Well here I am in NEW YORK. Being a missionary and whatnot. I will tell you right now that this is the hardest thing I have ever done in my life and it has only been about 5 days. It is something else. The MTC doesn't prepare you for squat. Especially if you spend all your time learning Portuguese. BUt that is ok. I'm learning quick.

So I have a story about my companion: Sister Astorga. She is a doll and I love her to death. She is from Guatemala and is Fluent in Spanish. ANd wouldn't you know, Portuguese. (she says she isn't, but she can speak it) The cool part about this story is that my mission president didn't know that she was fluent when he assigned us together. This was SUCH a tender mercy from the Lord. We also are living with two other sisters, one who is going to The Brazil Rebeirao Preto mission just like me. So three of the four in our house can speak together. It is the BIGGEST blessing. Even if we don't always use it as much as we should. It just showed me how much God does love me and wants me to be successful in my mission, in New York and later in Brazil.

On my first day here, President Francis took all the new missionaries to a bunch of the church sites. It was a miraculous day! We went to the Hill Cumorah, the Joseph Smith houses, the Sacred Grove and a few other places. The Sacred Grove was my favorite. We always talk about the first vision and that it happened in the Sacred Grove... but I guess it had never really been real to me. I mean it was real but it just was one of those things. But then we went and I was there and it WAS real. President let us go off alone for a little bit and I cannot describe the way that place feels. We have the ability to bring in a testifying spirit when we talk about this experience, but to BE THERE was something else entirely. Sitting on a bench I was looking around and it was so clear. This happened. It happened here. And I knew it. More than I have ever known. Joseph Smith saw God and he restored the church. I cannot deny it. The coolest thing about my mission is that all the sisters who are called to serve here work as tour guides at all these sites, so I've been learning SO much about the early history of the church. There is a nickname for our mission and it's the Cradle of the Restoration. Everything that happened in the first few years of the Restoration happened in my mission. There is a Spirit in those sites that cannot be replicated. I know it is holy ground and I know that it is true. If nothing else comes from my time spent in New York, I will know that more than I ever have. But more things will happen for me than just that. They already are.

It's a privilege and a blessing to be a servant for the Lord. It is hard and it is tedious work, but it is not harder and it is not more tedious than what our Savior had to do while he was doing the Father's work. And I am here to find and teach those who are ready to receive this truth. Some days I don't know how that will happen, but I've been called to do it and I know it will. 

Here is a nother picture. I stayed in the house that Brigham Young's father built my first night in the mission. It was the best night sleep I'd had in 6 weeks and probably will be for my whole mission!