week of the 100s - May 21, 2012

Trenton - our mission uses u-locks because your bike apparently is never stolen with those. And then for bikes missionaries don't want stolen or scratched up too bad, they wrap them in saran wrap first and then ugly (or cool) duck tape. It supposedly works.
I keep track of how many days I've been on a mission (blah blah blah I know you're not supposed to count, but if I'm counting up without knowing the end goal, I figure it's okay) in my journal and this past week was the 100-day mark! Pretty crazy ya? I know.
Oh and I meant to tell y'all something about Chris' baptism last month: so I neglected to tell you that there was a SWAT team in the church parking lot as we drove up to prepare for his baptism. Apparently there was a hostage situation across the street and down the block. We just thought it was pretty interesting.
Also, is Brady Christensen home? He should be. I ran into his brother a couple times at the MTC. So Vaughn is married and Brady is back. Crazy.
Hey have the broke ground on the Provo Tabernacle temple yet? What are they calling it exactly? Oh my gosh I hope I don't miss that open house too! I'm totally driving down for Phoenix's next October.
Everyone is super fascinated that our trio will be together for 4 and half months. There are a lot of women in our wards that are RMs who all say the same thing about how crazy it is that we all get along and that we're going to be together for at least 3 transfers. We think it's partly because the three of us are super different. And because we know that we have to stay together so we have to get along hahaha. Just kidding. But sort of. Elder Nelson (one of our zone leaders) has this weird analogy that he likes to give about how, evidenced through our hair styles, that the three of us are total opposites and combine to make this crazy awesome companionship.
Not a single sister was transferred in the whole mission this last transfer. I guess they're pretty set and excited for how things are going haha.
I was going to attach some pictures but I forgot to bring my card reader. We climbed the dells in our backyard this morning after our walk for exercise and I got some shots of Sister Bruckman and Sister Falke at the top. It was funny.
So our district still consists of three companionships. Elder Hohman was transferred and Elder Keele (DL) is now with Elder Dunn who actually came out with Sister Bruckman! Pretty neat! Anyway well at district meeting this past Friday we were introducing ourselves and it totally got crazy as we introduced each other and Elder Keele had to rein us back in. I guess it's nice that we get along so well.
We're still looking for more people to teach. Our companionship is struggling the most right now, so the elders (in our district) are coming into our area this Satuday for a couple hours for a district blitz. Apparently that's when companionships either switch areas or all come to one area and do a whole bunch of tracting. So we're all going to this massive apartment complex in our area and all 3 companionships are going to tract the area for 2 hours. Hopefully that will give all of us a lot of opportunity to build our faith, bless people's lives, and perhaps find some people that are ready to change their lives by accepting the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. And it's all in our area which will be a great blessing. We're super excited.
For some reason, I didn't get any pictures that you or Mom sent, Hannah. I'll check again to make sure.
We've been meeting with members a lot this week and have been encouraging them in the things that they're doing. We love our members! As we work with them the work becomes so much happier and encouraging. It's when we as missionaries try to do it on our own that we lament the fact that nothing seems to be working. Love it. Love our members.
Sorry that these emails are super boring. There are still a billion things I'm working on to improve as a missionary. I hope that I've come a long way from where I was 108 days ago.
Love you all so much! Thanks so much for all that you do.
Love love love,
Sister Parks