Elder Kevin Clinton Todd

November 30, 2009

2009-12-03T19:34:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,
I am glad you guys had an awesome thankgiving. I miss the thanksgiving holiday, nobody here really knows what it is or celebrates it. It is during the thanksgiving/Christmas season that I miss the family more. Because you usually spend that time with you family. But at least I will be able to call home in about one month. So I miss thanksgiving first because of the family, and second because of the food. Food is good. On thanksgiving day I had rice and beans and beef milanesa, which is tasty, but not quite the same as the feast that mom makes.
First a little update on the work. This week on Saturday we had two baptisms, Luis and Andressa, who were both confirmed yesterday at church. Church was fun because somebody who was going to give a talk in sacrament meeting skipped out, so I got to fill in and give a 15 minute talk. The topic I chose was missionary work. Surprise. So there will be transfers this week on December 2. I am staying here in Navegantes but Elder Carrasco is getting transferred. I am excited to stay here because I already made friends with a lot of members, and the area is cool, and last but not least, I think we will be able to baptise frequently here as well. The chapel here is very pretty, it has two floors and an elevator and everything so it impresses the public, and the ward mission leader and ward missionaries are super excited to help out. So I am looking forward to this transfer. I am counting my blessings as well, trying to get into the thanksgiving spirit. I will be here until at least Jan 13, 2010, when we will have the next transfer.
I miss you guys.
Love,
Elder Todd

Luis and Andressa Baptism

2009-12-03T19:31:00.000-08:00

November 23, 2009

2009-12-03T19:30:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,
Navegantes is a scenic/turisty city as well. It is a big port city, so a lot of people work on the docks, unloading big shipping liners and stuff, or work as fishermen. And there are a couple beaches in the area as well. So no, it isn't out in the middle of nowhere.
Elder Souto is going home this transfer, which ends next week. So this was he last transfer before going home. And his is still one of the two assistants to the president, so I am not his zone leader. When we have zone conferences the assistants are there to help out and to train and practice and stuff.
Elder Carrasco is from São Paulo Sul, Estaca Jardim da Saúde. So I don't know if Whitney passed through his stake or ward or anything. He has one younger sister. He is the only member of his family. He was baptized in 2005, 4 years ago, when he was 15.
The three young men are all from different families, and they were the only ones from the families who were baptized. But they are all friends and they already have friends within the church. João, the young man who was baptized before them, is also their friend. João and Everton are not blood related. João's family chose Everton to be his godfather when he was baptized in the catholic church, even though Everton wasn't catholic. So they were good family friends, and now that João grew up Everton started bringing him to church and now he is baptized.
I hope everything is going well with you guys. Have a happy thanksgiving.

Bye everyone.

Love,
Elder Todd

My New Area - Navegantes

2009-12-03T19:28:00.000-08:00

João's Baptism- by Everton (in wheelchair)

2009-12-03T19:26:00.000-08:00

Elder Carrasco and me - Companionship of Power!

2009-12-03T19:24:00.000-08:00

3 New Members...Douglas, Kevin, Kaué

2009-12-03T19:19:00.000-08:00

November 4, 2009

2009-12-03T19:18:00.002-08:00

Hey Family,
Sorry I didn't send an email on monday, this week our pday was switched to wednesday instead. Next week I will send email on monday like normal. We switched it up because monday was Dia dos Finados here. It is a holiday like Day of the Dead, where everyone goes to the cemetery to visit relatives that have passed away. And we didn't want to waste the opportunity so we transferred our pday so that we could work in the cemetery, we went there with a little stand with free water and church materials and did contacts about the plan of salvation and eternal families and that kind of thing. It was a pretty cool experience, we met a couple of people that could have some potential as investigators. So that is why I haven't written email until now.
I have some exciting news for you all. It was a bit of surprise. Anyway, there were transfers last week like I told you guys. And I stayed in Pedra Branca with Elder Dunn. But, on thursday night after English class I got a phone call from the assistants. They said "Elder Toddy, pack up your bags, President needs you in Navegantes." And there isn't really much you can do at that point, so I packed up my bags and the next day I was emergency transferred, took a bus to Itajaí Zone, to an area called Navegantes. It all happened really fast. Basically what was going on was that the Elder that was here wasn't getting along very well the bishop and the ward, so the had to take him out and then they sent me over there smooth things over a little. So I left my son, Elder Dunn, with his new companion in Pedra Branca, and now I am with my new companion, Elder Carrasco, here in Navegantes. But I am actually liking it quite a bit over here. Elder Carrasco (carrasco means executioner in Portuguese) is a cool guy, from São Paulo. He has about 3 months in the mission. We had one baptism on Saturday, a young man that the elders here were already teaching, and we are going to have three more baptisms this week, people we found since I got here. So I am pretty excited. Elder Dunn will be fine too, he just got his first brasilian companion, and he is already speaking enough so that he can get along without me.
But anyway, I think that is about it for now. That is all the news. At least that comes to mind. See you guys later.
Love,
Elder Todd

October 26, 2009

2009-12-03T19:18:00.001-08:00

Dear Family,
To answer dad's question Elder Dunn is doing well. He is progressing slowly but surely with Portuguese, he is still pretty dependent on me for now to translate some things for him, and a little bit shy to talk to people. But he can teach his part of the lesson and pretty soon he will gain more confidence. He has lots of blisters on his feet, because he wasn't really used to walking so much. And he complains that I walk to fast sometimes. But it is all part of the training. I am pretty sure he has broke the mission record for most pairs of shoes he has destroyed in one transfer. I still am using the same pair of shoes that I brought from the states. Of course I have gotten them re-soled one time and they are flopping open in the front, but it is still my first pair. Elder Dunn has already worn through four pairs of shoes. He came with two pairs, and members have already donated two pairs of shoes as well. And all of them are super beat up. It is inexplicable. But yeah. I think that is a sufficient update for now.
And Elder Souto is doing well, this is his last transfer in the mission! He will be going home in about 5 weeks. It is pretty crazy, I know. When I got here he only had about 10 months in the mission.
The week was pretty cool, we were able to bring 11 people to church on Sunday. A lot of them were little kids, but that is still cool. There was an awesome primary activity on Saturday, with a trampoline and a ballpit and food and water balloons and stuff, and we went out and invited kids from the street and some kids from English class and some kids that we were teaching and about 20 came to the party. And everyone had a blast. The members said that we, the missionaries, played around more than the kids did. And then after we invited some of them to come to church, and a couple did. And I think four or five are pretty good prospects for baptism, we will visit them this week. I am praying that we will mark quite a few baptisms this week.
I thought Emily's talk was awesome, I think she has a better attitude about missionary work that I did when I was in high school. Back in the day…..So all you guys keep up the good work. I think my time is up, until next week everyone.
Love,
Elder Todd

October 12, 2009

2009-12-03T19:17:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,
This week was good, it would have been better, but our baptism fell through. It was very unfortunate, we will have to work a little more with Eluza and Augusto before they will be baptized. Everything was going as planned, we visited them on Friday night, and everything was perfect for the baptism on Saturday. But, on the day of, they went to visit some family members who just happened to be Jehovah's witnesses, and they family talked them out of getting baptized that day, told them that it was too soon and they weren't ready. It is actually a miracle that they didn't give up completely, they still want to get baptized but are just scared of going too fast, that they don't know enough. But we are preparing a special lesson, basically all the baptisms in the Bible and Book of Mormon are super fast. Everything will turn out all right in the end.
We a looking everywhere and doing everything to get new people to teach. English class is going well, we have about 40 people going now, and we started another little weekly frisbee activity. I ended English class a little early and taught the kids how to play frisbee, everyone loved it of course (because who doesn't love frisbee) and we marked a fixed day for the kids from English class to invite friends to come play at the church. We planned a Halo 3 tournament with the ward for next week, and the youth are super pumped to play, even to bring a non-member or less-active to the activity (which they have to do to play). Halo 3 is super cool here, because the 360 is really rare, playstation 2 is the norm. We are lucky because we have 2 360s in the ward, and I don't think there are any others in the entire stake. We have to use everything we have to our advantage. We are also going to experiment with some other new things this week, if they work out I will write home about them, if they don't you will never know what they were.
And I did stay awake during all of the conference sessions, even though one of the sessions we had to watch in Spanish, because we were either getting the wrong channel or we couldn't figure out how to get the right audio on the channel. But it was still understandable, so that is good. Elder Dunn stayed awake through the whole thing even though he couldn't understand everything that was going on. I will try and send you guys some pics of us two.
I also appreciate how awesome our family is. Thanks for the weekly updates, I will send more news next week.
Love,
Elder Todd

My Greenie - My Son - Elder Dunn

2009-12-03T19:15:00.000-08:00

3 "Generations" - A "Family" Reunion

2009-12-03T19:12:00.000-08:00

September 21, 2009

2009-12-03T19:11:00.002-08:00

Hey Family,
This week was another good week. We have started a lot of new things in the area, we are experimenting to find out what is effective and what isn't. We started up an English class, and it seems to be going well. On sat, the first day of class, there were about 15 people there, including 6 non members. It is cool that we are getting lots of the people from the ward to participate as well. In Rio Tavares, nobody from the ward would go to English class, but here everyone is excited about doing it. But since we want lots more people to come, we have been doing some advertising at the local schools. There are about 3 schools within walking distance of the church, and all schools here teach English class from 5th to 8th grade. So we got time to go to all the classes and talk about our English class. So hopefully the attendance in our class will go up. And it also gives Elder Dunn a chance to speak English with people in his conversation class, because he misses English. And English class is just one of the many things we are doing. Not everything works out so well, but it is part of the learning process, and getting to know the area.
Presidente was playing with us last week, but on the other field. We had two games going on at the same time. And I have been blessed with lots of great companions. A disappointment this week was Sunday morning when we went to go pick up a family for church. This is a family that we have been teaching this last week, of 5 people. The Mom, Márcia, is an inactive member, and has been for about 15 years. She lives with a man who is not a member, and her three children haven't been baptized in the church yet. Her two daughters are old enough to be baptized but her youngest son isn't yet. I agreed with the family to get a ride for them to go to church on Sunday, but when we got there everybody was still being sleepy and lazy and wouldn't go. Even after I entered and turned on all the lights and greeted everyone quite cheerfully. The mom wants her kids to go to church but doesn't want to go herself (she says that she works a lot during the week and wants to rest on the weekend, but I also think that she is a little embarrassed to go back to church). Her daughter has a friend that she was going to bring to church as well. But it will have to wait until this Sunday, and then we will try and baptize everyone the Saturday after that.
Elder Dunn and I are also exercising, like Dad and Whitney are. We go running every morning for thirty minutes. It is a pretty good workout. Sounds like you guys have a lot of plans, hope that everything is a lot of fun. How is Ethan liking BYU? And I am sure that General Conference will be a special experience. Let me know how everything going. I will write you all again next week. Thanks for the support and the emails.
Love,
Elder Todd

