Newsletter Week 10

Hey!! Well first off I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas!! :) This week was SOOO awesome!! There really is something special to having Christmas out in the field:) And thank you all so much for your love and support. You are all the best! :)

So this week we did a lot of caroling again! It is so fun! :) People are always so excited when you knock on their door and start singing to them haha.. lots of people took pictures and stuff it was awesome! :)

Christmas Eve we went and made breakfast with some of the other missionaries in our area! It was so fun and we ate so much good food:) The Missionaries in this area are so kind and fun. Then we went and did a service project.. We helped one of the members with his garage. We took everything out, built shelves and then put everything back in on the shelves! It was so fun and I totally felt like Bob the Builder... but a female version... ;) I used saws and drills and all kinds of cool stuff.. haha you would be proud Dad:) Then we went and had dinner with the Diaz family it was pretty tasty! they made traditional El Salvadorian Dinner food:) YUMMM! after we got super full there we went to our second dinner appointment of the night to the Penias family!! :) It was also very yummy and she sent us home with left overs too:) So that was great:) The people in our ward are so kind and thoughtful:)

CHRISTMAS DAY!! :) It was super awesome! I got to talk to my family in the morning and that was the best thing ever!! :) They all looked so good and happy:) Made my day. :) Then we visited with the Estrada family and I helped their son set up his new super sweet basketball hoop!! he is awesome! He is 4 years old and can still beat me in basketball... haha. Next we visited the Goosman family, she is a recent convert..we visited for a while and then i went and played Lego's with her kids. They are pretty awesome! :) Next we went to the Torros house for dinner and I ate the best tamales in the world! :) Then we played card games with the family and family friends:) it was a super fun night! And people set off fireworks for Christmas here.. which i thought was weird.. but i guess not.. but anyways it was super fun and pretty to watch:)

HAPPY BIRTHDAY WASHINGTON!!!!! 

Huge shout out to my nephew who turned two this Saturday! Love him to death:) And then this Sunday Roland and Jessica came to church again and we actually had tons of success knocking doors this Sunday. It was awesome, people let us in and set return appointments with us.. which is not super normal, so we were super excited! Well Thank you all for everything! I love you guys so much and I hope you all have a super great new years! :)

Love, Hermana Parslow

Newsletter Week 9

The Week of Many Miracles

Hey! So this week was awesome! Definitely the best week yet of the mission!!
Tuesday was a way awesome day!! It really helped strengthen my testimony of fasting:) We had our first lesson with Roland, we tracted into him while we were knocking doors. He is probably in his mid thirties and has a 2 year old son. He is awesome!! We taught him about the Restoration of the Gospel and how Christ's church is back on the Earth, we was really receptive to it and the spirit was so strong!! We invited him to be baptized and he accepted! It was great!

Wednesday we didn't have very many lessons planned so we did a ton of tracting!! It was great! We gave out He is the Gift cards and then we met with the recent converts, the Hernandez family! They are so awesome! They have 6 little kids and we have tons of fun with them... haha I give them candy and stickers every time I see them.. haha so they like it when the missionaries come over:) We also play "Down by the Banks" with them.. they think it is fun:) I love this family so much! we are working with them to get them to the temple and be sealed! Best family ever!!

Thursday we had another lesson with Roland, we taught him the Plan of Salvation, he was so happy! he has lost 2 of his older siblings and found peace that they have the opportunity to accept the Gospel in the Spirit World. :) Then we had a dinner appointment with the Estrada Family, and I swear they are the most loving giving family in the whole world!! I love them so much! They fed us dinner and then sent us home with enough food to last us another week! They also invited us over to skype our families on Christmas:) they are the nicest people in the world!!

Friday! This day was so so so fun!! We had a mission Christmas get together!! There is over 250 people in our mission, so it was a blast! I even saw someone who I graduated High school with! So that was awesome! we sang Christmas songs and ate food and laughed and had a great time!! I am so excited for Christmas! its going to be great!!

