’t bite though. They like them because they only come in May and signify the coming over rain. The rest of the year they stay underground. So gross! They said ppl here fry them and eat them too. They better not be doing that in NICARGUA ha chista.

Mom I got all your dear elders and Letter about grandma. It got here about 10 days after you sent it. So not too bad! Thanks for sharing the scriptures and quotes! So helpful. Oh and to answer your question I am so happy with my clothes choices. Thanks so much for all your help! All the Hermanas are so sweet and always comment on my clothes. I always say I owe it all to my stylish mom and grandma. The funny thing is I AM FREEZING HERE. I should have brought a winter coat. The boys like to keep it at about 64 degrees in our class room so all the Hermanas are dying. It is 4 against 8 though so we usually don´t win. I also lost my black sweater darn it. I am sure I will be dying of heat in Nicaragua though. We are going to the Market in Guatemala City tomorrow for our pday! AHH I CAN’T WAIT! I am going to try and get a sweater there. I also need notebooks, folders and note cards. I am hoping I can find those somewhere. I am getting worried about weight in my suitcase though. I bought a bunch of garments here and they gave us a solid 15 lbs. in books. We will see how it all goes. I have about a million funny moments I want to share but don’t have time. Just thought I would let you know (family and friends) I am totally called spaz here because of all my weird little things. Everyone thinks it is hilarious though so that’s a bonus haha. I know you were worried about my awkwardness...wink wink.

Well I love you all so much!! Boys hug mom and dad for me EVERYDAY. We are lucky to have the best parents in the entire world!!!

I LOVE YOU ALL!

Love, Hermana Kendall

p.s. To my students: I am doing all my exercises and stretches every day! So you better be too. If you all have your splits when I get back we will have a big ice cream party. I also I brought all my pics of you cute girls and show them off to everyone here each day. YOU GIRLS ARE INCREDIBLE! NEVER FORGET IT!!! LOVES!

5.22.2013

Field Trip!

Hello!!

I got tons of emails this week and I have less time than normal so hopefully I can respond individually more next week. Just real quick I LOVE YOU ALL AND MISS YOU EVERYDAY! That goes for friends, students and of course family! Thank you for all the support and sweet words. I am so blessed!

Things in the CCM are good. I am officially half way through!! HOORAY! I am SO ready to be out there yet still feel like I have way too much to learn. It is a weird feeling. We got to go to the city last pday and it was a BLAST! It was so nice to be out of the CCM for a little while. As we were driving up to WALMART (yes we went to Wal-Mart and I have never been so excited to see that store) we passed a couple VOLCANOES and rod all through the JUNGLE it was gorgeous. And they even gave us our cameras for a few hours so I took pictures of everyone in my district! Oh and to answer your question in the picture Hermana Teichert is far from me. She is 5 ft. 9 inch so I basically look like her child. Cool nothing new ha. Anyways we went shopping in Wal-Mart for 30 mins! I felt like I was on a game show because we were all running around like crazies trying to get all the candy and supplies we could find. Outside of Wal-Mart there were guards EVERYWHERE. Much different than what we are used to. We also went to the Mall for the FOOD COURT. I went to McDonalds and got a Big Mac, Fries, Mcflurry and COKE. I didn’t ever even eat that while in AMERICA haha but it was delicious. It was such a fun day.

Last week all the 6 weekers left and we officially were no longer the newbies. I miss all those Hermanas SO MUCH!! The new girls are great though and it is nice to see that I really have improved. This week I was called to be Sister Training Coordinating leader or something like that. To my understanding we are the equivalent of Zone leaders except only for the Sisters. Clearly I am not really sure though. We have 4 zone leaders and 4 sister leaders here in the CCM. It is actually a little stressful because ALL our meetings are in Spanish. I think that is why I am still unsure of what I am doing. Mostly right now I am making sure everyone is getting along and everyone is healthy. I have already had 3 am knocks on the door because sisters are sick. Waking up the Presidente and his wife then is NOT my favorite. Oh well. Last night one girl came running in my room at2 am in a panic saying one of the sisters had a fever and was shaking. I ran over and it was one of the Latins so I couldn’t talk to her very well. I got medicine, water, rags and since there is no ice I found some popsicles for her head. Then we just said a prayer all together and I rubbed her back. All she could say in English was Thank you I can feel you truly love me. MAN! That hit me hard. I am so blessed to be here.

