Shelby's Flight Information

I'm adding this because there are several apps out there that let you track flights so any of you who would like to track Shelby's travel here it is...
MISSIONARY TRAVEL

  BRAZIL CUIABA MISSION

 

SERVICE               DATE  FROM           TO             DEPART  ARRIVE

_____________________ _____ ______________ ______________ _______ ______

DELTA AIR LINES       31MAR NEWARK NJ      ATLANTA GA     445P    706P

DL 2042              MONDAY NEWARK LIBERTY HARTSFIELD JAC

V ECONOMY                   TERMINAL B     TERMINAL S

                                                          NON STOP

                            RESERVATION CONFIRMED         2:21 DURATION

                  AIRCRAFT: BOEING 717

                            SEAT 24C NO SMOKING CONFIRMED

 

DELTA AIR LINES       31MAR ATLANTA GA     SAO PAULO SP   822P    650A

DL 59                MONDAY HARTSFIELD JAC GUARULHOS INTL         01APR    

V ECONOMY                   TERMINAL INTL  TERMINAL 2

                            DINNER                        NON STOP

                            RESERVATION CONFIRMED         9:28 DURATION

                  AIRCRAFT: BOEING 767-300

                            SEAT 31B NO SMOKING CONFIRMED

 

TAM LINHAS AEREAS     01APR SAO PAULO SP   CUIABA MT      1225P   140P

JJ 3638             TUESDAY GUARULHOS INTL M RONDON

Y ECONOMY                   TERMINAL 1

           NON SMOKING      SNACK                         NON STOP

                            RESERVATION CONFIRMED         2:15 DURATION

                  AIRCRAFT: AIRBUS INDUSTRIE A320-100/200

                  NO SEATS ARE AVAILABLE TO PRE-ASSIGN

    PLEASE ARRIVE EARLY AND REQUEST YOUR PREFERRED SEATS AT CHECK-IN

Brazil Bound!!!

Hello everyone :)

Well this morning I am still in New Jersey. I will be flying out at 5:30 this afternoon so I get to email a little bit before I head out. I'm all packed and ready to go! So some cool news: My companion in the MTC, Sister Dunn also received her visa and will be flying there today as well. Her mission is in Terecena (I have no idea if I spelled that right or not) so I wont see her ever but still its super cool :) My last week in New Jersey has been great :) Our investigator, Donna Schmid is going to be baptised soon, we taught her the plan of salvation and talked to her about Jesus Christ and his atonement and she cried and said she wanted to be baptised so that was awesome :) also she gave me a Portuguese to English dictionary and cried when we had to say goodbye. Its so hard to leave the people you have served and come to love! especially when you know you probably wont ever see them again. We had a little bit of a scare on Friday, Sister Cronan (the 95 year old lady that we yell scripture at) called the relief society president  frantic saying that she needed help badly and she wanted the missionaries. So the relief society president called us and we dropped everything and went to her. We had to go the speed limit because of the tiwi in our car ;) (which is probably a good thing actually) but we hurried as fast as we could to get to her. When we walked in she was sitting quietly in her chair and I thought "oh no shes dead, she died and now we have to take care of it" so I knelt down beside her to see if she was still alive and she smiled and calmly handed me a five dollar bill and said "this is missionary money, I don't know what I was thinking when I took it, but its yours" all I could do was stare at her. Of course I had no idea what she was talking about with the five dollar bill so sister Holyoak just took it and I asked her if she was doing OK and she said she was doing fine she just needed someone to blow up her donut to sit on. I had to go in the other room to rinse it off to blow it up and clam myself down a little bit! It was good though because we were able to help her with a few more things and share a scripture with her, then we gave her our number so she wouldn't have to call around to get hold of us. Also this week Brother Murphy came to church again! yay! this time he had on his shirt, tie and suit coat and looked great! When I told him this was the last time I would see him we both cried. I took a picture with him but I sure am going to miss him. A lot has changed since the first time I walked into his little trailer house and wanted to walk right back out because of the smell! He is such a great friend. also Yesterday I received a blessing from Elder Lortcher (a senior missionary in our mission) and Brother McCready who lives in the house above us. It gave me great comfort and helped me to know that I'm going to be just fine :) I think I'm ready for this :) Well I love you all and I miss you all! next time we talk Ill be in Brazil! bye for now :)

Love, Shelby

Last Week In Jersey!

