January 3, 2010 Keep On Swimming!

Dear World,

Hello 2011!!! Wow, I´ve entered my long-haul year on the mission. Feels a little wierd, doesn´t it? Anyway let´s talk about the week shall we?

So I started the week with a division in Embu-Guaçu with Elder Mello. I really liked it there and he gave me a ton of really great advice so it was a success. An irma there also gave me a book of brasilian bread recipes! Little did I know about his snoring problem. The room literally shook he was snoring so loud! haha Somehow I managed to get some sleep and the next day went back to Parelheiros.

We found an amazing new investigator this week named Emerson. His cousin is in our ward and he is way interested. He also wants us to meet his girlfriend´s family because their daughter passed away and he believes our message will help them.

New Years was definitley different on the mission. Everyone was out of town so it was pretty difficult to find people in their houses and make visits. There were fireworks going off all night and our neighbor decided the best place to light them off was right next to our bedroom window. haha For January 1st we had another P-day and Elder Vidmar, our district leader, planned an activity for us. So we all went to a cool sitio (like a little ranch) and had a churrasco and played football in the grass. It was awesome! Then I messed up my toe... haha It is pretty gross looking right now.

After the activity Elder Vidmar gave me my Christmas package! It was very well received. :) I also received a few letters. I read the MOSS letters and they really helped me a ton. It´s awesome to know that I have so many amazing friends serving all over the world! I remembered how important it is to love the people and it´s really been helping me.

We also started teaching another family whose daughter passed away a few weeks ago. They were a reference of a less active member. They have already received the missionaries but it´s been a really long time and they didn´t really understand the message so hopefully we´ll be able to help them a bit.

Our baptismal goal for January has fallen through (already) so things are pretty tough here. We´re going to just have to push through this month and prepare a ton of people for February. I´m reminded of Dori from Finding Nemo. "Just keep swimming."

Thanks for all the prayers! Love you all!

Elder MacLane Taggart