Christmas pics from Spain - December 2013

Our huuuge District! 8 of us are in Elche 

Christmas eve!! us compies :)

the coolest 4 missionaries in Elche...yes that is wine...we did not drink it lol 

Elder Paxman is on the far right. He was with me in Almeria!! siblings united :)

Christmas eve table! 

our meal...it was actually really good!!...because the family is from Argentina:)

White elephant party with the Zone! Hna Hubbard and I chose this awesome mini pool game and they just had a blast...it was as if we were watching Santa Claus 2 with all of the adults playing little kid games haha

members like to call me hermana diario...lol cuz that's daily in spanish

Elche Hermana's:)

Eliz Ano Nuevo!!! - December 30, 2013

ELIZ AÑO NUEVO!!!!! 

It was SOOOO GREAT skyping with you guys!!! Why is my family so dang funny and awesome? Im really glad that the video worked out perfectly. Thank you for making it the best Christmas ever :)

It has been SUCH A GOOD WEEK! We got to eat with members almost every day this week and actually eat real good food! Then at church we got like 3 new investigators on the spot! Remember the story from last week when we knocked a member's (Clara) aunt's door and she slammed it in our face?? Well that aunt came to church with Clara!!!! She is sooooo awesome and is dying to have us over :) We are going to see her tonight and now we are besties with her daughter who is not a member either. So, as you can see, we are super super suuuuuuper excited. There is some huge work here that could be done with this family and the rest of Clara's family :) 

This week is our last week together as compies, Hna Hubbard and I :( It'll be weird cuz she is seriously the map and knows eeeeverything. I just follow her lol so it'll be super interesting next transfer. Cant wait to see who my dying compy will be!!! 

MISS YOU GUYS SO MUCH! Have a happy new year!!! 

love

Hermanita Daly

Skype with Hermana Daly - December 25, 2013!!

Alaena is doing terrific and enjoying the last 2 months of her mission:)  Merry Christmas from Spain!

Christmas Party pics! - December 23, 2013

me and Hna Hubbard at the Ward Christmas party

the party

the disgusting food they gave us....shrimp?! oh Spain...

the four Hermanas of Elche :)

Feliz Navidad!! - December 23, 2013

FELIZ NAVIDAD!!!

I love you guys!!!! Just two more days and we'll FINALLY be able to have functioning skype and see each other. It's only been a year....sheesh im so excited :)

So the mission totally owned it!!! We were supposed to find 800 new investigators this week and we ended up finding like 847!!!!! YEAH! Super awesome. It was a really hard week for me and my compy but we worked ourselves to the ground. We found this one guy knocking doors and he was like, "yeah, my cousin is a member of your church but I dont think she goes very much and I am definitely interested in the Book of Mormon." YEAH! We were so excited. So we are going to see him tonight and hopefully find out who his cousin is so we can reactivate her.

We also had a super cool experience at church yesterday. OH ps we got to see the salt lake christmas devotional!!!!! I got teary eyed of course. I freaking love MoTab!! Anyways, we were getting ready to watch it with the wards and a girl our age in our ward, Clara, came up to us and said that we knocked the door of her aunt who isn't a member and she apparently slammed the door in our face but her daughter wanted to hear us!! So she then told her cousin, Clara, that she wants to have us over! Clara is the only member of all her family and she is going to get her mom to come to church next week and then have her aunt and cousin come! Such a cool miracle. We had such a hard week and then just hearing that the other day totally was a testimony to me that even though we didn't meet our goal of finding 8 news, we had some huge miracles that we didnt even know about. It was super cool. Can't wait to meet her cousin :)

Other than that we have been teaching a 20yr old Romanian who is the BOMB! I freaking love her. Her name is Narchisa and she is the coolest person ever. She is drop dead gorgeous and so needs to be baptized. She was studying with the JW's but she was like, "yeah I dropped them because I realized that the Book of Mormon is true and the JW's teachings were all against what the BOM said so I couldnt handle that anymore." YES! She is such a stud. We hope she gets baptized in the beginning of January. She just needs to come to church.....she is always taking care of all her little nephews :(