Oi Everyone!

Wow its been a CrAzY week! but a good one:) I had a companion exchange on Tuesday and Wednesday with the sister training leaders. I stayed in my area and the sister training leader came to me. Then sister Holyoak went with the other sister training leader. Sister training leaders are kind of like district leaders for the sisters. So anyway I was with Sister Webb for 24 hours and it was super fun! I was really nervous about it at first because I was leaving my companion for the first time, but it turned out to be pretty great! Sister Webb is also a visa waiter for Cuiaba Brazil! but she has been waiting for over a year so she decided to be permanently reassigned to New Jersey. She is a great missionary and I leaned so much from her. We had a lot of fun and she taught me better how to talk to people on the street! I needed that! However when I got Sister Holyoak back I was super glad! I had missed her so much! haha kinda funny. This week we met with Amos again (hes the one from Ghana) and we had his appointment set at 7:30 but then he called us a few hours before and asked if we could do it at six. So we had to switch around a few things but we were able to tell him that we could do that. So at six we met him at one of our members houses and he told us to sit down and make our selves comfortable (remember this is not his house, its our members home and hes only been there twice before so it was kinda weird and we didn't know if we should do what he said or not!) So we sat and once he had every ones attention he told us the reason why he moved the appointment was because last time we met he didn't have enough time left because we had to be in at a certain time of night,  so he moved it up so he could have as much time as he wanted with us! So we had to explain to him that our appointments were only supposed to be about 45 minuets not three hours long! Then sister Hout (the member whose home we were at) said that she had dinner for us and Amos said No we cant eat you have to answer my questions then if we have time we'll eat... It was kinda weird but pretty funny! So we were able to talk to him and teach him about the Plan of Salvation and also eat. So everything turned out just fine :)

 We also had a miracle happen this week! We have been visiting a man named Bill Murphy and trying to get him to come back to church. He hasn't been to church in over 20 years. but he had helped build the chapel. So we have been visiting him trying like crazy to get him to come back to church and each time we come he says maybe next time. So this week was no different and we left his house in defeat but then about three hours later he called us and he said "sisters I guess I'm going to church"!!!! we were so excited we jumped and whooped and hollered, it was so great :) Then yesterday he came in his Sunday best and we sat by him. He told us that he was so happy he came and that he would be coming back next week! So cool :) Also this week I had REAL JERSEY PIZZA!!! All you people in Utah (and Oregon:)) have no idea what a pizza is!!!!!! That stuff that they sell at Dominoes is not pizza, its a roll with some spaghetti sauce on it and a few pepperonis wishing it was a pizza. This is the real deal! I don't even know how to describe this wonder fullness to you... its so sad. Someday we will all have to come to New Jersey just to get a Nicolina's Brooklyn Pizza, you will not believe how splendid it really is. Sister Holyoak and I ate an entire pizza ourselves. Then the next day the Italian lady who lives upstairs made us ravioli with real homemade sauce and meatballs. WOW. That's all I have to say. is WOW. Well I should probably get going. Thank you so much for all your prayers! Keep em coming! I'm going to need them when I get to Brazil! I love you all!

Love Shelby

Big News!!

Hello Family :) 

