January 5, 2015

I´m going to be in for a temperature schock in a few weeks. I am looking forward to the cold again. :) Is it snowing yet..

I hope it snows the day I come home!

Our week was a bunch of working in other areas and not ours. We were out of the area until Wednesday because of a Council meeting with the leaders in the mission. We were in Manaus. It was fun because I got to spend a lot of time with Tereza and family. It was fun to see everyone again! Monday night we did a family home evening and they invited Fernando to come. He really is getting ready to serve a mission. It is so exciting to see the change the gospel has made! Other than that, it was a very tiring three day trip to Manaus. I got to see one of my old companions and some of my other friends! It was great to see them all again. 

After the meeting on Tuesday we went to the temple. Going to the temple was a miracle and by far my favorite day of my mission! It was a miracle. I saw members from all of my areas in Manaus at the temple, including Parintins!! :) We were outside of the temple taking pictures when my companion tapped me on the shoulder. There was Marcos and his dad waving from the other end of the parking lot. I screamed while running to them. I thought that I was never going to see them again, expecially since I am leaving in two weeks. Marcos told me that his wife Irleia was there too. I don´t think you have ever seen such a big  smile on my face. It reallly was such a miracle to see some of my favorite members all on the same day in the temple. Heavenly Father knows how to give some good gifts.  :)

Anyways we traveled back to Acre on New Years Eve. We got home and then went to bed. I dont think there was a day in Manaus when we went to bed before midnight. As an effect we were very tired the rest of the week. We did a division with some sisters...and then tried to work a little in our area. My companion rubbed my feet one night, and to our suprise there were hundreds of those stress knots in my feet. She would squeeze really hard on my feet and they would all start popping. It was like there was bubble rap or something in my feet.... needless to say I am ready to come home and take a break. 

It is weird to think that I only have two more weeks here in Brasil. 

That family we spent Christmas with is really fun. We ate lunch with them yesterday. They let me sit in the hammock while we were waiting for them to finish cooking. Ana Alice is our neighboor. She is always giving us food, etc.. She let me make the beans the other day for lunch! It was fun. :)

All in all I am way excited to see you all in 2 weeks!! I cant wait for the day to arrive. We still have a lot to do in this area, in regards of divisions and trainings... etc. It seems like there is not enough time in the day to do it all.

LOVE YOU BUNCHES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sister Chatwin

December 22, 2014

So I am planning on using the internet between 4-6 here in Acre on the 25th. My companion is going to use the computer to talk with her family first, so just as always keep your eyes out. I dont know how long she will be talking to her family. Anyways, I am excited to talk with you all!

I had a good week. A really good week. :) I was getting nervous about coming home and having to say goodbye to all of my friends. It was really messing up my ability to work. I finally was able to turn everything around with the help of the scriptures. I decided to read in my english set. I looked up fear in the bible dictionary and started to read. I read how it was a feeling unworthy of Gods children. I stopped and made a list of what I was worried or preoccupied about. Then I kept reading. I finally came to the conclusion that the solution to get rid of those feelings was to really repent. I noticed that I hadnt really been repenting lately. Therefore as a consequence I began to build up all of these feelings of anxiety and fear. I said a prayer to Heavenly Father that moment. I prayed with confidence that He would forgive me of my sins, just like it said to do in the Bible Dictionary. Just like that all of my anxiety was gone. It is like I am a whole new person. It is crazy cool how the gospel works. This experience really opened my eyes as to how there is a consequence to every decision we make. My faith has grown so strong these past few weeks. I really am excited to come home and begin sharing the gospel from another persepective. 

Mom, your crazy. I am glad that I was not home to witness that experience. lol. Remmi should cut his hair. Its so long that I dont recognize him anymore. Guys. I really am excited to see you in the airport!!!

Anyways. I am looking forward to talking with you on Christmas. I am sad that you werent able to go to Colorado, but I am glad that I get to talk to you. How is the weather in Oklahoma... cold i bet.  I am not so sure how I will handle the cold. It rained today and I got cold with all the wind. Boa sorte. 

Last week was our Christmas Conference. It was a lot of fun. I got to bear my testimony because I was leaving in a few weeks. Two of the Elders that were in my district last christmas were in my zone again for this christmas. It was fun to see how much everyone has changed and how quickly time flies. :)

Love you all a lot! 

Sister Chatwin.

December 29, 2014

It was great to talk with you too! 

As for inspiring stories, I have one that just happend. :)

So in my area we have been having difficulties finding people to teach. Which is uncommon in this mission. This is the first area where I have had people flat out reject what we have to say. We were kind of bummed out and resulted early on in the transfer to spend a day contacting people in the streets. Anyways, we made contact with an artist. He was sneaking pictures of us on his camera while we were giving him a friendship card. He told us he would go to church if we came to his exposition at and indian culture fair. He works a lot with the indigenous tribes here in Acre. Anyways, we couldnt leave our area to go to his exposition. We didnt see him again. 

