A FULL Week of Thanksgiving!

Dearest Family,

As might have been evident by the long delay in our last letter, it has been a very busy week, starting with last weekend.  We decided that it would be fun to provide a full Thanksgiving dinner for all of the missionaries here in Vienna.  The entire zone includes several missionaries who live at quite a distance and it seemed that most of them were already being taken care of by their local wards.  But there were still 14 elders and sisters who were right here in our immediate area comprising the greater part of three different districts.  We initially proposed that we celebrate on Thanksgiving Day itself but there was a little hesitation about devoting some time away from a normal working day and a couple of them indicated that our predecessors had done the same thing on the normal P day last year, that being Monday.  So we decided to do the same and actually found a couple of small turkeys in one of the stores.  That's a rare thing as most Europeans are happy with duck or goose so we snatched up two of them about 7-8 pounds each.  

We decided we would pick up everything else on Saturday and then it would be fresh for Monday as we got it all prepared. Saturday is usually OUR Pday but the previous Saturday we had spent trying to get an apartment ready that really had some major problems that we have talked about before, and our district leader announced that the next Saturday would be a special district meeting with President Kohler in attendance to interview everyone in the zone.  That would take two days, Friday and Saturday and our district was told to come on Saturday at 1 PM.  We were the last group and sort of assumed that we'd be all done within 2-3 hours, getting away by 4 PM at the latest. Apparently the previous mission president had always been fairly efficient with his interviews, allotting a specific time to each missionary. Not so with President Kohler who felt each interview should take as much time as was necessary.  Senior couples are typically the last ones interviewed and so we were actually finished about 5:45.

Now you need to understand that Austria is not like the US with Saturday being a big shopping day.  Generally speaking, at least as far as the businesses are concerned, all the sidewalks are pulled in by 6 or 6:30 at the latest.  If you want to go to the opera, symphony or the theater, that's a different thing but if you're looking to buy Thanksgiving goodies, we figured we might have 45 minutes at the most to get into the store for our purchases.  We hopped on the subway which would have taken us about 15 minutes to get to our desired store and sat and sat and sat until they announced that there was an electrical problem with the system and there would be considerable delay.  Everyone disembarked and we looked for another way to get into the city from the outskirts where we had been interviewed.  One of the tram operators indicated which line we should pick up, across a plaza and heading into town and it was really crowded and most of those who had left the subway were doing the same thing.  We realized immediately that this was going to be a long ride and after about two stops they announced a transfer point to a different subway we were familiar with.  We decided to hop off the tram and grab the new subway line with the result that something that should have normally been about 6 stops, turned into 18.  By the time we got to our intended destination it was just after 7 and the store had been closed for a half hour. We remembered one store in a different station that remained open every day until 10 PM and there we picked up our corn, other veggies, cranberry sauce and the fixings for the dressing, getting home just after 9 PM.  

Early the next morning we had scheduled a visit to one of the outlying wards that required us to get up at 5 AM, catch a train and then from the destination train station, walk about a half hour to the chapel.  Probably not the best decision considering but one of the sweet young adult sisters who has been newly called as the Stake YSA leader and whose father is the bishop of the ward we were attending offered to drive us back to the train station on our way home.  That was a real blessing and after grabbing a quick bite we headed off to the center where we only have one oven so that Mom could make and bake the pumpkin pies for the next day. We decided Saturday night to pick up some extra turkey breasts that we could use Monday night after the missionaries had eaten for Home Evening and so pre-cooked those at home for a couple of hours anyway late Sunday night after baking the pumpkin pies in the center.  You see why we had no time to write a letter that weekend.

Monday we were up again at 6 and got to the center early to start baking the turkeys and the dressing.  Mom was really putting her all into it as she usually does and I set up a bunch of tables and chairs.  We decided that we would do it up right and instead of using plastic plates and utensils, we found some table cloths, real china and silverware, pretty orange napkins and fancy glassware that had been stored high in some cupboards.  We found several good pictures depicting various Thanksgiving themes including the Macy's Thanksgiving parade and some great cartoons from Peanuts that we used for decorations.  All in all it looked quite festive.

About 1 PM the elders and sisters began to arrive with many bringing some assigned food like golden carrots, rolls, whipped cream, mashed potatoes and one of the elders, our district leader who finishes his mission in a week brought some yummy Apple Crisp for dessert.  We had a wonderful and delightful Thanksgiving celebration and most were able to stay for 2-3 hours.