So just some funny or rather random things about good old Guatemala. The Elders in our district LOVE to play basketball. So last week they SOME HOW convinced me to join. I think it was mostly me feeling guilty because my companion loves bball and I never play. So anyways I thought I could just walk around and avoid the ball. Man I was wrong! It became a game of try and pass the ball to Savannah and make her shot. It was COMEDY hour I tell you! Seriously we were all laughing so hard my stomach hurt the next day. Now they always beg me to come play. NEVER AGAIN. Also, a lot of the Hermanas hear call me Princess Belle it makes me think of my cute students EVERY TIME and them calling me that. Another little tidbit one day I was having a hard time with the language and my progress in general. I came back to my room and they had changed the blankets. Guess what was on mine! POOH BEAR AND TIGER! What the?? Made me smile. Also mom thanks for all those little notes I still find them and they always make me smile. So the CCM is down the street from a night club and we ALWAYS here all their AMERICAN music. Last night it was a BRUNO MARS party. I thought of you dad. Oh and mom you are officially the best packer EVER. I literally have everything. Thank you so much!! You should consider doing it professionally. The Elders are all on the second floor here and every night from 9:30 to 10:30 it sounds like a ZOO up there. We finally found out it is because they have dart wars. And here we sisters are having hymn and prayer together hahaha.

I have been teaching the Latinos a lot lately. It really helps my Spanish. Although, I still am nowhere close to where I want to be. I do lots of smiling and nodding. So does my companion. It is always funny when they stop talking and we realize they have just asked a question and here we are just smiling and nodding. Oh brother. Our whole district still teases us about several of our funny moments teaching. Whenever we teach we use lots of BIG hand gestures. Our logic is that it gets the Spanish across better haha. Anyways we wanted to end the lesson by saying Will you offer the prayer for us and can we say it on our knees. Instead we said Usted, Oracion, Rodeas? Which means You, Pray, Knees? We of course were waving our arms and pointing the whole time too haha. We will never live that one down.

Last night we got to hear from another member of the 70, Elder Duncan. He talked about Obedience and Love. It was a WONDERFUL devotional. The Spirit was incredible. I can feel my testimony growing EVERYDAY here.

Few quick things- I CANT BELIEVE WE WERE ROBBED! I am glad to hear everyone was okay though and nothing of great importance was taken. Still so crazy. Also GRANT you are the sweetest for taking care of the sweet little birds and saving them. I LOVE YOU GEES! And B I took a couple vids on pday so I will send those when I can of Guatemala. Mom and Dad I am so excited for your new calling. You guys will be great with the Stakes Single Adults. They are pretty stinking lucky to get you guys. Also, so excited I have a new cousin! I guess that means you will be going to Texas soon mom. Hope you have a good trip!

I wish I had more time to write but I am out! So lastly, I have picked a mission scripture John 21:17. Love is EVERYTHING!

I love you all so much!! Never forget.

Love, Hermana Kendall

P.S. Congrats to all my cute girls on doing so good at comp for solos! Keep up all your hard work in class. LOVES.

 
Savannah is on the second row -third from the left.  Taken on 5/15/13.

5.13.2013

Exactly Where I'm Suppose To Be!

Mi Familia y Amigos!!

How are you all!? I miss you and think of you every day but I know this is exactly where I am supposed to be. It just feels right. MOM!!! I love you so much and was thinking about you ALL DAY YESTERDAY. I hope you had a great mother’s day! Those boys better have made you breakfast in bed and done ALL the DISHES. You are incredible. How did I get so lucky?

Things are great here in the CCM. Classes all day long like usual. It really is so hard to be sitting all day long. I can't wait to be out in Nicaragua so I can get moving around and meeting people. Hermana Teichert and I are still the only two Missionaries going to Nicaragua north in the CCM. CRAZY! I am sure we will get some Latinas and Latinos in 2 weeks. The Latinos are seriously some of the sweetest, most expressive and loving people I have ever met! I can't wait to serve amongst them in Nicaragua. The Spirit here really is incredible. I hope to always live in a way to feel this sweet spirit. I have to say again that I love my district!! Every single one of them has become a best friend. I wish I had time to write about all of them, maybe in a letter if I have time. Hermana Teichert and I really are BEST FRIENDS already. I love that girl! Hermana Scott and the other Hermana have me laughing constantly. As for the Elders....they are some of the greatest men I have ever met. Love them ALL! Okay enough of that.