This last week I kept thinking about him and I told my companion that we needed to go see him again. She had forgotten who he was and wasnt very interested in going back to see him.  This Saturday we were on the bus coming back from doing divisions with some other sisters. We took a bus we had never taken before. As I sat down I heard someone behind me say, hey! Your Sister Chata right?? I turned around to see who it was. No one remembers my name here, so I was very surprised to see this artist. We talked with him briefly and explained to his friends why we were so far away from home serving missions. 

We invited him to church and he said that he would come. We passed by his house to leave him a Book of Mormon later that day to read. Come Sunday when we got there he didnt remember saying that he would come to church with us. He was very polite, and conversing with him was very interesting. You could feel the Spirit strongly. He started talking about his son Amon, and how we should invite him to church too. Ended up that Amon came to church with us, but his dad had something come up that he had to attend too. At church everyone made a big deal about Amons name and about how he wasnt a member yet. We sat down in class and a Sister (irma) pulled me out of class to tell me that she had talked with his dad before. She told me about how his dad had a vision and that is where he chose the name for his son Amon. We showed Amon where his name was in the Book of Mormon. 

This family is very intelligent and active in learing about other cultures etc. We wont be able to pass by again until Wed. or Thurs. because we are in Manaus for a meeting. But I really hope to be able to baptize Amon before I leave. It looks like I will be spending my last week here in Flores because of a training that President will do with those who are leaving. Therefore my last sunday on the mission will be in the ward where I began my mission. It is a great blessing to be able to see everyone that I love so dearly. It sure will be hard to leave here!

Love you all so much!! :) :) 

I am excited to see you! 

Sister Chatwin

p.s. That experience was inspirational because if we hadn't been having difficulties finding people to teach we would have never resulted to street contacts and therefore we would have never found this family. There is a plan in everything. 

December 15, 2014

I am doing great here. Getting excited to see everyone again. I hope that Daddy feels better. :) I love you all so much.  My new companion is great! She is super loving and just what I need. We work really well together.

Right now we are looking for a family to baptize before I leave. A miracle happened and we finally found the street where a family that was baptized but never confirmed lives. We are going to do a family home evening there tonight. I hope that everything goes well and they accept the gospel again. Seeing as it has been more than one year they will all have to be baptized again. 

My companion was serving in Flores before coming here. She is filling me in on all that has happened. My second baptism, Fernando, is now preparing to go on a mission. The rest of his family moved to Manaus from Columbia and were also baptized. It is amazing the things that can happen. I remember how it was a miracle that we found Fernando to teach. It made me really happy to see the fruits of our efforts. 

I am excited to continue doing missionary work when I come home. I have really loved to do retention work. A.K.A visit the less actives. They are so much fun to get to know and help come back to church. Plus there is almost always someone in the family or visiting that hasn’t been baptized yet.

Love you all bunches! 

Sister Chatwin

November 24, 2014

Hi Dad!

I sure do love you all a lot! :)

I would love to have a late christmas with all of you when I get home. :) It will be a lot of fun!

So our big family home evening this week was a sucess! So many people came, and they even brought less actives! :)

Our lunch yesterday was super yummy. Brazilian style pancakes. Then for dessert we had the best açai ever!!

I am having the time of my life working in this ward. It is so much fun! I am really going to miss it here.

Lots of things happened this week. I started a piano class for two little girls in the ward. I am the pianist for ward choir now. They are going to sing for our ward conferance.

We had interviews, and conference with President Castro this week. Elder Aidukatis of the seventy also came to give a training. It was a lot of fun. Sister Marinho and I called all of the sisters to have them bring or borrow a pair of heels to wear at conference. We wanted to make Sister Castro really happy. She is always talking about how the sisters need to make an effort to be pretty and dress out best for conferance. She was so happy that she made us do a fashion walk and recorded it on her phone. Sister Marinho thinks she might have put it on the mission facebook page.

We learned a lot about planning and about how we need to do a better job.

My companion goes home in two weeks. YAY. It is fun talking about all the things we have forgotten about. Poor thing. She doesnt want to leave. She only spent the last 5 months of her mission in Brasil. Other than that she spent it all in the states waiting for her visa.

Funny story of the week. After lunch we walked out to see that the chickens left poop and pee in her shoes. I sent the pictures to you in another email. I couldnt stop laughing it was sooo funny. She was mad, so I took the advantage to record a video on my camera of her reaction. lol.

I sure do love you all a lot! I am excited to share all of my stories with you soon!

 Sister Chatwin

Pics: Conference with President, Sister Marinho and I planned for every Sister to come wearing heels. It made President´s wife super happy! The other one I think is me showing how I think chickens could be related to dinosaurs.

During lunch the chickens pooped in my companions shoes.

