Mar. 23, 2015 - The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for the good man to do nothing

That quote is spray painted on the path we walk down everyday. Its pretty good actually! 

Anyway this week was sweet! We have a baptism this Sunday!! Haha but the story behind it is hilarious! We have a member in our ward with a grandson who has been coming to church for years and knows everything but isn't baptized. I don't know why he isn't but he's 12 years old and so we just have to teach him some stuff and review and make sure he's ready for baptism. But the funniest thing happened because we hadn't even met him and yesterday they announced his baptism from the pulpit! haha he wasn't even a new investigator yet! hahah strange but fun!

Oh so we were eating lunch on Wednesday and we hear these two huge explosions. Like our windows kinda rattled. So we look out the window and there's this huge fire probably a mile away or so but it was intense! It was up on this hill and they put it out pretty fast it was intense. Heres a picture. 

But yeah we also have this other investigator Karen. She is elect! We only taught her the first lesson but she is so prepared and so ready! She has a 16 year old son with pretty bad autism which is making her skeptical to come to church but we also have a member in our ward with a 16 year old son with autism so guess who's going to teach with us? Its going to be awesome! Hopefully she'll have a baptism date in next weeks email!

Well love you all! If you think you can or you can't; YOU'RE RIGHT!

Mar. 9, 2015 - The ward is most important

Tudo bem!

Well this week was quite interesting. On tuesday I got a migraine so I stayed home all day and just slept in a dark room . That was fun. And at the same time my comp had some virus bug thing and the Stake missionary health lady told him to go on a 24 hour fast only drinking Coke. Haha strange but apparently the chemicals in the coke kill the virus. But it worked! Crazy stuff. 

But on saturday we did a little Mini-Mission or MTC activity with the youth in our ward. There were 8 Youth there and we paired them up as companions and we taught them about our daily schedule and how to sew and how to iron and we made lunch ad we practiced street contacting and it was a pretty fun experience for them! Then at the end we gave each dupla 2 cards and said dont come back with them. It was so awesome! The looks on their faces were priceless! Hahah so I took a dupla and my comp took a dupla adn the sisters too and we went to a park and had them do street contacts! It was so fun and they did surprisingly well. I was with a 16 year old kid Joel and he was really outgoing and gave his out way fast. We had a lot of fun.

Its been pretty hot this week and I got a taste of the Portuguese sun but the sun brings out people so our contacting pool grows with every degree it goes up haha

We made pancakes! With bananas and they were quite incredible. The sisters in our district have a baptism this week so thats really awesome and really brought up our spirits about the tough work here. 

Last night we had dinner with a member family and they have a 16 year old son with a mental handicap. His biological mom did drugs during her pregnancy and he was adopted by this family. And they told the story of when he turned 12 he could do baptisms for the dead in the temple. And when he came out he was dissapointed. They asked why and he said becasue he didn´t see Jesus. They kinda laughed about it but the next time they went they asked if he saw Jesus and he said YES. Sitting on the bench inthe baptistry.They asked what he was wearing and he said a purple robe. It was incredible. I believe it 100%. This meek innocent boy was expecting to see Jesus and when he didn´t he was dissapointed. The amount of faith he had to have had is incredible. Then when he did see him to be wearing a purple robe. Amazing. 

I dont know how to tie that in to a spiritual thought but it was just a cool story. Well love you guys! I can feel your prayers every day. The mission is awesome! Com Amor!

Mar. 2, 2015 - We're Master Chefs

Hello from cloudy rainy Braga!

Haha yup its still raining! Ok its not exactly "rain". Imagine this. Theres a really big fan with those mist sprayers, but like 30 feet away. And you just get that light\decent mist. but all the time. haha thas Braga for you. 

Well to start I just want to say that me and Elder Arnold have been cooking like wizards! haha this week we made shepherds pie! yup with homemade mashed potatoes and everything. Then on friday we made chicken cordon bleu! No joke! We sliced open some chicken breasts shoved in some cheese and ham and dipped them in flour then eggs then cracker crumbs to have the batter crust. Yeah heres a picture haha it was quite divine. 

