Well. Pday switched to monday, soooooooooooo its pday again!!! How are you all?!
This week was a tough one.....
for example. Last thursday night, we marked to work with a young
member couple from the ward. SO GREAT. It is hard to actually be able to
find members to work with and this couple is seriously awesome. I love
them!!
We went out with them to the José Ometto (the area WAY far from
everything where they are starting the little mini-branch). We had
marked to teach a family that we´ve been working with, but when we got
there, no one was home...... We then tried to pass by about 4 other
families/investigators and either they werent home, were busy, or were
just not interested...... In the end, we spent a good hour just driving
around, finding these people and EVERYTHING fell through. It was super
depressing. I HATE when that happens!! Especially when we have members
with us to help out and everything. Ricardo and Carol were SUPER cool
about it though and when we had nothing left to try they were just like
"Sisters.... its okay. Lets just go out to eat!!!" hahah. So we did, and
they were super nice and bought us food. Really though, they are super
sweet and I love them!!
ANDDD..... about thursday..... We went to our lunch appointment and
it was really good. Way good. Afterwards, we were just sitting there
talking with the irmã giving us lunch.... She is a super cute, funny,
little older lady and we were just having a fun time talking with her.
After a while she gets up to go get the dessert.... And she says "let me
go see if the jello has set up yet...."
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
Then... just to make it better, she gets it out and puts it on the
table..... and this jello is purple. GREAT. So sister F. is like "ohhh
what flavor is it?" and yes.... it is indeed grape jello. AGAIN.
And this irmã... bless her heart.... dishes us each up these HUGE
cups of jello. Oh man. I thought I would die.... probably just from
trying not to laugh.... Then she left the room for a bit to go take some
to her son who came by from work to visit on his lunch break..... While
she was gone, I frantically put as much of that horrible grape jello
into Sis. Feistner´s already spilling-over-cause-it-is-so-
Random side-note.....week before last, we met a lady that is turning 100 years old in december!!! crazy!!
Then this week, we met an old lady who has a great-great
grandchild. WOW. and she told us that her mom passed away at age
126!!!??? INSANE. I dont understand!!!!!!!!
And another side-note. Over the past few weeks, the political
campaign in Araras has been getting up a storm..... I think it is just
people running for city government, but I´m not sure.... BUT, basically
every candidate has TONS of cars that drive around the city with
pictures on the sides and the number to vote for them. But to make it
even better, they put these HUGE speakers on the top of the cars and
just drive around ALL DAY blasting obnoxious little jingles to convince
you to vote for the candidate. I AM ABOUT TO GO CRAZY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Worst thing is, apparently this will go on for another two months. TWO
MORE MONTHS!!!!!!!!!!!!!! AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
Friday................. almost all our appointments fell through again. SWEET. hahah.
SATURDAY......................
saturday was also a little tough because it was a moment of
realization for me...... about how much I need to work and improve on
actually talking to people and not being scared!! hahah. OH gosh. We had
a lesson that night and I was too scared to say anything..... I wanted
to smack myself in the face afterwards. BUT, on the bright side, I have
realized what it is I need to work on now, and now I just have to DO IT.
Sunday, was the best day of the entire week!!!
Sister Feistner and I have to do divisions each sunday at church.
One of us stays at the chapel for the church services there, and the
other goes out to José Ometto to be at the sacrament meeting that is
starting out there.... Yesterday, it was my turn to go out to José
Ometto. It was super cool!!! It was only the 3rd sunday that they have
held a meeting out there. The group is basically just one family of
members that have been pretty less-active for the past couple years.
They dont have much money and cant afford the bus to come in for church
at the chapel each week. This week, we had a couple other members that
live nearby as well.....no investigators showed up, but I´m hoping for
next week!!
