Week 15 - October 27, 2025

 Bom dia! 💌🫶🌺

I always try to make these shorter, but it never works. 

photos 📸https://photos.app.goo.gl/svYny8Zum8pNbRjC7

my week 

-zone conference

-learned how to make tapioca 

-my comp hit halfway today! 9 months

-we found 16 new people and had 15 new people at church 🙌

-natália 

Zone Conference 

This week we had zone conference. once every 6 weeks (or every transfer) we get together and learn how to be better missionaries. something funny is they talked about which people are the best to teach, and it was decided anyone who isn't from Santa Catarina. (my mission) yay! Time is going kind of fast (lies) because I felt like we just had it last transfer. but also, so much has happened since the last one. this one was so much better I actually kind of knew what was going on and could understand. I also curled my hair for the first time since the MTC, and it's actually growing. huge news. had to make the email. 

We walk so much mostly because our area is huge and we're 2 American girls who have no idea how to work the ônibus. when I wake up it feels like my feet are broken. actually, it feels like that all day. I am also so tired and I don't notice until we sit down for a lesson and I can't wait for the prayer so I can shut my eyes. there are definitely a couple times I have fallen asleep or had to fight so hard not to. also, my Grandpa George will be proud because I've gotten really good at catching mosquitos with my hand. 

Random from the week that I put in my phone

-met a cat w down syndrome 

-drove past a Capezio store (for my dance friends)

-we were stuck in traffic and our driver just hopped out and left 

-chatted with our Uber driver and I asked him to guess how long I've been in Brasil by my Português and he said 1 year 🤑 he may or may not have started immediately bashing us after though. win some lose some

-we don't have a ton of meals with the members, so now this transfer's side purpose is for us to work on our wife cooking skills.

-Sis Bird has put me in charge of lessons with drunk people so I can get good practices in with the Portuguese.

-a member at lunch asked my hobbies and I said "antes?" meaning before. but the son thought I said "autimso." What are the odds 2 weeks in a row. 

-bananas are my new favorite thing. Where have they been my entire life 

-there are so many cockroaches 

-people are shocked to see 2 Americans together. I think we're pretty entertaining to everyone here. especially when we see cockroaches. 

Area

Jaraguá isn't the best for missionary work. It's very German, very Catholic, and lots of people have money. those 3 things together create very closed off people to missionaries. also there's 0 Brazil culture. we'll greet every person we walk past and 99 percent of the time they don't say a word and just keep walking. my social skills have hopefully increased a ton because I've learned how to start conversations with people who want nothing to do with us and actually get them talking. Majority of the time we are rejected but

this week we had so many Spirit-led experiences, it's actually crazy how many blessings happen daily. Here's a couple!

-we were looking for this specific person's house, and we couldn't find the address. we asked this family who actually were from Africa if they knew where they lived and they didn't so we left. but I felt like we needed to ask them instead if we could have a lesson with them. I told my comp I'd buy her açaí if we went back and asked. so we go back and asked and they happily accepted. it quickly turned into some bashing on the dad's end. so now my poor comp is stuck answering all the questions after I made us go there. he was pretty much mocking our teachings and our Português too haha. but, by the end of a pretty unsuccessful lesson of him just trying to prove us wrong I said, "I don't have very good Português but I'd like to say my testimony." I was overcome with the Spirit and love for this family that I literally knew nothing about. It was a mom and dad and 3 little kids. I was in tears and my voice was shaky and I gave my testimony about the Book of Mormon and the gospel of Jesus Christ and how I know it blesses us and especially families. I told them they had a special family and basically begged them to read it. They accepted and we left. I don't know yet if they'll progress, but it was a really special experience to me of seeing just a glimpse of the love God has for his children. 

-on a normal night of our normal visiting people's houses, we stopped at an apartment complex. we had the name of the person but not the specific apartment. at that point since its closed off, there's nothing really we can do. but I had an idea to try and call every possible option on the keypad. on only the second option this little girl runs out. we were stunned because we had seen this same girl at church the Sunday before. her mom is baptized and went inactive and recently started coming to church again and the dad is pretty against missionaries. (or at least Elders) and no missionaries have been able to visit, find or get in contact with them before. we then had the most tender lesson with the girl and her mom. we had another lesson with her on Wednesday, and we put her on date to be baptized for November 9th! she is 9 and we bond over loving pink. her mom is so excited for her too and makes us feel so appreciated. 

