PHOTOS OVER THE PAST SIX MONTHS

APRIL ZONE LEADER COUNCIL

We always love to get together with our zone leaders. This month we had quite a few new ones to join the council. This is their time to share their ideas and concerns with each other and council with President Carlos. Sister Russell was in charge of the lunch and everyone enjoyed her fruit kabobs, lasagna and chocolate cupcakes.

we wear shoes 24/7 we never walk bear foot, which i miss SO bad! man that stinks what happened to carson, scars on the head are like lifetime things, hopefully it wont be to obvious the rest of his life. thats cool u got those pictures, i have a bunch more now too and i dont know if ima send them, ur probably going to have to wait until i just get home. that is sweet for dallin though, that will be a GOOD learning experience.(He's going to the West Indes in August) Man im glad those videos made it there. Ya i know, i will probably be coming home pretty dang early :( i told president he didnt have to, like if anything, i didnt really want to and i defiantly doing want him thinkin i wana just get home, but he totally understood, pres is just liek that he relises that i need to get that stuff, schooling, getting going too...
SO this week was awesome. it FLEW! like i couldnt belive that it was sunday yesterday, but i guess that is just what happens when u are staying SOOO busy. so this week we had to do a bunch of ZONE LEADER stuff...:), but i LOVE all the elders in our zone, they're doing so much better now. and then Thursday we had our zone meeting, it went really good. afterwards we got interviews and me and pres got to talk a little while, so i found out my comp is leaving and im most likly going to get another one to train to be a zone leader but nothing is really finally yet. it was a sweet interview though, i love our pres! then saturday we had to go and conduct, and teach, 2 firesides, where we literally did about the whole thing. but it was good, it was all for getting member involved in missionary work and about REFERRALS that are desperately needed. so that was good. then yesterday was awesome, we had to conduct another baptism and got a lot of work in and a TON of people back to church again. our work is going WAY good right now, god is just helping us out a ton and we are always busy with stuff to do... we are so busy we even had to teach a guy earlier this morning just so we could get it all in. but its good, i love it like this, the only bad thing is it makes time FLY.... But everything is going good, nothing to bad has happened or anything like that, the mission is going awesome, im learning a ton. kinda bummed my comp is going to be leaving, we have a good time, but thats just how it is. LOVE ya too mom, im thankful for all the letters. hope everything is going good at home. i cant believe its tahts close now, until i get to call home for mothers day.... crazy

well everyone one of those prayers where defiantly answered this week... i kid u not like it was a huge testimony builder this week watching things go in a 180 degree turn... so last week, even though we worked our BUMS off and everything, we only ended up with like 3 at church and then all of out baptismal dates just fell through, this week on the other hand. we had 11 go to church and a TON of progressing now. 11 is a lot too, it was pretty much everyone we invited and like 6 of those were people we just found this week... it was nothing short of a miracle that we experienced this week, in my opinion anyways. i knew this whole thing was just a test and i just needed to endure a little longer and god would bless us, and he totally did. i believe none of this was a coincidence, it was just another test to build my testimony and faith, so im soooo thankful for that! but ya, all the sudden the work is going AWESOME now. its not that we ever slowed down or anything either, but when ur finding all day and everyone u teach is knew, a lot of your appointments dont go through and u ended up finding and walking a ton, not able to teach as much. but with all these knew progressing we should have a TON get back and going! im way excited. one thing that happened this week, and we got a investigator out of it, we that this 26 year ol guy accidentally ran over his 1 year and 2 month old kid, that was SOOO sad. but now the guy is coming to church with his wife, who was a less active member, and they are way interested now in the discussions. that was missionary work stuff, a lot of other good things happened too and its all just awesome, testimony builder stuff. then on the other side of my job out here, we dealed with a lot of missionaries this week too. just a lot of stuff is going on that we had to fix and stuff, i love these elders and they seem like they are trying harder and stuff, but its really have to get them to be completely obedient like u want them too be, so that's and on-going-battle, but im thankful to be able to serve under all these missionaries. the week was great, thanks for all the prayers, really came in handy this week, and god answers them all, just not in the way we always want it, basta, he answers them! Love ya mom, take care, have another good week, thanks for the updates, i hope they liked those notes i need to send them more ofter, did payton get his coin thing? i got his note, tell him thanks. i still havnt gotten those pictures cheslea said u sent, i hope it wasnt lost, where they just CDs or what? my package thing should get to u pretty soon, ull love all those pictures. alright INGAT (Take care) see ya next week.

