Lehi was married to Santa Claus...

So this week I get to use the WHOLE hour just for you! Yeah! And hopefully I won't run out of things to say cause I have 2 week to tell you about.

But lets get business out of the way.... My Phone Call HOME! So what's the time difference again? If I call you Christmas morning here is that too late for you? Or when should I try and call? Cause I think I can use the Couples phone (which is free!) but there will be a lot of us so I think there is a scheduled. Just remind me of the time difference. Excited ako!

And the Thank you's!

Kevin- I love the pics of Mara and the house, I can't wait (ok I really can) to see them in real life

Deb- My mom told me you gave me money for Christmas, Marami Salamat po! I am really grateful and will put it to good use! :) 

Paul- Thank you for your note, but I still have a very loooooooong time left to go! I hope you have a great Christmas!

Rachel- Ummmmmm..... I would really like to thank you for the pictures.... that I hope will be here next week. But I still Loves you tons! 

And the apologies, I still can't send pictures. :( Sad day. Later on I will see how much a card reader costs. 

We have had so many investigators come to church this last couple of weeks! 8! That's a lot for me before the last two weeks the highest I ever seen is 6! And the was a miracle! We won't be having any baptisms in December but we will hopefully have a bunch in January! 

So the funny stories for this last two weeks...

We are teaching this really cute family, the Lagat's, they are less active and two of their kids haven't been baptized yet. They have ten kids all under the age of 16 and one grandchild. So it's a zoo! But we love them! But every lesson we have to make EXTREMELY interactive or we lose them all. So we were teaching about the Book of Mormon so we took a map so they could see where the Bible come from and when Nephi traveled. They thought it was epic. But when Clyde, the little boy, saw America, we all lost it because he was like, "hey, that's were Captain America lives!" Yes, that would be the thoughts of a nine year old. Then we asked the question, who was the wife of Lehi? Nothing... ok, it starts with an 's'  Then cute little Judea, "Santa Clause?" Yes Santa Clause is married to Lehi. and Christmas is coming and that is all a 8 year old girl can think of! We love it there, it is always so fun, but we never know what is going to come out of their mouths! 

The second story... We were teaching another kid, Eric James, who is 12 and who's whole family are members but him, but less active. Just to explain him, he took my camera and took a picture of himself acting all cool. When his whole family comes to church, he doesn't, cause he is just a little independent punk. He has 9 brothers and sisters and is ADHA. So our lessons there are also interactive. One time we were teaching and he was super distracted, and I butchered a pronunciation of a word, so simpre he totally started making fun of me. And being the punk that I am, decided to switch to teaching in English. Two can play that game. :) He busted up laughing! He didn't understand anything. (cause I was saying really big words) I asked him a question in English and told him to answer in English. It was so funny to hear what he thought English sounded like to him. It is like when we 'try' to sound Chinese. So now, every time he is out of control we threaten him with English. Very effective.  And last time we taught about Sabbath Day and set things on fire. Needless to say, he came to church finally! So yes, mom, it's not just the Elders that are pyros. 

Now for the Spiritual stuff...

I love the Plan of Salvation! We were trying to teach the Plan of Salvation to a family. They aren't members but the wife and the daughter are interested but the father is kinda combative and just wanted to bible bash with us. It was just so sad to see how little people really know about God's plan for us, when it is all so clear, even in the Bible. He couldn't except that we lived before this world. To him we just come from dust and will go back to dust. It just made me realize how much I have taken for granted the knowledge that we are more then dust and that we really did live before this life, and this life now isn't just some accident. And that their is more to come. At every little point in the lesson he would tell us we were wrong, although he could not support it with the Bible. When we said Jesus created the world, it was almost more then he could bear. We finally told him that we were not here to Bible bash or debate. That we did not come here to prove him wrong, so we would like the same from him. I really thought he would leave. (cause I was kinda bold.... yes I am even stubborn in Tagalog) but he didn't he sat down and actually listened and we were actually able to teach him. The next couple of days Sister Hunt and I really studied the Plan of Salvation. It's all there in the Bible, even that Christ created the world. Shocker! But it is even that much clearer in the Book of Mormon and the Pearl of Great Price. Sister Hunt and I have been just really talking lately how much the Gospel makes sense. How much knowledge we have always taken for granted because we have been members our whole lives. It's just been another testimony to me about the importance of missionary work, because people really don't know. I love being a missionary! I can't believe I have been doing it for a whole year! Gahhh! 

