Conference, Conference, Conference :)

"My Favorite Picture"

Hello Everyone:D

This week was GREAT! It was absolutely hilarious and I would love to describe it, but I would also love to describe my companion before we might have transfers:) My companion is Hermana Beltran and she is from Colombia. She is 28 years old and will finish her mission in May. I really respect her for her honesty and think her examples in lessons are great for our investigators! 

Hermana Beltran from Colombia

These are the cutest girls ever :)

Their names are Gabby and Danny
and they have the voices of angels.
They really ARE angels :D

Funny: We went to visit a family, and the little kids let us in to help them with their homework. While my companion taught some math, I decided to sweep. While I was sweeping, I discovered their older sister hiding in a closet, haha:) We laughed and talked for a bit and are now, excellent friends! We also had a drawing contest which is added in this email. Needless to say, we decided that I needed drawing lessons, haha!

The Drawing Contest :D

"The Baby", haha :)

Cultural: Another funny moment was when we knocked on a door to meet with a woman, but ended up talking to the nanny because the woman had not returned from work. We were talking for a good 10 minutes when she all of a sudden panicked and told us she needed to get the baby. We thought, great idea until she reappeared with a baby bird in her hands....Perhaphs babysitting priorities are a bit different here for different people:)

One of the cute Hermanas in our zone who has trapped a spider in her bed post with tape, haha :D  She checks on it every night to make sure it is still there; arachnophobia - what a thing, haha :D

I got to see my hija again today as we are in Cochabamba for a leadership conference.  She is doing so well and is one of my dearest friends.  What a blessing that was to see her!

Spiritual: Women's Conference and General Conference were absolutely incredible and I really enjoyed the sessions. I absolutely needed to hear the messages-especially about confidence in God. I love conference talks and I am so excited to apply them to my teachings:D

I love you all. Have the best darn weeks of your lives:D 

Hermana Garff 

We always receive green mandarins for our dessert after lunch.  This is great, but they are green and just not as good for a bit of time, haha :)  One day, we discovered we had 15 mandarines, and contemplated contacting with them. haha!

A Night in Bolivia

Celebrating Women's Conference

Women's Conference - we celebrated at a great restaurant!

Hello Everyone:

This week was incredible, and I absolutely loved Women's Conference! I definitely needed to hear every single one of the talks and I am very excited to apply the talks to my mission!

District Activity

District Activity with the other Hermanas

A Little Hockey in the District

Funny: We had a p-day activity where we played beach volleyball. This was really fun, but my KNEES got absolutely roasted! Of all things, really, haha:)

Cultural: After having been reviewed by the editing committee, this section has been omitted.  You may inquire of Katie regarding its contents at a later time. Rest assured, she has not lost her sense of humor.

Another gringa and I watched conference in English.  What a blessing! :D

Spiritual: We had exchanges this week in Tupiza:) Tupiza is a good 8 hours in bus from Sucre so for 2 nights we had a pretty excellent experience in the bus. It really made us grateful for beds, haha! Exchanges are wonderful becuase we can learn so much from one another during this change in companionship. Specifically, I got to serve with a sweet girl from Idaho who is new. We laughed all day, and it was amazing for me to see just how much energy she radiated when teaching/contacting. Although the language is new, and she is also new to missionary work, I loved seeing her efforts to help the people in her area:D

Have a great week. I love you all!

Con amor, 

Hermana Garff

Things Are Sweet in Sucre

El baptismo de Familia Duran (Juan, Pablo, y Mario)!

Hey Everyone:D

This week was amazing! I was able to grow in so many new ways, and see the hand of God every day:) Specifically, we had 2 baptisms this week, and I was able to help

Nuestra zona jugando volley:D

Funny: I was trying to print out a phrase by Elder Holland in Spanish for our zone conference, but my mind was in a complete WHIRL on p-day because internet time is so limited. Thus, I accidentally printed it in English. I realized this, and hurried to print antoher copy, but realized after we had left that I had printed it in Portugese, haha! Resolutely, I had a gringo help me translate the phrase into Spanish.
Good old gringos:D

We were teaching a lesson to a woman when her niece decided to join us.  Throughout the lesson she was rifling through my bag, and ultimately decided that my water was the best item to enjoy :)

Cultural: I have learned to check expiration dates:) There are little stores about every 10 houses, which is great, only a little sketchy sometimes because the expiration dates are a bit off, haha:D

Zone Conference :D

A picture of exchanges we had with another companionship  I love this picture, because we were all trying to take a picture at once, and Sister Madsen ended up with a completely red face, haha :D

Spriritual: We had 2 baptisms this week and it felt so great! Juan Pablo and his dad, Mario, are such amazing people and have such strong testimonies of the church. My favorite part of the baptism was seeing the bright smiles on their face after their baptisms and hearing their testimonies as well. They are very excited and eager to grow and help in the church!

