Week 2 in country

I only received a mom e-mail this week, but I did get some pictures that I can share, so I suppose that will have to do for now.

"The cool buildings are in a town called Avola, they are know for their almonds, and the word for almond is really similar to my name." {mandorla=almond}

These next 3 are my personal favorites!

This is what you get when you order a hot dog in Italia!

This dish was made for the Sorelle (sisters) by a student in their English class. They are teaching English to the Italians and it has proven to be a great finding tool to teach the gospel.

I assume that these are the missionaries from her area, but I am not sure because of the vague email I got from her today. She assures me that next weeks e-mail will be wonderful. (IT BETTER BE!)

That's all for this week!

I love missionary moms!!

I received a sweet email from a missionary mom whose daughter is serving with Mady. She even sent a picture! Thanks Allison!

Her first week in country

I am officially in Italy. I was shocked at how much you can feel the love and guidance of the Holy Ghost in the MTC but it is about 1000 times stronger in the field. There was one day where both companionships (we have two sister companionships in this ward) were planning a lesson for a part member family in our ward. When we went to talk about what we wanted to teach, we had planned the same lesson down to most of the same scriptures. It was really cool to see how the Lord uses us to teach his children what they need to know.

I am serving in Siracusa (Sicily) right now, my companion and I were "blown in" which means both of us are new to the area so we are starting from the ground up. We have one investigator that the other sorelle were not making progress with anymore, hopefully we can make a difference. He is a wonderful guy who just does not have any hope. He has had a really hard life and he doesn't seem to believe that God could possibly exist, but I hope that we can help him find his faith again. We spend a lot of time finding, which we don't always have a lot of success with, but once someone accidentally buzzed us in and we were able to fill an entire apartment building's mailbox with pass along cards (that's legal here.) I'm pretty sure a miracle is going to come of that.

The language is kind of tough, the southern dialect is very different than what I learned in the MTC, so I don't always (and by that I mean, almost never) understand what people are saying to me, but I can fake it for about 5 minutes because I'm pretty sure I know what they are probably saying so I do OK.

Our biggest tool for finding new investigators is the English course. I teach the advanced course, which is tough because it turns out that I don't have a lot of knowledge of English rules. There is a man in my class who is obsessed with America. He has a cousin who lives in Michigan who he is going to see next summer, and I have great hopes for him. I know there are a couple of people who get this who are either serving in Michigan or are from Michigan, so maybe I will tell him to look you up, because he is DEFINITELY going to be baptized by then.

I am so grateful I am on a mission. Its changing me so much. I have learned a lot about hard work and about loving people. It's amazing to me that our Heavenly Father has the ability to show so much love for each and every one of his children, but he does. He loves every individual person in Provo, in Georgia, and in Siracusa, and he just does the most wonderful whimsical things to give us the happiest lives possible.

The coolest thing about serving in Italy is knowing that I'm not in the birthplace of Christianity, but the place responsible for Christianity's ability to endure for the last 2000 years. I am walking where apostles walked and talking to descendants (mom please fix that spelling) of people who talked to Peter and Paul! These people have a lot of faith. Its kind of misdirected sometimes but they truly want to believe in something. Hopefully we can lead them to the thing that will bring them the most happiness.

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Mady sends two emails to me every week. One for the blog, and one for me. This next section includes excerpts from her personal email.


Oh mom you have no idea how much I miss you. As missionaries we spend a lot of time talking about our families, and I just continue to be amazed at how wonderful mine is. A lot of missionaries don't have parents who would take care of them when they had bad dreams or when they were sick, and I'm so grateful for the compassion and love our family has. I'm using a computer in a public internet cafe and it is pretty old, so I haven't figured out how to email photos yet. My address is Via Poblio 17, 96100 Siracusa, Italia. I cant wait to hear from you! I am anxiously awaiting letters from home! Italy is a lot like Georgia in weather and culture. People are very kind, the biggest difference is that men read into kindness a little bit more so you have to be careful. My ward is fantastic. They tell me my Italian is great and they love practicing English. Members expect you to eat a lot. They don't do leftovers so we legitimately have to finish everything on the table. We went and got gilatto and I ordered 'nutella fredo' (cold nutella) it was so gross, but I have had gilatto since and I love it! ...... My apartment is the biggest in the mission, and was just remodeled because of mold.