So they weren't lying when they said the food here is INCREDIBLE. I have a mango and guacamole addiction. It is a problem. We also get fresh bread and a dessert with every meal, even breakfast. They also have a constantly supply of ice cream treats. SO dangerous. Carlos, our chef, just absolutely spoils us. We love him. Tonight because 3 districts are leaving we get chocolate dinner. We heard they put chocolate fountains everywhere and we just get to go to town! They do it every two weeks when missionaries leave. Hermana Teichert and I have been counting down the days for it haha. I am so sad to see all these missionaries leave. I have grown to love them so much! Yesterday was really hard. We were crying anytime we saw each other practically. They will be phenomenal missionaries. 15 sisters are going to PANAMA! I keep thinking Steve is so lucky to get all those Hermanas.

Hermano Fabio is now being taught by the real missionaries so we just teach our teachers now. It is so hard to teach an entire lesson in Spanish. ESPECIALLY when they start asking questions. We can't prepare for that as well. We are fumbling our way through every time. Whenever we testify though the spirit is so apparent. We also teach less actives during at time called Cré. It is nice because we get to leave the CCM (spiritual prison) and go out in the real world. It is super hard though because they speak absolutely NO ENGLISH. We do a lot of charades. Thankfully they are all so sweet and patient. There is always something going on here at the CCM. I love staying busy. We have had some amazing devotionals and speakers. I can't wait to tell you all about them when I get home. My testimony grows every day. Something’s that I have learned and that have really stood out to me are - The real MTC is in the home! So boys, listen to mom and dad! Don't groan when we have family council or FHE. It is so important. Another is serving a mission is the ultimate training to be a mom. How incredible is that! I need all the training I can get. Last is... as missionaries we have the SAME commission as the Apostles. They can't reach everyone in the world so we are called. We must live worthy to stand shoulder to shoulder with the Apostles. What a grand calling! Jesus Christ IS the head of his church and IS actively involved in how it is run! He Lives and LOVES us. I can't wait to tell my Brothers and Sisters in Nicaragua that message. I can't believe I have been so blessed in my life. Helping spread this Gospel is the LEAST I can do after all I have been given. I am so lucky to have been surrounded by such wonderful people all my life. I LOVE you guys!

Okay last week we got to go to the Temple. That was one of the most wonderful experiences of my life. I can't write all that I felt and experienced now but it is in my journal. Tomorrow is our next pday and we are going into the city!! I can't wait!! I definitely need a change of scenery! I’ll let you know how it goes. The only time we get to leave the CCM is so church (which is in the middle of the Jungle! We hear birds and animals the whole time), Cre, to go to the Temple and the distribution center.

So quick funny story. A couple days ago we were all falling asleep in class so Hermano Cuque had us all get up and run laps outside the CCM. It felt like missionary boot camp haha. We were all dying laughing as we watched each other run around the building in our church clothes. I guess we did enlist in Gods army! He also had us do jumping jacks and say BAPTIZE BAPTIZE. HAHAHA we were quite the site. LOVE all those people.

Sorry I haven't had time to write individuals yet! I will soon I PROMISE!

Misit and Lauren thank you SOO much for the letters! I love you girls forever. I am so lucky to have such great friends. I wrote you both a quick note and it should get there in a couple days I hope. And Lauren I got all your dearelders. THANK YOU SO MUCH! Just what I needed. And thank you so much for the mini Preach my Gospel. I use that and my mini English one EVERYDAY. Everyone is so jealous of it.

My dear students thank you for all the emails and letters! They keep me going during the hard times.

Grant I showed our family picture to everyone here and they all agreed you are the coolest person ever!

Branson!! I randomly thought of that video you took of me at the airport when I was trying to get on the rail.....massive double chin. HAHA I died laughing. Also you and Grant keep watching fails for me.

Dad! I hope the launch went well and stress levels are lower now. I have a HUGE favor to ask. Will you send me a list of rules for verb conjugations? I have all the different ways to conjugate but I don't know when I use what. Also I am having a really hard time with Spanish right now. It is NOT clicking. I feel bad because I promised everyone I would learn it fast. It isn't coming though. I don't know what to focus on. It seems like it is coming faster for everyone else. Everyone else had YEARS before as well. Any advice? Thanks! LOVE YOU!! Oh also could you send that in a dear elder so I get it quickly. THANKS!

