Week 4

Hola Famila and Amigos!

      Well week four here at the beautiful provo MTC west campus, I've officially been here a month! I cant believe I only have 17 more of these:( it feels like the time has flown! I miss everyone alot, but when you learn as much as I do in one day the days are literally hazey. I want to thank everyone who wrote me letters, emails, pictures, dear elders, cards and sent packages this week. Thanks for not forgetting me yet;) but really, it means so much to me and I am truly honored and blessed to have you all in my life and thinking about me. I love you!!

Wow, I cant even describe how extremely lucky I am to be here at the MTC a this time, it is truly exciting! All of the new mission presidents have been on campus this week for their training with the first presidency and the quorum of the 12! It has been so great. I am also blessed to be here at this specific time because I am convinced that I have the best zone, district, teachers, devotionals, branch presidency and ESPECIALLY companions of all time! I just love all of them!! I feel like such a spiritual infant compared to all them and I learn from their examples, comments, and personal experiences everyday. I'm not even kidding when I say I have the Best of the Best!! Also, I get to be here on the 4th of July, and I'm pretty sure we get to watch the fireworks from stadium of fire that night, it's like a personal goodbye America party for us! Anyways, I've had so, so many spiritual experiences I'd like to share so let me get right ino it.

This sunday we had probably the most inspiring, and hilarious, devo yet! Sister Janice Kapp Perry (an incredible music writer for the church) came to speak to us about music and how we can bring the spirit with something as simple as a primary song. Her and her husband had the whole MTC roaring with laughter as together they shared with us the story of how they met through music, their family song and the spiritual experiences they and their family have all shared through writing and creating music together. At the end we sang the classic duet of "As Sisters in Zion"  and "Helamans Army" as missionaries but we used Sister Perrys new sister missionary words that we sing every week in relief society. I cant remember the whole song but this is a part of the last verse and it's my favorite part..."We go forth enlisted with Helamans army, in numbers much greater then ever before. We go to the nations (awkward... i forgot this line),  declaring truth is restored!". Then we sang the We are as the armies of helaman part again all together, I have never felt the spirit so strong as I did be a part of that incredible missionary choir. 

As if that wasnt enough spiritual uplifting for one day the following tuesday we had another awesome devo. You'll remember I told ya'll the quorum of the 12 and 1st presidency was on campus so we knew it would be someone real special. We were right! We got to hear from Elder D. Todd Christofferson!! Thats our 3rd apostle in a row. AND... there were 5 other apostles sitting on the stand also! Including David A. Bednar, M. Russell Ballard (who we heard from last week :)), Dallin H. Oaks, Neil L. Anderson, and Russell M. Nelson. I felt like I was in Heaven, But literally. Thats probably as close as I've ever been in my life! Elder Christofferson shared a wonderful message about the worth of souls based on the scripture mastery in D and C 18: 10. It was so powerful and I could basically feel waves of the spirit rolling off him. Some of my favorite quotes from his talk were: from C.s. Lewis: "There are no ordinary people", you have never talked to a mere mortal in your life. We spend our days in the presence of people who all have the potential to become Gods and Goddesses'. Another good one was, " Satan tries to convince us that the value of our souls are irreparably damaged and destroyed by sin, this is the greatest lie of all". and last, " The one who demands such high expectations of us will always be the one there to help us attain them". I was so impressed with his talk because he made it a point that he wasnt only talking to us about our future investigators he was sharing that with us. Our souls are precious and of worth, my soul. Christ loves my battered, care worn, and imperfect soul and it is by his goodness, grace and atonement that I can become whole, spotless and perfect before him. And this, this marvelous message of hope and forgiveness, is what I get to share with the beautiful people of my beloved Costa Rica! Could a girl get any more blessed?? you think I would say no. But thats not even the end of it. My Father in Heaven chose to bless me even more this week in private ways.