Last P day we went to the big cathedral up on the hill over looking Braga called Bom Jesus and it was sweet! Catholics are pretty good architects! I found a 4 leaf clover too!! It was probably the luckiest thing ever (ba dum tss) but really we were just walking and passed this grass/clover patch and i just saw it! boom. 4 leaf clover. 

We helped a member tear out their bathroom this week. Well basically just the bathtub. It was this really old rusty bathtub that was extremely awkward and heavy ad we had to carry it down a flight of stairs and out to the backyard. It was intense. And i think i got rust on my pants and white shirt. Oh well. It was good to serve! 

This week has been pretty tough with teaching and finding people. We have had hardly any lessons and the one pesquisador who was gonna come to church didnt so that was unfortunate. But we´re going to keep working hard and fasting and hopefully I have better news next week but this area has been pretty rough. Pray for the people to be accepting.

And we had my first zone Conference! We took like a train for 90 minutes to Porto and met with everyone and it was pretty fun! I had to give the opening prayer so that was nerve racking. And we had our entrevistas with Presidente which was incredible. He is so loving and just an incredible leader and man. Ive only talked to him for 20 minutes in my whole life but i can already say that. Hes definitely called by divine revelation.

This week I looked in the Bible Dictionary at all the names of Christ and I knew there would be too many to count but 1 i found was really interesting. Captain. Christ is our captain. And we are his army. It was so cool! It made me look at him as this ripped powerful captain  with his hair flowing in the wind with all the power in the universe and WE are his army. Pretty sweet stuff. 

Love you guys and miss you all!

Feb. 23, 2015 - i finally saw the sun this week!

yes it stopped raining this week for a couple days! haha it was awesome and actually pretty hot! but this week was good, not that much success but it was an intersting week!

on tuesday we had a little ward party/carniaval and it was lame. haha only like 15 people showed up, mostly kids with no parents. weird. but we picked up these two little african kids, brother sister and the little girl, who was 7, won the costume contest! it was awesome she was so cute and so happy! 

then the next night we helped someone move. and my first thought when we got there was, this is mom´s worst nightmare. baha try not to have an anxiety attack while you read this. so we get there and nothing is packed (it wasnt that much stuff but still) and they have no boxes. so theyre frantically putting everything in these random tote bags. yes bags. and its me, elder arnold, the bishop, and two other members who are old and couldnt carry anything so while they packed everything, me and elder arnold were running up and down the stairs a million times. haha it was a disatser. portuguese people arent the brightest. and all they had was this one van and a mazda to put the stuff in. oh did i mention it was 8 pm when we started? haha yeah so we got home at 10:45 and we got some serious faca from the zone leaders but oh well. we were serving so it was good! fun night. 

This week we knocked into some romanians. they answered the door and just welcomed us in like immediately and wanted to be taught everything like right there. crazy! so we teach the first lesson and by the time we´re done we realize they didnt understand anything. haha like they just said oh thank you that was good but it all went over their heads. haha they spoke very little portuguese and that didnt help. so next time we´re going to have to teach like we´re teaching primary kids. itll be fun!

oh we got a francezinha! its basically a steak sandwhich with an egg on top smothered in sauce. it was quite good. 

This morning i was reading ether 12:27 and it just made me realize that we need to truly humble ourselves before the lord can build us up. he cuts us down and gives us trials and weaknesses and as soon as we realize that then he`ll build us up to what we can be. amazing.

well love you guys! hope youre all doing good and remember to trust the lord in all things!

