December 28, 2015 - Moncada, Paniqui, Philippines

Hahahaha, I can now start singing that song and it will be true! (re: subject line of "I'll Be Home for Christmas!")  haha but don't worry, i am not trunky yet.  Just SUPER India trunky! I leave tomorrow morning for india and i am so excited!

So because we skyped like 3 days ago i will  keep this email fairly short but want to let you know it was awesome getting to skype you all! I love and miss you guys so much! You are the best family ever!!!  I sent some pics on Dropbox by the way so go check them out!:0

Anyways so winding down my time in the Philippines, we didn't get a lot of teaching in this week because we moved on Tuesday, and on Thursday had the Christmas conference and curfew at 6, and friday was Christmas so everyone was busy and we were in a tri-panionship, and then good-byes yesterday.  JR Andres came to church again! He is the one in the red tank top in the pics i sent doing my "deuces" sign!  I love that guy.  Bryan finally came to church!!!!  He is doing better now and looks to finally be progressing!!!  Mari Nica's interview is today and she is so ready as she also came to church again, so saturday is her baptism!  Also Myrna and her husband Recto came again and are doing great!  Said good-byes to many members yesterday and i will really miss a ton of people here, but frankly i am ready to return to my India! I still have no clue where i am assigned yet though! haha.  

Sounds like you guys had quite the holiday with lots of fun!! Next year i will be part of that! Thanks for update on some of the fam! Tell Ryker i say what's up! I miss that guy.  Also mom if you could try and see if you can get ahold of Caleb again i would really appreciate that...haven't heard from him forever.  Glad the family is all doing well!! 

I love you guys so much! Sorry if i left stuff out of this email...but we just talked like two days ago right?? haha Love you!!!

Elder Ball

December 28, 2015 - Pictures, Moncada, Paniqui, Philippines

Indian Elders at zone conference while in Angeles Philippines mission. 
Four of the six are headed back to India soon.

Elder Ball & Elder Porter

President Peralta moving out

President Peralta

Kenneth, Emerson, Jericho

Jericho

Michael

Taclibon sisters

Elder Ball with investigator, JR Andres

Tatay Dong Turqueza 

Kisses 

At Angeles Mission Christmas conference...



Elder Ball with his three companions in the 'pines...Elders Neri, Van Tassell, Oldejan.

Great friends!

December 24, 2015 - Christmas Skype!

Awesome to hear from Elder Ball when we skyped on Christmas Eve!  Not great connection or picture quality on this call, but he still sounded great.  He spoke to us in Tagalog; we loved hearing about his experiences; and Tyler sure squealed to hear Ryan's voice.  :)

December 21, 2015 - Moncada, Paniqui, Philippines

Hey everyone!! Merry Christmas this upcoming week!!! So excited for Christmas!! So as for skype, i will coming to the computer shop to skype you at 10 am here or so here in the Philippines...so which would be about 7pm on Christmas Eve for you guys.  Would that be okay?? Ma, could you send my skype info again?? I can't find it...Thanks! Excited for our 3rd skype!!

So this week was a weird one.  We finally got stuff figured out for our new house so we are moving in tomorrow, so i will only live in it for a week.  it is right next to the church, so i will get basketball in every morning until i leave to my India!

JR Andres came to church finally this week and is doing really well.  I think he is really progressing.  He was quite disappointed though that i am leaving, but i am sure Elder Ordejan will take good care of him.  JR and Bianca Sibayan got confirmed yesterday which was great, but it was a little embarrassing because the member who was doing the welcome after their confirmation was blooper nation and couldn't figure out what to do haha, it was funny but super embarrassing.  Bryan didn't come again so we were super disappointed about that.  But Myrna and her husband came again which was great, and Myrna will be getting baptized on the 9th instead because of coffee but she is doing well.  We moved Mari Nica to the 2nd of January so i will still be here for her interview this week, so this would be my 13th baptism in the Philippines...crazy...

I got the package!! It is awesome! I am loving all the peanut butter products:) And the shirts are great, and ornament, but those socks!!!!!!!! AWESOME!!! Everyone is jealous of me for those socks;) Elder Ordejan loves the shirt but it is quite large on him.  He is only 5'3 so...it is about two sizes too big haha but he still likes it:)  Thanks so much for the package it is awesome.  

This week is our Christmas conference which yes is pretty much our mission Christmas party so pretty excited for that, especially i get to see Elder Neri again!  I looked for a philippines christmas ornament here but haven't found one yet!:( I am looking again today so pray that i find one! haha.  I am trying my best mom!  Tyler looks huge!!!!  Wow Dad! Sounds like you are quite the popular guy! (re: updates from several of Ryan's friends he saw at MV bball game) It's because you are so awesome. What a social guy!!;)  Thanks for keeping up on my boys...not long before i get home and see those guys win state next year!;)  Sounds like they are doing pretty well!  

I love you guys so much! Enjoy like anything! (my indian grammar) i have practicing it and the head bobble because i kind of lost it...:/ 

Love,
Elder Ball

December 14, 2015 - Pictures, Moncada, Paniqui, Philippines

Elder Ball with his favorite Elders in the 'pines...Elder Van Tassell and Elder Neri.

Sibayan family

Elders Ordejan and Ball with Charmie and Bianca.