Saturday we taught a lesson to Roland.... AND HIS WIFE!! :):):) He has been meeting with us, but his wife who is a devoted Catholic has not been interested and wants her son baptized in the Catholic church and none other. This week she agreed to meet with us, she was expressing how she had just lost a very close friend and her friend had always inspired her to come closer to Christ. We decided to share the Plan of Salvation with her. She had a lot of questions and was very interested. We had a member present with her, and the member also used to be Catholic, so I think that helped. But at the end of the lesson we asked her to say the closing prayer in way we had showed her. She was a little hesitant at first, but decided that she would. After the prayer her eyes were watery and the spirit was so strong. As she gave me a hug good-bye she said she would meet with us again!! :) She also came to church with her husband Roland and their son this week. It was so so awesome!!

Sunday: Roland and his wife Jessica came to church with their son Max:) It was so awesome! :) We also went caroling with the elders and it was a blast! The Christmas spirit is the best!

Thank you guys for all you love and support! I received your Christmas cards this week and it made my week! I love you all so much and hope you all have a very merry Christmas! Love you!

Love,
Hermana Parslow

Newsletter Week 8

It is so crazy.. I am only a couple states away from my home state and often have to remind myself that I am still in America. This is a very different America than I am used to! But it is awesome! The Mission President said that the population is 50/50 on Latinos here. There are a ton of Latinos and African Americans here, not as many white, People are so kind and caring. I love it!

My companion is from Hondorus, so she doesn't have her drivers lisence.. which makes me the designated driver, haha people here drive so crazy. But I am quickly learning how to drive like a Texan:)

Me and Hermana Diaz went on exchanges this week and I was with Hermana Tu'i! She is so so so awesome and she helped me so much!! She is Tongan and has a heart of gold! :)

The language is coming.. slowly but surely.. haha I can now atleast pick up the main idea about what is being talked about, not all the details, but atleast the main point:)

This week we were having family home evening with one of the less active families in our ward, and we talked about faith. We read in Ether 12:4. I absolutely love this scripture. It talks about how faith is our anchor. It makes me think of us being in a boat, our faith is the anchor that holds us in one spot during the storm.. If we have a weak (or light) anchor we are going to be carried away and lost in the storm. We need to have our faith firm in Christ and exercise it daily, so that when the storms do come and the waves beat against us we will know that we are safe.

I love this gospel and my savior! Thank you all for all of the love and support! I hope you are all doing great! :)

Love, Hermana Parslow

Newsletter Week 7

So this week has been pretty crazy. I arrived in Texas and got my new companion. Her name is Hermana Diaz and she is from Hondorus.

We went tracting our first day here and I had my first experience of getting doors slammed in my face.. quite a new experience for me. Most people just politely say no.. but there is a few who are not the kindest. haha I also had someone ask me how many wives we have in our church and was telling me that Mormons are killers. He is a very interesting man. His name is Glen. But he is awesome and I hope we get to interact more with him.

The Hernandez family got baptized this week. there is three little kids that were baptized. They are all very sweet and I love them so much.

We tracted into a man named Ceaser, he said he is looking for truth and is interested about learning more. So I am really excited to work with him. We have an appointment with him today. We also met a family with six members in it and invited them to church this week to the baptism and they came to both! It was so awesome! The little girl told us she wants to get baptized , and she is 12 so I am so excited to start teaching them.

Our mission goals are to ask someone to get baptized every day. so that has been fun trying to complete. My companion is cool, she is super intense in the work and has a lot of passion. Its great, sometimes I get a little overwhelmed, but I love it.

I know this church is true and I know Jesus Christ is my Savior. Love you guys! thank you for all the love and support!

Love, Hermana Parslow

Newsletter Week 6

Hey! This week has been really good. It was the final week here at the MTC, so that is super exciting! (:

Our lessons keep getting better and better and so is the Spanish, so I guess that means the MTC was a success.. haha

We had an In-Field Orientation this week and there was a super awesome quote that was said, and I love it so I wanted to share it. Here it is:

Faith is the power
Obedience is the price
Love is the motivation
Spirit is the key
Jesus Christ is the reason.

I am so lucky to be able to go and serve! I already love the people of Texas and couldn't be going to a better mission! I got a really strong confirmation this week that Texas is where I am suppose serve my mission! (: It was an awesome experience.