My Nanay, Sister Stonick, goes home next week. Weird. I am now one of the old sister missionaries. Most of the missionaries now in the field will go home after me. I still feel super new and can't believe I am hitting my year mark. Days feel like week, and weeks feel like days. 

I get to go to the temple the day after Christmas! (that is if I don't transfer, but I'm pretty sure we are both staying, but then again, I though I was set in Carmona.) 

I love Sister Hunt! We are always laughing about something. I can't remember if I told you this but she is from Australia, but her parents are Samoan. So her accent is super cool! And she has see a real kangaroo in real life! We are already planning my trip to visit her. Now just for the money part....

 I have yet to have a companion from the same country. Canadian, American, New Zealander/Tongan, Filipino, Pakistani, Australian/Samoan. Cool huh?  I wonder where my next  companion will be from? 

Well, I hope that was a long enough letter to satisfy all of your wishes and desires! But I want to make sure that you know that I love you tons! ALL OF YOU! And I can't wait to talk to you all in real life... or at least over the phone. Can you believe it's been 6 months since we last talked? Crazy! It went by so fast! 

Love you all! 

Sister Lyons

It's not like I'm in another country or something...

Magandang Hapon po galing sa Naic.....

Waaaaaa?

That's right... this email finds me back in Naic. Kinda. Earlier Sister Asif went home and our transfer day isn't until thrusday, so am temporarily here in Naic (Trece to be exact, so not the same as my first area, but I am super duper close!) Ah Nako! I just want to go visit every one I know and love here, but I can't so I won't.

So this week consisted of a lot of packing, tears, saying goodbye's, and marami marami dinner appointments! I am so full! Yesterday we had three dinners. And they all want to feed you more then your stomach can possibly hold... and then times that by three.

But we also had lots and lots of good experiences.

First Tatay Ernesto. A long long time ago, we gave him a pamphlet, almost in passing. And we forgot where he lived so we really never thought to go back to him. One day, we were walking and we got a text. And I have this inability to text and walk at the same time. So we stopped. Right in front of his house. He saw us and said, "Sister's! Come inside! It's hot and I read your pamphlet." He then asked if he could ask us some questions about it. Sure, why not. :) He was a pastor before and left his ministry, because he felt people served to get money and recognition. So the fact that we have lay (is that right?) was very appealing to him. He had so many good doctrinal questions about the Godhead, people seeing God, and even that we lived before this life. He knows that Bible like the back of his hand. He sure keeps us on our toes, when it come to knowing our Bible. But luckily I had had the impression to start reading the New Testament again, and we were able to answer all of his questions.  We gave him a Book of Mormon. And his basically begged us to come back. When we had come back he read all the way to Alma. I loved it! But once again he had so many questions! All we did for 2 hours was answer his questions. But he wouldn't except what we said unless we could prove it with the Bible and the Book of Mormon. He even told us, "The Book of Mormon is the same as the Bible. Everything that is in the Bible is in the Book of Mormon!" Highlight of this story (so far!) is he came to church yesterday, and accepted a baptismal date. But in December pa! KC he want's to know know before he gets baptized. So if you have any references about how Jesus Christ becomes the Father, that would be helpful. He understands that they are three seperate beings so that concept of Christ becoming our Father because of the Atonement. Just the scripture in Alma 11 (I think, the one where Amulek and Zeezorom are taking) is really thowing him. We tried to explain about the atonement, but it is just not making sense to him. So if you have any brilliant ideas, that would be awesome!   

