Pneumonia...

Yes, this letter will be waaay quick and short because I am headed back to where I have been the past 5 days- bed. I have pneumonia, but the good news is that it is "light." Well that’s at least what the Brazilian doctors said. But it doesn’t appear to be light to me. I have had a fever straight the past 6 days, and I am coughing up a lung. Lungs are quite sensitive I am learning. (Jennifer Sattley, I have been thinking a ton about you, you are amazing!)

Anyways, but the Lord is continuing to bless us in unexpected ways. A pesquisador that I have been teaching since March, Elaine was baptized yesterday!! I am convinced the only reason we moved houses was to find her. We moved to the other apartment, began teaching her, and then had to move back, but we continued teaching her until she FINALLY had the courage to be baptized yesterday. It was amazing. Our bishop here really helped as well, He helped give her that final push that she needed from someone else besides the missionaries. Yay for members!

The Lord has been so good to us, we are still waiting for the marriage of Adriano and Marines, they are sooo excited to be baptized in 2 weeks. Adriano watched the baptism yesterday, and afterwards asked if he could use floaties when he is baptized. Ha-ha. He is hysterical.

Anyways, I am doing well; I am soooo grateful to be on the mission. This is something that I am really realizing right now as I can’t work like normal. I am dying to make contacts, teach lessons, bare my testimony... anything!! Ahh, the mission is the best.

Ok love you all, don’t worry too much about me!

Love Sister Melanie Monroe

Smoking like a chimney

I have never been around so much smoke in my life. But its all good, because we are helping a lot of smokers stop!! A few weeks ago my companion and I took away 17 packs of cigarettes, took them home and destroyed them. Yesterday, this same woman who smoked like a chimney, Cleide, was baptized!! Wahoo! She is amazing!!! She has been cutting down on the smoking until she finally had the courage to stop... A group fast also helped her find this strength, and it is amazing to see the light that has been growing in her face. She was soo happy as she was baptized yesterday, and her daughter Marines, cried with joy as she watched- she will be baptized in 3 weeks after her casamento, um, marriage is official.

We learned a lot about cartorios this past week as my companion and I went with Marines and Adriano to help them get married. It’s a funny process, but it’s halfway done, Wahoo!! They are super excited to be married, and be baptized, and it will be my first Brazilian wedding. Should be interesting. But they are an amazing, amazing family, who wait for us anxiously every night... because we are always running late. Oops. But one night this week when we didn’t visit them, they sat around reading the scriptures. Wow! Please pray for Adriano, he loves to drink, and badly, badly, wants to conquer this so he can be baptized, and can be a good father. This couple is amazing, and I feel so privileged that the Lord has allowed me this experience to know them.

I truly don’t have too much to say today... other then I accidentally took the wrong onibus this week, oops. Luckily we got off quickly and had to run back to catch the right one. My comp nearly killed me. hehehe.

I am very happy, completely tired... P-days all I want to do is sleep... it’s funny because at the beginning part of the mission I never understood because missionaries just sleep on P-days... now I know. I feel so wiped out I don’t even know what to think. But it’s a good feeling.

Once again, I just feel so privileged to be on a mission. I have never felt so close to the Lord in my life.... everyday there are a billion of experiences that I don’t even know where to start. I am so grateful for this gospel- it is so perfect. I am so flawed, and I feel like the more I am here, the more I see that I have to grow and change. I loove this gospel, I love the scriptures... it’s all awesome!!

Give away a pass along card, its not hard, and it could change someone’s life!!

Love you all!!

Love Sister Melanie Monroe

Loira de Novo? Eu nao acredito!

loira de novo?? eu não acredito!

Yep, blond again. I know that this is what I wrote about last week, but this week was soo much more funny. I don’t know what happened. ha-ha.

I had a week full of blond adventures, heres a few that happened-

-I had to climb under a billboard.... for the second time... but its like 2 feet of space... way small... and there is me, way tall, with my skirt and bag , climbing on my knees again, squeezing under this billboard. but it saved like 10 minutes, way better. But once again, (cough, cough) definitely NOT one of the guidelines of how to properly be a missionary. oh well.

- The same day I had to climb over a huge wall... ha-ha. We were in a new city that is close, and the area we had to teach was the other side of a wall, it was like the wall the separates the highway, I don’t know what this is in English. But yeah, we had to cross the highway, climb over the wall, and then run to the other side. And I was laughing hysterically the whole time.