September 14, 2009

2009-12-03T19:11:00.001-08:00

Hey Family,
I will try and give you all a brief update on my new area and on my new companion! The name of the area is Pedra Branca. It is a lot smaller than my last area (I can actually walk across it). Even though it is a relatively small area there is still a pretty good number of members and we have a really nice and new chapel. It was constructed about 2 years ago. It isn't the biggest, but it is probably one of the nicest chapels in the mission. It should be a really big help in attracting lots of people to church. And that is what we plan on doing. The attendance on Sunday was under 100, but there seem to be a lot of really cool members. We are kind of starting from scratch here in the area, there wasn't that much left for us here to work with, but we (Elder Dunn and I) will work really hard and make the most of it. I am super excited to have my son, Elder Dunn, and he, being right out of the CTM, is excited and ready for anything. We hope and pray for lots of baptisms. I already got an English class organized that will start up this week and should be giving us a lot of new references and people to teach, made friends with the leadership of the ward and a couple members. It was weird being transferred after being in Rio Tavares for so long, but it is cool to be starting over in a new place, meeting new people and so forth.
Elder Dunn is American, from Indiana. Brasilians don't know where Indiana is. Sometimes they think he says India. They also don't know where India is. But anyway, he has 15 brothers and sisters (7 half siblings and 8 step siblings). He wrestled and played football in high school, and he also played a lot of ultimate frisbee. So we get along great, he is already speaking a little bit of Portuguese, he bore his testimony in sacrament meeting and everything. I am sure he will get accustomed to the mission quite easily, he is a pretty chill guy. He ate his first brasilian pizza (outside of the CTM) this week, just had his first p day today (we played futebol). I got to show off in soccer today to impress my son. We went and played on the turf field today, my team won 19-11 (I had about 15 goals and 3 assists). Go me! I think it worked, he was impressed, he didn't like it though because he was playing against us.
It will be a week or two of adjustment before we get used to our new area, but we already met some special people that have potential to be baptized within the next few weeks. Hope you all are doing well, I am having a blast, and I will talk to you all in next week's email.
Love,
Elder Todd

September 7, 2009

2009-12-03T19:10:00.002-08:00

Dad,
Thanks for the letter and the update on everyone. I do have some exciting news about transfers!!
I am glad the ward and missionaries there have investigators that are progessing, and that you guys are helping out with Manuel. I will try to include everyone that you mentioned in my prayers. It is cool that Stuart is serving in Virginia. Is Dalin going to Africa to give service? Because in your letter it said get service. What kind of service is it? Is it like a mini mission? If you ever talk to him tell him how great the mission is, that it was the best decision I've ever made. There are probably lots of other people telling him the same thing, but one more time wouldn't hurt.
We have transfers on this Wednesday, and there are several surprises! First of all, I'm getting transferred! I am finally leaving Rio Tavares, after about 7 months. And Elder Clark will stay there. I am being transferred to São José, the sister city right across the bridge on the continent. It will be the first time that I am leaving the island, so I am a little nervous to see what it is like out there. But I won't be too far away, I will still be able to take a bus and play futebol every p-day with the guys at President's house. The area is called Pedra Branca (White Rock). I am pretty excited, I have heard a little about it. I heard they have an awesome chapel there, so I am already planning ways to utilize it to attract more people. Oh, and the other big surprise. I am going to train! I am going to be a pai (dad). I am training Elder Dunn. I know nothing about him yet, not even where he is from. I hope he's cool. But I am sure we will get along great. I am going to spoil him, I still have some presents and candy left over from your visit. I am really excited for this next transfer, there will be a lot of changes, new experiences, I am sure I will grow as a missionary.
I will update you guys next week. I will tell you all about my new companion, fresh from the MTC. You guys have a great week.
Love,

Elder Todd

August 31, 2009

2009-12-03T19:10:00.001-08:00

Dear Family,
I am glad that you guys liked the trip and had a good time here. And that all of you are home safely. This week was pretty good. The work is still going well here, we are coming up on another transfer next week, on the 9th. Elder Clark and I think that probably one of us will be transferred. We will see what happens though. I feel like I am part of the ward here, so it would be sad to leave. But I would be excited to start over again, get to know a new ward, new city, new people. My guess is that Elder Clark will get transferred and that I will stay here for one more transfer. But it is just a guess. Wish Ethan and April good luck for me. Ethan will have a great time at BYU. It was good to see all of you guys. I hope the calling is going well for Dad. I am sure Whitney will help and with the new enthusiasm you have for missionary work you will have lots of success. I will send you an update next week, by that I will know if I am getting transferred or not. Until then.
Love,
Elder Todd

Until We Meet Again.....

2009-12-03T19:09:00.001-08:00

A Family Reunited!

2009-12-03T19:08:00.001-08:00

Brazilian Missionaries Meet - Brother & Sister

2009-12-03T18:43:00.000-08:00

July 27, 2009

2009-12-03T18:12:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,
This past week was also really good. We had three baptisms on Saturday, so that was probably the highlight. Savele and Victória were baptized (Han's sisters). Savele is 20 years old and Vitória is 11 years old. And another 11 year old named Glauber was also baptized. Basically everyone in his family is already a member, but when they got baptized he wasn't even born yet, and then his family went inactive so he hadn't been baptized. We are reactivating his family at the same time. We actually met Glauber playing frisbee in the street. He fell down and hurt his knee so we walked him back to his house to clean his knee up, and we found out the some of his family had already been baptized and that he hadn't. After that it was pretty easy to teach him and get him excited for baptism. He is a really goofy but funny kid.
I am glad that you guys enjoyed the pictures of the monkeys. My monkey search finally came to an end. Speaking of transfers, I think President likes the work that Elder Clark and I are doing together because he left us here for one more transfer together! So this next transfer will be really cool, I am very excited about it. I will also be here close to show you all around when you fly in.
Happy birthday to April! I am glad she is getting treated for her medical problem. I also wanted to say congratulations to Emily! She did an excellent job. Plan an awesome family home evening and invited him over to participate, and plan an activity with the youth of the ward to get him integrated. It should be really good. I am excited for your trip out here too. I will talk to you next week. Oh, there is an Elder that is my friend that is going home this transfer, Elder Huber, and he lives in Maryland. He will get home on the 8th of August. I was thinking maybe he will go to the temple after he gets home and before you leave you could meet up with him there. I will give him our home phone number, and he will call you guys if it possible to work out the plans. It should be pretty cool, he can tell you all about me, the mission, and Floripa right before you guys come out here. Anyway, I think that is about it. I will talk to you next week. Tchau.
Love,
Elder Todd

July 20, 2009

2009-12-03T18:11:00.000-08:00

Hey Family!
The reason that I didn't send a letter last week was because I was working on my p-day. I did a special division authorized by the President to return back to Ingleses, my first area, to try and reactivate some of the people that we baptized there that have gone less active. I went with Elder Souto, and spent the day there just visiting the families, seeing how they are doing, saying a prayer and leaving a blessing with the family. It was good, even though it is sad to see people who were so active and firm in the church drift away. They all still have their testimonies, but just complications have happened in their lives.
Anyway, this week was awesome. I also did a division in two other areas, Saco dos Limões and Tapera, so I wasn't really in my area very much. But we had a baptism! Hans was baptized on Sat, and it was a really cool baptism. And this week his two sisters, Savele and Vitória will be baptized. They are a cool family, from Acre, in the north of Brasil, but have German heritage. We met them through English class, invited them to play frisbee, and then started visiting them in their house. And now they are getting baptized. Everyone in the ward loves the family, especially the youth and young adults. Hans is very cool, 18 years old, wants to be a video game designer, is thinking about serving a mission already. Things are just really going well here. We are going to try and have a really good week this week, baptize everyone we are teaching, because there will be transfers next week, and we don't know who will leave or who will stay. I have already been here for a while, so who knows.
And finally, I have more exciting news. I finally found and fed wild monkeys this week! Isn't that awesome!? They are tiny little monkeys that we saw out the window when we were eating at a member's house. There was a little family of them, so we got little pieces of banana and they ate out of our hands. I have been on the monkey hunt since Mother's Day and I finally found where they live. The are pretty cute, but you have to watch out when you are around them because they like to pee out of the trees, and they don't care if they hit innocent passers-by. I will send you some pictures. Of the monkeys and of the baptisms.
Hey dad, that is awesome that you have a new calling. You will see how difficult but gratifying missionary work is. Hope everything goes well, I know Whitney will help you out a lot. I think that is about it for this week. I love you guys.
Elder Todd

Hans is Baptized!

2009-12-03T18:10:00.002-08:00

Hungry Little Monkies..

2009-12-03T18:10:00.001-08:00

Finally Found the Monkies!

2009-12-03T18:07:00.002-08:00

July 6, 2009

2009-12-03T18:07:00.001-08:00

Dear Family,
I will keep this letter short because I will try and send some more pictures home to you guys. This week was a good week for the work. We baptized 4 people, and confirmed 6 on Sunday, because Vanessa and Maria Luiza were baptized on Sunday after church last week. It actually should have been 5 baptisms, but Jaime, the 16 year old, changed his mind at the last minute and decided that he wasn't completely ready to be baptized. So João, Janine, Lourenço, and Leomar were baptized. But I am confident that Jaime will be baptized this Saturday, along with some other people we are teaching. I will send you the pictures from the baptism. Anyway, I think that is about it. I don't have any other exciting news. I hope everyone is going well, and that the 4th of July was exciting.
Love,
Elder Todd

Goodbye to Our Good Friend Evandro

2009-12-03T18:06:00.000-08:00

João, Janine, Lourenço, and Leomar are Baptized!

2009-12-03T18:04:00.000-08:00

Vanessa and Maria Luiza were Baptized!

2009-12-03T18:00:00.000-08:00

June 29, 2009

2009-12-03T17:59:00.002-08:00

Dear Family,
So leave the planning up to me, I'll take care of it. And I will get mom the brand name of the tie next week. Talking about presents, there are a few more things that you guys could bring me if you wanted. Because everybody here is a soccer fan, I got into soccer jerseys, and I was wondering if you guys could get me a D.C. United jersey. That would be cool. If I think of any more things I will be sure to mention them in the upcoming email.
Vanessa and her daughter were baptized yesterday. The baptism was awesome. About 50 people were there, the young women sang a special song and so did the primary, and the spirit was really good. So everything turned out perfectly. The only disappointment was that Vanessa's husband, Rodrigo, didn't go to the baptism. We will go back and visit with him and invite him to come again on Sunday to see the confirmation. We also are teaching a different family of 5: João, Janine, Jaime, Lorenço, e Leomar, who are going to be baptized on Saturday, along with a man named Miguel. And then there is that family that we were already teaching that we met because of the English class, and some of them might get baptized on the same day. So it should a really busy week, we have been working hard and are working hard and we are receiving the blessings. I guess I am wrapping up my letter for this week, I will talk to you all later. Congratulate Ethan on a talk well-done.

