Week 66, Fourth Area!

I got transferred!!!!!! I'm going to San Tiago, to an area called Chao Bom. I'm leaving in a few hours, I hate saying good bye to people, I fell in love with this branch :(
I'll arrive tomorrow, it is a one hour car ride from the city of Praia. My new companion will be Elder Barrus, he is Cape Verdian from Fogo but I've never met him. Should be fun though, I'm excited :)

Week 65

Psh, I don't know what this whole "adult" thing is you are talking about, but if it doesn't include Dragon Ball Z, then I'm not doing it.
Anyways, Hi! This past week was great, I even walked around with my camera and took a bunch of pictures to send you, but then I got here to the internet cyber, and the owner apparently downloaded some sort of other internet program and DOESN'T allow you to send pics.
But back to my great week; the work is going a lot better now, we had been struggling for a few weeks. We are teaching a few families that are super cool, and we had 10 investigators at church yesterday.
Also, the Chapel is almost done! So we have had the chance to do activities every Saturday again, but this time us missionaries are in charge, at least for the next few weeks. This past Saturday we had like 30 people there and it was super fun, everyone loved it. I definitely feel loved here, I love the members and it honestly makes me not miss home.

Oh Yessss! I figured it out! lol turns out I CAN send pictures from here.

This was this past Saturday, this is the Sacrament room.

Also, we visited a zone a 20 minute car ride away called "Palha Verde" and we took some members with us. We have an inactive family there that nobody visited for a while, they were happy to talk to us. 

It's in the middle of nowhere though, and there is NOTHING out there lol. 

And I'm not sure if I ever told you, but our Branch President is in a wheelchair. He had an accident a few years ago and can't walk, but he always stands up for a couple of hours a day because he's been able to take a few steps and believes he can walk again someday. I hope he gets there!

So these are the April Fool's pictures of the Saran-wrapped toilet.

Week 64

    Well, my week was great! We almost doubled our Sacrament attendance from last week. It was 37 last Sunday and 61 yesterday. It was way awesome seeing the chapel that packed with people. We had been struggling for a while, I don't know why but it happens. They weren't all investigators, a lot of them are less actives that we have been working with and they are coming back strong. It's going to help this area tons, we literally only have 4 worthy priesthood holders besides the missionaries in the entire city. This branch is super new, only about a year and 10 months.
    We also had interviews with President Matthews again. It was pretty good but nothing crazy special. He always starts the same way, "Are you obedient?" then it goes on from there. He is really into obedience. It's crazy though, I never really talk to him much about how I feel, but during the interview he said "I know after spending so much time in Ribeira Grande you didn't feel like you were progressing or becoming a better missionary, but I've seen you progress a lot here in the past few months." Which is completely true, it was definitely the spirit that told him cuz I have never told anybody that. I definitely feel like a much more powerful teacher now. It's nice to have someone to talk to about everything that's not your comp (nothing against McMullin, I love that kid).
     Oh and speaking of McMulling, some guy totally punched him in the chest this past week, lol. They guy is mentally ill so he didn't really know what he was doing. He is always walking around the streets. We walked past him and I heard a super loud smack, so I turned and McMullin had the most confused look on his face lol.
    I forgot my camera this week, so I'll send pics next week! (sorry) Also, I'll be Skyping home on Mother's Day next month, Elder Gooch was nice enough to give me his web cam before he left.

Week 63

Hi! This week was kinda normal, but a lot better than last week. General Conference was pretty cool, I enjoyed it a lot since a ton of the talks were about marriage and families. We saw it at our Branch President's house on Saturday and at the chapel on Sunday. The chapel is about to be finished! Sorry, I guess I never really told you that its been under construction for the past 2 months, so every Saturday night or Sunday morning we have been cleaning up the Sacrament room and other new classrooms. They are doing the finishing touches and should be done this weekend. I'll take pics and a video for you.
April Fools was fun! McMullin and I seran-wrapped the toilet for the other Elders lol. Like 95% of all pranks happened in the bathroom or while someone was showering. I have a few pictures but I'm at an internet cafe that doesn't allow me to send pics, lame -.-

Week 62

Man, you have no idea how much your email cheered me up. I had a really rough week, we taught less than half the number of lessons we usually teach. Yesterday we only had one investigator at church again, AND for some stupid reason, soccer (and sports) are now against the rules in the mission.
Also, our water heater blew up last Monday, so it was gushing out water while we were out working. We came back to the house to find a solid inch of standing water everywhere. We mopped up water for 2 straight hours.
This is kind of a bad picture of it, but I didn't think of photographing anything until after half the water was gone.

Also, here is a random selfie of Me, Chevy, and McMullin. We are wearing the 3 ties mom sent me a long time ago. 

Week 61

I can finally send pics, but the week was pretty normal, nothing too crazy. We had a ton of success this week, we have been struggling to get investigators to church for the past month, but we had 5 yesterday, which was a huge improvement from the 1 we had last week. I also gave a talk on missionary work along with Chevy and Sampson. All 4 of us also put together a fireside about temples and missionary work, it went pretty good.
It was also my son's birthday! We didn't celebrate it with anything big though, just shawarma! Sorry it was a really bad pic of it but it was darn good. Chevy and I wrestled him down and gave him his birthday spankings though, haha it was fun. I also somehow talked him into buying this shirt that says "we own the night" lol it fits him extremely small.

 

Btw, PLANNER NUMBER 10!!!! I hit double digits!!!! I was very happy that morning. My stack actually looks like a stack! Haha McMullin is all mad cuz he only has 2 lol. Which does feel horrible, Olsen had 10 and I only had 1 when I was being trained and I wanted to cry, lol not really. 

So here is the picture I tired to send last week of McMullin's broken bed. It happened in the middle of the night too, I heard a loud sound at like 4 in the morning, so I turned my head and saw his legs up int he air and he was all like "shut up" half asleep and it was HILAROUS. I lost 30 minutes of sleep due to nonstop laughing. So he basically just balanced it until 6:30 when it was time to wake up and rolled out of bed and the bed just fell apart again. 

Also, the senior missionaries went home!! The Demkes are awesome, I'm gonna miss them a lot. They took us out to eat one last time before they left, they were super nice. 

Oh and before I forget, McMullin's mom is super nice and she sent him a care package with a tie for me. It's like a pastel purple for Easter. Tell her I said thank you on my blog!

Week 60

Week 60!!!!!!! Transfers were last night, nothing changed in Santa Maria, I'm gonna be McMullin's only father, woop!! I'm in transfer 10 of 16!!! It's crazy!!! Time is just flying by. So I had a few pics to send you but this computer isn't letting me send anything -.-
It was only like 1 funny picture of Elder McMullin praying early in the morning with his broken bed, like it was all tilted. He basically fell out of bed, it was hilarious at 6:30 in the morning. It fell apart again, but we fixed it again so now it's good.

So that's basically it for this week I'll try to send pics next week. Love ya, talk to you next week!