April 29, 2013

FAMILY!!!!  How are you all doin??  This week went a lot better than the last one! haha thats for sure!  It is rough opening a new area.  We dont have a lot to work with so we have been making tons of contacts, talking to everyone!  The people here in Biguaçu arent super open to hearing about the gospel, but we have found some that are accepting of a visit in their house.

We got stopped by a lady named Renata who has a husband and two kids.  She asked us more about family search, so we are going to meet with her tomorrow.  We are going to to help her tomorrow, as well as teach her the first lesson.  She said that she practices a little bit of Budhism, so it should be interesting!

We also made a contact with a lady named Sonha.  She said that her daughter had heard a little bit about the Mormons from a friend of hers.  Before we could even ask to come to her house, she invited us.  We went there the next day like we had planned with her but we couldnt find her house.  Everyone we asked didnt know where she lived.  We asked so many people in the neighborhood.  Then we decided to say a prayer that we could get a hold of her.  We kept askin around and askin around, and we were lucky to find a lady who knew exactly where she lived.  We went to the house and her cousin gave us her phone number cuz she wasnt home.  We called her and we hope to visit her this week.  The Lord answered our prayers cuz we were able to get a hold of her.

Other than that, we are trying to find more and more people to teach!  I have never walked so much in my life and I have never climbed taller hills! haha.  But we will keep talking to everyone and find the people who are looking for the gospel.  Yesterday we had a stake conference and I played prelude and the opening hymn on the piano for everyone.  I was nervous out of my mind! hahah.  Austin and Hayden, Practice Practice Practice.  Especially hymns.  Mom and Dad were always right when they said I'd use it on the mission.  I love you all and hope you have a fantastic week!  I cant wait to call home in less than two weeks!  Tell Morg that I love her too!

Elder Howard

April 22, 2013

FAMILY!!!!  I hope you are all doing great!!!  This week was a stressful one!!!  Monday I headed to Floripa and spent two nights there!  It was so cool!  It is such a pretty island and I got to hang out with a bunch of the other missionaries.  Then we got assigned to our companions who were fresh off the plane from Sao Paulo.  My new companion is Elder Lima and he is from Mato Grosso.  He is a super cool kid!  Right now I am living with 3 other Brasilians!  I have never spoken so much Portuguese in my life! hahah.

We got to Biguaçu and had absolutely nothing to work with.  This week we did a lot of contacts and got to know the area.  We werent able to find much success, cuz a lot of the people here arent very open.  We have found a few people to teach this week, so I hope that everything goes well with them.  We will do a lot more contacts this week and try to find people interested in the gospel.  It is super stressful, but it is slowly coming along.

They have just a branch here, with about 50 members who go each week.  Our goal is to help turn it into a ward.  On Sunday we got to meet everyone.  We all bore our testimonies and introduced ourselves.  The members here are really great!  I am excited to work with them, I just need to be patient with getting the work going.

I love you all and hope you have a great week!  Tell Morg that I love her too!  And Aust, CONGRATS on making SBO!!!  I am so proud of you bro!  You are gonna love it!!!

Elder Howard

April 15, 2013

There won't be a family email today. Landon is being transferred to Biguaçu -- a city on the coast just north of Florianopolis. He is now a senior companion and will be training a  new missionary.

April 8, 2013

FAMILY!!!!  This week was a great one!  It seemed to fly by super fast!  I hope that you all had a great week at home.  Conference was absolutely amazing wasnt it??  I love listening to the Prophet and the other church leaders.  It truly is amazing to have a living prophet on the other to lead and guide us each day.

Monday we met a lady named Maria and her granddaughter Brenda.  They are great people!  We went with some of the members and left the first message with a BOM.  Maria really liked it and was so happy for our visit.  Then Sunday rolled around and she came to conference.  It was so great to see her!  We meet with her again tonight and I am super stoked.

To top off an amazing conference weekend, was the baptism of Leo!!!  It was an awesome experience being able to watch 5 sessions of conference, and then having a baptism right after.  Leo truly is an amazing kid and the baptism went great.  He has showed so much faith through our whole teaching process.  He will be confirmed next week in sacrament meeting!  Also, I showed him pics of me with my nature tees and he loves them! hahaha it is hilarious! I wanna get him wearing them down here in Brazil ;)

We met another family this week named Antonio and Bernadete with their son and daughter.  They are another great wfamily and were very accepting to our message.  We left them the first lesson and it went really good.  We follow up again with them tomorrow.

Thursday we had a training with the president in Lages.  Lages is an awesome city, and the bus ride from Curitibanos to Lages is beautiful.  Full of green and everything.

I hope you all have a great week!  I love you all so much and tell Morg that I love her too!  Aust, good luck with all your SBO stuff!!!

Elder Howard

April 1, 2013

FAMILY!!!!!  Wow that week went by fast! haha I hit my 7th month mark this week! It is pretty crazy, sometimes it feels like it has gone slow, but looking back it has gone pretty dang fast! haha.  This week was a good one and it sounds like you all had a good one too!

We met with Leo this week!  It went really well!  He is such a good kid.  We taught him the plan of salvation, and also taught him about the word of wisdom.  He told us that he would stop drinking coffee.  So far he has stopped a little bit, and he is improving so much.  I truly can see a spiritual change in him.  He is a genuine good kid.  He comes to church every week on his own and has been reading the Book of Mormon on top of school, work, and everything else.  He is a great example to me.  We are trying to mark his baptism for next week.  We meet with him again tomorrow night.

We also met with this girl named Pamela, who is friends with a Recent Convert family.  We taught her the first lesson and invited her to be baptized on the 13th.  She accepted, but when Sunday rolled around, she didnt come to church.  We will have to push the baptism off another week if she still follows through.  We met with her two times, and we will meet with her a third time this week.

We met a new guy named Jair.  We met him last week doing some contacts.  We returned on Saturday and shared the first lesson with him, and gave him a Book of Mormon.  He seemed to really enjoy the message we left, and is looking forward to meeting with us again on Friday.  We left him a part to read and said he will read a bunch this week and pray to know if it is true.  He is a really great guy and I hope he follows through.

We have been working a lot with Less Active Members, and trying to find new people to teach.  It isnt very easy to find new people! haha.  A lot of people already have their religion, and they just say, "We love the work you are doing." haha but they dont accept our lessons.  But we are trying to find new people and we are working with a bunch!

I love you all and tell Morg that I love her too!  I missed Easter without you guys, but me and Elmer chilled and made some cookies for the neighbors.  I am super excited for Conference this weekend!!!!  You all better watch it :) Have a great week!

Elder Howard