It might be hard to believe from the way I talk about how wonderful the MTC is, but sometimes thee's hard days, sometimes there's struggles and sometimes you feel a little discouraged. But whenever I have felt this way the Lord has done something, for me personally, to perk my spirit right back up! For example, the other day I was in the gym and I was really tired and sore from the previous day but I knew I needed to work out to feel good the rest of the week. So I got up on my favorite elliptical and started slowly to begin a workout. At one point I looked up and on the exercise bike in front of me someone had left their flash cards on it facing in my direction. The card on top said one simple phrase, in Spanish none the less.. "Valle la Pena". Which means in English, "It will all be worth it." From then on I could do my whole workout focusing on those words and knowing that everything I was doing: in the Gym, at the MTC, on my mission, will all be worth it!   A second experience I had was when I was kind of frustrated and walking back to class. I'd had a lot to deal with and was really exhausted and frustrated because I cant speak spanish haha. Well this Elder was walking behind me and reading a letter out loud and this is what I heard "Now remember, you are on the Lords Errand. It's not about you, it's about him. But, because you are on his Errand you are Entitled to his help". I realized hey, I'm not here alone. I am entitled to His help!! I also remembered sister Perry reminding us of a line from one of her songs " Pray, he is there. Speak, he is listening. You ARE his child. His love, now surrounds you". So I said a pathetic little prayer and I was able to enjoy the rest of my day and learn many important things! This is how I know the Lord loves and cares for me. He knows my needs before I do and places something in my path to help me overcome every trial I face.

I'd like to just thank everyone really quick for the role you've had in my life up until this point. Each person who is reading this has helped me and given me experience to be who I am. Everyday when we're teaching our investigators I share a story or a principle or a quote or a memory that I have learned from you!! Thank you for helping me and assisting me in achieving the Lords Work and Glory: To Bring to pass the immortality and Eternal Life of man. Because this is truly what It's all about. There is no greater work to be doing.

Also, I feel an urgent need to thank everyone who is continually blessing the lives of my dear, dear family while I'm here, having the time of my life! Thank you for taking care of them. Thank you for your friendships, your service projects your thoughtful prayers. The Kugath family is so ridiculously blessed by their ward, neighbors, friends, relatives and basically everyone who meets them. I especially am aware and grateful to you. The Lord sees your service and love to my family and he will help me to pay you back for it. Every time my mom sends me a letter she relates to me another miracle that has happened in their lives that has been administered by Heavenly Father through you!! From the bottom of my Heart, Thank You and may God bless you for blessing us.

Elder Christofferson left us with this promise, " Your faith in God can only be matched by his faith in you".... But I think you guys come pretty close;) Thank you for having faith in me! I wont let you down!! You're always in my prayers!       

All My Love,

       Hermana Kugath

Week 3

Hola again Family and Friends!

    Wow what a beautiful week here at the MTC! I am so grateful for this opportunity I cant even really express it. Well finally in the third week this has started to feel like my real life instead of "playing missionary" I really feel like one! This week has been a rollercoaster for me and my companions. We've gone with days of 6 teaching appointments, doctors visits, days where we only teach once or twice and finally.... a whole day without mail! Yep, it happened. However most of what we go through here is happy, spiritual and uplifting. 

This week I've been thinking alot about all the wonderful men in my life. My daddy, Grandpa and Grandfather of course are right up there! How grateful I am to have such wonderful priesthood leaders in my life. And Happy Fathers day!! I know I'm a bit late, please pardon my tardiness... but know that I love you, miss you and think of you fondly. Grandfather has especially been on my mind. I miss him alot but because of the wonderful knowledge I have of my Heavenly Fathers amazing plan I atleast dont have to worry about him. I know where he is and what hes doing, and it the same thing that I'm doing.. Missionary work! I also want to thank all my awesome examples of priesthood holders and missionaries. I have been so blessed to watch countless numbers of faithful friends, cousins, classmates, "guy friends" and others go out and return from serving hinirable full time missions. Thank you for your example to me and thank you for your service to our savior. I love you for it!

