June 29, 2014

Well I had a pretty good week. It sounds like you all had a great week! I love the picture of Kam and Hallie you sent me. Thats a long time without seeing each other! Pretty crazy. Mom you only have one child at home for the week! Thats boring. Haha just kidding. I loved reading all your emails today. Dont worry about school or coming home early or anything though. I will pray about it again but from a lot of people Ive heard from, starting school right away is good. I was a little sad because I wanted to come home with my batch but maybe this is what Im supposed to do. As I keep thinking about it, I feel good about it. So I might just leave my release date as how it is right now. But like I said, I will pray again. So dont worry about it! Im not mad or anything. I dont feel like you have interfered or done anything wrong. So its okay! And dad the house looks great! I wont even recognize it when I get home! Justin emailed me today! Its the first time Ive heard from him! It was very nice and I enjoyed reading it. Thats another reason I think Im okay with starting school right away. He talked about it a little in his email. Well this week was good though! Yesterday we didnt do as good on investigators at church. The Mahilum family(the giant family that came last week) was going to come but their brother who has a trike didnt show up to take them to church and I dont think they have enough money to take a normal trike so they werent able to come. But we visited them and they really wanted to come and they are coming next week. They are doing great! They had a couple concerns about Joseph Smith but yesterday we did member exchanges and I went to them with Sister Gigi and shes a return missionary and she was great! She helped solve a lot of their concerns. It was really good! On Saturday we had a branch home evening and it was a ton of fun! The branch is so funny. They did a lot of funny stuff. It was great! The theme was for fathers day so I loved it. At the end we watched the video Earthly Father Heavenly Father and I have to say, it is one of my favorites. I always get choked up watching it! I just love my daddy! And my Heavenly Father! Its great! Also, did you see when I posted that on facebook for fathers day? Yeah that was me! Just some great things are happening right now! It was a good week! I hope you all have a great week! I love you!

Sister Remund

June 22, 2014

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOMMY!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Sorry Im a few days late.... I kinda forgot to mention it last week because I only was thinking about fathers day. But I hope you had a great day! And hopefully you get your letter soon. I was hoping it would get there but I guess not. Im surprised because grandma got hers. What is wrong with your mailbox? You never get any of my letters! Just kidding Im sure it will get there soon. I had a great week this week. Zone conference was just amazing! I really love going to the mission home and being able to learn from my leaders and from President and Sister Lopez. They are just the best! We didnt really think this week was going to be very good though because through most of the week, we kind of struggled. We were still struggling to find more people to teach and struggling with the investigators we have. So it was a little hard. But then, yesterday, it was great! Most of our investigators that we thought were progressing didnt come to church. So that wasnt really great. But three investigators came and they brought their friends who want to listen as well! So that was good. But the best part was a member from Manila came. His family lives here in my area and he lives in Manila but he came back to visit his family and he brought a lot of them to church! Then we went by after church to meet them and his whole family listened and they are really interested! The ones that came to church loved it and when we went, his parents listened and they are really interested! And they are a big family! We taught the dad, mom, two sisters, a brother, and a few children! It was the best thing ever and Im really excited to teach them. I think they will progress very well! The member has a strong testimony and hes not afraid to share it with them! It was great! Im excited to go back. So we had 13 investigators at church! It was great! Oh, also, the three investigators that came and brought their friends with them are so great! We taught them the word of wisdom and they gave everything up! It was so great! As we have continued teaching them, Ive seen a big change in them already. Its great! I love it! Also, I saw a little bit of what mom probably looked like right after I left on my mission. We have a branch member who is serving a short term mission right now. It was only supposed to be a week but they ended up needing him a little longer so he should come home this week. After he had been out a week, we visited his mom because she is less active. She just started crying because she said that she relies on his faith and she just misses him. I just thought it was sweet because I could just feel the love of this mother for her son. And then I realized how lucky I am to have a great mother who loves me! Even though she is getting old because she just had a birthday! Haha just kidding mom. And then I realized how much Heavenly Father loves us and wants us to be able to return to Him so we need to do everything we can while we are here so that we can return to Him because He loves us so much! It was just cool. It was a great week. I love you all and hope you have a great week! You are all the best!!!! I love you!!!!!!!!!!

Sister Remund

Happy Father's Day!!!!

Hello Family!!

HAPPY FATHERS DAY TO THE BEST DAD IN THE WHOLE WORLD!!!!!! Hopefully you will get my letter soon. It should probably be there next week. Sorry I didnt get it there by fathers day. But I love you daddy and hope you had a great day! Dont you think its a little unfair that mom gets skype for mothers day but you just get an email? I think I should get to skype... haha just kidding. But it sounds like you all had a great week! Glad you got to visit with Korey and his family. Sounds like fun! You all seem to be doing great and having a fun summer! I had a pretty good week this week. We kind of struggled finding this week. We were also a little disappointed yesterday because most of our progressing investigators werent able to come to church. But it was still an okay week. Hopefully this week will go better though with finding. Right now we are struggling to find people to teach. Everyone just went back to school last week and they dont get home until 5 or 6 so we are trying really hard to find people to teach until kids are out of school and trying to find out how to best use our time still but its coming. We have tried going to different places different days so we will continue working out our schedule so we can still see everyone and find those who are prepared. So its been interesting. Im really excited for today though because we will go to Bacolod for our zone conference. Im really excited! I love meeting with President and with the other missionaries. Its great! Last Monday we had a family home evening with the Abiera family, Rebato family, and Michelle. They are my absolute favorites. It was the funniest/best fhe ever. I loved it. I wish you all could meet them. You would love them! We just had some great experiences this week though. I really felt the spirit strongly as we taught this week. It was just really cool and I loved it. It was just cool to see how the spirit was directing me and Sister Manosig this week. We had a few lessons that we got in there, and we both knew immediately we werent teaching what we planned for. We didnt even have to talk about it. We just could jump right in and start teaching. Thats my favorite. Just when we both have the spirit and teach in unity and the lesson just goes great. I love it! So yeah, it was a great week. I love you all and hope you have a great week! Youre the best family ever!! Happy Fathers Day again Daddy!!!

