March 31, 2010
Hey family,
How are things going? First off, yeah we had zone conference with President (Vecci). He is always at every zone conference. And I also got my package.!!!! Thanks so much. I loved it so much. You guys don’t know how much of a boost packages are ha. Also sorry I never tell you but I get letters from you all the time Mom. Thanks so much; they really do mean a lot to me.
Well this week was good. We worked really hard and are teaching lots of good people. This is the last week of the transfer so who knows what will happen. I hope to stay because we have 3 really solid baptisms marked for the beginning of next transfer but if I’m here or not doesn’t matter. I just wanna at least see pictures of their baptisms.
But also this week we had kind of a sad thing happen. We have this family we have been teaching and reactivating. The husband served a mission and the wife was baptized a little while ago but they were inactive when I got here so we re-activated them and were preparing them for the temple. They have a goal to go the end of this year. There will be a bus that will go. The wife is a really, really cool lady. She makes lunch for us sometimes and they have the cutest, happiest baby I’ve ever seen in my life. I love this family in a different kind of love than I’ve ever felt. But anyways, so we were walking down the street and we see the husband on the internet in a lawn house. I thought it was kinda weird because they have a computer in their house but he didn’t see us because he had head phones in. By the time he saw us we had entered the lawn house and were about 10 feet from him. His eyes got huge and he quickly exited out of everything on his computer. We just talked to him for a couple of seconds and left. When we left my heart just sank. He was for sure looking at porn. It was the saddest feeling I’ve had here on the mission. It was really hard, but we’re still working with them and hopefully we can help them solve all of this.
That’s so cool that the Hillmans got sealed. Tell them congrats for me. That really is the goal. Baptism is just one of those steps. Ry told me that Kimbo waddles around at church and that she looks ready to pop, ha. Tell grandpa I’ll pray for him, and tell everyone hi for me. I love you all.
Take care.
Wednesday, March 24, 2010
March 24, 2010
Hey Family,
So I know that I never have a bunch of time and I always forget what’s been going on in the week when I get in the house so I sent a little voice recording about my week. (It is transcribed at the bottom of this email.) But this week was really good. I got the video of Monty also. Thanks so much. He looks good and looks like he is a lot of fun... and trouble.
Zone Conference is this week. It’s tomorrow actually. I’m pretty excited. All the guys in our zone are sleeping in our house tonight because we live right by the chapel. So I’ll get to see Morris again. I can’t believe this transfer’s almost over. Time is going fast cause were working like crazy. I’m excited to call you guys up too on Mother’s Day. Hey, I have a favor to ask about that. So Pres said that if we have a girl friend or someone else like that we can call them too... just that we only get an hour total. Like it could be 50 minutes with you guys and 10 with Brenna or something. If you guys would be willing to give her 5 or 10 min I’m sure she’d like that but it’s your guys’ time so just tell me if you want it all and it’s yours.
Oh man Caleb is home... that’s nuts. How is he doing? I love that guy. Yeah Dad, I can feel Grandma all the time. I know she is helping me a lot. Sometimes I just really have down days but I know she’s always there. (Tim’s Grandma passed away just a few months before he went on his mission, and he commented once early in his mission that he felt she was close by and helping him sometimes. So we asked him if he still felt her helping him.) And don’t worry Mom. I’m not like skating all the time and I’m not doing stupid things. (Konni worries about him getting hurt, especially after Elder Nalder broke his ankle playing soccer on P-day.) The last thing I wanna do is go home right now. Tell the Larsens I’m praying for them. How long has he been bishop? It’s been a while now hasn’t it? Anyways, I love you all. Take care until next week.
Transcribed from voice recording: (Note: As you read this, try to imagine him speaking with an accent like he was born south of the border and English is his second language. That's exactly how he sounds!)