We are stoked for Christmas. We got to go caroling all last night with the 6 other missionaries here and with some members and it was incredible. We visited some less actives and some really old widows and all of them were crying. We must have visited like 10 different families and they all loved us so much even though their hearts are a little harden. It was super awesome. I love caroling and my comp is SUCH a good singer. So we sounded dang good ;)

Love you guys so much. Talk to you in TWO DAYS! YES! Merry Christmas. I hope you all serve lots of people this season and help them remember that their Savior loves them :)

love

Hermana Daly

New Pics! - December 16, 2013

Gracia's baptism!our capilla!

this the the Dama de Elche...it's super creepy haha

Hna hubbard and I on our way to the baptism!

our capilla futbol court...holy palm trees!

Gracia got baptized!! - December 16, 2013

Heyyoooo

Gracia got baptized!! YAY! It was a great baptism and the ward totally took care of eeeeeverything. I have never ever had such a calm baptism. It was beautiful. I think the ward should help us more often! ;) jk they do a lot, I swear.

I was pretty sick for a few days so we didn't get the chance to do much work :( It was really sad. We were so grateful for the other hermanas who went to some of our citas for us!! I love them so much for that. But Im all good and healthy again and ready to find 8 new investigators this week. It's going to be really really really hard. Briiiiiing it oooon

Yeah, Elche is just doin great! ish, we don't have work, but hey thats normal! We are ready to get some investigators. We are just very very veeeeery excited for Christmas because a.)we get to skype you lovely people :) :) b.) the members allll want us over to eat! c.) It's the time to celebrate our savior's birth!!! YAY!

Hey fun fact. Spaniards hate Christmas. Absolutely hate Christmas. Why? Because they don't understand that it actually is not about money and buying but it's about Christ!! They just don't understand and they need some love and happiness from this message :D

I love you guys and I am so grateful that I know the truth and that I have loving family and friends who always support me and help me in everything! Remember the reason for the season :)

love

Hermana Daly

BAPTISM!!! - December 9, 2013

Hola hola

We have a baptism this saturday!!!! Our bomb investigator, Gracia, is finally set on getting baptized. It took quite a while to fix her doubts about Joseph Smith and the BOM but she is all ready! We are so excited. The ward just LOVES her. She was actually converted by a pass along card. One of our ward members was also converted by a card so he allllllways gives cards to everyone he sees with the chapel address on it and he gave one to her on the bus!! She then showed up to church randomly one day and hasnt stopped going since :) Huge miracle right there. So, go hand out a million pass along cards to everyone with the church address on it ;)

We went to Alicante twice this past week to help them contact for 3 hours in the morning. It was a blast....kinda...not really. I wish 30 missionaries could come to Elche and contact for us!!! It was a good service though. We also had a zone meeting up their and had president interviews. I love president Deere!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Love that man. Greatest interview ever. I seriously feel like im talking to the Savior when I talk to him. He is incredible.

Well this week we are going to hand out tons of cookies to our members so that we can be BFFs and get some new investigators ;) We hope it works. Everyone is Spain hates Christmas because they have no money and no lives. It's really sad but at least they love decking out the town with christams lights! I'll have to take some pics.

I've eaten like 85 napatolianas...i'll take pics of it. it is so.dang.delish. Get ready to eat some mom and dad ;) love you guys!! Have a great week and stay safe in the snow!!!

love

Hna Daly

NEW ADDRESS:

Please send all Christmas packages and letters to the following address:

Hermana Alaena Daly
c/ Capitan Antonio Mena 150 E.S.C. 2, 1 I        (the last letter is a capital i)
03204 Elche (Alicante)
España

Pics from Puerto - December 2, 2013

Our Puerto District!!! my favorite District ever. love them so much!

more investigators..looooove these girls!

members..love them...Jose Manuel in the middle!

our chicos from futbol. they are all non members and we taught three of them. great guys!

some investigators that i looooove! from Puerto

Thanksgiving dinner with another Sister in our district

Arrived in Elche!!! - December 2, 2013

HEYYY!

