Our trip up over the mountains from Chur to Campocologna.

MAY 31, 2010 MONDAY

We were up at 5:30 to catch the bus at 6:47 to get to the bahnhof for our train to Zurich. Our train should have arrived in Zurich at 7:48 which would have put us there twenty minutes ahead of schedule. The best laid plans of mice and men........ Our train entered the long tunnel just before we got to the Zurich bahnhof and then it stopped. We waited in the dark tunnel for about five minutes before an explanation was given us over the loudspeaker. Something went wrong with the electrical system between us and Zurich and we were stuck until it got repaired. Most of the people took it in stride, but a few were frustrated and unhappy at the delay. It wasn’t long before Elder Porter called on our cell phone to ask if we were coming. We told them our problem and they said they’d wait for us. Finally after a twenty-five minute delay, our train started to move. We called Elder Porter and told him we were on the move and would get there as soon as we could. Our train arrived and we hurried off and to platform 5 where we met Elders Porter & Morris and Charlotte. The train we wanted to take had already left, but we found the next one to Chur that left fifteen minutes later and got on it. There’s always another train.

We traveled to Chur which took an hour and a half and then switched trains and continued on to Samendan where we changed trains once again. From there it was a slower train that traveled up the mountain through many small towns including Pontresina, Bernina Diavolezza to Ospizia Bernina, the Bernina Pass, and then down the other side through Alp Gruen, Poschiavo, La Prese, Brusio to Campocologno where we had to stop because we ran out of time. The train ride was up from the valley where it was lush green grass and forest up through the winding canyons and snow-covered mountain peaks and then down the other side. We went over many bridges and through tunnels, over ravines and through valleys, up above the tree line and down, sometimes sunny, sometimes raining and sometimes snowing. The higher we got the colder it was and we even traveled through a snow storm or two. The snow was melting which created many waterfalls emptying into the river and small lakes. We saw a couple of glaciers in the distance as we traveled along. We never tire of seeing the small towns with the ever present churches and steeples that nestle in every open area between the forested hillsides. Scattered along the mountain sides were buildings that look like castles perched on high places where it looked like they’d be easy to defend. We see all these things as we ride along, but it would be neat if we could stop and explore some of them, but we never have enough time. We have to be content just to observe and enjoy the view.

We had to stop one stop short of the end of the line and turn back and when we got off at Campocologno, our return train was sitting right there to take us back to St. Moritz, the famous resort town. When we got there, we had to wait for almost an hour before our train was due to arrive to take us back to Chur through Samedan. During the hour Charlotte took us to the longest escalator we’ve ever seen. St. Moritz is famous for all of the rich people who live there and it’s the holiday destination of the rich and famous from all over the world including our own President, Barack Obama. The rich and famous don’t like to walk so they insisted an elevator be built from the train/bus stop level up into the center of town. The buildings and hotels are built out of the finest materials and workmanship. We didn’t get to see much, but we found a souvenir shop and bought a couple of small things and then returned to the train station.

The trip from St. Moritz to Chur was slow, winding, but beautiful. At Chur we boarded a fast train that got us back to Zurich in just over an hour. It’s always fun to travel with Charlotte and we’ll miss her a lot when we go home. It was good to get to know Elders Porter & Morris a little better. We said our goodbyes and finished our trip back to Schaffhausen, arriving home just after 9:00.

We listened to a message from Sylvain on our answer machine saying he is doing okay and will call us back tomorrow. We got out the frozen hamburger to thaw for Sloppy Joes tomorrow and then wrote our journal. At 10:30 we got a call from Elder Bentley who informed us that we could expect two more for lunch tomorrow, Elders Talley & Anderson, our zone leaders. We had to get two more packages of hamburger out to thaw, but we already had enough buns, thank goodness.

David Wichtermann & Sweta (Sweta, from Russia, finally got her visa and they'll be married on June 25. Elders Irick, Dias and Harris; Angela Lloyd, E. Larson & S. Larson.