Bolivian Night in Sucre

No Dragons in Sucre

My New Zone

Hey Everyone:)

This was an incredible week and I learned "oso" much!!! I was able to go on exchanges with two sister trainers and we are going to have 2 baptisms next week:D

Celebrating birthdays here is a bit different:D

Funny: Bolivians celebrate birthdays a bit diferently. There is always a giant cake and the person with the birthday "takes a bite out of the cake" but in reality, everyone knows that their face gets smashed into the cake when they go to take a bite. It is awesome! 

There are pigs in this area!

Cultural: Our area is absolutely beautiful and it is filled with livestock! I have seen pigs, goats, chickens, cows and sheep! It is amazing and I am so happy to be here (with the exception that I haven`t seen any dragons....;()

A CUTE girl whose parents were recently baptized as of a month ago.  Her name is Gabby and my companion and I love her TO DEATH!

Spiritual: Because I am serving as a sister training leader, we get to have exchanges with the other sisters. This week we had two exchanges where I got to serve in two different areas. The people are incredible just about everywhere here, but what I loved was the strong desire that the sister trainers had for their companions and the strong desire they have to serve the people in their area. The sisters in my district are incredible and I love and will learn so much from them!

A cute girl from one of the pensionistas during intercambios.  She loves to "jump high" and she loves it when we take pictures of her...so I have a lot on my camera, haha!

It looks like we cooked something, but in reality, we just washed her dishes and threw on some aprons, haha:D

I love you all so much:) Thanks for your love and support!

Hermana Garff

We All Need 4 Ducks and "Special Spanish"

Note: In her new area, the computers do not accommodate Katie's photo memory card.  She has promised to send more pictures next week.

HELLO Everyone:D

I am in Sucre and it is absolutely BEAUTIFUL! I love the people, the culture, the food, todo!:D What I love the most is that there are no fences:) I served in Ingavi, which was probably the wealthiest area in Bolivia. It was wonderful and I loved it, but there are NO FENCES to keep us from reaching the people!

Funny: We were teaching the Restoration one day and I was likening the 4 principles we need to that of a chair (we need 4 chair legs/4 principles to be able to sit down (or have a strong foundation in the church). However, I accidentally said we need 4 "patos" (no "patas")....which means that we need 4 DUCKS to sit comfortably in a chair...solid, haha!

Cultural: The people hear are WONDERFUL, but the house development is a little slower. Hardly anybody in Sucre has a functioning bathroom or a running shower with hot water. Gratefully, we have both of those, but WOW! That was definitely a shock to me!

Spiritual: God has blessed me abundantly with the language. Por FIN I feel like I can understand just about anyone and I can say just about anything....but with "special" Spanish, haha:D

Happy Carnival!

Angela's Baptism

Hello Everybody! Happy Carnival!:D

This week was very special. We received our new transfer information, and I will be serving in Sucre as one of the two sister training leaders in both Sucre and Tupiza. I am so excited and feel so happy to know that God has confidence that I can help build the God by serving in this calling:D

We painted one of our investigator's houses with the Elders

Funny: It rained a TON on Tuesday. We had a 10 minute walk to the church, and during these 10 minutes, we were absolutely 100% SOAKED! Because we were covered from head to toe in water, we decided to make the most of things, and we jumped high and hard into every puddle that we saw:D

Jumping in the rain puddles :D

Cultural: Happy Carnival:D Carnival is where there are tons of dances in the street, people decorate their houses with lots of colors and everyone douses each other with water to "chase away the devils":D

 Hermana Condori y yo at the last district meeting juntas;( 

Spiritual: We had two baptisms this week!:D The first was Angela and the second, Carlos Fernando. They are both 8 years old and were both very excited for their baptisms. My favorite part of the baptisms was their testimonies in the end because they thanked everyone for coming and described their decision to be baptised. So cool!

