One week left in the CCM!

DEAR FRIENDS AND FAMILY…

So I was thinking this morning… and how are politics in America?  What has Obama done lately?  I am dying to know.  Who I am kidding I don´t know anything about politics.  It was an interesting thought though as I got ready…

HOW EVERYONE THIS WEEK!  I am doing GREAT.  And oh my I leave in just a couple of days to go into the mission field.  It is so crazy!  My days in the CCM are few!  It is so scary but it so awesome.  I am SO happy and so comfortable here… but I am super excited to get into the field!  It is WHITE and READY to harvest and I can´t wait.  I can´t wait to actually get out there into the real world and do what I came here to do!   I feel like I am constantly thinking about where I am going to go for my first area, what food am I going to have to finally force myself to eat, and what is my trainer going to be like!!!  I think that out of anything I hope that my trainer is AMAZING!  I heard that your first trainer really sets the course of your mission. I am super nervous!   But regardless of whether she is my soul trainer, best friend, lifesaver girl haha I am going to start off my mission on the right foot!!!!  I am so excited.  I am cherishing every moment.  I just love this work with all of my heart and with all of my soul.  SPAIN HERE I COME!  Being a missionary is so hard.  Don´t get me wrong. .  I am so tired and exhausted everyday… but I am so happy!   I am so thrilled to be here.  It is the biggest blessing and the best opportunity and gift that I could have been given as a 19-year-old girl.  I heard that Sarah Stringham and Grace Gochnour are working on their PAPERS!   That is the COOLEST thing I have every heard.  Katie...when I read your email and I read that, I just got the biggest chills because I am SO EXCITED FOR EVERY MISSIONARY.  Coming on a mission was the best decision that I have ever made in my life.  It already means everything to me. 

So another cool thing about being here in the CCM in Spain, is that we get to give tours of the MTC and sing to people!! Haha it is SO fun!   Just last night we gave this group of young women from Barcelona a tour of the MTC!  They were the cutest girls.  They made me think of you Mary!  So pure and so happy.  They really touched my heart!  It was soooo much fun.  We showed them around but my favorite part is when we sing to them.  We always sing Armies of Helaman.  It is the most powerful thing!   Their cute beaming faces just look up to you and you can tell how much they are feeling the spirit.  I LOVE singing with a bunch of missionaries!  I swear it is just the coolest feeling in the world.  We added on a third verse to that song, and it is awesome.  In the chorus instead of saying “We are as the Army of Helaman,” we sing “We are NOW the ARMY OF HELAMAN!  We have been taught in our youth… and we are now the Lord´s missionaries to bring the world His truth.”  Every time that song just gets me!   Especially when we say we are NOW the Army of Helaman.  It is such a privilege being a missionary.  I have never loved something more in my life.  I have been prepared for this moment and now I am here.  In Spain.  As a 19 year old girl. 

I have grown so close to everyone here, but one teacher in particular.  Her name is Hermana Martinez.  She is the probably one of the best people that I have ever met.  She has the BIGGEST heart in the whole world.  She is the happiest lady!   Actually she is like the Ruby Matesen of SPAIN!  Literally the happiest strongest lady that I know.  She reminds me a lot of the lady Rosy I worked with at Meiers.   This lady is incredible.  She has influenced my life so much.  A lot of the people here are actually converts to the church.  She was converted to the church when she was 14.  She served a mission.  And she has been working at the CCM ever since.  I love how every one here has served a mission!   It is sooo inspiring.  Every teacher has this BIGGEST passion for missionary work.  It is the most important thing in the world!   The gospel is the most important thing!!  We have been blessed and we need to use our talents, give our hearts to the Lord first, and then everything else will fall in place.

