Mountains and Miracles

Hermana Alley with her mission president and his wife, "This is the Place" monument in Salt Lake City Holaaaa Familia y Amigos!!  Oh my I just wish I could hug all of you, the love that Heavenly Father blesses his missionaries with to share with others is so much. Also because I have a taste of what it means to be a real missionary now, I respect all missionaries and returned missionaries everywhere so much more now! Thank all of you amazing people for serving the Lord with all your heart!! This is demanding stuff. If I wasn't here for the reasons I am, no one could convince me to do it.   OK so, I'm going to start with talking about the Salt Lake City East mission! Any of you out there who don't think Utah is diverse, you would be surprised! I am covering the Mill Creek 3rd ward(Spanish speaking) with my trainer  Hermana Dorsey and we've met people from (get ready for this list) Iraq, Bosnia, Brazil, Guatemala, China, Colombia, Mexico, Holland, Gha...

Holaaa Familia y Amigos!    Aaaah I have so little time and I don't even know where to start so I am so sorry this is going to be a scatterbrained email. First, my CCM experience is coming to an end! I fly out  on Monday  to Salt Lake and will stay in the mission home that night! Crazy thing is, if I understand the email right,  on Tuesday  morning I will be traveling to the Provo MTC with my mission president to pick up the missionaries there! Which is so crazy for me because I thought I wouldn't see Provo again for 18 months. Its going to be hard driving through there knowing I have many friends and family members there and I cant see them! My people in Provo, know that I am waving to you the morning of  September 19 !   So much always happens but Ill just pick a few things to share right now. First, at the  Tuesday  devotional this week I sang with the CCM choir, and we sang the EFY medley, the Army of Helaman and Sisters...

Amada Familia y Queridos Amigos, *Sister Training Leaders are experienced sister missionaries who train, encourage and uplift other sisters serving around them.  Oh MY the CCM is a powerful place! I can't even describe it. I'll start with the biggest news of the week, my companion and I were called to be Sister Training Leaders for our zone for our last two weeks!! It's a responsibility, but I'm grateful for it. Responsibility makes me work harder. It's actually pretty fun, we just get to work on being really good friends with our Hermanas :) Our zone received a new district of missionaries on Tuesday , and it was surreal for me to greet them. I feel like I was just in their place and I related so much to the overwhelmed look in each of their eyes. I felt so much love for them and testified to them about the power God will give them here- and it felt strange to do so in English! So weird to be in a position now to give advice. I'm in the middle of ...

Mis Amigos y Querida Familia,   Yup. I don't know if I can claim to be a real adult because much to my dismay, I pulled out some pink laundry this morning. Muy triste. You'd think that having a year living away from home already would help me avoid these rookie mistakes. Guess I still have more to learn!    Anyway haha, the missionary life of Hermana Alley is going forward here in the CCM! It is now my fourth week and third letter to all of you! Crazy how time starts to fly. My first week I wouldn't have thought it possible. Now I'm about to be one of the older missionaries, by Mtc standards anyway. Native speakers are only here for three weeks, and the Hermanas that arrived with us left for their missions at the beginning of this week. Crazy! Today is P-day and we got to relax which was way nice. Hermana Fenton, Hermana Williamson, Hermana Lindsay and I watched Meet the Mormons together :) Would reccommend! Our first two P-days we went to the Mexico City temple whi...

Querido Familia y Amigos,   If anyone gets the reference of my email title I will be soo happy. Missionaries are easily entertained so please humor me haha. But for real, if anyone has cool pictures of the solar eclipse I very sadly missed, please please send them to me! We were instructed not to try to look at the solar eclipse on Monday because no one had the special glasses. Its a little sad because the missionaries in my mission in Utah got to see it pretty close to the path of totality. Pero esta bien, I'm just *llorando en espanol*.  Anyway, what a week its been!! I decided that its impossible for me to share every cool or spiritual thing that happens here at the CCM, so I'm going to settle for sharing a few experiences that hopefully gives a decent glimpse.  Personally, I've been working on a few things lately. The funny thing about being on a mission is that you learn a lot about yourself very fast, especially things you need to work on! I've realized I n...

Hola hola Familia y Amigos!!!  Todo está bien en la Ciudad de México!! Ok, apologizing in advance, prepare yourselves for the brain dump I only have less than an hour to give to all you people I love. I also have to resist the urge to write in Spanish.  My missionary adventure started with a early morning flight last Tuesday (the 8th) from Chicago. The plane was late leaving and my sister Anika(who flew with me) were pretty nervous about making my connecting flight in Salt Lake, headed to Mexico City. We both prayed and I made it onto my flight less than ten minutes before departure!! That´s only the start of the missionary blessings. On that flight in Salt Lake were probably 50 other incoming missionaries, obvious in their classy dresses or suits. In talking with a few of them, I quickly realized that most of them were 18 year old Elders just out of high school. (LDS missionaries can serve starting at age 18 for young men and age 19 for young women). It was really interes...