-we were visiting a person who was interested but they weren't home. but their mom answered instead. she was hesitant but invited us in. after a couple minutes of our message about Jesus Christ's atonement and sacrifice for us, she was telling how she's very depressed, just lost her job, and was going through the motions and doing the dishes when we clapped at her door. she was in tears and told us she needed us that day. 

🌸

one thing that is clear when serving a mission is how every person is going through something. sometimes this is easy to forget, and we can be quick to assume why people act the way they act. but here when we go to pray for people and ask if there's something they need in the prayer, there is always an answer of something very heavy. cancer, divorce, depression, lost their job, their parents are abusive, or even just needing peace. we hear it all, every day. especially people are very cold at the beginning, their demeaner completely changes when we ask to pray for them and they always have something going on. 

So my spiritual thought is grace. we hear it all the time, but we always forget, everyone is going through something. so give grace and be kind. when someone isn't very nice to you, it usually has nothing to do with you. so just be kind. people who are kind to us make our day. even in the littlest ways. 

A personal example that I could work on is driving. 🙂 which is actually one of the things I miss most. when I get on the freeway, I think everyone there is trying to offend me. why would they be going 70 mph under the speed limit I will never know. but maybe they have a birthday cake in the passenger seat and don't want to ruin it... or maybe they cut me off because they're late to work. maybe they're not really just trying to make me mad. so, I will give grace and maybe in return get less tickets. speaking of which, the cops are an amazing example of grace. pulled over 6 times, but only 2 tickets. be like the cops!!

Because of Jesus's grace for us when we did nothing to deserve it, we can give grace to others to be more like him. an amazing way to show Jesus we love him is by loving his children. 

"amazing grace

how sweet the sound

that saved a wretch like me!  

I once was lost, but now am found,  

was blind, but now I see."

I love you all, boa semana para vocês! 

All the emails mean so much to me, thank you. knowing I have the support makes me feel connected to home

listen to Red in honor of fall for me 🍂

💌 sister copeland 

Week 14 - October 20, 2025

 Hi, all! This week felt like 70 years. but in a good way. 

my week

-we moved to Baepandi 

-baptism! 

On Tuesday, we finally got to move to our new house. Before we lived in a tiny one room concrete box and now we live in a big concrete box. Neither of which have a.c, but we do have a lot of spiders. but in this house, the spiders have wonderful ability of jumping. Why do spiders jump?  That should not be allowed..our new area is so pretty. We have very big steep hills, but once at the top it's so pretty. There is nothing better than working on a big hill in the sun and getting açai after. 

I already miss the members from Parque Malwee so much. We don't know a ton of the ones here yet, but I'm sure they're great. We had lunch with a couple our first day here and the wife was from Venezuela. The husband from São Paulo. The husband's son has autism, so he thinks everyone has autism. So, in all seriousness he looks at my companion and says "você tem autismo?" (do you have autism?) he was not joking. I heard batismo, not autismo so I then said sim! yes! whoops. I am still laughing about this as I'm writing it. Sorry Sister Bird. 

First baptism! His name is André. I have to give credit to the Elders who were here before because they found him and put him on date. But leading up to his baptism, Sister Bird and I were able to have a couple good lessons, one being about temples. It was such a good lesson. We don't get to teach temples that often either. it was a special experience getting to see someone hear these principles for the first time. We know through temples we can be eternally sealed to our families. I miss the temple, I felt so much peace there. André got emotional during the lesson, and he feels so much peace about the gospel. So happy for him to be baptized! I won't go into details but so much opposition happened before we could baptize him. We literally did not know if it was going to work out until he was actually in the water. Now after having my first baptism as a missionary, I get the hype. There is no better feeling watching one of your friends be baptized and cry tears of joy. I want to baptize every person in the world now. 

This week I noticed I could understand basically everything. or at least follow every conversation. We spend hours on hours in the streets visiting people, so I get a lot of practice time with my comp while walking. When speaking I still sound slow, but I don't think that has to do with the Portuguese. 