Feb. 16, 2015 - rain

Olá família e amigos!

well i completed my first real week here! and its been awesome! we went on divsions with the zone leaders on thursday and that was pretty stressful. they both came here so i had to lead and find people. and i dont know if he knew but i had only been here for 7 days! hahah but it was a good way to have to learn the area quickly. miraculously i found all the house i needed to and i suprised myself with my memory! nobody was home at any of the houses we visited but oh well i was just preoccupied with finding them.  

we ate dinner at a members house twice and 1 investigators! the investigator, Fernanda, made feijoada which is a bean, meat, vegetable stew over rice. it sounds pretty gross but it was suprisingly good!! apparently very portuguese so that was fun! then we ate at the marinho´s who are from england and speak english and way funny! i forgot what we had but it was good. then yesterday we ate with another member who made feijoada too and i dont know what it was but it was probably the best food ive ever eaten in my life. no joke. haha hes a miracle worker.

well last time i told you about that family we found and we went back and taught just the dad, Domingos, and at first he seemed interested and we got all the way thorugh the first lesson and at the end when we offered him to keep and read the book of mormon HE SAID NO. like what the heck man?? its a free book. just take it and read it and get baptized and get sealed to your family man! oh well. maybe the next missionaries will get him! haha 

so basically our whole mision isn´t doing too well and have had like basically no baptisms and 

we´re getting a lot of faca from the president so today we started a district fast so that we can just have more success. 

so last night we visited a lady who lives in our same housing complex who isnt a member but just loves the missionaries and is so happy and so we went over to share a prayer and scripture and when i started praying she starts mumbling to herself and like whispering. i continues and shes saying amen and thank you thank you amen mmhmm haha it was so funny. 

but yesterday we got a call from a member who says that she has a nephew who got permission from his parents to be baptized and we just have to teach him! so that was basically a miracle and hopefully this week we get to teach him. 

fun week! love you guys! 

Feb. 9, 2015 - PORTUGAL!

Olá!!

Well i finally arrived here in Portugal! Our flight was actually pretty good and i slept most of the time which was really nice. Our flight form atlanta to Amsterdam was half empty so we all could spread out and sleep which was kinda bizarre haha then we arrived in lisbon and met the mission president and my trainer Elder Arnold who ill describe later then we got assigned out areas and I got assigned to Braga. So we booked it over to the train station and took a 5 hour train to a little area North of porto. It is freezing cold! like probably 35 degrees. So i wear my shirt and sweater and big over coat and gloves and I am still cold BUT its been way fun! We got to the apt at like 1130 at night on thursday and we just went straight to sleep. We have been doing just a lot of street contacting and door knocking and trying to visit less actives and stuff like that but we havent been very successful. But this week looks pretty promising becasue we found some faimlies who we felt pretty good about. so we will see about that.

MY TRAINER! He is amazing. Elder Arnold The first thing we did was just practice a street contact. Like an hour after i met him we were already practicing and preparing which was realy cool. He is so loving and selfless and told me that he has been where I am so I can come to him whenever I just have a bad day or something which is awesome. Hes DL and a really hard worker and so obedient and I can tell its going to be a fun 12 weeks!

Church was actually not as bad as I thought. Its a ward here of about 80 actives and they asked me to bear my testimony and introduce myself which wasnt too bad and everyone told me i speak really well for how long ive been here which was encouraging. But I still cant really talk to anyone. I can understand about 80% of what people say but i just cant put together a response. com tempo. The accents here are really really thick and people just talk like softly so even if i could understand them i still cant even physically hear them so its going to be an adventure haha

Oh and I forgot my carry on bag at the mission office. haha so I dont have my english book of mormon or any of my toiletries and MY CAMERA or my blanket that i desperately want because its so cold haha but we are so far north that i honestly dont know when I am going to see it again. dia triste. 

Well thats basically my first couple days in the field. Its been fun. its been hard and I´m always tired but I love it! Tchau!

Feb. 4, 2015 - Portugal or Not?

So over the last week we have received several emails from Tanner keeping us abreast of his travel plans.   Here they are in the order we received them.

1/29/2015
Big news here! I got reassigned to the Santa Rosa, California mission!! Apparently everyone going to Portugal or brazil in the MTC didn't get their visas so theres been like 100 reassignments. Anyway I leave on Tuesday morning at 4:30 am and my flight leaves at 10 am flying into oakland. I'm way excited to see what a US mission is like! it's going to be a struggle to keep up on the language but I know I'm meant to be there! It's a shame elder rich is going to Tuscon Arizona but we're all way excited! 

