Queridos Amigos y Familia,
       I realize that this is the last email I will write to you all
as Hermana Schmidt and that the next time something goes up onto the
blog it will be of my return home. So, I will try to make this a good
email about the great week my companion, Hermana Aguilar, and I have
had.
        After our excursion to San Juan on Monday, that included a lot
of hills and steps, we ran up another hill were we had a Family Home
Evening with a recent convert of the church, with her son our ward
mission leader. We taught the Ten Commandments and did it as a memory
game. Whoever made the match with the commandment and the number that
corresponded to it had to explain the commandment. I loved being able
to hear as everyone bore testimony of the commandments and why they
are important. We went home very happy and very tired. Then, we
received an phone call from our district leader saying that we would
have our district meeting Wednesday morning instead of Tuesday.
"Nooooooo" I thought. I had a companionship exchange to do and now I
would have to switch it around.
      So, Tuesday morning my companion left for San Sebastián while
Hermana Handy came to be with me in Bilbao. We went and talked with
people in a park nearby and had a lot of good conversations and ended
up finding a man from Colombia who was interested in learning more. On
our way back to the apartment to eat lunch, we were stopped by two
young men who were missionaries of a different church. We invited them
to come to a baptism that was on Saturday and quickly left. That same
day, we went and passed by some people and in one apartment we rung
the intercom and they allowed us in the building. Then all of a sudden
we heard a dog barking and running out of the door we were going to
knock. Hermana Handy screamed, but the dog was harmless. The lady we
were looking for was not at home, but we talked to her friend and she
seemed really interested.
      On Thursday we did another companionship exchange and I went to
Santander to be with Hermana Tamayo. We had a visit with a young girl
whom I taught when I was in Santander. When she first saw me she
didn't seem to recognize who I was, but when I asked if she remembered
me she stared at me for a second and then her eyes got big as she
realized who I was. She quickly gave me a hug and started to tell me
about all the things that had gone on in these past five months. She
is going to be baptized soon! She was so excited to announce it too.
After our visit with her, we went and visited Carolina, who was
baptized when I was in Santander. It was so good to see her again.
Seems as though life is changing a lot for them and they've decided to
move to London. I'm happy for them though and things seem to be
looking up.
      Hermana Tamayo and I decided to go running the next morning and
we were doing good until my foot hit a rut in the sidewalk and, not so
gracefully, I rolled and quickly got back up. It was more like I
rolled in slow motion, but I would say it was much better than just
landing flat on my face. Thankfully there were not many people around,
but I have a nice size bruise on my leg now and I think it might be
from that fall.
      On Saturday, the Elders in our ward had a baptism and when we
arrived we saw our "missionary friends," that we had met in the street
the other day, talking with the members. We were surprised that they
actually came. They stayed until just after the lady was baptized and
then had to leave. They want to meet with us again. We will see what
happens.
       Sunday morning we woke up to the sound of rain falling. That
morning we had to go to the far end of our area to pick up a friend to
bring him to church. We quickly ate breakfast and ran in order to
catch the subway. Our friend is a little old man named Albaro, and
when we arrived he was just looking out the window waiting for us. As
we walked slowly back to the subway with him and to the church, I held
an umbrella over the both of us so as not to get wet. We arrived just
in time to church but had to sit in the back and for some reason the
microphone wasn't working and on top of it all I needed to translate
the meeting into English for the Nigerian member sitting next to me.
That was an interesting meeting.
       In our ward there are very few members who are actually
Spaniards, and so receive a lot of help from our Latin American
friends, but this week it seemed that God wanted to show us just how
much the Spaniard members love us as well. One invited us to eat at
her house where we had a delicious Paella. After an activity at the
church all the Spanish women made sure that we were able to bring some
food home with us since we were fasting at the time and not able to
eat at the activity. We talked with some other members in the street
and they started to tell us about the Basque culture and history. I
loved seeing how excited they got while speaking about their culture.
And on Sunday we were able to visit some widows in our ward with their
home teacher. It was such a neat experience this week to be able to
get to know these people better. I love the so much and am so grateful
that I have the chance to serve them.
     I will end with just a short scripture that I read during my
personal studies this week. In Galatians 6:9 "And let us not be weary
in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not." I
know that as we keep doing good unto all men, even during those times
when we may feel inadequate, we will see that there has been a change
within ourselves and that we have been able to touch the lives of many
others. I hope that we might all find ways to serve those around us
this week. I know that we will find joy by doing so because "when we
are in the service of our fellow beings, we are only on the service of
our God." I love you all!

¡Hasta la Vista!

