BONJOUR!!!!!!!!

 me and my compys

 our zone

my cute district

HELLO!
I am alive and well and made it my first (almost) week here in the MTC. I LOVE BEING A MISSIONARY! I feel so blessed to have the opportunity to be here.

Here is a typical day for me:

6:30 wake up, get ready.

7-7:45 eat breakfast.

7:45-11:50 personal study, companionship study, language study

11:50-12:35 eat lunch

12:40-4:30 more study, teach our investigator Gregory

4:30-9:30 Language with Soeur Judas

I am NOT going to sugar coat my experience here. It is HARD. Very hard. I have definitely been pushed to my breaking point. The food is hard to eat. I have not gotten a lot of sleep. I have needed to rely a lot on prayer. It has been an awesome testimony building experience. The lord definitely qualifies the called, and it is not an easy process.

I am in a lovely tripanionship. Which definitely has its ups and downs. Particularly downs. It is hard enough to stick to one person, let alone two. Both of my companions are going to the West Indies. Both are 23 and 24 and have graduated from college. One is from Florida, is Haitian, and converted to the church when she was 18. She's sassy and fabulous and constantly talks about Dwyane Wade.The other is from LA. It has been quite an interesting experience getting to know them both but I am growing to love them. When it is hard, I just pray and ask for patience. I have definitely felt the lord bless me with that. I am SO different from both of them. But it’s okay.

The french speaking missionaries are the coolest ones in the whole MTC. I love everyone in our zone and the other french speaking zone. Six missionaries going to New Caledonia left yesterday, and I wanted to stowaway in their suitcases so badly haha. I will miss them, they are awesome missionaries. The Tahitians also left after being here for 12 WHOLE WEEKS. Shout out to Elizabeth Watkins who will LOVE the MTC and is probably one of the only people I know who has faith enough to endure it for that long. Liz, you will LOVE IT. Oh, and another shout out for you Liz--The kid who plays Thomas Dobson on Ephraims Rescue is my Zone leader. He's going to Lyon. He doesn't really have a british accent, haha.

Here we call people according to where they’re going/what they speak. The Tahitians, the Frenchies, the Creoles, the Canadians, and then... us. Haha our district is just kind of a melting pot. In our district we have my tripanionship, and then two elders who are both going to New Caledonia. Elder Simmons is from West Valley and Elder Tempany is from Australia. Have you ever heard someone with an Australian accent speak french? Pretty sure his voice was sent from heaven haha. Once the Canadians leave this week, we will be the only girls left speaking French for at least two more weeks. So that will be interesting.

The french is coming! It has been amazing to see how much I remember just from high school. The whole immersion thing we do here really helps. I am getting better and better at understanding french everyday. It's just the responding in french that’s tough. But I love it, and Soeur Judas is so cute, and an amazing teacher. She's from France, so that is pretty neat.

Well, that’s about it!! I love and miss you all so much. THE CHURCH IS TRUE.

Avec l'amour,

Soeur Gardiner