Hi guys!‏

Hey everyone!!

First of all, thank you SO much for all the pictures and videos!! I just spent almost 45 minutes looking at everything and it totally made my week to see all of you!! Unfortunately, now I have to hurry a bit, but it´s worth it to have seen you all looking so adorable. I can´t believe how big Carrie is!!! She´ll be walking so soon! I LOVED seeing her dance! Those pictures of her through the fish tank are beautiful, and her eating the popcorn made me laugh out loud! Thanks so much for making videos for me! It was so great to see grandma and grandpa. I´m so glad you´re all doing well. Thanks so much for thinking of me and making sure I get to see everything! :)

As for me here, it´s been a pretty normal week. We didn´t have any baptisms, and it was kind of weird because we didn´t even teach very much, we were really busy getting ready for this musical fireside in our area. All the missionaries here go together to organize a fireside, it was awesome! President and Sister Myrrha came from Santa Maria to speak, and we sang musical numbers in between. It was really fun! I even sang a solo in one of the songs, can you believe it? It didn´t even really scare me! Killing spiders, talking to strangers, singing solos...the mission has been conquering all my fears!;) But it was great, although not as many people came as we had hoped.

So that was the most exciting thing of the week, that and that Andréia has now been telling me about all you guys because apparently she found you on Facebook! It was so funny, she ran up to me and showed me a picture on her phone...it was like worlds collided in my mind when it turned out to be Katie, Alex and Caroline! Crazy. But she´s really excited, she loves to practice English and wants to go to BYU for college. So I´m sure she´s loving talking to you guys!

Let´s see, what else is new here? This transfer is winding down! I can´t believe it, time is flying by. I can´t believe it´s NOVEMBER! And the leaves are all changing colors there...here it cooled down a bit, thankfully, last Monday was seriously the hottest I´ve ever been in my life. I´m a little worried for summer! But it rained, and washed away the heat for a little while. It´s the weirdest pattern here, it gets hotter and hotter and hotter until it rains, then sarts building up again. I don´t understand the weather here!!

But....let´s see, what fun Brasil facts are there for you guys this week? Oh, I ate cow heart!! It was exactly like normal meat. I didn´t even know, so I might have even eaten it before, the irmã who was feeding us just randomly mentioned that it was cow heart, her husband´s favorite. But seriously, it´s exactly like normal beef. What else? Oh, yesterday I found out something weird - apparently you have to "register" your child when they´re born, I don´t know exactly what it involves, but their name was to be approved, and you can´t name them anything "foreign"! Someone said they liked my name, but "too bad I can´t use it for my kids". So weird! No wonder they´re so amazed by people from different countries, they´ve never even heard a foreign name. We´re lucky to have grown up in America!

What else? We just keep plugging along as usual, sticking to the exact same routine every day, studying all morning and teaching all afternoon. There are the nicest people here - Marcos and Jovana especially are attached to us. They worry that we´re hungry and always try to feed us, even though they don´t have a ton to spare. I finally brought my camera to get pictures off it, and there are a bunch of them on there, but it looks like I´m only going to be able to put MTC pictures on photobucket. They´re taking forever, so I had to cancel the beginning of the Cruz Alta pics. But I´ll do those next week. But when I do, there are a bunch of Marcos and Jovana on there! Their wedding, the dinner we made them at their house (to repay them for all the times they´ve fed us), their adorable daughter Roberta.

I´m getting nostalgic for all these people now, because it looks like I´m getting transfered in two weeks! Like I told you last time, just a rumor, but it´s looking likely. I can´t believe it´s my last two weeks here! But it will be good to get to another area. There´s really not too much to tell you guys, I´m sorry! I made sure to remember about the cow heart, but there´s really nothing else very unusual. Like I said, the exact same routine every day...vida missionária!:)

But I´m doing great and loving every minute of it, even when it´s hard. Don´t worry, I just mean, like, hard to get up at 6:30, hard to walk in the heat, fighting-laziness kind of hard:) But it´s so good for me to learn to work hard, and worth every minute of it. The things I´m learning here are priceless. I´m learning so much every day, about myself, about the world, about the gospel. I´m really learning that the gospel really is the way to live a complete, fulfilling life - it really is perfect. The people of the church aren´t, but the gospel of Jesus Christ truly is perfect.

I love you guys so much, thanks so much for writing me and supporting me! I think about you guys often and wonder what you´re up to and how you´re doing. I´m glad you´re taking care of grandpa and he´s not going without his ice on Sundays;) Enjoy the fall for me, cheer for the Utes against BYU!! Oh, and if you can, get a picture of Carrie in her Utes gear! I only saw a little bit in the picture with the popcorn, but it looked adorable!:) Ok, I´m already over my time limit, but love you guys!

Til next week!

Love,

Heather