Good thing His ways are higher than ours, right??

    Welp, I'm back! And have been for about 3 months. It's been a little rough. Every single day I miss the mission and serving and being sleep-deprived and slammed doors and my people and Spanish - especially those last two. Sin embargo, slowly but surely I'm figuring out how to acclimate in this super weird transition phase and still keep the things I learned the past 18 months. And it's harder than I thought it would be; there are so many things vying for our attention, that if you get complacent for even a second, the day is gone! One thing my mission president, President Lewis, told me before I came home, was to make scripture study and temple attendance a priority. Like the TOP priority. And let me tell you, it has saved me. Going to the temple every week is like hitting the reset button for me, it clears my head, gives me perspective, and helps me feel like I'm still doing something that matters. Which is huge, because compared to the work you're used to doing as a missionary, losing those opportunities makes you feel like a useless pile...heh heh.

        The GOOD NEWS though...

Plan of Salvation from Visions of Hope.

     ....is that it's still okay! It's supposed to be like this. (Or so they tell me). The amount of change that comes at the end of a full-time mission is so huge that there is no way to avoid collateral damage. But you know that message missionaries share with everyone? Time to apply it personally. The Atonement is real, it's not just a nice idea. James E. Faust said that "the unfailing source of our hope is that we are sons and daughters of God, and that His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, saved us from death." Unfailing. What else on this earth can we really truly classify as unfailing? Nothing. And I'll be a monkey's uncle if that ain't true. I know that it is. I have seen it change lives, and felt it change mine. He has a plan for us, and that's what it's all about. Some would say that because there's no proof, it's not worth it to put the effort in.
          But really, what do we have to lose?
          Nothing.
And we have EVERYTHING to gain.

The Kingdoms

These Little Ones

If there's one thing I know about myself, it's that I love kids. They bring joy to my heart in a way that nothing else can. The love that I have for children is something I feel so strongly that I've based my life around it. I'm studying to be an elementary school teacher. I want to be an influence in their lives for good, to be able to facilitate their growth and learning. I can't wait for the day when I can love and nurture children of my own. The innocence and spirit of a child is something that I think the world needs more of.

So this morning at work when I pulled up facebook to fill some downtime, I was not prepared for what I would find. What I found was not the normal update I was expecting, about finishing finals or traveling home for the holidays. Instead I read post after post of expressions of sorrow and shock over the tragedy that had occurred at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. As I read various news reports on what had happened, and the gravity of it began to sink in, tears started streaming down my face. My thoughts immediately turned to my little ones at the preschool at which I've taught for the past two years. 

Most of them are kindergarten age now, around the same age as the victims of today's tragedy. I thought of their smiles, their laughter, and their sweet spirits.

 I thought of how quick they are to help and to forgive, their innocence, their purity and the happiness they brought me on a daily basis. 

The past two summers I would go into work looking forward to hearing their excited chatter, seeing how smart and capable they were, and the opportunity to help their already incredible minds grow.

The thought of anyone inflicting intentional harm on even one child brings an overwhelming sadness over me at the wickedness that this world is capable of. I stewed over this at work all day. At first I tried not to think about the horror of the situation, but just could not seem to get it out of my mind. It's as if it had taken grip of my heart, and wouldn't stop squeezing. I thought of my grief and then compared it to what the families of these children and teachers must be feeling, and could not even fathom it. Sons, daughters, sisters, brothers, parents and friends, gone just like that. I was so overwhelmed and just did the only thing I felt I could do, which was to pray, and I mean really pray, the pouring out your heart kind. As I prayed for peace and comfort to be upon the victims' families, I was overcome with gratitude for the Savior. It's an odd feeling, to be so incredibly sad but so grateful at the same time. Thankful for the Atonement of Jesus Christ, for the knowledge I have that the children taken from their families today have been reunited with our Father in Heaven and are wrapped up in His loving arms. I hope that when we think about the events of today, that this will be what we focus on. Instead of harboring hate and anger, that we will pray for the families to be comforted and be blessed with a feeling of peace. The path toward hate is an easy one to get caught on, much easier than the one toward forgiveness, because it requires no restraint, no mercy. I felt myself slipping in that direction today. The thought of harm coming to innocent children makes me as angry as I probably will ever get. But as I tried to keep a little prayer in my heart for some peace, I realized that when we get stuck in these emotions we are only harvesting more anger and paving the way for more hatred and destruction in the world around us. Through the Atonement of Jesus Christ, all things will be taken care of in the end, no matter how out of balance they seem now. Our Savior is the only one by whom perfect justice and mercy can be carried out, and through whom the wrongs that have been done can truly be righted.