By the time everyone had finished with warm hugs and great feelings of appreciation, we cleaned up, the missionaries helping quite a bit and then they all left, with us then getting ready for home evening in a few hours.  We finished up cooking the extra turkey breasts, had some pumpkin pie and plenty of dressing left over and put on the equivalent of a second dinner that evening.  Elder Parker had the assignment for the spiritual thought and made a presentation on the importance of family history, passing out the little booklet "My Family" to all who were there.  We had both filled our personal booklets out placing pictures of everyone in them up through all of our great grandparents, most of which we were able to find on line in Family Search.  A few of the missionaries came back with investigators and so had their second Thanksgiving dinner that day!

Tuesday we finally had a little bit of a break and that's when we wrote last week's letter but had another good attendance at the language classes.  One young lady walked in wanting to learn better German. Interestingly she comes from Hungary but spoke pretty good English. She works as a make-up artist and had worked for a year in Frankfurt with English speaking film makers and then returned to Hungary where she got married and returned to Vienna with her husband.  Elder Parker took her in hand personally and told her she was a real godsend because we have a young Hungarian man, a member of the church who speaks very little English and equally little German who we've been trying to work with and improve his German with great difficulty because we have no common language to work with.  So we spent an hour with her going over some basic vocabulary and I indicated that if she would return on Thursday, our other Hungarian should be present and if she was willing to help translate for us, we could then work on the German language together.  She was very willing.  It's always fun when we get a chance to teach personally.  At the end of the day the sisters came by and we broke out the turkey leftovers for Thanksgiving number 3.

We then had to scramble a bit to get ready for the Institute class that Elder Parker teaches on Wednesday and that took up most of the extra time available that morning.  We meet every couple of weeks with the Institute Council, usually at 7:30 in the morning on a Thursday and so that looked like our beginning of the actual Thanksgiving holiday.  In two tender mercies, first we got an email telling us that no one could make it on Thursday morning and so they were going to delay it for a week. Hurray!  Then we received a phone call from a sweet brother in one of the wards, inviting us for the real Thanksgiving dinner at his house.  We had previously been invited there one time before way back in June when we first arrived.  He's a retired attorney who married a delightful wife originating from Mongolia.  He does have some major health problems with diabetes and is essentially blind. He was recently in the hospital with a heart attack but seems to be doing much better now. They speak excellent English and he's fun to talk to because he's been everywhere.  (We finally determined that he'd never been to Japan or Portugal.  You name any other country and he's been there.)  He indicated he had invited 8 other missionaries including our zone leaders and district leader and asked if we'd like to come.  Of course we said yes! and he asked us to be there by 12:30. More turkey with all the trimmings and even a home-baked cake with ice cream!

It was truly a delightful time and we decided to show our appreciation by offering them a bouquet of flowers, note on the left in the last picture. 

That evening we had our language classes again with another session with our new Hungarian woman but unfortunately our other Hungarian member didn't come so we're still waiting for that all to finalize.  But we told her we usually start each session with prayer which she was very willing to do.  We have also started meeting with an older member who wants to perfect his English and so Elder Parker also spends an hour with him once a week, just discussing our lives.  He seems like a very warm man who found his wife by direction of the Spirit before he was a member.  But they've been married for thirty-three years and members for thirty and have yet to be sealed in the temple.  That's our real goal, to see those blessings actualized.  Thursday night it was our fifth Thanksgiving dinner with lots of left overs still around from Monday and Tuesday, the good fortune of all who host fancy dinners.

That brings us to Thursday evening.  We got home a little earlier than sometimes and Elder Parker spent the evening bringing up Christmas music from the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, all on line.  It was really quite fun because the selections went back over all the previous Christmas specials.  Kate was all over the place and Jessica was really well featured in a Silent Night selection.  Finally spotted Sam in a very quick glimpse but it took a long time to find Laurel.  At last she was there, seated on an aisle in (I think) a Sandi Patty special but once we'd spotted her we could pick her out in every shot of the women.  I even saw Frank Bentley from high school who's long retired, and good old Brother Crapo from Alpine.  Last summer we met one of the clarinetists in the Orchestra on Temple Square who was here in Vienna on vacation and so he's now a familiar face we see often and of course Brother Smith who is a tenor and always easy to see, three of whose children I have delivered.  It was really old home week and brought the beginning of the Christmas season right to the front.  By now the lights should be turned on at Temple Square. 

