Coming at you from a brand new location!

Here's the latest! There's a big change going on for her - there's a picture at the bottom. Enjoy!!!

- Ridiculouslygoodlooking

"November 16, 2009

Okay, so big news first....Remember how I said I expected to be in the coldest part of Portugal for the winter. I lied. Seems that I have won the transfer lottery and will be sweating out my Christmas on a tropical Island off the coast of Morocco. I am going to the Island to be with Irmã Call again. Weird....and REALLY exciting. So as a result of going to Madeira, my only workable address will be the island address and I would say to direct all mail there, because it will be my last area on the mission. Irmã Draper is loving that because she is inheriting all the clothes that I can´t take since we are only allowed one suitcase of 20kilos. Luckily, I don´t have to bring a coat because it doesn´t get that cold!

On other news,we now know what it is like to have a fire in Portugal. Our neighbors left the stove on when they left for the night so Irmã Draper and I were awakened to the sound of the firemen breaking down our neighbors door and putting out a fire that had resulted. Mom don´t worry...the only problem is the lingering smell on our floor. However, we did realize for the first time that there is no such thing as smoke alarms in Portugal....we prayed real hard before we went back to sleep, so I´m not worried :)

We have had a bit of a crazy week with transfer calls coming in, because the schedule is way different due to flight times for me. However, we have managed to get a good bit of work done, and we had an awesome lesson with Francisca, our investigator who is going to be baptized in a couple weeks. The only sad part about heading off the continent is that I won´t be able to come back and see the baptism.

Well, I am sure there is a whole lot of other exciting stuff, but Madeira pretty much trumps everything since there are only 10 missionaries there, it is pretty coveted. Irmã Draper has been looking at me about every 10 minutes for the past two days and saying something along the lines of.... you realize you are going to Madeira! Funny huh. Thank you all for your support and love.

LOVE YOU ALL

Irmã Ray

November 23, 2009

Well, this week has definitely been a whirlwind of a week. I had to say all of my goodbyes to the Mainland Portugal and then catch a plane to Madeira. It was quite the interesting experience and all happened a little bit faster than I was expecting. Irmã Draper thought I was nuts trying to take pictures of all of the trains, metro, everything that I am not going to do again on my mission. it was a bittersweet moment to be staying in the mission home the night before and realizing that the next time I would be there was my last night in Portugal.

HOWEVER, that being said I am now in pretty much the coolest place ever and loving the fact that I can use short sleeves in the middle of November. We live in Funchal, which is the biggest city on the Island and also the place where all the cruise ships come in everyday. It is absolutely gorgeous and we can actually see the ocean from our balcony. Yeah, life is great. We are actually working in two branches and that means lots of names and faces for me. Hopefully I will be able to get them down in the next four months. At least I know exactly what I am getting in to seeing as how President gave me my ticket and it happens to be one of the very few round trip tickets bought by the mission. Very weird. There are no real beaches, it is all rocky cliffs but it is BEAUTIFUL. I already know it is my favorite area, but not just because it is a cool place, but because I have already felt that I have made a difference here and I finally feel that I am here for a reason. I feel like my time is so short, which is funny because in the beginning I thought it would never end. Weird

We are currently getting ready for Christmas since we can see all of the lights all over the city, we are very anxious for them to be lit! Sorry all of you from Utah, but Funchal blows Temple Square out of the water....however, it will help Irmã Call and I feel a little more Christmas-y while we are walking around in our short sleeves.... We also have some fantastic investigators, one of whom I have already become very good friends with, her life is crazy, but she just started investigating the chruch and it is amazing to see the ways her life has changed in the past week. We are hoping to baptize Liliana in two weeks, so keep her in your prayers.

Well, time is up so I will attach some P-day hike pictues and then you will know a bit of how I feel, even though pictures never really do it justice. LOVE YOU ALL!

Irmã RayThe Best way to write Sarah is: (Ok this is a change, pay attention)

A) Since Sarah is on the Island, the best way to send anything (i.e. letters, packages, etc) through regular US mail is below. This method requires US $.98 postage for letters. (Better check this out, it should be the same as before)

Sister Sarah Ray
Rua de Ponte Nova
nº 12 5P
9000 Funchal
Madeira
Portugal

B) The alternate way is of course Dearelder that may eventually get to her.
1) On the internet go to dearelder.com website.
2) There is a drop down box on the right hand side down just a couple inches. Enter her mission which is Portugal Porto and then click "write a letter" just below where you select the mission.
3) On the next screen enter your return address and Sister Sarah Ray in the address line, add your email in the email box below the envelope.
4) Write your letter in the text box and then hit the "send letter" box under the text box to send it on.

This site does require US $.98 Postage. You can set up an account and it will deduct the postage each time you write.

Chestnuts for Halloween?!

Here's another fantastic update from your fave missionary! I thought it was interesting because she said for Halloween there, they roast chestnuts... Um, Christmas anyone? Haha... Who actually does that anytime actually? Ok - maybe you do. Sorry if that was offensive - haha!

