Week #2

Hola Familia! So first off, im so sorry about my letter last week being so crazy..i reread it just barely and i messed up everything i was saying and forgot to tell you some things but i have more time this week so hopefully that will help. This week has been fabulous as well. It is so true that the days in the CCM seem so long, but the weeks go by so quickly. I will tell you some of the things i forgot to say last week and then answer questions and then tell you about this week. Um first off i realized last week i made a mistake and said i was in the intermediate level, but im not, im in beginner, i think you probably got that but just to clarify. Also i forgot to say that Hermana Garbett and I are Sister Training Leaders. Really that doesn´t mean much here in the CCM, we basically are just supposed to watch over the other Hermanas if they have any problems, but yeah we don´t do much otoher than that. Also i forgot to tell you all the people ive seen here from Springville! it really isnt that many people but on the first day I ran into Hermana Thomas (she did sterling scholar) and she left this last week i believe. Also I ran into Hermana (Lexi) Lister my first day, i actually see her quite a bit and we chat, it was great to talk to her my first week because she is only a week ahead of me so she knows exactly everything im going through. Also Elder (Derek) Boyer is here, he is going to a different mission in El Salvador. He said he remembered taking your sewing class mom and it was his favorite haha. Anyways i think there might be a couple other springville kids here other than them but i dont know them very well. Also i don´t think i really talked about the organization here at the CCM. So im sure in provo it is super organized but here it is a little laid back. Like i didnt tell you but the night we got here we didnt really have any direction on what to do after we checked in and just you kinda have to figure things out for yourself, its kinda funny but the first week is kinda confusing sometimes, but its better this week. About the temple last week, we bascially go every other pday, so we didnt go today but we will go next week. It really is beautiful and there are some gorgeous paintings inside and a lot of them i hadnt seen before. I loved going to the temple but it did make our pday go by super super quick and we didnt have a lot of extra time. It takes like 30min to an hour to get there. Um mom i have been taking the probiotics every few days, but not every day. I did at first but i havent been sick yet so i think if i just take it every couple days i can save more for later when im in the field when i might need them more. Also i am still eating fine. like really dont worry about that at all anymore cause i literally eat SO much every meal. People complain about the food a lot, but i still really like it :) Dad, im not sure how long a package would take, maybe 2 weeks? if not still send me the shorts later in El Salvador. Also if you have heard of dear elder its a website you can type up a letter and then they print them off here and i get it on tuesdays like i would a normal hand written letter (thanks Avery for sending me one it made my whole day! plus i needed your email!) So about my week, After last pday i had friday and saturday and i felt like those days were a little rough. I literally love everyday but i was struggling with things i felt like i needed to work on or what not. But sunday was fast sunday and I was fasting for things to help me be a better missionary and literally every single thing i was fasting for was answered in our meetings on sunday. I seriously think all of our meetings were just for me specifically. Our leadership meeting was how we can better help our companions and how we don´t know the background stories of those we are around. Relief Society was on the universal language of love and how we speak with the tongue of angels. District meeting was on Christlike Attributes.Sacrament meeting was a testimony meeting (so everyone had like 45sec to share their testimony). then we had our class with the MTC president and President Pratt spoke on the the Atonement and Grace. He really focused on grace and how it is because of the atonement that we are able to do things we wouldn´t have the strength to do on our own. It made me think of you this summer Mom and i know God doesn´t make our burdens lighter, but he strengthens us so that we may be able to carry them with more ease. Sunday Devotional was a recorded broadcast from Elder Christoffersen, and he talked about how we can´t just be busy. We most truly focus on our efforts and the results of our work. I love listening to the devotionals from the apostles to the missionaries. First off, you think that the apostles are sometimes funny when they crack a joke in conference? haha well you should hear them in the missionary devotionals. they are hilarious! Second reason I love them is because they always have comforting words for the missionaries to not be discouraged and they always reassure us of their love and the prayers of the people all around the world. It is so amazing to hear that we are probably the most prayed for group of people in the world. It gives us a lot of strength. Also they always talk about how although we are not apostles our duty is apostolic (i dont know if i spelled that right) and that we walk side by side with the apostles. Our purpose is the same. Also Sunday night for our movie we watched a movie on the Book of Mormon (i cant remember the name) and its about how people literally gave everything they had to learn more about the Book of Mormon because they knew it was true. Parley Pratt gave up his whole house and farm and everything to search for the truth and then he came across the Book of Mormon and read it and new it was the word of God so he traveled until he could find Joseph Smith or anything related to this book, the movie also talked about a minister in Italy who found the book of mormon in the street but it was so worn he couldnt seee the title anymore and the title page had been ripped out. He read it and new it was the word of God, so he spent a lot of his life preaching from it to the people in his churches but he got in trouble for it and was banned for teaching. He had so many times in his life where he gave up his career and everything for this book and he didnt even know the title or the church that it belonged too. Eventually he came in contact with the church and after many many years (because of circumstances that weren´t allowing him to communicate with the church) he was baptized. It is an amazing story and my summary doesnt do it justice but anyways sunday night movie is always great. The beginning of this week has been fabulous as well. I feel like our district has grown even closer. The other day in the cafeteria there were some missionaries singing god be with you till we meet again because some of othem were leaving the CCM and I can´t imagine what that is going to be like when we leave. The other day our whole district broke out into song and we were singing high school musical in our classroom and it was hilarous. Our district is all so different but we love each other so much. Tuesday night was a devotional and Elder and Sister Villalobos (I think they are from the area seventy here in mexico) talked. Also