I'd like to throw out a quick thank you to everyone for the packages and letters that I have recieved this week. I LOVE, love love love to hear about your lives and the fact that youre thinking of me is so incredibly kind. Thank you for the uplifting messages and stories. Nana- Thank you again for more cookies!! My zone absolutely loves you and they call you the Cookie Queen because they're all so delicious, and such a fun variety of kinds! Thanks:)   Mommy and family thank you for my package, you know just how to brighten my day! Tell me I'm skinny and Beautiful and throw chips at me! MMM my companions and I thank you for feeding our late night cravings. Thank you for the letters, post cards (lexi!), pictures, dear elders and most especially the prayers. I cant tell you how much I appreciate and need your prayers. Learning a language is well.... not easy. And I know that I'm recieving extra help because of all the faithful prayers from my loved ones. Keep em comin por favor;) 

So let me tell you a little bit about my week. Pretty much thursday, friday and saturday we study, teach lessons and practice spanish. But the weekends get a little funner. On Sunday we had an awesome devotional by Sheri Dew. She talked to us about the Power of Gods Grace in our lives. She is such an interesting and inspirational woman. She shared some beautiful insights about the Savior, his atonement and how we gain access to this healing power. She said "Grace helps you do things you can not do on your own. for example: theres two ways to serve your mission. 1. on your own, when you know youre bound to fail. or 2. with heavenly help, when you know you cannot loose." I love the fact that I have unlimited access to Gods Grace and help through my elder Brother Jesus Christ. She also said "Jesus rarely moves the mountain out of our way, but he will always help us to climb them". Her talk was incredible and helped me come to understand the nature of my Savior a bit more. 

Also on Sunday we had an awesome Sacrament meeting. You know how they do that thing when they call a random person and have them speak.... yep you guessed it, me. Luckily I had prepared thoughts on Baptism so it wasnt awful. But the rest of the meeting was Jam packed with spiritual thoughts. At the end districts A and B sang God be with you till we meet again, because they were leaving for the field the next morning. I cried. Its crazy because I'd just met these Elders and Sisters a few, literally, weeks earlier and now I was so sad at the thought of not being with them anymore, But the Lord needs them in the field. Thats why were here afterall, but I felt a little bit of what I feel was how God loves his children. I'll miss those Districts, but we all need to move upward and onward. 

Another cool thing that happened this week was our comanionship got to go out into the "real world" haha. My companion Hermana Bratt needed to go to an eye appointment so we got to go with her. As we walked, and I kid you not, 1 block... 6 or 7 cars honked, everyone waved and a soccer team asked us to say a prayer with them before their game. I love being a Missionary!! All of a sudden everyone in Utah knows who you are and Loves you! We even get half off at Jamba Juice:) Anyways, it was just a fun expirience to be somewhere not on campus for an hour or so, we felt all "grown up" again. 

Now for a total highlight of the week... for the Second time in a row an Apostle has come to speak to us on Tuesday night Devo! Elder Ballard was here and wow oh wow.. He. Is. Awesome. Of course I already knew that, but yesterday was a double testimony. We are so blessed to be part of the church led by Living apostles of the Lord Jesus Christ. Seriously, how lucky are we?? Some of my favorite things from his talk were "Be wise like serpents but as harmless as doves". He taught us oh to be smart and successful missionaries. He also talked about Never, never being ashamed of the Church, its leaders or its principles. I love the church and everything it does and stands for, thats why I'm here after all! Another awesome quote was" Keep your eyes on the bretheren. we will not, we CAN NOT fail you.". These men are called of God. Nothing the world says or does invalidates them because theyre are our direct line of communication with the creator of the World. A third thing I loved was he said was" people today are so worried about "being on the wrong side of history", History is not our judge, God is our Judge. Neither is public opinion our Judge, God is our Judge.". I know that in the world there are many differences and wars of opinions going on at this time in history, but my testimony is rooted in my savior. Luckily for me I believe that, if the prophet says so.... thats all I need to know. 

Just real quick I wanted to tell you about our investigators.. as of now were teaching 6 people. Mercedes, Alejandro, Jose, Jose Luise, Luisa, and a 6th surprise lesson every week. Its really fun and gives us lots of expirience and we learn so much about how to and how not to teach. Its a little bit scary beacause, like I said earlier, we're never really sure If theyre real investigators or member actors. But I love them all anyways and am grateful for the service they provide in helping us learn. 

