zone conference is alegrete october 20, 2014

good 

●zone conference is alegrete. winnnning. it was super funny because there was a baptism during our zone conference at the church so this kid had like 50 missionaries at his baptism... legit. he’s serving a mission for sure. 
 

do you remember these boys from provo mtc?        or what about this girl from santiago?

so i've never met sister stodulski... until just now at zone conference.  we have talked on the phone with mission stuff quite a few times.  but i knew i loved her even before i met her.

...and this darling missionry goes home in 3 weeks!  we love sister correa!

bad

●when someone says “now i remember who you look like --britney spears!”

●so there was a wicked bad hailstorm here that took out like 1000 houses in our little town of rosario do sul :( that night i thought i was going to die and our apartment was going to fall apart. it was sooooo loud!!

awk

●when a kid asks if you’re pregnant (i thought i was getting skinnier…L #20morecrunchesadayforme

●dreams with friends, missionaries, members, brazilians, americans, etc all in one. 

●when i don’t get the time change right *details below

●when someone gives me shoes, and takes my shoes i’m wearing and then throws them away (my nude flats 2.0 had seen better days but they go with everything!)

awesome

●when president says “não dá para fazer um selfie batismal” (english translation: it doesn’t work to do a selfie baptism—meaning it doesn’t work to baptize with your own authority… you need the authority of God aka the priesthood)

ok. so where to start. zone conference was great. talked lots about family history and temples and what not. so solid. the church is pulling out all the guns for the “latter days”

hail storm-- not even kidding, i thought we were at war. it rained and hailed so hard. hail the size or golf and baseballs. houses in brasil are no where close to prepared for that kind of thing so almost everyone was affected. the city ran out of the materials to fix things. it was 2 am ish when it was hailing and imagine you have hole in your ceiling and it’s raining so hard and you have nothing you can do. it was super super sad. luckily, practically none of the members were affected but some of our investigators were.

so this week we had the time change in brazil, right? in america we know spring forward fall back.. right? ok well everyone kept telling us that we would get to sleep more.. so i didn’t ever stop to think about fall spring winter.. or what season we are in here in brazil. i know some of you are wondering why this was hard for me, it’s not my first october here. everyone kept talking about more sleep... so i did just that. we got up at 6:30, studies at 8, everything normal. then at 10:00 am we were planning to go invite people to church before lunch. so, i was brushing my teeth and the elders called and asked where i was. i told them i was at home. they asked why? i told them because we just finished studying. i asked him where he was? they said they were waiting for us at lunch!!! #problema. yeah. so actually we woke up at 8:30, studied at 10 and at 12:00 we left running to go to lunch at the other end of town. just my luck. why do i do this to myself?

then after lunch we called our investigators to make sure everyone was going to church. no. of course everyone had an excuse. so we got on the bus (did i mention the branch has a bus and picks everyone up? it’s the best) and i just prayed the people we couldn’t call or get ahold of came, or that the members that we asked to help the investigators to the bus did their part. but no. no one was going to church. soooo.. when the bus got close to the houses of the people we taught we got off the and basically started begging them to go to church. no jokes and i’m not desperate it’s them that need the blessings. i was just so sad because this would be the fourth week in a row that none of our investigators went to church. BUT i used my poder conveniente like president says (convincing power) and america (yes her name is america), joão (not to be confused with my joão in cruz alta) and erica came with us. wooohooo! 

erica and i on the bus headed to church... she is seriously sooooo cute!

but something really sad happened. joão is 9 and didn’t want to go and i didn’t understand why. finally he told me he was embarrassed. i asked him why? he said he was poor and people would know that and laugh at him. yeah. it was super super sad. i hate when people think that our church is for rich people. the church is for anyone who is a child of God, and that would be every single one of us! it doesn’t matter color, money, advantages/disadvantages, etc. we just need to be humble enough to realize that we need the saving ordinances of the priesthood to return and live with Heavenly Father and our families. 

just so you know, joão went and loved it. i hope they will come back next week :)

anyways. i loveeee you so much. even if i don’t know you and you are reading this. i love you! and i want you all to have eternal happiness and i testify that it comes through the ordinances of restored gospel of Jesus Christ. but you have to do your part. 

have a great week!

how excited i am when my cousin hunter sends me treats from his mission in italy:)

and... here is my zone picture from LAST zone conference when i was in cruz alta:)

xoxooxoxo ash