NEW HERMANAS, JAS FIELD TRIP AND MORE

La Laguna got their first Hermanas in many years, Hermana Heims and Hermana King.  We picked them up at the airport and drove them to our favorite spot overlooking the La Laguna hills.  They are darling girls with a wonderful missionary aura of goodness.  We are excited to work with them.

There are yellow flowers growing all over the hills of La Laguna, not sure if they are weeds, but they make everything look a spectacular green.   This is my favorite scene in the islands.

We live up the hill, on a hill in La Laguna about 15 minutes from downtown Santa Cruz.  This is the scene we see as we drive to the city on many days of the week.  I enjoy the changing clouds around the port and the changing light on the hills and city buildings.

This is another view with light on the hills and pink clouds.  This island has clouds and more clouds moving and changing all day.  In the South those clouds never rain.  Up here they rain often, at least this winter they have.

We took one of our JAS kids home today 20 minutes further North than we are.  This is the view of Teide right now, on a rare cloudless day, with lots of snow even on some of the lower surrounding hills. 

This lookout is less than 10 minutes from the La Laguna Church so we often drive up here to show people.  We have taken this picture of us several times but can't ever seem to appear to have hair.  



They build amazing Sand castles on the beach in Los Cristianos and people throw coins to take photos.  This is the Last Supper and as you will see they are still working on it. 

VALENTINE'S DAY AND MORE

Our JAS had a Valentines Day party.  We ended up with 5 investigators in the end.  Not counting the missionaries, they outnumbered the members.  I made a tree with photographs on hearts of the JAS members from past activities and some Origami hearts we made last week.  We played games and ate.  We were missing some of our core group for some reason but it was fun.

 These are the ones who came on time.  I got busy and didn´t take more photos.

Ayelen is our 5th JAS Baptism in 6 months.  Hermana Burgos and Hermana Money taught her.  Elder Bird baptized her.  Much to our surprise Hermana Money is going to stay in Santa Cruz for another transfer.  She came soon after us and will leave soon after us.  We love her dearly and look forward to 6 more weeks.

Elder Schmidtlein and Elder Bird from Santa Cruz taught Chari and she was baptized on Saturday also.  We are sad to be losing Elder S. on Monday.

On P-Day this week the Santa Cruz and La Laguna Missionaries and the 2 sisters from Los Cristianos went to Anaga with President Jackson and his wife, who were here for interviews.  It was foggy, cloudy, windy and a little cool but we had a very fun day together. 

THE GOOD AND BAD OF THIS WEEK

First the bad.  For about 3 weeks we have worried that Mike had Pancreatic Cancer.  After a routine check the Dr. here found a 2 inch tumor on his pancreas.  If you research this cancer it is pretty much a death sentence.  We waited 10 days to see a doctor that spoke good English, which was a mistake because it gave us too much time to think and stress.  On Thursday we found out that it is a fatty tumor on the outside of the pancreas and is not affecting the surrounding tissues.  It is still a bit of a worry and next week we will know more about treatment, but for now we don't have to go home immediately.  So this is the bad and ultimately the wonderful all wrapped up together.

I lay on my bed to rest this week with a constant prayer in my heart, I dozed a little and when I opened my eyes this rainbow appeared in our bedroom window...a symbol of hope I needed.

 This is the view, from our office window, that we see while on the computer.  I decided that the Canaries have 2 seasons, Summer and Spring.  Trees have been blooming for the last month.  The bougainvillea bloom profusely all year long.  Since the rain started a month ago the hills in La Laguna are covered with a profusion  of yellow flowers.  We are looking forward to warmer days but the signs of spring have been around for some time.

Yureny is our 4th young adult baptism in the almost 6 months we have been here.  She is the aunt of Adriana, on the right.  They moved here together a few months ago, Adriana from Venezuela and Yureny from the small island of El Hierro.  Recently another cousin of Adriana's, Legna was baptized.  They all attend our JAS activities.  We were with the missionaries the night they committed Yureny to baptism and it was a wonderful experience.  Elder Larkin and Bohne taught them.

Luis, one of our young adults from Los Cristianos left on his mission to Barcelona this week and we were able to attend his setting apart.  He has been an active missionary while waiting for his call. 

This is our darling recent convert, Isabel.  She is teaching us how to make an African desert.  You mash bananas until smooth and mix in some flour but more bananas than flour, add a little baking powder and drop them in hot oil to fry.  They were very tasty.

TORTILLA NIGHT

We had a great FHE with our JAS group this week.  We made flour tortillas.  We mixed 4 or 5 batches of 12 and baked them in the frying pan.  Everyone rolled and baked and we ate them with re-fried beans and pulled chicken and some with nutella.  We had 4 investigators.  It was a fun evening even if there was flour everywhere.