I am so grateful for this gospel and for the message of hope and peace it offers to everyone. I love my heavenly father and my savior Jesus Christ. I am so, so blessed to be his personal servant at this time in my life and look forward to sharing opportunities of joyful service with and to his many beautiful, wonderful people in Costa Rica. Know that I'm praying for you all and miss you bunches! until next week!!

All my Love- Hermana Kugath

Week 2

Hola Again my Family and Friends!!
    2 weeks down here at the MTC and only 4 more to go!! Its been another beautiful, inspiring and spiritual week for me and I am so excited to tell you all about it! But first, please excuse any spelling, grammer and language mistakes. First of all because I'm trying to sort out my English from my Spanish and second of all because this hour to email is literally the single most stressful hour of my week here. I am trying to type as fast as I can to say all that I need to say so I dont really worry about my mistakes so forgive me all you grammar natzies out there:)  

-Sister Love-

   Well I'd like to begin by explaining a few things that wernt really clear in my letter from last week. I'm really sorry I couldnt send any pictures last week, my camera was rebelling so I couldnt send any, hopefully it will work this week! second, here is my MTC mailing address for those of you who asked for it:   Hermana Aleena Catherine Kugath, July 8th CRA-SJO, 2023 North 900 East, Unit 830, Provo Utah, 84602. Physical mail is truly cherished;) Third of all lets talk about our investigators. Here on campus we teach about 6-8 lessons a week. The scary thing is... they dont tell us weather theyre member actors or REAL LIFE INVESTIGATORS!! We assume that we have some of both, but we treat them all as if they were all real. On top of that we teach our teachers also so they can give us feed back and suggestions on how to better teach that lesson (so those ones at least we know are members haha). Its very fun but also very difficult. They ask you the hard questions that would be difficult for a 19 year old to answer in their native language but then expect you to find a way to communicate your, thoughts and feelings in SPANISH! but esta bien (it's okay) because we really don need the practice. 

Second I'd like to take a second and give a huge shout out to my lovely nana kugath!! It just so happens that on my hardest and most discouraging day here so far (I was having alot of.. personal... issues) I recieved a gigantic box of, I kid you not, The largest and most delicious sugar cookies I have ever had the priveledge of eating. After eating 1 or 2 or...5, I felt so much better and could continue on in my studies.However there were so many i had to enlist my whoel zone to help me finish them!isnt it

wonderful how the Lord is already aware of our needs before we are and sends one of his earthly angels to answer that need. So thank you Nana! I,  my companions, my district... even my zone all thank you for your delicious cookies.

Now about the rest of my week, its funny, but so much happens here in one day that you cant even remember what day it happened on. for example, I was sharing a thought in class about a thought my companions and I had thought about, I began by saying "a couple of days ago at breatfast my companions and i talked about this same thing.... my hermana cook leaned over and whispered, "hermana that was this morning!". I was shocked.. Seriously, one day feels like a whole week. but one week only feels like a day.. it is the oddest sensation.

 

One of the verybest parts of this week happened on Sunday night at devotional. I got to see one of my very close darling friends. Mary Lundin!!! This sweet friend entered the MTC on last wednesday and I hadnt had a chance to find her until Sunday night. Yay for friends in the MTC!! theres a couple of other people from my highschool that are here, but mary is my closest. It was the best to finally see someone I knew and who knew me! again, tender mercies of the Lord. but wait, it doesnt stop there! We had a very powerful devo sunday night followed up by another miraculous video of my very favorite Jeffrey R. Holland. We watched the video of his thanksgiving devotional back in 2012 just after the age change and holy bananagrams! Thats why I love Sundays here, we are literally stuffed with the spirit all day long. His talk was about being born in this the last generation. my favortie quote says " Every other age and dispensation knew that they would loose. Every prophet of old looked forward in hope at THIS generation of missionaries. They saw us and knew we were destined to finally win. This generation will Not Loose, You Will Not Fail!". Wow right?? for someone whose as much of a sports enthusiast as I am, going into a game and already knowing that you would come out victorious is incredible. there is no doubt, this dispensation will win the war against Satan, of that I have no doubt. My other very favorite quote was "If there comes a time when you just cant do it anymore. You cant do it for your mommy or daddy, you cant do it for the prophet, you cant even do it for yourself... Do it for the Son of God". What greater motivation do we need? Do it for the Son of God. 

