July 15, 2013

Hey family!!!! :) How are you all doing? Well.. I have some big news for you. This week was pretty good, we worked really hard. So i'll give you a clue.. "the best two years" when the President goes to the house of the missionaries.. Well.. This thursday the President came to our house! It was the coolest thing. The Zone leaders called us Wednesday night that we were going to have interviews in the office or our house. so we said okay. Then we were like, well he won't come to the house. But luckily I started cleaning a Little that night and everything. But not like the house was really messy, just a little bit. Then we were planning for the week on Thursday morning and we were waiting for the President to call. He didn't call forever, so we figured he wasn't going to call us. Then at the end he called.. My companion was in the bathroom. He said "Elder Parker, are you in your house?" I was like yeah. He said "wait for me i'm heading your way right now." So we hung up and we hurried and cleaned a little more and got everything ready. haha my companion was really nervous. Because he didn't think he would come. But I told him he probably would. Then he arrived in about 10 minutes. We met him outside, and he said "Well let's go to Lomas." Another área in the district with other missionaries. So we grabbed our backpacks and hopped in his car with him. We traveled like 30 minutes with him to the other área. I was in shotgun talking with the President. I felt like I was with dad in the car. Then we got to the house of the other elders. We entered their house and he said.. Well let's make some changes. I need your help. He had a few maps. And it turns out we created another new área in the district and split another área and changed everything. It turns out that here in my área will now have sister missionaries. So we are automatically transferring next Monday. We created another área, which we have been working in that área this week and our área. He told us to look for a house also to rent. So we have been looking for a house. So the other Ward will now have 4 missionaries and our Ward sister missionaries. It is weird because I already know I am going to leave next week. But we still don't know if we will go to the new área and open an área or leave to another part of the misión. It should be really interesting!! I am excited to know what will happen. Then we ended with the President and he took us back to our área to eat some lunch with some members. So that was such a great experience. He has been calling us about the houses and stuff also. I am happy and will miss my área but changes are always good! :)
That is so sweet that you are getting a puppy!! The dog looks really playful and happy. It has rained so much here this past week, and it looks like it will rain right now!! The road was crazy again and one car passed, which was crazy and the wáter was higher than the Windows of the car. hahaha it was insane. There is still water flowing down our road at this instant. Well I love you all. Thanks for everything. Love Elder Parker

July 8, 2013

Hey mom!! How are you doing? I am doing great! This last week was amazing!! I had the best time ever. I was so blessed. My birthday was fantastic thank you so much for the presents and the packages and all the letters. It was awesome because in the morning of my birthday my companion put up streamers from the package and blew up balloons. While I was in the bathroom he laid all the packages out, except one so I could open it. And he bought me a tie and made some oragami stuff. It was really awesome!! So that morning I couldn't enter the room with all the presents. Then my companion put on some music and started recording me and I entered the room and saw all the presents and it was so sweet. Then we went to the zone meeting later that morning and when I arrived everyone came up to me and wished me happy birthday. Elder Stevenson gave me a tie and a letter and elder Gaytan gave me some pictures and a snickers. It was so awesome. I also received more letters from you and the family and from Court and Grandpa and Grandma Linda and some friends. Then I also received the package of the Fourth of July and the package from Dave and Nat.
So a few elders had interviews with the President that morning. But he had to leave early so I didn't have mine. I was like well... he didn't remember my birthday. Then all of a sudden at the end of the meeting, he showed up with his wife with a birthday cake! And everyone took pictures and we ate the cake. I was like, "No way... "It was the neatest thing ever!! We took some pictures of that. I was really happy and it hurt smiling because I was always smiling. Then he took us to his office and gave us a brand new microwave. Because we didn't have one that worked. After that we went home to drop off everything and elder Macias pulled out a package from his family and the things were for me!! They gave me some treats from Liverpool, a store in Mexico, and a tie also! They also gave me letters. It was so neat. Then we went and ate at a returned missionaries house. He bought us some food from San Marcos. A really expensive restaurant. It was like pizza but made of pork and cheese and steak. It tasted so good! After that we worked and taught a little bit. Then in the night we did service, painted. And after they made us dinner for my birthday and gave us flan. It is like a cake more or less. It tasted so good. So the whole house is still decorated with presents and balloons. I loved my birthday. Thank you so much. We ate so much on my birthday that my companion couldn't lay down at night because he was so full. hahahha It was so hilarious. We were so so full.


