Happy Birthday Mom!

This week was great. We just got back from Magat Dam about an hour ago. I was expecting it to be pretty lame, but it was actually super pretty over there! Alot of green mountains and hills and rocks. There was also some wild life, two goats and a few dogs! We went on a boat ride to boot! There was also a cool hanging bridge in a pretty little spot we found. I loved it!! I'll send pictures next week!

 

We did splits again this week, this time in my area and it was SUPER fun!! We taught 5 lessons thursday night!

 

One of the things I was thinking a lot about this week was agency and how important it is in the plan of happiness.

And Satan from the beginning has tried to take that agency away.

He tries to take it away by sucking us in to addictive behaviors and substaces, and even attitudes.

Sometimes I feel so helpless and when I start to think about my weaknesses it seems like I can never change and never get better.

But that is Satan! He tries to tell us that we don't have a choice, that we can't change, that we ARE helpless, but we're not! Because of the power of the atonement, and our free agency we CAN change! And we do it little by little, day by day, though the power and help of our Savior and obedience to His commandments!

I know that is true! Jesus Christ fought for our agency. We have a choice and we can change for the better no matter what our weakness is!

So grateful for our Redeemer, for His endless love, mercy and grace!

 

I love you all and hope you have a great week!

Recognize Satan and tell him "Get thee hence!"

 

Love--Sister Webre

Frogs, Corn and 4 Little Sweetie Heads

Hello everybody!

Well I don't have much time but I'll give you the short version of my week.
We had a baptism! The four cutest kids in the WHOLE WORLD! Yup!
Make sure and look at the picture! The man in the brown shirt is the father of the youngest boy and the older looking girl. (Ceasar and Armie) He's not a member yet, and his wife wasn't able to come to the baptism, but we're gonna start focusing on them. (The other woman is the mother of the other two kids and she is a member)
We have a way cool couple (members) that live close to them and are gonna come to lessons and they invited them to a FHE at their house next week. If you didn't know, members are EVERYTHING in missionary work. Investigators need fellowshippers and thats a fact! So we're excited to see what will happen there.
The baptism was so awesome! Sister Stewart and I did a musical number, piano and flute "I am a Child of God" and the kids all bore their testimony and I cried a little. I love those kids so stinkin much!

Well...we found that little frog in our apartment. It was just sittin there on the floor when we came in. Don't know how it made its entrance but it was a cool little guy, we didn't mind. Its the giant cocroaches, spiders, and mice that aren't so welcome. Even the lizards don't bother me.

We did our first split last week and it was really fun. Even though Sister Fort and I are still terrible at tagalog, we made it through 5 lessons and it was really fun! Then we enjoyed some delicious corn on the cob! Not as good as yours out of the garden mom!

Well gotta go. Love yalls
SisterWebre

Magandang Gabi!

Magandang Gabi!

 

That's filipino for good night but directly translated it means "beautiful night". cool huh?

Well I was really spoiled this week! I got 3 packages and another dinner at the mission home. It was one of the assistants birthday so we got cake and icecream and the leftovers of presidents dinner which just so happened to be pork chops and mashed potatoes with presidents special gravy. did I mention both president and sister carlos are legit chefs? It was sweet!

 

We went to Save More today. It is like a real mall!! It's in a different area about a 25 minute drive from Cauayan when Elder mulliner drives 95 the whole way. President gave us the OK to go check it out.  I'm not a mall lover, but when you haven't been in a nice place for a long while stuff like that is like a world wonder. It had a huge grocery place and i bought REAL cheese! It was kindof expensive but I still haven't spent most of my christmas money so I splurged.

I'm gonna make grilled cheese sandwiches this week booyah!

They also had a cool bookstore and I found a section with a ton of childrens classics: The Wizard of Oz, The Jungle Book, and also The Prince and |The Pauper, Le MIserables, The Count of Monte Cristo, there were a ton! I'm not sure if they were the exact original text, but they had really awesome illustrations and they were only two dollars a piece. I wanted to buy some but there were so many I just couldn't decide and we were in a time crunch  so I didn't get any.

The next time I go back I'm gonna get some though.

 

We got some referrals this week that seem pretty promising so far and also found a couple I have a good feeling about. I'll tell you more about them next week.

 

Last night when we came home there was a little tiny frog just sitting on our floor in the kitchen. We named him harold. |We don't know how he got in to our house but he was so tiny and cute! I wanted to keep him but ironically enough we had just read the day before the part in the white handbook that says no pets allowed. They say ignorance is bliss, but in this case we couldn't play that card. Sadness.