I wish that I could write each and every spiritual experience I've had while being here, but it would take you weeks to read it and years for me to write it! so I'm really just sharing my favorites. Another one from this week is on Tuesday Devotional we got to hear Elder Quinton L Cook speak to us. I was literally 1 row away from an Apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ! That was awesome. One of the most interesting things he said was " in the records we have of the risen Lord (christ after the ressureccion) his message is one of almost exclusively missionary work." "Lovest thou me? Feed My Sheep". This is why I'm out here. The Lord knew that there are people, perhaps only 1 person, or maybe just myself... but someone needs me here and so thats why I'm so anxiously engagaed. Elder Holland ONce said: The most important tying in the universe is saving a human soul". Thats what God spends all his time doing, so why cant I give a few measly whole hearted months?? 

I am so pleased to hear in all of the letters about the wonderful blessings and expiriences you all get to have back home! This church truly is one of miracles. I've come to realize in my short time here that the Lord needs more from me then  what I can currently give him. He needs me to learn better, think better and be better, but the only way I can become what he needs of me is through the atonement of his only begotten son. Christ really can, and Will, help us through any trial, change any behavior, repent of any sin, and become more then what we could ever make of our selves. I am so blessed to be surrounded by such supportive family and friends who allow and help me to change. So thank you all:) 

Just a few sidenotes and fun things about this week: 1. our minds are truly quickened by the spirit, we were blessed to memorize the entire First vision in one week, In Spanish! yay!.   2. We've began playing volleyball with our zone during gym time.. im not sure what happened, but Im far better now then I ever was in high school. odd? yes.  3. This week we also got to teach mini lessons to our companions and really talk through our struggles together. I really can turn to them for anything now and It's only been a few weeks. I love them! The spirit was as trong in our mini lessons as it was hearing from an apostle of the Lord. 4. Our Spanish really is getting better!! It feels slowly, but in just 2 weeks I'm able to communicate, pray, bear my testimony, just chat and even make jokes!! I say alot of dumb and incorrect things, but its coming! 5. Relief society was so so special! They took the song as sisters in zion and made New Missionary words! Its is beautiful. I am a member of the Worlds largest womens organization!! how cool is that??

Well I need to go baptize people... Just kidding, but really. Thank you again for all your letters, emails, paackages, thoughts and prayers. We Can feel them :) I pray for you all in every prayer I say here... which is like 65 a day so I'm sending some back to you! Elder Cook promised us on Tuesday that Everybody in our lives, past future and present, will be blessed by Our missions. I'm holding him and my Heavenly Father accountable for that promise! I love you all!

   All my Love-

         Hermana Kugath

Week 1

Mi Quire and most precious family and friends,

   HOLA!!!!!! It's me Hermana Kugath:) I have officially survived 1 week here at the MTC. Wednesdays are my p-day so you can expect to hear from me about this time every week.
First let me start by saying thank you thank you thank you so much for all of the letters and dear elders ive recieved this week. You cant know how much they mean to me and how excited i am to recieve them! mail time is a blessing. However there is just one thing i need to tell you guys.... When i entered the MTC I made the decision that I was going to be as obedient as I could be because I know that the Lord will bless me, my companions and my district for doing so. One rule I learned (and am completely heartbroken about!:() is that we are only suppose to communicate - so email and hand written letters- with famil and friends on p day.. and so, in the spirit of obedience, my companions and I will only be writing any and all letters on wedensdays. But i don want everyone to know that i do recieve, read and cherish Each and Every letter and not I recieve. Okay... now that thats out of the way, I'm sure you all want to know what the MTC is really like, Verdad? (true.)