Random

-2 homeless people were on the street and called us over. She already knew a lot about the church and was excited to talk to us. Mid lesson she pulled a pack of cigarettes out of the front of her shirt. She then also pulled a lighter out as well. I had a bis in my bag (Brazil KitKat) and asked if she wanted it. She took the chocolate and put the cigarette down. 😏  did she light it right after she ate the chocolate? Probably, but at least I'll never know. 

-having an American comp who is fluent in Português now doesn't allow me to use the American card as an excuse for not being fluent

-some man we had a contact with asked if we were armed, he then said we need to be armed with guns because there is a war. I don't have the internet, so am I missing something? This happened twice actually. 

This week was one of the most Spirit-filled yet. I may only have 4 seconds out here but, out of all the weeks this was a good one. I won't ever get to fully explain my experiences or put it all into words especially in an email, but one of the best parts or maybe the best part of being a missionary is how everything is sacred. The streets are sacred, our house, everything we do is in the intention of staying in tune with the Spirit.  Because of this, I am slower to anger or, honestly, I'm less sarcastic.  (You can't tell in these emails)

more grateful and overall happier

The Spirit is joy 

Find more ways to live a Spirit-prone life. The Spirit doesn't dwell where it isn't welcomed. i promise with the Spirit as your companion, you will have comfort and guidance. I also promise if you send me an email you will be blessed. (pls)

At the beginning and even now cutting out things of the world was so uncomfortable for me. music, movies etc. all of which aren't bad or harmful things, but they shouldn't be put over our priority of having the Spirit with us. I'll be the first to say I was never getting in my car and putting on hymns over some Gracie or Taylor. Or praying and reading my scriptures before going on my phone. But now I'm learning I don't want to get too caught up in worldly things so much to where it drowns out the Spirit.(and of course one of the first things I am doing when I get home is listening to Taylor's new album), but now I'm learning I don't want to get too caught up in worldly things so much to where it drowns out the Spirit. Or becomes a higher priority than allowing the Spirit to be with us. The Spirit is sensible and sensitive. I'm hoping to be more mindful of what is important and deserves my attention. but protecting my relationship with the Spirit will always be my number 1. 

John 21:15 "Lovest thou me more than these?"

He isn't A priority, He is THE priority. I am learning that I can't and don't want to be casual about the gospel or about my relationship with Christ. It needs to be the number 1 driving factor in my life. He shouldn't be an afterthought, or only important on Sundays. He should be the first place we look to. sempre

sister copeland 

Week 13 - October 13, 2025

 This week was good! one of the best yet 

my week

-florianópolis 

-sister bird

-said my testimony in church, I'm making it a goal to do it every fast Sunday of my mission!

I hope everyone is doing good! Something unfortunate about my specifc mission is we're not allowed to meet up with other missionaries or members on p-day. So seriously getting your emails is my highlight! Thank you to everyone who reaches out, it makes me so happy. 

We were able to have a 4-hour bus ride along the coast to Florianopolis to drop off Sister Cavalcante for her to go home. The drive was one of the best parts of my week. I got to look at the ocean and see more parts of what could be my potential new areas. It made me so excited. That night we slept at an apartment with 20 other sisters because everyone is being transferred around. It felt like I was back on the cheer team. #miss Also, a Brazilian sister with curly hair said she liked my curls. That's my peak in life. 

My new companion is an angel. angel. My testimony of fasting and praying grew immensely because I fasted and prayed for a companion exactly like her. Sister Bird. fits her well, she is petitie and gentle, like a bird. she has 8 months in the mission. the first day she literally said every single thing that I had been praying to hear. I feel so relieved to have her. I also think my Portugues will progress having an English companion because she's able to explain it to me in a way I understand. such a blessing. she is from Duchesne, Utah. (close to Vernal) Besides her love for camping, we bond over a lot. 

This week we had some really rainy days, there were waves in the road! so that meant online working, messaging and phone calls. people do not answer their door when it rains. Also, there was so much thunder and lightning they were not going to hear our claps.

We had so many good lessons this week. I love the way Sister Bird works and that she also likes to walk fast. she is very intentional and diligent which really makes it feel more meaningful. it will be such a good transfer! she also had a trainer who didn't speak English and she said that I've gotten through the hardest part of my mission. let's pray that's true. 

