All these are from Arth-Goldau and the Rigi trip.


MARCH 20, 2009 FRIDAY

When I went out on my walk in the forest this morning it was overcast and chilly, but an hour later it was freezing and snowing. I got a good workout, but I was ready to go in where it was warm by the time I got home. Later on I mentioned to Diana we hadn’t heard from Elders Pine and Harris for a couple of days to which she said to just wait because they’ll call this morning and want to use our computer. Sure enough, a few minutes later they called wanting to use the computer to print off some stuff for the zone conference coming up. They came over about lunch time so we fixed a quick lunch for them. Sherman sent us a recipe for a cake in a mug baked in a microwave. We tried out this recipe and it worked pretty good and they loved it with a little vanilla ice cream on the side. They also told us they had cleared Solange and Patricia, two of their investigators, for baptism and had set April 12th Easter as their baptism date. We are excited to see that happen. If all goes well, that’ll be four baptisms in our ward since we’ve been here. There was some question whether they could be baptized because they don’t have current visas to be in Switzerland. However, Pres. Matern asked Elder Kopiscke and he approved the baptisms.

Later this afternoon we visited Suwang and then went out to Ebmattingen to see if we could catch Nelly Rathgeb at home. We have tried to visit her several times, but not found her home. Elders Evans and Jensen caught her home a couple of weeks ago and have taught her and her husband twice already. They discovered she works out of town during the week and comes home on Friday evening for the weekend. Today was her birthday and we waited until the evening, but she was still not home. We did the usual and put her birthday present and card in the mailbox and we’ll try again, maybe on a Saturday or Sunday. We tried to visit the Friouds while we were out there, but they weren’t home either although she told us she’s always home because she has to be careful with this pregnancy.

We road back into Stettbach to visit another of our birthday less active members, and this time we actually found him at home. We introduced ourselves and asked if he were a member of the Church. He said he was, but hasn’t attended for a long time because he had some problems and just hasn’t gone back. We asked him if we could talk to him about what happened and he said yes, but not now because he was celebrating his birthday. We told him we knew it was his birthday and gave him his gift and card. He said it was just a coincidence we caught him at this apartment because he doesn’t live there, his ex-wife does. He just happened to be there to celebrate his birthday. We tried to make an appointment, but he said he doesn’t have time right now and asked for our card and phone number which we gave him. We hope he will call us sometime in the future.

We walked to another member’s home who lived in the area, but he wasn’t home either and so we walked to the tram stop and came home. After Elders Pine and Harris left today we discovered Elder Pine had left his day planner again. Just as we came in our door, he called to ask if they could come over and pick it up which they did. Diana nuked a couple more chocolate cakes for them and this time they turned out even better. They ate them up and left for home about 9:00. And that seems to be it for today. Tomorrow we’ll travel to Buehlach to be part of the display/contacting activity at the bahnhof (train station) there. Oops, just got an emergency call for help from a member. We’ll report on it tomorrow.