Madison and Zuster Djoukeng yesterday at Sunday dinner.

Wonderful Week!!

Hello Friends and Family-

 

First off, Gelukkige Verjaardag to Easton Boy!! I cannot believe he will be one tomorrow!! Time flies! I remember that day so well. Grammy, Lindsey, Emily, Mom- we all had some good laughs, troll hair, "so your a one- hander" haha Ill never forget it! Give him a big kiss and hug from me!

 

We had a great week!! Lots and lots of appointments and traveling. We had an appointment with Ena, our progressing investigator, on Tuesday and taught her the third lesson. We got to the end of the lesson and she basically asked us "so what day should we plan on me being baptized?" Me and Zuster Djoukeng have never been happier!! We have planned it for the 26th of October because her family from Mexico are coming in town to Belgium and she really wants them to be there so it worked out perfectly!! She will be golden and I just love her and her family so so much! We are going to have a member in our branch baptize her, who she has become really good friends with, and he speaks fluent spanish so everything will be able to be in her native tongue so we were extremely happy about that! We also had a baptism this past Saturday for Priscilla, one of the Elders investigators. It was so special and It is always so great to see the changes people make and how happy they are! Thats why we are here!

 

We had zone conference this past Wednesday in Antwerpen and it was SOOOOO AMAZING!! I am throughly convinced that I have thee best mission president in the whole world. He is hilarious and can bring the spirit in that room like none other. After that meeting I was soo excited and ready to just go out and do missionary work! I am also officially a Belgium Resident!! yay!! I went to Brussels again last Friday and activated my residency card and did the last part of my legality so that was really exciting! I also received two marriage proposals this past week, one from another missionary and the other from a random person on the street. haha So looks like ill be getting married pretty quick when I get home ;) It was hilarious and I couldnt stop laughing about it!

 

Other than that we are doing lots of tracting and door knocking trying to find more and more people to teach! Sometimes those days seem like they will never end but I am so grateful I am able to have this oppurtunity to do it! I love this gospel and I love this mission so much! I didnt think I could really gain a sincere love for people I had never met, but it is amazing how it works. I care about these people more than I can say. I know this gospel is true and that is why I am out here! I love all of you and miss you. Thank you for all of your prayers and support! It means the world to me!

 

Love, Zuster Brophy

This is Aicha's baby Julia. Isn't she adorable? I can see why Madi loves to visit.  Madison recently helped Aicha decorate cakes for Julia's baby shower.

Zuster Djoukeng and Zuster Geens (ward mission leaders wife)
While they were making cakes for Julia's shower.  Looks like they are having fun!

LOTS of RAIN!!

Hello Family and Friends!!

 

We have had such a crazy busy week! We visited alot of less active members and traveled to the end of the world and back it seemed like. We also taught both of our progressing investigators this week, Anna and Ena. Both lessons went extremely well!! Ena had lots and lots of questions about Baptism and she came to the understanding about it soo much more which made both of us super super happy. We are going to set a firm baptismal date for October 12th hopefully this coming Tuesday. We had a dinner appointment with member and we invited her and we ended up just talking all together for 45 minutes. Then we had to leave around 9:30 and Ena stayed for a whole hour after we left which was sooooo great! Anna is still trying to get over her coffee addiction and we are trying our best to help her. There is this stuff here called Caro which is basically coffee without caffeine and all the bad stuff in it, so she is trying that and it seems to help so we are excited and super happy she is progressing well.

 

Patrick and his wife had their cute little baby girl this past week so we went to the hospital and visited them! She is ADORABLE. Seeing all of the babies here is honestly just making me baby hungry. I should probably get married first though ;) Actually should come home from my mission first. Haha but we are meeting with him this coming week and we are also going to give him a baptismal date for the 12th too so we are crossing our fingers and praying everything goes well and works out like we have it planned!

 

The weather here is RAIN RAIN RAIN. I have never seen it rain more in my life. But I love it! It is starting to get really cold and we have been buying lots of scarves and sweaters. But I think fall is my favorite season so I am totally okay with that. The language is reallllyy starting to come and my ears and starting to tune to the language which is so great because I am starting to feel like I can have a normal conversation with someone without the language barrier there. Other than that we are just knocking on doors alot trying to find more and more people to teach and its a blast! We have two potentials we will be following up with so it should be an exciting week! I love and miss you all dearly and thank you for your prayers and support! Missionary work is thee best!!

 

Love, Zuster Brophy

It is officially FALL :)

Hello Friends and Family-

 

Well Belgian weather has officially taken a turn into the fall weather and it rains almost every single day. Last Monday night we were out tracting knocking on doors and by the end of it we looked like we had both jumped in a swimming pool because we were so wet! I am wearing thick tights as well almost every day because it is chilly, especially at night time. But I love it and people have told me to get used to that weather because it will be like this until about March :) yay!

 

We had a really great week with our investigators! We taught Ena, who was the spanish lady that wanted our help with teaching her two young kids about the gospel. She is taking the lessons soo well and has been to church every single week since we met! We taught her the plan of salvation and she said the prayer at the end and by the time she said "amen" we were all in tears because the spirit was so strong. We are going to give her a baptismal date this week and I cant wait! Us, combined with the Ghent elders could potentially have 6 people be baptized on October 12th!!! :) we are SOOO excited!! We told President Robinson and he said he would be coming down to Ghent that day if everything worked out the way it was planned! The work is seriously on fire right now and I am so glad I get to be apart of it!

