Feliz new year! 2016

     It has been FOREVER since I've updated this blog, haha! I literally haven't updated this since last transfer. :P Oops. Updating this thing is kinda hard, though. It's starting to turn into a little bit of a burden, email time is so short and I really would need a full hour to write a blog post about all of the amazing things that happen in day to day life. Just trust me; there is no way to accurately describe what missionary life is like and the immense emotions and blessings that come from it. It is the literal best. :)

    So transfer calls came on November 23rd at about 10PM, and I learned that I would be staying here in Naples for another transfer, and that Sister Jones was leaving. :( She is actually serving in my first area right now, over in Miami Lakes. I try not to get too jealous of her. ;) I love Naples, but I do miss everybody in my past wards and areas.

    And then I got my "daughter" (<mission lingo for a sister missionary trainee), Sister Evans! :) She is so fun! I joke around and say that she is like my own Kate Hudson. She reminds me a ton of what I was like as a greenie. We're working hard on the 12 Week Training program, learning Spanish together, knocking lots of doors and we have tons of fun doing it. Can't complain, life is good. :)

   We had an awesome Thanksgiving dinner with some members of our ward and it was delicious. such good people and such a wonderful holiday. <3

    The sisters that lived with us (Vanderbilt), we in a trio for the first week and then Sister Garlick got emergency transferred over to Davie. It was interesting. 5 sisters and one bathroom. We worked out a system. :) Oh, Elder Allen went over to Coral Springs and his last companion is actually my mission "dad", Elder Ortiz. Sister Abad is still in the Naples zone! Now she is in the YSA as a Sister Training Leader. I joke around and tell her that I can't get rid of her, haha! Sister PK is an STL now, too! And Sister Rammell got a trainee! :) So much fun stuff happening!

  Umm... what else? I really like my current planner cover. I put a ton of dinosaur stickers in my planner. We're doing volunteer service at an assisted living center in the early afternoons. Got to go up to Estero with Sister Abad for a full-day exchange.

    MIRACLE!!! On December 8th, we were out knocking at about 6:30 PM; tired, small teaching pool, but not quite discouraged. We couldn't figure out a good spot to knock, and ended up driving in circles for a minute or two. Finally, we decided to just go ahead and knock the next street over. It was really dark, but we decided to go for it anyway. 5 doors in, a Mexican man opens the door and we introduce ourselves and ask if we could share a prayer with him. His girlfriend came to the door and eagerly invited us in. We shared the prayer with them, and then the girlfriend, Adriana started to shed a couple of tears and told us that she was going through a VERY difficult time over the past few months, especially in Colombia. But while she was there, she had a dream one night. She has always seen missionaries passing by and wondered if they would ever come to visit her. In her dream, God told her that two missionaries would visit her in a distant land. So then she moved to the United States, moved states, ended up in Florida. One day she asked God, "When will those two missionaries that you told me about come and visit me?" And He told her, "This afternoon I will send them to you." 6pm came, and Adriana was saddened because no missionaries had come and it was dark outside. But on 6:30 we knocked on the door, and she recognized who we were immediately. MIRACLES HAVE NOT CEASED, PEOPLE! I have known for a long time that God still speaks to us individually, still gives us revelation, but this experience strengthened my testimony of that so much! At this point, we have taught Adriana and Bardomiano everything, and they are READY for baptism, we're just waiting on the marriage license. I love them to death. <3

   We've been doing a good amount of volunteering at an assisted living home. We have gotten to know a good amount of the residents there fairly well, and they really are delightful people. I enjoy doing service around them. :) Carolyn (the optimistic one), Elizabeth (the Yugoslavian), Mary Ellen (the Southern Belle), Ruby (the college counselor), Jaye (the cute 105 year old woman) and Harold (a quiet, neat man) have all particularly earned a special place in my heart.

       One night, it dropped to 65 degrees Fahrenheit and Sister Evans and I were FREEZING! You had better believe that we were blasting the heater in the car! 

       I had a neat little revelation come to me through another sister as we discussed what we had learned in our personal studies lately, and the thought was this: "Learn to listen for what God wants; not what 'you' want or 'think' He wants." THAT is a struggle, haha! Talk about the natural man right there! Mosiah 3:19 is probably one of the most difficult challenges- learning to fully accept God's will over your own. And then later, I had another thought: "Sister Curnow- Look at your nametag. You have been dreaming of these amazing 18 months. You have been eagerly awaiting your mission for years. Live every moment, have no regrets, take every opportunity. Live it up while it is here!" We become so caught up in thinking about the future that we forget that we are currently in the future period that we once eagerly anticipated.  Personal revelations are so cool!

    Another miracle! Sister Rammell and I had taught this one man and his wife that had had family members that are members of the church. We went over to teach them, and he just bashed us the whole time, was not willing to listen to us. We peacefully ended the get-together and left him with a copy of the Book of Mormon and an invitation to read it and pray about it with real intent, we promised firmly that God would answer him if he sincerely wanted to know if it was true. Several months go by, and about two weeks ago he showed up to sacrament meeting out of the blue. He spoke with the bishop, and then the bishop had Sister Evans and I go inside and meet with him. The man looked at me, recognized me, and said, "I have been reading in the Book of Mormon, and I have been finding beautiful things in it. I'm working on quitting coffee, and I want to see if my wife and I could get baptized." Bishop thanked us for planting that seed. I'm just very grateful that the Lord has allowed me to see some of the fruits of past efforts. <3

    We also went to Fort Lauderdale on the 23rd for the mission-wide Christmas conference! :) It was delightful! Great to see everyone again, especially the missionaries that are going home at the end of this transfer, I have worked around many of them! And many of the skits that the various zone put on were hilarious!

     We worked on Christmas Eve and on Christmas Day. On Christmas, we made a nice big breakfast of pancakes, eggs, bacon and eggnog. <3 then we opened packages (thanks Mom, Dad, Gran & Sampa and Grandma Jo!) We got down to studies, went to volunteer and visit at the assisted living home, and then Skyped our families! Gus brought in the dogs for me to see them, and Gran brought Cosmo down! I miss that guy, he tried to climb on my shoulder through the computer screen, haha! And it was nice to just chat with them for an hour. We had a good dinner with a member of the English ward, and back to knocking doors!

      Yesterday was a great day, too. Giselle and Giallyn, my first investigators in the mission field, were baptized on Friday and received the gift of the Holy Ghost yesterday. :') I'm so happy for them and love them to pieces! Sister Jones and Sister Soza helped them get baptized, and my trainer, Sister Lightheart even got to be there! :)

    Before church yesterday, our ward council got a special training by Elder Thompson of the Seventy. It was great, I'm so glad that I got to be there! :)

    Church was very nice, and our sweet Relief Society gave us missionaries some stocking stuffers. <3 Then we had dinner with a member, met a part-member family, knocked doors, met a nice Dominican family that we're going to go visit tonight. 

       That's all, folks! Have a great new year! :)

    La iglesia es verdadera! Con amor,

     ~Hermana Curnow

Feliz Navidad! 2015

No time to blog, I'll finish the draft that I currently have and will send it next week!

Feliz Navidad!!! :) Les quiero!

I'll do a post next week!

Sorry! I'm too busy applying for college to blog! I'll send a good post soon!

Just trying to get college papers in order and trying to figure out where the Lord wants me to go: Provo, Rexburg or Hawaii. Adult life decisions are the worst!! ;P

LOVE YOU ALL TONS! The gospel is perfect and the church is true!