I have the best district in the world.   In the WORLD!!!  I know that coming here to Spain with these other missionaries was not just a simple coincidence, but that it was INSPIRED!   Next transfer they are going to have about double to amount of missionaries here… and I can just say that I am SO grateful for the opportunity to come at the exact time that I did!  I love how few missionaries there are here.  Everything is so cozy haha and PERSONAL!  I know everyone so well.  I eat lunch with the president.  I get to do an endowment session with the President every week!   How I got this lucky I DO NOT KNOW!  But I wow I sure am loving it here.  My district is amazing.  I love everyone here so much.  I am so excited to get into the actual field, but it is sure going to be hard not being around so many other missionaries here!  It will not be the same having the same support system of good friends that I have here in the CCM.  In just 6 weeks… all of us have gone through so much.  And we have grown so much together.  We are such close friends and it will be sad to go our separate ways into the field but it is also so exciting!!  I am excited to hear about all of the amazing things that I know without of doubt they will all do.  I am so grateful for how this has all turned out.  I have never been happier and I would never have it any other way.  I realized how much I just love PEOPLE!  I love people so much.  No matter how much or how little I know them. I just think that every person is so cool in his or her own unique way!  It is so cool how everyone has their own story.  There are good people out in the world.  Such amazing and good people who may not have the gospel in their life.  It amazes me. 

I have been thinking a lot about the light of Christ lately.  Everyone… everyone was born with the special light of Christ embedded in their hearts.  Mormon or not, everyone has this universal desire in them to good...to take care of others...to be happy.  And for one reason or another they either choose to act on it or to not act on it.  For example, when you get on a train and see someone who you can tell is having a really tough day, at first your heart just feels sad and longs to help this person.  Then, because of different reasons you choose to help or not to help.  This desire is the light of CHRIST! It is not just you… it is Christ shining your heart!  This power everyone has or has had or can have is sooo cool.  If only we chose to act on it can we change the world one person at a time.  Everyone can change!   The worth of souls is sooo great in the eyes of God.  This gospel is such a contagious joy.  I love it.  When I came Spain or even first said that I was going to serve a mission, it was the biggest step into the dark.  It still is.  When I came here I knew two things.  One...that I needed to serve a mission and two...that I needed to go to Spain.  The light of Christ  is often like taking a couple of steps into the fog.   We can´t can see the full light and full purpose… but we can just see enough to know that it is THERE!  The light of Christ is there for everyone.  Every single person needs to know this.  Spread the light!  Let others know that this light is indeed the light of CHRIST! This light is so cool.  What a cool purpose each and every one of us have.

I love you all!  I have to go now.  Time for Squid lunch aka my favorite… but not really even at all haha. Enjoy the pictures… I hope they work!

Love,

Hermana Nydegger

Dad... isn’t this a cool picture!  This is a picture of a regular street in the city.  But I thought you would appreciate the coolest guy playing the trumpet for all of Spain to hear!  Made me think of you.

In Spain, people just play music out on the streets.  They are always the cutest old men!  They play the cool Spaniard guitar and accordion. I will get a picture one day!  I am telling you all… Spain is just like the movies.  Even on the trains people are BOLD WITH THEIR MUSIC!

Real Madrid Soccer Stadium

Here is the beautiful Madrid temple at NIGHT!

The Rain In Spain

HOW ARE YOU ALL?? I am SO jealous that you all went to New Port with out me this year!!  Actually was it weird without Anna, Nik, and me??  I wonder how banana grams was treated without Anna and me... we practically own that game.  I GOT THE PACKAGE!  Wow, that was so nice of everyone!   I love it sooo much.  Me and EVERY OTHER MISSIONARY really appreciated all of the treats.  Dad, I loved the shirt!   I wore it the day I got it and felt like I was right there with all of you!  Thank you so much.  That was so nice!!!!  My district leader is from New Port and we were talking about seaside dounuts and tk burger and were practically crying over it.  But it is okay because we are in SPAIN! Loving and trying to soak in every minute of it!  I am in love with this place.