MAY 30, 2010 SUNDAY

I walked to Church in the rain this morning protected by my raincoat and umbrella, but even with that, I was somewhat wet when I got there. I was busy writing our report when Michael Hartig arrived at ten minutes past eight, but I interrupted my work to wish him a happy birthday. We gave him a white shirt and two of my ties. He was most thrilled with the ties, but was also surprised to receive a white shirt. He continued on with his job to get the sacrament table set up, the chapel seats organized and song books spread out. I continued on with our report and finished it by the time I had to leave to meet Diana coming on the bus. The rain continued unabated as I met Diana and we walked back up to the Church together. When we greeted Paul, he said he wished we would’ve come to Schaffhausen a lot sooner because then he could have been baptized a lot sooner. When Pres. Matern was wrestling with the decision to transfer us to Schaffhausen, he told us he had the definite impression there was a work for us to do here. We believe, for what ever reason, Paul Hunziker was part of the “work” and we’ll be forever grateful for the opportunity to work with him and help him in his conversion and baptism. Pres. Flammia asked me today if I would confer the Aaronic Priesthood on Paul next week and ordain him to the office of Priest. Paul was also sustained as the Sunday school teacher today and Bro. Wigger set him apart after Sacrament Meeting. Paul is excited to be able to serve in the Schaffhausen Branch.

Sunday school was fairly short today because Bro. Hartig forgot his glasses and couldn’t read the manual so good even with the small flashlight he had. He did the best he could, but it was hard to follow his train of thought. As soon as it was over we hurriedly said our goodbyes so we could rush to the bahnhof to catch our bus. We missed it by 20 seconds which obligated us to wait twenty minutes for the next one. We hate it when that happens. We wanted to hurry home as fast as we could so we could get lunch and then get on our way to Schwamendingen for the baptism. We finally made it home, broke our fast, packed up the banana bread, a glass platter for Agnes, a coat for Elder Porter that he left in our church building and then we took off. We arrived in Oerlikon a few minutes before 2:00, caught bus #63 and got off at Saatlenstrasse. After a ten minute walk we arrived at Charlotte’s hoping to get to visit with Elders Irick, Harris and Nilsson, who were back in Switzerland to assist or witness Angela’s baptism. The only one of the three there was Elder Irick, but Agnes was there, too. We gave her the platter which she accepted with profuse thanks. We had a nice visit with him, Agnes and Charlotte while we waited for the baptism. Whenever we see Agnes, we always ask when she’s going to get baptized. Charlotte said she told the ward she will be baptized, but hasn’t revealed the date yet although she said she would be the next one baptized. That is a big step forward for her and today she told us the same thing. It’s not a matter of “if”, but “when.” We hope it’ll be before we go home in August.

When it came time for Angela’s baptism, we left and went to the stake center. People were already coming and, by the time the meeting started, there were somewhere between 250 and 300 people attending. It was the most people we’ve ever seen at a baptism; it was unbelievable. People came from several wards to support her as well as family and friends. Missionaries came with their investigators as well. We were looking for Madeleine to give her the pre-paid phone codes to reload her cell phone, but Irene told us she came to Church this morning and had to go home early because she became ill and was throwing up. But as the meeting began, in hobbled Madeleine. We were thrilled to see her and later on were able to give her the phone codes. We also gave Elder Porter his coat.

We were able to spend time with Elders Irick, Harris and Nillson and renew our friendship with them. They are very special to us as well as Elders Evans, Elend, Pine and Jensen. The three elders came on standby flights and got here a day later than they wanted. They really hadn’t planned ahead where they were going to stay, but ended up sleeping on the floor of our old apartment on Schoerlistrasse where Elder and Sister Walters are now staying. Sister Walker was talking to them on the phone and asked them where they were going to stay the night. When they hesitated, she offered to let them stay with them. We hope this won’t be the last time we see them. Elder Harris said he is now working at a golf course in Park City and he promised us that we could go golfing there with him.

We also spent a lot of time talking to the Walters who are the mission home couple. They are uncertain what they will be doing or where they’ll be serving after the mission home closes down July 1. That’s when the Zurich Swiss Mission will cease to exist and will be included in the larger German Speaking Countries Mission. Pres. Condie, who will be the mission president of the newly organized mission, realized that the Walters have a Swiss visa and, with the restrictions the Swiss government has placed on new visas, they may be assigned somewhere in Switzerland. If they leave and go to Germany, they’ll lose their visas and couldn’t be replaced. They may even end up replacing us here in Schaffhausen; only the Lord knows at this point. The Walters said they would serve wherever the Lord calls them to serve.