~Hermana Curnow

9 Noviembre 2015

Wow! November is here! Que loco! Que rapida pasa el tiempo! Ay mi madre! And all that other good Spanish stuff.

  Well, this last week was pretty slow. We didn't find any new people to teach, and spent most of our time knocking doors. At the beginning of my mission, knocking was my least favorite activity. Now I really see the importance of it, and have even learned to make it fun. :) Which is good, since it is what we have been doing a ton of as of late.

   Oh, and Sister Richardson's birthday was on the 4th! Feliz cumpleanos a ti, Hermana Richardson! :D <3

    Sometimes it is easy to become depressed or discouraged when working out here. But the most important thing is that you trust in the Lord's timing and His way. Nobody cares about these people more than Him, and He knows exactly what they need. His way is the best way, and everything will turn out His way, I can earnestly testify of that!

     But we did see miracles at church! 4 less-active women (one with her kids) showed up to church! And it wasn't because of the missionaries at all! I don't know if it was the ward or the Spirit that helped these ladies come, but it was really a miracle! I was just so happy to see them there and see that God really is in charge and helping all of His children. And all of these women have amazing testimonies. It was wonderful to see them apply their testimonies and come to church. :) It really did fill me with joy!

     Anyway, that is pretty much it for this week! Oh, we also had some Washington-style overcast rain! Great stuff! I'm not homesick or trunky, but it was nice to have. :)

    Les quiero a todos! El evangelio es restaurdo y es perfecto!

         Con carino,

        ~Hermana Curnow

26 Octubre 2015

This is gonna be a triple-post. I ran out of time last week and the week before! :P

So we had transfers, and Sister Rammell and Sister Pankratz transferred :(

So did the ENTIRE Naples house! So I am the only one in our district that is here from last transfer.

Elder Allen and Elder Cutler are still the ZLs and they are rocking it! The new DL is Elder Naressi (second Brazilian DL in a row!) and he is training (did I mention that they are Creole missionaries?). Naples English is also training. So I have two new sons and I'm greenie-breaking Sister Jones! She is the bee's knees and we are rocking Naples! :)

    I bought an elk blanket last week and it is the only thing that keeps me from freezing in our apartment. :) Elkie is awesome! <3

    Still doing tons of knocking, nothing out of the ordinary. We had to drop some people that weren't keeping commitments. :( They'll come around, though. I've learned to love people in a new way as a missionary. It is a blessing and a curse. :P

     Oh! The Sunday before yesterday, President Richardson and Sister Richardson came to Naples! <3 They spoke in sacrament, and Sis Richardson wanted me to translate for her talk which included a tree analogy. And I was like, "uuuhhhhh that isn't in Preach My Gospel! I don't know how to say that!" so I got a member to translate for me! :) whew! And President gave his talk in Spanish. It went really well! I talked to him, and it turns out that the first Spanish sacrament meeting talk that he ever gave in the mission was back in the Miami Lakes ward when I was there (at my request, lol!). And now this last one was his third! Cool stuff :) I'm glad that I've been present for two out of three. We also got to go to a Youth Fireside that Sunday night. President Richardson was giving the fireside and he had the ZLs and us show how we teach and answer a bunch of missionary questions that they youth had. It was great! :) I really do hope that they all serve missions. ANYBODY that serves a mission faithfully, obediently, worthily and diligently will never regret it, I promise!

    Our current STLs are Sis Burdett and Sis Alcazar (<< I KNEW that she was going STL! President hinted that! ;) ) And I got to go on a full-day exchange with Sister Alcazar in Rio Vista! We have always said "we're going to be companions one day", and we finally did! For a day, but still! :) It was neat! Their area reminded me of Sebastian; at least the neighborhood that we were in that day.

    This last week was mostly knocking. Everyday Sister Jones and I work our hardest, and focus on glorifying our Father's name and helping others come unto Christ. Sometimes it can be taxing when you don't see the fruits of your labors right away. You just have to put your trust in the Lord and be faithful. It is His plan, and everything will work out the way that He wants it to.

     What else has happened lately...? Hmm... Oh, we visited a member family from Bolivia and had them help us pick a street, and the 8 year old girl looked at the map and said, "*GASP* Bolivia!!" :D And then her older sister said, "That says 'Boulevard'." "Oh" said the younger one. It was too funny!

      For Halloween we had to be home by 7pm, so we hung out and watched some LDS Christmas movies :) It was fun! And then daylight savings hit. All of the missionaries are tired! We have a very set schedule, and the time change is messing with us, haha!

   Also, fast Sunday was really good. My testimony of fasting is growing, and I'm starting to go at it with a new perspective. :)

         Les quiero mucho! La iglesia es verdadera!

     Hasta el proximo lunes,

~Hermana Curnow

I'll post next week!

I'm so sorry that I've put this off for a while, but I promise that I will post something next week! Les quiero todos! La iglesia es verdadera!

    ~Hermana Curnow

13 Octubre

   So transfer number 7 is about to start pretty soon! HOW does time fly like this??

    Last week we went to a Japanese buffet and had some sushi (they played that Celine Dion song from the Titanic in there. It was weird. Odd taste in music, haha!) and then we played indoor soccer as a zone. Super fun stuff! :) The next day we had an awesome zone training and a zone lunch (yay. tacos from a sketchy Hispanic store! lol).

     Sister Rammell and I did a TON of biking and knocking this week, as well as working with some formers and potentials. Good stuff! :) And we finally got ice cream sandwiches from a ghetto yellow ice cream truck that we LOVE! It was worth it! :) We're easing up on the less-active work just slightly. There is a new initiative that has been launched that should help members get more involved in missionary and reactivation work! :) I'm excited to see miracles come from it!

     The elders in Naples elders had a baptism, so that was great! Then Elder Higginbotham got on a plane for Portugal. Poor Elder Mota is bummed (well, we all are. But he was Elder Higginbotham's trainer, so he's more sad).

    Oh! And transfers are on Wednesday! I'm super sad that Sister Rammell, Sister Pankratz and a bunch of the elders are transferring. :( But the Lord always has good things in store for His children! This next transfer will be good! :)

    We're working with a lot of cool people and some families right now! Life is really good! :) And I'm way excited for the miracles that are coming soon! Love you all! The gospel is true!!

      Les quiero mucho!

~Hermana Curnow

5 Octubre 2015

It's P-Day again??

How does this happen? Seriously, this last week just FLEW by!

Speaking of "flew", we're getting WIND in Naples now! I didn't think that was possible (the Gulf of Mexico is weird. But the hurricane in the Bahamas is giving us some DELIGHTFUL weather!). Also, my "son", Elder Higginbotham got his visa to go to Lisbon. He leaves a week from today. I'm a little bummed about that, but happy at the same time. He's excited to get to his assigned mission. :)

     Anyways, besides the fact that we have lovely weather now (seriously, the clouds left and the wind came in and suddenly it just FEELS like summer), the elders in our ward had a baptism last week! Really cool kid named Gerardo! :) We hope that the rest of his family follows his example and are baptized!

     Before weekly planning on Thursday; the Vanderbilt sisters, Bahia South elders, Sister Rammell and I went and got $1 tacos at this place called "7"  (I think?). They have one-dollar-tacos on Tuesdays and Thursdays. SUPER YUMMY!