Hermana Schmidt
Misión Barcelona España

¡Hola Caballeros y Señoritas!
   This week was a bit crazy with my companion going to Barcelona on
Monday, and having to do a companionship exchange in Vitoria on
Wednesday. Those days and all the times that I got to be in my area
with my companion have been fantastic.
  I love going on companionship exchanges because I learn so much from
the sisters who I with. This week I took a 45 minute bus ride to
Vitoria to be with Hermana Canales. She is from Honduras has been in
the mission for a while now. The first lesson we taught together was
in English to a lady from Nigeria. It was cute to see how Hermana
Canales talked in Spanglish as well as the member who was with us. The
spirit was strong as we testified of the gospel of Jesus Christ and he
importance of baptism.
    We then received a phone call from an investigator saying that she
wanted her baptismal interview that day. We quickly called the
district leader and set up the interview for 7 pm. The interview
lasted for over an hour, but in the end the lady needed a little more
time to overcome her doubts. That was a little sad to hear, but also
understandable. She will be baptized when she is truly prepared to
make that sacred covenant with God.
    It was nice to be back with my companion, Hermana Aguilar, on
Thursday. We get along so well and love to work and have fun doing so.
We are teaching an old Colombian man that looks like the man from UP.
We visited him outside and we had his tiny little dog with him. He
looked so adorable with his little dog. It is a little hard to teach
him because he gets easily distracted, but we love him anyway.
   We talked to a lot of people in the street this week and many were
very nice and many waved their finger at us saying that they were in a
rush. We were walking down one sidewalk and a lady with her little
girl saw us and started to run. We tried to talk to them, but they
didn't have time. My companion and I started to laugh because we had
never seen someone literally run away from us before!
     One person I wanted to talk with was a mother with her child. The
more was following after her son. She didn't hear me when I tried
stopping them, but a man nearby heard and came up to me to see what I
wanted. I though, "well, might as well take advantage of the
opportunity." So I started to talk with him. Turns out he is from
Chile and the husband of the lady I had tried to speak with. When my
companion heard that they were from Chile she got really excited and
we are so excited to start teaching them. Sadly, because of his
studies, work, and friends visiting he family won't have time until
the 15th of June. It was such a miracle to find them though because
that day we had decided to go a different direction then normal and
that is when we found the family.
       I found a patch of grass, on Sunday, that looked so nice that I
couldn't resist but lay down in it. My companion thought it was so
funny that she she started to take pictures of me. I thought I would
make her laugh by making a funny pose and in her cute accent she said,
"Sexy Suunday." I laugh so much with her. Today we went to a place
called San Juan- of some Basque name that I cannot pronounce.- I had
been there before while serving in Santander, but it was fun to go and
is time be the only Gringa. I almost died from the coming back. It was
all up hill!
      I hope that you all have a fantastic week and that you can share
the great message of the Gospel of Jesus Christ with your friends and
serve them as well!

¡Os quiero mucho!

Hermana Schmidt
Misión Barcelona España

¡Saludos a todos!
      It was so nice to be able to see my family on Sunday. I'm
grateful for modern technology that allowed me to see my very pregnant
sister and her husband in Utah as well as he rest of my family in
Idaho. I look back on this time while I've been on the mission and see
the blessings that my family has received. I think some of the
greatest things that happened while being gone were the weddings of my
siblings and birth of my nephew and my niece- well the niece will be
born within this week. I love that I came on the mission to help
others come unto Christ and have eternal family and meanwhile my
siblings started their own eternal families.
       Well there have been many tender mercies of he Lord this week.
The first one happened on Wednesday when I went to Santander, my old
area, on a companionship exchange. I was in Santander for five months
and left many friends there, two of which I helped to come unto to
Christ and be baptized. When I arrived in Santander with the Sister
Whittle, we went and visited a less active member and talked to people
on the street. On our way to a meeting with the ward mission leader, I
had a thought to call César and Carolina my recent converts. We had
been trying to get ahold of them for a while now but were never able
to get in contact. This time, though, they answered and said that they
were in Santander. After the meeting, we ran to go and see them. What
a blessing and joy it was to see them and to see that they were still
strong in the faith. I also got to see their little girl and their
newly born baby. They will be going to the temple soon to be sealed
together as a family.
       On Saturday, while walking to a visit, my companion and I
passed by a man taping down arrows to point people to a specific
store. When he saw us he asked if we were missionaries. He was
speaking in English but he was from Bilbao. I asked him where he
learned his English and where had seen missionaries before. He told me
that he had gone to Australia for eight months to learn English, and
while there he also met the missionaries and started listening to what
they had to say. He said it was the happiest time of his life and he
was baptized. Being back in Spain it was hard for him to stay active,
but we now have his number and are able to meet with him to help him
come back. That same day we were just talking to people in the street
when a Nigerian man stopped and asked if we were missionaries.
"Again?" We thought. Turns out the man was also a member who no longer
came to church because of work. We were able to share a short message
with him and invite him to come back to church. He lives in the area
of a different ward, but will now be with the missionaries there.
       Yesterday my companion had to fly to Barcelona to receive her
residency. So, I had a member, Michelle, with me all day. She is from
Argentina and I loved listening to her accent! We found a lot of new
people to teach and at the end of one visit we invited the person whom
we were teaching to offer the closing prayer. Josefina is the name of
this lady, and she is such a sweet African lady. In her prayer she
mentioned a scripture that says "where two a tree are gathered in my
name, there will [the Lord] be also." All those who were present in
that visit felt the spirit confirming of the truthfulness of that
statement.
      I love that I get to be a missionary and experience moments such
as these. I love you all and hope you have a fantastic week!