The meeting was very spiritual with Rik Hansen, a high councilor, giving the talk on baptism and Bishop Schwendener giving the talk on the Gift of the Holy Ghost. In between those talks Elder Kevin Irick baptized Angela and after, Elder Jace Nillson confirmed her. Elder Diaz and Urs Wichtermann were the witnesses. Angela also bore her testimony. After the meeting there were refreshments in the cultural hall and, surprisingly, there were plenty to go around. The first thing I looked for was our banana bread with the chocolate chips in it, but it was gone in a flash. The loaf with only nuts in it lasted until the very end when it was almost all that was left. People over here must not like nuts in banana bread.

We had a great time greeting members from our old ward (Schwamendingen) who we had grown to know and love. They genuinely were glad to see us, too, and many of them gave us hugs and the three kiss salutation. Elder and Sister Walters brought us the German Book of Mormon on tape that we’d asked for as well as some brochures. When we thought about going home, we realized we had already missed our train, but Brother DeMarzi came to our rescue and invited us to ride with him and his son in his car. He took us right to our doorstep.

When we got home, we saw Dorothea Jaermann had called us so we returned the call. She invited us to lunch on Wednesday. She said this is her way of supporting the missionary work and who are we to deny her this blessing? Besides, she’s a good cook and she’s always excited to see what spiritual thought or object lesson we’re going to teach her. Later Elder Bentley called to get our statistics for the week and said he’d call us back later with our district meeting assignments. Mostly when he says that, he forgets until he realizes at the district meeting he forgot to call us back. Well, he still has twenty-five minutes until it’s lights out. We received a text message ten minutes after he should have been in bed asking us to give the opening and closing songs and prayers. He must have remembered when saying his prayers.

We called the Singen elders to see if they were really going to come tomorrow to spend their P-day with us going to Munot castle, Rheinfalls and Schloss Laufen here in Schaffhausen. They said they would like to, but it wouldn’t be a very good weather day and they had two service projects they were supposed to help members with. They elected to stay home tomorrow and do it next Monday. This frees us up to go with Elder Porter, his companion and Charlotte to Chur, St. Moritz and farther to two different glaciers. We don’t know exactly where we’re going, but we’ll detail it in our journal tomorrow. It’ll be a long day on the trains, but our mission will soon be coming to an end and we need to take every legitimate opportunity to see this part of the world. We may never come this way again.

The tender mercy today was the baptism of Angela Lloyd. Many years ago she was once a member, served a mission in Switzerland, married a Swiss after her mission, got divorced, fell into bad habits and was excommunicated. Then she was found by the missionaries (who were actually sent by the Lord to seek her out), rekindled her faith, repented, confessed and worked with her bishop until again worthy, was baptized and confirmed and tasted the sweet cleansing through the Atonement of Jesus Christ. Her countenance is now radiant and full of hope as she looks to the future of activity and service in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. It was and is a privilege to be associated with her and to help in a small way as she made her journey back into the fold.

Photos in Germany including typical little town, castle in Singen and a church.

MAY 29, 2010 SATURDAY

We didn’t have any appointments today so we decided we’d do our wash and do some baking to get ready for Angie’s baptism tomorrow. Two batches of wash at two hours each takes a long time to get it done. Each batch takes and hour to dry so that isn’t so bad. We made two extra large loaves of banana bread, but one with a different twist. One had walnuts in it and we put dark chocolate chips in the other so there would be a variety and not just the same old thing. I made a really small test loaf with the chips in it to try to see how it would taste. I liked it better than the normal kind we usually make. In the future I’ll probably always make one of each, but nuts would be good in it, too. We made up our shopping list, part of it to buy at MIGROS and part to buy in Jestetten this afternoon.