     We've also been working with a less-active that has an adorable nephew with Down Syndrome. He is the cutest!! When Sister Rammell was saying the prayer, she had her head bowed down and he kissed the top of it! Cutest kid ever :)

     I also caught a lizard the other day while knocking. It wiggled out of my fingers just slightly and jumped onto Sister Rammell. She freaked out a little. We had a good laugh about it aftwerwards. :)

     Other than that we are just working with a lot of people, knocking and biking. Life of a missionary!  Good stuff. :) And we just had ana AMAZING General Conference! I know that I LOVED it! So many good talks! The Spirit was SO strong and I know that I personally got a ton of answers that I needed. :)

     We also have a soccer zone activity today! YAY! I love our zone! And soccer is pretty awesome, too. :) Anyways, love y'all! Talk to you next week!

   ~Hermana Curnow

P.S. Don't overlook the importance of Elder Larry R. Lawrence's talk. That was POWERFUL.

28 September 2015

I can't remember what happened this week, mostly.

OH! Sister Rammell's family friends, the Walker family (with about 20 kids) will be shown in a documentary that will air between sessions of general conference this weekend.

     I'M SO EXCITED FOR GENERAL CONFERENCE OH MY GOODNESS!!! I love conference!

    Our ward had a Noche de la Hispanidad. SO COOL! So much amazing food and dances and cultural stuff and wonderful people! <3

    I hit my halfway mark on the 23rd. YIKES!!!! Freaking out over here!

Women's conference was AMAZING! I especially loved listening to Sister McConkie and President Uchtdorf.

   Sister Rammell and I are trying to learn a little bit of Portugese and Haitian Creole... it's not really working lol.

    And we got a new bishopric in our ward! They're amazing people! :) I'm so excited to work with them!

       PEACE AND BLESSINGS!

~Hermana Curnow

21 Septiembre 2015

Short blog post! Had tons of people to email today, I just love talking to people and keeping in touch! :) 

A little bit of a slow week. Lots of tracting, and not many people to touch. But that is OKAY. We work as hard as we can, we strive to have the Spirit with us, and the Lord does the rest.

    We had Zone Training this week, which was awesome! Trainings and conferences are the best. I learn so much and enjoy every moment of it! It is also great to see other misisonaries. Missions are just the best thing ever, okay!!! :D

     The 17th marked 9 months since my first day in the MTC. My first day as a missionary. And the 23rd (two days from now) is my halfway mark. I have no idea how this is happening! Scary, it is going by too fast!

     Also tons of biking! Bikes are AMAZING for doing missionary work!

Lots of good member meals, Stake conference, and earlier today, we went to the Naples Zoo! SO FUN! Anyway, that is all for now! Love y'all! Bye!

8 Septiembre

Not much to blog about this week, so it'll be short!

We've been working really well with the members so far this transfer, so that is super good!

We found an AWESOME family to teach, and they even came to church. They LOVED it! :) We met a LA member that we hadn't met before; she is coming to church this Sunday and her friend is interested in the gospel! We gave a Book of Mormon to another member's friend, and she PROMISED to read 3 Nephi 11. We're excited to follow-up with her about that!

    Our new DL is Elder Mota, and he gives AWESOME trainings! Revelation is so real! We're learning tons!

   We had some awesome dinner appointments and member moments. Good laughs. And we're biking again! YAY!!!!

    Some people that we prayed with gave us EIGHT huge avocados from the tree in their yard! YUMMY! And a 7 year old boy that had seen us before came up and gave us marshmallows while we were knocking! SO SWEET!

     Anyway, I gotta go now! LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH!     La iglesia es verdadera y el Evangelio verdadero de Jesucristo ha sido restaurado!

     ~Hermana Curnow

24 Agosto & 1 Septiembre

I have combined 2 weeks worth of blog posts yet again because email time is SO SHORT. :)
     I started off my mass email from last week by saying this: Congratulations to Sister Bond (a teacher from the MTC). She's getting married tomorrow! :)  <<Now it has been a week lol

SHORT BLOG POST!

Tons of lightning storms! This has GOT to be a Gulf of Mexico thing, because the storms were never this constant or crazy in Miami Lakes or Sebastian! Heck, lighting almost struck our apartment last P-day! And for these last couple of nights, there have been these BEAUTIFUL, QUIET lightning storms happening way far away in the clouds! It looks like a delayed strobe light, and sometimes you can see the rays streaking across the sky. Very gorgeous especially at sunset! :)

   We met a nice Cuban couple and prayed with them. They had one of those little saucer, vacuum robots. How cool is that?!

  We also had ZONE CONFERENCE! That was so fun and we learned so much! Then we had a wonderful full-day exchange with the STLs.

  The Elders in our ward have had a couple of baptisms these last couple of weeks, so we're super excited about that!

   Oh, and we also found English chocolate biscuits and Birds Custard in the "foreign food" section at Publix, so that was fun for me! It felt like food from my childhood! :)

  I've been having some exciting dreams. All of them either have to do with missionaries & missionary work, or zombies. Sometimes both. It's pretty entertaining, actually! One night I had a dream that Elder Jeffrey R. Holland came out with us for an MPL, and he was just the coolest, most humble man! Also super sweet. We took a selfie with him in the dream, haha!

  As for this week, we've been having TONS of lightning storms and heavy rain (even though Tropical Storm Erica missed us, the weather has still been crazy). Heck, Sister Pankratz and I almost got struck by lightning when we were on splits!

   We're still on the watch for hurricanes, though. Hurricane season is still in full swing and anything could happen.

   Oh, also our car battery died one night and a nice Haitian man gave us a jump start. :) He was a cool guy!

    That is all I have to say for now. Talk to you next week!

17 Agosto 2015

Sorry for the lack of updates lately. I've become a little less-efficient with email time. :P

Before I get right into everything, I have some fun facts to share:

    August 3rd was my birthday.

   August 4th was my six-month mark in Florida.

   Today (August 17th) marks 8 months since I entered the Provo MTC. Isn't that INSANE?! I seriously have no idea where time is going!!

   So these last two weeks, we have an awesome Zone Training by Elder Allen and Elder Jensen, so much good stuff! We also learned that poor Sister Samuels has bronchitis, so she has been mostly confined to our apartment for a few weeks, poor thing. :( So we've been taking turns doing exchanges with Sister Pankratz so that we can get work done in both of our areas. It's been good, we're hoping that she recovers soon.

    Lupita made me horchata when we had a late-birthday-dinner with her. SO GOOD. I'm hooked!

We've been dealing with a ton of lightning and thunderstorms lately, with CLOSE lightning! It's cool to watch when you are safe and indoors. :)

    And I've come to gain a testimony of knocking in INSPIRED areas! Seriously, praying beforehand and going where the Lord wants you to go is so important, and miracles come from it! Also, faith is ESSENTIAL while finding!

     We're currently working with some awesome Cubans (shocker) and some Haitians that speak Spanish! That's all that I remember at the moment! I promise I'm journaling the cool details!

     Love you all! See you next week! I'm alive!

~Hermana Curnow

P-Day and Birthday :)

      Not the most original of titles, I know. But hey, it sums it up! :) Today is my birthday, and it is also a P-Day. Not a bad combo, in my mind. And it has been going super well, so far! :) Sister Rammell and I have been joking around, saying that it is both of our birthdays (since we've been having such a good day so far, it is just on giant birthday for all of us). And Sister Pankratz is a doll and even made me a little birthday banner decoration! <3 The STLs gave me a card, and so did Sister Samuels! And the zone sang "Happy Birthday" on our P-Day conference call. I feel loved! <3

      OH! And send some birthday love to Elder Mitchell, serving in the Costa Rica San Jose West mission! We happened to be born on the same day, just hours apart. So send him some mail or something! :)

           Elder Benjamin Mitchell

        Mision Costa Rica San Jose Oeste

            Apartado 859-1000

                 San Jose, Costa Rica

So, yeah. That is the exciting news of the day! Oh, we've also discovered that our apartment complex has a vacuum center that we didn't know about, and that whole grain toast with nutella and Mexican crumbling cheese tastes AMAZING!!!!

