1-15-18

Hello. Haha honestly not much has changed here! It was a really good week but it's been a battle getting people to follow through on their appointments with us! All our investigators suddenly had more important things than salvation come up so we spent a lot of time on the streets! It really was a ton of fun though! We are improving so much in our contacting and I just think it's so fun to talk with random people 5 minutes at a time all day long!
We also met a ton of awesome people and because of that we have a jam packed schedule this next week!
So if you'd all just hope and pray something more important doesn't come up for every person we know this week, that would really help the mission work up here!
Progression man.
It's so true! If your not moving forward your moving backwards. I think stagnation is such a tool Satan uses. There is just such an urgency in the work of salvation that is awfully hard to convey to others! Not even just missionary work, there is urgency in improving ourselves, helping our family, and those around us! Someday... Is such a dangerous word! But we're trying! We are having lots of fun! We are getting to know all the streets and alleys of this here town, and man we are working hard! By the end of the day we are just pooped! Haha I'm serious!! So tired! It's the best!
So yes that's this week! It came and went so fast I'm sorry I don't have much more to say right now! It was a thrusting in the sickle sort of week, but get pumped because the harvest week is coming one of these days!!!!

Fun story.. So I'm doing alright with Spanish, like I can understand and generally have some good conversations.... But there is this one lady we met with this week Isora... She is cubano and they just speak a different Spanish I swear! I can understand literally 3 percent of what she says.. It's weird like I know what all the words she is saying mean but somehow nothing makes sense! It's insane! So here I am listening so intently and doing the 'yeah yeah okay mm hmm yeah' nod you do when you can understand people, there is a break in conversation... Suddenly I'm eating an orange... Then another... And another... And then she fills my backpack with oranges.. Haha I guess she kept asking if I wanted an orange, but clearly I missed that.. And nodded yes.. Over and over and over again! Haha. It was such a beautiful new missionary moment. I laughed for the rest the day and now I have a ton of oranges! 

Love you all! Have a great week!
️Hermana Simmons

1. Tired but happy 

Felíz día de los reyes

Best week ever. Lots of great things happened.

1. First.. We had intercambios, so I went to Vigo to hang out with Hermana White for a day. She is about to go home and she just preached how fast it goes and learn to love each day. Something cool. We took a boat to our teaching appointment! Haha it was awesome! We sat up top and we got sprayed hard with ocean water. Coolest most beautiful thing ever. There are some seriously beautiful islands round these parts.

2. We met the best new investigators ever! We contacted them awhile ago and gave a book of Mormon so we go teach them and Kati and her cute daughter Esthefani explain how they loved reading the first few chapters and were able to apply the story of Nephi to their own life this week......... What!? We hadn't even taught them yet. I'm so excited to keep teaching them. They also remembered we mentioned this drink that we hadn't tried called Morir Soñando and so they had it all set up cute ti make it with us. Wow. It's crazy the love you can feel for people after knowing them for 1 hour. I want sooooooooooooooooooooooookoooooooooioiiiioooooiiiioooooooooooooo badly for them to have the blessings of the gospel that my family has!

3. We are helping a member quit smoking so we put together a little project. We've been visiting her and it's great. But cats....... And dogs............ Haha. Heaven Help me.

4. Also this week was the big Christmas holiday here in Spain, Día de los Reyes, it's when they get the gifts instead of Santa coming the three wise men come. But yeah... They have partying here since Christmas haha. But it's over now and everyone goes back to normal life today. But we used it as a contacting method and learned lots about the Spanish traditions, so of course we had to try it out. They have this cake called Roscón de Reyes, so we got some to try and then people keep giving more to us.. We've eaten so much. Haha and our Fridge just broke so we have a lot of food to put down today so it doesn't all go bad!

Yeah. I'm so happy. I just love the people here! Even if they don't love me! Haha.