We saw an opportunity to purchase a Christmas tree of our very own at one of the building marts here, kind of a Home Depot like place and for 10 Euros we got ourselves a cute little two foot tree with all the decorations which we put up, as tradition goes, on the day after Thanksgiving after we got home from a good Waffle Night.  That also entailed setting up for a huge get-together today for about 60 young adults who gathered to make Advent Wreaths, a great European tradition. The four Sundays prior to Christmas are Advent Sundays and the Christmas season really begins on First Advent even though they're just like the rest of the world with commercial Christmas banging down the door by Halloween.  So we had to set up every table in the place and move a bunch of others from classrooms into the big assembly room so everyone could gather to use real evergreen boughs with decorations, ribbons, candles and just about anything else you can imagine.  

Mom was learning her way and so was I as we heated up little metal rods to push inside our candles and then insert them into the wreaths before using hot glue to attach a variety of other decorations.

Note all the pine boughs back in the corner.

Seated at the table to Mom's right (left in the photo) are Chris and Rahel, newly weds.  She was really good at this wreath making and her husband is a policeman leading the way for Brian.  He showed up one night in full uniform and I thought we were really in for it until they told me he was a member.  Here's the final product already to have its first candle lit tomorrow.

And finally, our impressive Christmas decorations, at least one view. 

Stay tuned for future letters to see the rest of the apartment.

  

(Sister Parker) I must say it was a lot of fun making a wreath from fresh pine boughs, but it took a lot of work to build it around the base. I'm going to try to remember how its done and maybe do one next year at home. They made 60 at the Center today. It was quite a delightful day with sisters of all ages  working together and even a few single young men in the group.

    How grateful we are to be able to work with these faithful young adults. It has truly been a blessing to sit in Family Home Evening with them and to feel their great spirit. Last Monday as we sang "Oh My Father" in preparation for the lesson on Family History the spirit rang out so boldly it touched my soul. These young people are the strength of the church here in Austria. We are also grateful for all the love and support we get from family and friends at home. May we always live so that the blessings of the Lord may surround us. I'm thankful for each and everyone of you.

   

LOVE AND HUGS   

Grammy, Grampa, 

Mom, Dad, 

Elder & Sister Parker

Inspectors General!

Dearest Family,

Wow, it seems like a long time since we last wrote and I guess that's because it has been.  Part of the reason we won't tell you in this letter is because it really belongs in next week's letter but suffice it to say that it has been a very busy weekend with not much time until now to get our weekly letter off.  It's about 10:30 PM on a Tuesday night as this is written and we're finally coming up for a little air.  Trying to find out where we left off, we realized we didn't put a title on our last letter so I guess we could call it "the Lord's Tender Mercies."

So anyway, as you gathered from that letter, the Christmas season seems to be off in full swing here in Austria and with everything coming up we decided we'd better get all of the apartments inspected that we're responsible for.  That meant that we needed to get all the outlying apartments done that are over an hour's train ride away.  We already reported on getting to St. Poelton last week but that left two apartments down in Wiener Neustadt that we'd only inspected once previously in the entire six months we've been here.  One of them had no lights in the bathroom and the elders were showering and shaving by the light of a small heat lamp they put in there.  We had been bugging them a bit on getting out to a store and buying two new fluorescent light bulbs to see if that was the only problem and it turns out they finally did that and voila!, they had light again.  The distance to walk from the train station to their apartment takes about 30 minutes and it's much colder now that the last time we went but at least the exercise kept us warmed up.  From the first apartment it was another good 30 minutes to walk to the second apartment.  Although they do have some bus lines, it's about on the equivalent of what we get in Utah with buses coming every half hour or so if you're lucky so it just proved easier to walk. 

The second apartment used to house three sisters but since they finally found a companion for the third sister, they decided to move the other two to Vienna and put some elders in the apartment instead.  One of the things we check on is to make sure their carbon monoxide sensors are working as well as their smoke alarms.  Most apartments have just one of the latter but this one turned out to have three.  But only one of them was working and we discovered that the other two didn't have any batteries.  I guess one is enough for most of the apartments in this mission but we decided that it wasn't that big a deal as long as they had them to get some batteries installed in their two extras.  When we finished up it was another 30 minute walk back to the train station.  We had left about 8 in the morning and got back to the station for the ride home about 1 PM.  The ride in had taken about 45 minutes of actual travel time and we took the first train leaving to get back figuring it would be about the same.  But NOOO.  It turns out we got the real local ride which stopped in every little village along the way and it was a good hour and a half before we arrived back home.  It was however quite scenic to stop and see the countryside along the way so it wasn't too bad.  We've been reading every day in the Book of Mormon in German and despite the fact that a few people might be listening, we figured it couldn't hurt them to hear a little scripture so we read along the way.

