November 27th, 2017

Hello all! 

Hope you all had a stellar Thanksgiving because this week was awesome for us here in Araucária!

Time is flying by still. This week we had our zone conference which was way fun. Learned a little bit more about the Book of Mormon. Also we practiced for this choir event that we are gonna sing in tonight. It's gonna be a huge Christmas event with the church and state together. Should be pretty fun but we are gonna have to practice there all day so that's why we are on so early today.

Our Thanksgiving dinner was  a huge success. I made stuffing, mac and cheese, some chicken breast because turkey here is pretty complicated, mashed potatoes and some rolls with honey butter! For dessert we had a lime pie and some chocolate oreo pie which was way good! It was a fun night with some of our recent converts. 

On Saturday we organized this activity called super Saturday where we did some spirit week type games and divided people up into teams and played games all day. We had lunch together and it was a huge 10/10! The ward is super excited so we are planning some activities for the next weeks.

If all goes well our ward should have some baptisms this week. We found a Cuban doctor who was way excited to go to church and already told everybody he's gonna be baptized on December 2nd. The only thing that might not work out is he doesn't control when his ticket back to Cuba is because he's going to spend Christmas in Cuba then come back but hopefully it'll all go well. 

Also everybody remember to light the world again this year! Check it out on mormon.org!!! 

love you all! 

November 20th, 2017

Austin Spencer Reid	Nov 20 (9 days ago)

HEY, so this was another freaking awesome week here in Araucária!

So this week we had a lot of success finding new people! 

On Wednesday we were walking around not having too much to do because it was a holiday here and the good news of the gospel wasn't selling like hot cakes. So Elder Garlick said we need to find a family so we started looking for a family to contact when he stops and looks at a  house and I was wondering what he was thinking  and he said  "dude it's number 3 and I was number 3 on my high-school soccer team.... its a sign". SO we knocked on the door and ended up teaching a SUPER awesome family of 5! They were way interested and we are headed back there tomorrow! 

Now that I am living with Americans we are gonna do an awesome Thanksgiving dinner with our recent converts! It's gonna be awesome! 

This week we have zone conference which is gonna be kind of a choir practice because next Monday we are going to downtown Curitiba to sing with some stakes for this big Christmas event so that'll be way fun! 

Tonight we have a family home evening and we had a ton this last week!

The mission is flyinggg by! 

Love you all! Happy Thanksgiving!!! 

November 13th, 2017

HEY

So this week was like the best week ever !

First off this transfer was nuts! Elder Zanini and Elder Melo got transferred.  My new comp is Elder Garlick from         Bountiful Utah and Elder S. Rochas new comp is Elder Eddington from California so now I'm living with 2                Americans which is way fun.                                                                                                                                          

President also sent another companionship to our ward so our ward now has 6 elders which is awesome! Elder Lara from Spain and Elder Cavaco from Portugal! Of the 6 there is only one Brazilian which is super rare!

This week we had our ward FHE and this time it was our turn to organize it. We did an iron rod activity by turning off all the lights and in all the classrooms we put a bunch of music, games and people to take the blindfolded people off the iron rod and in the end we had a huge feast that people brought and it was a huge 100%

The youth here loved it and we are already planning other activities. The parents of the youth asked us to do more activities for their kids and friends so things are going really well now. 

We are working a ton with the members now as well, we rarely have lessons that aren't with a member so that's been way fun.

Yesterday was our ward primary program which was also way fun as always.

Highlight of the week: I found dr pepper

The work here is crazy good and we are loving every second of it. The time I flying by, can't believe it's already gonna be Christmas!! 

love you all! 

some post-fhe pics

November 6th, 2017

Hey all so this week is gonna be a quick one because it was a transfer day and we got home way late but Elder Zanini got transferred and my new companion is Elder Garlick who is from Utah! Super cool guy and I'm way stoked to work with him!! 

It does NOT stop raining here which is way awesome! haha

Here are some pics from the recent FHE´s we have had! I love this ward!!

love you all

October 30th, 2017

Hey all! 

