So this week has been quite an experience. I had my first baptism with Elder Andrade. My companion let me baptize her. Her name is Maria das Neves Siqueira da Silva. It was a great opportunity. She has literally changed her life around in the matter of weeks. She has stopped smoking, and drinking coffee. She has developed a strong testimony of the restored gospel. I am blessed to have been a part of this. I give all credit to Heavenly Father for our success. We are simply instruments in his hands. He prepared her for this day and we are simply here to guide these people to the path of the Lord.

We are teaching lots of other people too. Mostly families. My companion and i have really set a goal to teach more families because the gospel really blesses them more and the home is the perfect place to learn the gospel together. The family can also go through the temple and be sealed together for all eternity. But to sum it up families just have more potential. In one of the families we taught this past week, the grandma who lives there and who we taught and visited with as well past away this past friday. It has been really rough on the family and we have been there helping them out and just having them talk to us. I can tell just listening to them alleviates a lot of their stress. They are a family of 8. I think the gospel will really help this family as we continue to visit and teach them and relate it to their lives.

Feliz ano novo! Hope everyone had a great new year! Here is what is going on right now in our area.

We have two baptismal dates but they are both going to be post-poned. One because the mom wants to know more about the church, and the other because she works on the sabbath. We have some other potential people though. Our main focus is teaching families though.

This past week we had taught a 15 year old boy the first lesson and commited him to read and pray about the Book of Mormon. When we followed up we talked to him about it and he said that he said that he ''felt the pressence of God.'' We invited him to be baptized and he accepted. He was beaming with excitement. The next day when we returned to teach him, his mom was right there waiting to kick us out. She went on and on about how we were crazy, and weren't going to baptize anyone in her house, and a bunch of other things. We were pollite with her back and left. We were really saddened. We prayed that night specifically for the family of Lucas that their hearts would be softened. Literally the next day when we were proselyting in front of the church on the street, two sisters of Lucas come up to me and talked to me. They said that their mom felt really bad for what she had done and that she apologizes and that we are welcome to return! Talk about a serious change of heart! My companion and I were so happy! The next day we visited their mom and got to know her and established a foundation of trust with her. Things are better and the Lord has answered our prayers. 

Any ways, all is going great here! We have a lot of potential with the people we are teaching right now! I love and miss everyone and wish the best for you all! Feliz ano novo denovo!