our branch and another branch sang Señor, Te Necesito (I Need Thee Every hour) as a choir. Sister villalobs talked really really short but she expressed a special thank you to the hermanas for serving and for the example we are to her daughters, it really touched me. Elder Villalobos talked about how when we serve others we tie our hearts to them. He also talked about M&M´s which equals Missionaries & Members. Members are such an important role in the work of salvation. At the end he also talked a little bit about Zions camp and that reminded me of Dads lessons in Sunday School. He said that at some point in all of our lives we will go through our own Zions Camp and that means we will all have a time in our life to provo ourselves to the Lord. And serving a mission i think is definitely one of those times. After devotional we have District Devotional review in our classroom just with our district and our district shared our thoughts on the devotional and then one of our District Leaders asked us to all go around a share a fear or weakness we have in regards to our missions. It was crazy to hear how we all have fears and weaknesses but when we see each other every day we are all so strong and such good examples to each other. The first week we only had one investigator (obviously fake, she was one of our teachers) and her name was Daniela. She was very accepting and open, which was good for our first investiagtor but I know it isn´t going to be that easy. We taught her probably like maybe 5 lessons? But then this week we got all new investigators. We now have 3 (they are still all our teachers pretending to be investigatros). we have only taught one of them so far this week, but we have heard from other people in our district that one of them doesnt believe in God, won´t read the book of mormon, is super happy with her life, loves to party, doesn´t pray, wont do anything, so im a little nervous for that lesson. But i hope we can just get her to feel something and mabye then will she open up a little. My spanish is okay. Im not really frustrated with it, but i dont know. At the CCm you are supposed to do what is called HSI (Hablar Su Idioma) which means speak spanish all the time, in class, at lunch, as your walking, where ever. You are supposed to use all the language that you can. But our district doesnt do that hardly at all. Our teachers are obviously way good at teaching to us in spanish, but there are like 3 of us in our district who will try to answer questions and share comments in spanish. and then when we are all talking together with our district they barely use any spanish at all. That kind of frustrates me because speaking is where I need the most help. Plus everything that we have learned so far I bascially already knew. It was a good review and i needed it. But i just feel like i havent progressed hardly at all because and i havent learned many new things (other then when we have language study on the computers and i can study what i want) and im not able to have many conversations in spanish other then during our lessons. I know i have improved a little, like i know a lot more gospel vocabulary now. I still am at a good level of spanish compared to the rest of my district but i just wish i myself was improving more. if that makes any sense at all. I really am learning so much each day though. About myself, about the gospel, about missionary work. I really am excited to get out there though haha. I know im not ready to be out there yet though, especially with the language. But as much as i love being around all the other missionaries and the fun we have here in the CCM I just want to be in El Salvador teaching real peopple. But ive got more to learn. Um random fun things about this week. Basically we got to la tienda (the store) every day and i buy ice cream and mexican snacks haha. We get 120 pesos a week. so yeah i spend my money on snacks. Also it rains SO much. Every day at 6pm you can count on a down pour. and the thunder here is CRAZY. I am thinking i might want a better umbrella for when i get to El Salvador. Hermana Garbett has a really nice one from the sister missionary mall. Maybe that could be a good bday or christmas present, and a rain jacket. i didnt bring one and i think i might want one. These are just ideas though, im fine with everything that i brought for now. Also other fun things is our district has been playing ultimate frisbie with another district during gym and its a blast. the other district is hilarous too! I love hearing from all of you and im glad everyone is doing well! Give me details about whats going on! I was so glad to hear the Utes won their game! One of the senior couples serving here that i flew in with on the plane told me on friday that they won barely and I was so happy! Also thanks for the pictures! keep sending more each week of whatever! Sounds like janelle and courtney got some good couponing done, nice work! I am so glad grandma emailed me, i am going to write her a letter back today, but also just tell her that i lover her! Im glad you all had fun getting together for labor day. Mom i am glad school is going well for you and i hope you have good classes! Dad i think about you lots here when im speaking spanish all the time. I dont think we have sung that hymn yet but maybe i will try too. We obviously love called to serve but especially here because there are two extra versus in the Spanish version. I miss you all tons. Keep sending me the emails or write me letters! I am going to send some pics in another email. I realized why they didnt all send last week so i will resend some of them. We are only allowed to take pictures on pday so most of them will still just be from last week or a few from this morning! Thank you for your prayers and i love you all! Mom i love you more than the universe! Hermana Groneman PS to Matt Duke, Hermana Garbett is disappointed she never got a goodbye from you ;) Also i need your email Matt haha forgot to tell you about breaking the rules....dad will enjoy this since it sounds like you spent this past week telling stories with your friends.. So me and hermana garbett live in a different house than the other two hermanas in our district which kinda sucks cause it would be fun if we all lived together. But this week our roommates left the mtc (the were leaving for a different mission in El Salvador, they were really nice but we didnt have the same schedules as them so we only saw them at night) so we were hoping that Hermana Jones and Hermana Hawkins could move in. But we asked and they said no and we figured it was because new missionaries were probably moving in that day (it was tuesday which is when all the newbies get here) but when we got back to our room at night nobody had moved in so we ran out of our house and met hermana jones and hermana hawkins in the middle of the street (this is at like 10pm) and told them to come sleep over and we were all so excited! also im pretty sure that might be against the rules. which is bad because they always stress to us that exact obedience brings blessings. but hey just once. So they brought all their bedding over and slept over at our casa and we stayed up late talking (also breaking rules oops) but it was fun and these are the memories im gonna remember from the CCM. Dont worry i´ll work on being more obediente this week!