The Fourth of July we sang hymns, the Star Spangled Banner and waved the flag and took pictuers in the night. I put that mini tie on my backpack the whole day to celebrate the fourth. It was a great day. Then the fifth was a great day also. (My hump day). We had a fun day and I interviewed some investigators to be baptized from our district. So we got to travel to another area like 30 minutes away. This week has been great. Thanks for everything! This week I also tried some different food. I ate little fish. Really small and the head and everything. It tasted really weird. hahah Well I will go so we can talk. I love you. Bye :)

July 1, 2013

Hey mom :) How are you doing? How is the family doing? We are doing great! Sorry I took so long to get on, we had to run a few errands. But we got to eat at Little Caesars pizza hahah. Thanks so much for the birthday wishes and all the emails and pictures. It sounds like the cabin went really well. I was really worried last week because you didn't email back, I thought something happened to you guys. But the Lord comforted me throughout the week. I am so grateful.


This week was a good week, we are having difficulties finding people to teach but we are working hard. I know this week will go by better, a lot better!! :)
Wow, so it rained so so so hard here last Wednesday. I am serious, harder than it has ever rained here. It was insane. We were teaching a few members in their house when it started raining. We finished the lesson and I was like, well we need to leave now. And they said, you are not going to leave. They got that right!! We were trapped in their house three hours straight! It was raining so so hard, and the lightning and thunder was so powerful! The whole main street was flooded and they had to block off the entire road. All the streets had rivers. Wow.. and our street where we live. You won't believe it. They blocked it off, the water pressure was so strong that it took out a wall!! And the wall washed away with the river. The people were emptying their houses with buckets of water! It was the craziest thing ever! Luckily we live on the second floor so nothing happened to our house. There were cars in the roads stuck and couldn't move. Than the next day a tractor came and scooped up all the sand in the street. It took like 3 or 4 dump trucks to remove it all in just 60 yards. It was funny because we were watching them clean it all up in the morning. It was quite a storm, and right now it is raining again! I love the rain. Well I will go so we can chat. Thanks for everything :) We will have our zone meeting on my birthday!! love Elder Parker

June 24, 2013

Whoa there!! Those are some pretty cool stories that happened in Yellowstone and with Court! How was the cabin? I hope it went great! The pictures look awesome!! :) This week went really well for us. We did divisions with a few Elders in our district this week. So I went to Suchiapa the área of Elder Stevenson with his companion. It is so different over there. We traveled in a van like 40 minutes and it was so Green! It was like a redneck city it was so funny. Elder Stevenson calls it Radiator Springs. Like the movie "Cars", I'm in Radiator Springs get me out of here. hahah It was a really small town. It was really hot and a ton of insects were always on our faces. It was a good experience. I tried a new fruit over here it is called rambután and another fruit is pitaya. The pitaya is pink on the outside and like white with dots in the inside. And the rambután has a weird shell with hair and inside it tastes like a huge grape! So crazy!

Wow, yesterday we listened to the transmisión of "The Work of Salvation"or something like that. It was a broadcast by the Prophet and his apostles for the missionaries, the Misión Presidents and Ward councils. It was so powerful, you will have to watch it, it is like 2 hours long. I got to watch it in the stake center in English with air conditioning. :) The coolest part also was that I saw Colton singing in the choir!!!! There were thousands of missionaries there and I saw him!! There was so many, it was powerful to see all of them. They said there are over 70,000 missionaries in the world now. I feel the spirit so strong right now, and when I was watching the broadcast also. I know this work is of the Lord. Wow.. I loved the broadcast!!

Today a member washed our clothes, that was really nice! The other day I heard the song It's a Wonderful World. That's a great song. Well I will go so we can chat. I hope you are safe on the ride home. Thanks for the pictures :) Love Elder Parker

(This is Elder Parkers mom--the cool stories he's talking about, is that on the same day he saw the huge Iguana, just minutes after he sent us the picture, Lauren and I and Elder Parkers grandpa and grandma saw a bat in town in Yellowstone. It was hanging on a sweatshirt outside--in broad daylight! And the day before that sister Parker saw a huge hairy tarantula that almost fell on her from the top of her door--on her mission in Nicaragua. (There's a picture on her blog). So it was a few days of crazy, curious, creepy, critters!!! And all within 2 days of each other!!)

