Week 78 Mission Complete :)

Week 78

Like 4 times this week I had this spy mission theme going on and I told Sister Cudo that she is the sequel to our spy movie because my mission is accomplished. :) Haha oh mission humor!

Dear Family and Friends,

I am so grateful to be able to be emailing you all again. Its been such a fast week my goodness...and Its also been a happy week.  Just full of great moments for great people....and its been such a blessing that I able to play a part of it.  Had so many moments this week where I just had a prayer of gratitude for my Heavenly Father for the things that I have been able to do and see. 

It goes perfect with Thanksgiving for this week...HAPPY THANKSGIVING TO EVERYONE. Hope it was one to remember. Mine was spent on exchanges with Sister Aniel and we ate pizza. Pretty classy :) we spent the whole time telling each other what we are grateful for...awesome memory.  

Thanksgiving...exchanges with Sister Aniel

Also this was Jon's baptism week...oh my goodness. This was such a happy day. I just felt so happy for their family and that they are complete and they love each other and they have an awesome life ahead of them in the gospel. I was able to speak at his baptism about the power of the Holy Ghost.  It was just super emotional for me...Their family has a special place in my heart.  

Jon's baptism on Saturday :)

Sweet Grullo family

I also did some visiting to see some people one last time that I was able to see get baptized.  We are able to do that in our mission because we are relatively close to them as far as distance goes. Just have so much love for some of the families that I have gotten really close to. Walked into one of the houses, they all yell "WELCOME HOME SISTER STARBUCKS!" warmed my heart...literally have homes away from home here.  Hard to say goodbye to so many that I've grown to love here. 

No words to express all of my thoughts and feelings over my service spent as a missionary... but I just wanted to close with telling how eternally grateful I am for the last 18 months.  It's been absolutely incredible. I just love and adore the people of the Philippines and am grateful I was able to serve them and share the gospel with them.  It feels so bittersweet to end such an amazing time spent as being a representative of Jesus Christ. I truly believe God knows us personally and that Jesus Christ is my Savior and He lives. Thomas S. Monson leads our church...and I'm truly grateful for Priesthood power. The Book of Mormon is the word of God and families are forever...excited to see my cute fam in just a few days. 

Love, 

Sister Zarbock

Kolca's house after Jon's baptism

Kolca's house--so much fun! We acted out the Tree of Life :)

Exchanges!!!

Playing with kiddos in the street like always :)

With the Bagay family

After exchanges with the Bagay family

Visiting cute Lita this week

Visiting some homies!

My last Sunday on the mish 

This is Jessica--missed getting baptized on Saturday but her's is coming up!

Jessica's family

My last Sunday in the Philippines

Saying goodbye to wardies

Seeing our cute Joshua one last time :)

Ward peeps

Ward Mission leader

Week 77 I spy in the temple waiting room...

Week 77

So we had our ward temple trip...I feel like I have been there like 10 times in the past week. But we waited outside with Jon and his kids because Aylene went inside to do baptisms for the dead. And the kids were getting super rowdy...so we whipped out some fun games while we were chilling there. We played 'I spy' and they had to go touch the thing that I was "I spying..." But they had to WALK.  I said if they ran they were out. Best one was when I told them to go touch the temple presidents nose...hahaha it was a good time :) almost went crazy...I watched so many mormon messages I can tell ya all of the good ones...

Us going crazy in the temple waiting room

Grullo kids getting rowdy at the temple :(

Dear Family and Friends, 

Hello everyone. Hope you all had a good week. This week has been so awesome, wasn't as many things to do and places to be....just a lot of feel good moments.  I am just really grateful to be in the Philippines and meeting fun people and all that. It's really sooo fun and time just goes by too fast. I can't believe I am back in the internet shop again!  We had an awesome week of teaching and getting our investigators ready for baptism.  

One moment I really loved this week was when we had our ward temple day. Its really cool to see Recent Converts experience their first trip to the temple. And Aylene, Jon's wife, went to the temple for the first time! She did baptisms for the dead and was baptized for her mom. It was such a cool experience for her! And we finished the lessons and Jon for sure will be baptized this Saturday...we are so pumped for him!  He is so prepared and so ready. It should be an awesome day!

Grullo family at the temple--Aylene did baptisms for the dead for the first time

With Grullo family--Jon will get baptized this Saturday!!!

More peeps at ward temple day

So I actually did my last session in the Manila temple this week...super bitter sweet moment.  Lots of  feelings of gratitude to have been able to serve in such an awesome place :) 

Last session at Manila temple

Good bye Manila Temple--you've been good to me!

Jessica wasn't able to come to church this week...sadly she won't get baptized this Saturday. But we are still pumped for her baptism at a later date!  Just sad I won't be able to see it. She is doing so good though! 

