Be an Example and a Light

Hello Everyone! Second to last email!

So our week was pretty great as well! Not as statistically amazing as last week. We did walk 9 miles yesterday.... and it was worth it because we had a very spiritual first lesson with a woman who seems like she just got it! It was very nice! We put our feet in hot water when we got home to make the weekly Sunday night calls to all the sisters. As far as the sisters, we found more investigators than even last week! They all worked really hard this week.

Today we had a sisters activity!! I am so glad I did one before I left! We went to Maunabo Lighthouse and it was amazing! We had the sisters read Pte. Monson's talk from GC, Be an Example and a Light, and have them choose attributes they want to develop to strengthen their lights to help other people. We also had them write their testimonies down and we put them in bottles and threw them in the ocean!! I will try to send pictures from H. Helmick's camera because I forgot my cord today! It was so much fun!

This week we also taught our inv. with a baptismal date but she didn't come to church... so we'll work for her to come this Sunday! I think my biggest commitment helper will be telling people it's my last Sunday, haha.

We had exchanges with both sets of the Caguas sisters this week! I was with Hna. Tanner, this is her first transfer. She is rocking Spanish! She also has such a Spirit and excitement with her that it made me excited! I was also able to work with H. Garcia from Nicaragua for one last time too! She was my last exchange. I love the sisters in our Zone. Each and everyone of them are amazing. I loved working with them and seeing all their different personalities and talents in the obra del Senor. 

We also had my last Zone Meeting and I taught about our mission culture and somethings we can do to improve our culture even more! It went really well. Our mission is amazing and I have seen it progress so much since I have been here, all thanks to Pte. and Hna. Boucher. I'm so excited for the future of this mission! I'm sad that my journey in PR and in the mission is ending here and I won't get to see what more miracles this mission will see but I am so grateful that I came and I'm grateful for everything I have seen here.

I am sorry to here about Brother Cundick. He was such a wonderful friend. He always made me feel so special. Did you know that every time I played in Sacrament meeting he would call me over the phone that day or that week and thank me and tell me how wonderfully I played? That takes such a special person to do that and it made me feel so loved and appreciated. I am sad that I will not be able to see him one last time. 

But I know that it is all in the timing of the Lord. and I am positive that in the Lord's Second Coming that Brother Cundick will be leading the angels' chorus. Please tell Charlotte that I love her very dearly and she and her family are in my prayers. It sounds like his funeral was quite beautiful.

You don't have to worry about preparing too much for me to come home! If you could just wash my bed sheets. Really that's all! I can take care of organizing my closet and everything. If you could just bring me a coat to the airport! That would be wonderful haha:) One of my red coats would be great, but I also think my brown pea coat goes better with my outfit. I am worried that all my clothes and skirts and blouses and dresses are all summer colors. I'm going to have a funny time adjusting to wearing winter colors!

I love you all so much! I can't wait to see you NEXT WEEK! So this is my official last week in the mission. I won't have time next week to actually work... next Monday I will be packing, Tuesday I will be driving sisters all over the island, Wednesday I will be in the office having auto sufficiency classes, and Thursday I will be on a plane and home to you! I am determined to make this the best week ever and enjoy every moment of working in the sun and teaching the people here in Puerto Rico. 

I love this mission. I'm sad to leave but I decided to just be happy and positive about it. Many missionaries get depressed before they go home and I figure that I could be panicking or really sad that it's coming to an end, or I could just appreciate that all good things end and appreciate my last moments instead of wasting them being sad! So I promise to be positive and happy! No matter what I have to come home! And of course I am excited to come home! So I'll just focus on the positive things and enjoy every moment!

I love you! I'll try to send photos!!

xoxo Hermana Hardy

Tastes Like Sofrito

Hello!

Last week we contacted and contacted and contacted to find new investigators. Also, we went back to contacts from the week before and we have a new family to teach! Yay! 

What does and doesn't work: well, it's hard to teach someone you contact at night, but making appointments for the next couple days worked pretty well. But contacting at night is often difficult but it's hard to find other things to do at 8:00 because people are starting to close up house earlier because the electricity here in PR is got more expensive about 2 weeks ago. We prefer finding people by members and references but it's not like we can have one of those EVERY day so we have to work to find inv. 