- Ridiculouslygoodlooking

"November 2, 2009

SO, this week was filled with all sorts of first. Who would have thought that I would be getting firsts this far along! However, we have a recent convert in our ward who is already less active. The Elders have been working with her, but as of this week we started preparing to help. Why would that need preparation you ask? Well, she is deaf so we have been starting to learn Portuguese Sign Language to be able to communicate. It is actually kinda fun, but very strange at times. When praying only the person praying closes their eyes because everyone else obviously needs to be able to watch, but it is still really weird. I also get to make up my own sign for my name....Anyone have suggestions? It is actually much easier to speak in sign that Portuguese because you don´t have all of the crazy verb conjugations...there really isn´t any grammer-you just throw all aspects of the sentence in there and everyone gets the gist. Weird.

Anyway, this week was the finale of the new student orientation-ish party that the university had, so we had a bit of time where there wasn´t really anything we could do outside of our apartment as it was quite the party in our area of Coimbra, we did have some interesting experiences trying to get home, but it was pretty funny. They have a huge parade where all the Coloiros, freshmen, are dressed up by their madrinhas in something related to the course they are in and then marched from the University all the way to the river where the madrinha or padrinho then baptizes them and they are officially recognized as students. However, they still can´t use the uniform for the first year. Yeah, pretty funny.

As for Halloween, that isn´t celebrated as much in Portugal except by the tradition of roasting chestnuts , so we had a ward activity in which we did just that. It put me in a very Christmasy mood as I then had "Chestnuts Roasting on an Open Fire" in my head all day. I have to admit though, roasted chestnuts are not my favorite and it seems all the fun came from the fact that your hands end up very black with soot and then everyone chases each other around trying to wipe blackness on them.

They also have November 1st as the day to visit your ancestors graves. SO, us being the followers that we are...we followed the people. This meant we also went to the cemeteries...armed with a whole bunch of Plan of Salvation pamphlets. It was actually really a great experience all the way up until it started pouring rain. Not too much of a problem except that I had left my umbrella in the house....oops. We had some amazing experiences and it really made me realize what my purpose is and how I have become a different person in the past year and um pouco. Who would have thought that one day I would be standing in a cemetery in the pouring rain praying with a woman in a different language and reassuring her that one day she would see her Husband again. I am so thankful for the wonderful knowledge we have of the Plan of Salvation. Sometimes I think I take it for advantage how I know our purpose here, where we came from and where we are going. It seems so simple to me, and yet it is such an amazing concept to these people who have no hope- to see the marvelous change and the light that comes into peoples lives as they come to know that there is a loving Father in Heaven who cares about them and that there is someone who will always know how they are feeling. How every one of us has someone we can turn to in any instance in our lives.

Well, hope that everyone has a fantastic week and it is great to hear from you. Love you!!

Irmã Ray

November 9, 2009

Well we had another absolutely stellar week here in Coimbra. Irmã Draper and I have been really praying and working on developing more faith in the ability of the Lord to work miracles, even in Portugal. Well, it has been a couple weeks of planning every minute of every day, working our tails off (more than we had thought was possible) and doing a whole lot of praying. After a couple weeks it has finally started to catch up to us and we saw a whole lot of miracles this week. We also were really able to work with our members (seeing as how we have the greatest ward in the country) and it has been amazing to see the amount of people that have started to change their lives and to see the differences and light that have come into their lives as a result. The greatest thing is that we feel like we aren’t even doing anything. We had a ward record this week in that with us and the zone leaders we had 8 investigators in church!!!! That might not seem like a lot to some of you who served in other areas, but it definitely was a miracle here in our tiny country. Even more of a miracle was that we didn’t know 4 of them before Sunday. I have been realizing more and more on the mission the way that the Lord guides each and every one of our paths. Definitely the master planner of the universe, because there is no way we could get everything to work out so well even if we planned for 10 years.

On a completely different topic we went to a really old monastery as a district today and it was really cool. Amazing that everything is still hanging around from the 1300´s….okay so it has been restored, but it was still super cool. Unfortunately my camera is now dead, so pictures will have to wait until next week.

As for the transfer question…calls come in on Saturday, so we will have to see. It is a pretty best bet that I, like Andrew will be relegated to the coldest area on the mission for the winter….I had the second coldest last winter, so Andrew, I feel your pain. We need to work on our luck. I have pretty much given up my Island hopes since you usually stay for 4 transfers, and I only have 3 left including the one that is coming. Weird. Hard to believe that so much time has passed already. Love and miss you all!

Irmã Ray"

The Best way to write Sarah is:

1) On the internet go to dearelder.com website.
2) There is a drop down box on the right hand side down just a couple inches. Enter her mission which is Portugal Porto and then click "write a letter" just below where you select the mission.
3) On the next screen enter your return address and Sister Sarah Ray in the address line, add your email in the email box below the envelope.
4) Write your letter in the text box and then hit the "send letter" box under the text box to send it on.

This site does require US $.98 Postage. You can set up an account and it will deduct the postage each time you write.

2) The alternate way for sending anything (i.e. letters, packages, etc) through regular US mail is below. This method requires US $.98 postage for letters.

Sister Sarah Ray
Portugal Porto Mission

Rua de Amalia Luazes

No.23 Sala 1

4200-052 Porto

PORTUGAL