This Sunday was a pretty big day, we had to sing a special musical number because we are leaving this week so we sang "Mas Cerca Dios, de Ti" Which is "Nearer my God to Thee" It ended up being pretty beautiful, then we bore our testimonies. So I am going to bear my testimony in Spanish, for those of you who know Spanish don't judge too harshly, haha I know I still say loads of things wrong... :) But here ya go:)

Yo Tengo un gran testimonio de mi Salvador, Jesucristo. Yo se que porque de Su Expiaxion todas las personas en el mundo pueden vivir con Dios otra vez. Yo se que Jose Smith fue un verdad profeta, y vio Jesucristo y Padre Celestial en el arboles. Tengo un testimonio que todas las cosas en este Evangelio de Jesucristo, La Iglesia de Jesucristo de Los Santos de los Ultimos Dias es la verdadera iglesia en el mundo. Y mediante esta nosotros podemos vivir con nuestras familias en cielo con Dios otra vez. Porque yo se estas cosas, yo quiero compartir estas con todas las personas. Y yo muy agradicida por la opurtunidad yo tengo a compartir con la gente en Texas. Yo digo estas cosas en el nombre de Jesucristo, amen. 

Love, Hermana Parslow

Newsletter Week 5

Week five was pretty great! I keep on learning so much about how to be a better missionary and how to better help my investigators! I love it!

We had an awesome devotional by Jeffery R. Holland this week about feeding His sheep. I was so touched and don't think I have ever felt the spirit that strongly. He was talking about how after our mission we are never going to be the same. He compared it to how the 12 apostles, after Christ was crucified went back to fishing the fish of the sea. They went on with their normal lives. Then Christ returned and asked the piercing question to Peter if he loved Him. Peter responded that he did love The Lord, and then Jesus told him to feed His sheep.

This is a very known story, but I loved the way Elder Holland compared it to us. Right now is the time when we are so close to the Savior, feeding His sheep in all we do. But when we are done with this short year and a half are we going to go back to our old lives? Like this didn't happen, or just thinking back on it like, ya that was great. Or are we going to truly love our Savior and continue to feed His sheep for the rest of our lives.

This is so applicable to all of us in our lives. If the Savior asked us three times if we loved Him, would we be able to say Yes, Savior, I love you and I am feeding your sheep.

Super powerful stuff! I love this Gospel so much! I have such a strong testimony that it is the true and restored gospel on the Earth! I am so grateful for the opportunity I had to come out on a mission and help bring others unto Christ! I hope you are all having such a fantastic week! And I hope we are all remembering to continually feed His sheep.

Love, Hermana Parslow

Newsletter Week 4

Hey! so this week has been a bit of a longer one, but I learned so much! And plus today is pday which makes it one of the best days of the week! cuz I get to take a nap, talk to my family and friends ANNNDD there is pizza for dinner tonight!

We went to a way awesome devotional at the beginning of this week and he talked about testimonies and true conversion. He explained that true conversion is when your testimony turns into actions. If your testimony is merely beliefs and feelings how strong are those going to hold up when trials come your way? There was such a strong spirit, I want to be sure that my testimony isn't only in my heart. It is in everything I do.

We have 4 'investigators' now, Ivan, Maria, Reid, and TRC. But we had an awesome experience with Ivan this week, he was just bawling through the entire lesson, he said that his parents came to church with him this week which was so awesome! and that he knows he needs help in his life from the gospel. So that was a way awesome testimony builder!

So this Sunday I had to give a talk in sacrament (in Spanish) I talked about faith. It's funny though, in sacrament they don't tell you before hand who is speaking, they just get up there and say "We will now hear from.. (Hermana Parslow)" haha so you don't really have time to freak out. But I think it went pretty good, the spirit definitely helped me a ton.

Me and Hermana Hammar were also asked to be the zone Sister Training Leaders, which means we really have to be on our best behavior now. But it was good, because I absolutely love the sisters in my zone. I hope i can help them the best I can.

Well I love you all so much and I am praying for you! This week when I was having a hard time I was reminded that salvation isn't going to be easy, Christ was the only perfect person to walk the Earth, and salvation definitely wasn't easy for him, so why would it be easy for us? I learned that if I just keep feeding and nourishing my testimony during hard times, it will all be okay. :) I read this quote and it said "His kingdom is not about earning and deserving, it is about believing and receiving." There is not possible way we could earn his love, or his kingdom, we just need to believe in him and have faith. Well I love you all so much! thank you for all your love and support!