We also have found some awesome people this week. One of them was a sweet Sister Emma...also came to church this week. She is like 70 haha.  We picked her up for church and everything. She's pretty spry for her age. 

Anyway...we really are just teaching and preaching away. So pumped everyday to wake up and teach the gospel.  We had a couple of awesome FHE's this week...spiritual thoughts and the food is always SO good. 

FHE this week

More FHE this week

Once again...another FHE this week :)

Finish off with a spiritual note...we had a cool FHE thought last night on Prophets. We went around the room and asked everyone to share their favorite scripture prophet and then a message from conference they liked. It was really cool to see that the messages of the prophet are of course put in different contexts and time periods...but the overall messages that we learn from the prophets are pretty timeless.  So awesome! 

Love you guys! I am on to my last week as a missionary!  Can't believe it!  have a good week everyone :) 

Love, 

Sister Zarbock

STLs stopped by for a visit

Week 76 KNOWLEDGE IS POWER

Week 76

So I gave a talk in church last Sunday--my LAST talk! Sooo weird :) And it was about 'Why is it important to gain spiritual knowledge and develop spiritual skills?' I was ALL over that :) That was a really fun experience this week. I told the Grullo family they needed to come early and sit on the front row so I had my support group--they didn't do half bad. They only missed 2 minutes of it ;) but anyway...good experience with that this week. 

With the Grullo family at church

My companion--Sister Cudo

Dear Fam and Frenz, 

Hey everyone :) I feel like I literally ran a marathon this week my goodness.  We had so much to do and places to be--but it was a week enjoyed and one to be remembered. I still am firm that my mission weeks have been the most unpredictable thing ever--you plan, study, teach...but in the end you honestly have NO idea what is going to happen.  It makes life fun and trust in Heavenly Father.  I'm down to 2 weeks...where does the time even go haha...But anyway on to our week! 

We had a service project on Tuesday. We cleaned cute Sister Rio's house---she had a stroke a few years ago and her husband is getting old so our district volunteered to clean their house.  This was maybe the scariest house I have ever been into...cockroaches, mice, rats, spiders--you name it and it was there. I only screamed twice. One was when they moved a big piece of wood and out came like 100 cockroaches, other time was when a rat ran across Sister Cudo's foot. Other than that, I was super tough. But to be honest, its so fun to do service projects--we truly had so much fun :) Always blessed to be apart of those.

Sister Rio front and center--our District cleaned her house for service 

Service Project

Our District taking a much needed break outside Sister Rio's house

Cleaning the inside of Sister Rio's house

We were actually able to go to the temple twice this week haha. We were chatting with some of our part member sisters at church and they said they were going to be endowed on Saturday but that they needed an escort. So we told them we could be their escorts! It was so awesome :) We walked in with them and were with them all day Saturday doing that. Brought me back to when I went through the temple for my first time...such a sweet spirit. And as we were helping the sisters through the endowment...it really was so special. Grateful I was able to do that. Then we went to the temple as a zone earlier today. Temples are definitely one of the best ways to spend your time. 

Escorts for these Sisters in the temple :)

Same Sisters we escorted at the temple

Our Zone at the temple yesterday--trip 2 to the temple this week :)

With Sister Tureman at the temple

We also had Zone Conference this week...one takeaway I had was when President Fermanis was talking to us about how "routine is the enemy." He talked about how often times we "get busy with being busy" and I actually found that so true. We shouldn't get caught up in studies, proselyting so much that it becomes our busy...but we need to work on being in the moment and treating everyday differently. Loved that thought. So we have been trying out some new schedule things in the spirit of Zone Conference. We tried it a couple days this week proselyting...also President added to our proselyting hours. I was pumped about it. We've been having fun with that.

President Fermanis--haha like what the heck does that even mean on the board?

Also had a training meeting this week...Loved when we had a section of that for just the trainers. And we talked a lot about how God has "foreknowledge" but doesn't have our whole life mapped out, but he knows us so well that he knows what we are going to choose--that was super awesome! 

Our investigators are doing awesome :) We found some newbies and Jon and Jessica are getting ready for their baptism on November 25th.  We had a way fun FHE on Saturday with some of our RC's and investigators. We played games and had a lesson about charity. We have such cool investigators.  

Anyway...literally didn't breathe for the whole week but I truly love this work. Feel SO SO blessed right now :) missionary work is so awesome. 

Love, 

Sister Zarbock 

Sisters in our Zone at Zone Conference!!!

My last Zone Conference!!!

This is Sister Turner--the nurse who always takes care of me :)

Just me with my cute anak

FHE this week!

FHE this week with the Grullo's and the Elders and some recent converts

Teaching FHE :)

Hahaha--this means Sister "foreigner" they put it on my laundry

We caught a rooster--they're all over the place here