Ohhhhhh the Christmas season here is aparently not good for missionary work. Everyone is either gone or not quite sober....but we still landed one new investigator this week! We have 5 solid investigators, others that have potential but 5 that we've met with more than once. This month ALL OF THEM WILL BE BAPTIZED (well, that's the goal). January 2016 will be our month. So I officially passed 2015 without baptisms. But we opened the area so that's probably to be expected. We have to get people to come to church! That's the biggest struggle here. Like, people will believe everything and be willing to keep other commitments but commitments that involve setting a date/time and leaving the house are another story. Reminds me of how I always was with plans with friends. "Hey friend, there's a party on Saturday! Will you be there?" "I don't know...maybe....we'll see". Oh goodness I was annoying. I've learned my lesson now! When I return I will make and keep commitments ;)

We spent the evening of New Year's Eve in the house of a member and they gave us presents (a box of chocolates) and while most of the food was still the normal Brazilian food there was a turkey and the christmas music was in english, so I felt a little bit at home <3

Again this week, we worked more with less actives than with new people. We're still visiting "Grandma" all throughout the week, and we've been meeting with 6 other people, and trying to meet with 2 others but they're never home. Teaching inactive members is really cool because normally when we teach about the gift of the holy ghost, we say "you can have this after baptism" but with less actives, we get to say "you've felt this in your life before and it can come back right now if you do the things you know you should be doing" and sometimes "you have the priesthood, you have the authority to bless your family and those you love. Let's help you remember how to use it."

I'm wondering if we're having trouble getting people to come to church because God knows the ward needs to be strengthed before it can really help new people. If the branches of a tree grow faster than the roots, the whole thing will fall. So maybe we need to be doing more to help the ward members in addition to the inactives we're trying to reactivate. Not to say we'll stop trying to find new people! Of course not! But I'm going to try to think of ways to help the ward help new people. Hopefully my companion has some ideas because I've never done this before!

That's it for today. I love you all! When the holidays are past I'll have more to say for you <3

Sister Steele