CONFERENCE TIME

Thanks for the info, I love hearing about that stuff. It always inspires me too to try to help everyone i can here to have tha,t and then in the back of my mind when we are having a hard time, i just remember what i still have to go home too and its awesome! to think about. that was so cool u got to go to the Conference center, jealous! I absolutely loved conference, of course. so many good talks, it makes me mad all the conferences that i could have watched and been inspired from at home, but didnt :). sounds like u guys had a heck-of-a-week... so grandpa got his letter? that is cool, but i thought i sent that with all the ones i sent to madi and chelsea and payton... did they get theirs? im excited too. to be able to read the conference talks, i loved the whole thing, it seemed like there was a lot of talks about dealing with hard times... and i LOVED THAT, to be honest i dont even know if that is really how it is, thats just totally what i got out of it, cause that is exactly what i needed. the area is getting HARD right now, we find sooooo much, we dont waist any time, we try our best, and teach awesome lessons, the best i know how, yet still, we cant get anyone to preogress really good like we need and to get them that interested like they need too be. all u can that is, " What am i doing wrong?" and what could i possibly be doing more? cause from what i know, we cant really do any better... 100% obedient, work all day, give our best in every lesson, but the same thing keeps happening. so that was the problem i have faced these last few weeks, and it has been a GREAT learning experience. i love it, im now thankful for these hard things that happen too me, expecially after some of those talks. its all about having that ETERNAL VIEW, of the real reason why we are here. so even though its hard and its not getting too much better, were just going to continue to do our best, knowing that is all god wants and expects of me. i love this work, i remember reading in preach my gospel while looking for answers to this problem i was facing and i read somthing like, NO TIME IS WAISTED, just us going to each of their houses, is a sign of Gods love for each one of them, and i know the time that it seems like im waisting, im defiantly not. I know god will eventually give us the success that we deserve and even if its somthing i will never know about, atleast im able to plant a LOT of seeds and future elders can harvest them off. i love the work, even when its hard, i love the feeling after a long hard day, laying down, but forcing yourself not to go to sleep yet cause u havnt prayed yet, just knowing that u gave ur best that day. BEST feeling in the world, and it seems like the holly ghost kinda lets u know, or atleast reminds u of that. its just an awesoem thing to be a part of such a spectacular work. hope everything is going good at home mom, love ya and i hope u can keep everything running and in order at home, its slowly becomeing summer time again CRAZY :).

SPLITS WITH SAUDI ARABIA

well thanks for the letter it was aweosme! you guys are having a BLAST at home that is so cool! Man i was SO bumbed when i heard that edmands was going home :( that stinks i guess it never even crossed my mind that i might not ever see that punk again! i need to tell him still have thanksful i am for him and i have thought about that many times how i need to tell taht guy sorry and how thankful i really am for all he did for me. TO BAD; i guess ill never really be able to do that... our last ap was the BEST AP ever! i loved him, everyone loved him, and his teeth were fake, it was soooo funny, man wait till i get home and tell u his story, guy is my IDLE!
Well my week was not quite as crazy as last week, but it was still NUTS :). i love being a missionary here in the Philippines!
So this week our KNEW district leaders had there first distric meetings :) the one i went to was like a HUGE motivational speech and the my comp went to the other one which was pretty much the same thing he said. but they are studs and they'll be able to help out this zone a lot, i guess, god called them anyways so thats what is expected :). the following day we had a big meeting with pres and all the zone leaders with the district leaders too, from 4 zones, we all gathered and talked about our responsibilities as ZLs and DLs, it was aweosme, we also got fed like KINGS! it was awesome. Thursday we went on splits i ended up going with Elder Arabia, sadi arabia is his name, and he is RIPPED! we had an awesome day! i learned a lot from and him found out a lot abot him and i Love this guy, we had an awesome split. he actually is just coming from my old area, mabini, and he said all of the people over there would always ask about me but he really didnt know me yet, then he showed my pictures of all the people he baptised which was a HUGE amount over there, and they were all my old INVESTIGATORS!!! i was soooo excited to see that! i seriously taught like 10 of the 15 he baptised there! then all my old baptisms there were still active and stuff so i was SOOO excited for that!!! it was just awesome to figure that out, it was so funny looking at all his pictures it was like a old life i loved taht i just had to pick up and leave behind in one day :(...
Then the other days were just full of work and meetings and stuff. its been another AWESOME week, we got a ton of lessons in again and we dont waist time at all which i feel really good about. i just want my mission to be something that i can say i didnt do one thing wrong, even though i have weaknesses i did my best and i dont ever want to have any regrets about any any of it. just wana be able to say after this that i gave the best 2 years i possibly could and untill this point i feel like i can defiantly say that, i just need to finish it of :) MAGTIIS, ENDURE.
Man i feel like i cant say to much more then the mission is aweosme, i learn so much, i get to work on, build up and gain my testimony every morning for 2 hours then the rest of the day i get to bear it to everyone i teach all day and its just so aweome, you could not go on a mission and not come home without the best, most rock solid testimony ever, unless, u did something horribly wrong and were a lazy missionary haha.
Im thankful for the support and the letters, they help me out a ton. the mission, by no means, is easy :). but thats defiantly what makes it so aweosme. thank you so much for everything LOVE ya!