So first one thing you need to know is that I am on whats called West campus. Its really incredible for a number of reasons. 1.West campus is entirely Spanish speaking. everyone says Hola instead of hello and you can talk to anyone because were all speaking the same language. Its as close to real language immersion as you can get in Utah  2. we live in the wyview apartments and sooooo we have showers in our apartments!!! its not dorm style like the main campus MTC (which is super nice especially for us because were in a trio so we have the apartment to ourselves and thus only have to share the bathroom with 3 of us instead of 6 hermanas.)

 So heres a run down of my daily schedule:
  I wake up at 6:30 say morning prayers and get ready for the day.
at 7:30 we go to breakfast in the cafeteria.
8:00 is called study cycle in our classrooms. we do 1 hour of personal studay, 1 hour of companionship study and 1 hour of laugague study. thats our first block.
At 11:30 we got to gym time, which to me is the most sacred time because we finally get to work out!!! most of the time we go work out on the elliptical, bikes, free weights or just like sit ups push ups etc.
after gym time we get a sack lunch (cause theyre wayyyy healthier then whats being served in the cafeteria) and got back to the apartment to eat and have some personal time
at 2:00 its back to the class room where one of our teachers (hermanos bliler or meek) will help us to prepare for our "investigator lesson that evening. we also do spanish practice, grammar, learning etc for 3 hours until dinner.
5:20 is dinner and its usually the best meal of the day.
6:00 its back to the classroom where we again study and/or teach a lesson to an investigator.
9-9:15 we plan the next day
by 9:30 were back at our apartment and getting ready for bed
at 10 my companions and I get together to do what we call question of the day. its a fun thing we use to get to know each other better. Last night for example we told the stories of how our parents met. we also have companionship prayer.
10:15-10:30 is quiet time when we all write in our journals and say our personal prayers
and 10:30 is lights out!
There you go, the typical schedule for a missionary here at west campus.
basically we study/teach for about 9 hours a day, eat, workout, pray and sleep. you would not believe how much we pray here!! its awesome. we pray and sing a hymn before every class, lesson, devo, meeting, everything. it gives us a lot of practice because we say all our prayers in spanish. Si, I can do that already!

1 Thing i have to say is I'm sorry if I throw a spanish word in here or there in my letters. were asked to speak as much of our laguage as possible every day and so I'm getting used to saying certain things in spanish instead of English. Its incredible how much I've learned in just one week here! Kind of scary actually.. so sorry if theres some words you dont understand, theyre most likely Spanish.

Now on to something much more interesting! Mis Companeras!! Like I mentioned, I am currently in a trio and will be for the durration of the MTC. And thank heavens I am!!! My 2 comapanions are just exactly what I needed. We get along marvelously while still challenging and helping each other to be better at everything. Their names are Hermana Cook and Hermana Bratt (like brawt not Brat). and they are absolutely wonderful. Hermana Cook and I met on facebook before we came here but hermana bratt was a surprise for us both. theyre both from here in Utah, one from sandy and one from provo. Fortunately theyre both far more spiritual then I am and much better at the langauge too so I'm able to learn from them and their examples constantly each day. I love them already!

In my district theres our trio and the elders trio. The elders names are elder kepo'o (from Hawaii), Rodriguz (from las vegas) and workman (from texas). Elders kepo'o and rodriguz will be going to Costa Rica with us but elder workman is going to panama. We get along really well as a group and the elders are funny so it balances out our seriousness as sister. Not to mention we have the best teachers in the entire MTC! Hermano Bliler is our main spanish teacher but hermanos meek and thoresen come help sometimes. They almost never speak any english to us. the first day we walked in they literally didnt speak a word of english, that was overwhelming. but now when we got to class we can understand enough to get the jist of what hes saying. No one would believe how much we learn here. Everyday we memorize new vocabulary and figure our how to put sentences together. During gym and lunch time my companions and I only speak spanish (well spanglish) and were actually really good at it! Most of what we say is silly though.. when we get into lessons its really hard though because our investigators talk really fast and we never know the words we want to use to respond so it also gets a little frustrating.