P.S. There is a rumor going around, from the travel office, that they are actually expecting the visas to come by Saturday and if they come by then we'll get to go to Portugal but for now I'm expecting to go to California. So It's going to be a crazy couple days. So.....yeah. Fun Stuff! Talk to ya on monday!

1/31/2015

Hey so we got our visas!!! It has been a crazy couple days but yesterday they told us that our visas did get approved! I'm not 100% sure of the exact travel plans yet but we are for sure not going to California. We can email once a day until we leave so I'll keep you posted. I'm pretty sure my P day is still going to be monday though

I did get the package and the bag will work great thanks! and the monkey is perfect! haha Thanks for that too! and rachel. that was pretty dang funny if i do say so myself! hahahahahahah so yeah I'll keep you posted until we leave. 

2/2/2015 Last Week in America

Hello family and friends!

Well I don't know what all you people know but I will try to set everything straight with a timeline of events starting on thursday. So we were in our in field orientation workshop meeting and after lunch we get the mail and everyone in our district got reassigned because our visas hadnt been cleared yet! It was crazy! I was going to the Santa Rosa CA mission and Elder Rich was headed to Tuscon and we were all really confused. So we go to class the next morning and tell our teacher and she's freaking out and emails our mission president because apparently they were pretty close and we had a pretty stressful 24 hours. THEN the next day we go to the travel office and they tell us that everyone except 2 got their visas confirmed and they were on their way back to the CTM and we were going back to portugal! It was quite relieving. THEN today they tell us that our visas arent actually here yet and they cant buy the plane tickets until they physically have them so we have to wait until 4 this afternoon, I guess an hour, for the next round of mail. And if they dont arrive today we will probably have to stay here untilwednesday. So yes. It has been pretty insane around here but we're all pretty flexible and were just in a state of waiting right now. 

But as I said 1 elder and 1 sister in our district didn't get their visas so they got reassigned. Elder allen left to bakersfield CA this morning and the sisterr carroll leaves to roseville CA tomorrow and another sister bale left to mozambique this morning too. So theyre slowing just picking our district apart one by one. It's been sad to say goodbye to everyone because we have all become such good friends over these 7 weeks! But i know our district is going to do amazing things in the field! So these are some pictures of our district and teachers on our last day together. 

Well it's been an awesome experience here at the CTM and I'm excited to finally be able to teach and help real people find joy in their lives. I had the awesome experience to start and finish the Book of Mormon in these 7 weeks and I actually read teh last chapter in the celestial room in the temple on P day and it was so cool. I know it is so true and I know if you read it everyday you'll become so much closer to Christ and be so much happier. 

Well I love being a missionary and I'm pumped to serve the people of portuguese! Wish me luck! Amo-voces!

Love,

2/2/2015

Sister bale loved her monkey!! It was so awesome! haha she was so happy! it was sad to have her be the first one to go this morning but she'll do great. well i'll probably email you in an hour about the final details if we get our visas or just that i'll be waiting another day haha who knows!

Love you and tell everyone ola minha irmas and irmao, voces estamos chatos :)

2/2/2015

so if you get this and think of anything you need to tell me in the next 30 minutes or so speak now or forever hold your peace. or until i call from the airport haha

2/2/2015  36 more hours in the MTC!

hey so the visas have not arrived yet. They are obviously expecting them tomorrow but who knows. So as of right now we're just stuck in the MTC until they tell us when to leave. but it will most likely be wednesday morning that we fly out. Tomorrow is our real P day so I guess I'll email you some more tomrrow! :D haha so if anything crazy happens in 24 hours lemme know!

2/2/2015  Its official

So its official! we leave tomorrow! finally. our flight leaves from salt lake at 2 pm and we go through atlanta and Amsterdam which should be pretty cool! I'm pretty sure i'll call sometime around 12 or 1 or so. I was thinking about calling dads cell then making it a conference call with you. So i'll talk to ya tomorrow!