Mom thanks for everything you do! Thanks for taking care of my phone and car. I think I might cry though. If you have time could put together a list a scriptures that coordinate with principles. Like Faith, baptism, love, atonement, ect. Hopefully there is something just on the internet. That would help a lot with my lessons. My strength is DEFINITELY getting to know ppl and becoming friends and showing love. Scripture knowledge is still a process. I don't think I need anything right now but I will let you know. That is so sweet everyone has said kind things to you about me. Tell them THANK YOU! I hope whatever President Scoresby said about me in STAKE CONFERENCE was good. You have me worried now. We know the greatest people. I am glad you are getting some quality time with Sister Anderson, Grandma and all the other wonderful ppl we know. Thanks for taking care of my pay checks and tithing! That is great you got to talk with Sister Cosper a little bit. They are the greatest family! I haven't been able to buy my scripture cases and stuff yet but I will tomorrow. The Guatemala money is AWESOME! I want to keep some to show you. Oh and they have the garments I like for dirt cheap so I may just get extras.

Tell GRANDMA I love her and thank you for her emails. I wrote her a letter and it should be there soon!

The weather here is AMAZING! I love it. I always go outside for personal study time. It is my favorite time of the day. I met an Elder here from NICARAGUA and all I could understand was it is SO HOT and LOTS OF BAPTISMS Sounds great to me. Well most days I feel like I am just in a dream and none of this is real. I think my whole mission may be like that. I love it here though and LOVE YOU ALL. Sorry this email was a beast and so scattered. I think I go into SPAZ mode whenever I get to a computer. (Let’s be honest though we know I am always in spaz slash weirdo mode. It is no different here haha. I think most ppl think it is funny though. At least that’s what I tell myself. Until next week!

Love!
Hermana Kendall

P.S. I sent you a pic from the CCM with the president and his wife. There is one with all the SISTERS then all the ELDERS. I am right in the middle of our pic. and that is everyone here in the CCM! BEST PEOPLE in the world! Besides you guys of course. LOVES.

5.07.2013

Guatemala!

Familia!

I love you all so much!! Thank you for all the letters, emails and messages. I am so blessed to have all of you. To my students - I LOVE YOU ALL!! Thank you for the letters and encouragement. I miss each of you and think of you every day. I brought pictures and have showed ALL the Hermanas how beautiful you girls are. Keep dancing and smiling every day. Quick story I was stretching during Deportes (sports time) the first day and all the hermanas and Elders were freaking out! They basically think I am the coolest person ever and a little freaky haha. Everyone calls me ballerina. I love it and it always makes me think of you cute girls. Love you!

Okay so this week has been INSANE! I love the CCM. It is so hard to be sitting all day. YOU HAVE NO IDEA. I am sure I look like a spaz because I am constantly wiggling in my seat and have to get up and walk around. The food here is delicious. Our chef, Carlos, is amazing. He also prepares great meals for us. It is WAY too much food but delicious none the less. I am so grateful for our hour and a half of Deportes each day. Mi compañera y I usual go running and do some strength training. It is a great way to break up our day. My maestro, Hermano Cuque, is the most incredible person I have EVER met. The spirit he carries with him is unlike anything I have ever felt before. Like I said before he just returned from Peru and he always has wonderful experiences to share with us. He really is patient with Mi compañera Hermana Tiechert and me. I appreciate it so much. I will be so sad to say goodbye to him.

So this is how our day goes, most of the time. Wake up, get ready then off to breakfast. We then have personal study, language study and classes until lunch. After lunch more classes and studying. At 3:30 we have deportes until 5:00 then off to dinner so we can eat some more. After dinner we prepare our lessons at 7:00 we have snack time. I am telling you the amount of food they serve you here is ridiculous! After snack time we teach our investigator and do more personal study. We have an hour to get ready for bed then lights out at 10:30. It is really hard to be in bed by 10:30. I usually do not fall asleep until about 12. It isn’t hard to wake up at 6:30 though. So that is a blessing. I just wish I wasn’t wasting time lying in bed each night. I want to practice Española! So as I said before all the classes are AMAZING. The spirit here is absolutely addicting. President and Hermana Nicolysen are the greatest ever. I love them so much. She has tons of sass and spunk. SOO refreshing. Everyone here is so friendly. The moment I got here I felt like I instantly had 150 new friends. That is how many people are here. It is about two thirds elders and one third hermanas. Okay my DISTRICT! THE BEST EVER. I love these people so much. I know we will be friends forever. We are laughing all day in class. The Elders are the sweetest to us. I love feeling their spirits and hearing their strong testimonies. The Hermanas are basically the coolest people ever. We all get along so well. I don’t know how I ever lived without them. Mi Companera and I are BEST FRIENDS. We get along so well. We laugh, cry and act ridiculous ever day together haha. I actually love having a companion and knowing I always have a friend. Our roommates are amazing as well. I will be so sad to see them leave. So Hermana Teichert and I are the ONLY missionaries going to NICARAGUA here. Crazy huh. Maybe we will get more in a couple weeks. We heard all the Elders going to Nicaragua are in the Provo MTC but you hear all sorts of things here. I am sure we will get Latinos 2 weeks before we leave.

