Week 38 - Mother's Day!

Hey Family,

How is it going? I hope you had a great Mother's Day Mom! This week we were really looking for new investigators because we lost half our area to the sisters. We were walking on a road we had walked on a thousand times and we stopped and had an impression to knock on a small house in an alley. We knocked on it and it was the house of some Brazilian students, they were super cool and let us in. They liked the message and said they would read the BoM if we brought one so we brought 2 and the next day they were fighting over who got to read it first so we dropped another one off! They are super cool and hopefully they will come to church this week!

In other news, we marked a baptismal date for Keily this Saturday and she is super excited. She is a little nervous and doesn't want too many people there but we are inviting the whole ward so she can just deal with it haha. Her birthday was this week so we stopped by her party and had a ton of food and awesome cake. They had alcohol but she was not drinking. They played Just Dance and went crazy. Brazilians are crazy especially when they are drunk but it was funny. They sang happy birthday to her and brought out champagne and she said, "I am not drinking" which was way cool!

As you know, on Sunday we got to Skype and it was really good seeing you guys! It was awesome that we had the Grovers and the Armstrongs in on the Skype call and we will have to do that for Christmas as well! After that, we had a pancake dinner with the Silva family which is always a blast but the sisters came so it wasn't as fun haha. Just kidding, I like sisters...I just love being a district leader over a district of only sisters...

Well that is all for this week, I love you guys and it was awesome seeing you. Christmas will come super fast and we will be Skyping again and we will wonder where the time went! 

Love,

Elder Ruggles

Week 37

Hey Family,

This week was pretty good. It was really hectic because we had a zone meeting and we had to help the new sisters open up a new area. We got 2 new sisters in the district, Sister Johnson (who came in with me) and Sister Smith (a greenie). They are cool but they stole half of our area and half of our investigators so now we have even less people to teach. Don't worry, we made sure that we will still be teaching Keily!

This week our numbers weren't awesome but we had some things to do like I said, but that is still not a good excuse. Our mission had the worst week for baptisms and I think president is really mad. We had 7 baptisms in the mission with over 100 duplas...pretty bad. President's letter is usually 2-3 pages long but this time it was 1 page with just the baptismal stats on it. We taught Keily a couple times and tried to pass Carla but she was never home. I think we might drop her because she is not progressing anymore, won't come to church and thinks she doesn't need baptism. 

We finished all the lessons with Keily, and finally got her the 4th lesson which is commandments. We have a rule in our mission where you have to teach that one with a member of the bishopric because people here don't pay tithing. It's hard for us to do that because our bishop lives super far away and he only has one counselor who works a lot. At the beginning of the week we talked about the Word of Wisdom and we had taught it a while ago but she thought that a little bit of wine and coffee wasn't bad so she did not stop. The other day while we were talking about it she gave us her coffee but already had a bottle of wine open and said, "last bottle." We tried to take it but she said no. The next day she said she tried to drink some but could not swallow the wine and spit it out in the sink. Then, she poured out the bottle in front of us and hasn't had coffee or wine in a week now!!!

Keily's husband, Ezikiel, has been working in France for the past year and only gets to visit every so often. He came home this week and we had dinner with them and he is awesome. He is the nicest Portuguese guy I have ever met. We taught him a lesson on families because he has an awesome one. He said he is annoyed with God because he is missing his kids growing up. He said the only reason he is in France is so that they can have food and if there was another way, he would do it. Keily has been trying to go down there for a while but she is from Brazil and can't travel whenever she wants to like Ezekiel. We invited him to church and he said he would be sleeping because of his long trip but he and Keily showed up to church with their 2 kids! We are going to try to mark a baptismal date with Keily for this week so Ezekiel can be here! Hopefully next week she will be baptized! 

Love you guys,

Elder Ruggles 

Week 36 - Sticking Around

Hey Family,
This week was a long one, our numbers were actually pretty good but the last week before transfers is always hard because you are worried about leaving and the Zone Leaders just want the best numbers possible so they pushed baptisms like crazy. The sisters had someone marked for baptism this week and the bishop of their ward thought it wasn't a good idea to baptize him so early so he was telling the sisters no. The ZLs were calling the sisters telling them to baptize so the pressure just made the sisters cry and I had no idea what to do so we met them at the church and I told them to say a prayer to see if he should be baptized and they didn't end up baptizing him.