But the members here are amazing and they feel bad that we are always walking around and they want to help us find people to teach- but it's also hard for them to find their friends or family who are actually interested or who haven't already listened and didn't accept the Gospel. 

But we do have a neat family that we're teaching who were a reference from some members! We also have 4 new investigators from last week that all came from contacting. One of them we can only teach in English so that was interesting for me!

Church yesterday was great! The Bishop's talk was pretty good- he talked about how we have a physical nutrition guide called myplate right? and he turned it into a spiritual metaphor of how our vegetables, etc are things such as faith and prayer, repentance, etc. I really liked it!

Speaking of nutrition! So the week BEFORE this past week we had a nutrition activity for RS. A nutritionist came and explained to everyone myplate and she also weighed all of us and gave us our BMI. 

She also gave us a long list of all the common Puerto Rican foods that we should avoid.... I laughed because I've eaten every single thing on that list in the past month and I usually eat two or more of those foods every day. But I'm not complaining because the members love us and they feed us and I only have a given amount of time to be here in Puerto Rico to eat all of these delicious foods.

The bad news is that I have gained almost 10 lbs (The scale showed 9 lbs more but she weighed us and didn't subtract for my clothes and my heavy walking shoes... which is all pretty heavy) but the good news is that my BMI is still very healthy! So my answer to how my health is.... I've been doing pretty well because I'm exercising every day and I try to eat healthy at home. 

Sometimes I feel like I have a bit of a cold but it comes and goes. It turns out that I am particularly allergic to garlic and it gives me really bad headaches but only if they feed me a lot of garlic. So that hasn't happened to me in a couple of weeks, and at least it's not a migraine! So in the end I am doing alright and I might be a little round in the face when I come home. :D

The differences in the food from different areas... Well here there are a couple of members who cook different things than just rice and beans! I forgot to tell you last week that I ate what was basically lasagna but instead of pasta it was layered eggplant with cheese and marinara sauce. That was interesting! I also had some fish last week but it's not very common to eat fish here because it's expensive even though we're on an island. But pretty much the food is the same as my other areas. 

All Puerto Rican food tastes almost the same because everyone uses the same GOYA seasoning and sofrito (which are things like peppers, onions, garlic, etc, all grinded up together) they use sofrito as a base for pretty much everything- rice, beans, meat, anything. 

Last week we ate a REALLY tasty sancocho- which is pretty much like a stew that had meat (it also had pigs feet but I didn't serve that to myself... I've tried it before and it's all fat and weird texture) and it had potato, platanos verdes, dumplings made of flour, corn on the cob chunks, and things like that. You serve it over a bowl of rice with lots of broth and it's quite tasty!

Also- The other day I realized that I totally eat like the Puerto Ricans. It's really uncommon to use a table knife to eat. They usually just put out forks. At the beginning I was really careful how I ate using only a fork and sometimes a knife if they gave me one. 

But the truth is that when they eat meat they use their left hand to hold the meat in place and a fork to rip it apart. or they pick up the meat with their left hand and bite out of it. It took me awhile to get used to that- but without a knife there is no other way to cut the meat because it's too difficult to do it with just a fork, so everyone uses their left hand- not all the fingers, just the thumb and pointer finger. 

I mean, not everywhere is like that, but just about! so I learned to just watch the host and copy how they eat. And almost everyone eats with two fingers on their left hand depending on the food they serve. With the sancocho stew you pick up the corn on the cob and you eat it with your hands. because there is no other way! Here we eat a lot of fried chicken... every now and then chuletas- which are essentially pork chops (I think...) but they're different from the ones mom makes because they are thinner and look a bit like a T-bone steak, and they usually cook them in a frying pan on the stove with different ingredients with sofrito. 

Also, we eat a ton of tostones which are 2 fried platanos verdes, or made out of pana- a funny round looking thing that comes from a tree and is pretty starchy. Also, there are amarillos which are fried platanos maduros. But yeah.

OH! in a couple weeks I will be cooking for a member family a typical dish from home... I am not sure what to make them. What do you think? I am thinking Mama's poppy seed chicken or something like that. Can you send me a recipe and other ideas? I will probably have to double or triple it...

Also we have Zone Conference this week and we'll be teaching, wish me luck.

