More Visitors!!

More visitors! Dave and Julie Colton, my brother-in-law and my sister-in-law, visited us last month and it was fabulous. They spent 9 days with us and we had a great time with them. They were able to meet our wonderful office staff and some of our missionaries and we were able to show them a good part of our beautiful mission. 

We started with a daytrip just north, where we took a classic fishing boat out to see the islands and coves along the shores of San Antonio. 

We enjoyed a dinner out with our senior missionaries. 

We shopped at the local market in Subic, where we bought the exotic fruits we've come to love, including longan, rambutan, chico, dragonfruit, green tangerines and mango. Darn it, we couldn't find durian.😉

Our next big outing was up to Cabangan, about an hour north, where we hiked up to the pools along the Dapya River, which we forded several times as we hiked. 




This little guy decided he liked my pants and he hung out with me for a good while while we were stopped for lunch.

We visited Corregidor Island, the furthest point south in our mission. Corregidor was the last holdout before the Americans and Filipinos surrendered in WWII.





We enjoyed a stay at the fabulous Las Casas Filipinas de Acuzar hotel, with another spectacular sunset over the West Philippine Sea. 

And we rounded out with one more hike in Bataan, along the Little Bataanes trail, which took us through the lowlands of the Mt. Mariveles volcano. 



My sister-in-law Julie is one of my dearest friends and I am so grateful that they made the huge effort to fly halfway around the world to visit.

Meanwhile missionary work continues and the day that Dave and Julie arrived, we welcomed 17 new missionaries. In this group of missionaries, we had 12 foreigners and 5 Filipinos, with one of the Filipinos waiting on her visa to travel to her mission in Madagascar. We love you already, Elders and Sisters!

And the day after Dave and Julie departed, we held our expanded MLC (Mission Leadership Council) in the Olongapo stake center, with all of our young missionary leaders. 


The day of our MLC, we were blessed with the arrival of a new senior couple, Elder and Sister Brown, who will be working with our missionaries in our Iba and Santa Cruz zones and with our members in the Bulawen branch. We love you already, Elder and Sister Brown! 


During the two+ years we've been here, we have been blessed with remarkable young service missionaries. One of our current service missionaries is our supply manager. She travels from her home about 45 minutes north of us four days a week to work in the office. She is wonderful. 


Another of our service missionaries lives in the south of our mission and he helps us with our social media. He is wonderful.


We said goodbye to 9 missionaries last month. Three have been waiting on their visas and are now heading to their permanent missions in Japan, South Africa and Australia. 



One is heading home to the US to finish his mission as a service missionary.

And the rest have finished their missions and are heading home throughout the Philippines. Included in this group is our very last Covid missionary, who was initially called to serve in another mission but who served his entire two years in his home mission, the Philippines Olongapo Mission.

Zone conferences continue and we love the training and teaching that we give and receive with our missionaries at zone conference.
Balanga Zone

Lubao Zone

North Zambales Zone

Olongapo Zone

Orion Zone

San Antonio Zone

We are grateful for our two assistants, who help us prepare for and who participate in each zone conference.

Our speaking engagements continue and we spoke at two YSA (Young Single Adult) conferences this week, one in Olongapo and one in Bataan.


And for anyone who was worried that I'd lost my touch, I haven't ... I continue to collect nativities. 😊
My greatest find has been a local art store with the tagline "From Ash to Art." The nativities are made from the ash from the Mt. Pinatubo volcanic eruption in 1991. Mt. Pinatubo is in our mission.  
On the store front

On the bottom of each nativity

I found quite a few masterpieces tucked away on these shelves.

My new friend repaired a few nativities and cleaned up a few more. 

I love every one of these nativities ...







In addition (of course!), here are a few more unique nativities I've added to our collection this year. 
This one is made of capiz shells, native to the Philippines, 
and was a wonderful surprise gift from our office secretary. 

And this one is made from buri leaves, a type of palm found in the Philippines, 
also a surprise gift from our office secretary. 

And just to round out the show, here are the other nativities we've collected over the past two years.
Igorot people, indigenous to northern Luzon in the Philippines, 
made from bamboo wood

Made from batikuling wood, native to the Philippines

Made from batikuling wood, native to the Philippines

A gift from our friend Jimo, who lives in the US 
and is from the Philippines

And finally the two that I think our grandchildren would like the most ...


I'll end with a picture of this sweet missionary who surprised us with this generous gift that she had painted. We love our missionaries and I stand in awe of who they are and what they do. 

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