Letter from June 18th, 2012

Sounds like your Young Women's trip to St. George was super fun.  One of the first things that I will do after I get back from the mish is go to the temple.  I miss it so much - seriously the best place on earth.  I sent Dad an email and Ithink I'll write something to Grandma Tenney tand have her read it to Grandpa.  

 

Things have been going pretty good here.  We had some people who went to Church with us yesterday, and one lady who is gonna be baptized this week!!  This is the last week of transfers, so the next email will be a week from Wednesday.   We will see if I stay or go.  I think I will be staying and my comp leaving.  This is already his 3rd transfer here and only my first.  Well, officially I have been in the mish for a year and a half now.  I was joking around with Dad that now I have served more time than he did (ha ha).  We celebrated by going to all you can eat pizza on Friday.  It was good since we received our allowance so that I had money because I was straight broke (ha ha).  It's been going by pretty fast - only 6 more months now. 

 

I think we might go visit the zoo today to mess around a little bit, but it has been raining a lot here, so maybe not.   This week our water bill came 1,200 reais.  We think that we have some sort of leak somewhere or someone is stealing our water because that is just super expensive!  It should only be like 75.   We made a delicious cake this week that is like a chocolate cookie cake.  It was SOOOO good.  I don't know if they have all of the ingredients to do it in the states.  If they do, I'll have to make it when I get back.  I want to learn how to make some of the foods here so I can show to you guys how it is here.  But, it will only be the good stuff (ha ha).  But hey, love you all so much.  Have a wonderful week.  Until next Wednesay.  

Letter from June 4th, 2012

That was a dog that bit my finger, and it swelled up like that and bled a little bit (ha ha). Also, I forgot to tell you that last week I was walking home with the pacakage that I got, and it started to rain and all.  Ever since then, it's been raining like every day here.  So, YES - I use the new umbrella like everyday.  It's so nice. 

 

On Thursday we had Elder Mazzagardi of the Seventy here with us to give us a training. It was super cool. He taught us a bunch of cool stuff. He is super intelligent and knows the scriptures very well, so that was super cool.  It will be fun when I get home to share all of the cool things that I learned.   It was also good to see old friends and comps and to get the mail. Yeah, it has been pretty rough in my area lately.  It is because in the past there used to be 6 Elders in this area.  So, 99% of the people we talk to have already talked with the missionaries and don't want anything to do with the Church.  But, the Lord has His hand in everything.  And Gods plan is perfect.  So, there has got to be some sort of reason why I'm here.   All I need to do is find out what that reason is.  We have been working with a lot of less active people here and we had a couple of less actives at Church yesterday which was cool.  Next Sunday we won't have sacrament meeting because the Manaus Temple is being dedicated so that will be awesome!!  Also, I have already lost a little bit of weight in this new area. When I got here in Brazil, I was weighing about 180.  Now I'm around like 165.  I'm trying to get rid of the little gut that i have (ha ha).   But hey, love ya tons and have a great week!! 

Letter from May 28th, 2012

The weeks here lately have been passing by pretty slow. We have been having some difficulties in this area lately. When I got here, there were no investigators, and the members haven't been helping at all with referrals. So, we have to do all of the work by ourselves. So, pretty much we just knock on doors and do contacts all day.  I went one year without knocking on one door, but here it's the only way that we can work.

 

Our meetings on Sunday are hillarious.  I have been seeing just about everything here. Yesterday after sacrament meeting I saw 2 little primary kids who were putting the sacrament away. The bishop here just yells at the pulpit like a pastor from some evangelist church and doesn't really talk about anything (ha ha).   I'll have a lot of stories to tell when I get home.

 

Tuesday we had a meeting and they gave us our mail finally.  I got the package from Amanda and from Grandma. I am so happy right now!!  I have only been eating cereal lately and junk food.  The only thing that I still haven't gotten lately was any letters.  But if you can, tell Amanda thanks. I don't know if I'll have time.  I  asked President about the whole going home early thing to get ready for school, and he still hasn't answered me yet.  So maybe I'll have to call him and ask him specifically.  I have been praying about this lately and all - about college and everything. Pretty much I think that whatever Pres. Hall decides is what should be done. And if I get accepted to BYU, that is where I want to go. So, those are my thoughts as of now. 

 

Here are some pics - hope you enjoy them.    Love you so much.  Have a GREAT week!!  

Letter from April 23rd, 2012

 

Thankfully this week I have been feeling a lot better. My nose has still been running a little bit lately, but my fever and throat have gotten a lot better. I took some medicine that seemed to help quite a bit, but I'm not gonna lie - it was miserable there for a couple of days.

 

This week was pretty chill.  Not much news to talk about.  We have just been trying to find new people to teach , and it hasn't been workng out very well.  But, we're gonna keep working our hardest to try to get some new people going to Church.  Meetings yesterday went well and all.  We ended up having to teach some kids in Primary.  That was just straight crazy!  They gave us a lot of work, but by the end of the class they were asking us to teach them next week as well (ha ha).  They seemed to like our class quite a bit.  Maybe it's due to the fact that we played Book of Mormon hangman (ha ha).