This week was another super rainy week. This time of year is known ofr being a super rainy season and all my shoes are soaked wooo 

This week was a pretty chill week. We had some meetings and such which is always fun. 

We had the zone leader meeting that comes once a transfer which is always fun to see the crew.

Our ward baptized this week. Her name is Gabrielle and she is a members girlfriend and here soon her mom and sister will be baptized if all goes well! 

Our area is huge and there are other cities that are way far away that are technically part of our area but we don't work there because President wants us to focus on the parts that are growing

butttttt recently we have been getting a ton of referrals for this city nearby called Contenda. It's a way small city basically in the middle of nowhere so this week President told us we could go check it out and see if it's a city that has potential to one day open a branch . It was quite the adventure. We got on the bus that heads to Contenda and told the bus driver to stop and let us off when we got near the center. After a while of riding in the middle of the jungle he stopped and was like here is your stop so we got off and were on the highway in the complete middle of nowhere but it just so happens that in this city there is one family of members and we found them and they helped us around so it all went well in the end!

We have some awesome ward missionary activities planned so we are stoked! The gospel is good!!!

Love you all!!! 

Pics:

Subway

 service project!

After Gabbys baptism!!

October 23rd, 2017

     Hey all whats up!

     This was another killer week here in Araucária.

Actually I didn't really get to work much in my area this week because we had a ton of splits planned so that was fun. On Tuesday I went on splits with Elder Cappi.

 He's a good guy from São Paulo and we had an awesome day together. Usually splits are known as being the day that every appointment falls through but that day we found 5 new investigators and marked some baptismal dates so it was  pretty awesome day!!

On Thursday we had split and it rained allllll dayyyy long so my shoes are all soaked because this rainy season is killin us. We got home at night after the splits and they cut our electricity so that was sick hahah we all sat in the dark and were way hungry so we decided only a pizza could cheer up that situation hahaha 

I woke up in the middle of the night to Elder Segalla, the elder I went on splits with, throwing up literally every last bite of that  pizza so that was fun haha turns out that his comp that stayed with my companion Elder Zanini also got way sick so we were like freak how are we gonna do this?

In some sketchy bus situations we ended up back in our areas and headed to a service project where we helped a family paint their house!

Saturday I did lots of baptismal interviews but the family ended up with some health problems and couldn't make it to the baptism this Saturday so the three will be baptized next Saturday! We are way stoked for them!

This week we have lots to do and have out zone leader meeting! Excited to see the crew! love this work and I love Araucária!!!

love you all!

October 9th, 2017

     YO! 

     Life here in Araucária has been a blast and a half!

To start off the week we planned an FHE at a recent converts house and we didn't expect many people. But in the end all of the youth pulled through and we had about 40ish people there which was way sick. The ward here rocks and the youth are the bomb. We work 100% with referrals from the youth which is the best and we take the youth with us to visit their friend every day so the time is flying by and I love Araucária 

     This month was jam-packed with inspiration and revelation cause my last week in Ala 5 was stake conference, last week was general conference and this week was stake conference here in Araucária which was awesome! Got to here some words from president. We had our zone conference which was a super 100% 

Our zone rocks and we had an awesome meeting 

Im living with my comp elder zanini, Elder S. Rocha and Elder Melo 

We are all working in the same ward cause our area is hugeee

We are teaching Paulo and Vitinho who are close to baptism so we are super excited for them and slowly but surely everything is falling into place here! I love the mish and I love this call! 

The gospel is true!!!!

love you all 

pics: The comp

Elder S. Rocha E' O Cara

October 2nd, 2017

     So this week was a big ol ten out of ten!

General conference was killer. Learned a lot as always and had a way good time with the whole crew. My new ward here is freaking sick and I am loving it. Pretty sure someone said that every area you go is better than the last and that's been way true in the mish haha love all of my areas and I know that God has perfectly put me in every place I need to be.

     So this week was pretty awesome, we had some great experiences.