I had the COOLEST experience at the Park this Saturday.  First off, I was companions with Sister Nikogosyan (one of the Russian sisters!!) and I had the BEST time with her.  She is so cool!  She is probably one of the coolest girls that I have ever met.  Everyone here is so cool!  I was so excited to serve with her!!!  Anyways, it was my favorite park day so far.  We placed two copies of the Book of Mormon and I finanlly got my first REFFEREAL!!  Oh my it just made me so happy!   Something that I learned is that there are people out there who are really prepared to hear this message of the gospel.  This day I also happened to talk to people from literally all around the world.  A cute lady from brazil, another one from Germany, lots from Spain obviously, and a couple from Hong Kong!  It was so cool! To literally be spreading this gospel alllll around the world is an amazing thing.  This missionary work is so so so so important!  Any ways we were walking and decided to go over to this lady and help her with her little TWINS.  Ah i miss twins so much so I was like YES LETS GO!  Haha anyways so go over to talk to her.  She was literally the nicest sweetest lady that I have ever met.  She reminded me of the sweet servant in "The Help."  She was from Brazil!   It was so cool. Like most people here, she came to Madrid to try to find a job.  So we start talking to her and find out that she is Catholic.  She was telling us about her life and we were telling her about ours.  She couldn´t believe that we practically give up our lives to come here only emailing family once a week.  So we start talking to her and she had never heard of our Church before!  So we start telling her about the Book of Mormon.  We are talking about it and the spirit was SO strong.  I showed her Moroni´s promise.  I shared my experience and testified to her of its TRUTHFULNESS and how my life has been changed because of it and how hers can too!  It was awesome.  Sister Nikogosyan is amazing and could somehow just pick of a little of Spanish and know English and Russian.  Someone how cute Marlene was able to understand us.  We told her about eternal families and kept telling her about the Book of Mormon and suddenly she interupts me and is like "Where can I buy this Book!?"  And I am just like "ES UN REGALO POR USTED. Haha and she was like nooo who do I pay!  And I am just like its free!  It is for you.  This Book is for everyone in the world.  Eveyone needs it because everyone is a child of God!  We are here to share this message with you and help you find even more joy that you ever knew in your life.¨"  It was so cool.  Her face just was BEAMING. She kept getting like closer and closer to me as I was talking.  I don´t know if she could understand me but she understood the spirit and that is all that mattered.  I showed her the chapter where Christ visited the Americas.  I told her about the promise again and promised her that if she read it with the a sincere heart, real intent, and having faith in Christ that she will know for herself that it is true.  I asked her to read it and she grabbed it right out of my hands and was like YES WHAT´S YOUR NUMBER!  And I was like uh what is your´s?? We will send to your house missionaries that can speak Spanish better than us haha and she was so excited.  Whenever we get a referal we rate it at the top from 1 to 5.  She was definitely a 5.  So cool.  I am so excited for her!!  It was so powerful.  I love being a missionary.  The verse in Alma 36 I think that talks about how he couldn´t bear to not share the gospel with someone.... that is how I feel!  And let me tell you, it is the coolest feeling in. the. world. 

Something that I love most about being a missionary is just being able to do weird things and be BOLD! Haha some of the things that I do here are things that I wouldn´t do back at home!   This precious 18 months is really a period of no regrets.  Haha for example, a lot of the time on the bus or train we will start singing hymns!  People will look at us like we are weirdos but i LOVE it.  Music is so powerful!  Missionaries are bold people.  I love it.

Yesterday we played fútbol with a ton of kids and other members here in Spain!  It was so fun.  The kids are all so cute!  Its fun to play soccer with them!  And the coolest thing happened when we were playing.  It has been SO hot here and all of a sudden it just started RAINING! While we were playing!  On a hot humid day it rained and there was steam everywhere.  It was like running around in a dream.  Rain in Spain.  It was awesome.  It was so happy.  We were just playing and laughing in the rain!  I love this Earth.  It was one of those beautiful moments that I will have engraved into my heart forever.  It reminded me Katie in Peru playing with the kids in the rain!  How did I get this lucky..

We had our first fast sunday here.  It was actually one of my first full 24 hour one.  It was cool.  It was neat as a missionary.  We started it right after lunch on Saturday.  It was weird because it wasn´t like we could take a nap or do anything different to pass time!  I thought that it was going to be tough but it was really good.  I really enjoyed the 24 hour fast.  Something about hunger and thirst really brings you closer to the spirit.  We had an amazing testimony meeting today.  The spirit was so strong.  I love missionaries they are all so cool.  

What I feel like I have been learning the most and in depth is about out Savior.  Quick side note in the park I just remembers someone asked me and my companion what it means to be a mormon.  The question hit my really hard.. people always ask us what it means to be a missionary, but not too often to we get asked what it means to be a mormon.  My companion paused for a second, and then said I means trying to be more like Christ every day.  that hit me hard. It truly opened my eyes with those few words. I love what I am learning here.  Í miss home but I don´t want to come back!  I am l o v i n g it here. I love my Savior.  I know Him so well.  I know he loves me individually and that he saw MY face on the cross.  There is so much to still be learned about this gospel and it is absolutley incredible and mind blowing.  I am a representative of Jesus Christ!  I may not fully underatnd what that means now, but I plan to by the end of this mission.  I love being apart of a work so much bigger than me.