Hey Family,
So today is P-day, and we are going to go to the internet here in a little bit. We normally don’t remember everything that happened in the week to write you guys and when we are on the internet we are always running out of time. ...So this week we had some pretty cool things happen. We have some pretty cool investigators right now. This one guy named Gabriel stopped us the other day. Well, a long time ago, he stopped the other missionaries and he was like “hey, I used to live in Itabuna and I was taking the lessons there”. And then some stuff happened. He actually went to live with his dad in Italy for a while – like a year and a half. And then he came back and things just didn’t work out. He almost got baptized in Itabuna, but he didn’t. So he’s here now - living here, and he stopped the other missionaries, told us (them) where he lived, but he lives in this big apartment complex. And Morris and me tried so hard to find him so many times. We’d go to his house and wait. We didn’t know what apartment number it was. There’s tons of apartments so we just literally sat there one day just hoping he would come home for lunch or something, but he didn’t. So shoot, we just left it and then me and Elder Sanderson the other day were in the supermarket and he like ran up and stopped us, and he was like “Hey you guys never went to my house”. And I was like, “Dude we went to your house a bunch but we couldn’t find it.” So then he told us what apartment number, gave us his cell phone number and told us when he’d be at home. So we went to his house this week. This guy’s amazing. He’s 19 years old. He’s read the whole Book of Mormon - the entire Book of Mormon. He has all the pamphlets and he has read them all. He has a testimony of the Book of Mormon and he is way excited. He went to church on Sunday. He wants to hear all the lessons again. Then he wants to get baptized. He’s just really cool. He’s studying Doctrine and Covenants. He knows pretty much everything. He has all these questions that are like way deep doctrine questions. But he’s really cool. He’s got a strong testimony. He’s really excited about serving a mission and stuff. So we’ve been way excited with him.
We also knocked some doors and ran into this woman who works with a member in our branch. She let us in and she’s just turned out to be an angel. She’s this old woman. She lives by herself, and she’s cooked ... every time we go to her house, she’s cooked at least, at least one cake. She makes these biscuit cookie things. The other day she made pizza, lasagna...she always makes us juice. She’s crazy. We keep telling her like... “Hey we’re not coming just to eat.” And she’s like “I know, I know but I really like cooking.” And she’s really a good cook. Yesterday she made us a pizza at her house. She made the crust, she made the sauce... everything. She made two pizzas yesterday...one we ate yesterday with her and then she gave us one to cook today for P-day. She also said she knows the church is true. She went Sunday. She loved all the people. The people were really nice to her, and she really liked it. There’s this one girl in our ward (branch)... I think she’s twenty years old. This twenty year old really liked this lady, Gina, and so she asked if she could come teach Gina with us, and she went and bore testimony. They have pretty similar conversion stories, so it was really cool that this girl went to teach Gina with us.
This week’s been going really good. We’ve been teaching English classes. It’s kind of a joke. I’m learning... I don’t even know how to spell in English. They make fun of me cause I always spell stuff wrong. But I’m learning to spell in English and teach English. But it’s good. We’ve got 4 or 5 men coming to this class regularly and because of this we’ve got 3 new men investigators that are real good guys. We’re excited to work with them this week. We’re going to go to their houses also. It’s been really good. Me and Elder Almeida (sp?) have been running our tushies off here in Porto just teaching everybody and doing everything. It’s been fun though.
The transfer is almost over. It’s crazy how fast it goes. And I almost have 10 months ... on the 27th ... Holy Smokes! Ten Months! It’s been crazy. I hope you guys are all doing good. That’s how our week’s been going. We cleaned the house today. We cleaned it all up good because we’re going to have Zone Conference ... tomorrow actually. Our house is right here by the church where we are having Zone Conference. We’re staying here in Porto this time for Zone Conference... just our zone. So who knows if President will swing by. But we’re prepared with a clean house now. And,,, I hope you guys are all doing good. We’re doing good here. So I’ll go and send this and I hope you guys know I love you and I pray for you all the time. I hope things are going good...
Hey Family,
So I know that I never have a bunch of time and I always forget what’s been going on in the week when I get in the house so I sent a little voice recording about my week. (It is transcribed at the bottom of this email.) But this week was really good. I got the video of Monty also. Thanks so much. He looks good and looks like he is a lot of fun... and trouble.