Hermana Schmidt
Misión Barcelona España

Queridos Amigos!
       I'm not sure what to write this week! Everything went by so
quickly with the transfers and meetings that we had. I love my new
area Bilbao. The ward is absolutely fantastic! We have received so
much help from our ward mission leader, our Bishop, and all the other
members. I have never been in a ward, on my mission, that is so well
organized. On Sunday the Bishop introduced himself to all us new
missionaries in the ward and had us all meet together to talk about
the plans that the ward has for missionary work. As the bishop talked
I could tell that he had a love for this work and for all those whom
he served.
      My companion, Hermana Aguilar, is so good about leading us to
all of our visits. We met a man from Africa who was just baptized two
weeks ago. He was huge! I thought to myself that he could be a
bodyguard. As we were teaching him in the park, it started to rain and
so we scurried over to a small restaurant, bought some hot chocolate,
and finished talking there. It is so cold here in Bilbao!
    On Sunday I had to translate for this man from Nigeria, but I
don't think it helped since he probably didn't understand my accent
that much. Even though Nigerians speak English, it's still hard to
communicate with them because of the different accent.
     That night we went to Barcelona for a meeting of all of the
leaders of the mission. Those that are going home usually have to talk
in front of all the other missionaries in the meeting to express what
the Lord has taught them. I was supposed to speak, but it turns out
that there is going to be another meeting in Barcelona for the leaders
in three weeks with a member of the 70. So now I get to speak on front
of a member of the 70. Yay...
    We were supposed to get back into Bilbao around 9:30 at night on
Wednesday, but the plane got delayed two hours and we were stuck in
the airport waiting. By the time we did get back to Bibao, it was 2:30
in the morning and all of us missionaries were so tired. As soon as my
old companion and I got back to our apartment, we fell asleep like a
rock.
    Bibao is a gorgeous! I love being able to serve here!  Today I was
with my old Argentinean companion, my Chilean companion and another
sister from Honduras. All these Latinas together made me laugh with
the way they spoke. We had a fun time together looking around Bilbao.
    ¡Os Quiero a todos!

Hermana Schmidt
Misión Barcelona España

¡Hola a todos!
         I'm back in the north! We received our transfer calls on
Saturday night and all week we were thinking that my companion would
be leaving. When Saturday came, I received a phone call from President
Dayton saying that I would be leaving for Bilbao to finish the
training of Hermana Aguilar from Chile. I was so shocked by the
unexpected transfer, but knowing that I was going to Bilbao made me so
happy that I almost shouted for joy! The other sister missionaries in
my apartment fell to the floor as they heard the news that I was
leaving which made me laugh. It has been such a blessing to have had
to be with them. We shared so many wonderful times together and I
will miss them, but I feel as if I've just been given an amazing gift
to be able to go back to the north and be able to see those people who
I had come to love so much as well as be in a ward that that helps out
so much with the missionary work.
        This week we had some really great lessons and seemed to be in
the right place at the right time. One day we were on our way to a
lunch visit, and when we got to the bus stop we saw a member. She
asked where we were headed to and learned that we were all going to
the same place. We took the bus together and she told my companion and
I that she was so happy we were on the same bus because she didn't
really know how to get to the house and needed our help. Another time
we were on the bus we saw our friend, Gloria, and were able to talk
with her. We then visited her on Saturday, and were also able to teach
her and her friends!
         During the next couple of days I said good bye to everyone,
and of course everyone just gave me a ton of food. An African lady
ended up giving me an African dress even. I almost thought about
wearing it to church, but then thought better about it because I had
to give the class in Gospel Principles. We ate tons of food, took a
lot of photos, ran a lot, and at the very end of the day our friend
from Argentina, Delia, met us in the bus stop to say good bye.
       Now that I'm in Bibao I feel as though I'm at home. I love the
north and the people here. What an amazing gift!
    Love ,

Hermana Schmidt