Painting each other and the house!!

Hola everyone,

         This week has been very interesting as always. We did a service project for a lady that lives about 30 mins from my area. We painted the outside of her house. Hits the title of this weeks email!! Anyways, it was lots of fun... we all painted each other and the house. When we were done we have to wash off outside because there was paint everywhere lol. But her house looks really nice now. After the service the lady feed us some weird look soup. I ate about 15 bites and couldnt take it anymore so one of the Elders finished it off for me. Its always great when the Elders eat with you because they eat your food haha. I drink there nasty drinks for them and they eat my food. It works out really well. Anyways, Ill send pictures of this service later.

Next thing, well this week was kind of chill until it hit about Friday. My companion and I were walking down the street to go home after a long HOT day. Then all of a sudden this old man is yelling at us from across the street. He was yelling out Hola and hello over and over again. Then finally we look over at him and what do we see.. This old 70 something year old man peeing on someones car... WOW!! I couldnt believe it. We just pick up the speed and walk a little faster until we got home and wrote about it in our journals. Haha how crazy is that??

Well that same night I taught my first family home evening.. all by myself. I talked about the Holy Ghost and how he could help us in our lives. After the lesson they couple said I did really great and that my spanish is coming along. Im soo excited. Pretty soon Ill be speaking awesome spanish. Everyone already thinks that Im latina. They all say I look like Im not from Estados Unidos (United States). So yea.. haha.

Well guys this week was also a time where I had to go get an Oltra Sound done.. I keep having this pain in my side for a while and it wouldnt go away. I think it was just the food but my companion thought otherwise. She called mission pres. and he made me go to the doctor. When I got there the doctor said he thinks I have stones in my something... idk some big word. Anyways, he tells me that I have to come back to get an oltrasound done. So we set up an appointment and go back to get it done. Before we went back I was really worried because I didnt want to have any problems. So the Elders gave me a blessing. In the blessing the Elder said that God will make the pain go away and nothing will be wrong when I went to the doctor. The blessing was super direct and super powerful. After the blessing, Im talking right after, the pain was gone. When I went back to the doctor to do the test everything was normal. What a blessing!! God loves me sooo much. So now I have pictures of my stomach. haha...

Well Dogsssss...... What can I say.. They just love me. This weeks as we were walking down the street to go to a house a huge bear dog thing jumped right out at us. Good thing was is that it was tied to a tree. The tree was pretty old so we ran as fast as we could to get away from the tree. Who knows what could happen if that dog got off. on the way back from the house there was a bus that was driving by so we ran along side the bus so the dog wouldnt see us haha. I love the dogs here. They are awesome!!

Well thats all for this week guys. The work is moving along we even had a investigator at church this week. Love you all miss you tons!!

-Hermana Patrick

                                     On the bus with my comp and our district leader

                                  This is Elder Henry. He is my Zone Leader and he loves texas!!

                                     This is at the investigators house.. I always sleep on it for like 5 mins                                             before we go and teach them lol 

                                     My comp and I painting the house

                                     The Elders and I had a war haha.. No one else let us paint them

                                  Me and Elde castillo

 This is the last pictures with this district... We found out if we get new comps today.. sad but im ready

                                    Me and micheal. He is a recent convert that just got the preisthood                                                            yesterday!! WOOHOO!! He is awesome
 

  Okay guys so this is the Ovandos. They are like 80 years old lol.. they are in my branch. He always calls me his grand daughter. He speaks english to

                                  They cant speak english very well lol. this was at the service.

                                     Teaching him to play I spy in english lol. Its pretty funny.

HOT WATER!!

So this week our District Leader put hot wáter in our shower. I just about died. For like 2 months I have not had a hot shower then when I got in it was burning me. Its super hot!!! Im going to enjoy it for the time that I have it lol!! It feels soooo great!!