As we reached into the brief case to pull out our papers we discovered a cute little chocolate bar along with a nifty folded paper in the shape of a white shirt and tie with a message on the back from the first elders we had inspected.  They had slipped it into the briefcase while we weren't looking and thanked us for taking care of them as their parents would have done.  We were touched by their kind gesture:)

The rest of the week was pretty routine with good turnouts to all of the daily activities.  We had about 50 people to Institute night and we're getting around 20 now to the language courses on Tuesdays and Thursdays.  One new brother is a member who was actually passing the sacrament at the ward we attended last week and he came once to try and polish his English, attending first, the basic beginners course but then decided it was too elementary for what he needed.  So Elder Parker decided to get directly involved and teach him the finer points of English conversation which was what he needed.  We started off just telling each other about our lives and he proceeded to tell us that he had been a member for about 30 years having left Poland during the years of the Solidarity movement when he and his family moved to Vienna.  He originally joined with a small group of other Poles but stated that he and his wife were now the only active members of the original group and he had no idea where the others had gone.  We had spent some time telling about our family and so as he was finishing his story we realized that he had been a member for 30 years.  So we naturally asked the question of when he first went to the temple.  To our surprise, he hadn't yet been to the temple at all.  So there is obviously much more to his story than we yet know and we suspect there may be some good we can do there in trying to motivate the family a little more.  He's passing the sacrament so we suspect there is possibly  an issue with his wife somewhere.

Our district meetings are usually held each Tuesday.  Following this meeting it had been decided to eat lunch at our favorite local Wiener Schnitzel restaurant that has favored elders for about 40 years.  It generally happens just about every transfer and here is the attendance this week.

At the end of the meeting we were informed that President Kohler would be in town on Saturday for interviews and we'd hold another district meeting while the interviews were going on as well as get some personal instruction from our mission president.  He's very good about taking whatever time is necessary with his interviews so the rest of us stayed busy until it was our turn with some interesting Gospel activities and discussions.  Seniors tend to be last on the interview schedule and so the meeting on Saturday started about 1 but we weren't out of there until almost 6.  Saturday being our P day it really put a crimp in our style as we had decided to have a special Thanksgiving dinner for all of the elders in Vienna on their regular P day which would be the next Monday.  So we really needed to get out of there and do some shopping.  Austria is definitely not like the US and even the big city pulls in its sidewalks around 6 PM as far as all the stores go.  Fortunately we found a grocery store in one of the train stations we go through that is open 7 days a week until 10 PM, a real rarity but saved us as we had to pick up quite a few things or else shop on Sunday which we would never have done.  More about all of that next week.

(Sister Parker) A few extra details of our weekly activities. We had to visit 4 different apartments for inspections and arrive early in the morning so we could fit the rest of the days activities in our schedule. That wears on us because we rarely get to bed before midnight, getting home most nights after 10:00 pm.-- so much for missionary bedtimes which are 10:30 pm. The other fun adventure we had was on Saturday when we were trying to fit in all our p-day preparations. Late from the Mission Pres. interviews we took a bus from the church to the Ubahn or subway only to find that the Bahn was not running because of problems on the line. Finally we asked someone where we could catch another bus or Strassenbahn (street car) and boarded only to have it stop every couple of blocks. By the time we got to the main station the store in it had closed so we had to take another slow bahn to another Station that had a store that stayed open until 10 pm. We couldn't believe we had such a hard time getting the food we needed to start cooking on Sunday Night. Then of course we had to be up at 5:30 am. to take us to one of the out lying wards. No rest for the weary we again had to be up by 6 am for Mondays activities. Hopefully this next week will bring a little more, much needed sleep. 

 The admonition for this week is: "Early to bed, early to raise makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise."  Healthy and wise is what I'm  trying for. 

Love you all and grateful for you all. 

Grammy, Grampa, 

Mom, Dad, 

Elder and Sister Parker

The Lord's Tender Mercies

Dearest Family,

It seems like another great week has passed with lots of exciting things to report and more things to do than there seemed time to do it.

First off, we were thrilled to get the latest edition of the Parker Post with all the news it contained.  Heidi really puts herself out to get that all together and it is very enjoyable to be brought up to date in a personal way.  We encourage those of you who haven't contributed in a while to REPENT.  All of the holidays will be over by the next issue and no one should have an excuse not to be able to give us a full report of the memorable things you all did to celebrate the birth of our Savior.