After we put the last batch of clothes in the dryer, we bagged up all the old milk/drink bottles and empty cans and I took my walk up to the recycle bins and disposed of them. While I was there I went into MIGROS and bought some cantelopes (1.80sfr. each) and hotdogs that were on sale, the cantaloupes for Tuesday’s district meeting and hotdogs to put in the freezer for July 4th. I also bought some buns for sloppy Joes that we’re having for this Tuesday. The groceries were pretty heavy, but I carried them in my backpack all the way home. I’ll be so glad when I won’t have to always have that backpack on anymore.

Later in the afternoon we tried to catch the train to Jestetten and buy the rest of the stuff we needed. As we were standing on the platform waiting for the train, we heard a message over the loudspeaker that something had happened and the train wouldn’t be coming. That cancelled our plans and so we detoured and bought from the nearby Kiosk 20.00sfr worth of pre-paid minutes for Madeleine who is being released from the rehab hospital today. Diana talked to her today on the phone and it didn’t sound like she was doing very well. She says she can’t walk as good as she could before the operation, but we told her to be patient and keep working at it. She hasn’t been able to bend her knee for many years and it’ll probably take time for the muscles, nerves and tendons and things to start working again.

This evening we spent time reading up on the Sunday school lesson for tomorrow, the book of Ruth and 1 Samuel chapter 1. As we were finishing the journal, Mayleah called us on skype. She was fun to talk to and we also got to talk with Drayson, Nathean (who can count and say colors) and Rees. They are all excited for when we return because it’ll be time to go on vacation to Bear Lake.

We had our girls bring us some bottles of glucosamine chondroitin for a less active friend in Bruettisellen and eventually Elder Porter and his companion delivered them for us. She asked them to ask us to call her so we did that today. She thanked us for the pills and wanted to pay us for them, but we wouldn’t let her. She let us know she was moving to Bern on August 15 to live with her sister, both of whom are widows. She’s going to get her address for us so we can stay in contact with her, but we also want it to forward to the Bern Ward so they can still try and work with her.

The tender mercy for today is that Dorothea is back from her vacation and called to let us know our street out front will be closed tomorrow except for the buses so she won’t be by to pick up Diana in the morning for Church. The road will be closed for the Slow Up program, a community activity where those who want to can ride bikes, walk, skate board etc. on a circular route through many towns and cities. Too bad it’s on Sunday.

Elder Neuffer bearing testimony; elders listening intently; Zone Zurich missionaries.

MAY 28, 2010 FRIDAY

5:00 came early, but we were up for it (ha ha). We should have tried to buy our train ticket yesterday, but we were too busy to even think about it then. We decided we’d go in a little before our train came so we could buy it over the counter so we caught the 6:07 bus. When we got to the bahnhof, we found out the ticket counter didn’t open until 6:30, the same time our train was scheduled to leave for Singen. Now what to do? We tried the automatic ticket machine, but it was only good for tickets within Switzerland. By the time we figured that out we only had about ten minutes to try something else. We went down through the tunnel and came up on the platform where we’d always caught trains going into Germany and found a ticket machine there for tickets on German trains. We punched in our destination and then put a twenty Euro note into the machine and it spit it back out. We tried it a couple more times with the same result. We finally saw the message on the display that it only took bills for amounts over 9.90 Euro. Our tickets were less than that. We didn’t have change and there was no change machine either. Since the Singen elders would be waiting in Singen for us to arrive, we decided to get on and try and resolve the issue with a train employee. We weren’t able to contact anyone before the train took off. A lot of the times we ride trains when no one checks tickets and we were hoping this would be one. No such luck! A few minutes into the ride here came the ticket checker. When he wanted to see them, we told him our sad story and, because he saw us at the ticket machine, he believed us. We wondered, if he saw us having problems, why didn’t he try to help us before the train left? He wrote us a violation ticket which would require us to pay the cost of the fare plus a 40.00 Euro fine, but he also allowed us to pay for the fare and then he wrote a second little report into his machine that explained the situation. He was kind enough to write that the ticket machine was defective and when the office reviews both the ticket and the report, they will forego the fine. We are hoping it all works out that way.

