JANUARY 19, 2015

Dear Family,

Had an awesome week! First off, Madison was baptized on Saturday and then confirmed on Sunday. The baptism went well, even if the programs got printed upside down… But we had about 10 non-members at the baptism and several want to now be baptized.

The Markers are set for their baptism this weekend. They have been asking about going and doing baptisms for the dead and having callings. Hopefully I will still be here and can go to the temple to do baptisms with them.

We started teaching Michelle, the bishop’s neighbor. She is awesome! She has come to church about 4 times now and is soaking up everything she hears. We will be extending a baptism date to her this week.

We also are going to be teaching family that has moved in with Madison's family.  She and her son have been talking about being baptized now.

Things are continuing to go really well here, the Lord is hastening his work.

I hope you all had a great week! Thank you for all the letters and packages and birthday wishes!

Love,
Elder Parker

JANUARY 12, 2015

Dear Family and Friends,
Well, it was a really good week here. We have seen a lot of miracles.

We got to teach the Cherneskys and finish the teaching Maddison, so she is set for her baptism on Saturday! Woot! We are pretty excited. They also have a friend that moved in and she and her 11 year old son were asking questions about the church and wanted copies of the Book of Mormon. So we will be teaching them as we continue teaching Maddison.

We also got to see the Markers a few times. Jon is still going strong, hasn't smoked in 12 days! Still working on getting him a new job so he can come to church every week, but he is on track for baptism in 2 weeks with Eddie and Haley. Another awesome thing is that his daughter is going to be staying with him on the weekends from Philly and she wants to get baptized as well and Alyssa seems to be getting more open to the idea. Hopefully things go well this week and we can get Alyssa involved in the lessons.

We had several investigators come to church, one of which was the Bishop’s neighbor and she brought her mother. We got to set up an appointment for tomorrow and will be teaching her in Bishop’s home. So awesome!

Carmen and Iran are doing about the same.

The Birthday was good, spent some time with the Markers and they made me Cupcakes and Fudge. They are awesome, some of my favorite people from the mission.

Thank you all for the Packages and the letters. I love you all!

Oh I got an email back from Tianxu! He said it took so long because he has been busy and his dad doesn’t read English, lol. He is still doing well.

Hope you all have a great week! Love you!
Elder Parker

JANUARY 5, 2015

Dear Family,

Well, we had a much better week than the one before. We have been able
to see Carmen and Iran a few times, we reset their date for the 31st.
Carmen made it to church and Iran will be there this week. We were
able to see them with bishop and his wife which went really well.

The Markers came to church! All of them. It was great. Last week we
started on Jon’s resume and his family tree. We were able to find a ton
of names, we will be helping him with that again this week. Hopefully
his schedule works out and they will still be baptized on the 24th. He
hasn't smoked since the new year! That family is awesome.

We are going to be teaching the bishops neighbor soon. She has come a
few times to church and we gave her a Book of Mormon last week. She
wants to meet with us, we are pretty excited.

Maddison is still on for her baptism on the 17th. The way we have
things layed out right now we should have a baptismal service the last
three weeks of the month, it'll be great.

New Years was good, we were on exchanges so I was with Elder Lee.

Not much else happened this week. Thanks for all that you all do! I
love you all!

Love,
Elder Parker

DECEMBER 29, 2014

Dear Family and friends,

Well, not too much to report on. It was great to be able to Skype on Thursday.

Not much happened this last week besides Christmas. Haven't been able
to be in contact with Carmen and Iran... Little worried about them,
but the bishops neighbor came to church for the 2nd week in a row,
hopefully we can teach her soon. Markers are doing well, Cherneskys
are doing good.

Hope everyone had a good Christmas and a great new year! I love you all!

Love,
Elder Parker

DECEMBER 22, 2014

Dear Family,

Merry Christmas!

This week was really good here in Exeter. We were able to work with the Markers a lot. They are doing awesome! We were able to attend their wedding on Saturday, tons of fun. Their 9 kids though… man, I do not know how they do it.

We also were able to see Carmen and Iran and their daughter Linda. We had a few really great lessons. Linda wants to be baptized on the same day as her parents and they all came to church this Sunday and really enjoyed it.

We were able to see the Cherneskys and celebrate 3 birthdays with them. That was fun.

Not much else has happened. We have our Christmas conference on Wednesday.

Hope you all have a great Christmas! I love you all!


Love,
Elder Parker

DECEMBER 15, 2014

Dear Family,

Well, we had a really good week. We were able to see Carmen and Iran a
lot, they are doing well. We had a really
good lesson with them and our Bishop. We were teaching about
keeping the sabbath day holy, and our bishop related the scripture
from when Christ was performing the atonement and his apostles fell
asleep and he asks "can ye not watch with me one hour." That scripture
really hit home with Iran.

We also have been seeing the Brady Bunch family a lot. Jon the dad,
Eddie who is 10, and Haley who is 11 all have baptismal dates for
January, and they are progressing so fast! It's so great! They
couldn't come to church this week because of his work schedule but he
wanted us to come by so he could hear about it and what the lessons
were on so he wouldn't get behind. They have been reading the Book of
Mormon together and love it. Also, another great thing is that they
are getting married on Saturday by bishop! Woot! It's been pretty last
second, but they are going to surprise all their family at a holiday
party, with the fact they are getting married right then and there, it
should be pretty awesome.

Also, all the missionaries in our Ward are staying for this next 7
week transfer, so excited! Which means Elder Peterson goes home from
this area in 7 weeks. Another strange side note, 3 of my companions
Elder Thomas, Elder Shaw and Elder Pintor all fly home tomorrow! Ah!
It's crazy.

Well, I think that is about all that happened this week. Hope you all
have a good week! Love you!


Love,
Elder Parker

DECEMBER 8, 2014

Dear Family,

Well, it was another good week here in Exeter. The beginning of the
week started off slow, but it picked up near the end. I think I told
you about Jon and Kimmie, a new family that moved into our
area? Kimmie is the only member and they have 9 kids, yes, 9.
Well Jon and the 3 kids who are 8 and up want to get baptized! Woot!
They are all super awesome. We spent a really big chunk of Tuesday
helping Jon move things from his old house. Then they all came to
church. They were all soo quiet, I was impressed.

So we were able to teach them this last week, we also were able to see
the Cherneskys and set their 9 year old with a baptismal date, which
was good. Then we were able to see Carmen and Iran. They are doing
well.They watched the Christmas devotional and enjoyed it and they are looking forward to
the ward Christmas party this week.

That really is about all that happened this week. We had exchanges
which were fun. We have a few meetings this week and we also get
transfer calls this week. Let's hope Elder Roberts and I both stay.

Thank you for all you do! I love you all!


Love,
Elder Parker