Love,
Elder Todd

June 22, 2009

2009-12-03T17:59:00.001-08:00

Dear Family,
Sounds like the week was pretty busy. But things will calm down soon. Our week was pretty full too. We had a festa junina on Saturday that was really fun. Festa junina is a party that they do in June that originated celebrating the birthdays of a few saints, but it is really more about celebrating the brazilian country folk, the brazilian hillbillies basically. So everybody dresses up, and the ward set up tents and tables for lots of food, music for dancing, games for the kids and stuff. We invited our English students and other investigators and some less active members, and everybody had a good time. I will try and send a couple pictures. So this week we started visiting a family that we met through English class. The two oldest children have been going to our English class, and we went to their house to teach the whole family, and all six of them went to church on Sunday. They liked church and said they want to continue learning more and going, and two accepted baptism dates. So I hope that all works out well. Vanessa is going to get baptized this week, finally. The work is good, I am happy in the ward here. I will see you guys later.
Love,
Elder Todd

June 15, 2009

2009-12-03T17:58:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,
I have some exciting news! We are going to have transfers this week... and so I already know where I am going to be for the next six weeks! So, I am going to stay in Rio Tavares with Elder Clark! We get to spend at least one more transfer together, it should be pretty awesome. Since I have been here for some time now, we have earned the confidence of the members, and some have gotten pretty attached to us. I think that this next transfer will be really good.
To answer Dad's questions: Elder Clark's knee has not been getting any better, we have the MRI results, but are waiting on a doctor's appointment to read and interpret the results for us. So we are still in suspense on what might happen with Elder Clark. We have just had to change the way we work a little to make accommodations for his knee. Use our heads instead of our legs, work smarter.
We had a really great experience last week with Vanessa. She really wants to get baptized but has a difficulty with smoking. She tried to stop a few times and could only go for a few hours, or maybe half a day without smoking. So she was getting pretty upset, and we went to visit her last Tuesday. We gave her a priesthood blessing, and since then she has not smoked another cigarette (that is almost one week). She said it hasn't been easy, but that every day it gets a little easier. And she even brought her mother-in-law to church on Sunday, and invited a girl who works in her pizzaria to go next week. Her baptism is looking pretty good. When we told her that we might get transferred on Sunday at church, she told us that we have to baptize her before we leave. So that of course made Elder Clark and me feel special. What I learned from the experience is that sometimes you just have to trust in the Lord and leave everything in his hands. We had tried lots of ways to help Vanessa to stop smoking, but after doing what we could we left it up to Him. I feel kind of silly for not trying the priesthood blessing first. I was being prideful and thinking that I could missionary work on my own, when the truth is, I can't.
English is going well and frisbee too, it is a great way to meet new people and become friends with them. I really want some baptisms to come from both of the activities that we are doing. So pray for us and more baptisms.
So, happy birthday to Dad and to Ethan. And happy Father's day to Dad as well. Hope you all have fun celebrating this week.
And I agree with Dad, I am pretty sure I do have the coolest mission president in the world. I don't know how we should work out the plans, it shouldn't be that difficult. One cool result from this trip, seeing Whitney and me, will be that everyone will like the mission so much you all will want to serve missions of your own. Especially Ethan. My advice to Ethan is to enjoy summer but to not forget about his mission. I am also running out of time, so I will write more next week. Thanks for sending the photos!
Love,
Elder Todd

June 8, 2009

2009-12-03T17:57:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,
I will try to put together my part of the family letter for next week. This week was pretty busy. We have been going to the doctor's appointments and stuff. Elder Clark got an MRI on his knee, we were supposed to get the result today, but we have to wait until tomorrow. I am still healthy and happy. We had several baptisms that had to be put off for another week because the investigators weren't fully prepared, but they will get there.
Whitney! First, congratulations on the baptisms, that is awesome. I have a question for you, does your mission have a mission hymn? What is it like? Are you still allowed to sing it? My mission president wanted to know.
Mom, you know that red tie with white stripes that you sent me for Christmas or my birthday? Pres. Queiroz liked it a lot so he wants to know if you can find two more of the exact same tie and send them to me. He wants one for himself and one for a man he baptized here. Do you think that is possible? If you don't remember I will send a picture home.
Also, Mom and Dad. I want you to take something into consideration when you are making your Brazil trip plans. You told Sis. Queiroz that you were planning on stopping by for about a day and spending a couple hours with me, but Sister Queiroz has other plans. She said at the minimum you need to spend 2 to 3 days here to get the full experience. She said if it was necessary she would trade my p-day to fit into your schedule or give me two p-days. She said she knows some really awesome trails/scenic places to go hiking, and that she wants to take the family out to dinner, and go shoe shopping with the girls. So, I don't know if you have time to stay here for longer with all the things you want to in Brazil, but I can promise that you will like it here, and there is tons of stuff to do with Sister or just with us. Anyway, that is just a heads up. You could probably even send another email to her is you had any questions or doubts.
I will be heading out know, I will write you all again next week.
Love,
Elder Todd

Elders Clark and Todd on P-Day

2009-12-03T17:56:00.001-08:00

Top of Morro da Cruz Overlooking Floripa

2009-12-03T17:49:00.002-08:00

June 1, 2009

2009-12-03T17:49:00.001-08:00

Dear Family,
Let's see. Summing up this week... English class is going well, our attendance has grown to more than thirty, and we also had an activity with all the advanced english students. We all went to Evandro's house to do an immersion activity - no one could speak Portuguese the entire night. So we ordered pizza and played some games and just spoke English. We have become good friends with a lot of the students, and they have a greater interest in learning about the church, so we are going to start contacting and visiting some of the people this week.
Also, conference with Elder Didier was a very great experience. We were all nervous before he got here, because he has the appearance of being a very severe man, but we realized that that wasn't entirely the case. You don't need to be afraid of any general authority, because even if they look mean and have an extreme comb-over they are always loving and Christ-like. He taught us about união (unity) in the mission, and also more about what the message of the restauração (restoration) is all about, and did it using about a million scriptures.
I have to wrap up my letter soon. Tell Mitch hi for me. We have a baptism this sat. of a boy named Sandro, who is 13. He is friends with a part-member family and has been going to church, but we have to make sure that his mom with let him get baptised. I will let you know what happens. Until next week.
Love,
Elder Todd

May 25, 2009

2009-12-03T17:48:00.001-08:00

Dear Family,
Thanks for the letter Mom, I am glad that you got to do all of that fun stuff with Aunt Denise and with April too. So you guys ended up taking that picture that I wanted? How hard is it to get a visa to go to Brazil? What is involved in the process? Did you take a picture in front of the embassy like you told me you would? So wolf trap was pretty cool? Brasilians do not celebrate Memorial day. In fact, I had forgotten that Memorial Day was today. They do have lots of other brasilian holidays (feriados) but there are too many to keep track of. Yes, I do remember Erin Pastor, but tell Ethan to tell her that I don't. Speaking of Frisbee, I taught the youth in our ward how to play ultimate frisbee this week, and everyone loved it. They asked me to let them borrow the frisbee for their next activity this week. Nobody here knows that ultimate frisbee is a sport. One day when we were tired of knocking on doors we went to a park where lots of kids were playing around, and we started to throw the frisbee. So immediately we were surrounded by a crowd of children who wanted to play, and we played around a bit and made lots of contacts with the kids, etc. It was pretty fun. English class is doing pretty well, and Cláudio, our English student/friend, went to church for the second time yesterday, and liked it again. We had more than twenty people both days of our class this week. And no, President Didier will not be here until this Friday, when we will have our first zone conference. And it looks like he will not have time to come to our ward on Sunday. But there will be a stake meeting sat. night and he will speak there. That's right the shirt looked really cool. We will see if the next one turns out as good. Anyway. We are keeping pretty busy. Elder Clark has been trying to get some good knee treatment, but we are still working on that problem. Vanessa is progessing, we are still visiting her. We really need to motivate her husband to want to come back to church again with the family. Jairo and his family aren't really progressing, they still invited us to come in whenever we visit, but they just don't want to do very much. They are a pretty shy family, and kind of just like to stay in the house. We are working with some families to try and become better friends with them. It will probably be a challenge to get the whole family to come to church.
Well, I think that is about it for this week. I hope you all have an excellent week. Send me some of those pictures. Love you guys.
Elder Todd

May 11, 2009

2009-12-03T17:47:00.000-08:00

Hi Mom,
I hope you had a great mother’s day. We went out to catch some monkeys today. We didn’t find them because the park people said that the feeding time for the monkeys is during the morning, and by the time we got there in the early afternoon the monkeys already had full tummies. But we did find and take pictures of a mommy jacaré (alligator) and its filhotes. So that was pretty exciting. I will send you the pictures later. So we will try again on another p day mais cedo. It was really great talking to everybody on the phone. By the next time we talk all you will already have visited Brasil and will know what it is like here. And Whitney will be with you guys. Whitney will probably disagree with me, but I think here is a lot cooler than São Paulo. But I have to have some mission pride. I only have two more phone calls left, isn’t that weird? Anyway. I think this email will be pretty short, but I will catch up with you all later. Keep on sending emails to keep me updated. Mom and Dad, tell the kids that unless they send some emails I won’t send more presents home.
Love you guys,
Elder Todd

A Mommy Jacaré, No Monkies!

2009-12-03T16:52:00.000-08:00

May 4, 2009

2009-12-03T16:51:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,
About Elder Clark, he hurt his knee here on the mission, helping a family move. He was carrying something and stepped wrong and hurt his knee. But I am not getting sick of the island yet, and am still happy to be here. I know my way around pretty well. I have worked in every area on the island, so that might come in handy if I ever come back and visit. It is winter time already, the winter has been pretty rough so far, I will send some pictures to show you how it is, that I took today when we went on a little hike. Being a senior is different, and really strange. But I think it will be good. We have been getting some good work done, we were able to bring Jairo and part of his family to church, and one of their neighbors too. Our english class is doing well, there were 12 people there on sat. And all the students are enjoying the class. It is a good well to get to know new people and get them to be less afraid of visiting the church on sundays. I have to go now, I will try and send some pics.

Love you all, will talk to everyone on Sunday!
Elder Todd

House Mates - Elder's de Souza, Menezes, Clark, Todd

2009-12-03T16:49:00.000-08:00

P-Day After Playing Futebol - E. Stephanou in the middle w/white & blue jersey

2009-12-03T16:39:00.000-08:00

April 27, 2009

2009-12-03T16:38:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,
Hey everyone. I am doing pretty good, and I will try and give a good weekly update. So... this week was pretty fun. English class is starting to go better. We only had 4 people that went to our class on saturday, but they were all people who had never been in the church before, and they all liked the class a lot. And teaching english isn't too hard. And I have gotten used to speaking english and portuguese together now. And we already have a poster in front of the church, but we are getting a banner done and we are going to put it in front of the bus station so more people will know about the class. We are still waiting on Vanessa's marriage papers to get back, but she is still excited for her baptism. We are teaching a new family now, Jairo and Maria, and their kids Henrique and Bruno, and they are nice people. One problem is that because they are really humble people they think that the church is really fancy, so they feel a little uncomfortable and out of place. Jairo drove to church on sunday, but didn't go in because he saw all the people entering with suits and nice cars and such. But I know that once he goes in he will how nice everyone is and feel more welcome. Yeah, two of the APs are americans, and one is brazilian, but basically I am the one that has been teaching the english class and stuff. Mostly because because the APs are always moving around, elder stephanou had to travel for a while, and then elder fletcher had to travel. So since the 15th I have been with my new companion, Elder Clark. He is from Rigby, Idaho, and has 5 months on the mission, 3 in the field. He is a cool guy, I have been with him about two weeks, and I will probably only be with him until the end of the transfer, which is next week. Because he has a knee problem, and unless he gets better treatment he might be transferred to a different area or even out of the mission. And it was cool because I got my first junior companion on my 6 month anniversary in the field. Because I got here in floripa on the 15th of october. Time has passed pretty quickly for me. But it was also not very cool because I was really sick on that day too, with some kind of fever and cold thing. But we are both doing well. If he doesn't get transferred you guys will get to talk to him on mother's day. Anyway, I think that is about it. Until next week.