I hope you all have a wonderful week!! Good luck to the new Bishopric and send my love to Bishop Miner and his counselors! I'm really grateful for everything they have done to help me and our family and ward.

Good luck this week with everything, I hope you feel better Mama!!

xoxo Hermana Hardy

Happy Halloween!!

Hello everyone!!!

Thanks so much for the packages! Everything was perfect and we're all excited for the Halloween candy!!

My Spanish is doing well. I wish I could say I have the accent down but even though it's not a horrible accent you can still tell that I'm a gringa. The only thing I can't do for the life of me is trill the r's. It's rough. I can do it with my throat but you're supposed to do it with your tongue. But no one minds. I do speak Boricua though. PR has its own Spanish. When I get home and speak to other people in Spanish they aren't going to understand most of the words I'll use.

A spiritual experience from last week. Well the owner of our apartment came by to fix the fridge and he was asking us questions about death and everything. He's read the Plan of Salvation pamphlet and everything but still has a problem with it. I told him that if he wants to understand death he has to understand why we're here on earth. So the spiritual moment was when I asked him if he's prayed and asked Heavenly Father about it and that took him off guard and he said no, he's never thought about that. So I invited him to pray. We'll see how that goes.

Also we ended up teaching a member's non member husband because we went for a dinner appointment and somehow we got on the topic of the Gospel and the wife basically taught all of L1 to her husband and that was awesome. The only thing with him is that it just goes around in circles. He knows everything is true but is waiting to decide for himself to be baptized and leave his worldly side behind. 

We spoke about having his wife forever and he said that when he dies he'll find her in the next life. I then told him that if he isn't baptized here on earth when he has the chance, he won't make the decision in the next life and then if he doesn't get baptized he won't be able to find his wife because she'll be in a place where he can't go. That made him think and he said that means he has to be baptized on earth.

Looks like I've been pretty mouthy this week right?? haha, but it sure made them think. I promise that I said it all in a loving manner.

I am still playing for the ward. De hecho, yesterday the missionaries did a musical number and I played the piano while the three other sisters sang "If the Savior Stood Beside Me" in Spanish. It was pretty good.

Hna. Martita (RS Pres.) has a piano in her house and when we go to eat every Thursday she loves it when we play the piano for her. It makes me happy to see her so happy!!

Dia de los Muertos is mostly part of the Mexican culture, they don't do anything like that here. No one observes Halloween except for teenagers who dress up and go to parties and besides that Halloween is a REALLY bad time to be outside and it's apparently really dangerous because of the people doing maldades. We have to be inside by 7:00. 

Before that we have a Mission Conference with some General Authorities so most of Saturday we won't be proselyting. The ward isn't celebrating Halloween. Halloween here definitely isn't the same as it is in Utah...

When is Baby due???

It sounds like you all had an awesome week! Good job Hannah with your lesson! That's awesome.

On Saturday the ward had an Indexing Marathon. It was pretty cool! We went to go help set up!

Well that's about it! This week was a bit crazy, I've been a little sick but I'm feeling a bit better. My companion made chicken soup for me! It's a bit different from our chicken noodle soup because they actually make the chicken soup with water, chicken, potato, onion, carrots, etc. and then they serve it in a bowl with white rice! I really like it. It tasted so good and it felt good on my throat!

Today we have a zone activity and we are going bowling! It should be fun. I have lots of pictures to send you but they'll have to wait for next week. This is Sister Gallardo's last week! Crazy!!!

I hope you have a wonderful week! 

xoxo Hermana Hardy

Sister Trainer Leader ~ Caguas Zone

Hello Everyone!

Let me tell you about my new area of Guayama, Puerto Rico. To drive there you have to go through a lot of mountains. There is a drought here so everything looks pretty dry. It is like driving through Utah, dry, brown, lots of mountains, curving roads and then you come out of the curve of the last hill and BAM there's the ocean. :)

 

How does my new area compare to my other areas? Well, the members here feed us almost every day. They are all hyped about missionary work and we have a whole bunch of recent converts. We need new investigators right now so we will be finding a lot the next few weeks (like my other areas).

They also have Ward Council three times a month. Which rocks! Before church too- I am proud of them! This ward is amazing and they have an activity called Pastoral visits where they all get together one night and decide who needs help or visits and then they split up and visit all the less actives. Right on! Really, I am so blessed to be here.