    But anyway, on Tuesday we had an awesome DT; Sister Rammell and I did the section on extending commitments (what I noted in last week's post regarding First and Second Kings in the Old Testament), and that went really well! We applied it to our proselyting and we've noticed it helps SO much! It helps us find those that are truly ready for the gospel in their lives.

   After that, the Vanderbilt sisters and us did a SHADOW EXCHANGE with our wonderful STLs, Sister Burdett and Sister McGrath! :) Basically what happened is the STLs split up, and we were working in trios for that day. It was a BLAST and I learned a ton!!

    We switched back on Wednesday, Thursday was mostly Weekly Planning and knocking. Then on Friday, more knocking and we helped the De Acosta family move and learned a little bit about their conversion story. It ALL started with an 11 year old member inviting her friend to come to church. And an entire family was baptized because of it. NEVER underestimate the power of member missionary work!

   We had some good member moments on Saturday (I learned that Chocolate Trinity Publix ice cream with lime jello is actually amazing! Thank you, Hermana and Hermano Aquino for showing me the light!). We had dinner with the CUTEST family ever, the Dirienzo family! The had 2 ADORABLE little girls, a snuggly Great Dane and empanadas. :) Afterwards we visited the Fernandez family. They were talking about how their 9 year old daughter doesn't really even look Hispanic, because of her blue eyes and light brown hair. Both of the parents have brown eyes and the mom told us, "Everyone always asks, 'Who does she get the eyes from??'." And then her husband whispered "El lechero", which translated means "the milkman". I DIED LAUGHING. It was soooooo funny!!

      Actually, just this whole week has been full of laughter. Sister Rammell and I are becoming close and we are constantly chatting, getting to know each other, and making jokes. :) Tons of fun! In fact, after we visited one of her recent converts yesterday, we were knocking doors. I decided to ask her about her favorite scary movie. We were in dimly lit apartment buildings, and she decided to make that freaky sound that that chick from "the grudge(?)" makes, and so that freaked me out. Then we round the corner to knock some more doors, and there is this CREEPY flower pot doll thing sitting outside someone's door (why ANYONE would use that as a decoration, I have no clue!) and it literally made me gasp and jump backwards! Then we rounded the corner again, and this lady was sitting on the staircase smoking and had her face lit up with her phone (she was staring right at me and her face was a little sunken) and that startled me again! Basically I was terrified for my life during that whole knocking session, but afterwards it was hilarious! :)

        Church was also really good (that took place hours before the creepy knocking). In Relief Society we had a wonderful class about temples. I miss the temple SO much! </3 And we watched an amazing video, following a girl going to the temple. It is on LDS.org and it is called "Standing in Holy Places". GO WATCH IT!

          Also, I found something super neat in studies today. It's one of those really neat, must-ponder messages in the Book of Mormon. Go read Alma 5:19, then Jacob 4:1-3 and ponder the significance of the word "ENGRAVEN". Neat stuff, huh? :) I love the scriptures!

         And Happy Birthday to my favorite little brother, Gus, whose birthday is the 9th of August! :) Wish I was there to celebrate it with you, but happy birthday nonetheless, bud!

         That is about all for today. Love you all! The church is true!

           Lots of love,

         ~Hermana Curnow

I'm in Naples!! :)

Whoo! P-Day already?? Crazy stuff! Well, I'll do my best to include all of the crazy stuff that happened this week, but (as usual) I don't have oodles of time.

    So Sebastian got closed down last week. It was sad, but I LOVE  where I am now! :)

We spent last P-Day packing and emptying out the house (since there is currently nobody living there) and on Wednesday morning we got up at 5 am and set out at 6:30 for Plantation. It took us 3 hours, but we got there in time and just a little bit early! Thank goodness for carpool lanes! :)

    So we got to transfers and it was SO exciting as usual! It is seriously like a mash of Christmas and a family reunion! Sister Montague and I went in and greeted the "baby" missionaries. I knew right off the bat which one Sister Montague was going to be training. I totally called it. :) And Sister Jackson came up to me before the meeting started and declared that I would go to Naples. Fancy that! :)

    The meeting got started, we had the testimonies of new missionaries (and there were a TON of  them. Mostly sisters!), then Elder Burgoyne announced that we would have departing missionary testimonies (typical, since he was dying, too!). Sister McAfee, Elders Pukahi, Christenson, Skidmore, Liddle, Noguerra, and Dinkins were the ones that I knew. OH! And the last Elder to bear his testimony turned his attention to a new elder in the audience (Elder Higginbotham, who is waiting on his Visa to Portugal) and said "I was a visa waiter, too." And then he just grinned. And then the whole audience burst into laughter! It took me a second to realize that he basically said that he waited in the Florida Fort Lauderdale mission for TWO YEARS FOR HIS VISA TO BRAZIL AND IT NEVER CAME!!!!! I was DYING with laughter when I made the connection!

     The assignments were announced, and I got sent to Naples to greenie-break Sister Rammell (Sister Alcazar and Sister Jackson's baby). I'm in the same district as Elder Scutt, and our DL is Elder Amos (he just got out of Key West). And they are in a Haitian Creole area. Elder Amos came into the mission speaking English, then President wanted him to learn Portuguese, then he went to Key West (so naturally he had to learn Spanish. Did I mention he only studied Chinese in high school?) and now he is in a Creole-speaking area AND HE DOESN'T SPEAK A LICK OF IT! Crazy stuff!!! Oh, and Elder Nielsen is the DL for the other district! :)

       We got going, it took us about 2 hours to get to Naples. We did some tracting and taught an English class, so that was fun!

     The next day we had district training, and it turns out I have a son! I'm the "oldest" sister in my district, and Elder Higginbotham is getting trained in our district! I have a kid!

     We accidentally knocked into a blind, English-speaking member named "Clyde Steele". He was SUCH a sweet guy. That was awesome! :)

       We've also found some cool people to teach, and church was great! I'm so grateful to be in a Spanish ward again. :) And our members are wonderful! <3

        I got a ton of loving from the Payero's  dogs last night, all three of 'em! They reminded me of Jet, Hoss and Scout!

       We're also housing with Sister Pankratz and Sister Samuels (Sis Samuels is going to heaven and Sis Pankratz is going down the other way. A funny story for another day; it involves a Hebrew Israelite that they encountered, lol!)

       Also, Sister Rammell and I found something neat in our studies when studying extending commitments. 1 Kings 17:10-16. Notice how commitments that are bold and loving are also ALWAYS specific to the individual. Even the Lord promises specific blessings, for example, look at the 10 commandments! And even in 2 Kings 5, too! It is so amazing how the Lord knows us ALL so deeply and personally, and loves us all the same. He never has us do ANYTHING without having an incredible purpose behind it.

     Well, that was essentially my week. Have a great week, everyone! I love you all so much! :)

      ~Hermana Curnow

21 Julio 2015 Transfers!

Hey, I'm back again!