Love,
Elder Todd

April 20, 2009

2009-12-03T16:37:00.002-08:00

Dear Family,
I think I will start out by explaining the little messages that you guys got from Evandro and from Daniela. So Evandro was baptized about 8 months ago, he is 23 years old, works in a bank, likes english, and likes all the missionaries. So he is one of our good friends, he likes to help out, give us references, drive us around sometimes when we need a lift. By glad couple he means a happy companionship, I think. And there is another recently baptized young man named Júlio in our ward who is also friends with Evandro, who is 18 or 19, but looks and acts about 5 or 7 years younger. So he is saying that I am the only one patient enough to deal with him. The Snow Ball Church is a church that I am pretty sure started in the states, but it is basically an extreme sports church that is pretty popular here in our area. The signs for the church all have snowboarders, surfers, skydivers, and that kind of stuff. There is a halfpipe in front of the church and everything. And we were actually teaching someone from the church, and so Evandro invited us to go check it out with him. I didn't learn much in the way of doctrine there, but the rock band was pretty cool, and I think our church could use a few pulpits made of surfboards and a couple paintings of christ surfing. And they do have chocolate and coconut pizza here! Pizza doce is pretty popular, so I have eaten chocolate with strawberry, or with sprinkles, with coconut, banana and cinnamon, even with vanilla ice cream on top. And to finish up, Evandro likes to ask all the missionaries that he meets if they have ever had to perform an exorcism, expel an evil spirit or anything like that, and gets disappointed with the ones who haven't.
Daniela and Hélio and super cool too, but their email was probably easier to understand, didn't have as many unusual references.
Working with the APs has been interesting. I have been trying to do regular work in my area, but it gets to be a little difficult with all the traveling to the office to do something, going to the zone conferences, and helping them put together their training session that they do. They don't do that much administrative work, but they do move around a lot. I actually spent one week with Elder Stephanou and another with Elder Fletcher, another AP, but it is all going good. I am learning new things. We started up an english class that I am teaching in our area, I hope that will attract a lot of people to the church. Because everyone wants to learn english here. So we just have to advertise it well, and then we will have the people coming to us in the church, instead of us going after them and trying to drag them into the church.
The family sounds good, life seems to be going pretty smoothly. The school year is almost over for april alreay? And Emily is driving, and soon Ethan will be out of high school. I guess time is passing pretty quickly. Anyway, I think that I will have to be going soon. But I am happy and the mission is awesome. I will try and coordinate a phone call home for after lunch, sometime during the afternoon, and I will get a phone number to you guys pretty soon. I will talk to you all next week.
Love,
Elder Todd

April 13, 2009

2009-12-03T16:37:00.001-08:00

Dear Family,
Happy Easter! Feliz Páscoa! Sounds like the everyone in the family is doing a lot of fun stuff. I did a divisão with Ingleses, and ate back at Daniela and Helio's house. They said that they wrote to you and got a response through email. That both of you used internet translators, so It came out pretty bad, but hopefully you understood what they were trying to say. They were pretty excited to see me again. Did you guys see the comment that Evandro from Rio Tavares made on my blog? I haven't seen it but he said he visited my blog and left a message.
About the phone call on Mother's day, I go to church in the morning too, so it should not be a problem scheduling for the afternoon. But I still have to find a member or figure out where I am going to call from. And they do have Mother's Day here in Brasil too.
Anyway, this week was pretty good. Elder Stephanou, my companion, went traveling to go help out some elders in Joinville, so I was working this week with Elder Fletcher, one of the other assistants in the mission. He is a good guy too, so it was a really good week. Because right now the mission has an odd number of missionaries, so there might be some confusion. I don't really know who I will be working with for the next little while. Stephanou comes back, but then leaves again after a day or two. Whatever happens it will be an adventure. I will let you know what is going on next week or something. I doubt the package you guys send will get here before Stephanou gets home. This transfer for us is only five weeks long, so he goes home in about three and a half weeks.

Anyway, I have to go do some work. I am happy and doing well, loving being here. Tell Ethan he should be excited for when he gets to come on a mission. He will like Heritage and BYU too. He should play frisbee with the YounGuns when he gets there.
Love you guys,
Elder Todd

April 6, 2009

2009-12-03T16:36:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,
Conference was definitely one of the highlights of the week for me. I watched the Saturday sessions in Portuguese and the Sunday sessions in English. I watched all of the session in the stake center, which is in the middle of the centro of Florianópolis. It was pretty cool, I got to hear Elder Scott and Elder Cristofferson dub their own talks in Portuguese. They both have pretty heavy Spanish accents. But I learned that I like watching it better in English, because the voices of the apostles are a lot more emotional and expressive than the translator.
By the first marriage I mean my first set of investigators that is getting married while I am teaching them. Because a lot of people here have the problem of living together before getting married, and this obviously prevents them from being baptized. But when getting married, there usually is not even a ceremony, the couple just has to fill out some forms, send them to the government, wait a few weeks, and then sign them when they get back. And if they did have a ceremony the bishop would usually do it.
I will probably stay in the area after Stephanou leaves, so that I can show the next elder that comes the area. That is usually how it works, so that two new elders don't have to figure everything out on their own. So I will probably be here for a little while. If I were to leave, it probably wouldn't be to the jungle. There are plenty of other big cities in the state, Floripa isn't even the biggest city, Joinville is. There are a couple areas far out in the western part of the state that are more rural, but it isn't really a jungle. The living conditions are relatively good throughout the state.
Anyway, what day is good for Whitney? I have not asked anybody in the ward yet if I can call from their house. I will work it out in the next week or two. Happy birthday mom! I am writing it now to make sure that I don't forget later. I have to go now, I will talk to you guys next week.
Love,
Elder Todd

March 30, 2009

2009-12-03T16:35:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,
Mom didn't need to worry, the email got here in time for me to read it. That is really too bad about the basement flooding again. That is one thing that I don't miss very much about home. I'm glad the damage was't too big this time. And I thought that the story about the notebook was pretty cool, how everything worked out in the end. Anyway, I have exciting news from the mission field. We are going to have transfers this Wednesday... Will I finally get sent off of the island? Will I get another companion after only one transfer with Elder Helamã? Is everyone excited? The answer is no, I won't be leaving, I will be staying here in Rio Tavares. But, I will be getting a new companion, because Elder Helamã is going to Itajai. And my new companion is... Elder Stephanou! It will be his last transfer in the mission, only 5 more weeks and he is going home. He is the traveling assistant to the President. (There are 3 assistants in the mission right now, one companionship and one traveling assistant.) So this transfer should be a good learning experience, I am sure I can learn a lot from Elder Stephanou. Elder Lima, one of the other missionaries who was living in our house, is leaving too. In his place a Brasilian elder with a couple months in the field will be arriving. So I am looking forward to this next transfer, and I will keep you all updated on what's happening. So you can still send the M&Ms for Elder Helamã, and I can leave them in the mission office for him. I have to think of a good going-away present to give him.
For the past couple of weeks we have been trying to contact a inactive partmember family that owns a pizzaria called Aloha. We passed by 4 or 5 times and never could catch the family at home. A family of 3, the father is a member, but the wife isn't and neither is the daughter. But this past Sunday we saw the wife, Vanessa, in church, talked to her, visited her the same day, and basically she has been wanting to get baptised for some time now. The problem was that they weren't married, but they have already put the papers in and in two or three weeks the will be officially married after 9 years of living together, and the mom and daughter will be baptized. So this will be my first marriage in the mission, even though I didn't really do anything to help. But they are really good people, and we are going to go visit their pizzaria again to try out the pizza buffet that they have there Mondays and Thursdays. Anyway, I think that is about it for this week. The mission is great, I am happy to stay here in the area and on the island. It is pretty cool because there are elders here in the Mission Brazil Florianópolis that never get to serve in Floripa, so I feel pretty lucky. So, love you guys, have a good week.
Elder Todd

March 23, 2009

2009-12-03T16:34:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,
It would be cool to maintain that level of success. Obviously that is the goal, or to continually do even better. I think that after almost 100 years here in Santa Catarina we have 5 stakes, and 3 districts. I think the church is about 90 something years old, the church started here in Brazil in Ipoméia, the first people to be baptized were there, and the first chapel in Brazil is in Joinville.
D day is like the D day of World War II, because we brought all of the missionaries in the zone, six companionships, or 12 missionaries, not counting the assistants. And there are a couple people/families that have potential, but we are still trying to contact all lot of the people from the activity.
That reminds me, we baptized a couple on sat. Cesar and Roberta. We didn't actually teach them anything, because they were being taught by Pres. Queiroz. He met them here, I don't know the story very well, he taught them for a quite a while and now they got baptized. They are both dentists, and it was an awesome baptism, because Sister Queiroz decorated and brought food and invited a whole bunch of people and had 4 or 5 special musical numbers planned.
Mom, Sister Queiroz wanted to thank you for the email that you sent thanking for the newsletter. She said it was really sweet, because it is rare for parents to send emails just to say thank you and my son is loving the mission. So anyway. I think that is about it. The next transfer is already arriving, and soon after that mothers day too. That is pretty exciting.

There is also a really cool guy in our ward, named Evandro, who besides for giving us rides to all the references that he has and whenever else we need it, has already bought two pizzas this week for us missionaries, and when we had a family home evening he prepared the message and a barbeque and everything. And the impressive part is that he was only baptized 8 months ago. He lives alone, is about 24, and is just a cool guy. We have a couple of baptisms marked for April 4th, we got permission to baptize people in between sessions of conference. So that might be pretty interesting as well. I am still doing well, I am looking tanner but it just a wicked farmer's tan. Anyway, I am glad everyone is doing well.
Love,
Elder Todd

CONGRATULATIONS CEASAR AND ROBERTA!

