JULY 28, 2014

Dear Family,

Well this week was another great one here in South Philly! Now the
challenge is to see if I can remember everything and then put it down
in a way to make it as awesome as it was...

Monday! Well, it was a great day full of nothing, other than a really
fun lesson with a less active named Jessie. Then we got like halfway to the church and realized Elder
Cottle didn't have his SEPTA pass.... So ya, we tried various ways to
get another and it just didn't make fiscal sense and so we have been
walking this last week. Lots of walking. Tuesday we had to go to
center city, and probably walked 55 blocks, Wednesday was about 60 blocks and
Thursday was about 75-80 blocks. My feet are gonna be like rocks! Calves of
steel! It's been fun.

Tuesday was a pretty busy day, taught the Marinellis, Carmen, Phatsala
and Ron. It was pretty awesome.

Wednesday, another busy day. Taught Mimi, Jessie again, brother
McDowel, Wayne and Sharon and Marlene. Marlene's lesson was awesome.
Brother Mounelasy came (high priests group leader) and bore great
testimony, we taught the restoration and she had great questions and
seemed to understand fairly well, we will be following up this week on
her reading and prayers. She could progress quickly if she gets an
answer.

Thursday, meetings, then walking all the way to center city, pretty
much as far south to as far north, for a dinner with the Steffens.
Which was awkward, they live in this super nice building with one of
those door guys downstairs that doesn't really think you are welcome... Ya.
It worked out though, then we did our home teaching of the Degeners.
It was good.

Friday, went to the Ronald McDonald house and did service with the
Spanish Elders. It was fun and then picked up your package. It was
great. Then we did exchanges, I went to the east side. Had some fun
with Elder Pead. They live with the Spanish elders in a house, pretty awesome.
Oh, we named all the rooms in the house and their basement bathroom is
called Scranton lol. It's pretty secluded.

Saturday we had a Pioneer branch activity. Not too many people came and
we (missionaries) started doing double Dutch in the assembly room. It
was pretty awesome, Elder Pead and Elder Mask are pretty great at it.
Then all our appointments fell through for the day (5) and we did some
walking and calls and finding. Pretty uneventful.

Sunday  we went to church and had dinner and a lesson with the Tomlins.
It was crazy, felt like a marriage class.

It was an awesome week, went by really fast! Crazy to think the
transfer is half over already! Thanks for all that you do, love you
all!

Love,
Elder Parker

JULY 21, 2014

Dear family,

This week was pretty great, we have been super busy, which is really
good. Don't do any tracting, but people just stop us on the street so
it's pretty neat.

Monday was awesome, we shopped at a place called bottom dollar. Got like
2 weeks of groceries for cheap. Then played ping pong for a few hours
at the church with the other elders. Then saw the Tomlins, recent
converts.

Tuesday was a packed day, taught Carmen, Ron, Mccoreys and Marinellis.

Wednesday we taught Claude and Arlene and Anita

Thursday we saw the Caramandi's (spelling)

Friday we saw Marlene and Phatsala.

Saturday we played football with the young men. It was awesome, played
at FDR park, could see the eagles practice facility across the street,
I think they were scouting me out as a QB ;) it was fun. It's a huge
sports complex though. The Eagles stadium is there, the phillies
stadium and the 76ers/ flyers stadium, all right next to each other.
Then we saw the Marinellis again, and a less active named Jesse. It
was fun.

Don't remember if I mentioned last Sunday I gave a talk, and taught in
relief society, this week elder Cottle and I taught elders quorum :P
on eternal marriage! Its was strange... Anyways, went well. Then we
did home teaching at the Teps.

Loving my time here in south Philly. We cover south of market street
and west of broad. The water is the other two boarders.

We have 6 elders here. West (us), east and Spanish. It's a branch.
Can't think of too many other random things.... Hope you all have a
great week!

Love ya

JULY 14, 2014

Dear family,

Well, got transferred! Now I am in South Philadelphia, serving the
area south of Market Street and west of Broad, it's about 1/4 of
Philly. I think we decided we probably have a little over a million
people in our area. It has actually been picking up a lot recently.We
have some very full days and are meeting with a lot of people that
have tons of potential. We are currently booked out until Friday. My
companion is Elder Cottle, he is so great, already love this guy. We
get along really well. He has been out about a year. We have similar
tech interests and he is the mission tech guy, so we set up and taught
the new missionaries on their iPads Tuesday and Wednesday, it was a
blast to be in the mission office for a few hours.

We use SEPTA here in Philly. It’s pretty great, except the buses run super
slow on Saturday and even slower on Sundays if at all. We have been
riding the subway, that's a first, now I know how accurate all those
games were that had subways in them ;)

I have only been in Philly less than a week and I already do not want
to leave. It's wonderful! I gave a talk on Sunday on baptism as an
ordinance and covenant and taking upon us the name of Christ. It went
pretty well. There are lots of students in our branch. The church is on Broad
and Wyoming. It’s in the 2nd floor of a glass building, which is different but
good. The church has a ping pong table that will be used today :D.

Update on Milford: well they replaced us with....... SISTERS!!
Speaking of which, It was super hard to say goodbye to the Houses and even
harder to say goodbye to Brother Moll. Super tough, left a piece of my
heart in his home.

Anyway, 3 sets of elders in this branch, no sisters. It is also
our district, so it's super fun. Us, the east elders and the Spanish
elders. The east and Spanish elders live in the same apartment.

Well. If this letter sounds scrambled with tons of info.... Now you
know how my brain has felt this week ;) It's been great though, some
of the greatest times of my mission so far. Working hard as well,
Should lose some of that Newark/Milford weight ;)

Love you all!
Elder Parker

JULY 7, 2014

Dear Family,

Well, this week was pretty crazy. Found out that both Elder Shaw and I are being transferred. Pretty sure they are going to put new Elders in, but not certain. It was actually humbling to have many members of the branch say goodbye to us and to see how sad they were that we were leaving.
Brother Moll is pretty sad to see us leaving. He found out his brother up the road who he hasn't spoken to in 10 years had a stroke and is in the hospital. It pushed him to decide to forgive him and try to make amends, hopefully it works out. He told us that Elder Shaw and I are like his sons and he wants us to come visit after if he is still alive, saying goodbye today will be really hard.
We spent a good chunk of time with one of my favorite families, the Houses! They had us over last Sunday, and on Friday for fireworks and Clarissa's birthday, she turned 8. An old missionary, Elder Nabors was there visiting as well, it was a party, had a great time. Then they had us over last night to say goodbye, it was really hard to leave.
Other than that, not much really happened this week. Joe, Mary, and Scott haven't even responded to us saying goodbye.... so that stinks. We will be saying goodbye to Edith today. Her daughter said she cried when we called to let them know....
Anyway, transfers are tomorrow. Should be interesting. Love ya all!
Oh! Susan... So finally heard back from her via email and figured out skype and we are now connected via skype. So hopefully in the next few weeks I will be able to video call her to teach her! Woot!


Love,
Elder Parker

Brother Moll

The House Family