The New Year Begins

Happy New Year to Everyone!!!

This week has been somewhat uneventful but we do have several photos that we would like to share.

Manuel Duarte and his three children, Eliézer, Eduardo and Siumara.

Brother Duarte recently moved to Mindelo from Porto Novo on the island of Santo Antão.  He was the bishop of the Porto Novo ward.  He works as a hotel administrator.

Soraia and Neilson

This couple has been married for about a year and they are expecting their first child.  Soraia is a high school teacher and in August received her assignment to teach English on the Island of Fogo.  The holidays brought her home again and she will stay in Mindelo to have the baby.  

Today we met Dany who is a convert to the Church and was baptized about a year ago.  

He is 34 years old and works at the port for Shell Oil.

On New Year's Day we helped a family move.  Unfortunately the husband and wife have separated and the wife with four children found a new apartment to live in.  When we arrived at the home, it was a typical Elders Quorum nightmare.  There were unboxed items scattered all over the floor and no boxes.

Transfers were also happening on New Year's Day so we enlisted the help of the missionaries who were staying.  Elders Edu, Floyd and Gale along with Sisters Christopherson and Ribeiro pitched in and made light work of what would have otherwise been a fairly large project.

Sandra Neves and her family including her sister on the far left.

The world globe in the praça in downtown Mindelo.

The islands of Cape Verde are not to scale.  If they were, you would hardly see them.

Yesterday Marcia and Isamira brought pillows to fill the pillow coverings that we received for Christmas.

A classic Cape Verde loaded truck.

They still had another large white bag to attach.

Pictures of the Family

Our daughter, Lisa, is a self-employed interior designer and works on several temples for the Church.  A couple of dedicated temples that she has worked on are the Payson and Cedar City temples.

Lisa in her element.  Fortunately for us, she is living in our home and taking care of it while we are gone.

The Couple of the Week

Elder and Sister Rose from Utah

We had the great experience to practice our teaching skills with the Roses for one week at the Mission Training Center in Provo.  Typically we had about 30 minutes to prepare a lesson and then 15 minutes to present it.  The experience was somewhat stressful at times but the blessing was that we came to know them quite well.

The Roses are Area Welfare Specialists in Peru and are instrumental in developing and implementing large welfare projects such as Wheelchairs, modular classrooms for schools, and feeding and caring for Venezuelan refugees.  Some of their work was written up in the Deseret News when President Nelson visited Peru in October.

Sunday Dinner

A great beginning to another week.

Elder Baird from California and Elder Edu from Nigeria.  These missionaries have their own amazing conversion stories.

Until next week....