So before I forget, I need to tell you something cool: My companion's older brother was Lindsey Stirling's DL in the New York Bronx mission! :) Cool stuff. 

Anyway!

    Sister Montague and I are both transferring! And they're shutting down the Sebastian area!!! WHAT?? I couldn't believe it! Crazy stuff changes are happening in our mission. She is also transfer training! :)

     Well, I'm running out of time pretty quick here!

Some other cool things that happened was our lunch with the Crosby's (AWESOME people!), seeing Mamma Rae, getting downpoured on while biking, teaching Donna about temples (getting her excited to go!) and celebrating Sister Montague's birthday. Good stuff!

    Love y'all! Talk to you soon! Please mail me! I LOVE being kept in the loop! :)

~Hermana Curnow

13 Julio 2015

(Please ignore that last post which was posted WAY too early!)

Welcome to my life of exciting things happening daily and having about zero time to type them up once a week! :)

     So last Monday we had the zone activity in a park and had a BBQ. It was actually pretty well organized, the food was great and it was fun! :) We got a group pic on the slides and Sister Montague, Sister Burdett and I owned the swing set, haha!

     We had interviews with President on Tuesday, those were awesome! President Richardson is seriously the best! I got a lot of revelation and good ideas for things to apply to our area and work.

     The next day we had a "Christmas in July" zone training, a white elephant gift exchange and a fire exchange with the STLs. It was Elder Christensen's last ZT. And Elder Skidmore's, Elder Liddle's, and Elder Pukahi's. Basically our whole zone is guaranteed to be at transfer meeting.

      We had lunch with Sister Holton on Thursday and MAN do I love her! She is just the most fun, fiery old lady you'll ever meet, and her testimony is amazing. :) And I ate 3 pieces of her turkey pot pie (it was heavenly). We did some biking in Vero, and met with Sister Lawson for a little bit to discuss missionary work, and that was great! She had some really good insights.

      We had dinner with the Doyles the next day. That was so fun. They're just such a hilarious and exciting family, especially the little ones! And Brother Doyle's accent cracks me up!

       Next day, service with the Escamilla family. Then biking. And we found another gopher tortoise! Those are so common up here! :)

       Sunday came the next day, so we went to church. A lot of visiting members came, so that was fun! :) Sister McEwen taught me a Dominican phrase, "A Po' Ta' Bien" or something similar. I'm still not sure what it means, lol! We were able to go over to the Mouso's house and have dinner and an FHE with them and Mike, which was wonderful! This ward has my heart. :) And the last event of Sunday was visiting Sister Blanchett (the new WML's wife) and seeing the 4-foot alligator that was swimming around in the canal in her backyard! 

        That was basically my week! Oh, look! I'm out of email time! Talk to y'all next week! Love you! Email me! I love knowing what is going on! :)

           Con carino,

       ~Hermana Curnow

13 Julio

Welcome to my life of exciting things happening daily and having about zero time to type them up once a week! :)

So last Monday we had the zone activity in a park and had a BBQ. It was actually pretty well organized, the food was great and it was fun! :) We got a group pic on the slides and Sister Montague, Sister Burdett and I owned the swing set, haha!

6 Julio 2015. 'MURICA.

So I just realized that I don't even need to put the year on these blog posts anymore cuz I have less than a year left- EWWWWW. Seriously, I have NO IDEA how time goes by so fast!

   Tuesday we met some grouchy people while knocking doors but whatever, we are here to do our Father's work! :) Then this SUPERSTORM started! Like, SUPER close lightning and everything! We were about 3 miles from our house and on bikes, so we were BOOKING it! I've never ridden that little lightning rod so fast in my life! And we didn't die, cuz Kelly saw us biking, had just gotten a weather warning on her phone and decided to save us and give us a ride to our house. I love her! <3

    Wednesday we had DT, went to the Toyota dealership to get our window fixed and we gout 5 Guys Burgers and Fries for lunch YUMMY! We went biking and did some good knocking on the island, and got to talk to Chloe. :) She's cool! The Traylor family fed us dinner, lovely folk!

   The next day the Baemans took us out to dinner at Ay Jalisco! Yummy! We had a GREAT MM with the Hauber fam.

    We went knocking all day Friday and saw Elisabeth. She has my dream job- biological scientist! :) Had a media referral for a Bible, so we delivered that, it was great! Somebody asked me if I was Sister Montague's daughter, and another person got confused by the "Hermana" on my badge and said, "I'm just gonna call you 'Hemmie'." LOL!

   The ward had this GREAT 4th of July BBQ on Saturday and we went on a finding blitz with the ZLs and STLs. And we got to know our lovely neighbors that just moved in! We were home by 7:30 

(safety reasons) and I took a LONG shower <3, caught up on some journaling and went to bed early. <3

  Yesterday was CHURCH. I love church so much! And we briefly visited with the Hayes family. :) That was my week! And everybody go study the talk by Elder L. Tom Perry from the April 2009 conference! Every member a missionary! Love you all!

    ~Hermana Curnow

P.S. Rest in peace, Elder Boyd K. Packer. <3 

29 Junio 2015

Hey, y'all!

    So things in my area are currently biking and knocking doors 24/7. That's kinda what happens when you don't have people to teach. :P

   A little bit of a hiccup in terms of the mailing system: We actually aren't going to be sending mail through the mission office anymore! So the Fort Lauderdale address isn't going to work. If you wish to send me a letter (which I hope you do ;) ), please ask my parents for my current address!

    I suppose this means an end to the legend of Mamma Orton. She had a daughter that served her mission here, and she writes so many of the sister missionaries in the FFLM! She did it through the mission office address. I wonder how that'll work out?

    But, yeah. Not a whole ton happening this week. We're working with some mega-awesome less-actives that I just love to death! :)

     We went and knocked doors in this cool town called "Felsmere". TONS of Mexicans over there! I loved getting to practice my Spanish! :) And we had a full-day exchange on Friday. Sister Burdett came over to Sebastian and we tracted all day! It was AWESOME! :) And she is so wonderful, working with her was amazing!

      Yeah, that was basically my week. And I only really took one picture this week, so I'll post that! A little treat for you guys! I needed shaving cream, I saw this, and I HAD to have it! It reminds me of the first Jurassic Park movie! ;) Long live the original!

​It's not a very good selfie and it is sideways, but you'll just have to deal with it. ;) #nomakeup #thatshowwedopdays

Love you all!!! The church is true!

            ~Hermana Curnow

22 Junio 2015

So before we get started, I'm going to apologize in advance for my English and any errors that I might make. I've noticed that I'm having difficulty speaking English properly! I'm making all sorts of spoonerisms and switching the order of words! Sister Montague and I just laugh and say, "Spanish missionary problems". ;)

   Happy Father's Day, Dad! I love you! 

 June 17th, this last Wednesday, marked six months since I left my dad's truck and walked into the Missionary Training Center in Provo. And tomorrow, I will have one year left of my mission. SCARY!!!! Seriously, I'm terrified of leaving the mission and going home! Time goes by so fast! One year left... SICK.

   We had Zone Training this last week, and the Stuart zone is full of awesome people! :) We are few, but we are quality! ;) And President Richardson decided to stop by and share some wisdom with us, so that was fun!

    On Tuesday night, the Relief Society hosted a Diabetes Awareness activity, with a guest speaker. ...We've recently invested in quinoa and lentils.

