Christmas Pictures & Lots of Laundry!

The one that lost her baby and has asthma, we gave them a BoM for Christmas and gave them a scripture about the spirit world and told them that they can see their baby again and that families are so important. She cried I cried we all cried we then asked them to read the pamphlet about the Plan of Salvation. After that she told us she enjoys when we come by. (We have dropped by a couple of times to see if she is ok) and she really wanted to be the one to pray before we left. 

Friday: we taught 2 women that we found when trying to find their mom, but their mom is busy all the time so we teach them. One of them was just listening to our lesson so intently last time and she reads the pamphlets and everything. It’s pretty cool when they show an interest in the Gospel and it is really frustrating when they don't hahah. Because you are like I KNOW WITH ALL MY HEART THAT THIS WILL HELP YOUR LIFE PLEASE ACCEPT IT! and they are like eh.... maybe. haha of course it is just an interest at first but if they pray it will be a testimony. 

                  

Sunday: Less active family came; even though they wanted to leave right after sacrament we directed them to the gospel principles class. They stayed but left right after that. 

Monday: LAUNDRY a lot of LAUNDRY aw man. When I get home I will fall in love with the Washer and the dryer. haha but it's ok. It was good. It is a sunny day to day so it should dry fast. 

Tomorrow we have a lockdown. New years we are having a lock down, but we live in the same house as our branch president so it is a lock down but a party lock down. We paid sister Travino (our branch president’s wife) and she wanted to cook for us and then we will watch the fireworks!!!!!! (they have no restrictions on fire works here it is going to be crazy fun. and we are allowed to watch Narnia as long as we tell the president how it is like the Atonement. What is a bummer is I can't light off any fireworks. Maybe when I return I will return at new years and just light off a bunch of fireworks and then go home ahaha.

          

The play and branch party

Yay letters!

Sister Pavino's Christmas

Characters at the Christmas party

Opening presents

A lot of food

The missionary party at our branch president's house.  There was a lot of food!

Our stable at the branch Christmas party

Bamboo star decoration

The Christmas story from the Nephrites perspective;

our DL is reading and the other DL's acted the rest out. 

I Ate Balute!

hahah so this week hardly any work haha. Monday is Monday we shopped and then did laundry. Tuesday missionary Christmas party at Cauyan. It was super fun we played a game where we were in lines of 5 and the last person has a balloon on their feet and the first person is out to pop the other balloons, and we had another game called Bahay (house) Baboy (pig) and Baguio (storm) where there is two people that are a house and 1 person is the pig and when the person says bahay we have to find a new pig and whoever is last loses and whenever they say Baboy the person that is the pig has to find a new house quickly and Baguio we all switch and change. It was super crazy.  There was food cooked by Brother Pete (a white guy that goes around the whole mission selling and buying sovereigns and nick knacks, he is a member and cooks the best American food) Then we had a devotional about all the different characters in the Nativity and about what is fact and what others were made up and also about how they must have felt Joseph, Mary, Elisabeth, and John the Baptist and his Father. Harod, the Kings (nope we don't know if there was only 3) the shepherds, and the Nephites in the Americas.     What I thought was cool is that they think the star is a convergence of 2 planets and 1 star. It reminded me of how amazing it is when the moon is super bright that there are shadows and it is a clear sky and it is just peaceful and how thoughtful Mary was all the time and how devoted John the Baptist father was. He was slain on the steps of the temple because he didn't give out the location of Jesus. It was amazing. I loved it.  Then the next day EVERYONE AT THE CHRISTMAS PARTY GOT LBM (diarrhea) hahah we all stayed home and just ate anti-lbm pills and bread. hahahah ya and then Thursday we had a Christmas party with all the branches in our district and then Friday was weekly planning and then work but no fellow shippers so we went and visited all the Less actives that we have. 

                           Saturday work again. We visited a huge Family that is all less active they live in this huge compound kind of thing and they are all related. So we had 2 lessons. The reason they went less active is they didn't go on missions and got married. We told them that was ridiculous and that they need the church more than ever now to bless their families. A lot of people don't go on missions and are still active.  Then we visited 3 sisters the oldest loves the lessons, the middle loved the friends and the youngest is shy. They don't go to church because their family got offended; we told them that they can enjoy the things in church still. They just need that faith and boost to go in spite of their parents choice not to come to church. another less active family the girl is 19 and she has an online business but because of that she doesn't go to church, and then the oldest is handsome young man he did work with the missionaries before and was really active, but now he is in college and doesn't have time for that. Their dad is this sweet x-marine that learned to cook in his service. (He has a classic Marine tattoo.) There are a lot of Marines and sea men here. 

