Email: June 5, 2017

Hello! 

To start off that story about Eli and Caleb most definitely made me cry too. I am SO proud of them. I can´t believe how fast time passes! I remember that summer 2 years ago, a VERY hard refining one for all of us, but I feel like I learned a lot too. I remember we were at Grandmas house and the Rebers and Williamsons were there too and you called me and told me Eli wasn´t well and was going to have to have ANOTHER surgery. Immediatly we all knelt down and prayed. It is a sweet memory I won´t forget. I too am SO grateful for temple blessings. 

ANYWAYS

This week was great. We are keeping pretty busy here finding new peeps and taking care of the others.Our gypsy fam is doing pretty well! Fatima liked church so much she told her sister about it and us so we went and visited the sister and she loved our message. But she told us church is really early for her and that the other one is later so she will just go to that one. We are going to help her try and understand the importance of going to the true church with power and authority. Fatima and her family weren´t able to go to church this week because on Saturday they were at Porto all day selling songs and didn´t get home until midnight. But she promised us again in the name of Jesus she would come this next week. 

We have also been working a lot with Lurdes and her family. Lurdes is someone with a lot of faith and she wants to get baptized. She just has to come to church.... She is like 45 and a super sweet woman. We never know if she fully understands everything we teach but tudo bem. (it's ok)  Also her mom and dad are pretty funny...her mom isn´t very well in her head and just always interrupts and asks us to say prayers and bless her feet and her intestines. This week her mom asked us to massage her feet, so we did! I kept thinking about when Jesus washed the apostles feet. Yesterday we watched the Joseph Smith movie with them and they loved it! Mostly they loved all the animals in it but in the end we think they understood more. haha This week we went out to Vale de Cambra because we had some references from members to visit. We didn´t exactly know how to get there so we just hopped on the bus and we were able to find it in the end! While we were over there we stopped by a member's house. They have a blind dog and she told us (with a huge smile on her face) that the dog was going to be sacrificed the following day and they were super sad! Anyways one of the members over there was in the hospital so we were able to go visit her and she was grateful! 

So this week president sent us a song from a recent convert, Israel Grando (from Braga, his dad is Celso and I spent Christmas at there house!) It is called Angels Without Wings and he dedicated it to all the missionaries. It put the mission in perspective for me! We are here doing a labor of love. He says in the song, "thank you thank you thank you." We listen to it every morning, and I hear it is going to be on the efy cd in 2018. It gave me a ton of motivation and also I was sad that I only have a limited time here on the mish. 

The lyrics of the song were running through my mind as we had a very special experience. Last week we found a young mother named Ana. She was super nice and wanted us to come back. We went back a few times and she was never home. Then that week I read a letter from Grandma and I couldn´t stop thinking about Ana, a young mother just like Grandma was, who needs the gospel! So we tried one more time and she was home! We go in and start talking and then find out that she wasn´t home because she had a miscarriage. Also this week she kicked her husband out because he has been beating her, and she found his drugs.She doesn´t have money to pay the bills and she was really struggling.  She cried and we cried with her. We didn´t exactly know what to do other than listen and testify of Jesus Christ. We read ether 12:4 with her and after our visit she told us she felt a great relief. It is crazy to me that the lord trusts us to help his children who are struggling. 

I love you guys all so much. Glad summer is in full swing and you guys are keeping busy. Thanks for taking care of my school stuff. 

Sister Hulsey

A McDonald's opened up in our area. I won´t lie, I actually thought it was a tender mercy from Heavenly Father