Jungle Fever

Hello my dearests!

So yes, I thought of my subject line while I laid in bed ALL DAY yesterday. We're not sure what I was sick with but Sister Schmutz thinks it was a mild form of Dengue Fever. So I was banished to my bed for a whole day and let me tell you what...I pray that NEVER happens again. Fevers are not fun here in the Philippines. I was seriously on a roller coaster of heat to sweating it all out for days...it wasn't fun :( But I am doing much better now, thank goodness.

Also, before I forget...Thanks Emily for sending me a package! WOW! (Rach please let her know I got it) I loved the watch and the earrings and most of all the letters and pictures from back home. I have the best friends :)

We continued to plug a long this week in Cortes....last Friday morning we had only 2 lessons for the whole week. I was so discouraged and thought to myself, "well this seems impossible!" Anyway, I had a heart-to-heart with my scriptures and Heavenly Father and things worked out. We ended up teaching 17 more lessons in 3 days. We also had an investigator family come back who we thought were far gone...and they went to church (well the mom and daughter) I've learned a lot about faith this week. And this area is going to take A LOT A LOT A LOT of faith.

We had Zone Conference on Monday and it was fantastic. President Schumtz talked about being set-apart and I just realized that while I am an ordinary person I have been set-apart to do extraordinary things and so I need to remember that! It was a great meeting and of course I just loved seeing the Schmutzs. They are my favorite.

Today we have a District Activity to a Bee Farm and also we are going to some caves. Should be pretty cool!

A new senior couple arrived for our District this week and I am so excited!!! SENIOR COUPLES ARE THE BEST!!!! They are so sweet, Elder and Sister Jacob from Orem. They don't live to far away from us and they have already been such a great help. I don't even hesitate when thinking about serving a mission with my husband in the future. It is a definite YES.

None of you had much news in your letters so I hope that all is well and that life is happy. Hopefully Zach's visa gets here pretty soon. I can't believe how long he has been waiting! Yikes.

This week I finished reading the Book of Alma and I love the story about Moroni and Pahoran. Moroni was so angry at Pahoran because they weren't receiving any help from the government and he wrote a very, very, very angry letter to him. But I love Pahoran's response. He wasn't angry at all. It is so clear he chose to look at things from both perspectives. Life is what you make of it. And full of responses. I hope we can all choose to be more like Pahoran. Choose to not be offended. Choose to react in a calm matter. Life is made up of reactions!
Love you all,
Nicole