FIrst Panama District Convention

Our convention this year was on September 8th and 9th. This year unfortunatly Panama had only 2 of the 3 days. We're hoping next year we will be able to have 3 again. It just shows how badly brothers are needed to care for the parts. For us it was about a 6 hour drive. I've never traveled for a convention before and never realized how much work is involved! It was overwhelming and felt we were moving all over again, but we made it with everything we needed. The assembly hall is on the grounds of the old branch. We drove through the gates and it was breathtaking how gorgeous it is! The grounds are kept up so beautifully. It literally brought tears to our eyes. It is an open air assembly hall. This year from what we heard some of Panama was sent to the Costa Rican convention so we weren't sure how many people would be there. On Saturday we had a grand total of 433. On Sunday there was around 600.  We met some very nice brothers and sisters from all over. Here is a picture from the front of the assembly hall.

 

 

And here is a picture from the back looking at the stage.

 

 

And this is from our seats looking out to the grounds

 

From the side looking in

 

 

And finally the baptism pool!

 

We realized the little mountain town we live in is quite nice. The weather here is so mild and cool at times. Where the convention is we really experienced true Panama weather. It was so hot and sticky. We literally were all drenched in sweat. Poor Kaia'a cheeks were so pink I thought she was going to overheat but she did ok. By the end of the first day we couldn't wait to jump in the pool at our house. We now understood why every home we passed on the way there had a pool!

 

Here is a picture of the girls with a dear sister from our congregation.



 

 

A family that is studying with a couple from our hall.  

 

 

 

Some of the sisters in our congregation

 

And here is a current picture of our family

 

 

 

 

Los Cangilones de Gualaca

We went with some friends to what we call as "the river" to go swimming. It's a beautiful river that has rocks to climb and rocks to jump off of.  The water was suprisingly clear. We could see down quite a ways. At first we were very leary of jumping off, especially the girls. But seeing our friends jump in and come back to the surface safely reassured us it was ok. :)  The water was so cold that it took our breaths away. But we soon got used to the temperature and really enjoyed it! The girls loved it. They kept jumping and jumping. Here's a picture of Whitney, Aribey and Cooper swimming.

 

The is the area where we get out of the water.

Here is a local climbing the rocks. The guys are so comfortable and know every inch of these rocks. You can tell they have been coming here since they could walk. 

As we were getting ready to leave several locals showed up. The show they put on I can't even describe. So here's a video to watch.