I've been studying some if the Book of Mormon missionaries. I love Alma and Ammulek. Wow. They knew what it was like to sacrifice. They made covenants, kept them, accepted a calling and with that call were given authority. Through their diligence and this authority they were given power. This power is available through Jesus christ for each of us to serve in God's kingdom in ways that may seem impossible.
Through the atonement if Jesus christ we can receive power that enables us to be more than we now think possible.

Also.... I just am obsessed with being happy... Haha sometimes I miss my old 'Life is Good' hat... Life is good. If you want to be happy....... Then Be Happy! I really believe we are as happy as we want to be. It sure helps to understand the atonement of Jesus christ and spend time thinking about others, but really, if you want more joy in your life, you can have it! Today! Despite circumstances.
Living the gospel of Jesus christ brings Joy!
Haha that is what I keep telling people! And I'm just pumped for others to come to learn that for themselves!

Life is Good!

Love you all!

️️️Hermana Simmons

Christmas & New Years

Okay. This last week has definitely been the best week so far. It started out chatting with my family on Skype. Weirdest thing ever. It doesn't even seem like that happened. Thankfully the work is picking back up a little bit as people are coming back from holiday. 

This week we had a meeting with all the new missionaries that I got to Skype in on. I'm not kidding it was a game changer for me.
I realized something. Even in my good intentions and righteous desires I am thinking so much about myself. So far my thought have been, how can I be a better missionary, what can I study to be more knowledgeable, how can I improve my Spanish. These things aren't inherently bad buttttttttttttt... If you want to be happy, stop thinking about yourself so much!
So I tried this. Man. As I spent even just a few days thinking about others I felt my very capacity to feel joy expand.
Wow. I was so happy this week. There are so many incredible people here... I've said it before and I'll say it again.. Life is Good!

New years! Yay! Church was kinda crazy.. Haha we had 2 investigators come so yeah.. We have quite a few investigators but not many progressing so this was really awesome to have someone follow through on a commitment! 
But new years eve we participated in the Spanish tradition where when the bell strikes 12 you eat 12 grapes in 12 seconds.... Haha our grapes went bad! So I ate 12 moldy grapes at midnight to roll in 2018!

My ode to 2017, man....... No words...... Just grateful for all I learned. But 2018 I feel so lucky. This is year I have the unique chance to forget myself and work like I've never done before! I can't wait to work and love and serve others every day! This year I don't have to think about myself one bit! Yeah I feel so lucky to have this opportunity and I'm stoked to work!
This may be the year with the least naps of my life...... Sorry to end on that bummer note. 

Ooooooooh yeah! It has been dumping buckets hahahahahaha I'll send some pics! There was this insane rain storm the other day, I broke 2 umbrellas in a day haha. It was hilarious but awesome. 


So yeah... That's all. We really got to work hard this week because our teaching pool needs some shaking up! 


Today is pday and we went to a pulpería and had some octopus.. Not going to lie.. I didn't consider myself a seafood person but maybe I just never had it done right. It's good! 

️ Hermana Simmons 

Our pday adventure(she's a Lil breezy. S/O to Iceland)  

Pulpo 

Christmas with the Bittons

What you know a bout rain

Facebook Video #lighttheworld

https://www.facebook.com/paige.simmons.716/videos/1537320956350927/

Beef Chop to go Please

Hello. All is well here! Fun fact it rains sideways here. It's the best because your umbrella somehow gets wet on the inside! Also I let this member borrow my umbrella but I have a feeling I'll never see it again so I found one in our apartment that us red so when I walk down the streets I have a red coat, red umbrella, and red backpack. It's the best!