I'm actually really sad about leaving Parque Malwee. transfers happened last week but now were switching areas with the Elders because of some border rearranging. we had such a good week of lessons and finding people but now we're switching areas. Also, I love the members so much, they are like family now. we're moving to bae Pandi. both of which are in the city of Jaraguá. which I heard is the safest city in all of Brazil. not sure if this is true but I for sure believe it. but I'm excited for a new apartment because this one has black mold and the lights broke. 

Sister Bird introduced me to this maracuja (passionfruit) mousse thing. sweetened condensed milk, creme de leite and passion fruit in a blender, chilled and it makes a passionfruit cream mousse type thing. I will absolutely be making this back in the states. 

A common theme this week for me, a message we shared often, too, was gratitude. 

Don't be quick to ask for help, and slow to give thanks. 

This goes for praying as well, I am guilty of being so quick to pray for help in something so intently but then when it happens or everything turns out okay, I'm not as quick to pray and say thank you. 

We will only ever be as happy as we are grateful! I love how President Nelson said our happiness depends little on the circumstances on our life and everything to do with the perspective of our lives. 

I am very grateful for my knowledge of the gospel, God's plan of salvation for us, and for Brasil. & much more  

Amo vocês!

🤍 Sister Copeland 

Week 12 - October 6, 2025

 Hi!

I've hit 3 months of being a missionary! 🥳 Start prepping those airport posters

My week

-transfer news

-general conference

-First in-field transfer finished

-got bit by the no-neck dogs

We had a baptism set up for yesterday, but unfortunately it was postponed for his reason of "my ex came to bother me over the weekend, so we need to postpone" our other baptisms are scheduled for later when we won't be here anymore. But I'm so happy they will receive the blessings of the Holy Ghost and deeper relationship with God. 

The highlight of my week was watching and listening to General Conference! I was counting down the days. I prepared beforehand more than ever, went into it prayerfully, with written down questions. I took note of how much peace, comfort, love, lightness and joy I felt. I know those all of those feelings come from the Holy Ghost who testifies truth unto us. 

My biggest takeaways were

🤍One of the most important things to Jesus Christ is the way we treat each other

🤍Families are a sacred privilege and essential to God's plan of happiness for us

🤍We need to nourish our testimonies. The fire of yesterday's testimony will not keep us warm forever. Our testimonies are ours, confirmed to us through the Holy Ghost. Whatever others say, we know what we have felt and experienced

🤍Trials refine us so we can become the people we need to become to live with God again

🤍Don't look to worldly resources for divine decisions 

& so much more. I have 10 pages of notes that were feelings and impressions I received. We are so blessed to receive guidance and words from God through his servants in these times. I know that the Holy Ghost can personally put thoughts and revelation into our minds during conference.

My favorite talk was Elder Kevin Brown about testimonies. I think every person listening and watching to that talk stood still in that moment, it was so strong. I was listening in English and my companion was listening in Portugues and after he finished, we just looked at each other and said, "muito bom" 

Transfer news‼️

My new companion is Sister Bird! She is an American. I haven't met her yet and don't know much else. But I am very relieved to have someone who speaks English. I'm grateful I had the chance to really work on my Portugues but, sometimes a girls gotta vent in her native language. She is coming to Jaraguá where I am, but we will now be in a different part of Jaraguá, Baepandi. I heard it's more wealthy and more walking. I am sad to leave the members of Parque Malwee and the people we are teaching. 

I've officially completed my first transfer on my mission! Not counting São Paulo. I think back 7 weeks ago when I was in a bus in the night heading to my first area, no one spoke English, I sat there for 5 hours in the dark trying to process everything. I remember getting to our apartment and having to take 5, 178-pound suitcases up 5 flights of stairs at 2am and I probably used the same 3 Portugues words with my comp. Now 7 weeks later, it's improved to the same 5! I remember feeling so uncertain, nervous and overwhelmed. Honestly, it didn't get too much easier, but it did get better.

This transfer I'll remember forever. I learned so much. It was hard! I am so grateful for the peace and comfort I had in Christ. 

Love you all, enjoy the new album for me 

Send me an email!

🤍 Sister Copeland 

Also, Brazil is beautiful, I am so blessed