Maiana 22 Nov 2015 handwritten letter arrived Dec 14

Peace, chill, swag, Dawg

That's pretty much our life our here nowadays. Haha not. But seriously though how y'all doing nowadays? Sitting here with one of my Maiana sisters Nei (respectful way of addressing girls) Teitiranga (Tayee-gee-rah-ngah) who is same age as Beth. Weird making comparisons like that when the Beth I remember is what like eleven...

So what's life like in America nowadays For us here on  Mwaiana we are stoked for our baptism this Saturday with some of our favorite people including Teitiranga so that's exciting (This paragraph was written in different handwriting.)

P.S. She's the one that wrote that part for me. Writes better than I do huh?

Also this past week I learned/gained the finishing touches on my building Kiribati houses. Including building walls out of coconut branches and make rope out of decayed coconut husks which is called "Taokora". 1001 uses of coconut trees right? People can survive on just that tree and its fruit. Or in other words WE survive on just that tree and its fruit. :) I'll have to bring one home and show you all how it's done.

Yeah so other fun news. We're starting/started a temple class for the members here to get a few families ready to head out and the eventual goal is obviously all of the families here. We have one sweet RM named Johnny and his wife Rereiti (recent convert of Elders Klatt and Loe) who I think will be farshore ready to head out in a few months. Different RM is teaching the class for us, named Tebwi (from Beru, taught his dad while I was there) who's going to do a great job teaching the class.

School's different here and summer break is starting now so all of the kids who go to school on Tarawa aka Moroni HS are coming back for break. So that's fun. Also Christmas package showed up this past week. Geesh Mom. That thing is huge! But way thanks. Stoked to give all the toys to kids at our Christmas party! It's going to be rough not to open the presents and stuff before Christmas. Big thanks for all the gifts for my comp since he likely won't get anything from his family for Christmas but you all gave us more than enough for both of us.

Sorry. Email hasn't been working so I guess letters will have to do for now!

I love you guys tons of buckets full

Elder Pettingill

These pictures were posted by a member last week on Facebook. I believe they are from when Daniel was in Tarawa before he transferred to Maiana. The older man is President Weir, the mission president.

This pictures does not include Elder Pettingill but look at that amazing view!

Maiana 16 Nov 2015 handwritten letter arrived Dec 14

Hey Guys

Fun Fact: the humidity here seals shut any envelopes that don't have a peel off for their sticky part. So I have different ones I found on Christmas.

Wasup? Yeah much not here either, just got back from checking the internet...Not working again. Hey but the fact that even has been working before was more than anyone expected. So I'm chill with it. I like writing letters anyways. I always feel very relaxed (optimistic) afterwards whereas emailing just drains me. Not used to handling electronics anymore. : )

So this morning we ate home cooked chicken. We biked through the pouring rain to a northern village to pick the chicken up. We were soaked. It's been raining pretty nonstop lately. Haha kinda lost my train of thought just met this guy next to our house our age who's way chill. He's been kinda friends with all the elders here on my Maiana since they came almost 2 years ago. Also these way nice members (one is our investigator) came and washed our clothes for us. We got a volleyball sent out to us. So stoked to use that on P-days nowadays.

Spiritual experience: One problem I have seen time to time is I get a prompting/random verse come to my mind to share with investigators but I won't know where to find it/it would take too long. One thing I've really been working on is recording/putting it in easy to find place every time I find a lesson that would be helpful. Well, this past week I asked an investigator what he thought it meant to be saved, following a prompting. The answer to my own question came in a verse I'd read a week or two ago. Alma 11:37 I thought it was cool and it really clicked with our investigator. His name is Teinatoa (Te enan toe-ah ). I think especially since he was the first one to church on Sunday with his little daughter, even though it was his first time coming. Way sweet. We are working long hard days out here trying to do our very best obediently and leading this unit/branch. Nice to see fruits of your labors/tender-mercies every now and then.

Lesson we got in an email from Pres Weir a couple of weeks ago. Talk of Pres Hinckley's to missionaries and how we "should get on our knees and plead with the Lord" every morning in prayer for specific blessings. That includes weaknesses. We can pray for specific weaknesses to be strengths.

Love you ALL

Elder Pettingill

Tatangiringkami