September 8, 2015

I don't have time to write an update now we are going to the CTM agiain today!! A 70 is coming to give a talk and we'll bus it over there. Im excited, never thought ´d return to the CTM! São Paulo West mission is really blessed because we have the São Paulo temple and headquarters and CTM in our mission. So if an apostle or leader of the church visited Brazili its highly likly to be in our mission and we get to hear talks! I´m emailing today because today is our p day because of the talk and yesterday was Brazil´s independance day so internet places weren´t open. 

September 1, 2015 First Baptism!

Weekly update,

This week went by very fast. Last Monday we made a cake for Sister Mejia and said goodbye!This week had two days tha were cold and rainy, but yesterday and today were hot! We also recieved our new roommates, there are now 4 Sisters in the apartment- Sister Garcia who is a newbie and Sister Tesser, both are from Brazil. We divided our area, which is hard because the area wasn´t big to begin with because there are many apartment complexes in the area of Maria Rosa. Apartments are hard because you make a contact and then you have to inter phone up through the security at the portaria, so it´s difficult to enter and teach sometimes. But we helped the new Sisters a lot this week,. We gave them some great investigators and contacts and we had a miny division Wendesday, I showed Sister Tesser the area and Sister D. Sousa show Sister Garcia around. 

We are teaching Cristiani and Igor as well as Mateus and we are hoping and praying for their baptisms this month, we will see!

This week was also very special because I had my first baptism, Maria! 87 years old! Never too old to change! We showed her the font again and assured her the water was "Bem quente". After she was baptized Sister Tesser and I gave a little talk about the Atonement and Baptism. After Maria redressed, Sister Tesser, Garcia, and D. Sousa sang the Children´s hymn "When I am baptized" and I sang the last verse and chorus solo in English seque. Cristiani and Igor came and watched the baptism. We will teach Cristiani today about the importance authority has in Baptism. The Church of Jesus Christ is the only Church that has this authority, so when we are baptized in His Church, our sins are truly wiped clean and we can recieve the gift of the Holy Ghost! 

Today was also P day at the Temple, which was really nice. 

It was Sister Mejia's last day of her mission, so we made her a cake and said tchau!

Maria's baptism!  She's 87 years old!

New Sisters

First P Day at the Temple

August 24, 2015

Weekly Update:

Last Sunday we had a difficult day, but we met Cristiani and her sobrino Allison ( A boy´s name here) and her son Igor. This family is a miracle. We met them because we made a contact with her mom, but Cristiani was home when we interphoined up to the apartment. This week we brought them to a church activity- "Improve Night". I´m not particularly fond of this activity in English none the less Portuguese haha. We were also the first to arrive at the Church, so I was kind of freakining out internally because this was their first experience with the Church and I wanted it to be a good one! We gave them a tour of the Church and it was really good. When the activity started not many people were there, but it worked. Sisiter D. Sousa and I participated in one activity where we spoke "Chinese" and two other volunteers translated what we said in Portuguese. For me this was particullarly funny because I didn´t understand the Chinese sounding words or "translated"version or the translated version in Portuguese because I was focusing so hard to come up with words in Chinese! But it ended up being good and Cristiani came with us to Church and liked it! I was able to bear my testimony that the good feelings she felt there was the Holy Ghost.I love Church, especially as a missionary because the classes teach the people what we will teach. I know that Church lessons are inspiried because this week the lesson was specifically what 3 people in the class needed to hear. We are also continuing to teach sweet Maria, her baptism is this Saturday! WOO!

This week was Sister Mejia´s last, which is sad. She is so wonderful. She will return to Peru and continue medical school. 

This week we also had training of the new missionaries, which was super fun because I got to see Sister Covey!

Also, tomorrow we will be getting another dupla of sisters in our apartment and area! I´m super excited! It will be a newb and a trainor. 

This week was really special because we were blessed to hear the words of the Apostle Neil L. Anderson. Before our meeting a member- Mirriam and Jussario- offered to take us out to lunch close to the temple and church building. They are super cool and nice. 

Elder Anderson talked about the Attonement. I have been thinking a lot about the Atonement. Every single person needs to study the Atonement. Jesus Christ is not soley a moment on the Cross. He lives! We can feel him in our lives and feel the healing power of him when we apply the Atonement in our lives. And we do that when we repent and change. This change is the power of the Atonement and through becoming better mothers, fathers, daughters, sons, siblings, workers, citizens, friends, people we can have true happiness now and joy for eternity when we are able to live with our Father in Heaven forever. If every person understood the Atonement, everyone would want to be baptized! That is why I´m here to share and teach people that God loves them and to give people more happiness. Sister Anderson also said we need to be honest. Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ are beings of perfect honesty. We cannot give ourselves the Holy Ghost. The Holy Ghost is granted to us by Heavenly Father and he cannot lie and so if we are living how God wants us to live, we will have the Holy Ghost in our lives. But if we are dishonest we are cheating ourselves of the blessings the Holy Ghost brings becasue we can only have Him with us when we are worthy. When we live how God wants us to and are obedient, we are happy!

