July 31

Today is the last day of July. It has been a busy month for us. I am having problems adding pictures so until I get it figured out, I will just write our happenings.Friday July 22, we went to Legazpi for our usual day. That evening we had an English class only 2 showed up so we did a little and got to go home early. We were able to be out of the city before it was dark. It is really hard to drive here when it is dark. There are lots of big buses and of course the tricies that do not believe in using lights and then all the people along the road. We are so thankful when we finally arrive home. The next day, we had the piano lesson at 9 a.m. and had a good lesson. Kit is only eight and he knows a lot about the piano however his attention span is about 2 minutes. Merrill and Megan are brother and sister and they are teenagers. We have to be on our toes to keep  everyone interested.
Carlo Adille met us at the Church at 10:30 and we left for Dyet, a town about 2 1/2 hours away on the road to Manila. It is a beautiful drive through the mountains. Everything is all shades of green. We will be giving a Stake Employment Committee Training. We missed the church so turned around. Like everything else, once you know where it is - it is easy to find. We were late but everyone just waited. It seems like everything starts late and so the members are used to waiting.There are about no more that 15 on the committee but there were at least30+ at the meeting. There is a week long self employment training that is offered in the Philippines called Alliance for Creating Employment or ACE. The class is being offered in Naga and Dyet is invited to send interested people. There is a recruitment fireside a month before each class so when we finished out training , Carlo did the ACE activity. Carlo is the volunteer director of the Legazpi ERC office.  After all the meeting were done the members brought in some refreshments. They make a roll that is filled with hard boiled eggs and meat. They are very good. We arrived back in Naga at 8 pm.  It was a long day.
Sunday we were on the road at 7am to go to Libmanan for church. Church starts at 8:30. Again it is a beautiful drive and would have been enjoyable if the road wasn't so bumpy. There were 3 bridges being repaired so that involved even a bumpier detour. We made it in time for church however the town was having a celebration and all the streets into the town were blocked because of the parade After backing out of one street we tried another only it was blocked also. We could hear the band playing. We turned around and went to Pamplona for church. We arrived at 8:59, just in time for the meetings.That night there was a ACE recruitment fireside in Naga. Erwin Boiser the presenter had finally arrived from Manila. The Panganiban Chapel was filled with interested members. So many feel that self-employment is the only way for them to get out of the poverty that is here in the Philippines. The class was advertised to start at 6 p.m. and at 7 it got started. We have decided that we really do not have to go early to a meeting. The next morning we picked up Brother Boiser at 6 a.m. and took him to Legazpi for the ACE class that was starting that morning. It had started raining and rained all the way and back.
We were teaching the Career Workshop to missionaries that have completed  there missions. Tess had a great dinner prepared for everyone. There were 15 missionaries that were to be in the class. Elder Alforte was serving on Cantadues Island and because of the storm was not able to get off the island. The storm was now classified as a #2 typhoon. We completed the first part of the class and headed home. The road was flooded once more. I really do not like driving through that much water but we had to get home. It rained all night. As we drove to the mission home the next morning the roads were even more flooded.

        Career Workshop

It rained through Wednesday. Trees were tipping over because the ground was so saturated with water.We decided that we would not make the trip back to Legazpi this week because there was so much flooding.

                                  A tree that tipped over going into our subdivision

   
  
We went into the Mission Office and then over to the FM office where Bishop Bigtus asked us to speak in his ward on Sunday. Friday night we taught a Employment Workshop to the CES students. It was a fun to work with the young people. They made a big banner for the workshop and presented us with a gift at the end.They also had refreshments and Elder DeGrange finally got a piece of chocolate cake.
We are back at Saturday and piano lessons once more. What a week we had! Megan was the only one at the lessons this week and it was good to work with her. She needs help with the left hand and that is my weakness also but we will do ok. We attended the Naga 3rd Ward today and gave out talks. We are always thankful when assignments are completed.
Saturday, July 30 was our 48 anniversary. We bought a plant for the house and went to dinner with the Bakers and the Bliesner's. All in all it was a very good day.
We also received a card from The CTR class in our ward at home. We love getting mail