2009-12-03T16:31:00.000-08:00

March 16, 2009

2009-12-03T16:30:00.002-08:00

Hey Family,
This week was pretty cool, I am still doing well. I actually just got back from pizza hut. Almost all the missionaries in the zone went to pizza hut to celebrate today, because this week the mission broke it´s record for the number of baptisms in a single week. 46, I think. So Presidente was really happy and bought pizza for everyone. And the weather has been good, it is still really hot, but it should start cooling down soon. About the photos, it was Elder Souto´s foot that had the blisters. I got a few blisters too, but none of them were big enough that it would be worth taking a picture of them. I wasn´t that lucky.
I am glad the family is doing well. That Ethan is liking going on splits with the missionaries. I probably feel the same way that Ethan does, that it is easier to speak about the gospel in a different language. But maybe it is because I only practice teaching about gospel stuff in portuguese. It is easier to say prayers in portuguese because my gospel vocabulary is bigger and comes to mind faster in portuguese than in english. I am glad Ethan is also perfecting the one pillow technique. It would extremely shameful to go to college or on a mission sleeping like a girl, using multiple pillows. He will have to practice sleeping without any sheets now, because that is what you have to do when you are in a mission in a hot place. I have a fan that I put on the bed at my feet that blows on me all night long. Tell April congrats on the study abroad thing, it sounds really cool. Sorry that she missed out on getting a new t shirt because she wasn´t at home. Sounds like Emily is having fun with lacrosse and will have fun with sarah and lauren. Good luck Mom and Dad with work.
This week was pretty fun, we had a "D Day" where all of the missionaries in the zone came to work in our area saturday morning. It was pretty cool because we had a bunch of members go on splits with the missionaries, so they got involved and excited doing missionary work, and now we have like a million people to go back and visit. We have to organize and get back quickly to the people who had a lot of potential. I am still getting along with the three brasilian elders in my house so its all good. I think that is about it for now. I will talk to you guys next week.
Love,
Elder Todd

March 9, 2009

2009-12-03T16:30:00.001-08:00

Dear Family,
I am glad the family is doing well and is super excited about doing missionary work. Keep looking for missionary opportunities. One of the things that I learned about contacting people and talking about the church is how to identify if it is the spirit or not telling you what to do. Presidente Queiroz talked about this during a conference a little while back. For example, you are in the street, or wherever, and have decided to tell someone about the church, but then for whatever reason you become afraid and invent an excuse, and don't make the contact, it was exactly that person that you should have talked to. Presidente told a story about how he walked in to a pizza place, announced to everyone that as a representative of Jesus Christ he was giving out free DVDs (passalong cards), and he talked to almost everyone in the place, conversing and complimenting and such. Except when he came to one man, he felt reservation, and he thought that he wouldn't talk to this man because he had already talked to everyone else in the place and was tired. A couple minutes later he was thinking about why he didn't make the contact, and resolved again to talk to the man. So he talked to him, and it was exactly this man, and no one else that day, that was baptized after that. Because the spirit won't make you afraid, it will be the spirit telling you to open your mouth, not to shut it. So basically we have been trying to do the same thing, and using this high-tech technique we have met in the last week our two most promising investigators as of yet.
Tell Grandma and and Aunt Jan that we are thinking of them and praying for them. Wish Emily good luck for me. And good luck dad on preparing your talk for sunday. I am glad everyone liked the shirts. You should send me a picture with all of you wearing the shirts, I think that would be cool. I tried to pick out ones that I thought each person would like. I am sure Elder Helamã will like the peanut m&ms. And I am sure I would like the next package that you guys send as well. Anyway.
Things are going well here. I will celebrate 7 months on the mission this week. So that is exciting. Time is passing quickly. Right now I have about the same time left as Whitney had when she started her mission. Only a year and a half left. I am sure it will pass quickly too. I will talk to you guys next week.
Love,
Elder Todd

March 2, 2009

2009-12-03T16:28:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,
Don't worry Mom, your letter got here on time. It is good that you guys have to have an investigator at dinner. Let me know how the dinner goes. It is quite a coincidence that this past sunday's fast in our ward, Rio Tavares, was devoted to missionary work. And after church we had a meeting for all the priesthood and auxiliary leaders, and a couple of other people too, about missionary work. So we, the missionaries and our ward mission leader, gave a message and proposed a ward mission plan along with setting goals for the ward including goals for how many baptisms per month, other things like that. Our ward mission leader is a really cool guy, Jullyan, recently returned from a mission in Recife, and we have already got some good plans. We left a message about "small and simple things" that the ward can do to make a big difference in the progress of the missionary work. We used a video from the San Jose California Mission (I think) called small and simple things... that you guys can probably look up on the internet. Then we all broke our fast and ate lunch in the church that one of the members prepared, so everone was happy.
And to answer your question, Mom, I haven't heard any news about Mexico here. So I have no idea about what's going on here. A little more about my companion, he is from Belo Horizonte, which is in Minas, he has one year and one month in the mission, he has two brothers, one of which served a mission already, and he likes to play soccer and draw. I am helping or teaching him to draw a couple things. He also likes to play with the Rubik's cube, it is surprising how popular the cube is with the missionaries. His record is 52 seconds. So far my record is 2 minutes and 48 seconds. But I just learned how a little while ago. I shared some of my candies with Elder Helamã, he likes fruit by the foot and beef jerky, and says he likes peanut m&ms a lot, like dad. So anyway, life is good. We have a zone conference tomorrow with Presidente Queiroz, so that should be good. I think that is about it. Thanks for the letter, I will talk to you guys later.
Love,
Elder Todd

New Comps - Helema and Todd

2009-12-03T16:20:00.000-08:00

Kevin's Address

2009-03-01T15:26:00.001-08:00

Missao Brasil Florianopolis
Caixa Postal 361
Florianopolis – SC
88010-970Brasil

February 23, 2009

2009-03-01T15:24:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,

I am doing well with my new companion Elder Helamã. He is from Minas Gerais. His full name is Lucas Helamã Almeida, but there was already an Elder Almeida when he arrived in the mission so he uses his middle name as his last to avoid confusion. Right now we are getting used to our new area, Rio Tavares! It is pretty cool here. I was in Ingleses, which coveres basically the north part of the island, and now I am in the south. This area is pretty big as well, so we have to take the bus pretty often, at least while we are getting to know the area better. We are visiting the members, trying to locate the people and addresses left in the area book, and working with the bishop and ward mission leader, who both seem really cool and really helpful. So hopefully we will be able to do some good work here. There are lots of bairros, neighborhoods, that are part of our area. If you want to look them up, Rio Tavares (where the chapel is), Campeche, Morro das Pedras, Armação, Pântano do Sul, Ribeirão (where we live), Alto Ribeirão. But I am getting along well with Elder Helamã, and we are living in a house with two more elders, Elder Lima and Elder Menezes. So I am living with 3 Brazilians, so I think my Portuguese will improve even more. The house is big, it is a little run down and dirty, but we will try and clean it up. Because a member of the church is donating the house for free, so we don't pay rent, just the bills for the light and water. We have to fix up the bathroom especially, and do some yardwork. But it will all be good.

Anyway, tell Ethan congratulations, I think I forgot to tell him in the last email. I did get the Valentines day package, thanks for everything that was sent. And I already sent the package that I put together, it should arrive in less than 10 days. I hope.

Love you guys, hope all is going well.

Love,
Elder Todd

February 16, 2009

2009-03-01T15:23:00.000-08:00

Hello, all right?

My name is Daniela, I am president of the society for relief and my husband is 2 Helio adviser about the Ala Ingleses, Florianópolis, Brazil. Todd Elder Ala that it serves. I am writing just to have some pictures we take here at home and I could not save him. You have a great son and a great missionary. Mrs. Todd your child eats very well (laughter) joke. I am using a translator online, do not know English so I will not perfect.

A big hug
Daniela and Helio Pierini

Fond Farewell to my First Companion

2009-03-01T15:22:00.000-08:00

Saying Goodbye to the Pierini Family

2009-03-01T15:21:00.000-08:00

Elder Todd...with Hair and Glasses!

2009-03-01T15:20:00.000-08:00

Elder Souto...with Hair

2009-03-01T15:19:00.000-08:00

A Goodbye Hug

2009-03-01T15:17:00.000-08:00

February 16, 2009

2009-03-01T15:10:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,

I have exciting news! I am being transferred this week... to Rio Tavares! So Wednesday is the day of the transfer, and I will be getting a new companion as well. My first new companion in the mission field. I will no longer be with my trainer/dad, Elder Souto. But I will still be in the same zone. Rio Tavares is just farther south on the eastern side of the island as well. So I will be staying close by, but Elder Souto is going to the opposite side of the mission, to a city called Chapecó. It is basically the end of the world. But he is really excited to be sent there as well. My new companion is going to be... Elder Helamã (that's Helaman in Portuguese). He is a really cool guy, I already knew him, he has been in our zone, zona florianópolis, for one transfer already. But he was in a different area too, so we will be doing another whitewash, entering together, into our new area. So it should be another interesting, challenging experience.

So yesterday was our last Sunday in our ward here. It was a little sad saying goodbye to all the people we have gotten to know and love during these last months. By the way, I celebrated my 6 month anniversary in the mission this week. I am a quarter of the way done already. The time is passing quickly. You haven't been getting any pictures recently because I am sending a cd with all the pictures that I have taken so far in Brazil in the package that I am putting together for you guys. You guys will like the surprises. So anyway, I have to go now. But I will send you another email next week letting you know how I am doing in my new area with my new companion.

Love,
Elder Todd

February 9, 2009

2009-03-01T15:08:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,

I did go to the mission office today and picked up my package! I was really impressed by the size, and flaunted it in front of the other elders. Elder Souto is always happy when I get packages because he gets to try all the American candies and treats, even if he doesn't like them. He is more of a chocolate than a sweet or sour person. And he always shares when he gets stuff too. So I lugged the package home and opened it. It was pretty exciting. I liked all the little toys, they reminded me of my birthdays when I was really little, with the plastic planes and such. I haven't played with them yet though. The candy is always awesome, and Elder Souto was extra happy because besides for the sweets there were cookies and granola bars, which he enjoyed trying. He saves all the wrappers of new candies in his journal. And the t-shirt is way cool, with the button. I will definitely wear the shirt. Brazilians are always commenting about Obama, about how good it is that the US finally has elected a black president, even though it has never happened here in Brazil yet. I will use the Obama button at the next transfer meeting. Which will be on the 18th. Probably elder Souto will get sent to a new area and I will stay here, but maybe not. So we will see. And the tie is super nice as well. Also, the package to the family that I am sending will probably be in the mail by next Monday. I don't have much time today so I will talk to you next week.

Thanks again.

Love,
Elder Todd

February 2, 2009

2009-03-01T15:07:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,

This past week was probably the hottest weather that we've had yet, at least since I have arrived. We can't sleep anymore without the fan going all night long, so we are wasting a little more energy, and our energy bill would be a bit higher. But it more than evens out because our electric showerhead burned out. It is pretty refreshing to shower in ice cold water. We tell ourselves that we like it this way, but really we haven't done anything because we are too lazy to have it fixed. But our energy bill will be lower too. It is interesting that the water that comes out of the tap is lukewarm, but the water that comes out of the showerhead is freezing. Personally I would prefer the reverse. We haven't figured out why the water is mysteriously colder.

We haven't been able to really keep in contact with the family of 8 because they work a lot, the move down here for a couple months during the summertime to sell stuff on the beach, so basically they work all the time they are here. Maybe they will have more time, maybe not. Leofreda is progressing, and we are teaching her son Braz as well. He was hit by a car several years ago while riding his bicycle, hit his head pretty hard, so his left side was left partially paralyzed. He is a funny guy, he has three or four jokes, and he will find any opportunity to tell them. He went to church this week and told his jokes both in Elders Quorum and in Gospel Principles class, but luckily he held it in during our Sacrament Meeting. He has already quit drinking, and we are helping him now to quit smoking as well. Leofreda accepted our challenge to live the word of wisdom as well, and because she didn't drink or smoke she threw out all the coffee she had in her house immediately. She wants to be a good example to Braz, and wants her health to improve even more as well. We are also working with Gabriel, a 14 year old boy, a friend of our bishop's son. We taught him and he wants to be baptized, but we still have to get authorization from his father. So we'll see. I think my time is just about up.