Do you remember the Bayugo family? They are the less active family we found in Langkiwa? We basically ran right into Nanay and they were so excited to get a Book of Mormon? Well, they come to church yesterday and they walked. It is a 20minute Jeepny ride to the entrence of Langkiwa and then a 10 minute walk to their house. They didn't have any money but they really wanted to come to church. Nanay is super old and has a had time walking and seeing, sister is 7 months pregnant, and they had a 4 year old and a 9 year old with them. Talk about sacrifice. They got up so early they didn't have time to eat before they come. By the time they got to church they we tired, hot, and hungry, but they were happy!  It is so touching to see what people sacrifice.

I don't know if I told you about kim. But she is a referral from a member, and is super interested. She always reads all of her assignment twice to make sure she really understands them. It was her birthday on Tuesday, and she invited us over. (all they do here on birthday's is eat... I think I am in the right place) We had district meeting that day, and one set appointment, so we said we would come but that we would be late. Well, district meeting went super long! So we were late to our set appointment, and thus super duper late to kim's house. All of the other guess had left, but she had saved us some food. It was fun just to talk to her while we ate. And then her husband came home. He has never listened to us. The first time he wouldn't even come in the house when we were there. So we were kinda nervous when he showed up, as was Kim. But he was super nice, and just started eating and talking to us as well. After awhile he just started asking questions about our religion, and you know what? All of his questions followed lesson one. We taught him a whole lesson without him even knowing. Sneaking! But Kim was super excited, so hopefully they will come to church next week!

I still want pictures! I have no idea what this wedding looks like. I am going to imagine that it is super ugly until you show me otherwise. I don't even know what the bride and groom look like! I haven't even been invited! What is this? It's not like I'm in another county or something. :)

Love you more then getting up at 4 in the morning... wait that's not very much love...

I love you more then wedding pictures.... that's better!

Sister Lyons

Just trying to find out where I am...

Just kidding! I haven't gotten lost once AND I have managed to get us where we need to, using jeepneys. So proud of myself! And I felt proud of myself now that people are asking ME if my companion speaks tagalog instead of the other way around. Yep, that's right my companion is not a native Fillipina. She's from... Pakistan! Cool huh? But don't worry she is fluent in Tagalog, because she is going home in october. So I probably will be the one to kill her off. Not literally, just a figure of speech here in the mish. Her name is sister Asif. She's my tallest companion yet and calls what I eat for breakfast every morning oatmilk. I think it's cute so I'm not going to correct her! :) We speak Tagalog all day long. Last night I was super tired so I switched into English. Sister Asfi said, "I've never heard you speak english and I wondered what you sounded like." I sound funny, that's how I sound, so I witched back into Tagalog and found it was a lot easier. I'm getting less and less blank stares when I teach and I'm giving less and less blank stares. So now that my bragging session is done, I probably won't be able to speak coherent Tagalog ever again. That's just how it goes doesn't it. 

So a little about the pictures. Yes, I know, I have now sent home 2 pictures of my feet. But we went tromping through a farmers field to find a less active family and it was actually much safer to take off our shoes and walk barefoot, because mud is actually a lot slippy-er then ice. Imagine that.  We also had to cross the bridge I am standing on. Yeah... that's a bridge. And you can't really tell from the picture but that is a very fast river underneath and a height that would make dad nervous. (A couple of weeks ago we went over a real bamboo swinging bridge, I can't believe I forgot to tell you that!) The 'I (heart) Manila' t-shirts are Sister Pacinio and I's companionship item. Cute huh? Oh, the picture from last week? The one where we are standing by the fence on a really steep hill? I climbed that. In a dress. With hurricane force winds. Looking for a less active. Boo-ya! Were they home? No. Aw-well... And the district photo? I just had to send it home because it makes me laugh! All of the Americans are about the same height and then there's the two Filipinos. Sister Pacinio and I laughed about that one for awhile. ;) 