Love, Hermana Parslow

Ps. 2 Nephi 31:19-20 is a great scripture and was a total answer to my prayers.. you should all read it:)

Newsletter Week 3

This week was much better than last!! I was having a hard time so I asked one of the elders in our district to give me a blessing and it was so so so amazing!!

Our lessons are also beginning to go much better now, the gift of tongues is real, I know so much more Spanish when i teach a lesson, then i do any other time. I truly am so blessed. We also had a devotional this week about prayers and how The Lord listens to them, it helped me know that The Lord is listening, he doesn't have to send down a bolt of lightening to show that he is listening, its the small peaceful feeling that means everything to me. So this week my testimony on prayers definitely grew.

So last sunday was Fast Sunday.. so they had a fast and testimony meeting, and they do E V E R Y T H I N G here in spanish, so of course sacrament meeting was in spanish, but i had the strongest impression that i needed to go and bear my testimony. Haha i was so scared.. but i got up there and bore testimony of our savior and his love for us in spanish!! It was a way awesome experience!! I'm not sure if anyone understood what I was trying to say.. but i felt the spirit.. haha. Oh and there are like wild Parrots here! tons of them! it is pretty cool.

Today we got to go to the temple... which was way awesome, because they keep you cooped up in the MTC.. so getting out of the walls was great. The temple in Mexico city is currently under renovation... so we couldn't go in and do a session, but we went to the visitor center and it was sooo beautiful there!! It was an amazing experience! I feel so blessed to be a part of this church and the opportunity to be on a mission. I am learning and growing so much here! Growing isn't easy.. but it's great.

Well thank you all so much for all the love and support you give me!! it means so much! I love you all tons! Here are some pictures from the temple today, and the picture with all the missionaries is my entire district, we are tiny.. but i love them all.. We are super tight. and then the picture with the 2 adults, those are our teachers! we love them tons to!
























Love, Hermana Parslow

Newsletter Week 2

This week was a little bit long.. but its all good. We now have 2 "investigators" Gabby and Ivan. Things with ivan are going really good, the spirit is so strong its crazy. I love having lessons with him. Now Gabby is a little bit harder.. she drinks and is really happy with her life and doesn't know why we want to teach her about the plan of happiness and stuff when she is already so happy and doesn't want to change.. but she is awesome too.

Its pretty cold here haha.. and the other day me and my companion were freezing so we went and got water bottles and filled them with hot water.. and so i put mine under my coats... ( i was wearing both of the coats i brought cuz i was so cold) and it felt so warm! so i squoze the water bottle to my tummy and the top popped off and scorching hot water exploded all over my stomach and legs and coats and clothes and everything.. but the hot water quickly got ice cold and i was freezing!! so we ran back to the apartment and i changed my clothes but both of my coats were soaking wet... haha so that was a bit of a bummer. But it was all good me and Hermana Hammar laughed our heads off!

The language is coming. it is still slow, but when i teach lessons i can speak spanish so much better than in class.. it is crazy how the Lord brings things to your remembrance in your time of need.

Well i know this church is true and i love my Savior. Thank you for all the love and support. I hope to hear from you all soon!!

Love, Hermana Parslow

Week One Newsletter

Week one newsletter!

So the first week of my mission was a success. There is so much to learn. The first three days I was here was all lectures, meetings and devotionals about the rules and stuff.. so they were not my very favorite. haha it was a bit rough... Things are much better now though, we have an investigator named Maria... she only speaks spanish though.. so that puts a damper on things.. But I love her to death. Her spirit is so sweet, we are having our fourth lesson with her tomorrow. We are going to teach about modern prophets.

My companions name is Hermana Hammar. She is super nice and we get a long great. i was very blessed. :) we only have six people in our whole district... so we are just tiny. haha spanish is harder than i though.. haha they don't really teach you spanish.. they just imerse you in it and hope you catch on. But hey i guess thats one way to learn.. a bit of a frustrating way.. but i hear it is pretty successful :) Today is my first pday.. but they changed the pday rules.. now here in the mtc and in your mission field pday only goes until 6pm and then you are to treat it as a normal day with lessons with ivestigators and everything.. haha so that was new... i was a bit bummed. but oh well.

Well things are going good here. Thank you all so much for all the love and support, you are all so great!! i hope you are all loving your time back home!

Love, Hermana Parslow