Zone Conference is this week. It’s tomorrow actually. I’m pretty excited. All the guys in our zone are sleeping in our house tonight because we live right by the chapel. So I’ll get to see Morris again. I can’t believe this transfer’s almost over. Time is going fast cause were working like crazy. I’m excited to call you guys up too on Mother’s Day. Hey, I have a favor to ask about that. So Pres said that if we have a girl friend or someone else like that we can call them too... just that we only get an hour total. Like it could be 50 minutes with you guys and 10 with Brenna or something. If you guys would be willing to give her 5 or 10 min I’m sure she’d like that but it’s your guys’ time so just tell me if you want it all and it’s yours.
Oh man Caleb is home... that’s nuts. How is he doing? I love that guy. Yeah Dad, I can feel Grandma all the time. I know she is helping me a lot. Sometimes I just really have down days but I know she’s always there. (Tim’s Grandma passed away just a few months before he went on his mission, and he commented once early in his mission that he felt she was close by and helping him sometimes. So we asked him if he still felt her helping him.) And don’t worry Mom. I’m not like skating all the time and I’m not doing stupid things. (Konni worries about him getting hurt, especially after Elder Nalder broke his ankle playing soccer on P-day.) The last thing I wanna do is go home right now. Tell the Larsens I’m praying for them. How long has he been bishop? It’s been a while now hasn’t it? Anyways, I love you all. Take care until next week.
Transcribed from voice recording: (Note: As you read this, try to imagine him speaking with an accent like he was born south of the border and English is his second language. That's exactly how he sounds!)
Hey Family,
So today is P-day, and we are going to go to the internet here in a little bit. We normally don’t remember everything that happened in the week to write you guys and when we are on the internet we are always running out of time. ...So this week we had some pretty cool things happen. We have some pretty cool investigators right now. This one guy named Gabriel stopped us the other day. Well, a long time ago, he stopped the other missionaries and he was like “hey, I used to live in Itabuna and I was taking the lessons there”. And then some stuff happened. He actually went to live with his dad in Italy for a while – like a year and a half. And then he came back and things just didn’t work out. He almost got baptized in Itabuna, but he didn’t. So he’s here now - living here, and he stopped the other missionaries, told us (them) where he lived, but he lives in this big apartment complex. And Morris and me tried so hard to find him so many times. We’d go to his house and wait. We didn’t know what apartment number it was. There’s tons of apartments so we just literally sat there one day just hoping he would come home for lunch or something, but he didn’t. So shoot, we just left it and then me and Elder Sanderson the other day were in the supermarket and he like ran up and stopped us, and he was like “Hey you guys never went to my house”. And I was like, “Dude we went to your house a bunch but we couldn’t find it.” So then he told us what apartment number, gave us his cell phone number and told us when he’d be at home. So we went to his house this week. This guy’s amazing. He’s 19 years old. He’s read the whole Book of Mormon - the entire Book of Mormon. He has all the pamphlets and he has read them all. He has a testimony of the Book of Mormon and he is way excited. He went to church on Sunday. He wants to hear all the lessons again. Then he wants to get baptized. He’s just really cool. He’s studying Doctrine and Covenants. He knows pretty much everything. He has all these questions that are like way deep doctrine questions. But he’s really cool. He’s got a strong testimony. He’s really excited about serving a mission and stuff. So we’ve been way excited with him.
We also knocked some doors and ran into this woman who works with a member in our branch. She let us in and she’s just turned out to be an angel. She’s this old woman. She lives by herself, and she’s cooked ... every time we go to her house, she’s cooked at least, at least one cake. She makes these biscuit cookie things. The other day she made pizza, lasagna...she always makes us juice. She’s crazy. We keep telling her like... “Hey we’re not coming just to eat.” And she’s like “I know, I know but I really like cooking.” And she’s really a good cook. Yesterday she made us a pizza at her house. She made the crust, she made the sauce... everything. She made two pizzas yesterday...one we ate yesterday with her and then she gave us one to cook today for P-day. She also said she knows the church is true. She went Sunday. She loved all the people. The people were really nice to her, and she really liked it. There’s this one girl in our ward (branch)... I think she’s twenty years old. This twenty year old really liked this lady, Gina, and so she asked if she could come teach Gina with us, and she went and bore testimony. They have pretty similar conversion stories, so it was really cool that this girl went to teach Gina with us.