Remember Christ in every step you take!  Always turn outward.

H. Nydegger

PS the pictures... I think that I am going to send my flash drive home to you all every couple of months or so.. and then a couple with each email!  Sometimes they load.. and sometimes they don´t.  But I hope you get SOME.  i love you all!

                                                            My companion Sister Fowers and me

Sister Nikogosyan...she will serve in the same mission as Tori...Kiev!  I like her a lot!

              Sisters in my district...Sister Hiems, Mather, Me and Fowers at the Madrid Temple

                         Elder Dunn and Franklin our zone leaders

HAPPY FOURTH OF JULY FROM SPAIN!!

In honor of America President Sitterud is buying us all KENTUCKY FRIED CHICKEN for dinner!! Hahaha when he told us that we were all just like YESSSSS!!!  But yeah that is how we are celebrating.  It is way fun though here to have it on PDAY!   At 6:20 this morning we all of a sudden here these voices coming from the other side of the building screaming the Star Spangled Banner. The ELDERS have all of the patriotic spirit!  It was so funny.  Plus is was like way early in the morning so as you can imagine their voices were just great.  Especially on the last high note.  Haha everything that happens here is SO funny!   Man I die laughing everyday. I love laughing and I love the people here SO much.  They remind of the Clydes!  It is going to be sad to leave in a few weeks!  But so exciting!  For some reason everyone on my distric sneezes a million times a day here... since it is the 4th of July everytime we sneeze we try to say "America" mid sneeze.  Hahaha yeah missionaries are easily entertained... it is HILARIOUS.

Later today we are going to the REAL MADRID STADIUM I think... that should be fun!  I just realized that I haven´t mentioned about what we have been doing on p days here.. so I will do now.  Quick side note typing up the weekly email is sooo stressful!  Haha I literally like shake trying to remember everything that I have done this week and trying to type fast while people are YELLING at you to hurry up!! Haha it is the WORST!  But it is fun to be able to email!  Like Anna was saying a few weeks ago how she always feels awkward about where to even begin talking about... I FEEL THE SAME!   And everytime after I hit the send button I am always like SHOOT I FORGOT to talk about this and this and this and this!  Okay back to pdays.  Pdays are so fun here but like just at busy as any other day!  I hardly ever have time to write letters... so to all of the people who have written me.. lo siento!  I promise I will get them to you eventually.  The first pday we went to El Sol aka the heart of Madrid.  It was so fun.  So beautiful too.  And last week we went to the Prado.  Apparently it is really famous... haha I am not the biggest fan of art museums.. but hey it was cool.BRIGHT pinks and purples and oranges that filled up the entire sky. I am convinced it  was heaven haha.  And what was smack dab in the center? The temple.  Purest of all whites.  And in the background were the classic Spain red brick buildings popping out.  These buildings looke like a tetris game of legos.  Not even joking.  I love all of the contrast of bright colors they have here in in Spain.

I AM IN LOVE WITH MADRID!  AND SPAIN AND THE PEOPLE AND EVERYTHING! Spain has the prettiest sunsets that I have ever seen in my entire life.  First of all in the summer it is light here until probably 11 pm.  It honestly is the most beautiful place and I am in love with it everyday.  I LOVE THE SPAIN MTC!  I love all of the people here.  Everyone.  There are the coolest most incredible people here.  I am convinced that the CCM is the coolest mtc by far.  So many benefits is it awesome.  As I lay on my bed at night and write in my journal, I litterally have the prettiest view right outside my window from my top bunk.  Everything is so beautiful.  I can´t even handle it.  Haha I literally can´t.  I wish the pictures I take could capture all of the beauty.  Looks like you all will just have to come here and see for yourself haha!  The Madrid temple is my favorite temple ever.  The temple and the grounds are perfectly white contrasted with the amazing deep red brick.  And then there are these skinny trees that just shoot up.  It is so unique and so classy and I love it.  And I pretty much live on it.  Honestly, how did I get this lucky! Really how did I get this lucky!  That is in my head constantly.  I don´t think I have ever been so happy.  