Aside from being lawbreakers everything else went super today. We arrived in Singen, found the elders, piled into their car and rode to Freiburg, a trip of about an hour and a half. We were an hour early for the conference and could have left a half hour later and the problem on the train could have been eliminated. Oh well. We visited the little grocery store by the Church and window shopped to see if we wanted to buy anything before we went home. However, we did buy a couple bananas, a baguette and a bag of trail mix for breakfast.

We had a great morning session, the highlight being the instruction from Pres. Matern. He used the counsel Alma gave to his sons Helaman, Shiblon and Corianton in Chapters 36-42 in the book of Alma to instruct the elders and sisters on how to be good missionaries. He always gives good counsel. He also told the conversion story of Paul Hunsiker who took over fifty years to decide to be baptized as an example of planting seeds. The seeds grow in the timing of the Lord when the person is ready and we shouldn’t get discouraged when we don’t see immediate results. He also related another story involving Elder Talley who gave a BM to a lady who didn’t really do anything with it. The lady’s aunt visited her, saw the BM and got interested in it. She took it back to the Dominican Republic with her when she went home, contacted the missionaries and was baptized four months ago. It would really be interesting to know where all the BM’s we’ve given out end up.

The last thing on the morning session was a testimony meeting. This usually occurs at the end of the conference but, since this is the last zone conference with the Materns and the afternoon session was a special one for them, it was held before the break. Diana was one of the ones who bore their testimony and again, she did it in good German.

We broke for lunch at 12:30 and the local Relief Society had a delicious lunch waiting for us. It was a chicken curry over rice, a green salad and a strawberry quark dessert. The dessert was something like yogurt, but not as sweet, creamy or good. During the noon break Pres. Matern had us all turn on our cameras and place them on the stage for a zone photo. After we all got situated for the photo, Brother Klaumuenzner dutifully took each camera in turn and snap a couple of photos. It took almost a half an hour for this to be accomplished. After that the afternoon session of the conference convened in the chapel instead on the cultural hall.

After the opening song I offered the invocation and the meeting began. It was more like a sacrament meeting farewell because this is the last zone conference with Pres. and Sister Matern. They will go home on June 30 to resume their life at home after three years serving here. There were a lot of nice things said, many songs sung by the missionaries and Pres. and Sis. Matern gave us their last counsel and words of encouragement and appreciation for all the hard work the missionaries have done.

After the meeting I slipped over to the store and bought the few things we had decided on. We piled back into the car for the ride back to Singen where the missionaries dropped us off. We checked the train schedule and saw that we had six minutes to buy a ticket and get to the train. We found the ticket machine, but couldn’t figure out how to make the thing work. After fiddling with it for a few minutes, we got desperate and asked two girls standing there for help. They breezed through the ten or twelve touch screen buttons as we gave them the information they needed. Finally, the money went in, the ticket and change came back out and we almost ran down the steps and back up on platform four and made it to our train. Why is it we always seem to have to run for our trains and connections? And wouldn’t you know it, no ticket checker on the way back to Schaffhausen! So, a long, but good day comes to a close. We left at 6:07 a.m. and got back home at 7:30 p.m. We envy the Doyles and Kroffs who don’t have to travel at all for their conferences.

We got a bite to eat, did some planning, checked the emails and wrote the journal. And that’s it for today except that Elder Neuffer called to see if he could get a haircut after district meeting next Tuesday. There are probably a couple more that’ll probably want their heir cut, too. Elder Vincent made his weekly call to check up on us and bring us up to date on what they’ve been doing in Zollikofen. We tried to call the senior couple in Ebnat Kapell, the Hutchesons, but they didn’t answer their phone.

One tender mercy today is that we won’t have to pay the 40 Euro fine, if all goes as the ticket checker said it would.

Just some photos of Switzerland.