    We bike everyday here and I love it! We've (as a companionship), have gotten a total of 3 flat tires so far. Not so fun. We're working to avoid those in the future, haha! In fact, we biked 46 miles on Saturday!! Including a ton of biking on Wabasso island! So fun!

   And John is progressing so much and came to church yesterday! LIFE IS GOOD! Sorry for the short entry, but I gotta go! Time is up! Love you all! Talk to you next week!

   ~Hermana Curnow

15 Junio 2015 New Area.

    Remember how I was getting transferred last week, and I was sure that I would go south?

Yeah, I got sent north. About as far north as I can go, actually.

I sat down at transfer meeting expecting to stay seated for a while (until they started listing off the people going to Southern zones). And then less than a minute later, I learned that I was going north and into an ENGLISH area. My jaw DROPPED. English??? I'm a Spanish missionary! I knew that Spanish missionaries often have to serve in at least one English area throughout the duration of their mission, but north??? That's where all the white people are! This is for sure something new for me! I didn't encounter very many white people in Miami, to be honest, haha! But I do love this new area. The members especially are super hard-working and charitable. :) It's a great ward. 

    I'm up here with Sister Montague. She is just super!!! :) We get along really well and work super hard to invite everyone to come unto Christ. We also bike literally everyday and I LOVE it!! Biking is the BEST!!

    We're working with a guy named John right now. He's super cool and reads diligently. :) We're also working with Ingrid, and she is just so funny and warm-hearted. :)

  We just moved into a new place in our area, and we just got a set of washing and drying machines. Yay for clean clothes! :)

   Oh, and there is SO much wildlife up here! Apparently people see manatees and dolphins in the canals by the generators! And I even found a softshell turtle in one of the streams and a gopher tortoise crossing the street! The reptiles that you see while biking! :)

   I'm out of time, but I love you all!

Talk to you next week!

Con amor, Hermana Curnow

9 Junio 2015 I'm transferring.

  So the Hialeah vs Miami Beach soccer match was a BLAST!! Miami Beach had a ton of Hispanic (and a Haitian) elders that had been playing soccer basically since birth, so they won LOL. :)

  At District Training we had a "Funeral" for Elder Hymas. All of us sisters dressed in black and gave him fake flowers. Then we took funeral pictures. It was fun. :)

  We went and visited Lina. She gave us dresses. She's so sweet, haha! And we're having dinner with her tonight! I've also been in Florida for just over 5 months now. Time doesn't make any sense while you're serving a mission.

  We're still teaching Harold and Saul, and they're AWESOME! Harold especially has great questions and wants to learn. They were actually at the Noche de Hogar/ Tomy's birthday party that Hermana Trini had last night! They loved it. :)

   This amazing woman named Maida has my heart. I'm running out of email time but it suffices me to say that she is a miracle and part of the reason that I needed to be in Miami Lakes.

   I've spent 3 AMAZING transfers, 5 spectacular months in Miami Lakes. And my worst fears have come to life. I'm transferring. I really hoped and prayed that I would stay in Miami Lakes with Sister Bradley for one more. I love my companion, ward, and area so much that I seriously can't put it into words. It's really hard, emotionally. But I'll come back and visit someday. And the Lord needs me somewhere else right now.

    And this transfer meeting is going to be INSANE!!! SO many areas are white-washing! I have mixed feelings about the idea that I might white-wash, but it could also be a huge adventure. :)

   Oh, and remember Gladis? The elders' recent convert? Yeah, she has dreams about transfers. Last transfer, right before transfer calls, she had a dream. And she only saw Elder Coburn, not Elder Ortiz. And then Elder Ortiz transferred. Then THIS transfer, she had a dream and only saw Elder Wilber, not Elder Coburn or Elder Dinkins. And Elder Wilber is the only one not transferring. She has a gift, I'm sure of it, haha!!

     But anyway, that's all for now! Love you all and miss you!

   The church is true! :)

~Hermana Curnow 

  

June 1st, 2015 (continued oops!)

Also, Rest in Peace Elder L. Tom Perry. <3 Thank you for everything.

I also realized this last week that this is one of the only missions in the world where you learn "Cuban" haha.

OH. There is a returned missionary here. She served in the FFLM and her family lives in the FFLM and so she lives here, too. She is actually in my ward! GO CHECK OUT HER Mormon.org profile! She is amazing!!   >>>>   Mormon.org/me/DSID/ElizabethAndarcioCalvo

   And I was briefly chased by a Doberman while on bike last week. Fun stuff. Nobody was hurt. :)

Have a great week!

AMAZING WEEK! Happy June! :)

June is here! The beginning of the month means many things: Baptismal records, new monthly miles for our cars (yay!), our MSF money is refilled (more yay!), etc.

   After email last week we went and played Volleyball and this fun little dodgeball-like game called "Smash Face" as a district. Then on Wednesday we had District Training, we saw Nerida (<3) and then something AMAZING happened!! We were talking before a dinner appointment about how we didn't have many people to teach, and we just said "We're working our hardest, we are striving to improve and we are focused on helping the people and doing the Lord's will. That is what matters." And then we walk into Hermana Trini's house for dinner and BOOM! She is housing two Colombians, Saul and Harold (father and son). And they want to learn more and get baptized!! And they came to church! Miracles are SO real! I've never seen such huge miracles or so many as when I have been in Florida serving! :)

    On Thursday we got our oil changed at Pep Boy's. Had a cheap lunch at Chili's (we were running low on money. Well, at least I was haha!). We taught some people, went finding, Sister Jenny O. feed us an AMAZING dinner and made homemade watermelon juice for us! Mmm! And we had avocado for dessert! Then we went to teach someone else, and our car battery died. Awkward. We were actually close to Trini's, so we had Tommy, Harold and Saul give us a jump. Even more awkward. Then back to Pep Boys for the rest of the night!

   On Friday we found Frances! She is super cool! :) And We prayed with some other really awesome families! We had dinner at Munchy's Pizza. I adore that little restaurant! And we met a super awesome LA named Martha.

    On Saturday, we weren't able to see Frances. but we had lunch with Alexandra (YUMMY!!!) and the stake hosted a Family History Discovery Conference! :) And our sweet Maida fed us a lovely dinner!

   On Sunday; MAIDA, FRANCES, HAROLD and SAUL all came to church!!!! I was so ridiculously happy that they made that decision to come and they all loved it! :) BLESSINGS!! We did some more finding later that day and visited the Cabo family (they're so awesome!!) 

     And today I am emailing, writing letters (btw, y'all should write me! ;) hint hint), going to Walmart and then we have a special event in Hialeah! President Richardson gave us permission to have a Hialeah zone vs. Miami Beach zone soccer game!!! I'm so excited!! Talk to you guys next week! Love you tons, and the church is true!

 ~Hermana Curnow

And Rest in Peace, Elder Perry. <3

#M.A.Y 26 Mayo 2015

Alrighty, so this last week we were fed by Hna Chavez, Hna Yolanda Ortiz, Hna Maldonado, Hna Franchi and Hna Trini Arce. Food <3 I love these amazing women, too. Now for the rest of the less-important stuff~

  President Richardson (MAN he is just so awesome!) is having us focus more deeply on the Standard Works during our Personal Study time. And Personal Study is just so great. The revelation flows like CRAZY and I'm getting more out of the scriptures than I ever have before in my life! We always start off with a half hour in the Book of Mormon and then we move on to Preach My Gospel, Conference talks, etc. I tend to focus on Doctrine & Covenants and the New Testament. A do some dipping into the Old Testament occasionally. I've been searching more carefully for evidences in the Bible about "Divine Potential of humans" and that humans have been able to see the face of God. Tons of people down here don't believe those things, but they believe every literal word in the Bible, oddly enough. It's seriously written all over the place.

