Hola! This week BLURRED by! I can't even believe it's already P-Day! I don't even have much to write about this week, it was all basic MTC class, spiritual experiences, lessons...Everything was basically the same as usual! Sunday night Matthew Holland - president of UVU came and did an amazing devotional on Joseph Smith! It was SO good! And he incorporated the UVU institute choir which just added so much to the devotional. And Elder Holland and Aunt Pat came to hear him speak! It was so great! Basically every missionaries dream - to have Elder Holland come to the MTC haha even though he wasn't speaking to us. He did give a short introduction on President Holland and that was great! Some of the things I really liked from his talk was "Put your priorities where your temple covenants are" Instead of Put your money where your mouth is haha And Don't try so much to find the right person but to BE the right person - which is exactly what my motto was with my companions! It was great listening to him for a few minutes and then President Holland's talk on Joseph Smith was incredible. It really put Joseph into a new light for me and gave me a new appreciation for him. And singing with the MTC Choir has been the best! We sang Praise to the Man afterwards combined with the Institute choir and it was so powerful. Brother Eggett the choir director is awesome! He is fantastic at making it fun and also making it spiritual. My favorite line from sunday was "Don't breathe before the last note in a song unless you're going to follow it up with jazz hands!" I always look forward to choir on sunday! It's so great! We taught some really awesome lessons this week, it's been so great learning and growing in my teaching in the lessons, especially in Spanish! I can't even believe how much I've learned in the past few weeks! I can't wait to get to Mexico in a week! We got our flight plans yesterday and we're leaving at 4:30 in the morning Monday the 3rd and we'll be getting to Mexico around 10:30 monday night! I can't wait but it's also really intimidating! It really stresses me out to think about how much more I still need to learn in the language but I realize it will just take time. Well I hope everyone had a great week! I know I did! Being a missionary is hard work but is so great! Have a fantastic week! :) Hermana Terry All the Hermana's in our Zone before four of them left last monday!
Hola! So I wrote out my email and then when I went to start adding pictures the whole thing deleted and didn't even save in my drafts! So this will just be short because I'm going to try and quickly retype some of what I wrote earlier. Being a missionary is amazing! There isn't even much to write about this week because we've settled into a routine of things but I'm loving it! At least 3 times a day I have a "I can't believe I'm a Missionary!" moment. It's been so fantastic. The language is still hard but I feel a lot more comfortable with it now. On Tuesday we started TRC and we got to teach a real member - not just a teacher and that was really great. We taught the sweetest old ladies and they were so nice about our broken choppy spanish. It's been so fun learning espanol though and I can't wait to get fluent and be able to express myself the way I want to and not just with the limited vocabulary I have now. Hermana Ledek is seriously the best companion - I love her. We get along so great and we have so much fun together. The other night we were walking back to our apartments in the snow and we sang Let It Go from Frozen and just laughed and enjoyed it. I love being a missionary and I feel so blessed to have an amazing companion! And we got called to be Sister Training Leaders for our zone! So that's exciting! This week we got a new district in our zone and its been awesome not being the new district anymore haha. On wednesday the Elders and Hermana Shingelton went to SLC to get their Visas because you have to make a personal appearance to get them for Mexico (You either go to Vegas, SLC or Boise.) So Hermana Jensen, Hermana Ledek and I were a trio for a few hours! It was great doing that - class was awesome because we were able to focus specifically on things we need help with - it was really helpful. And we get a chance to be a trio again on Monday because we're going to Boise! We'll leave at 3 in the afternoon and fly to Boise and we'll stay to night and get back sometimeon Tuesday. We are so excited to get out of our little missionary bubble and get a little break from the MTC. And I'm glad we'll be getting our Visas! Well I don't have any more time! But I'm loving being a missionary! It's been the hardest thing I've ever done but also the best and I know it'll only get better and harder but I'm so excited for it! I can't wait to get to Mexico and start sharing the gospel and bringing others unto Christ. Hermana Terry district Selfie haha Hermana Ledek and I in the Snow