Last district meeting with Sister Mejia

Treinamento dos novos e Sister Covey

Sister Covey and Sister Haggard

Mirriam and Jussano

From left:  Sister D Sousa, Sister Mejia :), Sister Haggard, Sister Carovana 

with Sister D Sousa

With Sister Covey (I look real bad in that pic, but se la)

with Sister Carovana

Yesterday a member gave us bags of dolces!

August 17, 2015

This week was intresting! Last Monday I was able to visit the Sanz family! Their house is beautiful and we ate a ton- a ton- of Brazilian BBQ, it was awesome. The Sanz family lives only 10 minutes away from where we live by car. Crazy. The Sanz family is super nice and funny. They have 4 boys and they remind me of my family, very funny and they joke around with each other a lot. It is super fun seeing Ricardo. He is teaching English and will start college, and at the end of the year serve his mission, he is hoping for Japan!

 Our message we shared with them was about the commandments. I love sharing this example. People here like to fly kites. Sometimes children want to cut the string of the kite thinking the string restricts the kite and the kite will soar higher without the string. However when the string is cut the kite will fall. We are the kite and the commandments are the string. Sometimes we think we do not need the commandments in our lives, that they restrict us. However this is not reality. The commandments maintain us and connect us to God. They protect us and guide us in our lives, and enable us to soar and reach happiness in our lives. I have a strong testimony that God only gives commandments so he can bless us and he never asks us to do anything without prepairing a way for us to complete the things asked. We made a little kite and put a magnet on the back so they can put it on their fridge! 

This week we had a division and I stayed in Maria Rosa and Sister Carovana came here. We had some good appointments and it was intresting because I was able to lead Sister C around! Sister Carrovana is from Argentina and is super awesome. 

This week we also had some difficulties. It remided me that I need patience! If I work hard and do the best I can the Lord will do his part in his time. 

Also! Next week I have trainging with the noobies with the President and the assistantes so I get to see Sister Covey! I´m pumped, I want to speak Portuguese really well haha. Also Elder Anderson, an apostle and quorum of the 12, is coming the 22nd to give a talk to the mission! I´m very excited!

muito carne!!!

professional!

with Ricky Sanz

Ricardo's mom is the best!

Look at all that yummy food!!!!!!!

A feast!

Ricky Sanz

Thank you for a great p day!!!

August 10, 2015

Weekly Update

This week flew by. We are continuing to teach Adriano and he´s pretty cool! We also started to teach Maria! She is 87 and so cute! We teach very simply and with pictures, I asked her if she wanted to be baptized and she said "topo tudo". There is a lot of work here in Maria Rosa! The family of Marriam and Jossario is super cool. They are recent converts and have a son Arthur who is 9 and isn´t baptized so we set a date for him and will start teaching him this week! This week I learned the importance of gaining investigator´s trust. When they relate to you and tell you about themselves it really makes the relationship so much better, and the people are easier to love because you can understand where they are coming from. We need to love all of the people here so our teaching is affective and how God wants it to be. The same thing with forgiving someone, if you can put yourself in their shoes it is easy to love. Arthur needed a TV for his school for a culture fair, but Marriam didn´t have time because she works and so we made the TV and it was "shique" and we grew closer to the family. Service is great!

This week we followed up on a reference we received from the ward for a member´s neighbors. They are a couple who are super super friendly and nice. They asked great questions and appreciated the Books of Mormon we gave them. And very special, they gave us flowers! They are very pretty. Tomorrow we have another divison! This time I will stay in Maria Rosa and Sister Caravanus an Aregtinian and our other Sister Training leader will come here. She is super nice I´m excited, but also very nervous because I will be guiding her around the area to our appointments etc. The Portuguese is still coming which is good, everyone tells me I speak well, but I´m not too sure about that haha. A new fancy bakery opened up by our apartment and this week some members are unable to have us over for lunch, so they gave us money instead and so now we can try it out! Yesterday and tooday my compainion and I are a little sick so we made drinks with lemon and ginger and water to boost that immune system (no honey because we are cheap) and I hope it works because it is not the most pleasant taste in the world haha! All is well and I´m excited to continue to teach! 

Abraços e beijos,

Sister Haggard 

Flores!

TV

Doentes!

August 3, 2015

Weekly Update 

I recieved pictures and my other glasses from my mom in the begining of the week, the pictures made me so happy!! Also Alexis Vielstich sent me the cutest letter from Japan @_@ it was awesome Obrigada Voçê!