Happy Thanksgiving e'ryone!!!! We have a fun one in Elche. We went to the mall and ate an an all you can eat buffet. We ate lots of pizza and pasta. It was super good....Spain wise ;) It doesnt even compare to America. So Elche is suuuuper pretty. Holy palm trees! It has the most natural palm trees in the world. Did I already say that? It may be #1 or just close second to Hawaii or somethin. But it is still BUTT COLD! SO SO SO SOOO COLD. Im going to buy tons of tights and scarves and gloves and beanies today. It is ridiculous. We just have a strong ice wind here.

So, Hna Hubbard, my new compy, is super nice! We get along great. The work is freaking crazy at the moment. Some sisters in the past didn't handle it very well so we are going to clean it up and get the work going again. There are two wards here and apparently they hate each other so the stake decided to re-do the boundaries and now they are all mixed up and we pretty much have a brand new ward as of this last Sunday. IT IS CHAOS. So we have so much work to do to help the ward and get to know them since they have no idea who we are.

We only have one investigator here and she needs to be baptized asap so we'll get on that! She's way awesome. Other than that, we have zero. Lots of work to be done! We had some really awesome door contacts! We already found 3 potentials that seem pretty legit so we'll see if they become new investigators!!

We are just going to work our little buns off together! I am so very grateful for the book of Mormon!!! I just finished it again and once again my favorite part is the all of Mormon and Moroni. I love them! It is so true and I love seeing how it has changed lives.

Love you guys a lot. Thank you for all of the fun thanksgiving pictures!!!! Have a great week!

love
Hermana Daly!!

Saying 'goodbye to Puerto" - November 25, 2013

 Loli and me with her little sister, Nerea :) love them!

TRANSFER!! - November 25, 2013

TRANSFERSSSS! I am heading out this Wednesday to ELCHE!! Im super excited yet really sad because I love Puerto! I get to travel for a wicked fun 14 hour trip to get to Elche. It is so freaking far away. I really hope there is a huge Thanksgiving party though....because I am missing out on the HUGEST party ever in Rota with all of the Americans. Im a little bummed. Hna hoffman is going to have two new comps and they are all so fun. Im super super super jealous lol but im sure there are tons of American famillies in Elche.....noooot. Im sure we'll be eatin some delicious bread with butter on it for thanksgiving. Not that Im complaining. I love me some Spain bread and butter. Only the best ;)

This week was pretty good. We worked our little buns off and got some good progress with our investigators....even though none of them came to church. LAAAAAAAME. But thats alright, im sure they'll all get baptized this next transfer. It was just a sad week full of goodbyes. The saddest one was with my little Loli!!!! She is soooooooo adorable. She's suuuuper sad to see me go. I gave her so many gifts it's ridiculous lol it's a good thing I love her so much. 

We had some crazy things happen this week that were soooo funny but I cant remember them! One of them was some creepy hobo on a bus that like yelled at us in a creepy smoker voice and then he hawked some gross loogies on the window right in front of us (how do you even spell that??) Anyways, it was super gross and hilarious. 

Hna Hoffman and I bought some super cute rain boots!!!! They are wicked nice and so cheap! Not that you guys care.....sorry im just rambling. Not much else to say because Im leaving this area....Next week will be a great email! 

Happy Thanksgiving!!! Travel safely please!!!! Love you guys so much. Im grateful for the greatest family ever! The church is still true :) I love this Gospel!

love

Hermana Daly

Funny pics - San Fernando - Nov 18, 2013

Transfer coming this week.....yay!!! - November 18, 2013

Holaaaaaaa

I am so sore at the moment. We did like 4 miles of running and a hard yoga class for pday today. Well....it was just the basics of yoga haha it was so hard! That was my first official yoga class and I wanted to die. Im not sure why we chose to work out like crazy on pday haha but it was a good time! 