How is everyone? My week has been very exciting :) Can anyone guess what happened?.......... No one? Ok Ill tell you :) I, Sister Whipple have received my visa for Brazil. Wow. I leave for Brazil on March 31st. So parents, I will be able to call you from the airport probably. This is kind of crazy. I really should not have recieved it. because 1: I turned it in kind of late 2: I went through the LA consulate which is one of the slowest, if not the slowest consulate. 3:everyone else that is waiting for a visa has been waiting for MONTHS and some even a year! This is the fastest visa my mission president has ever seen. I guess Heavenly Father needs me in Brazil! I dont know any of my travel plans but as soon as I know I will let you know. I should know by next Monday :) So I probably wont be able to recieve any more packages when im there.... :( because their expensive to send and pick up and the chance of it actually getting to me is very silm. Thank you for the packages sent thus far :) You guys are such a great fan club and I love you :) and I miss you :) If your planning on sending any letters to me I would suggest to send them pretty soon... but dont sent anything after like this Saturday because it takes awhile and if it gets here after ive left then its going to take awhile to get to me in Brazil as you all can imagine :) PS I wont be traveling alone there's another Sister who has been waiting 9 months for her visa and she just got hers as well so we will probably be traveling together for a little while. 

So this week has been an exciting one :) Also this week our investigator sister Schmid came to church! yay! she said she loved it and we have another appointment with her on Thursday and were going to invite her to be baptized! :) We are also helping another one of our investigators, she has an apartment inspection next week and she is a hoarder. so we have been going to her house everyday trying to help her clean and organize her appartment. Its a very small case and theres nothing gross, she just has alot of boxes of books and papers and just stuff stacked everywhere. So we have been helping her with that. Were going back tomorrow to help her some more :) Today Sister Holyoak and I went to a sister meeting that was super fun! :) we did yoga with all the sisters in the mission and learned how to properly massage our feet ( since we walk on them everyday) and we painted our toenails. we also all had lunch together and then Sister Jeppson and President Jeppson spoke to us on how valuable and amazing we are :) haha So its been a great week and Ive loved it. this comming week I will be going on a 24 hour exchange with one of the sister training leaders in our mission. Ill be with sister webb who is also a visa waiter for brazil from tuesday to wednessday so that will be an adventure :) Well everyone I love you all! Thank you so much for your help and your support! I miss you :)

love, Shelby 

Shelby and the mission Presidents Brother and Sister Jeppson

Hello from Shelby!

Hello Everyone!

This week has been great! I'm starting to realize that all the weeks are going to be great :) We have been having great weather here and have been able to just wear a light jacket! yay! We havnt had any snow for a while but were expecting some tomorrow I think. I hope that the weather man is not telling us the truth. Warm days are great because thats when everyone is outside! Sister Holyoak and I had a great day on Saturday, we spent most of the day knocking on doors. We knocked on about 67 doors and talked to about 27 people. I had another door slammed in my face! but this time I just laughed it off :) It was really funny because we were in a neighborhood of mostly hispanic people and so we were speaking alot of spanish (sister Holyoak was speaking alot of spanish, I just smiled and waved ;) haha) anyway, everyone was really nice to us but then the one white guy we contacted was SO RUDE and hes the one that slammed the door in our face :) We thought it really showed the difference in the culture. Hispanics are super nice even though you dont speak their language and white guys are super rude even when you say nothing at all :) We also got a new investigator his name is Daniel Darling and he is a Baptist but he wants to hear what we have to say. Hes old and hes black and he smells really good :) We also got another new investigator and her mom named her Christina after Christ. She is super religious but doesnt attend a chruch and she wants us to come back! yay! It was kind of funny because she was the first house we knocked on and as soon as we knocked she turned on her vacume so we waited for her to turn it off (which didnt take very long, thank goodness ) and knocked again. She opened the door and let us right in! She was so nice to us :) We also Visited sister Cronan again and this time she had a CD player with headphones that she can listen to the Book Of Mormon on CD :) Our Bishop got it for her :) She was very frusterated when we went and visited her though because she couldnt figure out how to open the player to put the next CD in, and was just waiting for someone to come and visit her so they could figure it out for her :) So she was very greatful we stopped by :) Also she had sister Holyoak do her tithing for her and she made her redo the slip three times and the check twice because "she kept getting thing wrong" even though she cant see... anything. She lives in a building that is especially for old people who are pretting independent, and as soon as sister holyoak and I got off the elevator to go to her apartment we about died because the place smelled like someone put their cat in their microwave and cooked it for a good 15 minuets... it was bad. So we ran to her door and prayed that the smell wasnt comming from her appartment. It wasnt so we were saved :)

Also this week I recieved my ok to drive! So sister Holyoak has been teaching me how to be a Jersey driver and its a little scary sometimes but Im getting the hang of it! No accidents so far! Pray that there wont be any in the future either! :) This week Sister Holyoak and I will be traveling to Morristown and also to Trenton for meetings so we wont be teaching very much! also next week we have a sisters meeting on monday so I might not get to email untill later or even until Tuesday so dont worry if you dont hear from me at the normal time! :) Well I love you all and Thank you for the prayers and Support! you guys are an awesome Fan Club :)

Love, Shelby

Another Week in Jersey!

