Me hablo Español...kind of

Hola familia y amigos!!!!! 

So this week was sort of a slow and a little less-eventful one! 

NEW DISTRICT

So we got a new district in our zone so we´re not the greenies anymore!!!!!! I love love love them all!!! Theres 6 Elders and 2 Hermanas! One of them knows my fall roommate Angie because she went to high school with her!!! So crazy!! We played signs with them last night for FHE (which by the way was not approved by our branch president which the last two districts told us it was but our awesome elders got it approved!!!) and it was sooooooooo fun!!!! I love how unified our district and zone is. Its makes everything much more fun and easier and yeah its amazing!!!! 

I MADE A QUESADILLA 

So the food here is good, but I had yet to have a quesadilla (one of my favorite foods) UNTIL ONE DAY I HAD A REVELATION. I had tortillas in front of me and then I remembered that I saw there was (uniquely) cheese out for us to have. I immediately stood up with the biggest smile on my face, the other hermanas were a little concerned, and proceeded to the microwave to make myself a wonderous quesadilla and it was a very very very good day after that hahahaha As you can tell I have grown to more appreciate the small tender mercies in the CCM! hahaha

I GAVE A TALK IN SACRAMENT MEETING...ALL IN SPANISH

This is where the title of this email came in. So every Sunday we all have to prepare a talk and then you go to sac. meeting and they tell you the 6 people who are speaking right before you have to get up! its crazy!! So i had a feeling they´d ask me to speak for some reason annddddd(drumroll) they did!!! It was very scary but I did it and I think it went pretty well!!! I´m excited for the day that I can get up and speak super fluidly and express exactly what I want to but on Sunday I felt like I could express myself in spanish better than I thought I could! So that was fun!!! 

MEET THE MORMONS 

We watched Meet the Mormons on Sunday!!! I had never seen it before and I loved loved loved it!!!! It was soooooo good!!!! Most of us Hermanas lost it during the missionary part hahaha it was very very very good though!!!! 

SPIRITUAL THOUGHT FOR THIS WEEKS EMAIL

So in class this week we got to watch a Mormon Message called "Daily Bread: Pattern". It talked about how manna was given to the people by God to sustain them and to allow them to live on the bare minimum of the environment that the people were in. It´s purpose was also to "look unto Him, to remember that He is the source of our life." It would be silly to think " Oh yeah I'll be fine by going without food for days, weeks, or months." Just as it is slightly silly to think that we can survive without partaking of the spiritual manna (scriptures, church, prayer). He is the bread of our life and we must partake of it to receive nourishment and happiness. 

HAPPY EARLY BIRTHDAY MOM!!!!!! 

I´m so sad I´m not going to be there on Sunday but I have something really cool planned for next Tuesday as sort of a belated present for you!!! I hope you have the most amazing day ever in the history of the world!!! I know I´ll be celebrating it here because its the day that the world was blessed by the most amazing person and I was blessed with the most amazing mom anyone could ever have!!! Love you so so so so so much!! More wishes to come next Tuesday!! :D :D :D :D 

I love love love love love you all!!! Thank you so much for all your support and love and emails and everything!!! 

Muchisimo amor,

Hermana Christensen

Emails and Pictures sent March 17th, 2015

Happy St. Patrick´s Day!!!!!!!

So first of all, thank you so much Mom for sending the package!!! It is awesome and so thoughtful and I love you so much!!!!! Also, thank you everyone for filling my inbox with love, it really means so much to me!!!! 

So this week was really awesome!! I love it here so much and am constantly learning and growing. An Elder from the only other district in our zone (who left yesterday so now were are alone until we get new people this week. which I am so excited for) said during his testimony the other day that the reason why sometimes the CCM seems like it´s forever long is because at every single moment something is changing or getting better or evolving. I totally believe that 1000000% because I have already changed and grown so much from being here. 

So our zone has lots of traditions in it's history of the CCM. We have FHE every Monday night and play a game called Signs. However it is a little bit different than the silent signs some of you may have played before. Oh no, it is much, much better. Everyone has a hand sign but you also have a thing you have to say out loud with it and the person in the middle tags the person with the sign before they pass it to someone else. So you can create your own sign or have one that has been passed down, I took one were you say ´´Rainin!´´ then do a motion with your hands like you're brushing paper off your hands. However I got a new one on Sunday that I wanted to be passed down to me soooo bad. So in the district that left there is an Elder whose name is Elder Fasao who is ginormus and Tongan and the nicest person in the world and his sign is ´´RAMAJAMA´´ and you do a wave motion and it is probably the most prestigious sign of all, and it went from a huge tongan elder, to me. I was very honored! hahahaha

So seriously my zone and district is AMAZING. We all are so fun and love each other so much!!!!!! All of the hermanas have already started to plan a trip to Disneyland and then Lake Powell with the Elders! hahaha

 So Sundays at the CCM are so great. I love them so much!!! After Relief Society we have a thing called Hermana Circle (another tradition in our zone) where all the Hermanas in our zone talk about their thoughts about the week or the lessons we just had or bare their testimonies. It's such an amazing experience because I love these girls so much and their testimonies strengthen mine even more. Snacks were provided by the AMAZING care package from Mom and we sung ´´As Sisters in Zion´´ and it was soo beautiful. I love that we all are there to ´´build up His kingdom...and bring the world His truth´´ because this work is so great and I love that I have Sisters in Zion who can be with me and help me and I can help them. 

