20th birthday!

Hello my family! I hope you all had a great week!! My week was a very good week here in Brazil! But first, Jonathan and Natalie, it looks like you ahd alot of fun at Bear World. Haha I didnt know that place existed... but it looks awesome! Connor, mom says you are doing very well at volleyball, congratulations! Keep up the good work!! I loved the Birthday video so much!!! Thank you so much!!!:)

Anyways this week was soooo cool. We got to baptize Neiva this week! We moved her baptism forward because this happened...

We have been teaching her, her daughter, and her granddaughter, and they are all super super great people. Her daughter, Nara is awesome, but smokes alot, drinks, and did some pretty heavy drugs in the past. Anyways, we got a call from Neiva that Nara was having medical problems, and the next day we went over and found out she was having seizures during the night. Poor Neiva, barely slept and was super sad. We explained that after baptism the Holy Ghost helps to comfort people, and as we were teaching Nara had another seizure!!! We ran in there and gave her a blessing and she stopped!!! She hasnt had a seizure since! (What a miracle, honestly I love that I get to see so many miracles!). But Neiva was pretty upset, and we asked if she would want to be baptized on the 13 so that she could have the Holy Ghost comfort her, and she became extremellllllly excited and said yes!!!! 

So Elder Menezes baptized her this Saturday, and she was so happy. She said thank you my sons for showing me the truth, and it made me feel amazing! The next day on my birthday, I gave her the gift of the Holy Ghost, and she satrted to cry becasue she felt so happy. Ahhhh she is amazing!!! And we are teaching her grandaughter who wants to be baptized on Saturday, but we need to talk to her mom!

So that was awesome, about Oscar, we found out that he really has no intention of coming to church or anything about God... He lied to us about stopping smoking, and so that kinda stunk. He was awesome. But we can only invite as missionaries, we cant force him. Pretty sad. But yeah.

About Regiane, she told us last week that she didnt want to go to church anymore. We didnt know why, and I was pretty upset, but this week we talked to her and found out that she still wants to go and knows that its true, but her husband doenst want her to go. We are going to work with him and help her to come to church! 

Oh I almost forgot! We started teaching an English class!!! We talked to this school, and now we are filling in for an actual professor haha... Theyll let anybody be a professor here... haha but yeah!! Super cool! We only do it once a week, but so far so good!

Anyways, yesterday for my birthday we woke up and had a mini party, and Elder Wilkinson gave me a piece of leftover pizza which was an amazing gift! We went to church and at night we had dinner with Jean and Bianca, the second counselor to the bishop that is super awesome! Every Sunday night we have dinner with him, but he gave me a pair of Grêmio (a soccor team) socks and my friend Lucian that is leaving on his mission on Thursday gave me a little Rio Grande do Sul case to wear on my belt for money and things like that! But anyways thats my week! I hope you all are well! Thanks for everything!!!

 

 

July 8th, 2013

Hey everybody how are you all doing!! I hope you are all doing well! Dad I cant believe that you went to Mexico and saw those ruins! That is so awesome! It looks like it was so fun! Soooooo... I have a confession... I got the birthday package... and opened it.... ...  ......... because it wasnt marked to nottt open until my birthday... anddddddd I Really needed to use the pants... But they fit perfectly thank you so much for all the stuff inside! I love all the notes!! And the peanut butter is heavenly, and the Cholula is amazing! Thank you so much for everything! Also Jonathan the T Shirt is awesome! 

But my week has been really good! I will finish the Book of Mormon in Português tomorrow, so that is really awewsome! I remember starting it and not understanding anything, and now I can translate it all in English! But we have been teaching this really awesome lady that I want to tell youa bout! Her name is Neiva, and she is like 75 years old, but so so sweet!

So we started teaching her my third week here in Brazil, and she is really religous and loves to read. She has been attending a church in Capão for a long time, and has alot of faith. Well we started teaching her a while ago and gave her a Book of Mormon, which she loves. Between our first and second visit she read all of first and second Nefi! She prayed, recieved and answer that it was true, and wanted to be baptized! 

But then, her pastor talked to her and said negative things about the church and so she stopped talking to us for a while, but we didnt give up, and met with her this week, and she said that she didnt want to go back to her other church becasue her pastor did some weird thing to baptize the congregation by the Holy Ghost, and she never read anything like what he did in the Bible or Book of Mormon and knew it wasnt true. She really has such a strong testimony of the Book of Mormon bhecasue she reads it so much!

And she is so much happier now since she has been reading the Book of Mormon, always smiling, and whatnot. She is so awesome! She wants to be baptized next week so that will be exciting too! We are teaching her granddaughter too! Yesterday we were at her house to take her to churdch with us and she told us that her daughter had medical issues in the night and that she had only slept one hour, but still wanted to go to church with us! Ah a she has so much faith! 

Yesterday at church the Bishop asked me to teach the young men and young womens class, and I didnt havce anything prepared... It was interesting... Haha but I managed to do it... And then last night we had a family night with a family, and only the mom is a member. It was awesome, we made cookies, and taught a lesson in a funnier way while we made cookies, and it was awesome! Alot of fun! 

But that was my week, I love you all so much! I hope all is going well! Ill talk to you next week!! Tchau!

 

 

Fala minha familia!

Hey everybody! So this week was a good week in Brasil and many good things happened! But first, I am glad to hear that you all are doing well! Connor and Carson! I hope you had fun at the campout! It looks like it was alot of fun! Jonathan how is your band!! I want to see more pictures! I hope all is well with you!

So yesterday we had our group and it was very sucessful again. What it is, is its still a part of the ward under the bishop, but it meets seperate. We are trying to start a branch soon but we need to find more people! We have a keyboard for the group that I am practicing for the Sundays and Im getting pretty good! Haha hopefully I can reteach myself before I get home!

So we found this awesome family that I have a strong feeling will accept our messages! The father, Douglas, went to church sometimes with his grandfather when he was younger with his grandpa, who was a pioneer of the church in Pelotas. He remembers the missioraries being nice to him when he was a kid, and said that he and his wife Rogera have been trying to find a religion that felt right but they didnt know which one. I have high expectations for them! They are such a great family! He goes on walks with his son so that they have a good relationship!!

Oscar is having a hard time, but we arent giving up on him. He is so awesome, but I think that he is starting to lose hope that he can stop smoking. We are going to keep working with him!

So Elder Menezes and I are going to be staying here for more one transfer together, and after he will probably leave! I can see myself staying here for proabaly 5 more months, because we are trying to start the branch! He is trying to learn English and so today we arent speaking Português and just English!

Falando sobre a idioma, eu estou fazendo muito melhor! We had a fast so I could speak the language and I really feel that I can speak better. I understand all the grammer of Português, I just need to learn words and my accent!

But thats how I am doing, I miss you all and hope that you are doing well! I love you all and hope you have a great week!! tchau!!