Love,
Elder Todd

January, 26, 2009

2009-03-01T15:05:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,

Thanks for sending me the birthday package, sorry I wasn't more helpful in asking for more stuff. I am sure I will like whatever you sent me. People have been requesting stuff from the U.S., and I told them that I could ask my family if it was possible for them to send the things they wanted.

This week went really well. We had a zone conference that was really awesome, the zone t-shirt that I designed was finally made, and it turned out really awesome. And finally and most importantly, we had 4 baptisms this week!! So that was pretty awesome. The first time that we have had four baptized one week and 5 in one month. Because we had a baptism last week too, I don't remember if I told you guys. Their names are Alexia, Anny, Ederson, Anderson, and Andressa. I don't really have time to tell you all about them, so I will just sum up by saying all the baptisms were good. We had been working with Ederson, Anderson, and Andressa for a long time now, about two months visiting several times a week, so it was good to see them finally take the step. And we have several more people who potentially could be baptized really soon, so we are still working hard.

Love,
Elder Todd

January 19, 2009

2009-03-01T15:04:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,

Dad, thanks for the letter. On the subject of being obedient, I know it isn't possible to be perfect, but on the last page of Preach my gospel has a list called lembre-se disto, or remember this in English. It is a list of the things we as missionaries should be doing, or doing our best to be doing. One is "be exactly obedient" in English, and "ser completemente obediente" in Portuguese. And while it isn't possible to be completely perfect in thought, I can be completely obedient to the schedule, which is mainly what it is referring to, so that is still the goal.

With regards to the email address of Presidente Queiroz, I actually would prefer you guys not email him. While he may very well grant permission, I feel like it still wouldn't be a good idea to ask to break to the rules. Like when Joseph asked three times if he could let go of the pages of the manuscript.

Love,
Elder Todd

January 12, 2009

2009-03-01T15:02:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,

I am still alive and doing well. I think my lack of writing for three weeks deserves an explanation so I will start with that. During Christmas week we weren't allowed to email because we were going to talk with our families on the phone (which was awesome by the way). I think I will have to practice next time, or think about what I would like to share beforehand. I didn't really know what to expect because it was my first phone call home, so the next one will be better. Not too far away, Mother's Day. Anyway, it was good to talk to all of you), so that is one week. New Years we also weren't allowed to email because we had to be in our house and not leave during New Years Eve, and during the day we weren't allowed to either. And this past week I had 30 emails in my inbox so I only had time to read them, and while I was replying to the emails I ran out of money at the LAN house so my connection shut down. So that is why you guys haven't received anything for a while. Anyway, New Years was good. It wasn't anything very special, but we could see the fireworks from our apartment so that was good.

This week was good, we have really been working hard to meet new families, and we worked harder than ever to be completely obedient and not waste our time. And we have met some really special people, including a family of 8 (7 old enough to be baptized) and another special woman named Leofreda. We are also working with some of our older investigators and have met even more people but I don't have time to mention them. Leofreda is a faithful member of the Deus é Amor church for more than thirty years, and she has 11 children as well, all older and married, and quite a few grandchildren as well. She was also pretty ill with heart and other various problems when we knocked on her door. So we entered and gave her a blessing, and the next day we returned and she was cured, probably due to her great faith. So we taught her the first lesson, as well as more about prophets and authority and miracles, and the day after that, she came to church, and she liked it a lot. She felt really good and said she wants to be there every Sunday. But I think she will probably continue to attend her other church as well. The miracle will only be worth retelling if Leofreda ends up being converted, because she would be an incredibly faithful member of the church. And we have one baptism this week that we are sure will happen, and we have hopes for many more this month.

Anyway, until next week.

Love,
Kevin

December 15, 2008

2009-03-01T15:01:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,

I am busy and happy, everything is going well. This week was really good, we had our Christmas Conference, so I got to see all the elders from my district in the CTM again for the first time and catch up with them. I saw their pictures of the flooding and all the cool stuff they’re doing. We also celebrated the one year anniversary of Elder Souto in the mission field, the half-way mark. He promised to buy me a pizza to commemorate, and so he did. But with my money. Adozinda, the wife of Fernando, was baptized the same night. So that was pretty neat.
So anyway, about the Christmas call. I don't know if it will work out the call with Whitney overlapping. What would work best for me would be to call at 10:00 A.M. my time, at this number (48) 3284 3035.

Anyway, happy birthday to me this week, and Merry Christmas to the family for next week. I won't have p-day on Monday, because we have Christmas day off. We also stop working earlier than normal on Christmas eve, and will be eating at the bishops house to celebrate, and the Assistentes will be there with us as well. So Monday will be work as usual.

Love,
Elder Todd

My Companion's 1 Year Celebration

2009-03-01T14:59:00.000-08:00

My CTM District Reunion-Xmas Conference

2009-03-01T14:56:00.000-08:00

December 8, 2008

2009-03-01T14:53:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,

I got your package this week!

We don't have the opportunity to work directly or give service to the victims, because the heavily affected areas are in other parts of the state. Some missionaries were stuck in their houses, some without light or water for some time, and chapels in other areas served as temporary shelters for victims. Members here from my ward in Ingleses have left to help caravan to bring supplies and give service there, but the missionaries don't. We have our work to do and people to help here as well.

Fernando was baptized on Saturday, at the same time as Jennifer, the 8 year old daughter of a member, Irmã Isabel. So there were tons of people and tons of food and treats and candies so that was awesome. We also chose Irmão Olavo, one of our ward missionaries who helps the full-time missionaries, to baptize Fernando. Olavo was the first person to greet Fernando when he walked in the chapel, and they are already friends so that is good. His wife Adozinda will be baptized as well this week, so we are looking forward to that. On Saturday, the same day that Elder Souto will celebrate his one year anniversary on the mission.

Roughly, 120 people are baptized each month. The number isn't very large considering the other missions in Brazil, but it is the most this mission has ever baptized. And Presidente Queiroz has an even higher goal. I don't know if it will work out you guys visiting, Presidente is awesome but he might think that the visit would distract from the work. I will ask anyway.

Love,
Elder Todd

December 1, 2008

2008-12-06T06:19:00.000-08:00

Dear Todd Family,

I have a lot of things to write about this week. First, news about transfers. I will be staying in Ingleses for at least one more transfer, six more weeks, with Elder Souto as my companion. Transfers were actually supposed to happen last week but because of the disaster/crisis/tragedy, the transfer didn't actually happen. If you guys were wondering what the crisis was, here in the state of Santa Catarina it has been raining like crazy. The month of November was the rainiest November in the recorded history of Florianópolis and I think the state as well. As a result of the excessive amount of rain there have been problems with flooding and mudslides/landslides in many areas. Cities such as Itajaí and Blumenau are pretty much under water, clips on tv are reminiscent of Hurricane Katrina. So far there have been over 100 deaths and over 50,000 homes destroyed. A hill collapsed over a major road pretty close to us here in Ingleses, so now it took us 2 hours to get to the Centro instead of 30 minutes because of the alternate route. But I don't say this to worry you, we are fine here in Ingleses, dry and have food and water. But you probably hadn't heard the news in the US, and you can keep the people of Santa Catarina in your prayers.

Right now we are working with several investigators that are progressing and have some special spiritual experiences. Luiza wasn't baptized because her husband forbade it, but hopefully eventually he will come around. Elisandra and Pâmela had a special experience. The first was that Elisandra decided to follow our and the Lord's counsel and not abort her child, and despite the fact that her job might be at risk she is living with more peace. They second was that one visit we brought Irmã (sister) Vanessa with us, and since Elisandra doesn't have very much she offered help in any way possible, and specifically mentioned help with buying medicine, even though no one was sick. And later in the week Elisandra's son Guilherme was playing in the street and hurt his foot pretty badly, but Elisandra had to work and couldn't afford to buy medicine of bandages. Anyway, Elisandra was distressed and prayed for help while she was working, and she found out when she returned that Irmã Vanessa had stopped buy unasked and uncalled for, and bought and bandaged Guilherme's foot. Anyway, it was a clear answer to her prayer, and she and Pâmela are going to be baptized next week. We are also working with an older man from Portugal named Fernando, and after teaching the first lesson and praying with him, he started reading the Book of Mormon in it's entirety, and when we returned he offered a prayer and felt physically an answer from the spirit. I invited him to be baptized and he and his wife accepted. He came to church Sunday and liked it, his wife couldn't make it because family visited. Both will be baptized this week. So, missionary work is a lot different than I expected. I don't have time to explain how the teaching techniques of Presidente Queiroz are a little different right now. But basically our goal is to get people to feel the Spirit. People don't have to know all the doctrine or read all the literature to know that the church is true, but primarily have to feel the spririt testifying that our message is true. So basically the first message we teach isn't necessarily the first lesson, but we kneel and offer a prayer and a blessing with every family that lets us enter to bless the family with more peace, happiness, to know that our message is true, and if necessary we give a blessing of health if any need it. And then we leave. We definitely have to use our priesthood, that is the goal of Presidente Queiroz. So almost every day we are giving blessings, and every day having spiritual experiences. Without exaggeration, Miracles are occurring in our mission now. And as a result, we are having record number of baptisms. In the history of the church here, this mission has never baptized this many. And the Church first arrived in Brazil here in Santa Catarina.

Christmas and my birthday are coming up. It will be a lot different having a hot Christmas. But I love working in Ingleses and Elder Souto is awesome, so I am really glad I get to stay here longer. I wouldn't mind at all working a couple or several more transfers here. Our area is so big there are places that we haven't even seen or visited yet. But the work continues. And it is beautiful here. We have numerous beaches that are just part of our area. You guys can probably look them up. Praia Daniela, Praia Jureré, Praia Canasvieiras, Praia Brava, Praia Ingleses, Praia Santinho, Praia Moçambique.

I have to go.
Love,
Elder Todd

Christian's Baptism

2008-11-29T19:02:00.000-08:00

November 17, 2008

2008-11-29T18:55:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,

Thanks Mom and Dad for the letter. This week was another good week, we didn't have any baptisms but we met a lot of special people and hopefully we will have several next week. Carla is doing awesome, she actually visited some other investigators with us and bore her testimony about the Book of Mormon, and especially about baptism and the blessings that she has received, how baptism has changed her life. Because of her I think we reached these two women who we wouldn't have been able to without her. Both women are single, one has two children, both are pregnant, and both left single by their boyfriends. Anyway, Carla is a single mother as well, and the woman who was considering abortion has firmly decided against it now. So Carla is pretty special. The language is coming along, I am splitting the lessons fifty fifty with elder souto and am able to do contacts, take addresses and names as well, which is difficult because names and places are often the hardest to spell. And I invited someone to be baptized for the first time yesterday! All the previous times it has been elder souto who has actually asked the question, but I had the opportunity last night and she accepted! And Luiza will be baptized on the 29th. I was a little nervous, and I know I didn't do it perfectly but in the end it all worked out. So that was a good experience. I don't have time to write more, I will write again next week.