This week lots of people canceled on us or went out of town but we still had some good times. We had a first lesson with two sisters, the food first off was delicious, and it was incredible to see the way they responded to the restoration, they loved it, it felt familiar and right. This to me is such a testimony of the truth of this message. We were even able to discuss the step we would ask them to take once they know which was baptism. It was helpful to talk about this in the first lesson to establish why we were here and help them realize the importance of keeping their commitments.
This week I worked on making more mistakes! I had a few of the most uncomfortable contacts of my life but also some good ones as well! Haha I think one lady I talked to thought I was immigration services or something. It was not my best. Buuuuuuuuut... I'm learning
I am learning that submission is a part of humility. Sometimes you just have to get over yourself and do it, this is really difficult but I did a little better this week at talking with others, being patient and sacrificing my will a bit!
Fun story, we have this investigator Rosa, she is a hoot! She has spent her life just absorbing every religion possible and worldy ideas as well and is like a Buddhist catholic free spirit. She loves to talk and has some pretty fun views of the world, fortunately she loves Jesus. We have been working on teaching the plan of salvation but she has so many questions it takes awhile. So she comes to church, yay. Haha and we walk into gospel principles and the topic is the milenium. HahahahahahahabababahahHahahahahahaha it was the weirdest craziest Sunday school class I've been in. Here is what Rosa learned from class Sunday in a nutshell, 1) Satan is real, 2) something bout special underwear, 3) don't worry, there is such thing as temple divorce. Ya, it was insane. We will have to clear things up for probably the next month. But she came to church so Yay.

I feel pretty lucky to be here at Christmas. We have a great branch, chapel, missionaries, and the cutest senior couple ever who really want to make Christmas special. Plus we are thinking about Jesus alllllllll the tiiiiiiimmmme so it's the best!

Hope you all have a fantastic week and do something to share your testimony of Christ. What a blessing it is to know we have someone who knows us and loves us perfectly. Through him we can find strength we could never on our own.
Love you,

💓Hermana Simmons

We did a little skit for the talent night and I was the arms and she was was the face it was awesome

Galacia not Galactica

Okay the first thing I need to clear up is I am in GALICIA España not GALACTICA.. Haha I felt like I disgraced every galician person  with that one, so thank you autocorrect.

Second thing, wow, rain! It's starting to get insanely windy and rainy. Actually we are on dangerous wind warning in the area right now so that's cool. We'll see what my Target umbrella can take!

This week we had zone conference, it was fun to meet all the missionaries in the area, play some fútbol and wow them all with my singing abilities. That's right I survived. Haha that's all I have to say about that. I learned a lot to about how to be a consecrated missionary now, time in the field is irrelevant to level of consecration to the work.

That night we went to the town and sang carols, it was a success I've got to say. It was super fun we had about 50 people singing with us and people really enjoyed it and it was a cool way to contact after. Haha Thacker and Eli YouTube the song A burrito de belén, that is a super fun Christmas song. Actually me and my comp made the front page of the newspaper here! Pretty sweet eh!? (Paige is in the red coat)

Who knew singing would become what I'm known for, funny enough right after this I almost died. I've been a little sick and something came over me so I spent the last three songs behind the elders coughing until I started dry heaving. Hah. It was a success though.

So on Saturday all 4 of our appointments fell through but this lady out of the blue called us up which was a little miracle but we got super lost! Because my comp hasn't been in this area long and well obviously I haven't either. We took the wrong bus and I got super car sick. Hah it has surprised me how often I make the plans to puke in the alley. But the good kind of puke in the alley, then we wandered the streets we couldn't get a hold of her. But by sheer inspiration my comp remembered a street name and we found her apartment! We were able to teach her and her two kids, they are Romanian but have lived here for a while, her husband was out of town but he is interested too! We are pumped to teach a family! After that we sprinted home because we had to get to bed! It was quite the experience!

I learned a lot about becoming a consecrated missionary this week. Experience as a missionary has no correlation to consecration to the work. Once again I am blown away at the chance that I have to be a missionary and gave God's trust in his important work.