So I'll hit you guys with some great stories before we get to the good stuff. So this week we ate lunch at this ladies house, the same one I told yall about that has like 100 flies. Well while we were eating they were just buzzing on by landing in our food and drinks. Not only does she have 100 flies she also has these bugs that they only have here in Panama. Really I have never seen them in my life until I got here. They are smaller then bees and they are black and White. They dont sting but they bite. Weird. Anyways so one of them was flying around and around me until it lands on my dress. I start to scream and then the Elders and my comp. start laughing. Finally my comp. comes over and starts to try and get this thing off of me but then it lands on my butt. I scream even more! Then one of the Elders takes out his Preach my Gospel and looks at me and says "Dont take this the wrong way", then hits my butt with his book and kills the bug........... Well atleast the bug died!! Guys dont ever do that on your missions. That Elder now needs to repent lol.

Next story... So my companion and I go to the house of a less active to do what missionaries do. Teach her... Lets just say I'll never forget this day... ever!! So we went to her house and talked for a Little while with her. After we sang a hymn and prayed. She wasnt really focused the whole time we taught her but at the end we asked her to say the prayer. She says okay and starts to pray. As she is praying she is whispering. my comp. and I lean in to her what she is saying. She sounded like she was off of a scary movie or something because she was mummbling things. She then starts to clap her hands and do some other weird things. I open one eye to peak at my comp and she if she is feeling the same thing I was. I look up and my comp. has her eyes wide open looking at this lady as if she was crazy. I started to laugh and the other lady opened her eyes. I closed mine then she said amen. After that she gives me and muy comp some really nasty food. We both were so ready to get out of there. We visit her again this week. Lets hope it goes better.

Dogs... so this week we were walking along the street and this huge black dog jumps out at us. It starts to bark and we just keep walking. It didnt bite or anything so thats good. It was just really scary.

Okay now time for the good stuff. So this week I experienced the hand of the Lord!! We went to a house of investigators this week and had planned on showing them the restoration video. I prayed about it and thought that this was something that they really needed to watch. When we got to there house the DVD player that we bought wasnt working. The screen was all black but the sound worked. As I sat there trying to fix it my comp. says "lets not waste anymore time, it doesnt work". In my head im praying to the lord and wondering why hes not letting this DVD player work. They really needed to watch it. I thought in my head, what can I do in this situation. Well like any god missionay you pray. So in my head I said a quick prayer and when I looked down I had no doubt that the tv was going to work. I looked down and there was the screen. As bright as ever!! It worked. I was so happy. I was reading in Preach my Gospel earlier that day about praying with faith. That night I did exactly that and the lord helped us.

Also this week I taught about a good 45 min lesson. My spanish wasnt perfect but they understood what I was saying. I learned so much for teaching them.

Well I love you all and hope all is well in Texas and any other place you might be in the world. Soy un hija de Dios y un misionara por La Iglesia de Jesucristo de Los Santos de Los últimos Días.  

-Hermana Patrick

Helping Panama one street at a time! :)

Hola,

   

       So this week has been long but great. Last P-day we had a water ballon fight with our zone. It was super awesome. We just had lots of fun last p-day. I also played basketball with the Elders haha. Only three sisters wanted to play so it was us three and like 10 Elders. Funny part is that Im taller then all of them but one. I shot like four 3´s in a row jaja. Fun day last week.

The rest of the week was great as well, we tought tons of lessons and read the Book of Mormon with one of our investigators. Hey is really coming along way and I hope he gets baptized. He is awesome!! 

So your probably wondering why then title says what it says. Well on Saturday we had a service project with our Zone. We went to a different part of Panama to clean the streets. Im talking sewers and all. I decided that it would be a good idea to not eat and go do service. Well actually we dont have any food at all in house so we couldnt eat. Anyways I got dehydrated and sick. But an elder bought me a banana and some water so I was okay. Ill send pictures of the service later. It was an all day service so when we got home we just passed out on our beds.

