Week 32💌 - Alvarado with Sister Ferraz

 Óla gente! 

Due to internet issues (they always seem to crop up around transfers!), today you guys will be getting week 31 and week 32! It's like Christmas time for you all, I am sure. 

Today was my first week in my new area, with my new companion! My companion's name is Sister Ferraz, and she is from Recife, Brazil. She is a convert to the church, which I think is so incredible. She has 7 weeks on the mission. I am also living with 2 other sisters: Sister Sanabria (this is her 3⁰ transfer, she is from Honduras) and Sister Johansen (this is her 6th transfer, she's from Ogden, UT). It's been a minute since I've lived in quatro, I forgot how fun it is!!

My new area is very different from where I've been before. For starters, it's about 10⁰ cooler!! Uhhh heck yeah! And 2⁰... it's 95% dirt roads. And 45% of them are impassable due to rain. This'll be an adventure for sure! And...gente. My house has air conditioning! We will be moving tonight... to another house with AC! I am sad to move though bc this house is so fancy. It has TWO couches. First time in 7 months that I have had a couch. The new house will have one smaller couch, so it's okay. But we will be going from 2 bathrooms to only 1...wish us luck gente.

Segunda: Happy pday!! Today was transfers, and it was hectic as usual. Sister Leite and I went to the casa de apoio. I got to talk to other sisters, and then call my mom. We all went and got lunch at McDonalds. After that, I got to talk to my cousin Angelina!! My parents were in Colorado for the weekend, so I got to catch up with her. Miss you babe!

Before the end of pday, Sister Leite and I went to a cool 2nd hand bookstore. He had so many good books!! I may or may not have bought 3. I've gotta practice my Portuguese depois da missão!!! 

I finally got to meet minha filha, Sister Ferraz. We went to McDonald's again (there aren't a lot of cheap food options in the centro de Teresina) and I got a chicken salad. It was actually so good guys. My body was CRAVING some leafy greens.

Terça: Happy travel day! My new area is a 16 hour bus ride from Teresina. That meant that I had to wake up at 4:30 to get to the bus. Because I have so much stuff, ofc I forgot stuff. I forgot my phone charger and my she's chocolate (but they will be brought to me at Conferência de Zona). 

The bus ended up being an hour late,  so we kinda just sat there. None of us were all that awake. Which ended up being a huge gift bc I basically slept through the entire ride. I slept for an hour or two and then woke up for 15 minutes,  then slept again.

The bus was SO cold. SO cold. I used a blanket and still was shivering. It was almost uncomfortably cold. However,  I will accept with gladness any chance to feel cold. How is the snow? Are y'all enjoying it? Go jump in it for me! Or stick a photo of my face in the snow and try and work some voodoo magic for me. Jk, I can't promote witchcraft as a missionária, can I? 

Quarta: We arrived at the bus stop at 12:30 in the morning. A member was thankfully willing to give us a ride, so we didn't have to try and call an Uber. We were able to get home safely and crash. I slept like a rock until 0630. Idk how I managed to sleep for almost 16 hours and still sleep at night, but Deus watches out for his missionárias for freaking sure. 

Waking up at 0630 was not fun, so we all collectively decided to sleep an extra hour. We didn't get home until 1 am, and we still had to shower. So cut us some slack. I didn't do my morning exercises because I was short on time. I did have a really great personal study though, so it's okay. Spiritual gains > physical gains anytime.

We only have one set of keys for the house, because Sis Molina accidentally took them with her... so we got locked out of the house after lunch. We had one pamphlet and one book of Mormon. Coolio.

I'm not going to lie, today was kind of rough for me. I wasn't liking the area, and I wasn't clicking with my companion. I kept reminding myself that I didn't like a single area when I arrived, and to give it time. I kept telling myself that patience is a virtue, because my patience with my companion was gone after about 5 minutes on the road. It's not entirely her fault that we weren't getting along. But man, I struggled today.

She just pushed back on everything. She didn't want to be the area guide, but I have 6 hours here. And yet when I tried to guide, she snatched my phone out of my hands and took over. It drove me nuts. By the end of the day, I was so done. I tried to not let my frustration with her show. My montage was basically "she has 6 weeks. She has 6 weeks. She has 6 weeks." If she didn't like one of my suggestions,  she would say "oh que feia!" ---> "that is so ugly!". 

