The First Week

Warning: This is not a well put together post. Just a bunch of nuggets put together. K, ready....go!

I haven't quite been here a full week, which is quite surprising for me. It feels like this week has taken a month to go by. This may partly be because I missed Sunday night somehow due to the red-eye and then I have been in a whirlwind adventure the rest of the time.

So, to recap. LAST week I moved in with my parents. I put all of my stuff into my old bedroom. I am happy to report that I have a dresser, a two level bookshelf, and one very tall stack of boxes worth of stuff. I think I have a few boxes of books in storage somewhere too. But that plus the instruments are taking up a wall in my old bedroom. Keeping the hoarding gene at bay! Hooray!

Sunday night I flew at 11:45PM to JFK and then from JFK to San Juan, PR. Landed at around 11:00AM. Understandably, I was a bit thrown off when I landed. Felt like I was in a dream when I got here. Good thing I wasn't asked to drive that day.

Went to the mission home, mission office, toured what will soon be my apartment, got the key to my car, met a bunch of people and remember only two of them by name...

Then she brought me to the house to stay for a while, and I tried to crash. I needed to crash. I only kinda crashed. I really crashed that night when I fell asleep and woke up the next afternoon. Yeah.

I slept in the next day as well. We didn't do anything truly remarkable Wednesday.

Thursday morning I cleaned the upstairs. I did a deep clean of the bathrooms...those shower heads were gross!!! They'll be way easy to manage now though. Next time I clean upstairs it will go waaaaay faster. Plus I know where all the important things are now, like plugs.

Friday I cleaned the downstairs. I am considering buying the home a Swiffer WetJet. Mops only work so well. Swiffers actually remove the dirt and leave a streak free clean AND make the place smell nice. I'll be going through a LOT of juice if I do get one, since every room besides the bedrooms are tiled. I am weighing my options, but really...I greatly dislike mops. Even nice mops that are electric steamers, which the house has. Swiffers just work SO MUCH BETTER.

I have picked the girls up from school, taken them to school, and babysat them.

Light first week of work. I'll be helping out with mission things as well, but really, I'm here to help with whatever needs to be done. So if babysitting is it, so be it. :) And I am having kiddo withdrawals after living with the Rogers (I will have to update on that part of my life) and having a week with my nephew, so I really kinda love hanging out with these girls.

Went to Institute Thursday night, which was a little adventure. It's held at the stake center, (which is a square of a building with an atrium in the middle, never seen that before) and is in Spanish. There were 10 people there, one was from the States. I believe all of them speak English, some better than others. There will be another one from the States there next week as well.

There is one English speaking ward on the island and I am lucky enough to be in the ward boundaries. Hooray!! There is a YSA group for the island, but there aren't any branches or wards. Which is how I prefer it, to be perfectly honest.

My calling for the mission is the Mission Staff Coordinator...I think. Basically I will help with meals and whatever needs to be done to make zone conferences, trainings, welcomings and sending aways more friendly. We think I will be officially an employee of the Church, but we are having to work all of that out. That would be nice if I was, because then I could get full insurance benefits through the Church and then life will be WAY awesome. Cause the Church's benefits are kinda amazing.

One of the zones is called the 'Islands of the Sea'. It's my favorite zone title. The mission covers Puerto Rico, the British and US Virgin Islands, and a bunch of the other little islands that complete the Eastern?Lower? Antilles, but not all of them. The French speaking islands for example are not a part of our mission.

The mission office is in the oldest Church building on the island. It was built in the 70's I believe, and now serves only as the mission office/employment center/CES administration and I believe Bishops Storehouse...

Not a very interesting post, but I did want to get that all out there.

Good night and Roll Tide!