So I don't know if you have heard on the news or anything, but last week half of the Philippines was in a state of calamity because of the Typhoon in Japan/China. 90% of metro Manila was flooded. All schools were cancelled and in Naic there is now a new island that didn't used to be there. BUT before mom freaks out... Carmona a is relatively high elevation and the drainage systems are pretty good. So we just had a lot of mud but no floods. But half of the Elders area was flooded so they we evacuated to the chapel. That was sad to see. And our Branch Presidency spent a whole night going to members houses to see if they were flooded and I mean the whole night. Many of the missionaries in the city were just doing community service and distributing goods to people. They weren't sure if we were going to be able to have transfer meeting, because of the floods. So they cancelled all of the extra stuff and told only the people that had to come to come. And we had it. God loves His missionaries. And He loves me, too and that is why I am here and not in the city. 

I wish I had some grand story to tell you but as always my mind always blanks when you give me a time limit. I have like 10 minutes more and can't think of what else to tell you but in about 20 minutes, I'll have like a billion things to say. Hummmm.... 

How are my fellow missionaries? Andrea, Ashley, Charlotte, Faith, and Emily? Have you heard anything from them? Being a missionary is great and I've decided 18 months is not long enough. Maybe 4 years would be a good amount. Sometimes p-days are too long. Every week I get excited for them but but by 2 or 3 I'm ready for them to be done. I have a new found love... jogging. Yes I love to run. I'm not even joking. I'm now the one that wants to keep running and running while my companion is way behind panting and saying she's done. Switch! But it's fun! 

I love you more then Reese PB cups (which I found today at the store... so of course I bought them) 

Sister Lyons

And the rains came down...

But don't worry the flood didn't come up!

It just been another great week here in Carmona. I love, love, love it! Let's start with Monday. So after I emailed you we had a zone activity at the Fornash house. It was really fun and the food was great! And I got your letters! It fun because the letters get here really late so I am still getting you reactions and comments about Naic, which is kinda fun to relive the memories. So next week is Jackie's baptism. And I am so excited. She is the 16 year old niece of the primary president, and has a HUGE desire to be baptized. We were there every day this week so get her ready for her interview, and everyday she would tell us how many days until her baptism. Her testimony is so strong and she says she wants to serve a mission. I told her that I will pray that she gets called to the new mission in Salt Lake. But then again Sister Pacino will be prayer for Jackie to go to her home mission. So we'll see who wins. But because there house is super close to ours, we always had it as our last appointment, and Sister Omendto always fed us. Yummy! It started to feel like home there. It's like we belong there. Later on tonight we are going there again, and we are bringing treats because they always give us food, so we thought we'd switch things around. Jackie had her baptism interview on Saturday and all is well! We are good for the 4th of August. I am so excited!

There is this couple, Harold and Lisa, that has been investigating the Church for over a year now, but they couldn't get baptized because they weren't married. They've been coming to church and paying tithing and everything. But then they went to  Lisa's provence so she could give birth to her baby, who is super cute! Well they are back now, and their paper are being processed for their marriage. They should be cleared to get a marriage licence by the August 3rd. And then they just have to wait for that part which could take anywhere from 2 to 4 weeks. It is actually super hard to get married here in the Philippines and really expensive and you cannot get a divorce. So most people just live together. But the point is they are super close and super excited. As are we! Sister Pacinio is a little sad because transfer day is Aug 8 and she has been here for 4 transfers, so she is probably not going to be here for their wedding or baptism. And once again I will be leading the area. I don't know where anything is... this could be fun. I just tell my companion that this is my first transfer here too... we'll she if she buys it.

One day (I really can't remember when... everything kinda turns into a blur after by the time monday rolls around) we went to go visit a less active sister who is coming back to church. She is super nice and always reads the Book of Mormon. But I have never seen her smile. It is so sad. She literally never smiles, which is really quite odd for Filipinos. She always has this look of pure exhaustion when we go there. But we went there unexpectedly, because both our plan and our back up plan fell through. Her sister-in-law was there because her and her husband are moving in with them. She is not a member but her husband (who is not on our records, because they moved from a different lugar) is a member but less active. She we taught them both and they both came to church on Sunday. And Sister Joanne seems really interested. This finding through less actives really works. Tell the Elders that are living in your basement, if they are lacking in the investigator area... visit less actives and they will find them. I wouldn't know how to do missionary work without this focus on Less active members.