Love,Elder Todd

November 10, 2008

2008-11-29T18:54:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,

Thanks for the letter Dad. I will respond more at a later time. Last week we baptised Carla Graciolli, she is 43 years old and has a six year old daughter. She is awesome, I will send more about her later, perhaps in a handwritten letter soon. I don't have time to do much emailing. But it was an awesome experience.
Anyway. I have to go.
Love,Elder Todd

November 3, 2008

2008-11-29T18:53:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,

This week we had a baptism, a really special lady named Carla. She is awesome. Anyway. The first picture is me and elder souto our first day together in our place. The second is me, lucas, christian, and their family, and also elder queiroz, who baptized christian, and elder souto. And the final one is of me at praia mole. It was awesome. I will send more of the beach and of playing futebol with presidente next week.
Love,
Kevin

November 1, 2008

2008-11-29T18:36:00.000-08:00

Dear Parents and Family:

I just arrived in Florianopolis! I am safe, and since we just ate, well-fed as well. It was strange to leave the CTM, but Floripa is beautiful. The plane ride was short and uneventful, and I feel like I still don’t know very much at all. We parted ways with the Elders from our district going to Rio Norte, but I am still with the 5 from our District going to Floripa and 5 other Brazilian Elders from the CTM. So even though I feel totally unprepared, it is really fun and exciting already.

President and Sister Queiroz are really friendly and I think we will be well taken care of. So make sure to tell everyone I am okay and I am out in the real world now. Presidente is awesome and funny, and he will give us 5 minutes to write an email home.

My new p-day is Monday. Our work will begin really soon. I bet I will have many adventures and stories to tell by the time next week is here. Brazil is the best and Florianopolis is the best of Brazil. Wish me luck with my new companion. I hope everything is going well and you aren’t worrying too much. I miss you guys. I am still glad that I got to go to the temple and see Whitney. I don’t know the next time I will be able to go to the temple. I am sure that I will have good stuff to write next week.

Love,

Elder Todd

President and Sister Queiroz

2008-11-29T18:16:00.000-08:00

2008-11-14T11:19:00.000-08:00

Kevin at beach in Praia Mole.

Oct. 27, 2008

2008-11-14T11:17:00.000-08:00

Dear Family,
First of all, the living conditions here are pretty good. Actually, they are the best in Brazil, but that doesn't mean they are all that amazing. There is running water, and even though the american missionaries aren't "supposed" to drink it, it should be safe it most places. It is usually filtered here, and usually the problem is too much chlorine, which is better than too many germs, viruses, bacteria, disease and whatnot. But the standard of living here is a little lower here, a lot of people live in conditions that we would consider pretty rotten but they get along fine. But there are also the well-to-do as well. So hopefully you won't have to worry about me dying of disease. And today was beautiful, especially after the first week of chronic rain.
Anyway, I think I would like to share a little bit about the power of fast. Missionaries are recommended not to fast too often, but Elder Souto and I thought that it would be a good idea. The area book we have is pretty sparce, and so we have been knocking doors, making contacts everywhere, asking every member for referrals. The ward here is actually pretty great about getting involved. Some people anyway. But we also were having much success after teaching about getting people to commit to being baptized. Nobody was accepting our invitation. So we decided to fast. That afternoon, we didn't even have to wait an entire day, we were lucky enough to meet someone who had been looking for the truth and was prepared to accept our message, who committed to be baptized. After that, everything started to go better. We started meeting more people, things started falling into place. After we fasted not one person has rejected the invitation to be baptized. So after our first week, which had pretty small numbers, we met and exceeded every mission goal for the key indicators, and have 8 people marked for baptisms this week. The first is Sergio, and his baptism is tomorrow. I don't know how many of the baptisms will fall through, but I have hope. This past week has strengthened my testimony of the power of fast.
Anyway, hopefully I will be better in the future with the sharing of experiences. I have to go now, we have a lot of work planned for tonight. I also visited the beach for the first time today on p day, it was awesome. Praia Mole, you can probably look it up. I don't have time to send all the cool pictures I took. The connection here is pretty slow.
Love,
Elder Todd

Kevin and Whitney in São Paulo

2008-10-16T18:40:00.000-07:00

2008-10-16T18:36:00.000-07:00

2 pictures of the city of Florianópolis, Brasil

First Letter in the Mission Field on Oct. 14, 2008

2008-10-16T18:34:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone,
I am really excited but I only have five minutes, because I am on Presidente Qeiroz's computer and we still have a lot of stuff to do. I sent you guys a letter today and will have so many things to say on Monday, which is my new P-day. I arrived in Florianópolis safely; the flight was very short and uneventful. I feel woefully unprepared but am so excited. I got called to serve in Florionópolis!!! My companion's name is Elder Souto. I am going to be working with very experienced and trained elders, some of the best in the mission. Presidente and Sister Qeiroz are great people, really friendly and fun. Also, they have made a big difference in the mission. The number of baptisms has almost tripled since they arrived, almost 4 months ago. I feel really lucky to be serving in Floripa. We had to part ways with the rest of the District from the CTM going to Rio North. I am opening a new area on the north part of the island of Floripa called Ingleses II. Wish me luck with the comp and with the area, we start tomorrow. Miss you all and I will email again on Monday.
Sincerely,
Elder Todd

P.S. Florianópolis is the best.

Kevin's last letter from the CTM on Oct 8, 2008

2008-10-16T18:33:00.001-07:00

Dear Family,
The most important news is that I did go to the temple today, and I did get to see Whitney and her companion there as well! Any trip to the temple is good, but this one was definitely the best so far. And it will be some time before I will be able to visit a temple again, so this was a good memory. It has already been a long time since I have seen the family, and even longer for Whitney, so it was really good to see her. We went through the 8:15 session together this morning. It was drizzling a little, but it didn't really matter. Right before Whitney showed up, Elder Nufer said that it was the most excited he has ever seen me. Whitney said I didn't look excited at all. It was really cool. Everyone in my district was really impressed with Whitney's ability to speak the language. Hopefully when we have been out as long as she has we will be able to speak half as well. We were able to go to the distribution center afterwards and pick up some supplies that they needed. We didn't have very much time to chat, but despite the short time it was awesome. O melhor p-day ever.
It is incredible and a little bit scary that this is my last week in the CTM and that we will soon be heading off to Florianópolis. I love hearing about the city though, and can't wait to see it. I am glad that everything is going well for the family.
Love,
Elder Todd

Kevin's 7th letter on Oct 1, 2008

2008-10-16T18:31:00.000-07:00

Kevin's 6th letter on Sept. 24, 2008

2008-10-16T18:22:00.000-07:00

Hey Family,
I only have about 15 minutes right now so this email will probably be a little short. This week was awesome, as usual. The time is really flying by. The next oldest district in our branch just left, so district 33-B is now the oldest district there. That's us, by the way. And we aren't actually the oldest, we have just been at the MTC the longest. But it is funny because it seems like the same thing. When we showed up everyone else looked older, and now the blue-dots say the same thing about us. Also we get to amaze and impress the new kids with our amazing grasp of the Portuguêse language. Actually, we are not near fluent but they are just awful.
I am glad you will be able to come down and pick up Whitney. Not only will that be really cool for her, but it will be cool that all of the family will be able to experience Brasil. So hopefully that will be possible and work out.
This week we got to go proselyting again. It was a completely different scenario. Last time we were near a bus station and the streets were crowded etc, you know the story. This time we went to a small park area next to a theater. The theater was a pretty old ornate building, and there were statues and fountains and things of that sort. So there were fewer people, and more missionaries were out with us. So it was challenging to find people that wanted to talk that hadn't been contacted already. But the people who would talk with us were sitting and were patient enough that we could actually teach more than we had previously. So we had the opportunity to teach most of the first lesson to a couple sitting on a bench, gave them both books, talked to them, answered some of their questions. Like why our nametags said "Elder" and "Dos Santos dos Últimos Dias". The second question was good because then we got to teach about prophets and dispensations and apostasy and the restoration (my favorite principle in the first lesson to teach about). We got along with them, and it is great to walk by 30 minutes later and see them reading and flipping pages. But there were also challenges, Elders Gordon and Anderson actually talked to someone who had a gun in his pocket. They didn't find that out until they after they had started talking to him, and when they shook his hand they saw it. But they are all fine don't worry. Also a parade type thing came through the area where we were proselyting, a huge crowd supporting the incumbent candidate for mayor of São Paulo. And somehow the center of the crowd passed right around us and the candidate was there surrounded by cameras and media people. One of his people recognized the mormons and introduced him to us. So while he was shaking hands, Elder Gordon, not fully realizing who he was, offered him a pass along card. Lots of people got it on camera. Turns out he is pretty friendly with the church already, so he didn't mind. He already instituted a mormon day in São Paulo once a year. It was still awesome though. Sorry I don't have time to share any spiritual stories or anything I have learned from my studies this week. Everything is going really well. I am making progress, but there is still a lot to learn. I hope that I can be ready by the time it comes for us to leave. It seems impossible to be fully prepared for everything that will happen in the field. So I hope the family is doing well and having fun, I will update you again next week.
Love,
Elder Todd

Kevin's 5th letter on Sept. 17, 2008

2008-10-16T18:20:00.000-07:00

Hey Family,
It is good to hear from you all again. my language is coming along, that Português is an awesome language and I love learning how to speak it. In response to your question about my health, I have yet to come down with anything worth naming a disease after, fortunately. Also everyone else has seemed to at least momentarily recover from what they used to have. I have felt reasonable healthy during my first month, and mostly just suffer from being tired. For a while when I was using the CTM pillow to sleep on at night I wasn't sleeping well because it was lumpy and felt like it was stuffed with rocks, but then I broke out the pillow I brought and I felt better. And amazingly enough I am not the person that falls asleep most in class. I thought I had a good chance to be that person, but it hasn't really been a problem at all. Plus Elder Cook is pretty amazing, he can fall asleep before you finish shaking him awake from the last time he fell asleep. Anyway.
We had the opportunity to teach a full lesson to a member family who came to the CTM. We will do this two more times, and go and proselyte on the street two more times as well. It was the first lesson, and Elder Nufer and I feel reasonably confident teaching it, but we were still a little nervous. We heard that at least once you will make the family burst into laughter from what you inadvertently say that is either ridiculous or crude. Also, at the last minute, since only four member families came and we have five companionships, one split and we got an extra person, Elder Coburn, to teach with. We did some rapid changes to the lesson plan, and it turned out way better than I expected. For one, our member family was really nice, a mother with two daughters and a son, and didn't give us much trouble or ask difficult questions, and they seemed to enjoy the lesson. Also we never made any ridiculous statements that we had to apologize for, so that was good too. Our district leader elder gordon and his companion, elder anderson, had to deal with some ladies in a family pretending to be lesbians. They had no idea what to say so elder anderson just said, "não é correto"=not correct. Everybody laughed and after that they behaved. The instructor monitoring wasn't very happy because they were only supposed to ask questions related to the lesson, prophets, dispensations, apostasy, restoration, book of mormon etc. Watching the tape of the lessons we taught was good too, because it made us all realize how much we say "um" and "uh" while we are speaking and trying to think in pourtuguês. Usually the sentences I form are alright, but right before or after I say them an um slips out. So I have been working on that. I am still getting better, but I am not close to fluent yet. But I can communicate most important ideas or ones that I have practiced pretty well. We have been teaching the 2nd and 3rd long lessons in english and shorter versions in português this week. The lessons are about the plan of salvation and the gospel of jesus christ. I learn a lot more about teaching and the gospel when we study and practice out of PMG. It is pretty cool. For sunday we prepare talks on christlike attributes, so I have been studying on my own about hope and now charity. Also, each day during study time we study a question off of the soul on page 107 of PMG, and the one we did last night was "Does god know me?" and gives reference to alma 5:38 and the good shepherd analogy, and talked about all that is involved with that. I don't have time to go into detail, hopefully next week I can tell you more about what I will learn. Also, I finished reading the Book of Mormon in Inglés this week and started reading in Português. Hopefully I can get pretty far into it before I leave the ctm. Talk to you all next week.
Love,
Elder Todd