So, this week was just so lame. I am sick of our investigators being super lame and cancelling on us constantly. But, we did have some cool things happening. We had a cool first lesson with this lady, Milagros, who we thought was a total crazy lady and it turns out that she's like one of our golden investigators haha weird how that worked out. 

I also gave a talk at church yesterday. I think thats my third one in the mission. It actually went really well and I tried really hard to get the members excited and get their faith up about the work. I hope they listened cuz we are struggling, both the elder and us because we just get investigators only by contacting. Usually the work here in our mission runs by references from the members so it's been a little hard with this branch. It'll get better though. The people here are super great! 

Well transfer calls are this week on mom's bday :) I for sure know im leaving because some leaders leaked the info for me haha but I dont know where yet. We'll find out next week! 

I hope you guys are staying warm. It's been butt cold here. Like 40s with wind I think. I couldve sworn it was 30s but I wouldnt know without my galaxy phone! It's always a fun guessing game every morning of how cold it's gonna be that day. Love you guys so much. Only one more month ish till our skype sesh! YAY! 

love

hermana Daly

Investigators being stubborn!! - November 11, 2013

Heyyyyyyyyy

It is getting really really cold here. Probably not any where near as cold as utah or idaho...but still. The wind chill is horrible! I guess I'm just used to really hot Spain weather. I'm definitely not ready to head back to snowy Idaho....

Well today we are going to be playing around San Fernando. It's really nice to be out of our area for a bit. We also had a zone conference in Cadiz and it was really fun! I loooove traveling :)

This past week was kinda lame because our investigators are annoying sometimes and don't come to church....

We had a lot of sad stories this week but that's ok because it'll make us work even harder this week :) just one of our investigators says that she doesn't want to receive the lessons anymore because she thinks about us all the time and about joseph smith and it scares her. GRRR!! We were like, DUDE that's the holy ghost telling you that this is true!! She was being really stubborn and said that we are stressing her out and she needs a break. It's so sad because she looooves the Book of Mormon and she believes everything we teach her but it just scares her because she is faithful to the catholic church. Get this, she even said that she believes our church way more than her own. We don't understand this lady, but one day she'll get baptize. I just know it!

Sorry, not much else to report. This week was really weird. Our landlady is FINALLY coming today to fix our stove that has been broken for ONE MONTH! We have been eating bread and cream cheese and bell peppers every single day because we can't cook anything. I don't know how we didn't gain weight like crazy.

The church is still true :) two more weeks until I find out if I'm going to serve in another area! YAY! love you guys!

love
Hna Daly

Another baptism date set!!! - November 4 2013

Holaaaaaaaaaaa!!

I hope you all had a great Halloween!! Halloween here was way lame and I cant wait to celebrate it the right way next year! People barely dress up. Just the kids get dressed up and then everyone else goes to party and pass out in the streets. BUT GUESS WHAT! We saw that they were having a huge concert in our area like every night for a week and guess who plays....American bands!!! According to the teenagers in our branch, Oasis was there, Nickelback, Simple plan....and some others that I've never heard of. So thats cool....too bad we didnt hear them. If it was the Biebs or One direction I would have flipped out haha but alas, it was just lame bands.

This week was gooooooooooood ish. We found 6 more investigators! So thats cool. We have been working our butts off to find these people but they are super lazy and dont want to change. So we are still on the hunt for those who are actually prepared!!