 

My companion is Hna. Alecxa Gallardo. She is from Tijuana, Mexico. She is 24 years old and the entire house got all excited when I told them I have a brother that is 24 years old. Haha. But she is an amazing missionary. She is finishing her mission in November. I really like being her companion.

 

We live with two other sisters. Hna. Hoko (my roomate from the MTC!!!) from Tonga/Hawaii/Utah and Hna. Garcia from Managua, Nicaragua!! They are both really awesome.
 

 

The apartment is the best apartment in the mission too! It is so beautiful, white, and bright. I love it!

 

My responsibilities as Sister Trainer Leader (STL) are the following: 

Go to Mission Leadership Council, teach District Leaders what we learned in MLC, teach the Zone alongside the Zone Leaders in Zone Meetings and Zone Conferences, and go on exchanges with the sisters in our Zone to help and teach them. Also to take care of transfer changes. I think that's everything, Hna. Boucher is going to come by sometime soon to go over all my responsibilities. Hna. Gallardo has been teaching me a lot this week too.

 

I am sending a LOT of photos this week, I promise. They are mostly all just me on the beach. Enjoy! That's why my letter isn't very long this week!!

 

It looks like everyone had so much fun in Newport! That's so awesome!
 

 

Please send me Anna's address in the MTC and everything!!

I LOVE YOU!!
 

xoxo Hermana Hardy

Happy Pioneer Day!!!

Hello Family!!!



We went to the Waterfalls today!!! It was so beautiful. Lots of fun. I will definitely bring the family here when we come back to visit so we can go swimming! Make sure you show the pictures to Grandma!

 

 

I am not sure if they really celebrate the 24th but we do have an activity and an amazing speaker from another ward is coming to speak to us. As far as I understand he is the Puerto Rican John Bytheway!

 

 

A few weeks ago in Zone Meeting our STLs told us that we needed to start inviting contacts in the street to be baptized! At first I was slightly incredulous and I had a bad attitude about it for about 20 minutes but I decided that since our leaders are inviting us to do it then Heavenly Father wants us to do it! So we started and it isn't too bad. 

 

I thought it would be really awkward and that we wouldn't know what to say but the very first time I just went for it and the Spirit helped me start a conversation about baptism, the restoration, and the invitation. The first one said she would have to find out more. The rest are so so. One problem is that often our contacts have to be really quick and there is no time to invite them before they run off. But I am determined to continue!

So we found a new part of our area and contacted a lot of people there and found some families! Then we took out a map and figured out it's not our side of San Sebastian-- Whoops! But the other sisters are happy and I am excited for them! They got a lot of references that week. 

The music in this ward.. haha. Well I play the piano every week and their piano is actually a keyboard and it is so quiet that no one can hear it while they are singing except those who sit closer. So I will not be doing a solo here because there is not really a point if no one can hear it. 

 

 

THIS week. Haha, so the pedal to the keyboard got messed up and when I went to play the intermediate hymn the pedal wouldn't work while I pressed on it, but when I let go all the notes would stay together like a normal pedal. So I had to reverse the way I play with the pedal and it was very complicated but I got used to it very quick. When the phrase needed a break I would step on the pedal and off really quick so the notes wouldn't run together so. Very interesting. Then at the end it was okay.

 

 

Last week we had an FHE and dinner with the Stake President and his family. I tried to do the egg in the bottle thing that worked in a lesson the week before but it didn't work as well this time... haha, it took the egg ten minutes to be sucked in! SO we did the latas endure to the end lesson which I will explain when I get home so you don't know what it is when I give you the puzzle.

 

 

Why is running 17 miles so normal for you?! That's crazy! You run more than I walk! Transfers are the 11th of August.  I received the shoes! They are so wonderful, thank you so much!  I tried chicken liver this week. Never again! :D  I can't wait to get Jonny's and Hannah's letters this week. Make sure you write them! haha :)

Have a wonderful week! We watched 17 miracles for our missionary activity this last week. It is such a strong powerful movie! I love it so much and every time I think about our pioneers I feel the Spirit very strongly. I am so grateful for them!