My blood sugar was also really low. I come from a long line of woman who don't do well with low blood sugar. That also contributed greatly to my lack of charity and good will. We were walking with members, and one of them kept shoving his waterbottle in my face to pretend that it's a microphone. It got old after the 20th time. Basically, I had no patience for anyone or anything today. 

We went and got pastel with the other sisters, which helped the blood sugar level problem. I had another sort of bickering moment with my comp, and that was hard. I've never really bickering with a comp. So that was new for me. It was a rough day. I did a facemask while the LZs called to do an acompanhamento.  I also got 24628 steps! So that was the good part of my day.

Quinta: Today went better. We did both get kicked out of our WhatsApp and they told us that we were blocked for 24 hours. Coolcoolcoolcool. We had lunch with an irmão from the ward. He made really delicious lasagna and suco. I had been talking with Sister Johansen about the virtues of lasagna that morning, and God heard my prayers. The guy was a yapper though, it was hard to get him and Sister Ferraz to stop talking long enough to give a spiritual message. 

We walked 45 minutes to one of our neighborhoods. The roads here are HORRIBLE though. They dirt roads, and it rains a lot here, so the roads are like pools. We saw a giant truck get stuck in a giant puddle. It was funny, but I felt bad for the dude driving. 

We stopped by a padaria, and had a weird contact. I'll give you a play-by-play

Cashier: do you know God's name?

Us: Yeah, Deus!

Cashier: No, you're wrong

Us: Well He is also our Pai Celestial!

Cashier: No! Those are just titles!

Us: Okay, Elohim. That's His real name.

Cashier: NO. YOU GUYS ARE WRONG! His name is Yuah. 

Us: uhhh what??

He proceeded to tell us all about his religion which BTW doesn't have a name. And it consists of him and 15 other people in a group chat. Tá bom! To each their own. I also got to buy scripture marking tabs, yay!!!

We had Noite de Integração, and it actually had people! Real people! Investigators from OUR ward!! Our church building also has a real piano, and no one in the ward knows how to play. Sis Johansen and I are going to take turns playing in sacrament. Apparently here they sing acapella.

We ended the night with a First Responders meeting. I had lowkey been hoping to be released,  but that sonho was not realized. Oh well.

Sexta: Today was my 7th mês-versario!!! That is just so crazy to me. I have been out for 7 whole months!!! I cannot believe how much I have grown in this time. 

We had lunch with Irmã Ivone and her grandkids. Her daughter showed us the Instagram page of Sis R. Smith who is now engaged (congrats girly!!). Sis Johansen told me that I remind her so much of Lucy, Gru's wife from Despicable Me. We stopped by the mercado on our way home to get some food. Our fridge had ketchup packets.

We had our First Responders shift, but only one working phone. I did it for an hour and a half, and then took a nap while Sis Ferraz did it for the other hour and a half. 

Dude. We were walking to try and visit a woman with a baptism date, her name is Sonia. It was like 2030, and I was calling a recent convert while we walked. All of a sudden, we heard someone running up behind us. We both thought we were going to get robbed. Thankfully, it was a member. After about 5 minutes of talking to him, he told me that I remind him of Lucy, Gru's wife. That's 2 in one day! 

Sister Ferraz had a really hard day today. She told me that she wants to call Sister Tonini, because she wants to go home. She said she won't go home yet, but that she doesn't like the mission. She said that the mission is a lot harder than she was expecting.  She is also really jumpy, and our mission isn't terribly safe. After we realized that our would-be attacker is a member, I calmed down and felt fine. She remained SUPER highstrung and anxious. When we got home, I had her call Sister Tonini while the rest of us took part in the Zone Devotional. Hopefully Sister and Presidente can help her. If any of you have any advice, I'm all ears. I really want her to stay. Despite our differences, I do love her.

Sabado: I woke up freezing to death. I forgot how to sleep in AC!! We had lunch with Irmã Andrenia and her husband. They are such a cute couple!! She also made delicious mousse de limão.  