"And now, verily I say unto you, and what I say unto one I say unto all, be of good cheer, little children; for I am in your midst, and I have not forsaken you" -Doctrine and Covenants 61:36

misceláneo

Welp, we just got back from Barcelona last night. It was incredible. But more on that later. Just thought I'd touch on some random highlights from the last few weeks:

For our Día de San Valentín, we spent all day in class listening to sappy Spanish love songs and writing equally sappy valentines to each other in Spanish. If you have time, go listen to Solamente Tú by Pablo Alboran, and prepare to be utterly twitterpated. Later that night we had a dessert night for a YSA activity, and Elizabeth and I made cake balls! They actually turned out pretty good, considering we had to do a little improvisation involving magdalenas and nutella en vez de actual cake and frosting.

I failed to recount our trip to Segovia, but it was wonderful, even with the frigid temperature! We got to see the wonderfully-preserved aqueduct and el Alcazar, which was basically Sleeping Beauty's castle. The stairs up to the top of the highest tower were like giant cheese-wedges designed specifically to reveal how ridiculously out of shape we are.

Last week we got the chance to go to ArtMadrid. There was some art there that I wish with all my heart I could afford to buy, and some that I wish I could erase from my memory. But it was so fun to just wander through all the displays and take it all in. I saw this particular piece towards the end, and immediately I thought of my aunt Andi. She makes the most amazing bread, in huge, round loaves with clever sayings written in flour. It sounded exactly like something she'd put on her bread, so I showed it to her on facebook. It was even more perfect because the addition of "pan" instead at the end of "preocupen" would be so punny!

The next day she uploaded this picture of her fantastic creation to facebook. I LOVE IT!

Cuenca wasn't originally on our list of trips, but I'm so glad the Larsens decided to add it for us! The city was breathtaking; I absolutely loved las casas colgadas (hanging houses), and getting barked at was a fun, new experience as well.

Temple de Debod, a super old Egyptian Temple in the middle of Madrid. We got there right as the sun was setting, and the view with the reflections off the water was really amazing. Just me and Anna walking like Egyptians, of course.

Last week we got the opportunity to go to the Madrid Temple as a group! It was such an incredible experience to attend the temple in another country, and still feel the comfort and power of the Spirit that comes from temple work. We've seen some of the most ornate, majestic, and historically significant buildings in the world on this trip, but this one is my favorite. By miles. No contest.

Finally ventured out to Parque del Retiro! It is a sprawling, scenic park in Madrid that I had heard so much about, and it definitely lived up to the expectations. Felt like I was straight outta Gossip Girl or something. Spotted: Little J eating lunch on the Met steps.

To celebrate (or mourn, not sure which) getting to the halfway point in the program, we decided to make a trip out to a store called Taste of America, to indulge in some of the finer things the U.S. has to offer, that unfortunately we don't have frequent access to over here. Namely, Dr. Pepper and Root Beer, Reese's, Pop Tarts, and Milanos. Halle-freakin-lujah, 'twas grand.

Next post will be about Barcelona. I will have to gather up all the blogging energy and prowess that I possibly can, because there is so much to tell!

NSP moment:
helado. gelato. ice cream.
enough said.

OOPS.

okey dokey.

So it's been 3 weeks since my last post.....my bad. I just got overwhelmed by the prospect of writing about our trip to Andalucía because there was SO MUCH to tell, and I just kept putting it off, and now here we are. So now for the next couple posts I'm just going to bombard you with pictures and little captions from the last little while. Prepare yourselves; lots has transpired.

¡ANDALUCIA!

First stop was featured in Cervantes' Don Quixote. The windmills of Consuegra.

Don't worry, I got a few punches and kicks in to help ole Don out.

Next up was Granada and La Alhambra. Utterly fantastic.

Love, love, loooooove Moorish architecture. The detail on everything is so intricate and ornate, and my eyes and brain were just on overdrive trying to take it all in.

Me and Aly - I'm obsessed with this place.

Anna, Madi, Aly and I just plopped ourselves up on a wall, got some sun, did some chatting, got paparazzied by some Asian tourists, and marveled at how awesome life is right now.

Próxima Parada: Córdoba

Inside the Mezquita. Again, LOVE the Moorish architecture.

Just gettin ma stankyyy leg on in the streets of Córdoba.

Juderia in Córdoba, so many flowers hanging from the buildings, loved it!

Ruins of Medina - once a bustling, powerful city until it all got burned and blown up. War is dumb.

Onward to Sevilla!

Hellooooo. I like you.

Plaza de España! And yes, Star Wars Episode II was filmed here.

Coats of arms inside the room where Columbus had his little chatty-chat with Isabel and Ferdinand about his travels.

Columbus' grave inside the Cathedral of Sevilla (third largest cathedral in the world).

View of the top of the cathedral and overlooking the city from the tippy top of La Giralda (the tower of the cathedral). Climbed like 35 levels of ramps to get up there, but it was a wonderful excuse for some gelato later, of course.

We rented bikes and rode all around the city. The weather was SO nice, we got a little exercise, and it was just all around PERFECT. We even choreographed some synchronized biking in the Plaza de España.