On Sunday Hermana Bloxham and Hermana Saunders wrote everyone notes in our district and I I LOVEEE getting notes and they were so sincere and loving and I am going to keep them forever. I adore those hermanas soooo much. 

So something I want to share from our devotional on Sunday. The speaker said that ´´ Who cares about your boyfriend/ girlfriend or your family you left behind?´´ Which made me mad for a second and then he said ´´God cares, God is going to take care of your family, and your loved ones while you're here, devoting yourself to the Lord.´´ I found such great comfort from that. A huge theme of this whole time I´ve been at the CCM. My family is a huge motivation to serve. Without them I could not and would not have been able to do this work. We watched the Joseph Smith movie also and I had never seen it before. I now want to go to all the church history sites and I told Hermana Bloxham I did and she has been there a thousand times and she pinky promised that she would go with me. She seriously is my best friend in the CCM. We have a list of things we are going to do together when we get back hahaha

 I want to share two of my favorite parts from that movie. First, when Joseph is by Alvin´s bedside before he dies and he makes Joseph promise him that he will bring forth the Gospel of Jesus Christ and then many years later when the church was restored Joseph went to his brother´s grave and told him he had kept his promise to him. The second part I thought was really special was when Joseph tells his dying father that he will be with Alvin again, that they all will be together again. I am so grateful for that and for Joseph Smith and his family for helping him and supporting him. The temple today was also so crazy because in the visitors center tour we talked about families and we sang ´´ Families Can Be Together Forever´´ and I had tears in my eyes because I am so thankful for that and for my family. 

I loved the trip to the visitors center today and one of my favorite parts was on the bus there and back we all sang hymns and it was beautiful and such a spiritual experience to sing the words and mean every single line and have a bunch of other kids like me mean them to. When we sang the EFY Medley of As Sisters in Zion and Army of Heleman/ Bring the World His Truth, I really felt like I was apart of an army of people trying to bring people unto Christ and show His love unto the world. 

I love the CCM and I love the Spanish language(even though it can be frustrating) and I love this Gospel. 

AND I LOVE ALL OF YOU!!!!!! 

Mom's package and me enjoying it very much  

Hermana Haycock and I: she is the one I know from EFY who was on the plane and is in my casa! I love her!!! 

Emails and Pictures!!

We got our first official email from Taylor yesterday! It was so exciting to hear about her life in el CCM, aka the MTC. She really is doing so well. For those of you who only know very little Spanish (like myself), Hna is short for Hermana ;) Here's the first email: 

I LOVE YOU ALL SOOOOOO MUCH!!!! I miss everyone so much. El CCM is so amazing!!!!!! So I dont even really know where to start but I guess I'll start with my companions. Yes that's right I'm in a trio!!!!! My dream!!!! My companions are Hermana Moss y Hermana Nicholes! Hna. Moss is from Houston and she's practically fluent in Espanol and it's crazy. Hermana Nicholes is from American Fork and she knows very, very little about Espanol pero she's trying really hard! My companions are VERY different but I love them! We are all always laughing and they're so great! MY DISTRICT IS SOOOOOO COOL!!!!!!!!! There is one other set of Hermanas and they're Hna. Saunders who's from Corona(!!!!!!) and Hna. Bloxham from St. George(!!!!!) They are sooooooo amazing and hilarious and I love them so so so so much!! Hna. Bloxham is probably one of my favorite people ever because she LOVES Parks and Rec and we talk about it all the time and we have so much in common! I told her one day that she kinda looks and her manerisms are sometimes like April and she said that that was the first time she cried at the MTC because it was so awesome!! hahaha Every Monday we have FHE with our zone and play a game called signs and it's so fun!!! 