Kevin's 4th letter on Sept. 10, 2008

2008-10-16T18:18:00.000-07:00

Hey Family,
It has been another entire week. I am almost halfway done with my stay at the MTC, which seems pretty strange. When you first show up the nine weekers seem so much older and know so much more than you do, and then all of the sudden there is a whole new bunch of blue-dots arriving slack-jawed and staring wide-eyed. Soon our district will be the big dogs in the little pond/the big fish on campus. I am excited to go out to the field, but I want to take advantage of the wonderful tools, resources, and opportunity we have at the MTC. There is so much to learn that it can be a little stressful sometimes, but I am handling it pretty well. I get tired sometimes, and our district is getting sick more often, but I'll talk about that later. But the weeks are slipping by at an increasingly rapid rate.
One of the coolest and most exciting things that happened last week was Friday, the day that we started proselyting on the streets in the real world for the first time. They drove us by bus to a place they called "wall street", were there was a large bus station, hundreds of small stores and office buildings, and thousands of people milling around. And by milling around I mean walking swiftly and with purpose. Almost everyone is "com pressa", in a hurry. So our district was dropped off with our materials, and we basically just started with a prayer and then spread out all over the streets. It took a couple of minutes to get up the courage to begin talking to people and to compose your thoughts and words in Português, but after the initial worrying it was very encouraging and even fun. Almost everyone we talked to was friendly, even if they were in a hurry. And even if someone didn't want to learn about or read the Book of Mormon, most would want to know more about Christ and would take a pass-along card. But many would accept a Book of Mormon, once you convinced them that it was actually free, and I hope they will keep their commitment to read and pray about it. And there are tons of people everywhere. So the problem isn't finding people but choosing who to talk to, because even though you want to talk to everyone it is impossible. So Elder Nufer and I gave out the 7 books that we had and about a dozen pass-along cards in a little less than an hour and a half. The experience was very encouraging and got the whole district pretty pumped about sharing the gospel, which was good.
Other than that, classes are still fine, we are working pretty hard, and trying to be obedient to all the mission rules and prepare ourselves as much as possible. But I guess the next most exciting thing to talk about is that our district seems to be falling ill pretty consistently. It is nothing to worry about because we are taken care of pretty well, and the médico is here, most of time at least. We changed the name we had for ourselves from distrito legal to distrito doente. We have named the various diseases/plagues/epidemics after the people who showed symptoms first. Hettingitis (from Elder Hettinger) was a nose and throat thing, Coburntery (Elder Coburn) was an unfortunate bowl problem, but if you are lucky you return to a solid state in a couple of days. Elder Coburn also got some pink-eye-esque thing and his eye was swollen/stuck shut for a while. But the scariest was we just named Andersplosion (Elder Anderson). He was feeling so ill that he asked for a blessing from us in the district. During the blessing he blacked out and then threw up. He didn't hurt himself because we caught him and had a trashcan there in two seconds, before he even woke up. We pseudo-joked that it was just the sickness coming right out of him. But afterward he felt better and has now recovered with only that one incident. And considering things that was probably the best place for it to happen because we all were there to help and had the médico there in no time. Anyway, everyone in the district has a disease named after them already because we are pretty sure that everyone, even the ones who think they are healthy now, will all come down with something. But that is enough of that.
My time is just about up, so I'll wrap up this email. This week is exciting because we get to teach a full lesson to a member family that will be video recorded so we can go over it and learn from it. The older guys say that it is even rougher that the street proselyting, and at some point most of the families will burst into laughter concerning something that the missionaries accidentally say in Português. So, I will let you know how that goes.
Love,
Elder Todd

Excerpts from Kevin’s 3rd letter received from the MTC Sept 3, 2008

2008-09-22T15:45:00.000-07:00

Hey Family,
Another week has gone by. Time moves strangely here at the CTM. It seems that each day lasts forever but the weeks seem to fly by. This week we have been preparing to go proselyting, practicing our street contacts, getting pass-along cards, etc. We already have a few to pass out if we are brave enough today on p-day. I can deliver my contato de rua fairly well, but I don't know if it will be effective. On Friday we will be out on the streets for three hours or so, I'll be sure to write about it in my next letter home. Our district is still getting along really well, and working together pretty well. We seem to be slightly ahead of the learning curve, thanks to Irmão Peçanha pushing us. Right now we are working on the Second Lesson: The Plan of Salvation (30 minutes) in English and the short and medium Lesson 1 in Português. We are also learning how to better plan and focus our planning on the investigator. I am also over halfway through a stack of 500 verbs that I am memorizing. Just trying to work as learn as much as possible. Right now we, as a district and as a companionship, are trying to work on obedience. Because the first week in our study time we were focused the entire time, mostly because we were scared of our instructors and not knowing anything, and now that we are getting more comfortable sometimes we lose that focus, and we are working on that self regulation. Being obedient for obedience's sake, not because of fear, but because it's the first law of heaven and all that. We want to be effective missionaries, and I feel that it is pretty impressive how far we have come. We are trying to obey all of the mission rules.
The good news is that I have two Brazilian roommates now, Elders Da Silva and De Paulo. They are very cool, very friendly, and speak very little English. But that is even better for Elder Nufer and I because it gives us more time to practice our Portuguese at night before we go to bed. They will be here for about three weeks before leaving for the field. And temporarily we have Elder Smith staying with us and being in a tripod companionship with the two Brasileiros because his mission was in between two transfers when he was supposed to leave, so he stays for two more weeks after the rest of his district ships out. It is kind of unlucky but he does get two more weeks getting even more prepared with a brasilian district and companions. So now our room, which used to have only two residing within it, has five.
It has been good, I am still alive, and I have to hear from you guys soon. If you send pictures I can print them out here and fill up the extra photo album that I brought. Until next week.
Love, Elder Kevin

Excerpts from Kevin’s 2nd letter received from the MTC Aug 27, 2008

2008-09-22T15:35:00.000-07:00

Hi Family,
My p day is Wednesday and I will usually be checking my inbox in the afternoon around 3:30 or so. Both p days we have gone to the Campinas temple, a really neat place, more than two hours by bus away and after a couple of weeks we will be able to go to the Sao Paulo temple as well.
During the devotional last night Bishop Edgley, first counselor in the presiding bishopric, talked about the blessings that the families of missionaries can receive if we serve faithfully. It was good to hear that message, and it uplifted our district a lot. Some of the elders in my district come from part-member families, or they are the only member, so that reaffirmed their hope that good will come to their family from their serving, even if it is in the next life. I hope our family will come closer even though we are physically farther apart. And I am glad Ethan feels a desire to serve a mission as well, because for a while before I came I questioned it myself. It was mostly before going to BYU, where having friends like Peter who had such desire to serve really inspired me as well. But being here has done more than that. It has already been some of the most important and memorable times of my life and it will go up from here. I am learning a lot, of the language and of the gospel. I spend twice as much time in the classroom as sleeping. I think that I will be ready to leave the MTC when the time comes, but that doesn't mean I will be ready for everything that will happen in Florianópolis. It will be an adventure.
Love,Elder Todd
P.S. If people not related to me wanted to send messages, I don't know if there are any, you could include parts or whatever in your letters. Thanks, bye.

Kevin’s first letter received from the MTC on Aug. 20, 2008

2008-09-22T14:58:00.000-07:00

Dear Family, Hello from Brazil. I know that it isn't as exciting to get news from another country because Whitney has already sent many letters home from Brazil, but it is still new to me. I only have a half an hour or so to send mail, and typing on a portuguese keyboard is a little different. I guess I'll tell you about some of the neat experiences and cool stuff that happens down here. I'll just copy some parts out of my journal and then tell you more after that. 13th August, 2008: It seems that since I have some time on my hands, because my flight from Dallas to Sau Paulo doesn’t board for an hour, that it would be good to begin my journal. It is more than appropriate because today is also the beginning of the most important and life-changing journey I have ever undertaken. Which, as it turns out, I should have begun yesterday. In what is a most embarrassing manner my entire family and I assumed that my flight would depart on the day I enter the MTC, not the day before. Such is my life. But everything has worked out just fine. I expect the full weight of leaving the family and everyone will hit me later, bur for now I am preoccupied with traveling and my concerns about entering Brazil and the MTC. The family has been great, the past summer has generally been the best that I have gotten along with everyone. Playing rafting with April, high adventure and Frisbee with Ethan and giving driving lessons to Emily were some fun memories that I get to keep with me. I didn't really tell that to them before I left so I'll try and make up for it now. 16th August, 2008:Whitney was right. It hasn't even been a full week here at the CTM and it already feels like the longest week of my life. I have a companion now! His name is Elder Scott Kenneth Nufer, and he is and will be a solid missionary. I'll share more about him and our district a little bit later, but now it is the time for the first experiences here. It is a place where you feel perfectly at home and incredibly out of place all at once. My District Leader Elder Gordon said that what he likes is that everyone here is unified in purpose and mission, and unlike school he doesn't have to feel judged or to put on an act. But the schedule is packed past full and we have just begun to learn. We are like a perfectly planned tornado. The instructors push you enough to keep you a little off balance. Irmão Lemes and especially Irmão Peçanha take this to heart. Even so, it has been great. The ten guys in our district get along more than well, our only problem is staying focused during MDST (missionary directed study time) because we enjoy each others' company so much. I am sure we will succeed, because we enjoy learning and progressing even more. I am rapidly becoming better at planning, and more ironically, seeing the importance of it. I feel slightly hypocritical for giving Dad such a hard time for micromanaging. It seems that it is going to be the norm around here. Language acquisition is coming along as well. One of the neatest things so far is being taught how to pray and share my testimony in Portuguese. I am also picking up words from my new friends, the Brazilian elders, at mealtimes. I didn't have time to get through much of the journal, but that is okay. My time is running short. Our district consists of myself and Elder Nufer, companionships Gordon and Anderson, Hill and Coburn, Hettinger and Wilson, and Cook and Moody. I'll share more later. We have had some great guest speakers at devotional and Sunday meetings, etc. I feel really lucky to be here with this group of guys and especially lucky to be sent to Floripa. The more I hear about it the better it sounds. I will send emails home every p-day and letters as well. I hope everything is good at home. Love, Kevin

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2008-08-09T11:47:00.000-07:00

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