Belleville - 05/11/15 (Belleville, IL)

Dear friends and family,

I hope that everyone had a great week, and all the mothers out there had a wonderful Mother's Day! Even though I am not a mother, I sure had a great one! It was such a blessing to be able to sit down with my family over Skype and be able to talk and laugh with them. It sure is a great booster for me as a missionary and gives me new strength to keep moving forward in the work. 

So I am getting settled into my new area of Belleville Illinois! Yes, I am still in Illinois! But I am back to being just outside of St Louis. I am actually about 30 minutes south of my first area in Glen Carbon, and I am back hanging out with the East St Louis Elders! haha! 

Belleville seems to be a pretty nice area so far, we cover a lot of area so there is a lot of work to do. We cover most of Belleville, the City of Mascoutah, and all of Scott Air Force Base. A very large majority of the ward members are active duty Airmen. Come to think of it, most of the non-members are Active duty Airmen too... everyone is either Active duty, former military, or family member in the military. But there are a lot of great people here! We also have a car, we drive a 2013 Chevy Cruz and our apartment is actually a 3 level house. So we are doing pretty well right now!

My new companion is Elder Jones, he is from Idaho falls, Idaho. He has been out for only 6 months and I am his 3ed companion on the mission. He is pretty shy and quiet, but we are making it work. he is a great a companion. 

I am still trying to learn he area and learn the ward members, but I am figuring it out alright. We don't have a very big teaching pool right now. We started teaching this guy on Friday, his name is Samuel, he East St Louis elders were teaching him a while back, then he moved over to Belleville. We were able to track him down and we started teaching him again. He is pretty interested, bu is obvious that he hasn't retained a lot of what the past missionaries have taught him. 

Ya, That is about all I know right now...I really don't have a great grasp on what is going on yet. I haven't really gotten the chance to meet our other 3 investigators and have a lesson with them. But the work is moving forward, and Elder Jones and I are working really hard here, and are set up to have a pretty good week! So we will see what happens! 

So funny story before I end, This morning we were headed out the door and as soon as I open it there is this little dog sitting on our front porch! He was wet and he didn't have any tags on. I tried feeding him a chip but he didn't want it. He seemed really friendly and happy, so we got some towels and let him inside. We put a leash on him and we took him to the Dog Shelter! It was pretty great, as missionaries It feels good doing some good in the community, for members, non-members, and animals! haha!

Elder Chase Peterson