clicks of the week

and i ran out of time to write a life update, but just now that this week was MIRACULOUS and we have a few progressing investigators now, so I know that faith and hardwork pays off!! I feel that im going to transferred in a few weeks, because im started to feel in peace with the work ive done in this area. Only a couple baptisms, and a couple reactivations, but MANY HEARTS TOUCHED, including mine :) 

Have an amazing week y'all, and if you feel more or less, read 2 nephi 2, and you will understand why life is so hard sometimes, okay?

Love, Sister Lipps

ps, we had an improve concert for Sister Vicente's birthday, I wont give all the deets, but its safe to say thay beyonce and tay swift showed up (because she turned 22, duh) and alot of brazilian dancing was involved, hahaha sometimes being a missionary is ridiculously fun too 

…

1. Sister de oliveira and I with the presidentes wife, sister louza, and elder santos, one of the assistants that saw us going to take a pic and we didnt want to leave him out hahaha

2,3. Me and Sister Da Silvia, from brasilia, and she finishes her mission in 2 weeks!

4. Sister Vicentes 22th birthday!! hahaha we forced her to do her hair like that, we are so cruel

5. Us and Roni, with his "future missionary" tag because he did visits with us all day on sunday! 

 

 

my little update

this week literally flew by, and by "flew" i mean sitting on a bus for almost 20 hours in total haha it was "really cool"

Ok so last week on monday and the whole week, I was actually feeling PRETTY BAD. I was so tired and so scared because I was losing energy and also stressed out with our area and even more worried about the sisters. When we were in Santa Maria on tuesday, and I took advantage and asked one of the assistants to give me a blessing in english. BEST DECISION I COULDVE MADE. The moment I felt his hands on my head, and I heard my full name in perfect english, I felt at home, the my Heavenly Father was with me and all the bad feelings washed away. I got to feel how Id been wanting to feeling for 14 months now: that God is happy with my work, proud of me, and that he will accept my mission at the end of it. WOW it was so amazing, and ever since tuesday, not that it has been "easy", but I now I´m going to make it because I feel that kind of peace we all seek. Peace isnt just sitting in a clean house on your couch, resting. Peace is knowing that you are living in a manner acording to God´s willing. And folks, I think im getting there! 

I love my mission, and I love the people here, even the ones who dont love me, because they let me feel more in Christ's shoes :)

MUITO AMOR PARA Y'ALL,

Sister Lipps 

pictures:

All the sister training leaders! I love them, and learn SO much from them! 

Me and my hot comp on the bus 

ME AND IRMÃO NELSON!! Ugh i cant get enough of him, I already marked a date and hour to skype him when i get home hahaha

ME and Sister Gregatto from São Paulo :)

Me and Sister Miranda from Equador :) 

work hard play hard sleep never

you guys know what it says in d&c 121:43? yeah that described my week.

step 1. seeing problems

step 2. "helping" people recognize and fix their error

step 3. demonstrate love to those people so they dont think you are their enemy

step 4. repeat like 6 times because you serve in uruguaiana, the most infamously problematic zone there is

step 5. end the week 250% tired as heck

hahaha we gave a training in our zone meeting using 1 nephi 4:13, talking about slackers and rule-breakers and now everyone "loves" us more but actually probably respects us more too.

We also had, what i call "sleepover do inferno" (put it in google translate) this week with a few sisters that werent getting along very well, AND we went to help and find out what was wrong, and yeah in short it didnt go very well............but we're trying okay?

in our actual area, not many things are happening. were teaching like 15 new people every week, but none of them have really accepted or shown progress, so its a daily process of finding new people and being obedient and diligent until God puts someone prepared in our path :)

Other significant event of the week:

For the first time in my life, I taught a whole lesson in english! and my companion was an elder because he speaks english too! HA it was the weirdest experience of my life. There was this 20 year old who is learning english and said it would be cool to speak with an american, so the elders called me and we met and took advantage and taught him the restoration in english, which was so STRANGE because i dont even recognize my own voice in english, but also it was really spiritual, and I gained more of a testimony of the restoration, that it doesnt matter how you say it or in what language, what matters is how the spirit makes you feel when you are teaching/being taught.

So, thats all for now folks. In 40 minutes we grab the bus to santa maria, come home tomorrow night, and wednesday morning im going to alegrete for 2 days and ill come back on friday afternoon, so the week will be busy but itll be worth it!

love, Sister Lipps

pictures:

MY 14 MONTHS! im so old, my body feels like its falling apart.