We let the little guy go.

 

Overall it was a generally a very happy week. I'm always happy, but this week was just extra happy. It might have something to do with the fact that my companion knows how to pronounce my last name. Not sure.  Its probably because a lot of our investigators have actually been reading the Book of Mormon! YEAH! They gotta read it, its the only way they will be converted!

I went on splits with Sister Fort who is from Texas and is 6 weeks behind me in the mission. that's right, BEHIND. So I was just a little bit concerned about how we were going to be able to teach and get along on our own, but it worked out just fine and we actually had a lot of fun. It was good for both of us to get to stretch oursleves with no one to fall back on. We're going to be splitting a lot because her comp and mine are going to different areas of the mission every thursday to do training with the sister missionaries. Fun times! A lot of Journal moments, I'm sure!

 

Take care, love ya

Love Sister Weever (Webre)

Happy New Year

Hello and happy new year.

The rumors about the sleepover party at the mission home WERE true!

Can you believe it? The only unfortunate part is that I've had the runs since thursday so I wasn't feeling like eating all of the delicious food they had for us. But it was still a good time. President let us watch the ultimate gift, which I find to be extremely cheesy, but it has a good moral and its like a real movie so we were all happy.

New years is BIGGER than christmas here. Everythining is closed and there are tons of fireworks and people start in the morning on new years eve. Then they go crazy when the new year turns. We got to watch from the mission home. Karaoke is like the biggest thing here, everyone has it at their house and their not shy about it. They turn it up way loud and just go for it. And most of the songs they sing are in English, popular hits from america.  It makes me laugh so hard!

I have a new companion. Her name is Sister Stewart. She is 5'11". She is from Spanish Fork. She likes sports and was on the track team at BYU. She is American. I like her. We're gonna start running together in the morning. (YES!!) She has been in the mission about one year. Anything else you want to know about her?

We had 7 investigators at church yesterday. They are all very good possibilities for baptism. 4 of them are the cutest kids we have been teaching. Two of them are cousins of the other two. Their names are Zyra(11), Jeyzer(12), Armie(12) and Ceazar(8). They have the greatest names here! Zyra and Jeyzer's mom is a member but she has been inactive for a long time. But she has a sweet testimony. The other two kids are her niece and nephew. Their parents haven't been too interested in listening to the lessons or coming to church but they all live in the same home.  They all pray together every night and they are way smart! They are super fun to teach and right now their baptism date is January 15. Sometimes they have a hard time coming to church but we're gonna talk about that in our next lesson.

The other 3 investigators at church are the Palma family. We were way excited when they came because one Jemarie(16) got offended by one of the other YW when she came to church her first time back in NOvember and hadn't come to church since. But she was there and her brother Fransisco and her mom Jane.  We wish their dad would come to the lessons or church but he has a lot of addictions and stuff and is not really intersted. That is sad. Jane rocks though she is already in 2 nephi (did I already tell you this?) and they also have family prayer every night. Their batismal date is on January 29.

So we're excited for those! We've also got several member referrals last week so hopeful some of them will turn into baptisms as well!

Its time for new years resolutions! (or maybe last week but its not too late!)

Well life is good. We have the true gospel.

No one likes the runs but I figure I've been healthy for four months in the philippines, its my turn.

I have pictures for you but I forgot to bring my card converter. Maybe we can come back later....

Okay love ya bye

Sister Webre

Feliz Navidad

[After talking about her Christmas phone call home...]

 

I was going to send you the picture of the GIANT rice cooker they have at the mission home but I didn't bring my hookup. Next time.

 

I forgot to tell you that I made some fresh mango salsa on christmas eve and it was SUPER DELICIOUS. Seriously, I have been in heaven for a few days eating it. I couldn't get any tortia chips though so Ive been eating it with taco doritos. It works though. I decided that Cilantro is one of my favorite smells/tastes.

 

This morning we deep cleaned our apartment. It was a mission wide thing. Our walls were filthy! I spent forever on those things and trying to get rid of cobwebs! Sister Carlos is so cute. She has prizes for everyone who completes the "checklist".  One of the prizes is a gourmet dinner at the mission home. (each zone will be entered in a drawing for the dinner)

And she pretty much told me that my companion will be transferred Thursday so I'll have a new companion pretty soon!

