AWEE our first email!

Subject: estoy animado! (I'm so excited) You should be to! an e mail from me!

Mi familia! Oh how I love you! Time is so precious here. There is a countdown timer at the top of my screen, so I feel pressured! If this e mail doesn't make much sense or suddenly ends, it's because time is up.
So much to say! Where to begin? The Lord loves me and has blessed me so much since I have been here. My assigned companion didn't ever come, so I am with Hermana Stringham and Hermana Ficklin. They are wonderful! Thankfully, they are not athletic, so gym time is much more enjoyable. Hna. Ficklin is only 4'6. Sometimes in a sea of elders, I feel like I need to protect her so she doesn't get trampled. I probably don't, but I feel that way.

Our district (the people we're in class with all day) is absolutely amazing. You can see the Lord working through them already. These 19 year old boys have been an example to me. Some of them can already pray in Spanish. Elder Carr learned to pray in Spanish before we were even taught. When he prayed, I leaned over to Hna. Ficklin in a panic and said "When did we learn to pray? I missed that!"

They've set an example for me and make me want to be better.Another wonderful thing they do for us hermanas is take our trays at meal times. I know it probably doesn't sound like much, but it's very nice not to have to take our trays and put them on the moving rack when we're done. They also stand whenever we enter the room or sit down at meal times.

Our teachers are amazing too. Hermano (brother) Hadly teaches us in the morning. He's a grad student at BYU, going into accounting and served in Urugay. Hna. (Sister) Allen served in southern Florida. I don't know if she's going to school or not, but she also teaches a beginning English class. She is so cute and up beat. She got her haircut and when my companion complimented her, she said "Hna. Summers kind of inspired me" (Her hair is cut pretty similar to mine. Thanks Melissa for being brave enough to get your hair cut and inspire the rest of us to cut ours) She also put a lot of time into decorating our room. One wall is completely covered in pictures of Christ/other gospel concepts. On the front wall is the wonderful charts of conjugated verbs, then some profetas and their names in espanol. It must have taken her several hours to put it all up.

I saw Lisa just before coming here. She's been in quarentine and got out today. We found out we have meals at the same time and perhaps gym too. Hooray! I consider that a tender mercy. With thousands of missionaries here, I am blessed enough to be able to see her during the day.What else? We have at least three hours a day of MDT (missionary directed time). An hour is personal study, one hour of comp. study, and one hour of language study. Soon we will be teaching lessons--to other missionaries in our district and our zone (I think some of the Elders have already started this.) There's also a placed called the TRC wherer we will teach "investigators," members who have graciously agreed to volunteer and help us missionaries out.Time is a weird thing here. Days of the week mean nothing.

Oh, could you please send me a small calender. We always wonder what day of the week it is, or what day of the week our departure is. We leave for DR on November 25. Is that the Wednesday before Thanksgiving?

Gym seems to last an eternity, but the blessed minutes between 10:15 and 10:30 when I have time to myself to write in my journal go by like a blink of the eye. Meal times go by fast to. I've learned I eat super slow! My comps are always done before me and when our Elders come to take our trays, I'm never done. Perhaps I will learn to eat a little faster. Class goes by fast and slow at the same time. We've done a variety of activities (watch video clips, discuss with a companion, discuss as a district, change teachers) so that makes it nice. We've been having gym at 6:35am, but today we didn't have it until 2:05, so this day seemed to last forever.

As I mentioned earlier, we've learned how to pray in Espanol. I haven't quite memorized all the words and phrases yet, but my goal is to have that down by tomorrow. We were supposed to learn how to testify in Spanish today, but I think we sidetracked Hno. Hadly. He was teaching us how to conjugate verbs and we were so confused. He was supposed to leave at 11:30, but we kept asking him questions and he stayed until 12:00.I think my MTC mailbox # is 216. Maybe 266. I don't know. You don't really have to have it to send me stuff. Also, if you go to dearelder.com, it will almost be like e mailing me. You type your letter up on the computer, hit send, it gets printed out somewhere and mailed to me either the same day or by the next.Nine minutes left.

Yesterday we had Hno. Richardson, another teacher from our zone, come teach us for a while. He told us we have the same power and authority as Alma, Amulek, and the other great missionaries in the Book of Mormon. We can go out and astonish people just like they did. We just have to take it to the edge. He also talked about the way we teach. Some people have never heard the story of the restoration before so we shouldn't just rush through it. We need to slow it down, pause, and make it meaningful. When he taught it to us this way it was so powerful. I feel the spirit so much here. I know I'm exactly where I need to be, doing exactly what I need to be doing. The highs are high and the lows are low, but the Lord loves me and has blessed me greatly

.Oh, if you could, please pray for my health. I'm not sick, I feel fine, but I desperately DO NOT want to get sick. I don't want to be quarentined!Another tender mercy: the first day mail was delivered, I actually got two letters. I wasn't expecting to get anything here (except from Hna Green, but I have to write to her first). My math buddy Rachelle and Jesse Cottam both wrote to me. I haven't really had time to read the letters yet, but I was very excited.I have three minutes left and don't know what else to write! There is so much! I love you all and hope things are going well at home. The Lord loves me and is taking care of me as I know he is taking care of you while I am gone. Keep praying and doing all that you're supposed to and the Lord will bless you.
El verdad (the truth)
Love,Hna. Laurie Summers