From: Shelby Marie Whipple <shelby.whipple@myldsmail.net>
Date: Mon, Mar 3, 2014 at 9:09 AM
Subject: Another Week :)
To:

Hello everyone:)

Thank you so much for your emails and for your love :) Its been a good week, but super cold! We had a small blizzard today and were almost not able to drive our car, but they cleared the roads and it stopped snowing, so President Jeppson said we would be fine to drive. Which I am so thankful for because now I get to email! yay! This week We visited a man who lives in a trailer park, (he kind of has a few screws loose but hes awesome:) we've been trying to get him to come to church since he hasn't been in about 30 years, and he always tells us that he'll come next week ;) We love him anyway haha :) I have a bit of a struggle going to his house though... Its very clean but it has holes in the floor covered by carpet... that you sometimes fall into 0.o and it smells kinda bad and weird. The first time we went I couldn't focus on anything because the smell was affecting me so much so the next time I coated my nose with peppermint chap stick and prayed that I could overcome it. And I did! When I went into his house I just tried not to breath through my nose, but then as I focused on him and his needs the smell went away and I forgot about it! Heavenly Father is the best :) We also went and visited a 95 year old lady that cant hear or see. She sleeps in a recliner and has such a bad back that when she walks her head faces the floor... sad. But she was so sweet and we loved visiting her. She had us scream verses out of the Book Of Mormon to her... Which was hard to do because I could not get through a verse without busting up :) She didn't really notice though :) Then she told us these great stories of adventures her and her Mother had on a trip in Mexico. She also used to be a nurse and told us tons of stories about that as well :) she's funny because even though she's deaf and blind (to read the book of Mormon she puts on two pairs of glasses, uses a giant magnifying glass and puts the book about a fourth of an inch from her face) She can tell if you touch or move any of her stuff... Sister Holyoak tried to move one of her books and she said -from the other room I might add- "you better not be touching my books in there!!!" It was so funny :) Also this week we began to teach a man named Amos. He is from Ghana and he is awesome! He is loving what we have been teaching him and is so kind and gracious, we have another appointment with him on Friday. Were going to ask him to be baptized :) We are also teaching a lady named Sister Schmidt. she is retired and lives alone with two giant golden retrievers. I love going to her house because it reminds me of being at home! Her dogs are thief's and love to steal my gloves out of my pockets... or anything else I have in there! the funny thing about it though is they don't rip them up they just steal them -very quietly and slowly- and then trot around the house with them in their mouths until you ask for them back and they give them back to you! What!? The first time I saw her dogs I got a little teary eyed because it made me miss my dogs but its nice to go and visit her dogs and get a taste of home :) Sister Schmid is also very receptive to our message and we are also asking her to be baptized this week :) yay! :) Other than that my week has been cold but nice :) We went to a bread shop on Thursday at got some amazing soup and sandwiches :) it was so good :) and sister Holyoaks favorite ice cream shop is opening back up on the seventh so I'm sure we'll be going there sometime soon as well :) Oh and I forgot to tell you last week on Sunday (my first Sunday out here) I got to talk in sacrament meeting! I talked about having faith in Christ and told the story of the stripling warriors :) The first thing I said when I got up was that, that story was a favorite book of Mormon story of my Dads :) I actually wasn't at all nervous and everyone said they enjoyed my talk :) So I guess it was a success :) Well I should probably go :) Thank you for all of your support, your love and your prayers! I hope you have a fantastic week :)

Love, Shelby