The festivities in Spain never end I decided- there´s always a party haha!!!! But how was everyone´s New Years??? I can´t believe it´s 2014!! That is so wild. What did everyone do? It sounds like it was pretty mellow on Butternut! How was the Hobbit? I´m jealous I bet it was super good! I am so so so sorry I didn´t email yesterday! So every 6th preparation day is on Tuesday because of transfers- so today is my p day instead. I´m so sorry! I promise I didn´t forget about yall :) So it´s freezing in Utah and even colder in Cincinatti eh? Dang that is so crazy! I can´t even imagine being in the negatives!!! Here it is brisk, but not freezing. I think we´re in the 50s ish but the humidity makes it colder. During the day it´s not bad but sometimes when we contact at night we are freezing! But that´s okay!
I can´t believe I survived my first transfer in the field! It went so fast, it´s unreal. I feel like so much happened this week, I don´t even know. Let´s see. . Well, New Years was crazy. It´s a huge deal here in Spain!!! So New Years Eve was crazy cause there was nobody out cause everyone was partying, but we contacted for 6 hours! I have never been rejected so much in my life haha. We started counting rejections to make it fun and in half an hour we got to like 25. It was awesome! But we had a HUGE miracle on New Years eve!! So earlier in the day we knocked a piso (apartment building). The first door we knocked, a guy peeked out and said he was busy. We asked him if we could give him a card really fast and we ended up telling him about the Book of Mormon. He told us about all the trials he´s had recently and how he wants to become closer to God to get through them. We told him about the Book of Mormon and he got so excited! He was like "this is what´s going to strengthen me right?" YES!!!!! We were so happy! We have a cita with him on Thursday! We called him a few days ago and he said he´s been thinking about us and how we left such an impression on him (this time it´s not an attraction thing- cause he´s middle aged and has a family so it´s legit!) and he´s been reading the Book of Mormon and loves it. YAY!!!! Such a miracle I can´t stop smiling just thinking about it.
But for New Years night we could be out til 11, so at 10 we hung out with the elders in the capilla. We played Bang and ate brownies and were all so tired we could barely sit straight in our chairs, but of course- that made it all the more fun! Here in Spain they have a tradition where the 12 seconds before midnight you eat one grape at each dong of the clock- so your mouth is completely full of grapes haha. We did it to 10 and it was really fun. It was weird not counting til 12, but we heard it in our beds from our neighbors so that was good :)
The next day we had a zone enfoque and it was amazing! Our zone leaders told us that we had 580 baptisms in our mission last year!!! WOW!!! And the goal for this year- 1500!!! AH! So good. And we are in Europe!!! So amazing. This year is going to be amazing cause the surge of missionaries that came last year are out of training and ready to work- I´m so excited!
This week we had lots of lessons, but something happened with all of them- they were either not in our area, Muslim, gypsy, or too intense so we handed them to the elders haha. But that´s okay! We will get some soon, I know it :) Our Elders are on fire- they have tons of investigators, so it´s super fun to watch them. Everyone calls our area the Grinch area haha cause it´s so hard. But I know that we will find people and I´m excited for that! We are doing TONS of contacting, which is fun, and super hard. But we have so much fun talking and laughing together and talking to all sorts of crazy people. We talked to one Catalan man that was so cute and old and he took us into this beautiful cathedral and had us watch some of the services- so that was fun. We just have adventures everyday contacting and it´s so funny. We laugh so hard and that´s what's keeping us going haha. But we are so tired everyday cause some days we don´t have any appointments so we contact for 6 hours straight! It´s unreal- but we make it fun and we laugh so hard. Hermana Tyler is the best!
So yesterday was Día de los Reyes! It´s a huge holiday here in Spain- bigger than Christmas! So they have the tradition that the kings- the 3 kings in the nativity bring gifts to the kids during the night- so yesterday morning was like Christmas morning for everyone. So on Sunday night we went to the giant parade that goes through all the streets and it was so fun! There were all these different kings throwing candy and performers and all this stuff! It was magical. Yesterday we didn´t do anything to celebrate other than eating at McDonalds and contacting for 6 hours :) But it was so fun to be a part of that!
So this week I read Alma 32 and instead of thinking of the analogy of the seed as faith, I thought of it as the work here in Badalona. It was amazing to read it that way! It says that if you nourish the seed with faith, patience nad hard work, you will eventually taste fruit more sweet and pure than any we have tasted before. I know that is what we are doing here! This area is new and super hard because it´s all Spaniards, Catalans, and gypsies, but it´s amazing! I know we are planting so many seeds and eventually the work here will be on fire too. I can´t wait to come back someday and have there be a stake here or something. I´m so grateful to be a part of the early part of this work! It´s amazing!! It´s super hard work- I don´t think I´ve ever been this tired (well, Brighton definitely rivals this haha), and our bodies are so sore everyday, but its´so worth it! We are seeing so many small miracles and I know that the Lord is blessing our efforts. I love this work!!! I wouldn´t trade it for anything.
Ah I love you all so much! Thank you SO much for every prayer, all your support and love and eveything!! Mom and Martha- I´m so sorry, I haven´t gotten your letters you told me about yet, but they will come! The mail has been shut down for all the festivities- so I don´t know if it´s cause of that or if this address doesn´t work. So I´m thinking it might be safer to write to the mission home haha. But I´m so excited for them and I appreciate them so much! I love you all more than anything in the world!
Love, Hermana Boyer :)
This is my "oh my gosh I´m in Spain at the beach, is this real life?!" face :)
This is in the rich part of our area where all the Spaniards live and it´s gorgeous!!! I love the sea!!!!
This monkey guy is a symbol of the beer company haha. but we liked it cause it´s on the beach :)
This is us at the Dia de los Reyes parade!!!
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