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This week, I got a third e-mail.

OK, we personalize EVERYTHING here! Our walls, our planners, our scripture cases, EVERYTHING. If you can find some great photos I would love to get them. If it isn't to much of a hassle I would love one real photo and a version you printed off the computer so that I can tape it to stuff like planners, and encourage everyone else to do the same. I love photos! Also pictures of Christ and quotes from prophets are also greatly appreciated.

I really appreciate getting dear elders because it's always nice to hear from you, but would you mind typing something up and mailing it to me instead? The dear elders get really confusing really quickly and we don't have a lot of time to piece them together. Also a nice short handwritten note would be nice as well even if it's on a sticky note.

Also what nationality am I? People ask me all the time. I get Russian and Polish a lot and frankly I do not know.

People are obsessed with my hair here. It's weird.

Sorry this is a mess, they have different keyboards here.

I love you to infinity and back, no take backs.

Travel Insights - Here they go!

This was taken from the Rome Italy Mission blog kept by Sorella Waddoups. Mady was one of those lucky ones traveling 8-10 hours by train to Sicily.

"The first day the new missionaries arrive, they are extremely excited and motivated and really, really tired. By the time they finally get to bed, they are completely exhausted. (I wish there was a better way to do this, but it just doesn't work out that way.) Because of the great distances some of them have to travel to reach their final destination, some of them have to be up by 5:00 am. The missionaries going to Sicily have an 8 to 10 hour train ride. Some of them have to take a plane to Sardegna or Malta. Most of the others usually have a long bus ride to reach their assigned area. Add into that equation the fact that it's also transfer day for the entire mission and it becomes quite hectic. We have missionaries coming to Rome from all over the mission to meet up with their new companions or else being transferred to another area of the mission to serve with someone else. It's complicated. Our wonderful assistants put the jigsaw together and somehow it all works in the end. I just pray each time that everything goes well and it does, but only because a higher power than us is overseeing everything. The assistants spend all day taking missionaries to and from the airport, train station and bus station. They are amazing. They really work overtime to accomplish such an amazing feat."

Arrival Pictures!! She made it!

Rome Italy Mission Blog

I was able to talk to Mady the day she flew from the MTC to the mission field. It was so great to hear her voice! She sounded so happy and excited. I know it hasn't been easy for her, but she is growing so much. I have been reading the Mission President's wife's blog. Her name is Sorella Waddoups. She is wonderful at posting pictures! For that I am grateful. I have tried to find a way to capture those photos to include in this blog, however I have yet to figure out how to do that. That being said, the next best thing is to give you the link so you can go look at them on Sister (Sorella) Waddoups' blog.



Experiences of New Missionaries
http://romeitalymission.blogspot.com/2013/09/experiences-of-new-missionaries.html

New Missionaries
http://romeitalymission.blogspot.com/2013/09/new-missionaries.html

This third link does not have pictures of her, but gives some interesting insight into what they go through just to get to their assigned areas.

Here they go
http://romeitalymission.blogspot.com/2013/09/here-they-go.html

I hope you enjoy!

A day in the life of Squirt the Missionary

So I sent Mady several packages while she was in the MTC. One of the things I sent her was a figurine from the movie Finding Nemo. It was "Squirt" the young turtle that Nemo met along the way. I sent it with this message..... Don't be a squirt. Write your mother!

My darling daughter has such a wonderful sense of humor. I got the following box right before she left the country.

Once I was able to get the pictures developed (it only cost $15!!), I found pictures of her adventures with Squirt in the MTC. It was a fun box and I am always so glad for as many pictures as I can get. There were more than what I am posting here, but these were my favorites. I hope you enjoy.

I didn't think I would miss her as much as I do. Man was I wrong!