At last, in Oceanside - September 30, 2013

I've been white-washed into Oceanside.  Neither my new companion nor I have been in this area before. We've established that I'm the foster kid. Since I'm on my third transfer and my third area and my FOURTH apartment. I'm wondering if this is going to be the pattern of my mission. People say that there's no way, but I only have twelve transfers total and the President is changing a lot of things and he LOVES white-washing. My new companion is a lot like us. A Who-vian and a geek. She quotes movies all the time. She and I have seen almost all of the same movies. I can tell that this transfer is going to be fun. :) She's from Tennessee and when you get her excited you can bring her accent out. I get her excited a lot ;D Her name is Sister Rodney and she's a southern fireball. I love it!!

 We get to go to the temple in a couple of weeks and i'm so excited!!!! I haven't been since June and I've really missed the spirit that I feel in there. I need that little boost. I'm looking forward to the spiritual overload I'm going to get from conference and a temple trip. This ward is totally awesome though, I love it!

 

Sister Park

California's getting colder! 9-23-13

Trust me. I'll need that jacket I asked you to send. There's going to be an ocean breeze in the winter and it's already getting colder. I'm coastal now not inland, things have changed.

 

I really wish you had sent me that song. I've been DYING to sing it all the way through. (Note: She's referring to a composition I just finished and played in Ward Conference.  Mom)

 

This has been the best week of this transfer. We played Quiddich with our zone last monday! It was such a blast! We just got a new investigator and he’s really solid. We made some great contacts and found some people that were interested that we handed off to the Elders.  One of our members brought us her nonmember friend and we gave him both an English and a Japanese Book of Mormon. Sister Wickham wrote her testimony in the front of the English one. He was so much fun! This Japanese guy had never met a Mormon until he came to America and now he’s really interested in learning more. He saw the San Diego temple and said that it was like the castle at Disney Land. I love that people think that our temples look like castles! There is also a neighbor of some members from a family ward who has a lot of our same morals and when she found out about us she wanted to know more. The biggest draw for her was also the temple. We brought the relief society president to meet her and they hit it off great. I’m so excited because I’m sure that she’s going to fit right in with the ward and they’re going to love her! I wish that I could see how it all plays out. I guess I’ll just have to count on Sister Wickham to email me the updates. On that note; I’m being transferred….again. I’ll know tomorrow where I’m going so again I’ll update you next week. I’m going to miss being able to drive around everywhere in the stake and see the ocean all the time (that’s assuming I don’t get called to another sea side area).

 

We’re getting 14 Sisters in this transfer and only 10 Elders. That’s a new one. We’re really excited, but it also means that by next transfer (November) we’re pretty sure every Sister will either be training or a trainer. I’m hoping that tomorrow they tell us that we get facebook and ipads. The Anaheim mission already has it, so we’re praying for it, especially those in Singles Wards. By the way

 

I am so coming back to this singles ward after I get off! They are so much fun!! I love ya I miss ya. I’ll tell you my fate next week.

 

Love Ya

Sister Amanda Park

Amanda to Mom 9-9-13 - Spider hitched a ride!

Dear Mom and Dad...You had a raccoon in the house!!!! insane!!!! We had a spider attach itself to the back of our car and rode about 15 miles down the highway with us. We were amazed he lasted. We didn't find him till we got home.

We just moved into our new apartment on Saturday. Its amazing! Its half a mile from the ocean. All of the appliances are new and we have 3 closets, one of which you could fit a bed in. Plus this place is 7 minutes away from the church. Its great!!!

The man we met, his name is Park Larsen. Unfortunately we don't get to see him anymore because he's out of our area, it breaks my heart.

We had a great dinner with a member last week. He brought a friend and it wasn't until we started our lesson that he told us his friend wasn't a member. later that night he told us his friend was very impressed with us and like the lesson and wanted to meet with us again. He also bragged to the ward about us and encouraged them to invite their friends to meet with us.

We seem to be our ward's favorite sisters, because we are so enthusiastic and get involved with as much as we can. I'm just excited because we can go to the single's activities :) I love this ward so much though! It's so great!

 

We're doing a musical fireside on Sunday. I've got a solo. The song is so beautiful, I feel so privileged to sing it. I wish I had some new pictures but this week has been a little crazy so I'm short on pictures. But I'll work on getting more for you next week. I love you and I miss you.

 

Sister Park

Amanda to Mom; Amanda to Dad 8-26-13

The reason we get two separate responses is because I (Donna) usually am composing my email to her late on Sunday night and by the time I'm half-way through John is asleep, and John usually uses his voice texting to compose his letters on his phone during commercials of "Longmire."

