Sunday, May 31, 2015

May 25, 2015 prayed for a miracle contact

         back to square one.



So.... Weve got some sad news....

after a whole day of planning on marking a wedding and trying to contact Ka she told us that she liked her church better. Its the Bola de Neve. translating to the snow ball. It has a surf board as a pulpit and is based off of regae. really dumb. so she wont get married now. we have cut her and she cut us.... so there goes our only person in this area. we have moved our focus to less actives and recent converts. the saving part of missionary work haha. oh and by the way this area hasnt baptized for over 7 months...

On friday we were invited to paint a house. that was well needed service project and normal clothes helped us keep going. 

On saturday we were really sad. a lot of our appointments have fallen through but we were still walking. following our plan and doing the things like we always do. At about 6:30 our DL called us and asked us if we were alright. i said our day was crap but we were still going. He invited us to say a prayer. So we did and we asked for a miracle. When we did this we went inside our next 2 lessons and taught them both! we even got them marked for baptism which we thought probably wouldnt have happened. 

We took an investigator to church. she wont progress but she went. she gives us lots of references cause she talks to all her neighbors about us so we get into a lot of houses cause of her :)

Thats about all that happened this week. it really sucked for the first part but in the end it all turned out fine. just goes to show that the lord blesses with the miracle after you have done all that you can huh? :)

anyway have a good week! love you all!
Elder Kyson Sullivan


a little of my area. it goes back a lot more than this. this is at the train station. pretty legit stuff :)




This is Kyson's cheer team. A lot of the ones he cheered with are graduating! :(
He will miss them.



This is the press box at Utah State that is getting torn down. So many changes happening right now that will rock Kyson's world when he gets back!


One of Kyson's good friends, Shiloh,  from the cheer team got married!
This stuff makes Kyson happy!


Monday, May 18, 2015

May 18, 2015 Been in Brazil almost a year!

          Week 51 


Well.. im coming up on being a year here in brazil. its kinda weird to think that its been so long away that it doesnt really feel real. 

this week picked up a ton from the last one. we found a bunch of people to teach and we are hoping that a few will be good and that we can progress with them. 

Kari is doing really good. she went to church this week and really enjoyed it. she said next week she wanted her family to go with her :) so that should be pretty chill. we are going to mark her wedding on wednesday so i hope everything runs smoothly.

One day we took a member over to her house and she basically taught the lesson herself. the spirit was really strong and she had a friend the whole day in church. she even participated in the classes. She really is pretty special to us. 

One day we challenged our zone to a double rainbow day. that means that you do 30 contacts that day. Our numbers were pretty weak but ya after that day everyone did it so we got back on track :)

One day we had a family home evening and we made a scripture puzzle from scripture mastery where you have to put the words in the right spot and make the scripture. then we talked about this scripture and how it applies to our lives. it was pretty cool :)

oh and this week someone made us fried chicken. tasted like bacon but it was some of the most delicious food ive had :) 

weve taught a lot this week and set up this week to be equally as good. i sure hope so! :)

have a good week everyone! até próximo!

Elder Kyson Sullivan

Monday, May 11, 2015

May 11, 2015 skyped with family and Koby



          Mothers Day / 50 Weeks


Well i hope you all had a great mothers day. I did for sure. it was so nice to be able to see my family and get to talk for them for a little time.

This week... well. Eh it had its ups and downs. 

It started with a leadership councel and going to the temple on tuesday. That was really good and really spiritual and im learning how to be a better leader. We have a couple things going on this month that should be pretty cool. First President challenged us to baptize one person for every missionary. and if you wont get that chance then you should be able to participate in teaching and helping someone who will be baptized. The second thing is that this month is the month of consegration. so we are giving all our time, efforts, and talents to the lord. President said that we dont live by the law of tithing so we have to live by some sort of law.. which is the law of consagration haha. So on pday we stay home and clean and update the area book and we dont leave our areas. a little different but it makes my job a little easier haha.

The next day we had a surprise exchange. Elder Nissenin who is a secretary came with us and helped us out a little. he trained us how to make trainings and that was pretty helpful considering i havent done much of that. 

Also we have a pretty awesome Elder here. Elder Jeronymo. who is a short time missionary. Just for this transfer. We had this broken shower for over 6 weeks. He got the part we needed and fixed it really fast. we now have hot ish showers from a shower head and not a pipe in the wall. this guy is awesome! (all showers have gone from 5 minutes to 15 -20 haha)

We are having a really hard time connecting with the members here for some reason. I dont know why but we are trying to be friends with them and they are a little shut off to us. So we made a family night calendar for this month. weve had a few people sign up so we can get to know them and also so we can teach them and their friends. We have a few activities that would be cool but if you guys have any others id love to hear them. 

Also on mothers day we went to craigs house. he is that american guy i think ive mentioned before. He made us chicken bbq pizza. that was freaking amazing. that is something that  you dont find here in brazil. i think its pretty safe to say you dont find that south of america haha. 