Carlos' & Fernando's Baptism

These baptisms were very special and SUCH miracles because Hermana Condori and I had been working, praying and fasting a ton to have 1 baptism, but God blessed us with 2!

Hermana Condori`s family sent her a package and they sent a sweet hat from Peru to me:D
We are so grateful to Hermana Condori!  Katie has loved serving with her.  She is a wonderful missionary and Katie will really miss her!

Have a great week. I love you all so much!

Hermana Garff 

Music, Sasha and Valentines

This week I accompanied the Young Women in my ward in their song festival with all of the other young women.  It was so neat because I could tell they loved it!

Happy Valentine´s Day:D

This week was incredible for lots of different reasons, but my favorite being that we are going to have 2 baptisms next week!!

Funny: This week was a little funny because there was tons of music! I accompanied the YW in my ward for their music festival. We preformed "He Sent His Son." I also acompanied the second counselor in our ward for sacrament meeting. He sang "Love at Home," and I LOVED accompanying him, because he was VERY excited to sing and happy to share his talent:D Lastly, I accompanied a group of missionaries in our zone conference. We sang "Be Still my Soul" and this too was very powerful:D

I accompanied these missionaries in our Zone Conference.  They sang "Be Still My Soul" and it was beautiful :D
It was so great to be a part of this!

Here is another beautiful picture of the celestial skies here!

Cultural: CARNIVAL:D This is a HUGE holiday here where people douse each other with water in the streets at any time and at anyone. Carnival is next week, but the celebrations have started this week and it is pretty crazy:D As we were walking past one of the grand events, a little girl doused us pretty well. Wow, I can´t wait for next week, haha:D

This is one of the set ups of a huge festival here called "Carnival".  Carnival will take place next week.  It is a HUGE celebration where everyone throws water at one another.  A little girl sprayed us pretty well when we were walking by ;D

There is a ton of fresh juice sold on the street and it tastes SO good!
The only problem is that the people selling the juice never want to take a picture with us, haha :D

Spiritual: This week we are expecting two baptisms: an 8 year old from a less active family who is going to be baptized by his dad:) and another 8 year old girl from out ward.  We have been meeting with her for the past few weeks because her family really wanted her to be baptized, but she had lots of doubts.  Now, she is excited, ready, and anxious to be baptized and receive the grand gift of the Holy Ghost:)

This is a picture of me and a dog named Sasha.  We are not friends, haha!  We had a golden investigator, but Sasha always interrupted the lessons because she wanted to play.  Now we can't get ahold of the golden investigator.
So yes, we are not friends ;)

We had a ward activity this week called Minute To Win It.  The members LOVED it and our investigators did too...

This is one of our investigators, Javier.  He is "super-awesome", and as we discovered, also very competitive, haha!  He was very proud that we won, so he asked us to take a picture :D

My companion can cook like a champ.  I am so lucky!

I love you all!  Thank you so much for your love, emails and support.  Sorry it I can't always respond right away - please just know that it always makes me smile to see emails from such great people!!

Love,

Hermana Garff

My Companion and I were each other's Valentine twin;)

Happy Valentine's Day :D

pic1: There is tons of fresh juice in the street and it tastes SO good! The only problem is that the people selling the juice never want to take a picture with us, haha:D

pic 2: This week I accompanied the Young Women in my ward in their song festival with all of the other young women. It was so neat because I could tell they loved it!

pic 3: This is one of the set ups of a huge festival here called "Carnival". Carnival will take place next week, but it is a HUGE celebration where everyone throws water at one another. A little girl sprayed us pretty well when we were walking by;D

pic 4: Here is another beautiful picture of the Celestial skies here!

pic 5: We had a ward activity this week called minute to win it. The members LOVED it and our investigators too...

pic 6: This is one of our investigators, Javier. He is super awesome, and as we discovered, also very competitive, haha! He was super proud that we won, so he asked us to take a picture:D

pic 7: This is a picture of me and a dog named Sasha. We are not friends, haha! We had a golden investigator, but she always interrupted the lesson because she wanted to play. Now we can´t get ahold of the golden investigator, so yes. We are not friends;)

pic 8: My companion can cook like a champ. I am so lucky!

pic 9: I accompanied these missionaries in our zone conference. They sung "Be still my soul" and it was beautiful:D So great to be apart of it!

pic 10: My companion and I were each other´s Valentine twin;)

pic 11: Happy Valentine´s Day:DHappy Valentine´s Day:D