Letter # 4

Dear Family,                      August 18, 2014

I made it to my first area which is Sheldon C which is just outside of the big city of Birmingham.  The first day we went to the flat (apartment) and we unpacked our stuff and got settled in. We then went and met some of the members in the ward and also some of the non-members.  It was really fun to start to meet new people. 

My companion is an Elder from Shelley Idaho.  He is a really cool guy and we have a lot of things in common.  He likes to go hunting with his family and his favorite sport is American Football.  We are learning a lot together and it's a lot of fun to get to know him more. 

The second day in the field wasn't too bad.  We went out and started knocking on doors to see if we could find anyone who wanted to listen, but all we got was people slamming doors without even listening.  We then went and visited some less active members and we talked to them for a little bit and shared a spiritual thought with them.  We invited them to church and they did show up on Sunday. It was really good to see them there. 

We went and mowed a members lawn for service that day. On our way back to the flat it started to pour so we walked for about 15 minutes in the pouring rain and got soaked because we had forgotten our umbrellas at the flat. Once we got to the flat we noticed that we had forgotten the keys back at the member’s house so we had to walk back and get the keys in the rain.  It was kind of fun walking in the rain.  We then made it back and did our planning meeting and went to bed. 

The next day we found a man who kind of seems interested in the gospel.  We will be meeting with him tomorrow and hopefully we can teach him more.  We gave him a Book of Mormon and a Plan of Salvation pamphlet and said he would read it before tomorrow.  Hopefully he does because we aren't having a whole lot of success. 

We went to church yesterday and it was great to meet a lot more of the members at church.  They are all great people and they are really friendly. 

We had a great experience today.  As we were walking up to the library to email, a man stopped us on the side of the road.  He said that he has talked to the missionaries before and that he wanted to start to go back to church.  He said that before he starts to go back he wants us to meet with him and teach him the lessons again because he has kind of forgotten some of it.  It was a really cool experience and I can't wait until next week when we can talk to him.

To answer one of your questions I had fish and chips in the MTC and they were super good.   I had two whole fish and I went back and had a whole plate full of chips.  We learned a lot in the MTC and we did play a lot of Football (soccer) on our exercise time.  It was a little fun playing, but I still don't think I will come home liking it more. 

I'm glad that I'm finally out of the MTC because it was getting a little boring sitting in class most of the time.

In England they do a thing called bank holiday which is on Mondays.  There is a bank holiday a couple of times a month and on those days most of the places are closed.  One of those places is the library so when there is a bank holiday we will be emailing on Tuesday not Monday.  There is one next Monday so I will not be emailing then.  I will try to let you know when they are, but they don't have a set date of when they are so if I don't email on Monday expect one on Tuesday. 

I hope you all have a great week and I will email you next Tuesday.

Love Elder Peterson

My Favorite part of the mission so far is probably meeting new people and serving others.  We try to find lots of opportunities to serve others and it makes us feel good when we do.  I challenge you and the family to find opportunities to serve it makes your day so much better.  

My favorite part of the MTC was definitely the food because we were fed a ton of food.  I weighed myself the day before I left the MTC and I had gained about 3 pounds.  Good thing we had exercised or I probably would have gained more.  

My favorite part about England is looking at all the green grass and all the flowers that people have in their yards.  I haven't seen anything that is brown and dead yet because it rains so much and no one had to water.