Monday, July 18, 2011

Carioba

My New Area



Ch..ch...ch..changes

So we baptized John and Larissa...yeah!!! Had a bit of drama to get the pool filled (because it´s a house, we have to use a swimming pool) and because of some problems we ended up loading buckets of water to fill it up! It was a nice baptism, filled with a ton of people. We then continued working with Zilda and the whole branch is in love with these 2 new members. It´s awesome!!! Filling the font (swimming pool)

Had the best p-day of my life!!! We watched Work and the Glory 1,2 and 3 with a group of missionaries. We ate and ate and ate.

It was announced on Sunday that Zilda is going to get baptised. The whole branch started to cry. It was soooo funny to watch the members' faces. Like a fish, mouth opened and eyes like...DUDE. Felt good. She's been attending for 6 years!!

So, Monday morning get a phone call that we would close Cordeiro (we knew that) and that no one would open it. Yeah, the branch president was not happy with us. It´s "all our fault". Hmmm, yeah. So, we spent the day cleaning the house and saying goodbye to everyone. We called the zone leaders and they came and interviewed Zilda for baptism. She was amazing...6 years of elders and it took two sisters for her to decide to get baptised. Oh, how I love that woman. She´ll get baptised on Saturday. It was hard to say goodbye to Elisa, Cairo, Vitoria...Irmá Maria started crying, that was hard. Laila thanked us for giving her strength and taking her to the temple. Jaque and Jaina gave us huge hugs and Ana cried as well. I hate it when people cry, it makes me want to cry as well.

Then Monday night we had a family night with Garcia, his family and John and Larissa. It was great. They are growing so much, Larissa especially. We are leaving them in good hands and I don´t feel sad. We did the work that the Lord asked us to do. We baptised and did our best. We worked hard and gave our all. Miracles happened and now the branch needs to grow a little. We lost 20 missionaries and only got 8, so every stake had to close an area. I hope that this will help the branch be more appreciative of missionaries and help more. But, Sister Cleise and I are without guilt. We´re happy, we did our part and the Lord blessed us.

There is a down side to closing an area...you have four suitcases for 2 sisters. We walked to the Rodoviaria (again, no help of the members). The bus would leave at 7:05, so we left at 6 am and got to the bus station at 6:45. (Oh, I´m going to give my smaller suitcase to S.Cleise, she needs it more than I, and I´m not going to be bringing a lot of stuff home...my clothes are dying.) We got to the Rodoviaria in Campinas, and it was amazing to see old friends. We laughed, silly people. Several of my friends are done after this transfer. This is the transfer that I could have gone home...but S.Poast and I are going to be okay, working an extra six weeks...42 days isn´t that much more. I'm glad to have email, facebook and skype to stay in touch with dear friends.

So, where am I now? I opened Carioba with S.Barbosa. This is her second or third transfer. Carioba is in the city Americana. It is a huge area and should be fun. While reading the area book last night (she has a killer cold that she gave to me, urg!!!) and saw that some of my old leaders worked here, E.Dunn and E.Rhodes and that they baptised a ton!!! So, WOOOOOOOOOT!!! I am going to work hard and hard and then even harder.Here we are with the ward's YW.

Anyway, I love you guys. Sending you photos...from my morpher (S.Cleise says it looks like a morpher from Power Rangers). This is god´s work and mom don´t worry, you´ll get your creative inspiration in the right moment...you always do.

S.Stapley