The other night when we were brushing our teeth I heard this Sister yell, "HERMANAS GATHER ROUND!" Haha we all just like SPRINT out there and are just thinking what the heck is going on!? Haha then we look outside this giant window to see the most beautiful sunset our eyes have ever seen.  Bright pinks and purples and oranges that filled up the entire sky.  I am convinced it was heaven haha.  And what was smack dab in the center?  The temple.  Purest of all whites.  And in the background were the classic Spain red brick buildings popping out.  These buildings look like a tetras game of legos.  Not even joking.  I love all of the contrast of bright colors they have here in Spain.  

I can´t help but feel so grateful for the beautiful world that the Lord created for US! We are so lucky!

On Tuesday my district had a language fast.  Yeah It finally happened.  It was so hard but awesome.  We only spoke Spanish alllll day. No english nada.  It was so hard but I feel like I learned so much.  It was one of our goals.  It was rough and fried all of our brains at the end of the day but it was awesome.  As I spoke more and more spanish I would get into this intense Spanish zone haha and would be able to spit out all of the spanish words without even thinking about it.  Hermano Pickup told me that it was my inner Spanish flamingo in my heart dancing around.. hahaha. Things about the language really started to connect for me so that was a blessing.  The best way to learn a language is to speak it and MAKE MISTAKES!  Then people can correct you and your can learn.

Everyday here we have an hour of fiscal actividad and I seriously CHERISH it.  Everyday me and some of the Sisters that want to go play soccer with the elders.  it is so fun.  I am loving soccer and I am going to come back loving it.   It is so intense sometimes and so hilarious.  It is more like footsol??  Tiny court like field and small ball?  Is that what it called?  It is HUGE in Spain.  So fun.  we look forward to it so much.  I love EVERY Hermana and Elder here so much.  Dad, remember when you were telling me that I would bond with everyone so fast?  It is so true.  The people I am with here are so funny!   And we are together literally all day.  We are all like best friends.  Its crazy.  Its only been 3 weeks and we know eachother all SO well.  I love it and love the people so much!  We really are best friends.  My zone is HILAROUS.  I die laughing everyday!  It is so fun and I am so happy here.  I dont think I have laughed this hard while doing something so hard in my life.  I LOVE it.  I love the smallness of the CCM.  It is so cozy haha.  But really I love it!   I see and get to talk to the directors and president everyday!  I love it.  

On Sunday nights we get to go out onto the temple ground steps and sing these beautiful arrangements of hymns.  We go out and sing around 9:00 pm.  I LOVE nightime here in Spain.  The people come out and go our walks with their families.  It really is just so peaceful.  A lot of the Madrid missinoaries will come and listen to us and it is so fun to talk to them after.  I love music.  It is just such a testimony to me.  "Song of the righteous is a prayer unto me." (DC 25:12)  I love that verse.  I love any opportunity to give people my testimony through music.  I love it so much.  It brings the spirit like no other!!  It is powerful.  We sang a fun but slower arrangement of "Now let us rejoice."  It was beautiful and so perfect with the great piano.  We sang that as missionaries outside of the Madrid temple on such a calm and beautiful night.  At that moment I felt SO happy.  So happy.  I felt such a strong confirmation in my heart that I was where I needed to be.  The spirit just blew into everyone.  I love this work.  It is hard at times but so uncredibly rewarding.  I can´t even describe how grateful I am.  I am changing and growing so much.  My testimony just burns harder and harder in my heart every day.  I just feel this STRONG desire for others to know what I know and for them to have what I have.  It just pounds in my heart every night!  I am so happy here.  I am so GRATEFUL for the missionary age change!  It was the bigget miracle for me!  I had no idea what I was getting myself into when I put my papers in.  But I went forward, took the biggest leap into the dark.  I here I am now.  I know why I am here and what missionary work really is.  I love this work so much.  It is so REAL!  The love I have for my Savior Jesus Christ is stronger than ever! I wish I could describe everything in words.  I have been thinking a lot about Clayton lately.  Wow what an amazing missionary he is!   I AM SO HAPPY!   The first week here was rough.  It was hard and I had no idea what I had got myself into, but now I AM HAPPY!   I love everyone here.  They are my best friends!   Everyone has the coolest story and we are all here to do the same thing.  I seriously amd LOVING LIFE!   I love the way my life is right now.  The thought of having to come home is like stuck into the back of my mind.  I am so grateful to be here.  I LOVE putting on my nametag every morning.  It brings me so much joy.  What a privilage and JOY it is to be a literal representative of Jesus Christ.  I LOVE THIS GOSPEL OF HAPPINESS.