This week I have felt the fulfillment of the scripture in Ether 12, "If men come unto me I will show unto them their weaknesses." I have most definitely seen lots of areas I can improve. I definitely have fears I am working on putting on the Sacrificial Altar. I'm just going to focus on improving a bit day by day. I'm grateful to recognize some of these weaknesses so early on because I know I can overcome them and become  a better missionary. This week was like step one in Ether 12, Recognize a weakness of mine ✔️, now I get to work on humbling myself and having faith (acting), and I believe that through christ my weak things can become strong.

The Christmas spirit is great up here and we have really been able to share lots about light the world! So ya!

Love you all! Have a happy week, I'm praying for snow for yall.

♡ Hermana Simmons

The picture of us eating is this weird miscellaneous meat sandwich that missionaries are obsessed with here. I think it is some middle eastern thing, it's called Kebab, so this was the night of our K-babtism.. It's kinda a big deal. It was pretty good. Then just have these random dried slabs of meat and they shave it for you and make a sandwich. 

 Sheep in the middle of the city.

I'm alive

Hey! Sorry it's been some time. So I'm not dead. This week has been insane but all is well it was zone conference this week so the schedule was way off and conference is in our area so it's been insane getting everything ready.

First,

Wed: so yesterday I walked from the mtc to the church the aps took us to the mission home. We hung out with the president and his wife for a while learned a bit about how our mission works. Ate homemade Cafe Rio. Ate seconds. Then met our trainers. Everyone got to meet their trainer but two. One girl is training in the islands and yours truly got handed a series of train tickets because I'm going to the farthest north west tip of Spain to the beautiful A Coruna! So last nigh I spent the night with some sisters in the city and went contacting. Then got up at 5 to start my journey. As I'm typing this I'm on the train. Wow. I cannot describe how lucky I am to be on this train! It's a 5:30 am to 7:30 pm travel day, but wow Spain... First we went though north central Spain and it has the classic Spanish countryside look. Almost sort of Tuscan. A few hours later I was right at the Portugal border going through mountains with scattered lakes and mountain villages. After spending the last 6 weeks right in the city I didn't expect to be seeing these beautiful European mountain villages! I can't describe how beautiful. Then when I hit the western ocean I had a few hours north along the coast in beautiful green Galactica Spain. Wow. I'm not quite to a coruna yet but I can't wait. Google it and you'll understand how beautiful my new home is! I wouldnt be mad to spend the next year up here in the north. 

Anyways that is my little solo, soul searching, hobbit journey north.

I typed that a while ago.. But now on to more current events

My trainers name is Hermana Glover. She has been out six months from Indiana.  She is a stud. She is a whole ton of motivation packed into a 5 foot little body. I have so much to learn from her.  Her older brother was my EFY co-counselor in Tonga, small world!  

Sorry don't have much time because there is a fútbol game about to start up in the parking garage I got to get in on but I'll share an experience from this week.

So my Spanish is OK. Enough to participate a little in each interaction. We met this lady on the street who was a balloon vendor. And started talking to her. Well she was really in a place where she needs God in her life so we ended up sharing the whole first lesson. And somehow I end up holding the balloons. Hahaha ha picture this I'm holding like 75 balloons trying not to fly away and they are blowing everywhere but at the same time I got to teach about Joseph Smith and share the first vision. It's the best. 

I am so impressed with this area! There is work to be done! It's been little crazy getting ready for zone conference but we are staying busy.. Lots of investigators, but not many progressing so there is a ton of work to be done! There are so many people willing to listen to us on the streets too. It kinda surprised me!

I have a vocal solo tomorrow in front of two zones and the president.. I'm singing and my companion is fluting.. I'm crying.... Sweet mercy.... This isn't a joke..... I knew the mission would be a challenge but I had no idea how big of a challenge... 

Anyways sorry I have no time! I will email Monday. I promise. But I'm happy. I am going to work hard this week to participate more in our companionship. Haha I have no time to be funny anymore. Oh boy. I got to fix that! But yeah I'm happy, just humming along. I promise I'll send more next week! 

Love yall 

️Hermana Simmons

You'd better believe I'm still a snow flake making machine