Which brings us to our current report.  We're always a little critical of all the businesses who are already jumping the gun as soon as Halloween is over to get involved in their merchandising and I guess Vienna is no different but at least it's interesting to see the European or Austrian spin that gets put on things.  We get a little throw-away newspaper thrown at our doorstep every week and this past week they listed 29 different Christmas displays being set up around the city. At least half of them started this past weekend with the remainder all starting by next weekend.  We took our P day yesterday to fine tune one of the missionary apartments that has been vacant for about 3 months getting major overhauls and repairs finished and it looks like it's finally ready to go.  We found a great huge store equivalent to a Home Depot or Lowe's where we were finally able to find the equivalent of a squeegee and a vacuum filter, look at some possibilities for living room overhead lighting and it even carried some cute little 2 foot Christmas trees that we thought might fit into our apartment. One of the 29 displays/markets had some really impressive Christmas articles that Sister Parker decided should be in the homes of each of our children so we made a purchase there and you can all expect to be getting a little gift from Vienna sometime in the next several weeks.  Anyway, we got those home and then decided we would head over to the big City Hall or Rathaus where the main Christmas display was set to open.  We didn't realize that it would be like turning on the lights at Temple Square after Thanksgiving with what seemed like the whole city standing elbow to elbow as they lit up a huge plaza together with the city Christmas Tree to the tune of a band playing "We Wish You a Merry Christmas" (no kidding!) 

 They had several of the very large trees in the park all decorated with huge lit up ornaments, lighted guitars in one, typical ornaments in another, red valentine-like hearts in another, the sum total looking very fun and impressive.  There were two little trains that kids could get on and ride around the park with a man blowing a loud whistle every 5-10 seconds leading the way to warn the crowds that the trains were coming through!  One of the members informed us that one of the many displays, #17 to be exact, is thought to be the most genuine Austrian of the whole bunch so I guess we'll wander that direction one of these days.

The early part of the week was taken up with more routine things.  We traveled out to one of the outlying cities, St. Poelton, that we have some apartment oversight responsibilities for that now has 4 elders in it instead of the 2 who used to be there.  They have a wonderful little branch there that has the only standing choir we've found in the stake so far and a strong spirit that's quite evident as we have visited them on Sundays a couple of times.  They're the ones that want us to speak when we come and I guess we'll have to gear up for it the next time it happens. Anyway, they have a gung ho branch mission leader who's a little compulsive about how the elders should set up their apartment, somewhat to their irritation.  We informed the mission office and got specific instructions that they have the final say as to what goes on in their own apartment and we may have to try and gently get him to back off a little bit as to how they arrange their beds, that they can keep a door off that leads to their kitchen but blocks access in an out to their refrigerator, etc.

Then as to our language classes, we've continued to see good things happen.  Elder Parker has gotten directly involved in teaching a humble young Hungarian member some German and it's been difficult because he doesn't speak very good English either.  But he's very willing so he comes in for a special hour of instruction twice a week and is generally there for home evening, institute and waffle night as well.  This past week we had a member from one of the wards come in wanting to improve his English but he found that what the elders were teaching was way beneath his level.  He wants to get better at engaging in English conversation so Elder Parker agreed to take him on at a 4 PM lesson next week and back the Hungarian member off until 5 PM.

We've mentioned our Zoroastrian family from Iran a few times.  They truly have a wonderful spirit and some of the family have already left for San Diego in the last month.  But several others continue to appear for instruction in English every week.  There were only a couple however, who were there this past Thursday and so we were surprised when about 8 of them appeared on Friday night about an hour after we had already served all of the waffles.  But they indicated they just wanted to come and socialize so waited until they thought the meal would be over before showing up.  In what we thought was a very nice "tender moment" one of our members who will celebrate his first anniversary as a member this week and is scheduled to receive the Melchizedek Priesthood on the 30th, showed up with his date for the night who is a returned missionary from England.  They had planned a different activity that kind of fell through and so decided to come by the center instead.  It just so happens that he's also from Iran, speaks fluent Farsi of course, and was able to fluently converse with the whole family as they played UNO about how wonderful the church has been in his life.  As we have said many times, there are no coincidences in this work!