- Presidente Condie changed the rules that we have to wear button up shirts with collars everyday... I about died. i went from using it about once a month to everyday... groan. But don’t worry, I am adjusting, we went to some thrift stores and I bought some of the ugliest, ugliest bottom up shirts I have seen in my life. I look like an 80 year with these shirts, and like a member of the asemblia. (only mike will get that joke, sorry folks) ha-ha, but whatever. I am following the rules! haha. But its way hotter, I don’t know how the elders do it with ties. i would die. Thank goodness to be a sister.

-ahem, entao, with this rule, I have a bit of a problem; a few of these buttons don’t stay closed. Its quite embarrassing to be teaching and look down, and there is the shirt, that is opened up for no reason- these shirts are huge on me- so its just that they are incredibly retarded. Ahh, there is nothing to do but laugh. ha-ha.

-I talked in my sleep the other night, I was making small chat, in Portuguese of course. Sister Feijó said that I began asking this woman what her name was; how long she had lived there... sister Feijo of course began to laugh.

-This week as we sat down to teach this lady for the first time, we made some small chat, and then I started to introduce myself. I told the lady, "então, eu sou sister Feijó e ela é sister Fei...." (Ok, so I am Sister Feijo and this is sister Fei...hey!) I totally botched up our names, I have definitely never done that before, introduced myself as someone else, ha-ha... we starting laughing so hard, and we didn’t even make it through the hymn afterwards without laughing. Sister Feijo wanted to kill me, i was laughing so hard. ha-ha, but such is the joy when you have a way blond companion.


Anyways, that was my funny week. We still worked incredibly hard, and have some AMAZING people that we are teaching. We are here in the center because we are preparing the marry a couple tomorrow so they can be baptized!! wahoo!! Marines and Adriano, they are hysterical and awesome, awesome people. Today Sister and I will start the process, and then tomorrow they will be with us to sign papers and stuff, and then in 3 weeks the paper will be released and they will be officially married and then can be baptized! wahoo!! So that is exciting, Pray that everything will be right, marriages here are so complicated because it all depends on the lame judges, as mike knows.

- We are also teaching the mother of Marines, she is awesome; she just has to stop smoking. Last week she gave us 17 packs of cigarettes, she smokes more than a pack a day- it was awesome. She is still smoking, but a lot less, so we are working really hard with her. Claide is awesome! Pray for her.

- We have another stubborn, stubborn pesquisador, much like Danilo and Eva and Filippe, she believes in the church, goes to church, loves everything, just doesn’t want to get married yet.... ugh. And some members started talking to her, telling her that Brigham Young waited 2 years to be baptized. Thank you soo much for that. (Dripping with sarcasm in that..) But oh well, we are marching forward with Elaine, and hopefully we can get her this week. I have been teaching her for 5 months... which is A LONG TIME in Brazilian standards,... but she really is awesome, very timid for a Brazilian, and shy, but I am sure that soon she can overcome her fear and be baptized too.. She had a lot of her answers responded on Sunday, it was amazing to see how the Lord is so perfect that he answers prayers of everyone at church, the speakers ALWAYS talk about things that our pesquisadores need to hear. it never ceases to amaze me, because they of course have no idea.

Well, that’s about it for my blond week, had interviews with the President again, which is always fun. misericordia its going by so fast. Kind of freaky. I love you all, thanks for the letters, love, and prayers, it makes a difference!

Beijos!!!
Sister Melanie felony Monroe (Or Fel Gibster.. hehe)

Ainda sou louira

So yeah, I may be a missionary, but I am still waay blond. Vichi maria. I just had to laugh at how many blond things I said or did this past week. As my skill has grown in Portuguese, You would think that I would say things better, but then I realized, wait, I say stupid things in English, of course I will say stupid things in Portugues, And I do. We have a fun time laughing about it. This last week i said "Nossos coraçoes são molhados." I meant to say "molhe"... The difference is that I said our hearts were wet, and not soft... yeah, that’s just one of the many language blunders that happened this past week. ha-ha.

Então, it is awesome being with 4 sisters, we are having a blast. I feel sad at times not being able to work with Sister Menezes- she is amazing, and I just love her, but at least I get to see her every morning and night, and accidentally at times during the day. ha-ha. But I looove my new comp- Sister Feijó. She is from the South, a bit quiet, and white, like me!! She teaches awesome, and has a great understanding of the mission. We are teaching ate o po!!