Exchange with sister fagundes, who is on a mini mission for 6 weeks because she was baptized only 3 months ago!!

Work shoes vs. play shoes

hahaha 

i always run out of time on this flipping thing

IVE SPENT EVERY DAY OF THIS PAST YEAR BEING A SERVANT OF GOD, HOW COOL IS THAT???

It has 100% been the most challenging, most rewarding, best year of my life! this year i hit my 14 month mark, which scares me because I dont want this experience to end, but what are ya gonna do?

A short summary of this week, Sister Vera and Sister Gibson left, and we all cried for 10 min together before they got on the bus :( but after, Sister De Oliveira arrived and she is AMAZING! haaaaaaaa we get along SO well, we are never not laughing because we are such funny dorks. She is from São Paulo, and we finish our missions on the same day! She has already taught me SO much about how to set HIGH goals, I feel we are really going to push ourselves to the max in these (probably my last) 6 weeks in Uruguiana!

other cool things:

A guy in a wheelchair that we went to go help in the street, and then we stood up and starting walking haha WHAAAAT he was just trying to play with us to see if we would help ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh que coisa

RONI IS GOING ON A MISSION! (like, in a year from now, but he's already planned out his whole time line. I hope he comes to California so I can make them american dinner)

Still love being a missionary btw.

Love, 

Sister Lipps

ps dont forget to pray every day, because if you dont that is rude, he's waiting for you 

 

Pictures:

 sister vera´s farewell :( haha we bawled at the bus station, because in a month she finishes her mission so i may not ever see her again. ugh such angst missions are so sad.

HA but you gotta love this funeral pic, amiright? HAHAHA every time i look at sister gibson's face, i cry. i miss her too tchê

our new years eve at Roni and Miriam´s house :) i was so sweaty you guys TMI but i cant lie it is so hot here imma die

we put on lipstick (sister de oliveiras idea) to watch the fireworks at midnight HAPPY 2017!!

happy birthday to my momma!

 

 

our family christmas card

So i spent most of my time responding to people and send pictures, AND on Saturday i talked to my fam and already gave them all the deets on my life, but i share with yall what i have time for:

sister vera was transferred, sad :( she leaves tomorrow, but the good news is that shes going to SÃO GABRIEL my old area, so im already telling her ALL about and shes going to deliver letters for me :) 

We went to santa maria this week for a training, and we almost missed BOTH of our buses, there and back. HAHAHAHA i wished someone had video-taped it, because us and our zone leaders got to the bus station and 12:31, and our bus was leaving at 12:30, so we decided "elder ramos, you run and buy the tickets, elder cruz, you stay and pay the taxi and grab the receipt, and sister vera and i will run with all our luggage and these 5 boxes in our hands to the bus terminal" ohhhhhhhhhh it was the funniest thing of my life, we ran and almost fainted in front of the bus because we were carrying all these things in our hands and we caught the bus 12:35. good times, good times.

BEST PART OF THE WEEK:

Roni's baptism!!!!!!! it was the most SPIRITUAL baptism i have ever watched, EVERYONE cried! and almost all the missionaries in the city came to watched, and we sang "joseph smith's first prayer" and it was so beautiful and yeah many tears much happiness.

OTHER BEST PART OF THE WEEK:

skyping my family, even though i 100% couldnt speak english. i forgot how to say "fourteen". EMBARRASSING. i literally stayed there thinking for 30 seconds "how in the freak do you saying catorce in english???!" but, it was so wonderful to see them :)

and like always, my time is out. Keep praying for me because I pray for all of you too :)

loves,

sister lipps 

FRIDAY WAS THE BEST DAY OF MY WHOLE MISSION. enough said 

 last weeks surprise party me threw for a few missionaries (including sister gibson and falcão) who had birthdays this month!

Sister vera and i made like 70 sugar cookies for the missionaries at our meeting this tuesday :)

MATCHING SKIRTS! my mom sent me one in my christmas package, and sister vera had one almost identical!

RONI´S BIRTHDAY PRESENTS FROM US. cute right? the book of mormon in english, future missionary nametag, a new tie!