The first week, there were six people, the next week 9 and this
week 13!!! SO great!! ALSO, this family is the family of Luisa who got
baptized back in June.... It is so great to see that she will be able to
go to church and have that support in her family now! We also had a
lesson with her a week or two ago and she wanted us to mark our favorite
stories in the book of mormon for her to read... She already read one
and is starting on the other and so excited about it! so cute! I got to
ask her how that was going on sunday and she was soooooo excited to tell
me that she had read!
Oh, and I dont know if I´ve said this before.....but in general,
brazilians have a lack of musical abilities..... it is especially
apparent when singing hymns.... I think it probably comes from a lack of
learning about music, cause they dont teach music in the schools
here.... But anyways, I took the violin out to the meeting there and
played the hymns with them. It helped A LOT. As in, there was a MELODY
to be found in the midst of all the other stuff going on.... hahaha. And
Luisa´s cousin Gabriel (he is probably 4 or 5?) LOVESSSS music and
loves the violin.... he also is TERRIFIED of me and sister feistner....
hahaha. Not sure why. But he will shake everyone else´s hand but wont
even LOOK at us..... hahah. So I tried to win him over with the
violin.... Didnt quite work.... he was still to scared to touch it when I
handed it to HIS MOM to let him play a little bit..... But I caught him
watching me while I was playing the hymns. So we may be getting
somewhere. =]
 |
| the peacocks down by the lake on our morning walk to church. They were out in STYLE yesterday! |
 |
| Grupo de Oracão in José Ometto!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Luisa has a book of mormon on her lap, Gabriel is the kid in the green shirt. I will win him over someday!!!! hahah. |
ALSO, we did a lot of knocking doors and lessons on Sunday and I
was DETERMINED to turn over a new page and talk to EVERYONE. So I did.
And it was wonderful, super fun and way less scary than being too scared
to say anything at our lessons.hahah ALSO, I shared the message at our
lunch appointment and they had a TON of family and friends over to
visit.... I didnt think they were gonna all listen to the message, but
they all saw my violin and wanted me to play something. So I did. and
afterwards, everyone was listening so intently that I just had to share a
message with them all. hahah. It was great.
OH..... Some exciting news!!
We have a girl that we have been teaching over the last month or
so..... Her name is Bruna and she is 11 and SUPER shy. As in, she wont
hardly even talk to us! haha. Her family is less active, but they just
recently started coming back to church and want to keep coming back.
Bruna wasnt ever baptized and she really wants to! She apparently got
scared by the elders a few years ago because they tried to convince her
to get baptized before she was ready.... As in, they had the district
leader come in and do an interveiw with her (without warning them ahead
of time!) and he tried to mark her baptism for the next day..... And
since she is WAY shy, she freaked out. So we´ve been trying to take it
slow with her, and let her run the show.... but she decided to get
baptized this saturday the 8th!! Wooooo!!! So hopefully everything
continues to go well with her this week!!! =]
Last story......
So, we have a little bit of a pigeon problem on our back
porch............ they sit up in the roof part over the porch and poop
all over the floor out there by our washing machine.. It is sick!! So
last week, I got mad and cleaned the entire thing!! It was SO GROSS. I
was even yelling at these pigeons in english the entire time.....
hahaha. Hopefully our neighbors dont think we are too crazy now.....
But this morning, we had the back door open for a bit while we were
studying.... and we heard a racket coming from the porch. So sister
Feistner went out to investigate..... There was a pigeon in our little
mini-bbq thing..... but as she was trying to get it out, he got out and
came IN OUR HOUSE!!! she starts to come back in and she´s like "sister
ward, I figured out the problem..." and when I turn around there is a
PIGEON walking towards me, in between me and her!!! hahaha. The pigeon
freaked out a little bit and started FLYING at me, and then I freaked
out a little bit too. ahahah. Then he landed on our desks and started
walking ALL OVER MY BOOKS!!!!!!!!!!!!! oh gosh.. hahah. So sister F.
chased him back outside, caught him and threw him off our porch. HA.
take that evil pigeons!!!!!!!!!!!!
Anyways, enough stories for one email......
Love you all so much!!!
have the best week!!!!!!!!!!
Sister Ward
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