Sister Tk: Arroz & Feijao

Oi familia! Tudo bem?

I wouldn´t be me if I didn´t take some time to comment on the food here. Before coming to Brazil everybody told me I would be eating rice and beans every day...they were right! Rice and beans sounds pretty dull but it is delicious!! The days I don´t have the opportunity to eat it I go to bed craving rice and beans haha. Yesterday the bishop´s wife had us over for lunch and made feijoado. So good!! I love the food here. On Saturday a fruit vendor gave me a free goiaba (guava) because I mentioned I had never tried one. It was amazing. Sister Victorio and I are going back sometime this week to buy some. Later that day I found a HUGE avocado in the street and took it home to eat :) There are a ton of avocado trees all throughout the city. Right now isn´t the season for avocados so every time I saw one that had fallen from the tree it was normally cracked and gross. But the one I found on Saturday was perfect. I had been craving an avocado sandwich since arriving in Brasil so it was an answer to my prayers. On the way home we passed by the drugstore which has a scale and we weighed it....2.5 lbs!

The two most commonly used American words used here in terms of food are cookies and brownies. Everybody wants to try cookies and brownies. Last week Sister Victorio and I made cookies because she was craving them. We used a recipe from her previous American companion, but while she made them I did language study. After the first two batches came out a little less than perfect she asked me to help her. I didn´t know what was wrong so I chalked it up to be a bad recipe. After about 4 batches she asked me, ´How much is 3/4 cups?´ I showed her on the measuring cup (xícara in Portuguese) and she started laughing hysterically. She thought that meant 3-4 cups so she put 3 cups of each type of sugar. The cookie dough had 6 cups of sugar! No wonder they didn´t turn out right haha.

Aside from the food, the work in Guará II is going well. We had three days last week where members went out with us to our visits. It is always so awesome to have member involvement. I have noticed a lot of the sisters in the ward served missions. During testimony meeting yesterday at least 5 or 6 got up and bore their testimony about their mission. I have never been in a ward where so many people are eager to bear their testimony. There were no lulls.

The families that went to Conference are doing well. We had really great lessons with them last week. One of them came to church yesterday but the other one was sick so they weren´t able to. Gisa told us she wants to be baptized and she knows her son Davi will serve a mission someday, he´s 7 right now. She has really strong faith and is eager to join the Church. She said in all of her years attending church she always found one or two things in each congregation that she knew weren´t for her. The Lord totally prepared her to accept the gospel.

The rain continues every day, but life is good. :) I hope everyone back home is doing well!!

Love you!!

Sister Kerr