Signing Off from the Best Eighteen Months of My Life

Well not to be cheesy but this is officially my last email as a missionary of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. 

Updates!

CÁTIA! So she's an 18 year old that Elders Holdsworth and Franco found about a month ago. She's adorable and probably has the most desire of anyone I know to find the truth. She was studying with the Jehovah's Witnesses when the Elders found her. So we started teaching her and, well, now she's marked for baptism! She's stopped meeting with the JWs because she said that she could really feel a difference in the Spirit when she was with us. AND she came to church yesterday and LOVED IT! Sister Mortensen and I can totally see her serving a mission in the future!!

Just an update for Mia and Leonor: Mia's son got super sick this past week so we weren't able to meet with them nor were they able to come to church :( But they're reading the Book of Mormon so that's good!! And we'll meet with her tomorrow! Yay! 

Sister Mortensen is killing it. She's so determined and faithful. She loves the mission and the people. I'm sooo grateful for her. President definitely knows what I needed! 

Oh and I think I'll finally reach my goal of only using sandals until the end of the mission :) 

I always heard the quote: "You only have eighteen months to serve but an eternity to remember." I am so grateful for being a missionary and I'm grateful to have served knowing that Heavenly Father was and is working through me to bless the lives of others. I know that He loves us all so much and trusts us to show that love to others. Although I am NO WAY near perfect (just ask my comps!), I'm so grateful for the changes I've seen in myself and in those around me. This church is true. Without a doubt. 

BEIJINHOS GRANDES!

Sister Hillam

Division with Sisteres Huntsman and Pastana

Gonna miss our pday convos

Ran into these guys in Porto!

My favorite Hawaiian :)


The best sisters of the mission!



Sister Duce and Sister Kunz from Matosinhos (fav area!)


E. Karthigeyan, me, S. Nance. We've come a long way. Hoping to go to India to visit E. Karthigeyan :)

Our much needed pastry break with a view! 

 The districts of Amial and Porto 2

Miracles Here in Amial

Sweet week! We went to Guimarães for P-Day, Sister Carter and I did a 4 day division, Sister Mortensen and Sister Farris (the two greenies) killed it in Guimarães by themselves, Mission Counsel, Zone Meeting, and ya know, just the finding of elects here!

Remember Mia? Well.. she and her daughter want to get baptized!!! We taught them the first lesson last week and she said that she really felt like this is what she and her family need! Oh and when we gave her the Book of Mormon, we explained what is was and the beginning story from it and she said that she'd start reading it that day and that she was super curious about it! SHE'S AMAZING! Oh and her son Rafael made us a drawing! He was too shy to talk to us but he really really liked Sister Mortensen's messy bun and glasses!

FOUND OUT yesterday that the mom of an Elder that served in Georgia (Elder Freitas from Brazil) IS GETTING BAPTIZED HERE IN PORTUGAL!!!! Small world!! 

On Tuesday, Sister Carter (from Guimarães) and I were on divisions and asked one of the senior couples to give us a ride to our appointment. Bad idea because the traffic was TERRIBLE. But as we were driving, Elder West said, "Is crowding the road just a Portuguese pastime or what?!" But man do the people here know how to drive without getting in accidents. 

Well Halloween is coming up next week!!! And S. Mortensen is super not a fan of Halloween. So I was talking about how excited I was and then she said, "You know, I actually am excited for Halloween! Because the next day is the 1st of November and we get more money on our cards!" Man how I love her :)

BEIJINHOS GRANDES

Sister Hillam

Do you'all see the resemblance?

The drawing that Rafael made

Us and Vera

White Christmas

So it's been snowing....ASH! There are tons of fires nearby in our area and we get covered in ash as we're walking so it looks like it's snowing! Merry Christmas!!

This week was awesome!!! 

So first, Maria. We've been teaching her for a looong time now and in 8 weeks, she hadn't read the Book of Mormon or come to church and we were literally about to drop her but we invited her to read the Book of Mormon one last time. We went back on Saturday and SHE READ IT! And she went onto lds.org to find bigger letters for her to read. She told us that now, she doesn't want to put it down! We taught her a lesson about Alma 32 and how she needs to keep nourishing the "seed" that she planted. She still won't come to church but she's showing interest and desire now! PACIÊNCIA! Oh and I always joke with her that God sent her some really annoying little girls to help her and she always just laughs. But when she prayed and the end of the lesson she said how grateful she is for us and how she knows that we're not annoying and that we're just doing our role as missionaries. LOVE HER!

Friday, we went with one of the Stake Couselors, Presidente Jaime Azevedo, in Ermesinde so that he could show us some old investigators and less actives. We ended up going to an old folks home and we're going to do a Halloween activity with them! Woot woot! Finally got over my fear of old people :)

Found an amazing family on Friday too!! We felt like we should start knocking a road on our way to our next appointment and rang the doorbell of an apartment building. A lady answered and we asked if we could say a prayer for them and she totally said yes! We went in and taught about how important Christ is for our families. Mia, the mom, just got separated from her husband and has two kids. She told us how she just wants her family to feel united and to get back on their feet again. She was so excited when we said we wanted to come back. As we left, she told us that she felt like her spiritual battery was recharged :)

Funny story.. We went to a Pingo Doce to grab a snack and use the bathroom. Sister Mortensen goes and uses the bathroom first and then tells me that there is no more toilet paper and that the toilet doesn't flush. So the only other bathroom is the men's. So... I go in. As I was in there, I hear talking outside the door and I got kinda worried. Then as I leave, there's a teenage boy standing outside and we awkwardly look at each other and then Sister M and I leave laughing our heads off. She then told me that she tried to convince him to leave by saying that the person in the bathroom was going to take a LONG time. He didn't want to leave though and she couldn't think of anything else to say. Let's just say that Presidente Amorim put the two most awkward sisters in the mission together... 

