TALENT NIGHT SKIT

This was a funny skit preformed by two of our young adults Jatniel and Luis with Elders Anderson and Cloward manning the back and Dayde and Valerie manning the front.

A GREAT WEEK!

This was a great week for us.  The Branch put on a talent show.  Our young adults were involved in several of the numbers.  We spent some of our week helping and practicing with them.  It was well attended and a lot of fun.  The people here are more uninhibited than American members.

 This is most of the entertainers.  The people here love to take group pictures of everything.

Jatneil and Luis did a funny spoof with Elder Anderson and Cloward.  I made a movie and will try to post it.

 This is some of our young adults plus the Branch President doing the "Peanut Butter and Jelly"  Dance.

On Saturday one of our great JAS members, Jatneil, was baptized.  It was such a blessing to be here for this.  He is such a great young man.

Elder Cloward and Elder Anderson taught Jatniel and Luis and Jatniel became great friends as the Elders involved him in the teaching.

It was awesome to have a great Branch turnout at the baptism and we had a nice reception after.

I made some chocolate cake, which got squashed in the transfer from home.  They weren't sure if they wanted to eat it but it was gone in the end.  It was delicious, even squashed.

The occasion was even more special because that night Elder Anderson received a transfer back to the Madrid area.  We will miss him greatly, as will the entire Branch.  He has been here for 8 months and is such a wonderful hard working missionary. 

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ZONE CONFERENCE 4-13

  

Our Zone consists of 3 sets of young elders, the Altmans ( who didn't go this time) and us on our island of Tenerife and  2 sets of Elders and one set of sisters on Gran Canaria plus the Senior couple the Buhlers, who live in the old Mission Home in Las Palmas.  The house is a charming 4000 sq. ft. home in need of constant repair.  The church wants to sell it, but until that happens the Buhlers have been willing to host the entire zone for 2 days.  Sister Buhler cooked for all of us and the food was really good.  Monday morning very early we 8 missionaries boarded the ferry for a 3 hour ride to Gran Canaria.  The Buhlers rented a van and picked us all up.  It was P-Day and the boys spent the day playing basketball, ping pong and soccer.  They had a great time together and most of them were sunburned by the end of the day. Mike and I stayed behind, during the soccer game, to clean the kitchen and finish the lunch preparations.

   

 That evening, after a great dinner of pulled pork tacos,  we had a wonderful testimony meeting.  The spirit was beautiful there.  These young men and women are the best!

Here is sister Buheler in her kitchen with the dinner ready to be inhaled. 

 The next day we spent most of the day being taught by the AP's , President Jackson and Brother Denise a member of the district presidency (on the end)  This is all of us.

After the meeting a sweet lady from the Las Palmas branch had prepared a great lunch for all of us. 

This is 5 of the elders from Tenerife.

I borrowed these pictures from sister Buhlers blog (that is linked to mine on the side bar) if you want to see more.  The quality of the pictures in transition wasn't great but I am happy to have them.

 The view across the valley from the back deck of the Old Mission Home where the Buhlers are living

Reed and Laura Buhler the awesome missionary couple manning the JAS on Gran Canaria

CLOSE STUFF

We have been surprised at how few old churches there are in our area.  This is one up the mountain from us.

 Children were practicing for and Easter program in the church.

We ate at this restaurant high up the mountain overlooking the valley.

This is the view from the restaurant window.  We can see our apartment from here.

We hiked along the rocky beach one morning toward a lighthouse, trying it out for a possible hike with our young adult group.  This is the view up the valley.  You can always see lots of old volcanic calderas, like this one, on the left.

This ended up being a longer walk than we wanted that morning, but we were determined to get to the lighthouse.

It is a working lighthouse.  See how small Mike is.  

There is a cave close to us, where once lived a man now called Hermano Pedro.  He is a canonized Saint.  He was born here in in the Tenerife and lived in this preserved cave, but left at age 24 and eventually ended up in Guatemala.  He wanted to become a Priest but couldn't master the material.  He eventually organized a Franciscan order to help the poor. 

The area around the cave has been nicely preserved and fixed up to honor him.  The red flower is a Poinsetta.  There are lots of them cultivated around the island.

