Merry Christmas! ...and new years

Hello!

I hope everyone had a great Christmas, I personally loved mine! It was great to talk to my family, and hang out with the members down here, and of course to remember the Savior. 

I had a lot of fun this week with Christmas and Christmas Eve. On Christmas Eve we had to be in by 6, but we got permission to go to our DL's apartments where we had a fire and played games for a couple of hours. It was great. Christmas Day we started off with a mini zone meeting and then went over to the McMillans' where we spent a few hours waiting for people skyping, eating dinner and playing with new presents haha. Thanks to mom and dad for providing a drum set so my comp and I could jam out for a bit. It was super fun. 

This next week is a little weird because it's New Years. It's going to be 2016, which means it's the year I come home...weird. I had no idea it actually went this fast! But, I'm not gonna let that get me too distracted, I've still got plenty of time. I want you guys to know I love you all and hope you have a great New Year!!

Elder Packer

Merry Christmas!!

Feliz Navidad muchachos!

This last week was crazy and had a really fun surprise at the end. We did a lot of prepping for Christmas this week, helping out members and such. I ended up staying in Harlingen for those that don't know, and we got some cool people in the zone. Elder Taylor, the greenie from my last apartment in Hidalgo came to the district as Elder Cannell's comp, and Sister Guzmán is in the zone in Chambo's district. There's a lot of real fun people in the zone, perfect for Christmastime. 

I went on an exchange with Elder Cannell on Thursday, it was pretty fun, we taught a really cool word of wisdom lesson, and the lady is progressing super well, and came to church all happy on Sunday. Friday we planned a lot and ended up having another meeting after that, and we went and visited Carlos and Eliza and taught their seven year-old daughter the law of Chastity dance. It was pretty fun, Elder Prieto got super into it. Then on Saturday we had the mini missionaries from Brownsville come up. We weren't blessed with one, but to my much pleasure, I got to reunite with some of my homies from Brownsville 3! It was really cool to see them during our Saturday Zone meeting, I was super happy to spend a little time with them. I miss Brownsville a lot. Nothing will ever be so great:) 

But that's about how my week was. I'm really excited for this next week, tomorrow we have Christmas Conference with the whole mission, which is a rarity because the only other time the entire mission has gotten together in the 2 and a half years that President Maluenda has been mission president was when Elder Oaks was in McAllen. It's gonna be super fun, I can't wait to see my son again and all my other mission homies:) Then we've got Christmas Eve and Christmas, and that pretty much covers all of this week! I'm excited:) 

I hope you all have a very Merry Christmas, don't forget whose birthday we're celebrating on Friday (other than Kamry's). I love you all!! Have a great week and a Happy Christmas!!

Elder Packer

Transferencias

Good morning and merry Christmas!!

I hope everyone is having a great day and great Christmas Season. It's been a fun week getting ready for Christmas and for transfers and everything. I don't think me or my companion will be transferred, but who knows haha I thought the same thing last time. 

This week has been really good, we've been teaching some really cool people, meeting some really cool people and we've been focusing on spreading the message of The Reason of the Season. Christmastime on the mission is like nothing else. A lot of people down here get caught up in gifts and decorations and movies and parties and things like that, but as a missionary you are really only concerned about the one thing that really matters on Christmas, and that is our Savior, Jesus Christ. Back home we always talk about Him and that He is the real reason for Christmas, but you never really get to focus all of your time on that. 

Christmas was always one of my favorite holidays because of time spent with family and the presents and food hahaha. But now as a missionary, I've come to love Christmas for an entirely different reason. The greatest gift that was ever given was our Savior, "for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son." That gift gave us the opportunity to repent, to change, to become better, to love deeper, to grow stronger, to get over guilt and sadness, to be calmed from anxieties and depressions, and most importantly to return to live with our Heavenly Father and become like Him. So this day that has always been a day for family fun and parties and presents is really a celebration of Him who allowed us to have eternal family fun and parties and presents. I'm truly grateful for that this year:)

Outside of that, I'm glad to be on my mission:) I love the mission, I love my companions, I love the members and all the people I've gotten to meet, it's been great. That's really all i had to say this week, I hope you all have a wonderful week!:) We'll see what happens with transfers, hopefully I stay, but lo que pasa pasa. Love you all!!:)

Elder Packer

Can you Dig it?

Hooowwwdy yall!

This week was really fun, really crazy, and really interesting! We had some time spent in McAllen for a couple of us, we found some really cool people that we're still working with, we got to see the devotional, we found about about a lot of missionary meetings this month....it's gonna be a great month!:) 

Anywho, we had a lot of fun this week, we had a Ward Christmas party where we performed a skit as missionaries (I can't send a video, but you can probably look it up on my mom's FB page, I bet she liked it or shared it or something hahah) and then we have been helping a lot of members prepare for Christmas. 

Because it's Christmas time and everyone is sharing messages about sharing, I just wanted to talk about what the missionaries have been sharing...:) we have some pass along cards that are specifically for this time of year, this year. It's got a website (christmas.mormon.org) for a video you can watch that's about Christmas, and what the true meaning is, and there's a lot of really cool things on there. For those of you that need something to do for FHE, this would be a really great idea. 

That's basically all for this week. I'm getting pumped for Christmas, as I hope you guys all are too! I love you all!

Elder Packer

1. Christmas Party exchange with Elder Acosta

2. Catholic Santa

3. Tie Digging!