Elder Ordejan, Elder Ball & JR Sibayan

Elder Ball & Elder Ordejan

December 14, 2015 - Philippines - Dalawang lingo na lang...babalik ako doon

Subject line translation: "only 2 weeks...I am returning there"

Hello every one! 

This week was....let's just say an interesting one.  We had lots of stuff going on so didn't teach as many lessons as we had planned for but still had a successful week.

One of the things that happened was on Thursday, Elder Ordejan had a District Leader's meeting and Elder Neri's comp was also part of the meeting, so i met up with Elder Neri and i swear that dude is my best friend.  He has become like a brother to me.  So just to let you know if i or we ever come back to visit the Philippines it is mandatory that we bring him with us.  I hope that is okay.  I love that guy so much.  I really missed him and i don't know just like i can't describe how awesome it was to see him again.  He literally is like my best friend now.  So that was great.

On Sunday was Stake Conference and our branch was the choir and so we sang with them at stake conference, and of course they placed me in the middle and mic'd me up so that people could hear me.  I didn't really like that too much because it made look kind of prideful and show-offy:/ But it was okay.

On Saturday we had JR Sibayan's baptism (uncle of Bianca).  He asked me to baptize him and boy is he a big dude.  But i had the strength to dunk him so that was good haha:)  He is awesome and got super emotional during his testimony, and his mom Myrna now has an awesome testimony as well and is getting baptized on the 26th!!!  I sent lots of pics today.  One of them is random and is of a baby that looks like the baby off of Ice Age haha.  But lots of good pics from baptisms and stuff.  It is crazy because i only had 6 baptisms in India in 12 months, and now will have 13 in the Philippines in just 6 months.  Totally different missions.

Speaking of different missions......Guess who has  two thumbs, is 6'3", loves bball and got his visa this week??? This guy!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! My batch got calls from President Clark on Tuesday night, and we got our visas and are going back in a week or two! Probably December 26 or  27 we will leave.  Super pumped!!!!!!!!!!! So excited!!! I am ready. 

Me and Elder Parks went on exchange again this week, and i translated for him again haha, but no more of that in a couple weeks! It was actually a miracle/blessing from a little thing called fasting.  I told our whole batch last sunday to fast for our visas, and we did and two days later we got the call.  Super awesome.  I can't even describe how pumped i am...  So that is pretty much the stuff going on here!!! Trying not to get too Indian trunky haha. 

I love the christmas cards! Especially my pic with elder neri and with John! 

I got some disappointing news though about Sandra  and Judai and  Inggo.  All three have had difficulties with the WOW since i left.  It devastates me because i really hope they are not missionary converts.....it makes me feel bad.  Now i really know how God feels when we are struggling with a commandment...it sucks.  I was quite sad about that the other day.

So anyways you guys better get on the India trip plans:)

Love you all! 
Elder Ball

December 7, 2015 - Moncada, Paniqui, Philippines

Hello!!!
A pretty dang good week for Elder Ordejan and I.  The highlight though was definitely our baptisms.  We had two baptisms on Saturday.  Elder Ordejan baptized Charmie, and I baptized Bianca.  It was a great service and a ton of Bianca's family came! They are actually becoming progressing investigators now, as a lot of them came to church for the second week in a row.  One is sister Myrna, Bianca's grandmother.  She is super Born Again Christian, but the other day after the baptism we were eating at the branch president's house and Myrna was only eating a little bit.  Elder Ordejan asked her why...she said to become lighter for her baptism.....we were really shocked haha but it was way cool.

We taught JR Andres again, (the english speaker) and that was really good...he is slowly growing in his faith and is very sincere about coming to know of the truth before making any decision, and he promised us that he will come to church next week.  He is reading the book of mormon and praying so he is doing good.  He asked about baptism the other day too, so i think God is really touching him right now.  And of course it is always refreshing for me to teach in English:)

The other JR, Bianca's uncle, passed his interview on Friday, so we will be having another baptism this upcoming Saturday!! Pretty awesome.  Having lots of baptisms in the Philippines.  To be quite honest, the Philippines is a lot easier than India.  India is so difficult and challenging.  Plus the Philippines is pretty "ripe" from what i heard from President Clark from his Mission Presidents Seminar.  

So things are going pretty good.  We are still struggling to try and find new investigators for January and we lost one of our investigators this week, because if her catholic school finds out she is learning from us they will take away her scholarship and possible expel her.  Bummer.

But anyways life is good.  Our batch fasted for our visas this week so hopefully something comes of that:)

So happy for Michelle (Dubois)! She really is something.  Such a special person.  Especially her and Tyler seem to have a special bond as well.  So happy for her.  Truly a miracle.  God definitely had everything to do with it. 

We are probably going to move this week into our branch president's house because he is leaving on the 9th...crazy but we will be closer to the church so i can play ball every morning.  This morning i played with about 7 young men.  I love the young men here.  They are awesome and it was fun playing ball with them.  Christmas is huge here.  They start it in September...no joke.  Crazy.  But they love it.  Will share more as it gets closer.

Of course really missing india now.  If i was in DapDap with Elder Neri still, honestly i would not mind staying here for longer haha.  But i am ready to get back now.  

Love you guys so much!

Elder Ball