   I've been working with maps a TON more lately. We've made a map of all of the less-active members that we've never met, so we can LA search and find simultaneously! I've also printed out Google Earth maps and started marking the roads that we've knocked. It makes things easier.

   We got our miles cut about two weeks ago. Something tells me we'll be using our bikes a lot more! :)

    So we haven't been getting a ton of mail lately. But last week a magazine for Babies R Us or something showed up in our mailbox. What are the odds? A magazine FULL of babies shows up at a house of sister missionaries! Is the world TRYING to make us trunky?? Haha

   I looked it up on a GPS. I'm 2,700 miles from home. I'll start using that in my finding, saying "I came 2,700 miles to share the gospel of Jesus Christ with you." 

   So we went to Publix last week (I love that store! It is like the Florida version of Safeway) to buy cookie dough to make cookies for our amazing RS President that does everything. And Sister Bradley grabbed a DEADLY flavor of ice cream. She says that it is an FFLM tradition to try Publix's "Chocolate Trinity" ice cream at least once. It was heaven. And we can never buy it again after looking at the nutrition info LOL.

   We had ZONE CONFERENCE! I LOVE those so much!!! <3 Afterwards we had "Hurricane Preparedness Training" by Elder/Doctor C.P. Bean. He is a medical advisor for 9 missions in the Southeast of the U.S., a convert, ex-military, an orthopedic surgeon and he is HILARIOUS! Funniest natural disaster training ever! Plus his voice sounds just a little bit like the pig from Toy Story, so it was all the more better!

    He told us about what we need to know/do/ everything. Mom, Dad, I can't call you if there is a hurricane. Sorry. He told us that there is a high chance of a hurricane this year, but we're going to pray that that training was wasted time. He told us that the floods brought in by hurricanes tend to bring water 17 feet above sea level. He called out "How many of you Elders are in the keys?" They raised their hands and he just chuckled and said "You guys are so dead!" (The Keys are 2 feet above sea level LOL). Then I went over to Miami Beach with Sister Furner for a full-day exchange! It was great and we got to teach Brittany and re-teach Kenneth! :)

    Running out of time, I'll try to be quick!

   We got Harold, Palm Springs North's RC. He came to Spanish ward because he is bilingual but his fiancee doesn't know English. I love them both so much and I'm SO excited to teach them!!

   We met a guy that begs on Red Road. He came up to us while we were on bikes and we had a nice chat.

    We biked half the day yesterday and it was 91 degrees. I got burnt, but it was the best! And we found a new investigator! :) We also met a SUPER Patriotic Cuban lady! Like we're talking 'Murica bumper stickers all over her car and inside her house!

    And we also learned that Red Road and 57th is super dangerous when the traffic lights are out. Yay lol :)

       Anyways, I love you all! Have an amazing week!

~Hermana Curnow

    #M.A.Y (Miracles Are Your's)

17 Mayo 2015

These blog post titles are incredibly dull, I apologize.

  So a couple of fun things happened this week.

We had to drop a seemingly elect investigator. We'll call him "Jamie". We found Jamie while out knocking doors while he was riding by on his bike. Hna Elizabeth Calvo (coolest RM ever! And she's Cuban!) helped us out and he got really excited about coming to church and getting baptized. And later on, we found out that he was a little... attached. He didn't really want anything to do with church, he just was obsessed with a "muchacha". Namely, one of us. It got really creepy and awkward really fast. We passed him to the YSA elders but he just became a headache for them and didn't want to do anything with them. We're done with him.

   We've had to stop teaching another investigator (so now we are down to zero in our teaching pool). But her last lesson was HILARIOUS! So we had a Member Present Lesson with her once before with Yolanda. And this investigator has three rabbits that just roam around. And during our lesson, one rabbit kept trying to chew up Yolanda's shoes and my bag. So this last Friday we brought Yolanda's husband, Isaac, to teach with us. We had to show him were to park, but we left our car a little further off (due to our shortage of miles) and we couldn't ride in the car, so we walked ahead of him for 2 blocks to show him where to park. Isaac is driving really slowly behind us, and we're in a less-safe area. So this black mustang pulls up next to us and the guy rolls down the window and says to us, "Hey! Do you know that guy behind you?" We assured him that we did and he drove away. Then we just BUSTED up laughing because we realized just how funny/awkward/sketchy the whole situation looked! Our poor member!

    So we parked, said a prayer, and walked up to our investigator's door. I warned Isaac about the bunnies. But then the door opens, and there are TINY Styrofoam balls EVERYWHERE on the floor! And the investigator's half-naked, 2-year-old granddaughter comes running out excitedly! She was trying to entertain her. So this whole lesson, the baby is running around and sweeping, throwing and blowing bits of Styrofoam EVERYWHERE! SO FUNNY! We left and I had to dump the little balls out of my Book of Mormon and sweep them off my skirt! It occurred to me later that I hadn't even bothered to warn Isaac about the granddaughter LOL!

   But yeah. That was it for this week! And also always remember this: The love is more important than the KIs. Love y'all! Talk to you next week!

11 Mayo 2015

This will be one of those blog posts in which I basically just list things that happened.

We had a fire exchange on Tuesday! Sister Furner and Sister Mahterian are such bosses! :)

This week Gladis, Jenny and Criseth fed us!

There was an awesome Dia de las Madres spa activity put on by the Relief Society on Saturday! Really great turn-out, and people brought their friends! :)

Marisol, Hector and Hector's friend ALL came to church yesterday!! MIRACLE!! They're all way interested and are looking towards baptism! Honestly, as a missionary, the best way to see miracles is to work as hard as you can and then leave the rest to the Lord. Then, boom! Your faith is rewarded and MILAGROS!

And we got to Skype home! <3 That was way fun! I almost forgot what Gran's British accent sounded like. Oh, and yesterday, the nest of duck eggs by our house hatched! There are now a bazillion "patitos" in our neighborhood! :)

  We've been knocking doors all week, and I love it! This is seriously the best work ever! To anybody that is worthy and eligible to serve a mission: DO IT!! You won't regret it! :)

     I love you all!

  ~Hermana Curnow

P.S. I've realized that our Ward Mission Leader and his wife are the cutest little people ever! The remind me of the grandparents in the Land Before Time :)

   Quotes:

    "These are Mormons! They are good people, Christopher!" -Evelyn, a sweet little Haitian lady that we met

    "Hey, look! Two snowbunnies!" -From an experience that Hermana Bradley had in her last area

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May the Fourth Be With You! (Long post!)

I'm SUPER sorry that I ran out of time to blog last week! :(

I have a little leftover time right now, so I'm going to do my best to fit in all of the details!

   So we've been having some CRAZY storms lately! Lighting and thunder get really close, the streets fill up with water fast and it sometimes gets too dangerous to drive (water and lack of visibility). One storm in particular caused us to have to "rain check" (get it?) our trip to the gator farm yet again!

  I also got a flan de queso recipe from Hermana Alcazar (a missionary from Tijuana. Side note: Hno Barrett my MTC teacher served his mission there!) gave me her flan de queso recipe. It is AMAZING!! Super easy and super yummy!