Mom I loved hearing about the sealings that happened last weekend in our family!  Wow how amazing.  What I would give to have been there.  Sounds like you all are doing great!  

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO JOE this upcoming week!  I miss you all so much but I am so happy here!   Zac, congrats on the endowment session!   That is so cool!  I can´t BELIEVE you leave in 6 weeks.. I know how you feel! So exciting but enjoy this time.

I LOVE YOU ALL!  Find Joy in the Journey.

H. Nydegger  

Hola..Buenas dias!...June 27th

SO!  Who did you invite to church this week family?? Katie? Joe?? Mary, Lily, Max, Charlie?? Haha INVITE OUR WHOLE STREET!   WASN´T THE MISSIONARY BROADCAST THE MOST AMAZING THING!??  

Wow His work really is hastening on!!  It was craaaazy here right before that.  Anything like a broadcast, general conference, p days... haha really are CHRISTMAS for missionaries!   There were so many rumors before the broadcast of what they were going to change in the missionary programs.  For example. China openeing.  Extending the sisister´s time to two years. MEMBER MISSIONARY WORK!  it was soooo exciting!  And I TOTALLY called it.  Kinda.  I thought for sure that they were going to incorporate members and missionaries and LIFE!  Wow that was the coolest WORLDWIDE broadcast ever.  Ahh LILY!  Have you started making your baptism invitations yet??  And mom, what you were saying about our neighbors... I think that is such a good idea.  Missionary work is so important! 

Something that I learned this week is that we don´t have to be intimadted or worried of offending people ONE BIT!   When we are inviting with the spirit... no offense will be taken.  I am praying for our family to have a missionary experiecne!  The whole time during the broadcast I was thinking of ALL OF YOU!  How cool is it that we are at this time in our lives. There are so many golden people on our street and around us that could use the gospel in their lives to be HAPPY!  It is the best thing that we can ever give them.

Speaking of missionary experiences, let me tell you a little about SATURDAYS here in Spain.  We all go to the park and go attempt to proselyte to people there, get referrals, place BOMS, and other missionary stuff haha.  Anyways, so I was lucky enough to get to be in a trio this past Saturday.  Anyways as soon as we got to the park, we said a little prayer, and were off on our way.  The first people that we talked to were these two cute old men with canes sitting on a bench.  (We always go for the people on the bench because it takes more effort for them to get up and run away hahaha.)  So we go up, say hello and introduce ourselces.  Sure enough both of their names were Antonio!  Haha it was funny.  So we started to talk to them and immediately they LOVED talking about religion.  It was great I thought that we had found the perfect people!   But quickly the feeling changed.  They began to talk about really deep doctrinal stuff.  It was interesting how the Holy Ghost left in a heartbeat.  I am glad that at least one of the sisters in my trio new Spanish A LOT more than me.  Anyways, these men started to ask us questions about Jesus and Mary Magdelines relationship, and polygamy and stuff.  It honestly just gave me the sickest feeling and I didn´t even understand everything they were talking to us about.  They even talked about ordinances and covenants.. we could just tell that they weren´t interested in what we had to say.  They just wanted to bible bash with us.  After about 15 minutes of this, I felt promtped to just share my testimony of the truthfullnes of the Book of Mormon.  I can´t say a lot in spanish, but I can bear a simple testimony of My Savior and the love he has for everyone.  Even though it was so small.  And so simple.  The spirit came immediately.  It was such an awesome experience.  We left these men with a Book of Mormon and were off on our way.  Bearing simple testimony is powerful and I am grateful for that experience.