So on Sunday it was fast Sunday. So I got up and shared my testimony at church. IN SPANISH!! WOOHOOO!!! Everyone after said that it was really good and that my spanish is getting better each day.

This week we started making a game out of contacting people. We have only a min. and 30 seconds to contact someone. We just walk up to them ask how they are and tell them about our message. Put our number on the back of whatever we are giving them and ask where they live so we can come and teach there family. Work gets done alot better and we contact a lot more people that way. We are going to try some other stuff this week as well.

Well no crazy food or crazy ladies and dogs this week. Sorry. Maybe next week. We did have two roaches in our house this week but my companion is not scared so she killed them lol.. WooHoo thanks tou Hermana Bennett. Well thats this week. Until next time!!

xoxo

-Hermana Patrick

P.S on the 9th I hit month 3 in the mission WooHoo!!! :)

      My companion and I wear the bows mom made all the time lol she loves them

    She is putting her mission papers in soon. She goes on visits with us all the time

        My companion and I. We were on our way to someones house that lived by all these trees

             Service. Picking up trash.

                     Some of the people in my zone. We all stoped to take pics while doing the service

                   Super nice Elder from Basillios county lol... He says hi!!

                   Some of the best Elders. They dont speak english and its so funny when they try. They always ask me what hommie means lol

                    Little kid in the branch

          Haha he has is Texas sign up lol.. this is a little kid from my branch and his brother. they came to help do service

                           Another kid in the branch. This was a church on Sunday

GC and dog!

Hola Amigos y Familia,

      So this week has been great!! My spanish is coming along pretty well and the work is moving forward.

This week the investigator that came to the temple with us came to General Conference. He and his dad only came to one session but thats still great. He got to listen to the prophet speak and really understand what our church is all about. We put a baptism date with him and he is going to pray about it. I really hope he accepts becasue he would make a great member of the church. My companion and I are looking to visit him 3 or 4 times a week to read El Libro de Mormon with him.We are trying to get him excited about living the gospel. He is a great person and Ive been praying for him so I hope he can live his life the way Christ wants him to.

Speaking of Conference... OMG!! Its was sooo super awesome! Whats even better is that everyone here loves me so they made sure I could watch part of it in English. I watched the last session in spanish but I understood most of what was going on so thats good. Although it was great Im going to print off the talks so that I can study them better.

My companion is great!! She knows so much about the gospel and helps me with things I never knew before. This week we both have been studying alot on charity and love. We just got a new district leader in our district and I was kind of upset. Well lets just say that there is a bunch of things happening in Santiago right now. Anyways, I didnt really l

ike the new DL and I was just having bad thoughts, not being a very good missionary. So I saw I needed to change and I read in Preach My gospel about charity and love. It said that God loves all of us and we are required to love everyone just the same as he loves us. Even if they have things that you dont agree with. At the end it said, "pray unto the father with all the energy of heart, that [we] may be filled with this love" (Moroni 7:48). So thats what I did... Guess what??? I love the new DL now haha. Its amazing what Heavenly Father can do when you ask.

So story time... sit back and relax because when I tell you this you will be out of your seat. So this week my companion and I went to visit a lady in the branch that is less active. We were having a very good lesson with her and were reading the Book of Mormon with her. As when were reading she gets up in the middle and walks to her back yard. Doesnt say a word,just walks to the back yard. She proceeds to grab a broom stick from her yard. She walks to the front of her house where he dog is laying in the grass and proceeds to beat her dog. She not only hit him once, not twice, not even three times, four would be far to little, but five times!! My face dropped to the floor!! I couldnt believe what I just saw!! Poor dog! All my companion had to say was "fix your face". She came back in and acted like nothing happened. All I can say is WOW!!

Well thats all for this week folks. Until next time!!

-Love Hermana Patrick

  

     

So we went to a lesson and the lady gave us a sugar cane lol.. Its pretty good!!