Good morning! 

So we got the phone call yesterday right in a middle of a lesson. And....I think this is the first time where I´ve actually called it right, but Elder O was transferred. But the Assistants are doing transfers different this time. We don´t know where Elder O´s going, who´s his new companion, who´s my new companion. Nada. But we´ll all find out Wednesday at the MISSION CHRISTMAS PARTY!!! 

The whole mission is stoked for it! It´s been in the works for a while now. It starts Wednesday morning at 6am where our zone gets picked up by a van on a 2 hour drive to where the party´s at. I promise I´ll get some good pics of all the activities and my mission buddies. The President asked us that we don´t schedule any appointments that day, so looks like there´s gonna be a lot of great stuff (maybe the movie Frozen?). Our zone organized an annonymous gift exchange between us. And we´re gonna be doing a Mini-mission-musical in front of the whole mission. Wish us luck!

This last week I went on an exchange where I stayed in the area and Elder O went out, which gave me the chance to be a sneaky Santa and check out the shoe stores in our area. Our area is located right in the smack middle of Sao Paulo, and we´ve got street fairs, fancy clothing stores, and even a few malls. The hardest part was looking for a pair that would last at least 8 more months. But we found them!! I haven´t given them yet to Elder O. The only place that I could hide them without him accidently finding them is my suitcase, and I´m planning on giving them to him tomorrow night. He´ll be so surprised!! I feel so much better giving than receiving, especially to someone who needs it.

We had an AWESOME experience this week with Ramiro and Natalya. They´ve been coming to Church every week and loving it. This Thursday we all drove to the Temple to show them around the garden and the Waiting Room. The traffic was rough, and we probably spent more time in the car than outside, but it was all worth it. We showed them around the inside as much as we could, and then we asked them as a couple to say a prayer together about them getting married. We watched them read the Proclomation on the Family, talking with their stepkids they brought. The best part was what they said afterwards: Our greatest goals are to get married, be baptized, and then get sealed in a year - in that order. BOOM!! We´ve got it marked on the calendar to go to the Registration Office to schedule their marriage in January. I´m hoping it´s gonna be something like when the Hicks in California got married and baptized on the same day. It´ll be so awesome. I love teaching families!!!! And I love Portuguese!!!

We´ve come to love the members and make some great friendships with them. They offer to give us rides home so we don´t have to spend more money on the bus, ask when they can do splits with us, and (despite our consistent refusal) command us to be the first ones to serve ourselves at meals. One Irmã wants our suits to be in tip-top shape for this Sunday´s Christmas program, so she´s paying to have our suits dry-cleaned this week. It´s super humbling and wonderful to be spending Christmas with so many loving people. 

Oh, before I forget, I´ll be finding out at what time the members can have me and my new comp over to Skype on Christmas Day. President is letting us talk for 40 minutes this year. 

Elder O has been like a Big Brother to me and a great friend. My first Brazilian comp too! He works a ton and plays hard too. We´ll be having one last round of ping pong to determine if the US or Brazil is better haha.

Love you all! Merry Christmas (I´m trying to say that as much as I can to everyone!), eat another Mickey Bar and use all your FastPasses. Tell Ninnie again THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU for her Christmas package that I just started to open this last week. I Love it!

Love Elder Nissinen