OH!!!! We've already started teaching an investigator(we're pretty sure he's actually a member but I'm just going to pretend he because it's better that way. like Santa)  in all spanish(his name is Obdulio and we forget it almost ever day because its so random hahaha) and it's really amazing. It's been hard and a little frustrating for us because we all just want to be at a high level of spanish but I'm honestly a lot less worried about it than my companions because I've been able to bare very heartfelt testimonies every lesson and we've been told so many times that the goal of el CCM is to learn to teach by the language of the Spirit and one of my goals I made before I got here was to teach with genuine love and concern for the people I teach and I already feel soooo much love for Obdulio and also everyone I meet here. I encourage all of you to try to implement that in your lives. It seriously would be so easy for me to constantly be annoyed by people here if I didn't have the mindset that every single one of these people is loved more than I can ever imagine by the Savior and Heavenly Father. I'm sooooo happy here. I mean I've totally cried several times but those were only when I felt the Spirit and when I got your letters and when I got the package Sis Wilkins sent me(pictures of me sharing the wealth to come) THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR YOUR LETTERS THEY MADE ME SO HAPPY!!!! I love all of you so so so so so so so much. Whenever I have little tiny intsy thoughts about how class is hard or whatever I always think of my wonderful family and how one of my goals for my mission was to serve well so my family will be blessed. I'm so happy to hear Trey has been talking about his mission!!!! that's amazing. I can't wait to give him all my advise when he's older and I'm going to start writing things down for all the boys to know when they're preparing! 

I have like a bazzilion pictures!! Mom I got your letter today that said "please send pictures if you can" and I laughed out loud because I was soo happy I have so many for you all!!! I have seriously so many thoughts hahaha I'm typing like a mad-woman hahaha Epañol es interesante porque yo encomprendo muchas cosas pero hablar es dificil a veces. My teachers are sooo amazing and very strict and intense at time but they love us so much and they are so amazing. Yesterday was a little bit difficult for me, I was just very emotional during our companionship-teacher coaching time and she(my more intense and strict teacher) talked to me alone and said that Heavenly Father has put me in this situation because He loves me and knows that I can help. She gave me many hugs and besos on the cheek and told me that she is so grateful for me and my spirit and desire to serve and she got emotional too. So after that the day was so awesome and our lesson with Obdulio was awesome because he said he wanted to be baptised! 

 Me encanta Español. Me encanta el CCM. Me encanta el Evanjelio de Jesucristo. Yo se que Jesucristo es mi Salvador y tenemos un Padre Celestial que ama todos nosotros. Yo se que El Libro de Mormon es la palabra de Dios. 

I love you all so much!!!!!!!!!! 

Here's an excerpt from another email explaining who everyone is in the pictures:

in the picture of me and two others, those are my companions. the one in the yellow shirt is Hna. Moss and the other on is Hna. Nicholes.The elder in the picture where he is looking at the camera and sitting next to an elder reading is Elder Despain(Elder York took my camera and took that hahaha). In the group picture with all five of the Hermanas the other two besides my companions are on the left side and left to right it's Hna. Saunders and Hna. Bloxham (they are seriously the best and so fun). So basically I have an amazing district and we're all so friendly and hilarious and when we share our thoughts about lessons and devotionals its amazing. ALSO I forgot to say in my email that Sundays are the best days ever here. They are so spiritually enriching because we don't have classes to worry about we can just focus on the lessons in church and we get to watch devotionals (the one we watched was from Elder Holland at the Provo MTC in 2013 and it was without a doubt one of the best talks or devotionals or anything I've ever heard) we also get to watch a movie and we watched one that was about appreciating the accessibility of the Book of Mormon( if you can find it WATCH IT its amazing).

We got one final email from Taylor yesterday and we are all so proud of her. She is teaching all of us wonderful lessons about the love of Christ and enduring. I know that through her example we will all gain stronger testimonies and closer to our Father in Heaven. Here's her last email from yesterday:

I think that this might be the last email for today, I'm not super sure but I think it probably will be but I just wanted to tell you all that I love and miss you all so much.I could have never gotten here and enjoy it here as much as I do without all of you. I LOVE LOVE LOVE it here and everyone I'm around and meet are so kind and amazing and it's just the best. I got sooooooo lucky because every single person in my district is so great and nice and hilarious.The hermanas in my district are amazing (especially Hna. Bloxham, we are kindred spirits). 

The other day I was thinking about why I'm serving and one of the reasons I thought about was because I want people to feel the unmeasuable happiness that I feel because I get to be with you all forever. Someone also talked about how though this is hard to be away from our families for 18 months/2 years, we can find hope in the fact that we are going to be together for eternity and that we are going to help others do the same. 

I have the best family in the world!!!!! 

Love you all so much!!! 

She's on her way!

Well, she's now officially Hermana Christensen and she's on her way to the Mexico MTC!

We'll be updating the blog with her emails, pictures, etc... as we receive them. If you would like to contact Taylor you can do so by email or mail. Her email is christensen.taylor@myldsmail.net. If you would like to send her letters you can mail them to

Sister Taylor Michelle Christensen

[14/04/15] [12-B]

Carretera Tenayuca-Chalmita #828

Colonia Zona Escolar, Gustavo A. Madero

07230 Mexico, Distrito Federal

Mexico

She has informed us that we can not send packages to the MTC. 

Once she gets to Irvine we will put her new mailing address on here too.

We are so proud of her and can't wait to start hearing about all she is learning and teaching. I know she would love to hear from you as well!