The first was that here in the ward there is an awesome family of recent converts and they gave us a referral of this 12 year old kid named victor. He's like the funniest kid I've ever met and was bouncing of the walls the whole lesson but we finally got to talk to him seriously, and invited him to pray. The next day when we went back (well Elder Zanini and Elder S. Rocha went back cause we went on splits) he told us he prayed and that night had a dream and received his answer! He is going to be baptized here soon! 

      This Saturday we should also have the Paulo´s baptism. He´s another awesome investigator that's had a lot of questions. We marked a follow-up interview to show him that he is ready but he said he wouldn't be baptized until his mom got baptized. His mom got baptized last Saturday so if all goes well his baptism will be this Saturday! 

     Joni l. Koch that gave an awesome talk about not judging others yesterday is from Ala 5! It was way weird seeing him here in the ward and giving a talk in general conference a couple days later!! He's an awesome guy! I loved all the talks but something that really hit home for me was, A religion that doesn´t require sacrifice will never help you develop the faith necessary to return to the presence of Heavenly Father.

I know this is the church of Jesus Christ and I know that it is being guided by a prophet called of God; Thomas S. Monson.

I love this work! 

Love you all!

Some pics with some of the awesome families in Ala 5!

September 25th, 2017

HEY

So last night we got the aniticipated transfer call....andddddd

I got transferred! !!!!!!!!!  I was way sad to have to leave Ala 5. That ward changed my life and I met a ton of people there that I for sure will never forget! But my new area is Araucária. It's a little outside of Curitiba so I am officially not in Curitiba for the first time in the mish hahaha

Our area is huge and a little bit rainforesty type of area. There is some pretty crazy wildlife here so thats pretty neat.

 

Last night with Elder Graças: 

me: Dude I'm pretty positive that I'm not gonna get transferred but if I were to be transferred I wanna go to Araucária

So looks like it was revelation! I"m way excited to be here!!!

Life here is way good!

 We have some awesome investigators it looks like so Im pretty excited about that!

This week we found a new investigator that is way sick! His name is Roberto and he has a huge family, on Saturday we had a FHE with the whole family and I made tacos and guacamole for 14 people all by myself so I bet mom's pretty proud of me! Nobody had ever heard of tacos in the fam and they all loved it so it was way fun but the best part was when  of them when to church the next day and loved it! Church was full of investigators this Sunday!!! Way excited  for the work here in Araucária! I love this work!

Love you all! 

September 18th, 2017

Hey all! 

I'm not even sure what day it is anymore cause this week was crazy and flew by!

First off, it's still way hot here and we are slowly melting away but Curitiba is also super crazy and today it got way cold again and everybody always gets sick.

 

We had our leadership meeting on Wednesday which was super killer. President talked to us about how we can be better leaders obvi but showed us some videos and everyone got way pumped. it was super sweet.

On Thursday we went on splits, I went to another area called Gralha Azul with Elder Ashworth from Utah. He's a way funny guy and we had an awesome day especially when our lunch appointment fell through so we made tacos at home which is always the bomb.

We had some pretty awesome lessons and we marked some baptismal dates.

On Friday we had a somewhat normal work day in our area. but at night we had some baptismal interviews to do for the assistants

On Saturday we had our stake conference which was way great cause President was there and really inspired the whole crew.

Also on Sunday the stake choir sang and woweee I don't think I've ever seen a better stake choir, their last song was the battle hymn of the republic and they freaking killed it and all of our investigators were in tears and it was way spiritual so yeah go stake choir!

This week some of our fav investigators Romario and Jacqueline and their two kids are progressing a ton. They finally were able to stop smoking and are now completely prepared for baptism we are just waiting some of the documents they need for the wedding! We are so excited for them and they have been super stoked about baptism!!!

Yesterday we were like freak we need to find some new people to teach so we picked up a list of less actives and randomly picked a name. We knocked on the door and this little old lady answered and said that the guy we were looking for moved but invited us in. She's 90 years old but I've literally never seen someone so healthy! She doesn't use glasses or have any type of medication and she exercises every day shes the bomb! She also understood the Book of Mormon and accepted our baptismal challenge so we are stoked to see how it goes with her!

love you all!