So while all of that was going on, in which Sister Parker was an active participant, Elder Parker sat down up front in our reception area with a woman who has been coming fairly regularly for several months now but who has been very lax about setting up lessons, reading her Book of Mormon or several other items we've sent home with her.  She is what is termed a Free Christian, a group that basically accepts all beliefs as OK, (except, of course, the Mormons) but has come back over and over again because she is fascinated by the unique beliefs that we have taught her.  So Elder Parker sat down with her and decided that he would teach her on a one to one basis as long as she wasn't doing it on her own.  We started out with Moroni 10:4-5, emphasizing that the only way she could find out the truth of what we were telling her was if she personally put out some effort and asked God personally if this was right.  She indicated that she'd love to be baptized but wanted to remain with the Free Christians as well.  We explained that if this was her attitude we likely wouldn't be able to approve her baptism until she acknowledged that much of what she was hearing at the Free Christians wasn't true. We emphasized how important the Book of Mormon was as a second witness for Christ and she asked why we needed a second witness, why wasn't one enough?  Her Free Christian friends told her the Book of Mormon was a strange thing, indeed.  We pointed out that they obviously hadn't read it and neither had she.  So it was suggested that we explore the book a bit and she would let us know when she found something that wasn't true.  So we simply flipped completely randomly through the book, every 30-50 pages or so and read a random verse on every page we came to.  Every...single...verse... we...read mentioned something about the Savior!  Again, there are no coincidences.  She had to agree that nothing we read could be construed as false.  

Many of the grandchildren will remember helping Grampa underline several passages in the Book of Mormon that provide an interesting short tour through the book from front to back.  He made a similar plan through the German Book of Mormon and actually put it on the computer so we could include copies in every book we pass out.  She took one and we'll see if anything different happens. As we were getting close to finishing a few people started passing by as they left the UNO game.  One of them was a young lady I confused as a member who is here as a nanny until January.  As she was putting on her coat I invited her to tell my investigator what she thought of the church.  She bore a wonderful testimony of how wonderful she thought the church was and it wasn't until later that I found out I had misidentified her and she was actually another investigator, only 16 years old who would likely join if her parents would consent.  Then our Iranian brother mentioned above was also getting ready to leave and I asked him if he would bear his testimony which is when he brought us up to date on his one year anniversary. At the end of our discussion we actually said a prayer together for the first time and she commented afterwards about all of the points included, praying to Heavenly Father, thanking, asking, and ending in the name of Jesus. So it seems she is paying attention somewhere.  All in all it was a wonderful week with the Spirit strong and helping out.  Thanks for all your prayers!

(Sister Parker) I think Grampa or Dad has covered all we did this week. It seemed very busy and by the time we got to bed each night, around midnight, we were often exhausted. It is ok to be exhausted in a good way or doing good things. We also had Zone Training this week and the emphasis was on looking for the things we do or don't do that keep us from finding the people the Lord has prepared for us. Perhaps we can each look in our daily activities and see what we need to change in order to find the person the Lord is preparing for us to help teach the gospel. Of all the wonderful gifts we give at Christmas this one would be the most precious. 

Love you and pray for each one of you too. 

    Love and Hugs,    

Grammy, Grampa, 

Mom, Dad, 

Elder and Sister Parker   

Don't Go Down There! It's Dark!!

Dearest Family,

Wow, another week has already come and gone and the work goes on! We try and keep a running tally of how many come by our center every week and this week we tied our record with 147.   We think we can still do better than that but it means we don't have as much time to just think up things to do.  (I don't think Sister Parker ever had that problem-she was always pretty busy.)  

We had some plans for pumpkin carving on Halloween but the YSA's came with plenty to do on their own so we delayed it until this week's Waffle Night which is pretty much a game night anyway and got into a pretty good contest between two teams to see who could come up with the best jack o'lantern.  It was pretty much a tie but unfortunately I guess we were asleep at the end and didn't take any pictures of the results (:  Oh well.  Otherwise we introduced some good rounds of Spot It with the real challenge being trying to translate all the little symbols into German. Some are easy like igloo is Iglu and flower is Blume and anchor is Anker, but you have to be on your toes for things like Marienkaefer for ladybug or Klee for clover. Women seem to have a distinct advantage in that game over the men but maybe it was just our poor selection of the men playing, like Elder Parker who was teamed with our member from Hungary who can't speak either German or English really well.  But we had a pretty good time.