TRIP AROUND THE ISLAND

We have been planning to drive around the island and last P-Day we ventured out.  It took us 3 hours driving time.  Parts of the road was climbing a mountain through some steep switchbacks.  The view of the volcano Teide behind us was spectacular.

The ocean waves seemed to be bigger over here and we spent a little time in Puerto de la Cruz

There were maybe 10 swimming pools next to the ocean.  There is no sand on these beaches, just lots of volcanic rock.

The town has an old European feel to it with narrow, cobblestone streets.

There is a beautiful park with a famous 1000 year old tree, which I guess is technically a bush.

The trunk of the tree.

Puerto de la Cruz is a beautiful city and so much greener than our side of the island.

The tree park was full of colorful roaming chickens.  If you know me well you know I love mother hens and baby chicks.

The park had some caves from the indigenous people that lived here and this mummy remains.

 The tree is really huge but it doesn't look like it from this angle.

The valley at the top of the mountain was lush and green.

Wild flowers bloomed everywhere across the valley.

OK, this is it.  The only cleavage you will ever see on me.

A better perspective at how large the tree is.

A closer view of Teide, the peak on the left.

FIRST ACTIVITY - Red Mountain Hike

We are at the "Everything is a first" phase.  On Saturday we climbed Red Mountain again, this time with a group of 11 other members of our branch.  This is our first JAS activity.  7 of the group were young adults and we couldn't be more pleased to get that many participating.  The first week we arrived here we met with Dayde and Valery, two wonderful young adults in the branch, who tried previously to get the group going.  They told us it was pretty much hopeless, because of various issues.  We told them we would give it our all, that we would have good food and lots of fun activities and hopefully we could get it going.  We have had 7 young adults at both of our activities and it was not the same 7 so we have lots of hope.

 

This is our group at the top.  The two men in the middle are brother Mendoza and brother Camargo our Branch President.  Our Missionaries Elder Cloward and Elder Anderson are at the top left.  

The Hike Begins

Luis Illescas giving us all a bit of a show

Valery Linares gave the spiritual message at the top.  She passed around the bible and everyone read parts of the creation, very appropriate, as we sat on top of the world.

 

 

We were worried about the sun but the big problem was the wind.  This beach is famous for its wind and wind surfing.  It was Easter weekend and the wind cooperated as hundreds were there taking advantage of the stiff breeze.

Wind Surfing looked very fun.

 A view of the volcano Teidi on our way up.

We had a picnic by the beach after.  I made chicken croissant sandwiches, carrot sticks, potato salad and rice crispy treats (with my recent find, marshmallows) It reminded me of windy Easter picnics, we used to have in Moab, when I was a kid.  We ate a bit of sand.

Our last windy photo.  Lots of pictures were taken that day.  It was great fun!  We look forward to many more good days together...and hopefully with an even bigger group. 

FIRST NOCHE DE HOGAR (FHE)

 The group at our first Noche De Hogar

On Saturday night we had our first Family Home Evening.  I worked hard to make a nice dinner.  We had it at the home of the Branch President.  We hoped to get more of the young adults out but we had a nice group and it was fun, which was our goal.  I should have had someone else take pictures because I was too distracted with other things to get many.   After dinner we taught them the card game Scum but called it Peón.  It was loud.  I think everyone had fun. 

The Aultmans from Santa Cruz told us they play Jenga and the kids love it so we got a Janga game.  It was good fun.  Everyone cheered and laughed.  Here is Valarie, Ángel, and Dayde.  These girls are the force behind the Young Adult group and better girls don't exist.

Dayde gave the spiritual thought.  At the end she asked for comments and 3 of the young adults bore a beautiful testimony.

Luis on the far right invited his friend Lucia, in the blue and her mother Monica, here next to Mike.  They are not members but had a great time with the group.  Dayde asked Monica to read a scripture in her spiritual thought and she did, gladly.

Brother Mendoza, the branch counselor in charge of JAS, is in the front next to our Branch President Brother Comargo.  It was Valerie,s birthday and Brother Mendoza  brought a birthday cake for her.

 Mike teaching the group to play "Scum" or Peón our Spanish name for it.