It is fun because with 4 sisters we are able to teach in areas that we didn’t have time to teach before. We have another city that is in our area- its funny because my two areas are way strange- they both had other cities in the area. We have one member family that lives there- they are recent converts, and amazing people. But this past week Sister Feijo and I had a chance to do some teaching there in Bolfim Paulista, this little city. The people there are sooo prepared, and its exciting being in an area where there have never been missionaries. We are teaching an awesome, awesome family there, so we are super excited, let’s see what comes of that.

We are also continuing with Elaine, she is this awesome person we have been teaching for like 4 months or so, I am convinced that we only moved to find her, because we ended up having to move back, but the good news is that she is SLOWLY progressing...we will see if we can push her a bit here... pray for her please. She is way awesome though. (Just has fear of baptism. ugh.)

I celebrated 4th of July with Sister Seastrand, another American that is comps with Sister Menezes, as in we said- happy fourth of July! ha-ha.. We made cookies this past week though...hmmm... That was fun.

In other news, I am sleeping on the floor, because we don’t have room for 4 sisters, but its all good. The Lord really blesses us to sleep wherever we need to on the mission. I am living out of a suitcase, which is also exciting... This house really doesn’t have space for 4 sisters- but we are all easy going, so it hasn’t been hard. It feels like a sleepover really, except this is the first sleepover in my life that is 6 weeks long, and that we have to be asleep at 10:30 and wake up at 6:30- hahaha.

The ward here told me that they are going to transfer my records here; I have been here so loong... hahaha. Its already been 6 months here, and will be at least 8 months! Crazy! And really its true that every transfer passes faster and faster, I can’t believe how fast its all going...ahh! The mission is awesome, and Brasil is ótima.. I really don’t have too much to say, I think I am just rambling, time to close things up.

I love you all!

Sister Melanie Monroe

Ps. Ok so this is funny, I think it’s a result to sleeping on the floor- So one of my good friends Brittany got married on Saturday, and Friday night I thought about it before I drifted off to sleep... and I had the weirdest dream. Brit- you had a red wedding dress in my dream, waaay weird. And we were in Brazil as well, the first red brazil wedding I have seen. This bit about receiving revelation through dreams is definitely not me.... haha...

Transferencias! 4 Sisteres Aqui!


Woah!! Wow, I don’t know how it is possible, but the time has passed so incredibly fast, and this transfer flew by!! And- we had transfers today and.....I stayed!! wahoo! I was so excited. Yesterday just waiting for the news, to know if I was transferred just made me sick. I have been here for 6 months, and so I was super worried.. And so I was super excited to know that Sister Menezes and I, both of us! are staying... só that now we have 2 new companions. We have 4 sisters here now! wahoo! So my new companion is Sister Feijó. She is amazing. I am really sad to not be companions with Sister Menezes, I just loooved her, it was one of the best transfers of my life- but I am really glad that I will at least be in the same house as her, and we will see each other often. I have no idea how we are going to divide up our pesquisadores, we have some great, great people that are progressing... but the Lord knows, so we will see.

and this past week was awesome!!! Filipe was baptized on Sunday and it was SOO great. He was the same guy that had a dream about Nefi about 1 month ago, he has been going to church steady for 6 weeks, and saw his mom Eva get baptized 2 weeks ago, and he was still resisting... but this past week, he was so touched that as he announced to us on Thursday that He would be baptized, he began to cry. It was so incredible, and I felt so grateful to see how the Lord prepares people.

Last night I had one of the most incredible experiences of my life, there are no words to describe what happened, it is something that will have to wait for after the mission. But I was able to see the power of the atonement at work in a good friends life here. I just wanted to talk a little bit today about the atonement- not to be preachy or anything, but yesterday as I reflected about how lost each of us is without Christ, I could see how much power the Imigo (Satan) has. I think it is C.S. Lewis that said that we know the power of things working against it, not giving into it, its like the wind- we know the power of the wind when we are walking against it, not when we give in and lay down... It is the same with me; I have learned the power of Satan more and more here on the mission as I have fought against him. He is so real, but Christ is just as real. He lives. It is he that binds us, that heals our wounds, that cures us- spiritually, physically, it is He that is our Savior. He pays the price and tears us from destruction and captivation....I am so grateful for Him, I know that he lives, that He is our advocate in front of our Father. I am so grateful for the atonement, and I just wanted to talk a little bit about it today...

I love you all, thank you for all your support and love. I love being a missionary, and I never will stop being a missionary. I will come home from the mission, and I will have to give up this badge, but each of us has this call- to call and save our brothers and sisters- to help them know the power of Jesus Christ- to help them know the power of the atonement in each of their lives. Share the gospel!!

Beijos!
Sister Melanie Monroe