This week was also good because we got a little teaching time in.  Two of the elders were teaching a female investigator and asked Elder Parker to sit in on a lesson.  She was really overwhelmed with life.  She feels like she'll be losing her job pretty soon but has two kids who live with her divorced husband in Germany.  She has no visiting rights and the courts won't grant them unless she can prove she has the ability to provide support.  We think she's actually got a pretty good testimony of the gospel but can't make the jump to get baptized until her life clears up a little bit.  At any rate we had a pretty good lesson with her and so we'll see what happens.  The other teaching situation was with our Hungarian member mentioned above.  He's got enough of a foundation in English to be able to teach a little more but we're really focusing on German right now so he can communicate more with those with whom he has daily contact.  We have a billiard table at the center and we found out he's a real ace with a cue stick, able to beat anyone who dares to challenge him so that gave him a pretty good ego boost.  We have two baptisms coming up within a few weeks if all goes well and a third if we can just get a little more leverage.  Our young lady from Kazakhstan has decided to try and finish her university studies in one year less and so has really been loading herself with extra classes. She's pretty smart but really getting overwhelmed and was on the verge of tears the other night with Sister Parker putting her arms around her to buck her up and give her the encouragement she needs to keep going.

Winter seems to be rearing its head a little more and we're all wearing coats around.  The sun is up around 6:40 but sets at 4:30 so it's a pretty short day.  Reminds us of the Warner Bros. character who came running up from the cellar saying "Don't go down there!  It's dark!!"

Well, the branch president of the St. Poelton branch we attended last week was really impressed at Sister Parker's German as she bore her testimony and still hasn't given up on the idea that he wants us to speak the next time we visit.  I think we'll just have to write it out and then translate it before hand and it should go all right.  

Well, not too many pictures today but thought you might enjoy this one of Lieber Augustine who woke up just in time to keep from getting buried alive buy playing on his bagpipe.  You've all heard the phrase, no doubt, "Ach, Du Lieber Augustine.

Our other picture is of a sweet sister who's been a member a little less than a year now who loves to come and help Sister Parker cook waffles.  She's a real stalwart and a regular attender. Our overall treasure trove of pictures is now over a 1000.  Don't know if we'll ever be able to remember which ornate church was which!

  (Sister Parker)There are not a lot of new or exciting things to share this week. The Center, the young adults, investigators, language students, and missionaries keep us well occupied. And we are glad to be there for them. Many a young adult has said what a great place the Center is for comfort and a few moments of relaxation where the spirit makes you feel good. It is sort of like a sanctuary away from the world. Lately, a lot of them seem to be under a lot of stress from various causes. Good company and a few hugs can make anyone feel better. This week's spiritual highlight from District Meeting was on Captain Moroni, the great and faithful leader of the Nephites. Alma 48:11-48. Verse 17  " Yea, verily, verily I say unto you, if all men had been, and were, and ever would be, like unto Moroni, Behold, the very powers of hell would have been shaken forever; yea, the devil would never have power over the hearts of the children of men."

These are some awesome scriptures and well worth the family reading together.

   Happy Birthday to Daniel and Camisha and Happy Anniversary to Trish and Aaron.

We love you all,dearly.  

Grammy, Grampa, 

Mom, Dad, 

Elder and Sister Parker 

All Saints Trumps Halloween

Dearest Family,

In some ways this week has seemed pretty tranquil compared to all the action and excitement we enjoyed with Andrew and Ruslana's family with us last week.  Following our first stake conference things seemed to return to a more normal status quo though we certainly must admit that the YSA center is still really booming compared to the summer.  The big event of the week was the fourth transfer occurring since we've been here.  These transfers are a fairly well regimented deal that didn't occur back in the old days when they were done pretty much at the discretion of the mission president.  Now it seems they're scheduled well in advance, not that every set of missionaries gets moved every time but definitely, as we've previously stated, it's a time of gathering and saying good byes and hellos. There is a main artery that runs through our mission from Stuttgart through Munich to Salzburg and ends in Vienna and every transfer basically brings everybody changing to one of those cities and then they move to the new location.  Being at one end of the line, it is traditional for 10-15 of us to meet in the morning as the departing move out, then form temporary teams for the day until the evening when the new arrivals show up and everyone is linked back up with new companions.  

Two were leaving Vienna this week who have both been here longer than we have, Sister Freimann, who hails from Hanover, Germany, and Elder Phillips, one of our Zone Leaders who was one that met us at the airport when we first arrived. I guess that now makes us the longevity champs here as far as the mission goes though there are a couple of elders who have been here before and have now returned.  At any rate, with Sister Freimann being transferred to Switzerland, a long 8 hour train trip and her replacement not coming in until about 12 hours later, Sister Parker was left to keep company with Sister Bushman.  They of course hit it off like a mother-daughter team and Elder Parker had to just stay out of the way until everyone linked back up again.  We were actually a threesome for most of the day but when they returned to the train station, he was left at the center until they returned with lots of action going on.  