Dear Mom:
The mission is great. I got stared down by a skunk and have been working on a crazy big map for our area since we cover the entire stake for the singles ward. I love the ward, they are so pro-active on getting nonmember friends to activities. It's really encouraging since we don't have any investigators at the moment. We've been sharing an apartment with another set of sisters and its been loads of fun, but its 20 minutes out of our area and we already have a lot of driving we have to do in there without tacking on going back and forth for dinner. However I think we're going to start getting more dinners. We told the guys in the ward that they can't feed us unless they take us out or they have another girl there. We are now an excuse for a date ;D They tell the girls they offered to feed the Sister Missionaries but they can't do it unless the girl is there. Some guys have set up double dates already. ^-^ The ocean is beautiful everytime I look at it. I took a lot of pictures but I forgot my camera so I'll just have to send them to you next week. How is the medco thing going? I'll send you my perscription recipts this week. I hope there's money in my bank account because I'll be out of medication on thursday so I'll need to get a refill. Fortunately Dr. Vincent gave me 2 refills on the bottles. I love you Thank you for taking care of me.

Love Sister Park

PS. How is Johnny?

Dear Dad:
It's been crazy, I've been moved from an area where people would stop and listen to what we had to say, even if it was only for a moment, and now I'm in an area where we're lucky if we can give them a passalong card. We don't knock on doors, we just talk to whoever we see out and about. We're over just a single's ward now so anyone who's interested who's married or not between the ages of 19 and 35 we have to hand off to other missionaries. We've started to run into some real odd ones too. Fortunately our ward is fantastic and is really gungho on doing activities that will get their nonmember friends out there and interested. I haven't given a real lesson in almost 3 weeks and I miss it so much. I love teaching and when people just wave you by it's hard to keep up your spirits. but thats one thing that I am set on doing. keeping my spirits up. I'm trying to be happy no matter what and talk to everyone I see. Sometimes I fall short but Sister Wickham and I have agreed to start over this week and really go at it.I wish I had remembered my camera to send you some pictures. I'll send you some next week. I can't believe its already almost September! Time is flying so fast!! I love you so much! and I love reading your stories! I share them with my companion and my roommates all the time.

I love you and miss you loads!

Sister Park

Amanda to Mom 8-19-13 The new assignment

Just got white washed into a YSA ward in Del Mar. One investigator might have potential, but I haven't met her yet and the former investigator that we could find and still lived here isn't really all there. She's kind of a hippy and she just sort of floats.

But the craziest thing! One of the guys from my YSA in Park City, who we all thought had moved to Chicago, apparently moved into the Torrey Pines YSA two weeks ago, the ysa I just got transfered to! It's nice to have a friendly face.

I have to admit though, this place is beautiful. I'm taking pictures all the time. The only down side is the hills I have to run (I swear they're 85% angles), the mosquitoes, and the wildlife. We got stared down by a skunk last night just around the corner from our church! The owls we saw the other night were pretty epic though ;) Here are some pics of my new area.

I've just been transfered from the hottest part of the mission to right by the beach. I get to see the ocean every day! It is the most amazing thing! no matter how many times I see it, it's always beautiful :) I'm now in charge of a young single adult ward and I have no one to teach yet but my new companion and I are working super hard on changing that. this new change is going to be great!!!

8-12-13 - Amanda to Daddy

Note:  Some of her responses refer to John's recounting of his mission to her.

That's so cool! Did you go into Switzerland a lot? I don't envy the stair climbing. They didn't make you run a half hour every morning too did they ;P I wish we could have motor scooters, that would be so much fun!!! Why did they faze them out? Guess what, I'm being transfered. I'm leaving Murrieta tomorrow to get my new companion and new area. And funny thing, the other day, I reached into the back seat and grabbed the cd case and a little lizard ran out from underneath it! I think I accidently left the car door open one time and a lizard snuck into the car! It was awesome! We chased it out just because we didn't want it to get stuck anywhere and die, but I wish I'd had my camera with me so I could have grabbed a picture of it. It was only about 2 /2in long. And there's been a gorgious fog that settles in in the mornings so we get to go running in it. Tomorrow I'm going to take my camera and send you some pictures next week. The most amazing thing is that I saw a fog rainbow this morning! I'd never seen that before. The fog had arched itself into a perfect rainbow shape....Why do I never have my camera when I need it?!?!

I love you so much! Thank you for the mission story, I love it and I'm looking forward to hearing more.

Amanda

8-5-13 - Short but sweet

By the way, P-day has been moved back to Monday. Nice to know that you wait till the last minute to email me ;P Love you.

Hey Dad, I was wondering if you could tell me more about your mission. I'm curious to know where it covered, your transportation, your prostilitizing styles...stuff like that. I didn't really ask before I left, but lately I've been wondering. And how are all of your projects coming along? I hear a lot from mom.......not that I don't love you, mom.....but I want to hear for you too.

Next week is transfers and I'm not really sure if I'll still be in Murrieta or if they'll move me somewhere else in the mission. It's going to be exciting to find out.

I love you SOOO much, I'll talk to you next week.

ps. by then I'll be 24 ^-^