April 8, 2012

Kumusta!

So Easter weekend has been great. We had conference and I loved it!!! I of course have limited time so I just want to talk about one thing that I really enjoyed about it. It was actually a talk about raising children. don't remember which one at the moment. Now for most of conference, and let's be honest for most of my mission, I have tried really hard to not think about getting married and starting a family because I am just so excited for when this is going to happen. It is especially hard with all the family talk during conference and when we are teaching two different families with brand new babies. Anyways... the talk was about raising children in the gospel and helping "our" children to make their own spiritual connection to heaven. Well guess what? I have about 30 of God's children that I am trying to help make a spiritual connection to heaven and it's hard! I just want every single person I talk to to understand the gospel and realize how happy they can be. I loved at the end of sister Esplins talk how she quoted "I am a child of God" All of us really need some one to lead us, guide us, and walk beside us during some point of our life. If you're not the one needing to be lead or guided I hope you can find someone to lead guide and walk beside. :)

No time left!!!! I LOVE BEING A MISSIONARY!!!!

LOVE YOU ALL!!!

Sister Morton

April 2, 2012

April 2, 2012

Kumusta po Kayo?!?

SO... The big news of the week... I'm not going to transfer day on friday! It will be the first time I won't be there since I have been in the field. Ha ha... It's sad because all the elders from my batch in the MTC will be there, but other than that I am excited to be staying with a companion for longer than six weeks :) and I will be getting another soon enough anyways because I will be "killing" Sister Rombaoa in 5 weeks. Ha ha yup my second "kill" is just 5 months. I'll be sad when she goes home.

Other than not really having news about being transfered, I really don't have any news.

It has been super rainy still. I found out that it is going to be a wet summer because of la nina or something, which means it won't be as hot this year, but I will be leaving more palda puddles :)

What else.... I swear I was just writing this email last week so it doesn't seem like anything has happened.

One awesome thing about this week- We started to teach Nolasco's (The old man we baptized last month) wife. She hasn't wanted to listen to us at all because of her catholic tradition but she let us teach her once, so we taught about eternal marriage and she has since started reading! I am so excited because Nolasco is so excited to go to the temple and he doesn't want to have to do it alone. So I am hoping and praying that she will continue to let the Spirit work.

Other coolness- Elder Tyler Haws (he's a BYU basketball player, who is serving in quezon city) came to san pablo to do a fireside last night. Our stake has been making a big effort to get the youth excited about serving missions and it was really good.

I'm outta time now so until next week.... Hopefully I will be able to send some photos later today :)

LOVE YOU ALL!!!!

Sister Morton

March 26, 2012

Kumusta po kayo?!?

SO... remember how a week of two ago I said it was the beginning of summer here and was SO HOT? well I spoke too soon. On Saturday we were sitting in a lesson and I heard thunder- for the first time since I have been here. Now it has rained before, and quite hard my first couple of weeks here, BUT I learned that thunder means it's a REAL storm! OH MY GOODNESS!!! I have NEVER seen rain like I saw on Sat. and of course it was one of the few days I chose NOT to bring my umbrella. HA! I'm really bad at following promptings.... so needless to say I was soaking wet for the rest of the day and I would leave a puddle wherever I went. Luckily we usually just teach on covered pouches or on concrete floors :) It has been cold for the past few days.... no joke. I even slept in my fleece jacket the other night cause the sheet just wasn't cutting it. ha ha. I still love it here though and all the rain has washed most the trash away so that has been nice :)

On a more spiritual note... a real quick one since I only have 4 minutes. This week I realized how even though each one of us has very different things going on in our lives we all have trials. We all have something that is trying to bring us down and something that is there that will make us stronger if we face it with the right attitude and know that the purpose of our trials is to make us stronger, better people. I'm grateful for this experience AND I'm so grateful for all of you!!!

MAHAL NA MAHAL KO KAYO LAHAT!!!!

Sister Morton

March 19, 2012

So another week already.... I swear it seems like I am just going to wake up and I am going to be freezing in Utah like most of you are right now. :)

I cannot even describe this week. I seriously don't think I have ever been this sweaty, tired and just plain exhausted in my whole life, and I don't think I have ever been happier. It's the strangest thing! As most of you know I am quite grumpy when I am really tired, but not anymore. I can't even describe how happy I am. It's crazy how having close to zero time to focus on myself has made me the happiest I have ever been.

Last week we had a "mini MTC" for the youth in our stake and we got to be the teachers. One of our APs gave a talk and he talked about how every single thing we do as a missionary is for someone else and effects others salvation. I have thought about that all week. Everything from doing yoga every morning, learning a language, eating dinner at 9:30 at night and lets not forget all the studying, oh and all the walking, I am doing because I want someone else to be able to be as happy as I am. I want them to know that they have a purpose here on this earth and that they have a loving Heavenly Father that has a PERFECT plan for them. All that we need to do is focus on Christ and when we do this everything else falls exactly where it needs to be. I know that just by reading the scriptures to really learn from them, sincerely praying and going to church we end up right where we want to be. Even though these things seem simple I know they can be hard because it took me a LONG time to figure this out. IT IS SO WORTH IT THOUGH!!!

I love being a missionary. I love this gospel. I love all of you.

MAHAL KO KAYO!!!!