The other day we were teaching Keily and we told her that transfers were coming up, BIG MISTAKE. She was really upset at us and was sure that both of us were leaving which almost never happens. She said that she does not agree with transfers and said she doesn't want new elders. When we stuck around she was so relieved but we better baptize her before one of us does leave haha. 

As you can tell by the title, I am not leaving Viseu quite yet. The Lord still has some work for me to do here and I am pretty sure that work is baptizing Keily and Carla! On Sunday we got invited over to the Silva's house for pancakes after church. Every Sunday they eat pancakes and they usually invite us. I ate 10 pancakes because I was so nervous for transfers and everyone was running around being loud then the phone rang and everyone was quiet to hear transfers. My ZL was playing a joke and told me I was going to Madeira (islands) and then he said just kidding you guys are staying and everyone in the room started cheering haha it was way funny. The sisters ended up staying too. Plus our ward will be getting 2 new sisters so Elder Reni and I had to split the area to share with some sisters...I wasn't too happy about it. 

Today we didn't do much, we just goofed around, slept a little and played ping pong. I haven't played ping pong since I left home and I was a little rusty but it didn't stop me from destroying Elder Reni. In the beginning he was kinda close to my skill level but after warming up he did not stand a chance. I beat him 8 times in a row but it was way fun! Well that is all for this week, hopefully next week we have a baptism with Keily but I will let you know! Love you guys!

Love,

Elder Ruggles

Week 35 - B-Day Surprises

Hey Family,

Well this week was a lot better than last week that is for sure! Bishop invited us to his house for dinner which was awesome! We had some good turkey and he loves snails so we ate quite a few of those.

I did miss all of you on my birthday but the people here made up for it. Being a Ruggles, I did not want many people to know it was my birthday so I only told my comp... I had told my investigator Keily a few weeks before but only because she asked and I did not think she would remember. We went to her house on my birthday and we taught her like everything was normal but at the end of the lesson her 5 year old son took me into another room to show me something and there was cake and treats in there and they sang me happy birthday haha it was embarrassing. Then, we went to ward council meeting and my comp had told bishop that it was my birthday during our family night with him the night before so he brought out a cake and they sang to me. I was embarrassed yet again but he said, "We don't forget anyone here" which was nice.

I got your guys' package the other day and I loved it. I especially loved the Dr. Pepper because that doesn't exist here unless your area has an American store which mine does not. The night before my birthday I got a call from a very special friend. That's right, Elder Bianucci got permission to call me and we talked forever! It was so cool and it was like I was at home talking to him like the good old days. The night of my birthday I got a call from a member in my first area, Oeiras which I thought was weird cause I didn't speak to anyone in my first area and I said, "I thought you forgot about me" and he said, "I never forget my elders." He went through a lot of trouble to call and get my number and area so it meant a lot.

We didn't have any investigators at church this week which sucked but Keily is almost ready to be baptized. She still doesn't have a date but she should soon. She is trying to give up coffee and wine which shouldn't be too hard! I did a division this week with the Zone Leaders which was awesome. I went with Elder Neilson and he is way cool and hilarious. Pretty great week! Love you guys thanks for the birthday wishes and all the support and especially the package! 

Love,

Elder Ruggles

Week 34

Hey Family,

This week kinda sucked haha. It started off bad because every p-day we like to go out to eat at a restaurant and last week was no different. We decided to go to Burger King because they are the only restaurant that offers free refills. After p day was over we had a lesson with Wilson and during the lesson I was burping a lot. We got home and I didn't feel good and I went to the bathroom and lost all the Burger King. I was throwing up every hour that night and didn't get any sleep. I lost stuff I ate 2 weeks ago haha and after that I couldn't sleep. I had to miss the zone conference the next day which I was sad about because a ton of my buds were there. There is one upside to the story. I lost some weight and now I look like the Hollywood movie stars. I think I will do this more often haha just kidding it was awful. Never thought BK would betray me like that. President called to see if I was still alive but all is well now.