Wow a lot happened this week!! This week I invited and set my first baptismal date! This week we marked two guys for baptism! Raphael- 18 yrs and Adriano 27 yrs. Setting the date is the easy part, but I´m pretty excited. We also have been teaching an awesome lady named Dalva who is so kind. We taught her about the Restoration and she said she believes in Joseph Smith and she reads the Book of Mormon! Also, one time we taught her I was really wanting some pão de queijo and we entered her house and I could smell it and at the end of the lesson she offered us pão de queijo, miracles! She is really awesome we can´t set a date yet for her because she is having a surgery, but she´s awesome. This week we also had interviews with the president of the mission- Del Guerso. He is so so nice and his wife is really animated and funny. She taught us to teaach in a fun and enthusiastic way. Today we found an awesome bakery that is cheap too! we noticed it is always busy although the outside looks a little rundown. I love it! The food here is still good, this week I ate more northern Brazilian food which is more extreme. For example the feijolada of the north has the pig ears and feet in there, but if you avoid those parts it´s pretty good! My companion is from the North and likes this kind of food. We would describe it as ´bem forte´and ´bem diferente´ haha. This week we also got to work at the Temple! We stood out front and made contacts and references it was really fun, I made 51 contacts! This week we also had the opportunity to talk to some really smart people. One of our investigators Kauá- 17, really likes to learn about religions and one of the contacts I made outside the temple was with a man named Melk Zedek who was really smart and asked awesome questions. I really love this becasue it is a testimony to me that the more knowledge we have and the more we learn, only increases our faith! Also this week we found people who are just waiting to be baptised. One of these people is Maria who is 85 yrs old and really nice. Her daughter attends church every Sunday with her boyfriend and Maria, and she wants Maria to be baptized. However the daughter of Maria is not baptized along with the boyfriend because they are not married. They have kids together who are members and they attend church every Sunday, but they won´t get married and therfore baptized becasue if they get married due to a law of Brazil they will have to give up one of three apartments they have. They have three apartments for themselves and their kids who are adults. I taught them about the widow of Zarapta and how she had to give up all the food she had to be blessed and be blessed more than she could imagine. We really have to be careful not to look at the material things we have, but put our faith in God trusting that he knows what is best for us now and in the long run and he will bless us! I know God is waiting waiting for US to show our faith and obey the comandments so he can bless us. 

This Sunday was my first fast Sunday in the field! I bore my testimony with my rough Portuguese. Also........RICARDO came and visited my ward!!! It was such a surprise, I did a double take! He lives in a neighboring area only about 5 miles away from the church, it is pretty crazy. Maybe on P day we will get authorization to have lunch with the Sanz. It was really special to get to see the Sanz :) Yesterday we taught a really cool girl, Victoria -17, about the Restoration and I´m excited to teach her more. Yesterday we also had dinner with the family of Irmõa Jossario. They are just reaching their one year anniversary of their baptism, they are supercool. There were also other members from the ward there as well, so it was pretty neat. Today marks 2 months I´m been here in Brazil! I can´t believe it. The first couple weeks in the field have been hard because  we're opening an area, but we are finally starting to really find people to teach. This next week will be very busy and exciting. 

first package!

I loved the pictures!

Irma Correa!!!!!!!

A girl we met on the street and talked with in the waiting room.  We gave her a Book of Mormon!

Ricky Sanz (our exchange student) and his family gave me a surprise visit at my ward!!!!!

Ricky Sanz!

Ricky Sanz!

my ward is great!

my apartment!

salgado

yummy!

July 27, 2015

Weekly Update,

This morning I made oatmeal with apples and cinamon, it was pretty good. This week was pretty good! I had my first division, which is when my companion and I switch companions for sister training leader. It was really fun. I went to the area Florinoplois which is very chique and nice. My companheira was Sisiter Meijia who is from Peru, 27 years old, studying to be a doctor, and only has a month left of her mission. She was super spunky and very very nice. We taught a bunch of lessons and it was very fun. I learned a lot. This week we got to know more members. The ward here is just so awesome. We went over to a recent converts house and I got to talk about Personal Progress which was really nice. Yesterday for lunch we ate at Dani´s house with her family. They were very funny. I also saw a picture of Dani on her mission with Irmã Correa! Correa was her trainadora! People here  will live together for many many years but aren´t married. You have to ask when and where they wre married to find out if they are actually married because people here say they´re married and wear a ring if they´ve lived together for a long time. We started to teach a women and her mom who are super awesome and I´m excited to continue to teach them. My Portuguese is pretty rough but I can communicate! I know a lot of words, but the grammar is tricky. Last Sunday Nilton was confirmd and his son wants to be baptized! I´m not sure how it will go but I´m excited. The food here is still awesome :)