June 17, 2013

Hey mom and family!! I love you all!! This week went by really well! We celebrated elder Macias birthday a lot. Thank you so much for the package and the celebrations that you sent for him. It was really fun what I did in the morning of his birthday. The morning of I was eating breakfast and he was sitting next to me, then he jumped into the shower and I got on my horse and whipped open the package and started putting a lot of presents on his desk and blowing up balloons and banners. I was running around like a wild chicken. And right when he was leaving the shower I finished and jumped in the bathroom after. Then after he was really excited. He couldn't stop saying wow wow thank you so much. We took a picture for every present and we filmed the opening and everything. It was really fun. He thanks me for you guys every day. I wrote him a poem hahah. So he had a great birthday! We went to the offices this morning and I got my other package from you guys and letters. I haven't had time to open the letters or package yet. But thanks a lot!! :)


I loved this week, it went by really fast. We passed the week with a lot of memories. And you won't ever believe what happened. We were walking to email you guys right now when we passed an iguana. A ton of people were watching it on a telephone line. I took a picture so I will try and send it to you. I am excited that you are in Yellowstone, that is the funniest thing ever. Because right before right now, I was eating with the members and told them we had a cabin in Yellowstone and we were talking about all the animals and everything for a long time, then I found out you were there!! What a coincidence. I love the cabin! Make sure you enjoy it there!


The baptism went really well! He was really happy and a lot of people showed up :) I will try and send some pictures of the baptism also. He has had a hard life, he has changed so much. I remember when we first met him, Leonardo, he was really different and a little crazy. But now he has changed so much and prays and has the desire to do whats right, he has quit doing a lot of things and I know he has changed because the gospel helps us change. It is a miracle. I have sure enjoyed seeing him change. What a miracle. Wow.. He is 20 years old. His mom and dad are separated. He relies a lot on Dios now. Well I will go so we can chat. :) Thanks!! I love you all.

June 10, 2013

Hey mom!! How are you doing? I am doing great as always! Wow this week was awesome!! :) The baptism was absolutely amazing. It was really spiritual. She was filled with the spirit. Her family showed up and some members even. We took a bunch of pictures before. I felt the spirit so strongly during her baptism. After she bore her testimony! She was crying and she said, now, my next step is to serve a mission. Wow.. How powerful that was. I can't wait for her to leave on a mission. It went really great. This week was really good. And guess what, no one in my district is transfering. We are all staying the same. So I will have Elder Macias's birthday here my birthday here, the 4th of July here and my hump day. What an experience! I am glad I get to stay because we will have another baptism this Saturday! So I wanted to stay for that. I like this area, there is everything here in the area. Dominos', Little Caesars, Walmart, a bunch of other stores too. Burger King, KFC, it is like the middle middle city. I am really happy serving the Lord, I have felt the spirit so much lately. I know the spirit testifies of the truth. I sent off a letter today for court! I miss that girl. We will be opening the package for Elder Macias soon! Thanks so much :) I love you all. I am so glad that you finally got those letters. The one champion one I drew the picture when I was really sick and in bed all day. But I finally got to send it off. I am glad youi liked the letters! I love those kind of movies, like 17 Miracles. That is awesome! The Lone Ranger, I don 't remember what that is. But our mission leader in our ward was asking me about it, he told me to ask my parents if they knew, which is funny because you just told me about it coming out on my birthday. It has been really hot here, but that 's normal. Today we ate in Dominos! haha tastes pretty good. Mccrae wrote me, which was really nice. I miss that guy. Well we also had the activity of the Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith. It went really good. I bore my testimony! I felt really good, and so did the members. well I'll go now so we can chat. adios amigos :)

June 3, 2013

Hey mom :) How are you doing and the family? I am doing great!! Wow, has it rained here or what!! I heard abiout that Hurricane also. That is so crazy that I was receiving the effects of a hurricane! Rock you like a hurricane. I was socking wet yesterday. It was so crazy! But I loved it. We had to walk really far, and we couldn't cross any road because it was so deep, the water was flowing really fast too. I felt like I was actually in Salina or something because there were ¨rivers in every place¨. The hurricane was mostly in Tonala on the coast. That is where elder Petersen is. I heard it was really bad over there. Over here nothing was harmed, only the amount of water and the wind. We are doing safe. The boots are working really good. But yesterday was a really hot day. So we decided not to put on the boots. Then all of a sudden at like 4 it started raining really hard, luckily a member let me borrow his umbrella. So we got soaked. It was a fun experience. We were the only ones in the streets, everyone else in their houses. We just use plastic bags to put our scriptures in.

Thanks for the package!! The one for elder Macias. When should we open it? There are transfers next Monday. I have a feeling one of us will leave! But guess what.. We will have a baptism on Wednesday. Her name is Karla. She is amazing, she knows a lot. Her mom and sister are members as of one month ago, but she never accepted baptism. She is like 23 years old. She has been listening on and off from the missionaries for like 1 year. And she accepted our invitation!! She said she has never felt the feelings she has felt with any other missionaries or lessons or anything. She feels the spirit so much. I know we were meant to find her and help her in her life. She was our chosen person. I can't wait!! I am doing good, we went to Walmart this morning :) The house is fine. We are enjoying the mission. I love you so much. :) I will go so we can chat. Love elder Parker