But I tell you what, Sundays make it all worth it! If you can make it to sunday youre home free. I dont think i've ever had a sunday like this past one was. It was perfect. fast sunday of course.... but iwasnt even hungry until right before dinner! On fast sundays we have whats called mission conference, its a broadcast from main campus and all the MTC presidency speaks to us, its kind of like stake conference. after that we had sacrament meeting with our branch. Were the great branch at the MTC! no I'm not being prideful, just literal. We're branch number 149 and there is no branch greater (or higher) then 149. Also our "branch" is our zone and our zone is about 4 districts so theres maybe 30 missionaries plus branch presidency members. Anyways, sacrament meeting was awesome because it was testimony meeting. We also got introduced as new members. Then we had personal study, sunday walk and devo. Devo was really good but what I really want to talk about was the video we got to watch after that. It was president Bednars address to the MTC las christmas and holy guacamole it knocked my socks off!! it was exactly what me and my companions needed to hear. He talked alot about "Cookie monster" attitudes... (i want baptisms now, i want investigators now, i want to learn the language now)  and we learned that its not about us. he said" get over yourself so the lord can work through you" which was interesting because we really had been stressing about the whole spanish thing... he also taught us about turning out. whenever Christ was in a trying, difficult, or painful situation he always "turned out' to help others. Even in the aGraden of gethsemane and on the Cross he turned out and took care of his apostles, his mother, the man whose ear peter cut off, the thieves who hung on the crosses next to him. he was always turning outwards. Thats the attitude I'm trying to adopt here and on my mission. I'm trying to "get over myself" and turn out. Yo se que Jesu Cristo es el redentor y mi elsalvador. yo se que el es su iglesia. I am so grateful for my missiona call and you, my beloved family and friends for supporting me. Thank you again!!! I'll write next wednesday (I'm also writing letter letters today! yay!!)

   All My Love-    Hermana Kugath

Here we go! I am officially a Missionary.

Well Dear Family,

We wanted to thank you for all of your support. Hermana (sister in Spanish) Aleena Kugath was safely delivered to the MTC (Missionary Training Center) on Wednesday in Provo, Utah, where she will begin her mission by spending the next six weeks studying the Spanish language and also ways to serve and teach the scriptures and the gospel of Jesus Christ. Then on July 8th, she will leave for Costa Rica where she will serve for the next 18 months (until about Thanksgiving 2015) Many people have asked me they can write and get updates, so her is that information:

While she is in the MTC: 
(May 28th - July 8th)

Dear Elder:

There is a free service that will allow you to write a letter, they then print that letter and deliver it to the MTC that very day! Here is the link, when you get to that site,

http://www.dearelder.com/

Hermana Aleena Kugath

Unit# 830

Mission Code: CRA-SJ0

Estimated MTC Departure Date: 07/08/2014

While in Costa rica (after July 8th)

Letters:

Sister Aleena Catherine Kugath

Costa Rica San Jose Mission

Apartado Postal 249-2010

San Jose, Costa Rica

Packages:

Sister Aleena Catherine Kugath

Costa Rica San Jose Mission

De la Pops de Curridabat

500mts, sur, Officina Isquienera

Edificio Trebol, Local #6

San Jose, Costa Rica

This picture was taken right before I got set apart

Shopping for the Mission!

Often times blessings come in disguise... When I received my call my packet said leaving May 28th! I was a little surprised because I had put "available immediately" on my papers. But little did I know I would need every extra second I could get to shop, organize, and pack!! My mom and I tried really hard to find modest, mission standard outfits that were still pretty and practical. I think we nailed it! My best buddy Kam and I played dress up the day before I left to show off all our hard work. For this interested, I found most of my clothes at:

  -Downeast
  -Dillard's
  -eshakti.com
  -Dorthy Perkins
  -Lands end
  -Kohls    (They're workout section is perfect!!!!)
  -Maurice's
  -Christopher Banks
  -Latter Day Sister Missionary
  -Payless, Chaco, and (I can't believe I'm saying this)  Crocs.  For shoes

It was a girls dream come true. 4 months of continuous shopping and a whole new wardrobe!! I know that part of becoming a missionary is looking the part and bringing the spirit with us through our appearance and actions. Thanks to everyone for helping get it all together and a special shout out to Kamie for being my beautiful Model! (I told you it wouldn't be weird.... Haha).   

All my love! - Hermana Kugath