We tried to visit our baptism date, Sonia. She was on her way out when we showed up, but we were able to say hi. We asked her if she was still good for her baptism, and she said "Precisamos conversar." --> "We need to talk." Not what we wanted to hear...hopefully we can talk to her next week.

We met a criança named Cecília. She was so cute! Her parents are against the church, so she can't go. BUT, they might let her go to English lessons. We are going to start offering aulas de piano and inglês now. Cecília asked if she could draw me, and so she drew me on a blank page in my planejamento.  It was so cute!!

This morning, I had tried again to add Sis Ferraz to our WhatsApp. We were both kicked out and blocked for 24 hours. However, at around 9pm, WhatsApp told us that we were blocked PERMANENTLY. FOR THE SECOND TIME IN A MONTH. So I am sem WhatsApp, de novo. Wish me luck guys... and pray that it doesn't take a week this time to get a new number. Bc I will beat up the Secretário if he pulls this again.

Domingo: HAPPY BIRTHDAY STEVEN!🎉🎈 Today my baby brother Steven turns 18 freaking years old. I love you so much!! 

We have church at 9am here. I really miss 10 am church...at least the church is only like 7 minutes away! We had 1 friend at church, and we were able to mark a novo! Clarice brought a friend today.

Oh my gosh. We were standing in the hallway, and this cat ran into the. He was chasing something. I then felt something crawl on my feet. My first thought was "RAT!" Guys. I jumped so high, I could've taken gold in the Olympics for highjump. It ended up just being a giant lizard, about the size of my palm. Wayyy better than a rat.

We ate lunch with the Bispo's sister-in-law.  Lunch was delicious! She had Coca-Cola zero and awesome garlic potatoes. When we got home, everyone took a fat nap. I love AC. Just so everyone is aware. I love AC.

We then started (ish) to prepare for moving tomorrow.  We are going to be moving tomorrow night. Our current house has 2 sofas, 2 bathrooms, and 2 large bedrooms amd a huge dining room table and AC. It also has a really nice oven. Our new house has 1 sofa, a small table (think basically card table), 1 bathroom, two tiny bedrooms (I hope we can all fit...), no oven (so imma starve to death...#gonnabesoskinny) and AC. At least I'll still have AC!!! But pray for us guys.

Spiritual Thought: Today's spiritual thought  from the Relief Society lesson yesterday, based on the Conference talk: "Taking on the name of Jesus Christ" by Dale G. Renlund  

(https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2025/10/55renlund?lang=eng)

He identified 5 steps that we must take when we take upon ourselves the name of Christ.

1: Identification 

2: Rememberance

3: Emulation

4: Alignment with His purposes

5: Empowerment

When we are baptized, we covenant to take upon ourselves the name of Christ. I invite you all to study these 5 steps more in depth, and I promise that you will receive an outpouring of blessings. I'd like to share a quote from the talk:

"...when we take upon ourselves the name of the Savior, our Heavenly Father blesses us with His power to help us fulfill our mission in mortality.

As we make additional covenants with God, we take upon ourselves more fully the name of Jesus Christ. Consequently, God blesses us with more of His power. As President Nelson taught: “Each person who makes covenants in baptismal fonts and in temples—and keeps them—has increased access to the power of Jesus Christ. … The reward for keeping covenants with God is heavenly power … that strengthens us to withstand our trials, temptations, and heartaches better.”

When we take upon ourselves the name of Christ,  we are taking upon ourselves His power and His grace. We are tying ourselves to Him.

If anyone would like to see more pictures,  let me know and I'll add you to the Google photos! Email only lets me pick a handful.

I hope that you all are happy and healthy and doing well! I love you guys!! If you guys have a spare second, I would love to hear from you. Remember how much I love you, and how much your Father in Heaven loves you!!

Pictures:

1. Time to travel 16 hours...

2. I love roadtrips

3. Skincare!!

4. Welcome to Alvorada!

5. ...fun times

6. The Sarah shrine... 7 mêses baby!

7. Anyone wanna go swimming??

8. Sunday selfies!

9. The height difference is elite. 4'9" vs 6'

10. Thank you Cecília!!

11. I love my new companion!!🩷💕