In the MTC, we teach investigators!  (Pretend.)  It is pretty stressful trying to teach in Spanish and be sinere at the same time with feeling.  Sometimes I feel like when I speak Spanish I just sound like an awkward robot spitting words out with no feeling.  But as I am learning more and more it is getting better. 

 Anways, my companion and I are teaching a girl named Elizabeth and another named Sarah.  We had just finished the Restoration lesson and I could tell that they were interested and wanted to know that what we said was true.. but they weren´t sure.  I felt prompted to share a personal experience.  I shared with Elizabeth how I first came to know the Book of Mormon is without a doubt TRUE! I wasn´t prepared to share this expierence in Spanish and didn´t know how I could possibly be able to do it.. but I decided to just do it anyways.  And you know what?  The spirit helped me.  I know that I didn´t speak perfect spanish by any means, but I shared my expierience and was actually able to share the feelings of my HEART.  In spanish.  I don´t know how it happened!  Now thinking back to it, it seemed to me that the words kinda just flowed from my mouth at that instant.  As I struggled but just tried, I was able to do it.  I felt the spirt SO STRONGLY!   It was a miracle to me.  I felt it BIG TIME.  It was the first time I really have been able to feel and experience that in Spanish.  This blanket of warmness just overcame me in a way that I have NEVER felt it before.  As I testified and was able to PROMISE blessings to Elizabeth, I felt suuuch happiness.  I wish that I could tell you exactly how I felt.  Right then I felt the spirit so strong and i decided to invite her to be baptised!  That invation is something that I have been learning for a long time, and I was able to look her right in the eyes, and invite her to follow the example of Jesus Christ and be baptized.  It was AMAZING!   I felt like at that moment I finally knew why I was on a mission.  This isn´t about me at all.  This is the Lord´s work.  It is what we are here to do on this earth.  This work is so important and while it is HARD I love it.  I felt a strong sense of clarity.

Yesterday, the CUTEST Russian sister missionaries arrved!!  They are just FUN people.  And they all speak English so well.  They really are such a blessing here!  Even though they will only be here for two weeks.  It is fun watching them on their first day of the MTC.  A little nervous but SO EXCITED!  There excitment and love realy just shines!  They are such examples to me.

Another highlight of the week:  I MET PRESIDENT AND SISTER JACKSON!  WOW it was the greatest!   During our fisical activity we were going over to the stake center to play volley ball and there was a big baptism day going on!  FOUR FAMILIES (emphasis on FAMILY) were being baptized.  We had the AMAZING opportunity to meet them!  AHhh it was such a blessing.  They are the NICEST people ever and so fun.  Sister Jackson is so cute.  I immediately felt there sweet spirits.  The MTC President told me that the Jacksons were BORN to be mission presidents.  I can´t wait to just get out in the FIELD! 

Sunday´s are amazing here.  It is so nice to be able to not think about the langauge as much and just attend church meetings and devotionals.  A tender mercy for was relief society!  It was great and I love our TEACHER!  She actually reminds me so much of Dana Johnson so it is really fun to here her.  We talked about faith and hope and it was a m a z i n g.  Here is quote that I loved and think is so important...

¨Hope is like the sun which as we journey towards it casts the shadow of our burden behind us. Hope sweetens our memory of experiences well loved.  it tempors our troubles to our growth and our strength.  It befriends us in our dark hours, excites us in our fright ones, it lends promise to the future and purpose of the past.  it turns discouragement into deterimination¨."

Isn´t that great¿  I really love that.  It is so true.  We just need hope and patience.   Alma 26¨27 talks about having PATIENCE in our affictions.  That verse really got me through the week.  If we can just be patient in our afflictions (which we will hvae)  we will have personal success.  We ALWAYS pulled lower, so that Christ can lift us HIGHER! 

I love you all so much.

Hermana Nydegger

PS Mom did you send a package yet??  If so YAY!  But if not I forgot my piano music.  They ask me to play piano all of the time here which is SO FUN FOR ME!  And such a breath of fresh air.  If you could send me some of those pretty arrangemnts that would be great.  If not, thats okay I usually just make them up haha. 

AND SAMMMMMMM!!!  Ahh when I read that I seriously was SO HAPPY!  I got chills!  Coolest mission.  I am so excited for you!  Ahh write me a letter haha!