 

I wish I could send you a picture of our beautiful new converts in their baptismal whites but alas, my camera broke the day before their baptism! I have to get the pics from my zone leaders later. Remigia and Fe, and they are both super cool! The baptism was great and Sister Rivera made "grey ham" which consists of graham crackers, cream, and mangos. It took me a while to figure out why she was calling it "Grey ham" and it finally donned on me-- the "gra-ham" crackers. It makes me giggle now every time anyone mentions the delicious "grey ham".

 

Well, sure love you all and hope you have a happy new year!

Theres a rumor going around that all the missionaries in cauayan Zone get to go to the mission home for new years and have a sleep over there. I hope its true!!!

 

Yours- Sister Webre

Merry Christmas

For  unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given and the government shall be upon his shoulder; and his name shall be called, Wonderful, Conuselor, The mighty God, the Everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.(2 Nephi 19:6) I love this scripture and song SO MUCH don't you??
It's Christmas! My first one away from home, but lucky for me, we celebrate the birth of our Savior all around the world!
 I am so grateful for His birth and His perfect life. I can turn to His example when ever I wonder what I should do, I can lean on His mercy and grace when all I can do is still not enough. His love helps me find courage when the evils and temptations of the world threaten me and make me feel little.

The baptisms are still on for Christmas! What a beautiful and perfect way to celebrate the birth of Christ, with the birth of two wonderful women who are starting a new life in the path that leads back home to our Father.

Love You

It has been a great week. In fact, Saturday was the best day of my life.

 It started out with a service project to one of our new investigators. There was a TON of garbage, a whole wardrobes worth of old dirty wet clothes and stuff all around their house that were attracting alot of mosquitos. So we removed all or at least most of that!

Then we helped a member set up her computers for her new internet cafe business at her house. That was fun. Mostly because we were with the AP's, DL's and ZL's. And they figured out how to take pictures of all our faces and set them as desktop backgrounds on all of her computers. It was so awesome!

Then she fed us lunch, we taught a couple lessons and went to the mission home to practice for the devotional. I sang a solo by the way for the District Christmas Devotional. It was fun. And sister fort and I did a duet "Away in a Manger" with her on the guitar and the rest of our zone joining in on the third verse. It was way pretty! We get to sing it for zone conference too! So I'll get a video later.

Oh wait, I almost forgot the best part! After practicing my solo, I walked into the kitchen and the most delicious smell filled my nose, I almost died and went to heaven. I kid you not, the night before (after finishing off some fresh MANGO salsa from Sister Carlos (which by the way is so good that it rivals Grandpa norms salsa)  I had mentioned how I missed mexican food the very most and what do I get the very next day? Angels cooking tacos in the kitchen and REAL CHEESE!! It was my first since I came to the philippines. I can't describe my brand of happiness to you. David Archuleta singing Joy to the World in the background had a lot to do with it I think. :)

President and Sister Carlos spoke about the gifts we can give Jesus for Christmas-- Our Faith, Gratitude, and Service to others. After the devotional we were getting ready to go home and President carlos comes walking out of his office with a wad of pisos. He says "who wants icecream" and we all go wild of course.

So he sent two elders to go get Icecream to end the night. It was just the icing on the cake!

Also, got to watch the First Presidency devotional  yesterday. Wasn't that wonderful? Of course I cried like a baby when they sang "What Shall We Give". We brought one of our investigators and It was a neat experience to be able to show her our Prophet and let her hear and feel of his sweet message and love. When the title came up "Thomas S. Monson, President, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints" I felt this strong feeling in my heart that he really is called of God! And how incredible it really is that we have a living prophet. And here it was, her first time to hear his voice and see his face. So neat.

When you said you ate at Beijing Buffet, the first memory I had was of Hunter (after much painstaking pep talk to get him to be happy about eating there) walking in and saying loudly and with great excitement "You didn't tell me they had "THIS"!! Pointing at the fountain/decor in the front. Oh what a funny kid!! I miss him.

Well thats all for now. After friday night it finally feels like Christmas even though the mosquitos are still more prevalent than ever! The things I will miss most are watching "Its a wonderful Life" and singing with the fam. Oh yeah and the Willard Bay LIghts. I will probably miss those the most.

Love you so so much! All of you! Thanks for your prayers. I need them always!

Love, Sister Webre

p.s. What do you mean when you say "trimming the tree" I forgot to ask last week, I don't know what that means.