We had a couple good lessons with Carla and I wasn't feeling good and I was tired of her excuses so I was bold and just said, "You know you need to get baptized" and we marked her for this Saturday but she called the other night and she said she can't quit smoking and she will never be a Mormon because of all of our rules. We tried talking to her and she said we could pass by and she knows the church is true but she doesn't like the "rules"...or the commandments. We decided to give her some time to think and so we will pass by next week but it sucked.

We taught Wilson a little this week but he still isn't reading so I don't know what to do with him. We had a good lesson with him on the importance of the BoM but he still has trouble reading and believing without seeing the gold plates. Keily came to church again and she is really liking it. She is probably our closest to baptism and her kids are adorable. Her daughter kept yelling during sacrament and said the cutest things.

We had a family night with the Silvas last night which makes everything better always. They are my favorite family and they always make us pancakes. We have a family night with the bishop tonight so I will let you know how that goes and try to take more pictures haha, I kinda spaced it this week. Thanks for all the birthday wishes. I love you guys!

Love,

Elder Ruggles

Week 33

What up family?

This week was pretty great, especially because it was Easter and General Conference. Easter is kind of a big deal here and they have a parade where they march through the streets way late at night with big statues that look like Jesus and the apostles and stuff. It's pretty apostate but it was fun to watch and they have a marching band too. It was kind of like the 4th of July but without the fireworks and the freedom.

We were fasting this week to have a lot of investigators at general conference and we had a lot of people marked to come who said they would come. Little did we know they were liars haha. We didn't have as many people as we would have liked but I realized that this fast helped the quality of investigators, not quantity. We only had 2 but one of them is named Keily and she has never been to church but she LOVED conference and she wants us to come talk to her more. She has a cute family and her husband is in France right now. She is the one who asked me why God lets children suffer, but she seems like she wants to know. Hopefully we can dunk her soon!

I loved watching conference and we got to watch it in English, which was good. I really loved Holland's talk as usual and during the story I thought of Jon and me and was crying but I pretended like I had allergies like a man! I also liked the one after Holland's about being taught the dance of the gospel and not being able to hear the music and after a while becoming uncomfortable with the dance. It applied a lot to me because I could not fully hear the music or understand the importance of it until I got out here on my mission but now I can hear it all the time and I am so grateful for it! I love this gospel and I am so grateful for living prophets. Did you guys hear those people in the Saturday session who said, "We oppose the first presidency?" I am surprised that they didn't get struck by lightning haha. Well I hope you guys enjoyed conference as much as I did! Love you guys.

Love,

Elder Ruggles

Week 32

Ola Family,

This week was pretty good. On Tuesday I planned and directed my first district meeting. I was a little nervous at first but I feel like I did pretty good. It wasn't as boring as they usually are because I made it fun, and I did half of it in English because we have 2 new missionaries in our district. Then, we got on a bus to go to an area called Mangualde that is pretty far away but we have a couple people out there to talk to.

Later in the week we talked to Wilson, our main investigator who is kinda at a stand still because he hasn't been to church. He keeps making excuses but he wants to come, I think. He has a lot of questions and sometimes they are hard to answer. Like the other day, he was reading in the Book of Mormon and the Lord spared a prophet from being killed by the Lamenites and Wilson thinks that the Lord took away their agency. I tried to explain that the Lord blessed the prophet but the Lamenites were still CHOOSING to try to kill him. I gave many examples and finally he understood a little more but he likes to ask hard questions. We are really good friends because he is our age and it's hard not to just hang out when I go over there because he is so much like my friends, he always wants to show me funny Youtube videos and stuff. He understands the importance, he just has a lot of doubts and I really hope he will be baptized this transfer!