So I did it! I have survived 10 days in the MTC! I'm still loving everything but it's definitely gotten a lot harder. Learning this much Spanish in this short amount of time has really been difficult and it's frustrating not really having much time to study and do more with it. It's amazing what the Lord will help you with though as you learn to rely on Him. Sunday was amazing! We had sacrament meeting and that was fantastic but Relief Society was amazing! We got to watch Music and the Spoken Word which was the first time that I really got homesickness because I just kept thinking of my family watching it at home. But it was so uplifting. I really loved their arrangement on sunday of "Have I Done Any Good" It really is such a powerful song and It's really stuck in my head throughout this week reminding me that my purpose here is to be a representative of Christ and to do what He would do throughout the day. Then we got to listen to Janice Kapp Perry speak to us! This was SO amazing! She is the sweetest lady and she gave an excellent talk. My favorite part though was how strong the spirit was through song as we sang songs that she wrote. We all sang a medley of her Primary songs with her directing (How cool, right?) Songs like I Love to See The Temple, A Child's Prayer, and a few others. I loved this. Then we sang as the closing song her missionary arrangement of "As Sister's In Zion" And this was AMAZING! I felt the spirit so strong as all the sister missionaries sang that song together. I am so excited to be out serving with all these amazing Sister Missionaries! After the devotional we went back to West Campus and watched different movies. The movie we watched was Elder Bednar's MTC Christmas address from a few years ago about Characteristics of Christ. I'm not sure if you can find that on LDS.org or Youtube but if you haven't ever read or heard it find it! It was SO amazing and I learned a lot from that. I'm loving my District. They are all so crazy - especially the Elders. They're in a trio and we've nicknamed them Spongebob, Patrick and Squidward because Elder Robertson is seriously the human version of Spongebob and Elder Goodman is his sidekick Patrick. And then there is Elder Brown just kind of shaking his head at them. A couple days ago it snowed and during a break Elder Robertson went outside and made a snow angel and played in the snow for the whole time and we all just watched him out there in it. He's from Las Vegas so he is really fascinated with the snow. It's been so great being able to get to know so many missionaries and we seriously are in the best Zone ever. Our District is the 7th graders - we've only been here 10 days - and then we have the 8th graders who have been here a week longer than us and the cool 9th graders who have been here 3 weeks more than us. We all get along great and I always look forward to lunch & dinner and being able to talk with all of them more. The past week we've been focusing on teaching Magdalena which has been so scary! I cannot even believe that after only being here a short time I'm already teaching lessons in Spanish. It's so frustrating not being able to express myself the way I want to and be able to say everything I want to say but it's been such a learning and growing experience that as I rely on the Spirit, I find the words I need. Though He doesn't make it easy! I'm loving this experience though and it's been so amazing! Now Magdalena - aka Hermana Ricks is one of our teachers and it's helped having her teach us after our experiences with her as our investigator. Starting Monday we'll have two new "investigators" - crazy! A highlight from Magdalena's last lesson we taught her was at the beginning we were asking her what her hobbies were and what she liked to do and then Hermana Ledek started talking about how I liked to sing and Magdalena made me sing in the lesson. It was so funny - I made Hermana Ledek sing with me and we sang I Am A Child Of God but we started it really high so it was a little rough haha After when we got to talk to Hermana Ricks she couldn't stop laughing about the fact that she actually got us to sing in our lesson. Tuesday I got to sing in the Choir for the devotional and this was fantastic! It was the MTC President Nally and Sister Nally's one year anniversary serving at the MTC so we surprised Sister Nally by singing her arrangement of Called To Serve but we sang it with all the missionaries and then had an obbligato part sang by the choir. This was SO fantastic. I can't even describe how amazing that felt to sing that song with all the other missionaries at the MTC. And it was so great watching Sister Nally's face as we sang it because she looked so surprised and happy to hear her arrangement of the song. It was an amazing experience! We heard from James Martino from the seventy and his wife Jennie. It was so great! He talked about involving the members more in missionary work which will be really helpful when I get out into the field. Something that stuck out to me from Sister Martino's talk though was that "Attitude determines Altitude" This is so true and every day I make sure to have a positive attitude because it just makes the days so much better and so much more enjoyable. Today we got to go to the temple again and do a session, I love that we get to do that every week it really makes all the difference! I am going to miss it when I get to Mexico and won't have that chance anymore. Well that's all the time I have this week, But I just want to tell you all that I love you! I am loving being a missionary! I sometimes look around and wonder how I ended up here at this amazing place full of so many amazing people. I can't wait to learn Spanish and go out and teach it to the people in Veracruz Mexico! My testimony has grown so much already and I am so excited for this opportunity to grow personally but to also invite others to come unto Christ. Have a great week! Adios! Me, Elder Brown, Hermana Ledek and Hermana Bunker photobombing us. Me and Hermana Ledek - my companion. We kind of matched one day! Us drenched after the rain.Hermana Ledek and I at the Temple today
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My name is McKenna Terry and I have been called to the Mexico Veracruz Mission. These are my stories. Hermana McKenna Terry
[email protected] Hermana McKenna Terry
Mexico Veracruz Mission Calle Altamirano #27 Entre 1 de Mayo y Carranza Col. Flores Magon Veracruz, Ver 91700 Mexico Archives
July 2015
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