SPANISH! AHHHHHH. I have never felt so frustrated in all my life. Everyone in our district beside MI Companera, me and one elder took lots of Spanish before coming. I hate feeling behind. I pray every day though and I know it will come with time. I know how to pray, testify and carry on a very basic conversation. We sit by the Latinos at meals as much as we can to practice. Hermano Cuque ONLY speaks in Spanish. I know it is really helpful but at the same time it makes me want to rip my hair out. It is then I have to breath, say a prayer and ask the Lord for help.

Our second day here we had to teach our first lesson to Hermano Lopez in ESPANOL. Here in the CCM we teach REAL investigators. He learned about the church while working in America last year. That first lesson was TERRIBLE. We walked away in tears because we could not say ONE THING. We decided right then we could not do this alone. We HAVE to teach from the spirit. Our second lesson went much better and he committed to Baptism! How incredible is that. Last night we taught about eternal families. The spirit during that lesson was unlike anything I have ever felt before. I loved hearing him try to explain what the spirit felt like to him. It is so amazing to see the change in him. We love Hermano Lopez so much and so does our Heavenly Father. We only get to teach him one more time and then he has to start taking lessons from the "real" missionaries. Please pray for him!

Okay Guatemala! This is the most BEAUTIFUL place I have ever been. The CCM is literally right next to the Temple. We get to leave and go to the Temple tomorrow for pday. I can’t WAIT!! I love the CCM but it really does feel like a prison sometimes. We call it spiritual prison in our district. Anyways it will be nice to leave and next week we get to go to the city and shop! I am sitting here right now looking out the window and we are surrounded by trees. It is GOREGOUS. You can tell it is poor here when looking at the buildings. The weather is always perfect. We had a huge rainstorm yesterday. We were instantly drenched as soon as we walked outside. I have never experienced rain like that. It was crazy! We just keep hearing how HOT and POOR Nicaragua is. I can’t wait to get there and see for myself.

I wish I had time to tell you about everyone in my district but I can’t right now. Trust me I am writing everything in my journal and can’t wait to share it when I get home. We have had some super funny moments already. Yesterday Elder Saunders was supposed to introduce himself, say something he likes and where he is from. INSTEAD he accidently said he was Jesus Christ and that he loved himself hahahah. We were dying!!!! He felt so bad after and said he repented ha. At lunch yesterday we had fish and one of the Hermanas wanted to say she loves fish. Instead she said she loves sin. Haha oh Spanish. One more story. Mi Companera and I were walking outside to get to our room and we were goofing off singing and kind of dancing around. Two Latino Elders came running up to me and started talking SO fast. I didn’t catch a thing they said. After about 5 mins and a lot of charades, we are getting so good at that, we finally realized they wanted me to sing. So right there I started to sing a hymn! Once I was done they started cheering and clapping. They said my voice was muy bonita. It was so sweet. Now every time they see me they ask me to sing haha.

Tomorrow for pday the CCM allows all these vendors to come and sale different things to us. They have these AWESOME backpacks that are supposed to be super good for your back while out in the field and they have scriptures cases for the Spanish Scriptures. I think I am going to get both. I also need to get more notebooks! So I will probably use my cash but just so you know. The CCM literally gave us 20 different books but I am not sure I will take all of them into the field. I will figure that all out when it gets closer to leaving. Here in the CCM we say the days are long but the weeks are short. It is so true!! Every day I have a moment of PLEASE just be over but then I have 100 other moments of pure joy. I am not going to lie it is SOOO hard to not just sit and visit in class all day. We do as much as that as we can during free time though and I am sure I will get all my visiting in on pday.