 

We also had the babyborrel (baby shower) for our cute neighbor Aicha. We were at her place baking and decorating cakes ALOT and can I just say? I am gooooood at decorating cakes and I didnt even know it. Haha We made 8 total and it was so much fun! So lots of service was going on over here in Belgium for us this past week. I probably will cry when I have to say goodbye to Aicha. She is kind of like my other mom and we have become such great friends! Her and her husband and two cute girls are coming to Utah next December (so I will be home!) and we have already planned that we will be going to dinner in Salt Lake :) I just love her to death!

 

I love missionary work!! It is so great to be able to sit and watch the lords hands in working all these amazing miracles in peoples lives. There is no greater job in the world than to give people such happiness! I love and miss all of you so much! thank you for your prayers and support! It means the world to me!

 

Love, Zuster Brophy

 

Our sweet neighbor traveled to Ghent, Belgium and took Madi and Sister Djoukeng to lunch today! He even took a whole SUITCASE full of goodies, gifts, and love to her for us! Thanks Brett....it felt like we weren't so far away today!!

Gelukkige Vejaardag to Grammy, Grandpa, Princess Belen, and Grandma Barb!! :)

Hello Friends and Family!! I hope all of you birthday people have great birthdays!! I cannot believe little Belen is going to be 3 this Thursday!! Give her a BIG hug from me!

 

This week went by so so fast! I cant believe that September is already half way over and it feels like I just flew to Europe yesterday! We have had lots of success with our investigators! We were out door knocking last week and found this 29 year old spanish lady named Ena who has 2 kids and is married to a Belgian. She opened the door and was super super friendly and looked at our nametags and said "you teach people about Jesus Christ right?" and we said "Actually that is the only reason we are here." haha and she let us in and we talked with her. She continued to tell us how in Belgium it is so hard to teach your kids about God and Jesus Christ and she wanted us to help her with that. She came to church this past Sunday and we are teaching her again this Thursday and we are going to give her a baptismal date. I am sooo excited for her and her cute family!

 

This week our neighbor, Aicha, asked me to help her with some cakes for her baby shower this coming Saturday. She isnt an investigator at all. I met her on my first day in Belgium because she just lives right below us and seriously...she is like my other mom. Haha if I had issues with anything, I would call her. We are going to be making 8 huge cakes with fondunt and all this good stuff and I am SOO excited! She has two girls, one is 1 and a half and the other is about 2 months old and she is so cute. Also, funny story, this past week I had taken off one of my cardigans and slung it around my backpack because it was a little bit hot. We got to an investigators house and realized it was gone. So either it fell and I didnt notice, or someone ripped it off. So that was a bummer but it was kind of funny because of course that is just my luck. Dont worry, I have like 15 more and I make it a priority to shop on P days :)

 

So this past week we ate at a members house the Vermeulen Family. Usually they make really yummy food and i have been really lucky as far as not coming into contact with fish. Well that night she decided to make Salmon, Kod, Rice, and this Shrimp Curry. I DIED. The only thing I liked on the table was the rice. haha So I ate the salmon (which she gave me the biggest piece naturally) and rice with...Ketchup. I had said a prayer right before the meal that I would beable to eat the fish without actually tasting anything and it really did taste like chicken. So moral of the story....the church is true!! haha But really, I was proud of myself for eating the whole meal.

 

I love you all and miss you so much!! I am so grateful for all of your prayers and support. I love my mission and I love these people so much. I know I am exactly where I need to be! I know this church is true and I am so grateful for the oppurtunity to be a missionary! I love you all!!

 

Love, Zuster Brophy

 Me and Sister Braet. We eat at her house for dinner a lot. I love her to death!

This is one of the little girls in our branch named Ellen. She is so cute.

This is my apartment

I am staying in Ghent!!

Hello Friends and Family!!

 

Wow this has been one crazy week! And it flew by so so fast! I hope everyone's first day of school was just great. I have to admit- I am really realllllyyy glad I am in Belgium right now and not studying. haha but keep up the good work! And Happy Anniversary to the best parents in the world!!! 20 years! Woo hoo! That is definately an accomplishment!

 

So this week we had lots of interesting things happen to us. Yesterday we were out tracting and we got to this one house and we started talking to this guy who was probably mid 20's or something years old. (sorry the way I am wording my sentences is sort of weird, the dutch and flemish language is all backwards and its starting to mess me up) Anyways, he wasnt very interested so we offered to leave behind one of our cards with our number on it in case he had questions or something like that. As soon as we handed it to him, one of his friends from a window right above us dumps a HUGE bucket of water on top of us and then slams the door and starts laughing. Me and Zuster Djoukeng just looked at each other and burst out laughing too. haha some people can be sooo rude. And I just consider that like modern day persecution as a missionary. So for the rest of the day we were completely soaked and I had looked like I just woke up or something.

 

Last night, we were also out knocking on doors. (we decided that is our favorite tool because everyone is home at night time) And we met this girl named Pegah who is from Iran. She was super nice and spoke english. you could tell by the way she was talking that she really was interested. So we gave her our card and everything and invited her to church next sunday. She said she was going through a difficulty and had had a really bad day that day and was hopeing someone would come talk to her because she wanted some direction in her life. Coincedence? I think NOT. (name that movie) but really miracles are being handed to us left and right and I cant wait to see what happens! Me and sister djoukeng decided this isnt missionary work it is just missionary fun.

 

Last monday we also went to Brugge for a Pday with our whole district and it was a blast. We took a boat tour through the whole city and then climbed the bell tower. It is a GORGEOUS city. When we come back here, we will for sure be visiting there. I have officially been to all the major cities in Flanders as well :) Belgium is my favorite and I never want to leave! I love you all so much and miss you. This church is true and I am so glad I am where I am right now. This work is so rewarding and I love helping people and bringing them so much happiness. I love you all!

 

Love, Zuster Brophy