Day 5

Hello Family!
I have been here for a week but I feel like I have been here for a long time... Days seem like weeks and weeks really do seem like days. When I am writing in my journal, I can't remember what happened that day because it all blurs together.

I love it here at the CCM (MTC in Spanish), and I love my companions. Yes, companions. I have two now as of last night and it has been great. I got pretty sick a few days ago and I was miserable. It was a really bad cold, but my companions gave me a blessing and I am now feeling better. Elder Page is from Glenwood Springs and he is great to be around. I feel lucky to be paired up with him and I know he is my companion for a reason. Elder Leigh is my other new companion, I just met him last night because he was moved up from the beginning spanish class but he has been really cool. I have pictures of us in front of the temple and I just have to figure out how I am going to get them sent to you guys.

The elders in my district are all amazing and we are really good friends. I will write more about them later because I am pressed for time. I love hanging out and learning with them because we have such a great time but we know when to get serious and work hard too. I met Hermana Eyring a few days ago. She is President Eyring's grand-daughter and she is going to the Buenos Aires North mission so her class room is in the same building as mine.

Erik and Jana (Jake's cousins) have the same cafeteria and gym times as me so it is really fun to see them everyday. I play 4-square with Elder Summers every day and we are both really good at it. I have scraped my knees diving a lot and I don't think I am supposed to dive, but I get really into the game and I have to defend my King Square.

USE DEARELDER.COM because it is the greatest thing ever to be invented. You all have the power to send me an encouraging note everyday while I am here in the CCM so I expect you all to use that power. I am the music coordinator for my branch so I choose every hymn to sing in Sacrament meeting and priesthood, who is going to play the song, and who will conduct. By the way, everyone in my district loves the knots I make on my ties and they made me teach them how to do it. I always took pride in that but you guys never liked how big my knots were. We are studying lesson 1 on the restoration and we are going to practice on volunteers on Friday. We are also working on relying on the spirit to tailor the lesson to fit the needs of investigators while we teach.

Things are getting easier around here. We only speak Spanish in class and we made it a district goal to speak during the meal times but every other time is ok for English right now. Spanish is getting easier to speak and I'm feeling a lot more comfortable speaking the language. The first day we learned how to pray in Spanish and we try to do that all the time. We went to the temple this morning and that was glorious because it was neat going together as a district. We are good friends and it is very easy to get along.

Please send me some new hangers! I don't have a lot of money here and I don't want to spend it on hangers. I need about 10 more, that would be awesome. I am just doubling up on hangers so everything is working out ok but more would be beautiful. We only get $6 a week and I spent most of my money on a Spanish hymn book and sweet clip for my nametag.

Life is good, use DEARELDER.COM every day if able to while I live here, send me some more hangers, the church is true, and pray for me! I love you guys and I love hearing from you. I received the halloween package of goodies and I plan on sharing them with my district. I will take a lot more pictures with them too so it should be some good stuff.
Con mucho animo y amor,
Elder Summers