MIRACLE! We have a new 14yr old american investigator from the Navy Branch and set the fecha for the 23rd!! So we are going to pray really really hard that he gets baptized then :) He's awesome and really prepared :)

Fast and testimony was really really powerful yesterday both in the spanish and english branch, but of course I got a lot more out of the english branch. They talked a lot about how God always has a different plan for us. Our cute senior couple serves here with the navy branch and they gave their testimony. They were saying how they thought going on a mission would bless their family so much but they have seen some of the hardest trials in their family during their mission here. They know that the blessings are there and some may not come till later. It really comfoted me as well because I had way different expectations of what I would see on the mission and it's been hard to face reality but I realize that Heavenly Father had a very different plan for me. Im just so grateful for my mission and the things I have learned!!!!!! It's so awesome!!!!!!

I hope you all had some awesome experiences as well during testimony meeting :) Love you all so much. Have the greatest week ever! Until next week.

love

Hermana Daly

Loli's Baptism! - Oct 28, 2013

Loli's Baptism

the family of Loli...two new investigators are in this pic!! (two women that are sisters)

LOVE THESE GIRLS! Zaira is the blonde one holding the sign and posing like a rock star ;)

Hna Hoffman and I matching at softball pday in Jerez. Cara de mono shirts! yeah!

Our two Zone Leaders

Loli - love her!

Depressing week filled with miracles!!!- Oct 28, 2013

Hey Fam!

So this week was insane. It was super devastating because a baptism failed on us the day of BUT we were able to reach our goal of finding 7 new investigators this week and we were only in our area for 3 days this week. Don't mean to brag....but yeah, the Lord loves us and blessed us big time. We honestly did nothing to get these 7 new investigators but we did have the faith and prayed for it every second and He answered our prayers BIG TIME. I also think he blessed us big time because he knew our baptism would fail on us and he wanted to comfort us lol.

So here's the story of the baptism: Loli is 8yrs old and is technically not a mission baptism because she's 8, but she counts for us because we fought our butts off to get her baptized :) She has always wanted to get baptized but her mom could never get a day off of work so we couldn't ever schedule a day for her baptism. After 3 months of this fight, we get a random call on a Wednesday and they told us that Loli was getting baptized that Saturday. It was very rushed and not many people showed up but we did it! We got Loli baptized. Her older sister who was our investigator was also supposed to get baptized but in the end, she didn't :( That was super super sad part but the baptism was still a great day! I love Loli to death!!! She is the most incredible 8yr old in the world. I want to take her home with me so bad. SO BAD! I am going to die when I leave her. I love her.

Out of the 7 news we found this week, one of them we found on the street in the pouring rain. We were running with our crap umbrellas to a cita and there was absolutely nobody in the street except for our dear friend, Jesús. As we were running, I hear a guy shout at me, "HEY! You're umbrella is huge!" I turn around and Im like, "yeah, yeah it is...." I was like, dude you are super weird haha. I wanted to keep running to our cita but he continued to yell at us. So I stopped and decided that I should probably be the Savior's servant and talk to him. We chatted in the pouring rain while he was smoking underneath a little spot out of the rain. He was telling us how he knows our church and would totally be baptized if we didn't have the law of chastity. I was like, "seriously, that's the only reason??" I kinda laughed and was like, "well, Jesús, we are having baptism tomorrow, you should come and we'll teach you more." He totally accepted the invitation and was dead set on coming haha. AND HE DID! HE CAME! It was a huge miracle and he's a little crazy sometimes but we'll see how he progresses.

YAY for lots of miracles! hna Hoffman and I are working our butts off and can't wait to get some baptisms and find even more people! I love this work so much and it makes me sad when I think about how much little time I have. I feel like I'm finally getting the hang of missionary work!! lol love you guys so much. HAPPY HALLOWEEN! Eat some candy corn for me.

Love
Hermana Daly

Pics!! - Oct 14, 2013

Here's rocio!!! She is miracle! Im so glad I got see her baptism

hehe here's a funny pic of me and a huge fruit cake!! My Arizona comp, hna Sanchez's family sent it! It's so huge!!!

TRANSERS!!! - October 14, 2013

What up!!!