This week’s been going really good. We’ve been teaching English classes. It’s kind of a joke. I’m learning... I don’t even know how to spell in English. They make fun of me cause I always spell stuff wrong. But I’m learning to spell in English and teach English. But it’s good. We’ve got 4 or 5 men coming to this class regularly and because of this we’ve got 3 new men investigators that are real good guys. We’re excited to work with them this week. We’re going to go to their houses also. It’s been really good. Me and Elder Almeida (sp?) have been running our tushies off here in Porto just teaching everybody and doing everything. It’s been fun though.
The transfer is almost over. It’s crazy how fast it goes. And I almost have 10 months ... on the 27th ... Holy Smokes! Ten Months! It’s been crazy. I hope you guys are all doing good. That’s how our week’s been going. We cleaned the house today. We cleaned it all up good because we’re going to have Zone Conference ... tomorrow actually. Our house is right here by the church where we are having Zone Conference. We’re staying here in Porto this time for Zone Conference... just our zone. So who knows if President will swing by. But we’re prepared with a clean house now. And,,, I hope you guys are all doing good. We’re doing good here. So I’ll go and send this and I hope you guys know I love you and I pray for you all the time. I hope things are going good...
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
March 17, 2010
Hey Family,
Oh man Dad keep up the good work. You’re looking good. I’m sure that 70 pounds is nice to have gone.
This week was really good. My comp and I are working like crazy and our work is starting to pay off. We found a 19 year old guy who was taking the discussions and then had to move to a different city, and he didn’t know where the church was here. But in the mean time he read the whole Book of Mormon and is studying the Doctrine and Covenants. He knows more about the church than I do, ha. He told us he has a testimony of the Book of Mormon and of Joseph Smith and he is gonna get baptized next week. It was really cool and fun to be working with him. We even gave up some of our p-day today to go teach him – that’s how cool he is. He is excited to serve a mission too. He’s the man. Other than that, we have just been knocking doors and trying to reactivate people.
Today I don’t have much time but we went and skated around a little bit. I love skating the Brazilian ghetto parks. I just feel right at home, ha. Tell Elder Nalder I love him, and I’m praying for him. I love and miss you all and I’m gonna get to call home in a couple of weeks!!! (I think he means months because that’s when Mother’s Day is.)
...But I love you all. Take care.
Hey Family,
Oh man Dad keep up the good work. You’re looking good. I’m sure that 70 pounds is nice to have gone.
This week was really good. My comp and I are working like crazy and our work is starting to pay off. We found a 19 year old guy who was taking the discussions and then had to move to a different city, and he didn’t know where the church was here. But in the mean time he read the whole Book of Mormon and is studying the Doctrine and Covenants. He knows more about the church than I do, ha. He told us he has a testimony of the Book of Mormon and of Joseph Smith and he is gonna get baptized next week. It was really cool and fun to be working with him. We even gave up some of our p-day today to go teach him – that’s how cool he is. He is excited to serve a mission too. He’s the man. Other than that, we have just been knocking doors and trying to reactivate people.
Today I don’t have much time but we went and skated around a little bit. I love skating the Brazilian ghetto parks. I just feel right at home, ha. Tell Elder Nalder I love him, and I’m praying for him. I love and miss you all and I’m gonna get to call home in a couple of weeks!!! (I think he means months because that’s when Mother’s Day is.)
...But I love you all. Take care.
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
March 10, 2010
Hey guys,
I’m really pressed for time today so I’ll be quick and I wanna try and send a picture. Sounds like things are going good there. I miss the Lowes a lot too. Send them a hug for me. I’m sure Zach is as lost as a district leader in Porto Seguro, but if anyone can do it, it’s Zach. He’s the man.
.....
Things are going a lot better with my comp. We kinda had a fight one morning, and so I said alright for study today, tell me about your family and why you’re here. And then I did the same. Now we know a lot more about each other. It was kinda weird - just two guys sitting in a room talking about their families and crying, but it was actually the best thing that could of happened. We’re now just peachy as can be. He is pretty cool. I’m learning lots from him and I’m teaching him to chill out a little cause he is from Sao Paulo. It’s just run run run there and here in Bahia it’s just sit around all day. That’s all the people do. But it’s good. He’s helping me be a little more fast paced and I’m helping him calm down a bit. But really he is way cool. The district is going good. I think conference de zona will be next week. We’re still not 100 percent on that though, so we’ll see.