   I had a nasty head cold from Thursday to Sunday of last week, and it was really bad on the last Friday of April, so I had to stay home and rest. IT WAS THE WORST. I slept all day and I've never felt so unproductive and useless in my life! Hermana Lightheart stayed home with me for the first part of the day but then the Palm Springs North sisters were on an exchange. Sister McAfee was here with Sister Heacock, so they did splits and Sister McAfee stayed home and guarded my unconscious, ill body. 

    Hermano Cabellero was baptized by the elders! He was basically already a member, the whole ward knew him and called him Hno Cabellero! Jajaja!

   We had been in a giant game of tag with Elder Ortiz and Elder Coburn, and we are often sent by members to drop off food at the elders' apartment. And Elder Ortiz had given us the commitment to be more "creative" with our tags (as opposed to leaving sticky notes that said "tag" on their bikes). So we dropped off some groceries at their apartment and gift-wrapped their apartment door! We used wrapping paper, balloons, a bow, the whole bit! We also filled the balloons with confetti pieces that said "tag". They admitted defeat after we did that! ;)

    I've been having tons of dreams over these past months. All of them are either about my MTC zone and/or weird proselyting situations.

    And we had a full day of biking the day before transfers! My legs were so dirty by the end of the day, I loved it! And we saw a storm coming in the late afternoon, right after we prayed with an awesome lady named Mirium (she's Cuban, and she already has a great testimony of the Great Apostasy, LOL), so we started biking North. Right into it. The lightning was super close, so we took cover in a Chili's restaurant and ate dinner. It started pouring right when we got inside!

   Sister Lightheart got transferred. So did Elder Scutt, Elder Ortiz and Elder Krikava. The only regret that Sister Lightheart had about transferring is not getting a picture with Jacob (this 4 year old boy in our ward that has the BIGGEST crush on her). And it was basically a companion swap! I got Sister Lakes' old companion, and Sister Lakes got Sister Lightheart! I'm now serving with Hermana Lakes. She is awesome! :) Super chill, and we're learning a ton from each other. Greenie-breaking is going good!

    We've been doing basically nothing but finding all week. At one point this man named Wendell came outside when he saw us from us house and gave us juice boxes! Turns out he is a JW and thought that we were JWs, too! That's why he gave us the juice, lol! XD

   We also found an English speaking member named Nicole. She was feeling homesick, and so we said a prayer with her. We don't think that her records moved from Utah to Florida, so it was a miracle that we just stumbled upon her! She is so sweet! :)

   Betty, a Dominicana investigator got baptized yesterday and will be confirmed this next Sunday!

   And Hna Elizabeth Calvo came out knocking doors with us! She is the BEST!!! She and her family were baptized in Cuba, moved to Spain, then her family moved her to Fort Lauderdale while she stayed in Spain to study medicine. She decided to serve a mission and got to... here! She served where her family was living! :) She decided before coming out to "move" here once her mission was over. She was released last Wednesday night, and now she is in our ward! She is awesome and I love her! :)

      That's all for this week! See yall next week!

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No time!

I'll do a long post next week!

Love y'all!

~Hermana Curnow

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This week in Miami... 20 Abril 2015

    Tabitha sent me a picture of my missionary plaque in my home ward. I almost forgot about that, haha! It made me really excited to see it!

     So we started off this week with interviews with President Richardson. He is seriously the best. He and Sister Richardson do so much for the missionaries and for the people of Southern Florida in general. I appreciate them so much. And they're also the funniest people! I remember on our first night in the mission home, we were waiting for the interviews to finish. Sister Allen and President came out of their interview and the first thing that President did was turn to Sister Richardson and exclaim, "Honey, she's never had a lemon oreo before!!" He then gifted each of us with a lemon oreo, LOL!!! They're hilarious!

     Mariela and Gladys are two adorable Venezuelan women that were recently baptized into our ward. Mariela invited over a bunch of people to her house for a Noche de Hogar. It was so lovely, and they the missionaries to come. Elder Ortiz gave the lesson, and then we ate! :)

    Ummm... This last Friday was the FOUR-MONTH MARK OF MY MISSION. Where is time going?! President said that it would go by in the blink of an eye, and I didn't entirely believe him. But it is! Missionaries need to live every second and take advantage of every day! Time really does fly!

      I heard my last song playing in the gas station on Saturday. "I Lived". And I heard "Shut Up and Dance" in Walmart the other week. It was so weird to hear those songs again. It felt like something from another lifetime.

      We also swung by the Javier house last night to share a spiritual thought and see how they were doing. Maria was cooking and she asked us if we wanted some tostones (fried slices of platanos). We graciously accepted and BOOM! She gave us dinner! She gave each of us a giant plate of bown rice, black beans, spaghetti, lightly-fried chicken legs and tostones! SO YUMMY! And so we ate dinner with Maria, Jose and their sons and shared a brief message. They're such a kind and giving family. <3

    Oh, and Hermana Franchi fed us breakfast on Saturday morning, too! SUPER yummy pancakes and hot chocolate! And she made Hna Lightheart a dog-shaped pancake. :)

     Right now we're such spending most of our days searching for opportunities to serve and people to teach. The Lord's work is rolling forward. Doctrine & Covenants 3:3.

     Les quiero tanto! Tengan una semana buenisima! Hasta luego!

~Hermana Curnow

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SCRAMBLING TO UPDATE

So super quick summary of this week: We taught a lesson to a super sweet Santero family, Hermana Chavez made us papusas, we did service for Linabel, we did service for a sweet old couple, we had zone training, Nerida is hilarious, an old man named Carlos tried to Bible bash with us (we always just walk away from those, haha), we ate Pollo Tropical, we had Menchie's, biked for about 40 miles on Friday and got WAY sunburnt, cleaned the baptismal font with lavender Fabuloso for Emilee and Robert's baptism the next day (cutest kids ever!), had a tug-of-war with Spot (the Cardenz dog), Robert and Emilee got baptized, met a really drunk less-active, and we had to stop teaching a family. It broke my heart. But yeah, CRAZY full week! If you want details, MAIL ME!

Email time goes by so fast!

I love you all! See you next week! :)

~Hermana Curnow

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Pascua y Conferencia General :)

So want to here something pretty cool?

    Last month, during "Miracle March", our mission... baptized ONE HUNDRED AND ONE people!! HOLY COW! 101 new Mormons in Southern Florida! :) We're way excited and the recent converts in our ward GLOW. They are so full of joy to be members and it never ceases to delight me! <3

    We had lunch with Sister Patterson and her family at China Buffet. That was such a blast. They're the most hilarious people! :)

   Still working with Selena and Enoch. They're such truth-seekers, I love them! :) Martha is still a blast to work with. Funniest little Cuban woman ever! She cracks me up and LOVES to talk!

   Something funny about Cubans: They're sassy. Lots of Hispanic people are pretty sassy, but Cubans just blow my mind! It isn't a bad thing; it's just cultural, a social device. And I was already called "The Sassy One" in the MTC, and I think that I'm starting to pick up on the Cuban sass, as well! I'll have a tongue like a knife by the time my 12th transfer comes around, haha!

   GENERAL CONFERENCE WAS AMAZING! Seriously, the talks were amazing and a few of the General Authorities THREW DOWN. I loved it! <3 On Saturday in between sessions, we ate arrepas with the elders at the RCs' house. Gladis and Mariela are Venezuelan, and they're just so wonderful! And arrepas are AMAZING.

AGH! I'm out of time! The only other news is that I caught 2 lizards this week and put one on my ear! :) Love y'all! The church is true! Bye!

~Hermana Curnow

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