Time is Flying!

6-24-2011

Querida Familia,

Well, I'm now at five and a half weeks. Time is flying, and its a little scary how soon I'm going to actually be in Chicago. This week is a little different here at the MTC because all of the new mission presidents are here for training. This means that a lot of general authorities are also here. Half of our lunch room has been closed off for them and we're not allowed to go in the main building. Some of the Elders I know have seen Elder Holland, Oaks, and Christofferson which is super cool. My companionship saw the cars of the first presidency as we were going off campus for physical therapy, but we we missed actually seeing the first presidency by only ten minutes. Today our p-day gets cut short because we're having a "special" devotional. I'm not quite sure what that entails, but I'm pretty excited. Other than that, nothing super new is going on.

Physical Therapy is going well. At first I didn't really agree that I needed it, as it is only a sprained ankle, but I am still having difficulty walking a lot without pain and my ankle is still quite week, so I guess under the circumstances of trying to get me ready to go out into the mission field its understandable. I go to the Utah Valley Outpatient center 2 times a week and I think I will continue to do so for the rest of the time I'm here. I feel bad for my companions because they have to come with me and just sit in the waiting room for an hour and miss class.

Well. Things are going good here. Teaching has really gotten better. My companions and I did something that really helped us prepare for one of our lessons this week. We have an investigator (who's really a teacher, but pretends) who we just didn't know how to help or what he needed. So while we were doing companionship study we all prayed individually to know Lucio's (the investigator) needs and then sat quietly and just pondered and thought about Lucio for 2-3 minutes. Afterwards we shared with each other what our impressions were. It was pretty amazing that we all felt pretty strongly about the same thing (the first vision) even though before none of us had any idea. When we taught him it was amazing. It was the best lesson we've ever taught and we all felt the spirit really strongly. It was incredibly the difference between that lesson and the one before where he just sat there and looked really bored the whole time. Something else really cool about it, is that afterward the teacher actually complimented us and used us as an example as to how to really focus on our investigators. The teachers NEVER talk about the lessons where they are investigators with the class. They always keep it very separate, so it was a huge compliment. He told the elders that if they need any advice on how to show their investigators that they really care, to ask us. It was awesome and it felt so good to feel like we were really helping someone. I can only imagine how awesome it will be when the really are real people that we are helping and caring about.

My time is running out, but I love you all! Thanks for the Dear Elders. I love hearing from you.

Les Quiero!!!!

Hermana Brown

ps. i just realized my spelling is awful at parts. sorry. blame the spanish. loveeee you