Our area is really catching fire in terms of the missionary work AND geographically.. So grateful to be here with Sister Mortensen. She is INCREDIBLE and is exactly what I need. Pray for us and our investigators! 

BEIJINHOS GRANDES!

Sister Hillam 

Divisão with Matosinhos

BRAGA

The Castle in Guimarães

My great x1000 grandpa! The first king of Portugal!

Everyone Loves the Dentist

I always heard that serving a mission would be stressful. Everyone told me that physically you fall apart. But man. No one ever told me how true that was. So this week, I had to go to the dentist because I couldn't open my mouth super wide (how can I preach repentance without speaking?) and the dentist told me that apparently I clench my jaw when I sleep which is caused by extreme stress. Oh and then I accidentally popped my shoulder out of place (it's still out of place oops). Oh and I can literally crack whatever joint in my body now. But putting all that aside, I'm so grateful to be able to serve the Lord with all my heart, might, mind and STRENGTH. It's such a blessing to give the Lord a year and a half of my time and dedicate it to Him. 


And he totally strengthens us! "And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them." So Sister Mortensen and I were running the other morning and I was SO tired and really did not want to run but I knew it would only help. So at the beginning of running, I was DYING. Maybe Sister Mortensen was too but I was too out of breath to ask. So I said a quick prayer and asked the Lord to help my weaknesses become strong. By the end of running, I felt as if I could keep going forever. I know that the Lord helped me (even though it was literally the smallest and probably most unimportant thing in the world.)

​​​​​​​​​​Right now in Amial, we're trying to find some new people. Our past ones aren't progressing super well so we're gonna give them a break. And we decided to take a random bus through our area and get off where we felt we needed too. We found some of the coolest people: This one couple that just had a baby. The mom of a member. A young couple that totally just let us in even though they were eating dinner (UNHEARD OF!). And more! I love the Lord's guiding hand in our work. We were always in the right place at the right time. I LOVE IT HERE!!

BEIJINHOS GRANDES!

Sister Hillam

Sister Mortensen and I on sketchy train tracks. (If y'all have been reading my emails for a long while, I always have bad luck with trains. Thankfully, nothing happened this time!) 

Just a cute little door

We found Texas and Georgia! Also this burger tasted nothing like America.

O pôr de sol

AMIAL IS ON FIRE!! Literally and figuratively. 

General Conference = A Missionary's Christmas

Great and crazy week! On Tuesday, we dropped Sister Gilbert off at the office so she could go to Abrantes. My two favorites, Sister Griffin and Carter, stayed with me until we picked up our greenies on Wednesday! I'm training Sister Mortensen from Houston, Texas BUT, she actually visa waited in the Utah Logan Mission for 6 weeks AND my best friend from college, Marissa, was her STL (Sister-Trainer-Leader)! Small world! Oh, and everyone thinks we're sisters! Sister Mortensen is amazing and ON FIRE! Her Portuguese is cinco estrelas which is great too :) 

So it's been fun introducing my favorite place in the world to Sister Mortensen, and I LOVE to see her reactions. We get honked at and catcalled all the time. She freaked out yesterday because she thought someone was going to kidnap us (Yes mom, we're fine!). She is slowly learning to not get weirded out when everyone watches and stares at us from their windows, and how to say the "lh" sound in "bacalhau." She found out the milk here makes her sick, and comes in non-refrigerated cardboard boxes. Things are unsalted, we have no air conditioning, everyone kisses each other, there are tons of stairs, we use doorbells more than knocking, her name has "morte" in it (aka death), and a ton of other things. But the greatest thing is that she's always excited to learn more and already loves everything here as weird as it can be. 

General Conference was AMAZING (better than Christmas)! We were soo sad when it was over! I literally can't choose my favorite talk but I loved the talks from Elder Uchtdorf, Sister Oscarson, Elder Oaks, Elder Holland, and Elder Koch. And I loved what Elder Andersen said about applying everything we learned. Man, it was all soo great! All of the  American missionaries were able to watch Conference in English with a missionary couple, the Wests (MY FAVORITE PEOPLE IN THE WORLD). So we had a junk food potluck and had permission to stay up late to watch the 9pm-11pm sessions each night. SO GOOD! Go check it out if you didn't have the chance to!!

BEIJINHOS GRANDES!!

Sister Hillam

May I present...... Sister Mortensen!

Ermesinde

O Distrito de Amial! I think this is the first time in the mission where I'm the shortest :'( Better late than never..?

General Conference with the best missionaries ever!

Helena :)