I love you all. Take care.
Hey guys,
I’m really pressed for time today so I’ll be quick and I wanna try and send a picture. Sounds like things are going good there. I miss the Lowes a lot too. Send them a hug for me. I’m sure Zach is as lost as a district leader in Porto Seguro, but if anyone can do it, it’s Zach. He’s the man.
.....
Things are going a lot better with my comp. We kinda had a fight one morning, and so I said alright for study today, tell me about your family and why you’re here. And then I did the same. Now we know a lot more about each other. It was kinda weird - just two guys sitting in a room talking about their families and crying, but it was actually the best thing that could of happened. We’re now just peachy as can be. He is pretty cool. I’m learning lots from him and I’m teaching him to chill out a little cause he is from Sao Paulo. It’s just run run run there and here in Bahia it’s just sit around all day. That’s all the people do. But it’s good. He’s helping me be a little more fast paced and I’m helping him calm down a bit. But really he is way cool. The district is going good. I think conference de zona will be next week. We’re still not 100 percent on that though, so we’ll see.
I love you all. Take care.
Wednesday, March 3, 2010
March 3, 2010
Hey Family,
How’s it going. That’s so nuts about Zach. (Zach Nalder broke his ankle playing soccer on his mission in Argentina and came home for surgery. He will be going back out in a couple of months or so.) Do you guys know if he is still a missionary or what will happen? That happened to a Brazilian here in our mission and he ended up having to make up those months. They said it’s a new thing the First Presidency is doing. Do you guys know if he will have to? Actually I don’t think he can cause a visa only last 2 years... at least here anyways. Man I’m sure his emotions were just going nuts.
Anyway that’s really sad to hear about Grandpa Lowe (Gerald Lowe passed away this week. He was Tim's Bishop, neighbor and close friend) ... send hugs to everyone from me. I’ve been thinking about him and their family a lot this week. What a great man! What a great family! He can be proud of the life he led here on this earth and he can be proud of his family.
So my companion and I are way, way different but it’s good to have a little contrast huh. He is really, really fast and talks way fast. He wanted to get a marker to mark a scripture and took the corner to fast and fell. I couldn’t help but laugh. I’m trying to help him to chill out a little about things. Here in Bahia everything’s so calm. But he is really good – really, really excited to teach and help the branch here so that’s good. It’s funny to see a new elder. We taught a lesson to a guy who was pretty wishy washy about everything but said we could come again. We left and my companion was already planning the guy's baptism and said “man what if he is called as a mission president some day? Did you think about that?” Ha, it’s funny. I’m just doing everything I can to keep that young, hopeful spirit in him. It’s funny though. He doesn’t speak a word of english so that’s good. And he talks really fast so I’m learning a lot just from communicating with him, but in the mornings he just wakes up and starts spouting Portuguese at me and I just look at him with a blank stare because I don’t catch any of it, haha. But he is a really good missionary. I’m actually learning lots from him. I think President got our callings backwards.
That’s so cool the Hillmans are still doing so well. Tell them I think about them a lot and miss them.
Elder Palmer was from Sandy, Utah and yeah, I do miss Elder Morris. I miss english and Americans - just have more in common most of the time so that was fun but my new companion is cool too. This week I did have to speak in church for the first time in my whole mission. It’s been a miracle because I haven’t been capable until now. And it wasn’t even in my own branch. It was in Coroa Vermelha, but it went good I think. I hope they understood some of what I said.
It’s still pretty hot here, but its been raining a lot this week and I just left the old umbrella in my last casa so I’ve just been manning up and dealing with it. But it’s good. So yeah my shoe laces broke and I had bought this one for my Vans in my last area and I put it on my dress shoe. (We saw a picture with Tim in it and he had a green shoe lace in one of his shoes, so we asked him about it.) It’s actually helped a lot because people just laugh when they see it and just realize were goofy normal people too. It’s funny. But yeah things are good here. I miss you guys a lot though. I thought that would go away, but no. But holy smokes I have more then 9 months now. I get to call you in a month and a half and I’ll have like 11 months behind me. It’s crazy huh. But anyways I love you all. Weenie man needs to write more and someone bark at Monty for me. (We told Tim that Monty is starting to tell us what dogs say.)