STORY OF THE WEEK

well that stinks, thanks for the letter mom but i didnt get any of dads or chelseas, just the 2 from u, and thanks u! love reading them. man this week was awesome, we had transfer meeting and i got to go and talk with all my batch for a little bit, pincok got his trunky letter, man that is so nuts, means he goes hom in 3 cycle, NUTS! well we had a ton of work this week, it was all really cool, way productive week. our work is still carrying on, we baptise some, then find knew others that are ready for baptism, its a never ending cycle taht is AWESOME! we had another baptism this week, it went really good. me and my comp are still together, im pretty glad, he is a hard worker and a cool guy so we dont really have any problems.
STORY OF THE WEEK: so we had the funniest thing in the world happen to us this week, funniest thing that has happened to me my whole mission. the story is way to long, ill have to go into detail when im there haha but her are the justs. so we met this white guy! i was jacked, actually my comp met him first on splits and he was like "Brother! give me a hug" first time he saw him, then he introduced himself as Dr. lion dalionking johnson. then he said he came out before the movie :) hahaha. so he got his number and told him we could try to come back cause at that time he was heading to a funeral of a muslum that had been murdered and and he was dressed in all black and had a wierd turban kinda hat on. so then of course next time we were in that area we went to his house and after about 10 min of finding we found it, it was the only one with little black kids that spoke nigerian.... so he let us in his house and we talked to him for a while, well he talked to us and we just laughed and were scared for our lives... he was a nut!?!?! it was crazy. he told us so much werid stuff, it turned out he was extremly religious and was s jew that belived in jesus, he is about 69. so it was the wierdest talk ever, turned out he was a psychiatrist. so after we left we were laughing out heads off about the things he was saying and stuff sooooo funny! but to be honest it was pretty scary too, he was a NUT as in LUNNY!!!! so we decided we would give it a week, then we would go back again :). so that was the plan, but we still had some people we were going back to that thursday.
SO thursday we went back and we just get out of this appointment when he comes flying by us on a tricycle, yelling for us to follow him cause he needs our house, so we ran to his house and when we get there he looked SOOOO scared, first of all last time when we were over at his house he said he had a bunch of guys trying to kill him and he needed to get the heck out of there, so thats what we figured was going on, cause before he was so happy and so funny, this time he was scared for his life, so we go in his house and he leads us to his bedroom, there he had us get his luggage up on the bed and he went off starting to pack, and so we were helping him, it was nuts, soooo funny, the best part is we got a vedio of all this which i will be sending home pretty soon :) so u should see what im talking about. but it was just like 15 min of craziness, just packing soooo fast and stuff, it was nuts, finally he got out and we brought all his stuff out and loaded it on the tricycle, and told us to text him in a half hour, the whole time he was telling us he wasnt going to tell us who he was running from cause then we would be in danger, so we just stoped asking :). then he took off, we thought we wouldnt see him agian, but it turned out the tricycle stopped so we caught up with him and when we did he jumped off the tricycle and told us it all, what he was doing. so it turned out the black guy he was living with, who is from nigeria, was robbing him of all his money and soo he was just leaving him, he was just sleeping the whole time we were doing this, and so he was running away but was not leaving, he goes on the explain how he is one of the meanest guys in the world and his nickname was, ash, hammer, and diamond. and he was going get him back and everything, then he tells us to text him and later and he jumped back on and went away. Until this point the whole thing was SOOO funny and we were laughing our faces off, then after this it turned really scary. like really scary, we didnt know what to do, we relised we were in the middle of somthing not cool anymore, even the police were in it and it was not good at all. so we ran after him again and we caught up to him and he was on the phone, then he hands me the phones and asked me to figure out the place he was talking abo0ut, when i figured it out he took it back and i was like, " look man, we are just missionaries, we dont want to get in the middle of all this, we love ya, and wil pray for ya, but plz dont drag us in this" then he said, we had already done everything we needed to, the only thing he needs is out cell number, NO :( so we had to give it to him, then the next morning at 4:30 am we got the funniest text from the guy, about how he had excaped and we were sent from god and he was thankful we were intuned with the spirt to follow its promptings, the whole thing was funny! man it was nuts. in the end it was all just the funniest memory EVER and i cant wait till u get the vedio! u will love it!

but that is just a little side story, My week, besides that, was all missionary work and it was awesome. im so thankful for gods help weekly with my work. its cool, this last week i just finished the bom again and i have started the new testiment and i LOVE it, it was so nice to finish the BoM again, its sooo true, and u cant read it without feeling that! actually can pala but that is only if u just read it like a book, u cant read this like a book, u have to live everything it says to, that will help you, there, the book becomes a tool, and ive totally found that out as i do that very thing!
THe new testiment is SOOO aswesome, its all about jesus and his life, right now im in john and its so cool how jesuses whole mission was about fulfilling his fathers will, none of it was for him. i know my mission is the same thing, well that's how it is suppose to be anyways, and thats what i try to do as much as i can and i love it, after that its just like no regrets. it also helps me relise how hard that actually is, jesuses whole life had to be rought :( i cant even imagine, but i love being able to read about it and try to imagine it. its just really cool, strong spirit as u read that. WELL, i have some other stuff i have to do right now to so i have to get going, just know i love you all and im doing all i can to serve a full awesome 2 years! INGAT!!!!
MOM i dont have time to read this over again so please edit it if there is any mistakes.... LOVE YA