It was super funny. I got a really funny video of her reaction. We were laughing for a long time.  Also , I decided chickens are related to dinosaurs. I was listening to  a rooster crow the other day, and thought it sounded more like a t-rex than a chicken.

A butterfly that has outer space painted on its wings. ZOOM IN!  
My mad butterfly catching skills.

November 17, 2014

Sounds like you all had a blast at Indy. :) I really enjoy seeing all of your pictures! I am super excited to see you all again. 

This week was really good. And it was really hot! First of all we set a goal as a district to find 75 new investigators this week. Sister Escobar and I were able to get 13. That is a record for us. Normally we get 5 or 6 a week without trying. I really enjoyed having this goal and trying to look more earnestly for people to teach. 

One of my favorite investigators right now is Michel. He is one of the young women´s boyfriend. She comes to every lesson with us. They read their scriptures together and she always answers all of his questions before our next lesson. I love that when we teach him he is completely honest if he has doubts or questions. He answers questions when we ask them... and basically he is just perfect! Normally we spend a lot of our time teaching the poorer people, but by far I love teaching the educated people. They aren´t afraid to hide what they think. It is so much nicer. We have some wealthier areas in our area, and I want to start proselyting in those areas. We may not be recieved to well, but we will find someone who is ready. 

Today for p-day we got up early to go walk the trails in the forest at the college. We went with our neighboors less active husband. Unfortunately today is a holiday, so their were armed guards at the entrance that said it would be better to come another week. Lots of people like to do drugs and bad things in the forest. And all of this people were free, because it was a holiday. So instead of walking through the forest we did a 3 hour loop around the forest. 3 HOURS OF WALKING. It was fun, but I sure was tired. I took lots of cool pictures. We found an ants nest in a tree, a cinammon tree, I think I found soapberries. I tripped over a plant with thorns and cut my leg. After that we went to centro and did some shopping. It was a fun p-day, but I would rather walk through the forest next week. I am never going to walk around it again. I did see a lot of houses though, and thought that they have probably never heard the gospel, and also that if they have they probably never went to church because it is so far away. That is the hard thing. You find a lot of good people to teach, but they just dont understand enough to make the sacrifice to come to church. 

We spake in church last sunday. We had like a 20 minute notice, because the other people who were supposed to give talks didnt come. I decided to give a talk I had already given in Manaus. I talked about the tree of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Roots=Christ Trunk=Atonement Branches=Principles of the Gospel Leaves=us. I explained that leave get their nutrients from the branches which get it from the trunk which gets it from the roots. It is a nice way to think about how we really are reliant on the Atonement of Jesus Christ as our support. Without the Atonement out tree is nothing. If it weren´t for the Atonement we would be nothing. Everything is founded upon Jesus Christ, everything that gives us the proper nutrients to grow strong!

I love you all bunches!!!

Beijos, Sister Chatwin

November 10, 2014

BE CAREFUL MOM. 

Your a good strong woman. :) I love you a lot! You always are a good example for others. 

You should tell Ashley that she should come to school with me. I think that she would love it there. 

As for work.. I don´t know what I am going to do. Temping for Halsey again would be nice, but is also quite a drive and a lot of gas money. Start looking for options??? Maybe start having Bruce look for options where he is too. I don´t know what will happen, but I know that I need a job until the end of April. It might be good to spend some time living with your family... I dont know. It would be good for them to have an example around, and maybe I could help Laurel out a little bit. Sei lá. 

Last week we did a big ward family home evening in a members house. Only a few members came, but they loved it! We talked about faith and then did a egg race. (the one where you have to hold the egg in the spoon) Only that the people with the egg didnt know that there were going to be sock balls thrown at them while they were trying to walk. They loved it and were laughing a ton. Adults are just like little kids. Anyways we are wanting to do this everyweek. This week the family that volunteered to host is planning on going to the temple in January. So our message is going to be a few morman messages about temples, and afterwards they are going to split into groups and build temples out of gumdrops and toothpicks. It is going to be great. I hope that more people start coming. Our goal with this is to strengthen the testimonies of the members and less actives of the basic principles of the gospel. IT IS GOING GREAT. Last week we invited an irma to bear her testimony. It was the first time ever, and she loved it! Now our goal with her is to get up next fast sunday and bear our testimonies together.

I really like it here in Acre. It is super pretty. It can also get stinking hot. Mom, there is a pretty neat college in my area. They have a big lot of rain forest with some trails in it. We are going to try and get some members to take us there for p-day. I saw some people who were studying foresting ( i think) last week. I am really excited to look into this college. 

We went to centro today and there were a lot of cool things. We sat down and chatted with the hippies for awhile, and then we came across an native indian. He was really excited to be talking with americans who knew english. He said that he had never had that experience before. We left a book of mormon with him. 

Life is good. 

LOVE YOU ALL!

Sister Chatwin