Oh man and I got my first kiss on the mission! This little girl - she is 1 and 6 and the cutest thing I’ve ever seen in my life - crawled up on the couch next to me and kissed me on the cheek. We reactivated their family and they’re going so strong now. I love them so much. I’ll send a picture of her. She never, never, never is not smiling from ear to ear. She makes me miss Monty though. But I’ll take a picture of her. Anyways, love you all. Take care. Peace.
Hey Family,
How’s it going. That’s so nuts about Zach. (Zach Nalder broke his ankle playing soccer on his mission in Argentina and came home for surgery. He will be going back out in a couple of months or so.) Do you guys know if he is still a missionary or what will happen? That happened to a Brazilian here in our mission and he ended up having to make up those months. They said it’s a new thing the First Presidency is doing. Do you guys know if he will have to? Actually I don’t think he can cause a visa only last 2 years... at least here anyways. Man I’m sure his emotions were just going nuts.
Anyway that’s really sad to hear about Grandpa Lowe (Gerald Lowe passed away this week. He was Tim's Bishop, neighbor and close friend) ... send hugs to everyone from me. I’ve been thinking about him and their family a lot this week. What a great man! What a great family! He can be proud of the life he led here on this earth and he can be proud of his family.
So my companion and I are way, way different but it’s good to have a little contrast huh. He is really, really fast and talks way fast. He wanted to get a marker to mark a scripture and took the corner to fast and fell. I couldn’t help but laugh. I’m trying to help him to chill out a little about things. Here in Bahia everything’s so calm. But he is really good – really, really excited to teach and help the branch here so that’s good. It’s funny to see a new elder. We taught a lesson to a guy who was pretty wishy washy about everything but said we could come again. We left and my companion was already planning the guy's baptism and said “man what if he is called as a mission president some day? Did you think about that?” Ha, it’s funny. I’m just doing everything I can to keep that young, hopeful spirit in him. It’s funny though. He doesn’t speak a word of english so that’s good. And he talks really fast so I’m learning a lot just from communicating with him, but in the mornings he just wakes up and starts spouting Portuguese at me and I just look at him with a blank stare because I don’t catch any of it, haha. But he is a really good missionary. I’m actually learning lots from him. I think President got our callings backwards.
That’s so cool the Hillmans are still doing so well. Tell them I think about them a lot and miss them.
Elder Palmer was from Sandy, Utah and yeah, I do miss Elder Morris. I miss english and Americans - just have more in common most of the time so that was fun but my new companion is cool too. This week I did have to speak in church for the first time in my whole mission. It’s been a miracle because I haven’t been capable until now. And it wasn’t even in my own branch. It was in Coroa Vermelha, but it went good I think. I hope they understood some of what I said.
It’s still pretty hot here, but its been raining a lot this week and I just left the old umbrella in my last casa so I’ve just been manning up and dealing with it. But it’s good. So yeah my shoe laces broke and I had bought this one for my Vans in my last area and I put it on my dress shoe. (We saw a picture with Tim in it and he had a green shoe lace in one of his shoes, so we asked him about it.) It’s actually helped a lot because people just laugh when they see it and just realize were goofy normal people too. It’s funny. But yeah things are good here. I miss you guys a lot though. I thought that would go away, but no. But holy smokes I have more then 9 months now. I get to call you in a month and a half and I’ll have like 11 months behind me. It’s crazy huh. But anyways I love you all. Weenie man needs to write more and someone bark at Monty for me. (We told Tim that Monty is starting to tell us what dogs say.)
Oh man and I got my first kiss on the mission! This little girl - she is 1 and 6 and the cutest thing I’ve ever seen in my life - crawled up on the couch next to me and kissed me on the cheek. We reactivated their family and they’re going so strong now. I love them so much. I’ll send a picture of her. She never, never, never is not smiling from ear to ear. She makes me miss Monty though. But I’ll take a picture of her. Anyways, love you all. Take care. Peace.
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