To Our Beloved Worldwide Family!
We've had another good week but the real news this week was to see all the news from you guys from literally all over the world. We had a good report from Jeremy in Escondido, California; Emily and Trish from St. George, Utah; Jacob Kmetzsch in Wales; Rachel Worthington in Opelousas, Louisiana; James and Mindy in Maui, Hawaii; and of course from Aaron in far away India (actually pretty close to us but far away from most of you guys). And we always also pray for grandniece Allison Antzchak in Poland and Ruslana's mother, Lydia in Ukraine. We've seen some interesting reports on the immense size of our universe which sometimes make our earth seen a little small and I guess we're beginning to believe it as we comprehend just how far spread out the family has become and yet we can follow daily reports (with pictures!) of all of your activities. We thought it was pretty neat to be talking with people from Iran and Hungary each week, this week actually including 4 guys from Afghanistan and one young man from Chile, but our family influence goes way beyond such things.
As for our personal activities, pretty much the same types of things we've always reported on. They had a big Young Adult Conference in Linz this past weekend, which is part of the Salzburg Stake but it decreased considerably our attendance for Waffle Night. Still one of our Italian sisters brought three friends from her country who really enjoyed a rousing game of Spot It while Sister Parker and I gave a good introduction to our Hungarian member in Rummikub. Although there were only 12 of us in total, we had 4 investigators and 2 YSA's so the odds were pretty good.
And the work seems to be having it's good results. One of our recently returned sister missionaries gave the report for a Visitor's Evening that we had last Sunday and she's now engaged to be married this summer, a young man we've always liked told us today when we visited his ward in Wiener Neustadt that he was engaged and will be married this fall and one of the students in our English Book of Mormon class is engaged to a young man living in Innsbruck.
While in Wiener Neustadt today we were invited to attend the ward mission council conducted by the Ward Mission Leader with a very active counsel consisting of the 4 full time missionaries in the ward plus 3 of the ward missionaries. They listed the 8 or 9 active investigators they're teaching and went over how best to help each one progress in their knowledge of the gospel and develop their testimonies of it's truthfulness. By the end of the day, Elder Parker had given 3 prayers, Sister Parker 1 plus a spiritual thought and we were invited for dinner to the Bishop's house with one of the sets of elders. Everyone is always impressed at how well Sister Parker speaks German and even though she doesn't think it's that great, compared to her peers she's eons ahead of them.
We've now had the opportunity to meet all of the "Goldens" in the zone since the last transfer. They include a home grown Provo young man who's a real ace on the piano, a recent convert sister who's says she's from San Antonio but who's really from Comfort, Texas and who by the way is also a real ace on the piano, and a young man from Memphis, Tennessee who's working with a companion from Kentucky. It's fun to see them gamely speaking German and remember where we were just 9 months ago. Our Kentuckian senior companion wants to be a linguist someday and speaks probably the best German we've heard from any of the missionaries so far. Thus our Golden will have a great advantage to learn the language for the next transfer or so. Very adequate compensation for not being a real ace on the piano!
(Sister Parker) I am always grateful for the opportunities I have to speak German, especially when I look back on the experience. But sometimes I really enjoy conversing with the adult sisters who don't really mind when I make mistakes. The Lord seems to know when I need practical experience in speaking and just sends people by the center or has me do something at church. That way I don't have to get all anxious about it. We had excellent meetings today with teachers and speakers that spoke High German. I was told by a member today that it is just another language of its own, which I just happened to have learned on my mission in Hanover. It is apparently the center of such language, but it is certainly easier to understand.
The topic of today's sacrament meeting was "Doing Good".They referred to a story given in a conference talk, where the father would ask his children each day at dinner, "What good had they done during that day." Then the "rest song" was "Have I done any Good in the World Today." All of this reminded me of my mother as she would sing this song to my siblings and I when we became agitated with each other. Hearing that song brought up a tender memory of her, always demonstrating goodness to everyone and trying to teach us to behave in the same way. Grandma Marcroft was a woman without guile, she always had love and kindness to share no matter who you were. It was a sweet moment for me in church today. And it is an awesome question for each of us to ask ourselves. "What good have I done today? How have I shared the Saviors love?"
We send our Love 
and Prayers to you all,
Grammy, Grampa,
Mom, Dad,
Elder and Sister Parker
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