 

 

 

finally my computer is being cool and letting me send photos! This was the baptism of Fabi from last and another girl Maria, from the ward next to ours :) So sweet right: 

 

 

MIRACLES HAPPEN ONCE IN A WHILE---LIZZIE MCGUIRE

HOLY COW this week was incredible!!!!!!! It made up for ALL the other crappy weeks I've had here in Uruguiana! Okay so Im going to list the miracles the happened this week, starting with the small ones and then the most important ones.

1. NO ONE HAD TO TRAVEL TO DO EXCHANGES! It was our first week in like 2 months that we were actually together everyday and we didnt have to walk back and forth to the bus station :)

2. On Monday, I finished reading the Book of Mormon! Oh, how I am SO grateful for everything he teaches me, especially about the Savior and his role in my life :) So on Tuesday, I started reading him again, but this time in Spanish! Its going super well, and its so amazing how God is giving us all the gift of tongues and helping us develop our talents!

3. TWO of our less active members came to church yesterday, and we didnt have to drag them, they got up themselves and went because they wanted to and it was seriously a miracle because this never happens, we always have to drag people out of bed and on their butts to go to church every week

4, FABI (FAB-EE) WAS BAPTIZED ON SATURDAY AND CONFIRMED YESTERDAY!! Oh it was amazing to finally fill up a font here in uruguaiana, but she was SO HAPPY and bore her testimony after and her family (non-members) came to watch, which is a BIG thing because usually the families that arent members dont come to support and it just makes me mad, but this time it left me FELIZZZZZZZZZ! (aka, happy)

5. OKAY so backstory: remember that family of recent-converts that we are always with? So for about 7 months, the running joke of the family is that Roni (hoe-knee), the 19 year old son, never wanted to be baptized, even though hes already read the entire Book of Mormon, has a testimony, wakes up everyone for church on sundays, tells us that hes already saving money to serve a MISSION FOR PETE'S SAKE. so usually when we teach them, we trying to make it spiritual, but his sisters or his mom interrupt with "so are ya gonna get baptized or what?". hahahaha i love them. but on friday, we taught him without his family for the first time ever, and we just read a few scriptures about small and simple things, how to seek God, how to feel the spirit, and i dont even remember what else because it was just God putting things in my mouth ya know? At the end of the lesson, we said a kneeling prayer, and he said the most sincere prayer i had ever heard from him, and the spirit was SO strong, it was such a wonderful moment. After, his mom walked in and said "so did you guys convince him?" and we said "no, but I think the spirit will".

flash forward to last night, when he said the opening prayer in our lesson, and then super quietly said "I decided" and we all said "wait what decided what?" and he said "this friday is my baptism" HALLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLEJUAH oh my you guys we all BURST INTO TEARS OF HAPPINESS. He told us how he kept praying after we left that night, and how he finally got the confirmation he was seeking, and this friday, on his 20th birthday, hes going to be baptized :) 

MIRACLES HAPPEN WHEN YOU HAVE FAITH YOU GUYS!!

I love being a missionary. I know that Christ lives, that He is the Redeemer, the Prince of Peace, Wonderful, the light of the world. 

Love, sister lipps

ps in 5 months ill show you guys a video of me trying to kill a cockroach with a broom in our apartment this week. you´ve been warned

Pictures, pictures, pictures!

1. we made paper christmas countdown chains for all the sisters with an activty for us to do everday!

2-4. our zone conference with elder costa! Me and a few of the sisters, me and my arrival group :) 

 

THANKSGIVING!!!! WE ARE POOR SO WE DIDNT HAVE TURKEY BUT WE WINGED IT AND MADE MASHED POTATOES AND STUFFING :) and we made hand turkeys and wrote all the things we are grateful for 

 

 

 

1. 13 months! holla im old

2. me cleaning and trying not to barf 

3. my (very expensive due to brazilians import taxes.............) christmas package. thanks mom and dad!!!!

4. our daily challenge one day this week! feliz natal! 

OUR CHRISTMAS CONFERENCE THIS WEEK WOOHOO! 

not pictured: the video of us in the talent show singing our mission hymns in tune with the cup song, it was flippin sweet and everyone went crazy, and ill show y'all in 5 months

 

 

 

1 and 2. me with irmão nelson this week when i visited alegrete!!! i love this goofball

3. family home evening of the week!

4. miriam, roni, and bia with the nativity set that my mom made and sent! they loved it :)

5. me and the former elder cardoso, now marcelo, who returned from his mission last week from rio de janeiro and just so happens to me the former companion of my pal elder danneman :) SMALL WORLD AM I RIGHT?