 

YEAH transfers totally pasó! I am staying here in Puerto when Hna Hoffman!! We are super excited to be working together. We are going to tear it uuuuuup. Puerto has been having some issues and we havent had much to teach but we are so ready to start seeing some major miracles and get some baptisms. We have some serious faith and are ready to start showing it.

 

Miracle time!!!!!!!!! This miracle happened in our neighbor city, Jerez. Jerez is actually super big and it has a lot of stuff happening. I have done aaaaa lot of exchanges in Jerez this last transfer and so I had to opportunity to help find this wonderful investigator, Maria when we were at a member's house. (NOTICE: The members just happened to have this non member friend over and we just casually talked to her and got to know her and invited her to learn more!!! GO MEMBERS!!) So we meet Maria and this member's home and she has like zero faith and says life sucks basically and we helped her rekindle that faith (totally by the Spirit). THEN, I returned back to Jerez just one week later and I got to teach Maria again and heard that she invited a friend to church with her, Rocio, and this lady was SOOOO prepared. She just went to church one time and was like, "I am not leaving until you guys give me this Book of Mormon."

 

I was in Jerez two days and I got to teach Rocio about the Restauration and then later taught her and Maria about tithing. They both got baptized together last night in Jerez.

This was the coolest thing ever to see how these ladies had never ever heard of the church and then got baptized within a week and half after meeting us. HOW COOL IS THAT?!

 

The Lord prepares people like crazy and thanks to the MEMBERS we found Maria and then Maria invited Rocio and now Rocio is inviting her friends. What a cool chain reaction. I have pics to send of Rocio. She is AWESOME! So even though I didnt get to teach all of the lessons, I got to be a part of their conversión and see how the Gospel brought them so much joy :)

 

We just need to see this in puerto!!!

 

I love you guys a lot. Keep looking for friends that you can invite to church and the Spirit will do all of the work :)

 

love

Hna Daly

Last week of transfers!! - Oct 7, 2013

Hiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii!!

Sorry for not writing last week! It was a crazy pday and I had to write my mission president first. Sorry sorry! We got to go see the monkeys last week and it was so fun and scary haha. One monkey attempted to attack me when I tried to steal back my bug spray that he took....dumb monkeys! They are evil. 

YEAH CONFERENCE! It was the best conference ever for me. This is my 3rd conference on the mission and I really believe that this was the best one and I havent even heard the very last session yet!! I really hope you heard every single session because it was incredible and seriously changed my life. Bednar and Holland answered SO many of my prayers and helped me to know how to help our less actives. The Church is just so dang true. 

This week was a toughy....we didn't see many miracles. We are just praying so hard for investigators. We literally don't have anyone and it's not very fun. This conference really helped me personally to get some more faith and keep working. We're ready for a brand new week!

Transfers are coming! We hear this weekend and it really is a 50/50 if Im leaving or if Hna Hendricks is leaving....usually I would stay because I havent been here this long buuuuut due to the fact that there are like zero older sisters, I may be taking over some leadership positions....but if not, then I guess I have more learning to do here in Puerto. We'll see where the Lord puts me :)

Family, I LOVE YOU! Happy Birthday to Cammo!!! Love you lots. I hope you all try to help out your missionaries that ask for your help! Go share about this awesome Gospel and bless someone's life :) I just pray that the members here help us cuz the work isn't going anywhere. Goes to show that members are very very very important. 

Looooove

Hna Daly

more pday pics - Sept 30, 2013

me in the tunnel

the trio:)

more pday/monkey pics! - Sept 30, 2013

when we first saw them I got so freaked out and didn't want to go near it haha. 

I had the monkey on my head at one point but my companions didn't get my camera in time so this is the only pic I have with the monkey :( 

Fun pday pics - Sept 30, 2013

looking out on the other side of Gibraltar....you can see the mountains of Africa!!! (it's really hidden)

this monkey was such a bum and refused to smile or look at me!!