Week 4 of Miriam's Mission (MTC Continued)

I made this picture for Miriam! This is her on the first day of Kindergarten. She has always been a little unsettled with big changes... and that first day of school was huge! She woke up excited to go but when she got to school and saw so many unfamiliar faces, we watched the nervousness begin to set in. Then they gave her a tour of the little bathroom in the classroom, she'd never had to use an automatic toilet before. It flushed louder than a jumbo jet taking off and she cried big frightened tears. Shortly after that, the teacher showed her the table for coloring but she just couldn't get her mind off new strange place with the screaming toilet (she called it "The Witch"- because the pipes made a high pitch squealing sound at the end of the super loud flush). 😂

This picture came to my mind when I thought of the changes she'll face going out into the field with a brand-new companion, experiencing the real part of her mission. She's excited but also nervous. 

We didn't get Miriam's regular email on Friday but she surprised us today with one. 👇💓 They treated today like her P-day because tonight is her last night in the Brazil MTC. We also got to facetime with her over Messenger for about an hour and a half. This missionary mom is feeling so happy today!! 

"The time has come, and I am now at the end of my MTC experience. It's somehow both flown by and felt like an eternity. I told my companion that I need to have a long talk with The Man Who Controls Time, because I'm sensing some gargantuan consistency issues here.

I don't feel at all prepared to go out into the field tomorrow, but I'm ready. I feel like I'm at a wall with learning Portuguese, so the field is where I'll have to learn it.

Again, there's not much to talk about since MTC is pretty much the same day in and day out. But I've met some awesome people here. 

My companion, Sister Stott, is fantastic. She's just as weird as I am; we had several interpretative dance parties to the youth music in the gospel library. We also had a fake fight the other night because I threatened to not invite her to my birthday party and to unfriend her on Facebook since we were getting ready for bed at the same time and ran into each other in the bathroom. One of the other girls in our district walked by our room and heard us yelling at each other. Needless to say that she was very confused.

One of my roommates, Sister Miller, is just as fantastic. She's a cowgirl and just as patriotic as I am. On top of that, she loves scary things and was absolutely dying of joy when I showed her a picture of the ventriloquist dummy in my closet. We've both agreed that when we're back from our missions, we need to hangout and watch come R. L. Stein Haunting Hour together 

I also met a companionship of a Brazilian sister, Sister (Or Hermana) De Angelo and Portuguese sister, Hermana Silva, at the beginning of this week. They're so kind and have been helping Sister Stott and I with our Portuguese, and they wanted to have a farewell party with us tonight. 

Now a little story about them.

So I lugged a full on winter coat down here just in case the weather got too cold. But after experiencing the weather here and having several people tell me that Piracicaba is even warmer, I regretted bringing it.

So today, while packing, I was trying to figure out what to do with it. Now, Hermana De Angelo is serving her mission in Argentina, which gets a lot colder. I brought the coat to her room and asked her if she had a winter coat for Argentina and, if not,  if she wanted mine. As it turns out, she didn't have one. She was so grateful for it (as a bonus, it was in her favorite color, too).

As obnoxious as my coat was to bring down here, I'm grateful that I did and that I was able to give it to someone who was really going to need it.

I'm excited to see what other stuff I can pawn off while I'm here 

Well, that's all for now. 

By the time I send my next email, it will be from the field.

Tchau!"