Semana 4!! (Week 4!!)

Olà everybody!!!

This week has been really really weird for me because I can literally only remember General Conference which is really cool because I love general conference now. I think out of my whole life I have got the most out of this one from all the ones I have seen. I thankfully got to listen to the prophets voice and not a voice over!!!

For my mom that likes to get and know my friends parents idk if I have listed people in my district or not but these are their names: E Hill my companion, E Dayton, E Haight, E Larsen, E Valdivia, Sister Braegger and Sister Bradford. We have been doing get to know you times where one of us tells everybody about their life story and about their families. Its so cool to know why there are here and what was the moment when their testimonies have grown to have them serve. I know it took me a while to want to serve because I wanted to so its way cool to hear their reason for going. I for sure think we have grown tremendously closer because of this. Its truly amazing how the gospel can bring us all together so much!!!

  

General Conference for those that haven't heard of it is where we get to listen to all the leaders of the church that have been called of God. I love hearing their talks because their testimony helps mine grow. A big topic for this General conference is how to feel the promptings of the Holy Ghost and how we can respond to those immediately! It could be something so simple and innocent but i know from listening to those we can become more in tune and as a missionary i will be able to come into somebodies life to bless them with the gospel.

   

Now as for me I have some ups and downs with the language especially because as I am getting better things also start to get harder...  One thing being for sure is I miss my family and friends dearly because I don't get to have contact with them every day like I have been for the past 21 years of my life. Another thing is because I am growing so much spiritually I am so so so exhausted by the end of the night to the point of once my head hits the pillow its already the next day! And I feel like I have been here forever (literally) but I have only been here exactly 1 month yesterday! I am also starting to think and dream in Portuguese which isn't tough but I just thought it was a really cool thing when I catch myself doing that. Now it feels weird to say "thank you" instead of "obrigado" and now my "yes" is "sim" just simple things like that. Idk if I mentioned this last week but I met some Elders at the temple yesterday when I was helping do baptisms and they were from North Carolina and they said that speaking English is now a chore for them. They have to look up words or just think more about what they want to say in English and I could tell they had to think more when I was talking to them. That for sure made me feel so much better about the Portuguese language!

One thing my district and I did last week was we talked about what quote has helped them get through tough things in life. I remembered a quote the a man named ET The Hip Hop Preacher said and it goes like this "When you want to succeed as bad as you want to breathe then you will be successful" I recently started thinking of this more and more and that's literally the attitude that I have to have while serving. Because my heavenly father is counting on me to learn Portuguese so I can help people in Brasil receive the light of Christ in their life. I think its amazing that Heavenly Father trusts me to do exactly what he did and still does now through us. I love this Gospel in my life so much and I couldn't be happier right now! 

I Love you all so much!!

- Elder Hammond

Bryson also writes a family letter home. Much of what he tells us is generally what he shared in his mass email but with some added thoughts or details. Some things he adds in addition to his mass email. Some of these things are fun! I decided to share some of this for those following his blog. I'll add these excerpts below his mass emails when there are more things to add. 

"Uhm so my district is soooooo awesome!! Everybody has found out about the Bryson smile and they all try to imitate it but I am the only one that can pull it off :) I know you all know what the smile is because it always got you all wondering what I was thinking at that moment lol."  - Bryson

He is right! He always made us wonder what his thoughts were up to when he would get that cheesy grin! I thought his friends and family that know the "Bryson Smile" he's talking about would get a good laugh out of this! 😂 lol   
 - 💗 Amy aka "Bryson's Mom"