 

xoxo Hermana Hardy

Gifts from the Sea

I will share an experience from today that has been developing for a couple of months:

 

 

So my reasons for serving a mission have changed several times since I have started my mission. To be honest I never really liked it when people ask me why I am serving a mission because I feel like there is no right way to explain what I really feel and because we are all in the process of answering that question...

 

Well, a couple months ago we were walking in an urbanization and I am not sure what I was thinking about (I wasn't discouraged... but we weren't see a lot of success with people) but the thought came to my mind that maybe my mission here in Puerto Rico is not the most important thing I will ever do in my life. It really took me off guard. It made me think A LOT and change my perspective and my reasons for why I am here in Puerto Rico. It also made me think of what is the most important thing I will do in my life. So I made a list of my purpose here as a missionary, why I am here.

 

Also a couple months ago President Boucher told us in a talk that while baptizing is very important, the most important thing is that we as missionaries develop to become more like Christ. That also caused me to think a lot.

 

Then today we had a zone activity (that went REALLY long, that's why I'm writing so late) and it was neat. We went to some cool caves in Arecibo, saw the ocean, gorgeous! They gave us some personal study time and invited us to focus in our purpose as missionaries and why each of us is here. So that gave me time to develop my thoughts even more and to write them out a bit more.

 

So... Now we come to Sister Hardy's Personal Reasons/ Personal Purpose as a Missionary:

1. To invite others to come unto Christ.
2. To become more like Christ.
3. To prepare myself for my role as a wife and mother (my true purpose in life).

 

To be honest I made this list a couple months ago and while I was looking at it again today, studying more, comparing with my Patriarchal Blessing, it came together even more. The thought came to my mind "This mission is preparation for my life's mission" and I had the wonderful experience of feeling the Holy Ghost testify to me that this was true.

 

Now how does being a missionary prepare me for the rest of my life? Lots of ways! I explored a few today.

 

In Preach My Gospel, chapter 1, there are a lot of quotes from prophets in the latter days about missionary work. I think none of them actually mentioned anything about full time missionary work... they were more on member missionaries, lifetime missionaries. One by Brigham Young spoke a lot about living the Gospel principles so I can teach the Gospel principles and help others. I think that living and teaching the Gospel are one of the most important things a mother can do for her children. (Like how my mama has lived and taught all of us)

 

Well, one of the ways that my mission is preparing me is to prepare me to understand the necessity of the Gospel, to live the Gospel and focus in the Gospel, and to prepare me to teach the Gospel (in the PR of course... but more importantly to my future children).

To be honest every missionary is different. And there are a lot more reasons and purposes and even sub reasons and sub purposes that we can't see or recognize. Everyone has their own reasons for coming on a mission (and everyone's reason changes while they are on the mission) and I realize that my purpose as a missionary may not be the same as others'. Furthermore I think it is more important to realize that Heavenly Father has His own reasons and purposes for each and every one of us.

 

But this is mine! And I will own it to the best of my ability.

 

Maybe there is more to Heavenly Father's purpose for me that I can't see. For now, I feel like I am on the right track.

 

So, that's my motivation. There are people here for me to serve and to teach. There are also more spirits that I will teach in the future. So for all of them present and future I will work my hardest to give them my best and prepare with all I can to do that.

 

Thank you so much for your wonderful example to me, Mama! I am so grateful for you and for everything you have taught me. You are the best and I owe everything to you and to Dad. I have been so blessed to have been able to be born in your home, with parents that would live and teach me the Gospel so that I would have the opportunity to develop my own testimony. To be honest I have never doubted that the church is true. I feel that is a gift of testimony that my Heavenly Father has given me and also the firm, strong testimonies of my parents that built that foundation for me. Our family is rare. The world doesn't have a lot of families like ours, where the parents are united. Even in the church it can be rare to see a family where all of the children are actively living the Gospel and not straying from the path. I've never realized how spoiled I've been to have this family and to have her for forever! So it's our purpose to stay strong and to help other families do the same.

There are a lot more ways that I can see (and can't see) the mission preparing me. I was only able to share a few but please know that I am so grateful for this opportunity and for the many blessings I have received and the many miracles I have seen.

 

So that is my testimony. That the Church is true. That our families will be together forever. That Heavenly Father has a plan for all of us. And I am so excited to learn more about what He has in plan for us. In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

xoxo Hermana Hardy