 Elder Brasesco my crazy lil chubs

District 32A back at it 

September 11th, 2017

Hey everyone!

Hope you all had a terrific week! 

I can´t believe its already September! Time is flying and these next couple weeks are super loaded with fun things so its gonna fly by! 

So this week was pretty awesome! First off, on Wednesday we we invited to march in the independence day parade. We had to wake up at 4 and gather everyone from the zone together to get a bus because the buses only pass like every hour on holidays and we had to be downtown at 7:30 to start so we made it there on time but turns out that it didn't actually start until like 9 am

We weren't allowed to take pictures because we were marching but the church had people there taking pics for us. I only have one but I'm pretty sure we will get more.

This week was pretty tough on the missionary side of things because it was a week full of holidays here so basically everybody was traveling and it's almost the end of the school year as well so everybody is starting summer break. Its been way hard to find people to teach because literally nobody stays home and is always busy on the weekends but we are still stoked to share the good news of the gospel.

But speaking of summer, its way freaking hot here again and the missionary tan lines are going strong!

The other day it got up to like 104 degrees so that was way fun!

This Saturday and Sunday we have our stake conference so everybody has been doing lots of preparations. We are excited and here in a couple weeks it's already gonna be general conference! That's crazy!

 This week is gonna be super packed cause we have a wicked awesome FHE planned for tonight, Tomorrow we have district meeting, on Wednesday we have our Zone leader meeting, Thursday we have planned to go on splits with one of the district leaders in our zone, Friday we have some baptismal interviews to do and on Saturday and Sunday we have stake conference and priesthood sessions! 

Love you all! The gospel rocks!!

leadership meeting with the LZ´s and STL´s

Parade (ft. my head in the back)

pic from our zone conference with the zone -6 missionaries that had to leave earlier 

September 4th, 2017

Hey everyone!

This week was way great!

 

First off we had some baptisms here which is always the best! 

João got baptized this week and it was way cool to see his whole conversion process. He truly is converted and loves the book of Mormon!

So on Thursday this week is independence day here and our zone got invited to march in downtown Curitiba so that's gonna be way fun!

We are teaching a a small family, Romario and Jacquilene and they are staring to progress a ton and have already been to church a couple times so we are just trying to marry them and they are excited for baptism!

We had some awesome Family home Evenings this week and are working hard to find new people to teach now because our teaching group is pretty small now but we are excited to work with the members here! I can't believe it's almost transfer time again! 

Love you all and I love this gospel!!!!!

Pics:  

the distrtict

Tryin to catch a jump pic

baptismmmm

August 28th, 2017

Austin Spencer Reid	Aug 28

HEY 

So this week was super super not winter and winter hasn't even started and its already over. Lately its been in the 90s and 100s and we are just sweating lots and workin hard haha.

So this week we had our zone conference that went way well. 

They took some pics for us but we didn´t get them yet.

Yesterday we had some meetings with President Cuvelier and our stake president to set goals for our stake and prepare for stake conference on September 16th.

September 7th is independence day here and our zone was invited to march downtown with other groups from the city and we are gonna hand out flags and its gonna be way fun! 

So the family of 8 that we found last week is progressing a ton! Most of them went to church with us this week and loved it! We are gonna mark a baptismal date with them hopefully this week! 

This week we should also have Joãos baptism  which we are way excited for! he rocks and is super excited! 

Time is flying by I can't believe its already the third week of the transfer!

pics: 

So we are teaching this lady who has a son named Alex that's the funniest guy I've ever met. the other day in the middle of our lesson he ran in wanting to show us his Santa and Elder Graças snagged a pic of him 

Then he wanted to take a picture with everybody together and his Santa after the lesson (don't mind our sweaty faces)

inspiradaaa

August 21st, 2017

Hey all! 

So this is gonna be a quick one!

We have zone conference this week so we are preparing a ton of stuff for that! 