                            We also have an investigator that is totally prepared because they read the pamphlets and they ask questions and they promised to go to church (they didn't go but we are hoping it was out of their control, because they were so looking forward to it.) they are a cute couple. They live in the middle of a corn field, and he works all day in the corn and rice fields, and when he comes home he plays with his 2 kids and nephews and nieces and giggles with his wife. They are just super cute! I love them. 

                        Oh also I ATE BALUTE! AT THE DISTRICT CHRISTMAS PARTY ON THURSDAY. It was epic! We were waiting for the bus and there was a vender there. It tasted like egg. There was just some cartilage but I pulled that out and continued and then there was the fur but it was wet so it didn't bother me that much. I have pictures.    

                             :) I am excited for Christmas; we have our branch Christmas party on Christmas and so many lunch and dinner appointments! IT is cool to be a missionary and to represent Christ, when it is his day, and my lifetime. We have such great knowledge about Christ that is amazing to share with others. No one else knows as much about Christ than we do. We don't just get that knowledge from books, or just from people. It’s from OUR HEAVENLY FATHER. We have the Knowledge about how to talk to our Heavenly Father to get that knowledge and we know that our Heavenly Father is the one to give us the gift of Christ.   

Mahal ko Kayo Lahat (I love you all.) Love sister Perkins

That is a baby Chick from the egg with all its fur. ignore the hair it was a windy night.

One Year Left

I am so excited for Christmas, what is weird is I now only have a year left on my mission. like really. next Christmas I will be home freezing. It really doesn't feel like Christmas no snow... it actually feels like Halloween, the kids here spend all night long going from house to house singing carols for money, and they won’t stop I mean WON"T STOP until you give them money, so we have to keep our gate lock. or we give them Cents so that they feel success. 

in this new area we have had a lot of just service and it is amazing. like one investigator we visited two times. the first time she was pregnant and the second time she had lost her baby, She was really weak so we did her laundry and we cleaned her whole house and we taught her husband to pray. then we painted the fence of this nice rich house of this less active and next Sunday she came to church. Woot for service. We walk a lot. 

Pictures!

The counting game where the punishment is powder

Our Zone

Baptism of Melvin and Martin

Mini Christmas tree!

Family home eveing with bunsay. We played a game where the punishment is to put baby powder on your face

Thanksgiving with all the solano sisters

(the next three pictures)

Nanay Vasquez.  She is so cute.

Elder Lapian, our district leader.  He is helping us with the branch solano to reactivate their LA branch. He is cool and that is an amazing picure of a trycie

Luciano Family, Reactivation time! ya the kids are so cool .

me and my Kids hahah i baptized them and it is cool.

our Branch mission leader and his family hahah they are so funny

My family history leader and her husband ya we are cool saluting the camera.

At transfer-meeting and in our area 

These are our zone leaders and they are in our same branch

Opening a New Area and Loving the Challenge!

I am training and I am going to open a new area. WooooT ! All I can think of is Bring it hahahah I got a call from Prez Rahlf saying heads up. YEps Crazy I now have 1 more day in Solano. (I am so in the dark about where I am going it could be in the country or in a city or ya.)

Monday: Saw Inglasian Missionaries and thought "oh that’s what we look like."

Tues: got a call saying you leave to night to get to Santiago, and then you will be in Cauayan in the morning. Ate at our newly baptized's home. Split with Sister Manukilea and sis Clyde, Got to Santiago and slept on the floor. 

Wed: Woke up got on bus. Had the trainers meeting teaching us how to train.  Got home and then slept sobrong tired. But woke up really early in the morning and exercised, (we play badminton on the tennis court next to the Catholic church, we play to the sounds of early morning mass. it is fun. )
Thurs: Punted (no one was home) and prez villaran almost got into a motor accident because he saw us sitting on the ground and was going to ask us why. (resting na lang) We lit 2 cotton balls on fire to explain why we need to go to church and read the scriptures and pray. The kids thought it was cool. Then we played game. We also made them spaghetti, after that we made some for our fellow sister missionaries (we had Thanksgiving with all the sister missionaries in Solano)

Friday: Thanksgiving at Brother and Sister Allen's house, (he is the one white guy in the branch) it was good

Saturday: we helped branch 2 because they have a branch in their area that became all less active so we split with them and visited the old members.

Sunday: Last Sunday, Taught Julius for the last time, he was sad because his family is not able to be baptized with him and that I won't be there. We taught him how the Holy Ghost works and the Word of Wisdom, and that even though I am going to be gone he needs to continue. He is so strong he told us that his friends tempted him with alcohol but he drank water the whole night though until he could slip out and go home. (That is before we taught him the WOW). We worked with the youth and Marellie my first baptism came with us. It was fun.  Then we got a call from Pres Ralhf saying that I am opening a new area with a new missionary and that I need to be prepared. 

Instead of feeling sad or not ready for this assignment I am feeling like BRING IT! Like this new challenge is going to be fun and I am loving it.