The area is hard. really hard. hardest that ive had. im having a hard time staying motivated to keep going and its all just tearing pretty hard on me. On top of having to be  a leader and be an example and have an example area its not working out too well. We have 2 investigators that are doing anything to learn more and they will still take a lot of work til they can be baptized.

This week was a good week but on the work end it was just crap. we didnt have very good numbers and even though we tried it looked like we didnt work at all. 

with love,
Elder Sullivan

skype time!



This sign that says: "não alimente o macaco" means dont feed the monkey. we didnt see a monkey... so we made one. thanks elder Williams haha






This is Elder Jeronymo. He is the best! Also my cool guitar. my fingers hurt all the time cause i play so much at night and in the morning.








this cat... i just couldnt help but laugh.. hahahaha i had to get a picture haha.






SKYPE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This is before Kyson got on Skype with us and Koby.


All of Koby's roommates that passed by the computer would stop and count the heads on the screen. Other countries don't have such big families as we do in the US.

An inside joke is Section 139 of D&C that has not been translated into Portuguese yet. That's why American's have more than 4 kids and Brasilian's don't. Section 139 tells you to have more than 4 kids. lol

In this picture, Carl is talking on the phone with Kyson while he tries to figure out his password to get onto Skype with us. Carl got a phone call from Florida, but answered it anyway. It was Kyson calling on an American's cell phone he had gotten in LA before he moved to Brazil with his Brasilian wife and baby.



They finally get to see each other and exchange greetings in Portuguese.


Kyson is showing us the view from the 16th story he is on. He is trying to let us see the lightning.


The zone leader, Kyson, had to take several phone calls while we were on our Skype call...


FAMILY PIC!



Kyson's host gave him the same candy that I got today from church...


Brady Bunch!



Kyson needs to know if that's a bald spot.
No, it's blonde hair and is invisible when it is short.


Chicken BBQ pizza.
He turned off the video while he ate it, but he ate his chocolate cake in front of all of us!!!!!




Kyson says he will be home before the next Mother's Day,
and Koby says he will be home 3 days AFTER Mother's Day!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!




Thursday, May 7, 2015

May 4, 2015 Counting down: 364 days left! haha


          364 days


well that can be a little trunky right? well if im not wrong and i did my math right, about the 3rd of may i should be home. that means this mothers day will be the first and last one on the mission. but who knows right?

So this week a lot of stuff happened. We got a short time missionary in our ward like a trial time. He will only be here for 1 or 2 transfers to see if he wants to serve full time. 

I got a package from koby with a bunch of stuff in it so that was a good birthday surprise :)

One day we were doing contacts and EVERYONE was telling me no. I was getting really sick of it and i just wanted a yes. I talked with this one lady and she gave me a thumbs down and said "im atheist and i dont like God", as she walked past me. I turned around and yelled after her, "Well then GOOD LUCK!!!" it was kinda nice and helped me feel better. but she isnt going anywhere nice after this life. 

We did however have 1 investigator who is progressing. Her name is Karina. She is married and has a daughter. We taught her the restoration and she understood the first time. Like thats is hard to find. Also when we came back she was asking us more about joesph smith and what happened. We showed her a video and she was a lot happier with the response we gave. She said she would like to go to church so we are still working closely with her. (the last church she was in is called the ´snowball´ church.... Go Brazil!)

On friday we had a devocional with Elder Christofferson. That was really cool :) We were able to shake his hand and ask him questions and he taught us about D&C 6:9. Say nothing but repentance. Also some other things but most of it was based out of this scripture. It was really cool and really spiritual :) 

Good news! After the devocional we came back to our house and we had energy again! that was a miracle only an apostle could have done ;) haha. 

We ended the week good. On saturday we had a member from heaven take us to Outback. Now.. i know outback in the states isnt too fancy. but here its like a big deal. They had the same break with butter, buffalo wings with hot sauce, cheesy fries with bacon on top, and RANCH!!!!! that beautiful white dipping sauce that doesnt exist here. Also we got some ribs smothered in BBQ sauce and it was so freaking delicious :) Also we each drank about 1.5 liters of coke so that just made us all happy. i didnt want to leave cause it reminded me so much of home. Also the member that took us is an american so we just spake english. Man that was the best lunch ive had here in Brazil. 

anyway i hope this week goes by smoothly for you guys and that you have success with whatever you are doing. 

Com amor,
Elder Kyson Sullivan



They are trying to "bring more water to the city of Osasco" so they destroyed all the sidewalks and leave them looking a lot like this. but its alright cause theres a pipe in there now. How do you like that dad? haha




A really cool picture i got of the temple after the devotional with Elder Christofferson

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The very first lawn mower ive seen in Brazil. Usually they use a weed wacker to cut the grass.

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and my cool little package and letters i got :) thanks fam!

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