MAY 27, 2010 THURSDAY

Our first appointment today was this morning at 10:00 with Jasmine Hunziker in Langwiesen. We went there to give her the blessing we promised her yesterday. Even though she was feeling much better today, she still had pain in her side and was still worried about what could be wrong. She’s suffered from stomach and intestine problems for months; it comes and goes. After we arrived the first thing she wanted was to ask us a question. She read Revelations 22:18 to us which warns about adding to or taking away from this book and asked how the Book of Mormon doesn’t violate this warning. We referred her to Deuteronomy 4:2 which says the same thing and reasoned with her that if the scripture in Revelations meant the whole bible, the same would hold true with the one in Deuteronomy which would then make most of the bible invalid. We reasoned that these two scriptures probably meant the warning for the book they were written in. We talked about prophets and how the Lord always works through them (Amos 3:7) and that he still talks through prophets today. This discussion lasted over a half hour, but that seemed to satisfy her although we forgot to tell her that revelations just happens to be at the end of the bible and wasn’t the last book written. Next time we meet we’ll mention that, too. We made our next appointment for Thursday, June 3, when Silvia could be there with us. I gave her the blessing and then we went home to finish our study time and prepare for the rest of our appointments today.

At 1:00 we visited Paul Hunziker and spent about an hour with him. As soon as we get there he gets the tea cups out and makes us peppermint tea whether we want it or not. We took him the 10 liter package of milk we bought for him and then spent time reading in the Book of Mormon with him. He told us he had a friend who, had she known about his baptism, would have come to it. He said she didn’t bother herself much about religion so we had him read Alma 34:31-41 about now is the time to prepare to meet God and told him that he could have her read it the next time she visited him. Before we left he gave me a pair of shoes he received from a lady thirty years ago after her husband died.

We went back home for a bit and then went into Schaffhausen to meet Silvia who was going to escort us to our next appointment and other places we wanted to visit. We got to the park and ride at the appointed time, but Silvia wasn’t there. We waited ten minutes and then just as we started to call her, she called us. We found out she was waiting in one park and ride while we were in the other. We got together and then drove to Andelfingen to visit Carla. Carla invited us in and we introduced Silvia. This is the first time they’ve met and now Silvia will be able to assigned visiting teachers to visit Carla. Carla has lived in the rest home for thirteen years, her name is on the branch member list, but no one has visited her or even knew she existed. Well, now Silvia knows her and the rest of the ward council will know about her, too, after we talk about her at our next meeting. Diana brought the song, How Great Shall Be Your Joy, and asked Carla to play it for us while we sang the words. Carla enjoyed learning the song and she even said she would come an accompany us to sing it at our last sacrament meeting before we go home in August. It will be wonderful to be able to have her come to Church again after these many years.

Next we drove to Uhwiesen to visit a less-active member, Katharina Schmidiger, but when we rang the doorbell, her husband answered. He wasn’t very polite and curtly told us he didn’t like to be disturbed at dinner time. Silvia spoke up from behind us to ask if his wife was home. He answered she was at work and next time we’d better call to get an appointment. With that, we left. At least he didn’t tell us not to bother them again.

Silvia had a piano keyboard in the back of the car she wanted to deliver to Jasmine Hunziker so we went there next. We were only there long enough for her to take it to her and then we went to the hospital to visit Sylvain. Since he’s been in the hospital, Silvia hasn’t visited him because she has wanted to deal with her own co-dependency and let him stand on his own two feet. However, today she decided to visit him because of his impending move to another clinic and she wanted to find out the details. We had a nice hour long visit in the outdoor patio. He has made great progress and is still working hard in the Twelve Step To Recovery Workbook. He has been accepted into a nine month program at a clinic, but there won’t be a slot open for at least a month. He will leave the hospital tomorrow and go back to his group home in Ramsen, but he’ll have someone to watch him a lot closer and escort him to the psychologist so he won’t be alone. Right now he can’t afford to slip up.

We got home a little after 8:00 and felt we’d had a good day. Elder Bushnell called to make sure where we were going to meet in Singen tomorrow morning for us to be able to ride with them to Freiburg for our zone conference.

Tender mercies for today include being able to use the priesthood to give Jasmine a blessing, reading in the BM with Paul and see him recognize the truth in what he read, and to see the progress Sylvain has made in his road to recovery.

Here we are on the Rhein in Buesingen; quite common house construction with wood beams and in between is stucco; a statue thing in Meersburg on Bodensee.

