July 7 hand-written letter

Life here is going good.  I have two companions, Sister Roberts and Sister Penovich.  We get along good, but it is sometimes difficult to work in a trio.  The Spanish seems to be coming along.  Still not fluent, but the strength of the spirit combined with what I do know seems to be a good combination.  Well, today is my first P-day and it has been a welcomed day.  I can get laundry done, write to you people, and rest from the run-around of the MTC.  It never stops here! Which is good, it'll kick the laziness right out of me.  Actually I feel more refreshed having a 10:30 bedtime cause then I have to go to sleep when I'm tired.

So how was your fourth of July?  Here at the MTC we had a freedom celebration show on the 3rd.  Its focus was more on the freedom of religion and how God paved the way through many men so we can have the gospel here in the Americas.  After that we were allowed to break curfew to watch the fireworks from BYU's football stadium.  It was nice.  A few hundred missionaries out on the south lawn, laughing, talking, and singing patriotic songs or church hymns,and somehow a group started singing a Christmas song.  Life at the MTC might be getting to them.  I like it here, people are nice and they always keep you busy, but I"m excited to go to the CCM in Peru.  On Sunday it was nice, we had a mission conference, then sacrament, and after another lengthy review of the rules of the MTC (not because we are breaking them, but just so everyone is still clear on the rules and standards), we were able to go on a temple walk.  Nothing too major, but we got to go to the temple and walk around.  I actually saw Elder Crockett (Justin) there.  We said hi and found out that he leaves on Tuesday, which was yesterday.

Again, life at the MTC is good. The spirit here is so strong and elders and sisters walk around speaking so many different languages!  I've heard Japanese, Chinese, Korean, Samoan, Finnish, Norwegian, Swedish, Marshalees, German, Tagalo, and of course Spanish!  I'm sure I've heard more, but I don't know the difference.  Here in Utah, the weather has been good, but they keep the air conditioning going all the time in the residence halls, so inside I freeze.  I don't believe it's hot enough to justify so much air conditioning, but don't tell that to someone from Utah.  Right now I'm wearing my sweater in my room because it's 70 degrees with air blowing on us in the room.

I love you all and miss you lots.  Don't worry, they are over-feeding me and keeping us over-protected.  Today I think we get to walk around the temple later.  So if I didn't say it before, one week accomplished!  Today new missionaries also came in today as old ones left for their fields yesterday.  Yeah, we aren't the newbies anymore!  Ok, well, again, I love you and hope to hear from you soon.

Love, Hermana Wood

5 things I'm grateful for:

1) My family
2) The gospel
3) The Book of Mormon
4) To live in America
5) Surving the first week here!
( 6) Finding vending machines; here, we eat dinner so early I'm hungry again before I go to bed.)

July 2 Letter

Hola Familia!  This week has been physically exhausting!  Let's see, let's start with what happened after I was stolen by the missionaries.  First I was taken to my room by my host sister, then I was quickly wisked away to "check in", I confirmed I was here, got my pic taken, got my name tag, books, then taken straight to class!  It was crazy!  Then we had a big meeeting with the MTC mission president.  There they discussed obedience! obedience! obedience!  These last couple of days we have been focused on learning how to pray in Spanish and how to bear my testimoy. It is amazing how the spirit works in learning a language!  I have taken spanish classes, but I feel like some of what I have learned before is being brought back to some remembrance, but clearly my spelling is terrible in English.  (That's okay, Beth, Mom will take care of that!)We are also learning to recognize, with the spirit's help, what people need, or recognize what a person is looking for in their lives.  It's amazing and the spirit is so strong here, but it is not easy.  I feel I have so much to learn so fast, once we are in Peru I hope I have picked up enough Spanish to understand and communicate in espanol to my companion.  Yike!  Pray for me!
Okay, something I need from you guys is mucho letters!!! I feel lonely out here and would like support.  I know I am here for a reason and I feel like I know I am supposed to be here. I know God loves you and is mindful of you all.  I love you and miss ya!  Love, Hermana Wood
P.S. My estimated departure is July 21st (for Peru).

I've survived my first week at the MTC!

Received by email on July 7, 2010 -

Hey familia! How are you all doing?  I've survived my first week of the mtc!  I love it here.  Today is my p-day.  How was 4th of July for you guys?  It was good here.  I sent a long letter home today so you can raed about that there. I'm sorry to hear about mittens, well for Jenni, but that cat was old haha.  Is it sad I'm more sad about Stodomier than the cat?  Hey you guys can send me letters through dearelder.com its like an email for you guys but it gets printed out and put in our mail box so it's like getting mail for real lol.  Tell Jenni about it too cause I don't have her email.  So far all we do is sing, pray, study, try to learn spanish and eat.  It's the perfect world if I weren't in a dress for most of it lol.  How's grandma and grandpa?  I hope grandma is home now.  I can't believe its ony been a week.  In a couple of more weeks I'll be in Peru! Crazy!  I'm getting better at learning to comprehend spanish, I think, although we all usually hear the same words over and over so maybe I shouldn't say that yet.  So any other big news in the sports world?  Its hard to know what to say since I wrote an actual letter today.  I only have 30 min of email time on wed while I am here, I don't know about what it'll be like in Peru.  Ok I love you all and miss you!  Dad make sure everyone gets to read this please. :) love you all, love Hermanda Wood!