Christmas Conference 2011

It has been a big week in the Texas Houston Mission, the highlight being the annual Christmas conference held yesterday.  It was wonderful to be together as a mission to learn, worship, serve and enjoy one another during this wonderful time of year.  The day began with a mission picture taken by a member photographer.  After we gathered for a two-hour morning devotional where President Pingree taught us about the Atonement of Jesus Christ through discussion and power point presentation. We then made sack lunches and boarded buses (paid for by an anonymous church member) and headed to the Houston Food Bank where we had the opportunity to sort food and package rice.  After our service activity we went back to the church for mission Olympics, a Christmas dinner and an evening musical fireside where we heard from many of your talented missionaries on the piano, violin, clarinet and guitar.  We also heard some amazing vocal arrangements.  As you can imagine, it was a long, uplifting, spiritual day for all of us and we thank the many church members and senior missionaries for their tireless efforts in helping to make this day possible for the Texas Houston missionaries.  Please enjoy a few pictures from the event.

Getting ready for the mission picture

Packing sack lunches

Traveling to the Houston Food Bank

Receiving instructions at the Houston Food Bank

Missionaries ready to sort

Mission t-shirts were worn to protect our proselyting clothing

Rice room

Cleaning up

 

Missionaries at the Houston Food Bank

Boarding buses

Mission games

Mission games

Mission games

Surprise visit from Santa

Christmas dinner

New Missionaries with Trainers

This week we held transfers in the Texas Houston Mission!  Ten wonderful missionaries went home and we received fourteen new missionaries from the MTC.  At this point, we only have the following pictures of our new missionaries with their trainers.  We hope to post all pictures from transfers shortly after we resolve an issue with our memory card.  Elder Englehart and Jumenez are not pictured below.  We were unable to catch them after the training meetings.

Elders Green, Moesel and Lowe

Elders Troester and Itow

Elders Francis and Crane

Elders Bartholomew and Bitton

Elders Syme and Hardy

Elders Schmidt and Curtis

Elders Wilkes and Knight

Elders Hicks, Rodriquez and Lewis

Elders Englund and Boehmer

Elders Stepp and Gardner

Elders Murphy and Fox

Elders Stanford and McClellan

Sister Hanson and Perez

Journey to Bethlehem and Santos Venid

Please enjoy pictures taken from two Christmas events - Journey to Bethlehem in Huntsville and Santos Venid in the Houston 10th Ward.  We also had a wonderful picture of Elder and Sister Nagel at the nativity, but couldn't get the picture to turn upright!

Elders Smith and Sagal participate in Huntsville's
Journey to Bethlehem

A few missionaries visit exhibit with recent converts

Elders Smith and Sagal with young shepherds

Santos Venid

Elders Murillo and Driggs with Sister Adaoag and Edge
serving in the Houston 10th Ward

Elders Trotter and Huntington

President Pingree and Elder Cawley

Elder Murillo visits with a ward member

Elder Huntington visits with ward members

Specialized Training for Spanish-speaking Missionaries

Please enjoy a few pictures from a training held for Spanish-speaking missionaries which was held two weeks ago. We thank the good members of the local branch for providing a yummy lunch for the missionaries.