Hope it all goes over well! 

Our zone is a lot bigger now which is fun! 

This week we found an awesome new family with 8 kids! They are super prepared to hear the gospel and I hope we will be able to help them to baptism!!

We are loving it here in Ala 5! 

Time is flying by!

Also my camera went nuts today and it's not letting me send any pics so sorry no pics today!

Next week will be better! Love you all! The church is true! 

August 14th, 2017

     I bet you all have a whole seat but are only using the edge of it cause you're so excited to know if  I was transferred or not!  Well turns out I am staying here in Ala 5 with Elder Graças another transfer. 

     Our zone grabbed another stake of missionaries now so  it got a lot bigger which will be pretty exciting. Our zone is the Portão Boqueirão zone. We are the zone of the mission office.

     This week was pretty good. We did lots of finding and have some pretty awesome people to teach.

We are teaching this couple: Baselais and Jacyara. Baselais is from Haiti and he is way awesome. They went to church with us this week and are actually super ready for baptism.

     We are teaching this other lady, Maria who is from the northeast of Brazil and they are way receptive there. We knocked her door and she answered and was like enter enter what do you guys wanna talk about. She has the coolest accent ever and she freaking rocks. We are way excited for her.

     Also this week I hit my one year mark! I celebrated eating these mini pizza things that are the bomb and mini churros all by myself because everybody here is sick because it got way cold one day and then was like 100 degrees the next day and people here aren't used to that so all of the elders in the house were sick but Connecticut weather is always nuts so I was all healthy haha.  I can't believe time is flying so fast. Well at least it's flying by for me hahaha 

I feel like I got here last month!

     The work is going really well and we are teaching a lot now which makes the time pass even faster.

love you all!

pics:

plates for the taurus (jk)

district pics 

happy 1 year to me

August 11th 2017

Hey all! 

     This week was another great week full of lots of miracles!

So this week we had our transfer meeting with all of the zone leaders which is always fun and interesting. Got to catch up a little with the crew.

    President has been talking a lot about faith and following the guidance of the spirit so we have been trying like crazy to apply all of that in our areas and let me tell you president is an inspired man cause we are seeing miracles left and right here!

     On Friday we were knocking doors and it was going pretty well but we stopped to head to our appointment. We were walking down the street when this guy passed us by on a bike and I was like we need to talk to him so I jumped in front of his bike and pretty sure I scared him but it's all good cause we planned to meet him and his family on Saturday morning. We stopped by and turns out he is from Haiti but married a Brazilian girl and they have 2 little kids. They are way awesome and went to church with us on Sunday! We stopped by their house Sunday morning at 8:30 and they were all out in the front all dressed up and ready to go!

When we got to church there was another guy waiting there saying he felt like he needed to go to this church. He's from Paraguay. He is working here in Brazil trying to bring his wife and 3 kids here to Brazil! He rocks and is way excited!

     I love this work and I love the book of Mormon! 

Follow President Monsons advice and read the book of Mormon every day!

This week is transfer week!

pics: 

candids with prez lol 

the crew. 

August 1st, 2017

     So this week was another jammmed pack week of adventures and such!

Rosa´s baptism went way well! She was so happy and a 70 was visiting at her confirmation and she thought that was way special and it was so funny. She's a funny lady

Rosa went into hiding this whole week and we were worried her baptism was gonna fall through but she showed up again on Friday so we marked her interview and the baptism went well in the end. 

     We went to the temple today which is always way great. We had to get up a little earlier to catch the bus and all but it was a great day and I love the temple! 

     This week wasn't all that exciting.

We are doing a lot of walking and knocking doors trying to find the most efficient way to work here in the area but the transfer is almost over! We have our Zone Leader meeting this week and then next week is already the last week of the transfer!

     At the temple Elder Ah Puck (from Hawaii) snagged a pic and we weren't even posing or expecting it but it turned out to be a pic that looks way posed and patriotic so we got way stoked wooo go Brazil 

other temple pics 

love y'all​