Words from Chandon Herring in Washington DC

"Well Hello everyone!!!!! How are you? Good glad to hear it. I am doing
great. Life here is the best and i love it. We had a solid week.
President Cooke wants each companionship to get 20 lessons a week. We
are trying really hard but I have to say we came really close this
week. Our area needs more people to teach so we try to contact a lot.
Last week we got ten lessons and this week we got 16 so good
improvement and we will get more i hope. It is hard trying to get it
though because the goal is also trying to get us in members homes.
Half of our ward does not live in our boundaries and our ward is
divided up into the french and english and there are now 12 elders. So
it is difficult not seeing the same people and being a hassle to them.
things are busy for them. But we are trying and it is nice to get
better acquainted with the members.

Tue... We had a busy day and met with P. Clark. He is a less active
that is odd. He is very poor because he cant get a job. He is like
60ish and does not have a high school diploma or a GED. No one will
hire him. We try to help but he looks for excuses. It is sad. We
almost got him to church though! Then we saw Bro Mays. He is so cool.
if you could meet him you would love him. He is a solid member who was
converted about 6 yrs ago. His wife was a cop and died. She was shot
3Xs when DC was the murder capital. But he knows the plan of Salvation
and is excited to see her again. He does his best to help others and i
love him. Then FHE. I had a great time teaching the lesson. I thought
I prepared well and delivered it well. It is weird teaching by
yourself. At the end Bro Pratt taught some family history stuff. He
has some cool stories. He, as a kid, had a weird disease that makes your
skin fall off and swell and ooze. He had it for years and when he was
16 he was given a blessing by Bruce McKonkie and was healed. He could
not go to school or anything before and then BAM he was healed. I love
the priesthood! This church is true!!!!

Wed... Today i was again reminded how serving others blesses us. I
was a little cranky for no reason but as soon as we were out teaching
I was so happy! I love being a missionary! We visited Sister Claude
today. She works in the White House and guess what... WE ARE GETTING A
TOUR!!!!!!!!!! I am so excited! I will let you know when it happens.
They have to do a background check and all that jone. But she is so
sweet. Super nice asian lady who wants to make everyone else happy.
very animated to. She cracks me up. We visited Elsa who we have decided
to drop if she does not come to Conference. She is picking the
Catholic Church. She has not done anything we ask her to
except she came to church once and it was right after the ward Palmyra
trip so they bore testimony of Joseph Smith and she was mad and left
early. grrrrrrr. but we are here to give her an opportunity. We saw
Bessie again this week. She is so cool. She is a little crazy and
needs the gospel. But her testimony is so strong. She is amazing. I
love her so much. I got to teach Mrs. Hicks on facebook and this
random lady who is super cool. She lives in Michigan and is moving to
Provo soon. Then we had Ward Coordination and dinner and bible study.
Good times.

Thursday... The most busy, non productive day of the week. So i will
keep this paragraph short. We studied. had district meeting. Then
weekly planned. I made pumpkin bread too...."