Like I said the Española is really hard right now. The first couple days I was having a hard time. Everyone here is so knowledgeable in either the language or the Gospel. I felt like I really wasn’t proficient in either area. I took some time to think about what my strengths were. I decided it was my love for people and the Lord. I feel most confident when I am getting to know other people, becoming friends and loving them. That is my goal for this mission. LOVE! To me that is what the Gospel is about and that is what is important. The Language and the Gospel knowledge are secondary. I was called to Nicaragua because I need to teach those PEOPLE. Like it says in preach my gospel we teach people not lessons. That is so important. I love the spirit here! This Gospel is so true

Well trust me I still have my weirdo moments and sassy moments but I wouldn’t be me without those, right? haha. I LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH! I pray for you every day in my broken Spanish. I am a MISSIONARY. What the?

Love,
Hermana Kendall

5.01.2013

I Made It!!

Hello Family! I have made it here safely in Guatemala. I LOVE it Here!! It is warm, humid and BEAUTIFUL. Traveling was long but great. We had about 18 people leave from Salt Lake and we picked up10 more in LA. I instantly had 28 friends! The BEST! As soon as I got over to the gate and sat down I met Hermana Teichert who is going to my same mission. She is awesome. Seriously, we are already great friends and we just found out 10 mins ago that we are companions. LOVE HER! We are going to do great work together I can already tell. While waiting at the gate I met a man, Victor, who served in my mission 5 years ago. How crazy is that?! He told us all about the mission and had me write down a couple names to check on when I get there. He is from California and was way chill. We met 3 other returned sister missionaries on our flight and one other man who served in my mission as well. Man, what tender mercies. Well the flights were long and we are all beat today. I LOVE the ELDERS and HERMANAS in my district we were laughing all day while traveling. We
all kind of had a freak out moment leaving LA, knowing we were not going to see America for quite some time. Okay the drive from the Guatemala airport to the CCM was INSANE. First off we hauled all our luggage and self’s on to an old school bus, that is how they travel here. It was hilarious to see us all crammed in there. Guatemala is just beautiful! I feel like we are in the middle of a jungle yet
surrounded by what they would call a city. Really all it is to us is extreme Ghetto. There are people everywhere and everyone rides motorcycles or drives tiny cars. We saw a TINY taxi cab with 5 ppl
shoved in back and 4 in the front. So crazy. Once we got to the CCM we all started to have another freak out moment. Is this really happening! We tried to get a little bit of sleep but none of us really did. So we are walking zombies. We were the only missionaries coming in this week, so 28 of us. There are 4 hermanas in my district and 10 elders. Hermana Teichert and I are the ONLY Hermanas going to Nicaragua. We may get a few Latinos in 2 weeks but as of now we are the only ones. Pretty cool if you ask me. President and his wife came and  talked to us for a while today. They are wonderful people. Our teachers name is Hermano Coolkie. He just got back from serving a mission in LIMA, PERU. Thought of you dad. He is the best. He only talks to us in Española. I already love Spanish! I can feel myself remembering things from Jr. High and learning new things already. Everyone is so sweet and friendly. There are about 150 missionaries here right now. By the end of this week I should know EVERYBODY. So awesome. Tell Sister Golden I saw Tyler. He is doing GREAT!! He loves them and is thinking of them. He already knows so much Spanish. We just got our schedule and we are going none stop all day every day. The food so far is delicious! The chef is super sweet and takes care of us. The CCM is really beautiful as well. I know it is going to take some getting used to but I do love it here. It feels so right. Thank you for the letters!! I loved reading them and I will keep them forever. This keyboard is pretty confusing so I hope you can make since of everything I am trying to get out. We only have 30 mins today but we will have 1 hour on pday, which will be Tuesday or Wednesday. The temple is beautiful and we can see it from our room. Most the Hermanas are 20-21 but I am sure more 19 year olds will be coming soon to represent! We got about 15 lbs. of books today so I am going to have to figure that out. We are supposed to only talk in
Española all the time which is REALLY hard right now, considering it has been half a day, BUT I feel the Lord helping us and I know it willcome. Tell Daniel I was thinking of him when I arrived and all he told me about the CCM. I can see why he loved it so much. I am so lucky to be a missionary! I absolutely love it already. Okay I am out of time for today I will write again soon! Love you all!!! Oh and Branson thanks for your letter. It means the world to me. Adios!
Hermana Kendall