We have been passing by this investigator named Keily lately and she is from Brasil and has been taught in the past but she is really cool and nice. Brazilians always are haha. She wants to come to church and her husband lives in France and wants the talk to the missionaries there. She has questions too like, "Why does God let children starve and stuff?" and I am just like ....."Read the Book of Mormon to find out".....all these investigators trying to stump me is pretty annoying but oh well. We talked to Carla and tried to mark her to be baptized in a couple weeks and she said it's too early but we'll see if we can change her mind.

This week an old investigator called one of our members to ask if the missionaries could teach him again and so we went to meet with him and he has a pretty strong testimony about the church. He said he feels something different there and he wants to be baptized. We are going to teach him all the lessons again and hopefully have a baptism in a few weeks! sorry I wrote so much. A lot happened this week! Today we are going to play soccer with all the youth in our ward and a couple investigators will be there like Wilson and his brother so it should be awesome! Thanks for all the support! Love you guys.

Love, 

Elder Ruggles

Week 31 - It's a Boy!

Hey everyone,

This week was pretty good, I spent most of it outside of my area because I was chilling in Coimbra waiting for my new comp. They got here Thursday instead of Wednesday because the MTC changed their flight without telling them so they missed it haha.

My new comp's name is Elder Reni and he is way sick. He is from California and he played football in high school so he is super fun to talk to. He plays the guitar really well so the first thing he wanted to do this morning for P day was go to the music store and buy a guitar to take around with him on the mission. We got a cheap one and he plays really well! He was playing a ton of sick songs I knew and we just jam so I guess you can say it will be a sick transfer! My kid is super dope!

This week we got Carla to come to church. Well, I would say the spirit did more than I did. We told her to read the BoM and pray about it and the next day we passed she said that her heart is telling her not to miss church! I was so happy when she said that.

We have also been teaching this kid named Wilson, he is 20 and his mom is an inactive member but we want to get the whole family completed and back to church. He is a lot like me in respect to his humor and I showed him my pranks on Youtube and he loves them. He always invites us over and we are really good friends and he listens very closely in the lessons. He has a lot of doubts especially about the BoM and the story of it. He wants to know where the gold plates are and he said it was convenient that I said an angel took them. I was trying to explain all this stuff in Portuguese and he had more and more questions and then Elder Reni said, "We don't know everything but God does so ask him." Wilson said he would and I know that Elder Reni was inspired to say that. While I was relying on my ability to speak Portuguese, he was relying on the spirit because that is all he can do! I am very grateful to have Elder Reni as my comp and I am grateful for the spirit in my life! D&C 100:5 "Therefore, verily I say unto you, lift up your voices unto this people; speak the thoughts that I shall put into your hearts, and you shall not be confounded before men!" Have a great week everyone! I love you and thanks for the support!

Love,

Elder Ruggles 

Week 30 - Baby on the Way

Dear family,

This week was pretty long, we had some bad numbers and no one showed up for church, not even Carla. She said she wants to wait to go to church until she finishes the Book of Mormon which I told her makes no sense but for now she is not progressing.

This Sunday was transfer day and we were in the church and normally you don't get transfer calls until that night unless someone is going to the islands so they can go to the office to catch their plane. Don't worry, I am not going to the islands but Elder Poston went to the Azores haha. They called us after church and told him to pack his bags and then they told me that I will be staying with the zone leaders while I wait to get my new comp. I will be going to Lisbon on Wednesday to pick up a brand new missionary and I will train and have a kid of my very own haha... and I am also the district leader.

I don't know if I am ready for all of this responsibility but it doesn't matter now I guess. I only have 6 months in the mission and I am training, I hope I don't screw this kid up haha! 

In the mean time, I am with the zone leaders and the Coimbra district and Elder Fox, one of my really good friends from the MTC who just got here and will be serving in the Coimbra zone with me so we are just chilling and telling mission stories! It is way cool to see him. I am super excited and super nervous for this next week but it will go well. I will let you guys know but the kid's name is Elder Reni. I know that the Lord will provide and help me to fulfill my calling but I am still a little nervous haha! That is all for now, thanks for all the love and support! I love and miss you guys!

Love,

Elder Ruggles