 

You asked how many times I've read the BofM on my mission.  Let's see - I have read it I think 3 or 4 times in the mish, but only one time in Portuguese.   I recently started again in Portuguese and I'm in Mosiah right now.  So, I'm hoping to read it a few more times before I get home.   There is a great spirit and power from reading the Book of Mormon everyday. That should be your goal as a family. Well, that's about it for this week.  I hope you have a great week.  Love you so much!!

Letter From April 11th, 2012

This will have to be a pretty short email today because I am almost out of time. I can't believe that Trey is already 12 years old.  It seems like only yesterday he was just a little guy. By the time I get back he is gonna be bigger than me.

 

This week has been long,  but went well.  We had a good turn out at Church and all, and we actuallly had 2 less active members come back in to activity. The guy had been the ex-branch president and district president and had fallen away for a couple of years, but he is back now.  Him and his wife are really great people.   We will be using Skype at their house to call on Mother's Day.  I'm so pumped, I can hardly wait!!

 

Well I bet your wondering about how the transfers went and all.  I'm staying here in the area with my comp too.  I reversed the curse and will finally stay 2 transfers with the same comp (ha ha).  And also we have 2 new elders living with us because they opened up a new area here.  One of them is an American who got here today.  He is really green, but he is already speaking pretty well.  But, our house is  really small is the thing that is gonna be rough now.   I  love you all and will talk to you here in a couple of days.  Sorry about the short email.

Letter From April 2nd, 2012

I absolutely love General Conference. Such a strong spirit. Usually they have it in English, but they only had it in Portuguese again.   I felt bad for the newbies that didn't understand hardly anything. My favorite talk was Eder Jeffery R. Holland's talk.  He goes way hard.  He is my favorite apostle, but there were a lot of good talks given.  I didn't get to watch the priesthood session, so I still don't know how that was.  But, I did get to watch the 4 main sessions.  It's always nice to get a little break every once in a while from walking everywhere and sit under the AC for a little bit.  We were able to take a couple of investigators to watch Conference and they all said that they liked it.

We baptized a young lady who is the Relief Society's niece.  Yes, here we have to get permission to baptize if they are under the age of 18.  But, we have the baptismal record paper thing that when the parents sign it you can baptism them.  It had been awhile since we had baptized, but finally we had one.  This is the last week of this transfer so are gonna have the "drought" here this week and a half without emailing.  Who knows - maybe the next email I send will be in a different area, but I don't think that I will leave.  I have only been here for 3 months.  We are gonna get a lot of new missionaries this transfer, like 19 newbies and only 3 people are going home, so there is gonna be a lot of new areas that will open up.  So, I think maybe my comp and I will stick together and get some new elders in our house. I would like to stay with my comp another transfer.  I like him a lot.  But, as you know, President doesn't like to leave me with anyone even if I do like them.  Until now I have never stayed 2 transers with anyone, so I don't see that starting now (ha ha).  But, we'll see what happens.  A part of me wants to stay, but then again, there is a part of me that wants to go.

That's thats about it for this week.   One other thing, we got to do a service project this week for a member who was needing some help with doing the floor in their new house. Man, am I sure grateful for the way that we build our houses in the states.  It's way better.  Really, I'm gonna be so grateful when I get back for so many things that I think we take for granted as Americans and especially as members of the Church.  Love you all so much.  Talk to you here in a week and a half:)

Letter from March 19th, 2012

 Man - I just miss the snow so much.  I think when I come home, I'm just gonna spend like a straight week snowboarding.  That's so crazy that you guys got a snow day a week before Spring Break (ha ha).  It's pretty funny here because there are some people who when it gets to be about 75 degrees, they start to complain about how it's cold and then I just like to laugh at them and I tell them they don't even know what cold is!

 

     I got lucky on Tuesday at Zone Conference and I didn't get called on to talk (ha ha).  But, I was prepared.  It only had to be like 5 minutes long.  It's hilarious how before the mission a 5 minute talk seemed like a big deal, but now that's a piece of cake!  But each person in our Zone had to memorize a paragraph from the Family Proclamation and prepare a talk based on the paragraph.  So, I got the third paragraph which is the second longest, but it wasn't too tough.  It was cool to see all of the old freinds that I have made at the Conference. There was one of the elders from my MTC District.  I would just love to be comps with him, but we´ll see if that ever happens.  I don't think Pres. Hall gives much attention when people ask to be comps with someone. 

 

     I'm sending a pic of me and the sign that there is as you come into the city.  It says "Welcome to Rio Tinto". This week was a pretty normal week. On Tuesday we had the Zone Conference.  All of the talks were about the family and the importance of the family in God's plan.  It was an awesome meeting.   I think everyone got a little trunky thinking about marriage and everything (ha ha).  My Branch Pres. has a new born baby girl that is just the cutest little thing.  I just can't wait to be a dad (ha ha).  But, I still got a little time left before that comes.  The parents of the young woman still didn't give permission, but we will see if they change their minds. Yesterday at Church it was awesome to see a man, that the Lord baptized through me a couple of weeks ago, pass the sacrament for the first time.  I was so happy!!  But, other than that things are pretty much the same ol' same ol' here - just workin' hard to get these people dunked here.  I love you sooo much - have a great week!!