We also found a new Less Active family through a recent convert. Rachel would love him. His name is Cyrus and is covered from head to toe in tattoos. And is such a punk. He really is like the boys she used to work with. Cause he is a softy at heart. :) Anyway, he just want everyone to be a member, so he told us that we should go with him to his friend JP. So we went. Come to find out his Grandpa had died and there was a sit in. So of course we had to go pay our respects and then they shoved us full of food, even they didn't know us. Well, a sit in is a really good place to talk to people about the Plan of Salvation, oh di ba? So the first Nanay we talked to asked us where our church was. So we told her. Her answer, "I used to be a member." We get that a lot. No Nanay you are still a member, can we come visit you? Yes. Sweet! Then when we went back to her house, come to find out it's been like 20 years since they went to church (once again in a different lugar) so half of their children aren't members. Thank you Cyrus!

The Paglinawan Family are recent converts. They are a cute young couple with two cute little girls. Sister Liza was baptized in October and Brother JoJo was just baptized in March. Anyway, Brother JoJo had someone at work who had a question about people that died without baptism. He said that they were damned. Brother told him he was wrong and bore his testimony about history and baptism for the dead (even though he hasn't been able to do baptism for the dead yet, himself). We were so proud! He want's to look for his family's name when they go back to their province. We said we would go with him to Binan to help him look up the names on the church site. He got really excited, and of course so were we. I've never taught anyone about Family History yet, so this will be fun!

It rained again really hard yesterday, so Sister Pacinio and I were worried that there wouldn't be any people at church again. But there were so many! And we had 7 investigators at church. So cool!

You all sound so great, and I love you letters! Pictures! Send me more Pictures! Lots and Lots of them! That's my favorite part is the pictures. Salamat for all of the letters, they make me feel like I'm home, in a good way, don't you worry. Love you all! 

I love you all so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so so much!
Mahal kita!
Sister Lyons

I'm in love....

With Carmona... don't worry. :) A little about the pictures I am sending you... The one with the food is the Cusile Family. They are both returned missionaries and newly married, and they feed us every week because they miss being missionaries and they say we are like their children. The other boy in the pictures is Jewel, he works with us almost everyday and is preparing his mission papers right now. The family with the 3 little boys, is my favorite family, the  Evangalista family I told you about last week. Aren't they the cutest? The two little girls are neighbors, and always tell me how beautiful I am and always touch me and my clothes. I love them all! And the duck. He belongs to a member (as does the little boy holding the duck).

So last Tuesday was Zone meeting and it was super good! The San Gab district only needs 30 more active Melchizedek (or how ever you spell that) Priesthood holders to become a stake! Malapit na! As a Zone we set the goal to have it happen before October. We are all so pumped. We are the smallest zone in the mission. There are only 5 companionships and most of us (including Sister Pacinio and me) are actually working two areas. So it's a lot of work for just a few of us but President Stucki has asked us to make it happen, so we are refocusing our efforts again on retaining and reactivating. It will be cool to see it happen too. The branches are excited.

On Friday we had interviews with President and Sister Stucki, which of course is always good. Poor Sister Stucki, though, so many missionaries are getting sick and some are even in the hospital. One Sister in our zone was out for three weeks and one of those weeks she spent in the Hospital.Her phone never stopped buzzing the whole time she was there. She looked tired. President always know just what to say to make me feel better about what I am doing and gets me excited to continue pushing on. They are both so good.