The last leg of our bike ride was a journey to find el barrio de la Macarena. And find it we did. I can now say that I have done the Macarena in Macarena, Spain. (Anna, Jenna, Kim, Whitney, Aly, and I)

Flamenco stage. Absolutely amazing. We couldn't take pictures of the actual performance, but I doubt they would have done it justice anyway.

Last stop, Mérida. Roman ruins.

Roman amphitheater

Where they kept the animals before they set them loose to feed on convicts. Rawr.

Roman theater

Vern KILLING it. Girl gots pipes.

This is our creepy stalker man. He first appeared in Granada, but none of us thought anything of it, just a normal passerby in a red coat, right? Then he showed up in Córdoba, tagging along on our tour of the Mezquita. THEN he continued to follow us around our tour of the city. Tid bit weird, but we shrugged it off. Fast forward two days to Sevilla. Just finished a wonderful bike excursion through the city, and what do I see out of the corner of my eye? Red coat. Same man. Three consecutive cities. WHY YOU FOLLOW US HOMBRE??

Minus the creeper, in a nutshell: Andalucía = love.


NSP moment:
Too many to count. For example, right now it's one o'clock in the morning, and I haven't started my homework for tomorrow! Thank goodness for siesta, that's all I have to say.

musto gucho.

Hi friends.

Found good old Voldy in Madrid. Avada Kedavra-ed the heck out of Madi in his honor.

Found some churros and chocolate...ten minutes after finding some mind-blowing gelato... P.S. Madi cute churro smile.


Bought our ticket to Paris for our trip after the program! That's $600 worth of train ticket in our hands right thurr.

Friday and Saturday of this week we went to Ávila, Salamanca, Toro, and Tordesillas. It was fantastic, just like everything here, but boyyyy was it cold. It snowed the whole time we were in Ávila, which made for some beautiful views, and also some frozen feet. Ávila is famous for it's outer walls, Las Murallas. They were so cool, it looked like castle walls from a fairytale. You can kinda see them surrounding the city in the background of this picture of Kim and I.


At the foot of the wall we passed some of these jagged rocks, and thanks to the LOTR kick we've been on lately, we couldn't pass up this opportunity. Just being ork-esque, it's what we do.


On our way out of Ávila we stopped at Los Cuatro Postes. Supposedly St. Teresa ran away from home at the age of seven, with the intent of becoming a martyr in battle with the Moors, and this is the spot where her uncle stopped her from doing so. Strange kid. Kind of sheds a little light on the story of The Ecstasy of St. Teresa. Apparently these oddities were not super out of the ordinary for her.

Next stop was Salamanca, and it's cathedral. To the flying buttresses!

The cathedral was really stunning, but my favorite part was the little bit of humorous restoration to its façade. There's something here that doesn't really fit....

Apparently they had to restore some of the detailing recently, and some jokester decided to include an astronaut and a dragon eating an ice-cream cone on the outside of a centuries-old cathedral. Love it.


We then went and toured the University of Salamanca, which is the third oldest in the world. Can you say thousands of books from the 15th and 16th centuries??? I like very very very much.


Our guide throughout the day in Salamanca kept telling us all the hoppin discotecas that we absolutely had to go to. Since it's a college town, it's known for its nightlife, apparently people come from miles and miles away to partayyy on the weekends. By the time we got back from getting dinner and shopping, we were pooped. Out of 25 girls, not a single one of us were out past 11. We are a bunch of old grannies and I love it.

Next day we took a little stop in Toro to see the cathedral there, which was a lot more simplistic in its decoration than some of the other ones we've seen, but I still thought it was gorgeous.

Oh whatup roomie! Elizabeth is the bomb. She can handle my crazy pretty well and is very patient with me when I'm being immature. Love her.

Last but not least, we stopped in Tordesillas and saw the convent where Juana La Loca was imprisoned for 49 years. You can google the story if you want, but the moral is that boys are dumb and they're going to drive us all mad. But that's a topic for another day. The best part of Tordesillas was completely random and serendipitous. On our way back into Plaza Mayor to find some food, we happened upon a little five-man band playing music and a group of the people of Tordesilla dancing up a storm. After a little hesitation, we all joined in. SO fun.


Welp. I guess I should probably start my homework. Lots of times I forget that I'm here for school. Mostly because school consists of learning a language I love and studying super famous art and then getting to see it in person. I mean, it's rough.

Hastaaaa luegoooo


NSP moment:
While walking home from the bus Wednesday night, Elizabeth and I met a quite charming young gentleman. Good teeth, great scruff, about 6'3", studying civil engineering. Not too shabby. And me, being the conversationally challenged fool that I am, as we were saying goodbye, blurted out "¡musto gucho!" Oy. If you speak Spanish you know that that phrase means absolutely nothing. Switch around a couple consonants and you've got "nice to meet you," but I got a little tongue-tied and butchered it. Everywhere I go just reinforcing the worldwide belief that Americans are blabbering idiots.