Week 19

Hello Everyone!

So... I get to email today. I get to have my Pday too. I dont have much time, but I have a few interesting stories and pieces of information for you all. The most pressing news is that transfers (they were supposed to happen today) are going to happen tomorrow. The news of the transfer is that I will be leaving Guará and be getting a new companion. Tomorrow I will find out who my companion is and where I will be going! This is exciting, scary, and sad for me all at the same time. We were pretty certain that I would be staying here in Guará, but I guess we learned that things dont always end up how you think. This morning I started saying goodbye to folks and boy, it is a lot harder than I thought it would be. I think that today is going to involve a lot of crying. I really do love the people here. I think perhaps more than I realized.

Real fast I have a couple funny stories. 1. It rained a ton this last week. Tuesday was a particularly notable day because we left our house and seriously walked not even a block away when a bus passed us on the road and literally drenched us. It happened exactly how you would imagine in a movie. That was funny and embarrassing a little.

Another funny story of Tuesday is that we had a FHE planned with a Boliviano that lives here in Guará. We are teaching his cousin that lives with him. We got to their house and they had some other visiters. Jehovah Witnesses. Ha ha. That was awkward. I dont know exactly what is protocol in a situation like that but we left pretty quick. I thought it was pretty funny though.

I hope you guys enjoyed my awkward stories of the week and stay tuned until next week and I will let you all know where I am and who my companion is. Love you all,

Sister Hoopes

Week 18

Olá!

Things here are going great. Last week was definitely a whirlwind of events though. Last Pday we spent most of the day outside of our house while some fellows came and fixed our walls. It stormed a lot. We lost power for most of the day which was not a big deal really until we returned home at the end of the night. We sat and did our daily planning with candles. It was pretty special. ha ha. Luckily the power returned by the time I got up the next day.

Tuesday we had our district meeting in Asa Sul as per usual. Luckily our bus didnt break and we made it there on time. However, of the 4 districts that meet together in Asa Sul only our district made it due to sickness in the other districts. But, it was a solid meeting. The next day we had our first mission conference- which actually meant our zone the zone of Brasília and the zone of Brasília Norte meeting in Asa Norte with president and sister Gaertner. It was good and I got to see some of my friends from the CTM that I havent seen in a while there which was quite thrilling. We did get more information about our next transfer. Which is next week. We will be receiving 8 sisters and 4 elders. Wow times are changing right. This is significant news for me because this means that for sure I will be getting a new companion and I will probably be staying here in Guará. 3 new areas will open for sisters in our mission as well which is exciting as well.

In terms of missionary work- we had a pretty successful week. We found a new family to teach that are super excited for the gospel. They have 2 sons and one is autistic. They heard about the church at the school of Samuel their autistic son via another family that has a kid in the same class. They are super nice and last night they sent us home with 2 cakes--- yes two whole cakes to eat. Ha ha.

My best news of the week is I had my first baptism! Bruna was baptized on Saturday and confirmed Sunday morning in Sacrament meeting. The whole event went really smoothly and it was aweeeeeeeeeesome. We had one investgator attend, Nilson which was great as well. One funny thing about the whole event was that Friday, the day before, sis. V and I went to fill the font in the morning. Unfortunately it was really dirty so we cleaned it. Cleaning with Sis. V is probably on my list of least favorite things to do... because she has some weird methods of cleaning. However, cleaning the font was funny because she insisted that we use dish soap even though there was other all purpose cleaner. I just went with it. The best part was that the font filled with all the water we used to clean with and then we couldnt get the soapy water to drain so we had to use buckets to empty it and refill it with new water.

Whelp folks this is all for this week. Things have been great, and the mission is going good. Next week is transferences and I am about 90 percent sure I will not be emailing. So stay tuned for all the new news of the mission when I get to email again!

Love you all,
Sister Hoopes

Week 17

Hi Family!

So this week has literally flown by for me! I have several random things to note... so be prepared for a very scattered email- Yet again. =) So first interesting news- I am pretty sure I informed everyone of my companion´s love for condiments like mayo and ketchup... well we found at the store a combinations of mayo ketchup and mustard. We bought it and she is quite content with the product. Actually, this week Sister Victorio has a lot of stuff to be happy about. On Saturday her parents and one of her brothers were baptized. She has been waiting a long time for them to be baptized, so this was wonderful news. I am not sure if they were baptized in a river like she was because they didnt send pictures... but when they do I will see if she can forward them to me so I can show you all.

This week also marked month 4 on the mission and month 9 for Sister Victorio. We are getting old. Ha ha. we celebrated this event by eating cookies and brownies because those are the only two treats I know how to make without a reciepe. It has been pretty warm here... however today it is storming again- so it´s raining quite intensely.

Okay, so for some interesting stories. Tuesdays we ride a bus to Asa Sul in Brasília to have a district meeting. This past Tuesday we got on the first bus we saw headed that direction. By sheer coincidence one recent convert that we have been visiting Sthefanie and one woman that we met a few weeks ago were both on the same bus. We talked to them both for a moment and set times to meet with them, but, I guess we were supposed to talk with them longer than a moment because in the middle of the freeway close to basically no where, our bus broke down. So we all got out and waited for another bus to come along and pick us up. It was all good though. We definitely showed up late to our meeting, but it all worked out quite well.

Random funny story. The other night I woke up to Sister Victorio laughing. Hysterically. She was definitely asleep and she laughed for at least 5 minutes. I didnt know what to do. So I just laid there and waited for her to stop. I asked her the next day what she was dreaming about and she said she was teaching the Restauration to an investigator. Hmmm. The whole situation was funny to me.

So in other news our mission is receiving 8 new sisters in 2 weeks. Crazy. Right now we have 19 so we are definitely growing in numbers. This week we have a baptism planned for an investigar Bruna so hopefully next week I will have pictures of my first official fruit of the mission!!
Love you all and stay in touch,

Sister Hoopes

Week 16

Hello Family!

Today is good. This week has been awesome. And missionary work is progressing here in Guará II! The sun is shining the weather is perfect and all is well. My extreme happiness began last pday when I got a package from home. I dont know how to describe the joy of receiving a package. I mean I enjoyed mail and getting packages in the mail before the mission, but getting a package these days is inexpressable joy. I think I finally understand how Katniss felt during the hunger games when she got a backpack full of stuff. Anyway this week I have some new clothes, dark chocolate caramels, mail and a few other much desired items. I will try to send a picture so you all can really experience the joy I have right now!

Anyway news here in Brazil. It did rain a lot a few days last week and I took a picture with one of the rivers aka roads that we got to walk on so I will try to attach that as well. We have been super super busy this week. We have 4 people that we are preparing for baptism and somehow it feels like all of our investigators live at all the different edges of our area so we walk A LOT. But, its all good. The people here are great. Yesterday, we had some really spiritual lessons with our investigators. I also got to take the lead teaching an investigator for the first time yesterday. We had read the tree of life vision with this family last week and we labeled a picture of the all the different parts of the vision. Their homework was to find the interpretations of the dream and we talked about the interpretations yesterday. It was really awesome. At the end I asked them where they think they are in the dream and they all said at the rod. I asked them where the rod leads and they said the tree of life and the gospel. It was awesome and spiritual. One funny part is that Victor an 11 year old in the family is convinced the that fruit in the vision are bananas because bananas are white when you peel them.... ha ha ha.

So life is good. I got letters this last week too. Most of them were from December that got forwarded to me from the CTM. I was pretty thrilled so you all keep up the letter writing... but send them to the mission home! Love you all! Have a wonderful week.

Love, Sister Hoopes