It was a week of a lot of first, too! I showered out of a bucket for the first time, because there was no, and I mean NO water pressure. I also showered with a butike. I pretty sure I spelled that wrong but it's pronounced boo-tee-key, and they are the noisy little lizards that lose their tails if you scare them. And they have a nasty habit of jumping off the ceiling and scurrying who knows which direction. So needless to say I showered with my glasses on and was ready to jump at a moments notice. Luckily he waited until I was done before he dropped right to the place I was standing not two minutes before. :)

It's rained for 3 days straight. No joke. Manila is flooding, but what else is new. It's always flooding. Some of the city missionaries weren't allowed to work some days this week because the rain was up to their hips. Luckily the rain is only to our ankles here, although it has come into some people's houses. But they are amazing. They just scoop it out and move on like nothing happened. And we go out everyday, armed with out umbrellas, rubber shoes, and scriptures covered in plastic. And come home soaking wet and have to put out everything (including our money) to dry.

Sunday attendance was pretty low, because of the rain. At 9, you had the missionaries and the Branch Presidency. At 9:10 the RS and Primary presidents rolled in. And by 9:15 the EQ showed up, and right after the sacrament the speakers squeaked in. We only had one investigator, which is super low for us. The branch president was a little discouraged as were we. but hopefully next week attendance will be back up again. One of the counselors had us over a couple weeks ago for a FHE and I was in charge of games, so we played Big Buddha. They loved it! I guess they play it all the time as a family now, and every time they see me they sing the song and do the actions. So if Big Buddha becomes the big thing in the Philippines, you will all now where it started. With me.

So I haven't gotten any letters recently. Not because you haven't been writing them, but because I no longer live right next door to the Zone Leaders, and they keep forgetting to bring them. But we are having a zone lunch later on today, and Sister Pacinio has threatened them repeatedly, so hopefully today I hear some news.

I love you all so so so so so much!

Hugs and Kisses from Carmona!

Sister Lyons  

Pictures :)

First Transfer...

Danielle has been moved... and yet she still finds herself stranded on a beautiful tropical island. How does that girl swing stuff like this?

This week's email and pictures:

From Carmona! That's right I am still in the Provence! Yippee! Sayan, walang apalaya dito, pero maraming magangang Mountains (wow you have no idea how long that took me to figure out how to spell that) and maraming rice fields. My companion is native. Her name is Sister Pacinio, and she is super cute! I love her and the area already. I love that everyone assumes I speak Tagalog. It's great! Because guess what? I can now answer back... most of the time. And it's language study 27/7. I am starting to think in taglish, because it is a lot easer then thinking in English and then translating. Wow! I am really struggling to write this email. I can't imagine not having any investigators, like Andrea. Here, they basically find you. Like this one experience. One day we were having many unplanned opportunities (we don't use the word punted any more) . At this one point both Sister Pacinio and I just stopped and started talking to the same person. While we were talking to her, her friend came up and started listing. Come to find out, she is a less active member and her family is active in her home town. She moved here a year ago and is married to a non-member. She asked us when we could come teach her husband. He eventually came out, too and started talking to us. And then a wife of a less active member we were on out way to visit walked down the street, and asked for a Book of Mormon. It was like one right after another! And because there were so many of them Sister Pacinio and I were talking to 2 different groups. That's right I gave a lesson on the side of the street, all by myself, in Tagalog, and the guy is willing to listen. My Tagalog has improved so much just over the last 3 days.

It was really hard to say goodbye to Naic. So many people fed us that last week. And Evelyn (the one that lives really close to us and was the one that always said hi to us?) gave me these really beautiful diamond earrings. Wendy said she would hide me. And I'm pretty sure I made a few Nanays cry. And I cried. I don't have anything else really to say so I just send you the last batch of Naic pictures. After this Carmona lang!

Loves you all so so so so so so so so so so so very much!
Sister Lyons  
A little more about the area. It is huge! Some of the members have to spend more the 200 pesos to get to church. That is a huge sacrifice, because most only make about 100 peso a day. But they come. It is still a branch, but alot smaller then Naic, people wise. But the members are amazing. They love to feed us and work with us. I am super duper excited about this transfer. I've been reading the Priesthood talks... there amazing! (yes we are just barely getting the conference issue) Keep sending pictures and letters and boxes (just kidding on that one!) But I still love you tons!