Our language courses continue to attract a lot of attention so he wasn't bored at all until everyone got linked back up. Wednesday night was back to teaching Institute with about 8 students, one of whom is an investigator from Pakistan who is committed to being baptized at the end of this month.  His English is better than his German and so he chose to attend the English language class on the Book of Mormon and two elders sat in to help him with the translation as best they could. So with him and Sister Parker and the two elders, it was an even dozen. Elder Parker was to help them the next day teach him about the priesthood but interestingly we were unable to find the appropriate chapter on that topic in Gospel Principles which had apparently not yet made it into Urdu.  So we kind of winged it and will come up with other options. Our other young lady whom we have mentioned several times before seems now ready to proceed with a baptism here instead of waiting to return to Kazakhstan but would like Sister Freimann to be present and she won't be able to return until after she's released next year. She's indicated that she's going home first and I'm not sure we'll entice her back such a distance so we'll see what else evolves over time.

So Friday, as we're sure you were all aware was Halloween, not a traditional holiday in Austria although interestingly there are apparently a few neighborhoods who are even getting into some trick or treating and a little bit of costuming does take place.  It was our traditional Waffle Night so we actually came up with some unique games planning on carving a couple of pumpkins, playing a little Halloween Bingo, and really got big time into a Monster Mash balloon stomp with everyone tying a balloon around their ankle and then trying to pop their competitors' balloons while jumping around on one foot as good old Boris Karloff sang away.  We were playing along and so didn't get any good pictures but everyone really enjoyed it.  The evening ended up with all of them playing a game called "Werewolf"  and we were able to sneak off around 10:15 rather than stay around to the wee hours and wait for them to finish.  

Today was the official holiday the Austrians celebrate, All Saints Day, doubtfully even recognized in the States unless you're a Catholic but the population was out in force enjoying the day to the fullest.  Saturdays are not really big shopping days around here but we could tell it was a holiday from the crowds everywhere.  For the first time in quite a while we actually got out and spent a few hours seeing more of Vienna than we have in quite a while, this time wandering around in hidden-away back courtyards with surprise ornate churches turning up all of a sudden around a turn.  

We even stumbled across a small room where they perform small Mozart concerts and the doorkeeper wondered where we'd come from.  We snapped a quick picture, shrugged our shoulders and moved on. 

Tomorrow is Fast Day and we've cleverly decided to return to a very nice little branch in a city called St. Poelton to the west of Vienna.  We've only been there once and the branch president asked us to let him know when we came next time as he wanted us to speak in Sacrament Meeting.  Sister Parker has not been very enthusiastic for that return trip so we decided to turn up on Fast Day with the guarantee that we would both bear our testimonies in the meeting.  Eventually, I think he'll get us.  They are really quite a good little branch, probably on the verge of becoming a real ward and to the best of our knowledge, they have the only actually organized choir in the entire stake.  They have a great director and were featured at the Saturday evening session of Stake Conference last week.

    (Sister Parker) It's hard to add to Grampa's or Dad's description of what we have done during the week. He really does a great job. He is also very good at trying to speak German to most of the young adults and other people at the center. He does a great job at running the center and preparing tables and chairs for classes and dinner. You would be amazed to see him secure the legs of the tables and heft them into place. I'm sure he is getting muscles on those arms. We didn't know this assignment would keep us physically fit. Since Andrew's and Ruslana's trip it has turned cold here in Vienna with temperatures between 35 and 55.  So, Grampa also bought me a very nice, warm winter coat and I am now enjoying our walks in the cold air and grey skies. It reminds me a lot of being in Germany years ago.

    The other thing that stands out to me from this week is our District Meeting. Our District Leader had us all singing "Scripture Power" from the primary songs. It was awesome and we even lifted our scriptures into the air. There was a great spiritual witness about daily using our scriptures. Perhaps this week all of our little families could take time to sing "Scripture Power", and think about Grammy and Grampa sharing the gospel over here in Austria. Then they could think of ways to share the beautiful message of the Book of Mormon with their friends.   

Love and Hugs, 

Grammy, Grampa, 

Mom, Dad, 

Elder&Sister Parker