Sister Remund

They put flowers in my hair and took my glasses and called me barbie! It was funny. The two girls in front are twins. They are the cutest little girls and my favorite.

When your name is McKenna Remund and you live in the Philippines during rainy season, this is what happens. Some things never change.

June 8, 2014

Hello everyone!

I had a pretty good week this week. It sounds like you all had a great week! This week rainy season officially started. Its rained every day this week. But its great. I love the rain. It rains really hard. Within minutes of rain pretty much everywhere is flooded. Its funny. Last week I talked about Sister Rebatos baptism. I really loved visiting her this week. I just figured I would continue the story. We went to visit her Tuesday night and it was the coolest thing for me. I could just tell how happy she was. She really has the spirit with her. It was the coolest thing to see because lately she had been really sad because of her husband but after her baptism, the spirit was with her. She was so comforted and it was the coolest thing to see how happy she was. It was great! Also, did I tell you about Martin? Well, hes the best. A member told us about a less active member she wanted us to visit. We went to visit and found out its a part member family. Martin is the son of a less active member and he hasnt been baptized yet. He is the best though. We started teaching him and he is so prepared! Seriously we have been teaching him for two weeks now and hes already so great. His baptism is July 5. And he is probably one of the only 20 year old guys here that doesnt have any word of wisdom problems. He already knew it was bad for him before so he never started and now has so problem with it. I really like teaching him. It was the coolest thing to see how the Lord really is preparing people for us to teach. I already knew that because Ive seen it a lot, but it was really cool and a testimony builder to see it again. The work is going great. Im learning a lot and doing great. Thanks for all your support and love. I love you all! Have a great week!

Sister Remund

June 1, 2014

I had a great week this week! I was able to learn a lot. This week we were able to find quite a few more people to teach and they are great! Right now though President wants us to focus on finding less active members. This branch has about 700 members but we cant become a ward because most of them are less active. We are the biggest branch in the mission. They all went less active because they didnt have enough money to get to church. They live in my farthest area. We always have a good turn out on Sunday (about 150 members) but because of all the less active members we cant become a ward. SO... this is where the good news comes in. We are starting a special sacrament out there so they can still attend church and eventually, they will split off and become a branch out there! Im really excited. Its going to be hard because they have all been less active for so long that it might be hard to bring them back, but I think that since it will be closer, they will have more of a desire. So Im really excited. Hopefully it will start next week. On Saturday, we had the baptism of Michelle and Sister Rebato. I was really excited. The elders had four baptisms too. It was a big baptism. A lot of people in white. It was great! The first problem, we didnt have enough baptismal clothes. We share with the ward. So me and Sister Manosig had to travel to Victorias Saturday morning to borrow more clothes. The next problem, President Valero got called in to work and we didnt have a branch presidency member to preside. So the baptism ended up starting two hours late. It was a little crazy but eventually we figured it out and got a branch presidency member there. Then the miracle happened. It was probably the most spiritual baptism Ive attended since I got here. Sister Mercy, our relief society president, gave the talk. She talked about temples. It was clearly for Sister Rebato. Her husband is the one that killed himself last month. Sister Rebato was just crying the whole time but its because she had the spirit with her. I loved Sister Mercys talk. It was perfect and clearly from the spirit. Then they all got baptized and bore their testimonies. It was so great! I could just feel the spirit so strong as they bore their testimony. Sister Rebato has been waiting for this day for a long time and now, it finally came and she was so ready for it. It was the best thing ever. It was just a great week and I really learned a lot. Also, when we were looking for less actives this week, I met the Martinez family. They are so great! They have such strong testimonies and they are actually sealed in the temple! They have such a strong desire to go to church but they live very very far and literally have no money. But yesterday, Brother was able to come! It was so great to see him there! Im really excited to start the special sacrament because they will become the strongest members out there. Also, while out there, I met a girl names Charity. She is 17 years old and not a member. When I met her, I realized how lucky we are to have the gospel in our lives. She is 17 but she already has a live in partner and is pregnant. As I was talking to her, I seriously thought she was Kamryns age. It made me really happy to know the standards we have. Her life isnt very great right now and you can tell she isnt very happy. We are so blessed to have the gospel to teach us so that we can be happy and have a happy family when we are married and more prepared for it. That happens to a lot of girls here and it makes me so sad for them. So Im very grateful I was raised in the gospel with the standards we have. I love you all so much and hope you have a great week! Thank you for all the support and for the love! You are all the best! I love you!

Sister Remund