MAY 26, 2010 WEDNESDAY

This morning we went over preparations for our meeting with Jasmine Hunziker. Silvia told us yesterday that she wasn’t feeling too good again and because of that, wasn’t able to go to the branch BBQ Monday. We were hoping she would be well enough for us to meet with her this morning. We took the train at 10:01 and arrived at her door at 10:10. She greeted us with a smile and welcome even though she still wasn’t feeling well. After the initial pleasantries, we had a prayer and taught her the first lesson. We felt a good Spirit there as she participated in the discussion. Little David, her four year old son, was a little frisky, but he’s a sweet kid and didn’t distract a whole lot. When we talked about the gospel being a blessing for families, he was an important visual aid. At the conclusion of the discussion, we gave her a Book of Mormon along with the Joseph Smith pamphlet and the one on the Proclamation on the Family. We challenged her to read them; she accepted the challenge saying she had plenty of time today and was anxious to begin. The BM was a little daunting for her so we told her we’d bring her a list of scriptures that would help her get an overview before she started reading it from the beginning. Part of the challenge was to pray for an answer that it is true and she accepted that challenge, too. We made an appointment for tomorrow at 10:00 to bring her the list of scriptures and to give her a priesthood blessing to help her with her illness, anxiety and stress about not knowing what is causing the problem. When asked to say the closing prayer, she was too shy, but said she’d try and say it the next time.

We returned home to have lunch and then get the English BM for Roger and a birthday present for Carla Wigger. We went back into Schaffhausen and got on bus #25 to travel out to Buch, but decided to stop in Buesingen first to visit Carla. We had a nice visit with her and Fabian, her son, who has a two week vacation from school right now. We gave Carla her gift and we also gave Fabian one of the Camp Helaman coins depicting the armor of God as described in Ephesians 6:11-18. We read the scripture and then talked about what it meant in terms of real life. We had a prayer and then left to continue on our way to visit Roger in Buch. We returned to the bus stop and saw we had enough time to walk to the Rhine River, look around and then walk back. It was then we noticed on the bus schedule that there wasn’t another bus going to Buch until 4:30 and the current time was 2:12. When the bus came, we got on it anyway just to see if it would take us to Buch, but it didn’t. It took us to Thayngen instead. We called Roger and told him that we hadn’t looked carefully at the bus schedule when we made the appointment and that we could meet with him later at 5:00. We understood him to say that he was coming into Schaffhausen on the 5:00 bus and when he got into Schaffhausen, he would call us. So we went on home and did other things and then I went back into Schaffhausen to see if he came in on the 5:30 bus.

I wanted to be in time to be there when his bus arrived so I would know if he really came or not. When I got to Schaffhausen, I saw that his bus was already there and everyone had gotten off. I was walking up and down the sidewalk in front of the bahnhof to see if I could find him. As I was doing this he called me and we tried to set up a place to meet. The street is always noisy with so many people coming and going it was hard to hear and his poor English didn’t help either. Finally, after not being able to find him, I called him back and told him I would wait in front of the post office and he could find me. That finally worked. He said he didn’t have time to meet with us tonight and we agreed to set up another appointment on Sunday at Church. He said he had a lot of questions that he’d like to ask us. He also asked for a priesthood/relief society manual and I told him we didn’t have one, but we’d try and get him one of those, too. He wants to be prepared when he comes to priesthood meeting.

Before I came home I visited the Denners market and bought some bananas and banana yogurt to make banana nut bread for Angie’s baptism Sunday. I also bought a loaf of bread and some Roesti (hashbrowns) to put in our supply closet. I put all of that in my backpack and walked home.

Sylvain left a message on our phone while we were away today letting us know he would not be able to have a visit tomorrow until after 5:30. We would have liked to have talked to him to find out how his day went and also to find out if funding was arranged for his stay in the recovery clinic. We also tried to called Paul to set up an appointment for tomorrow, but never got in touch with him.

Diana liked the planter in Kreuzlingen and the fountain; scene of the Rhine taken out of the train window.

MAY 25, 2010 TUESDAY

Why do we wake up early when we don’t have to? Habit, maybe? We did our usual morning things and then prepared a lesson for Emely for this afternoon’s meeting with her and her mother. A little before noon we left to go visit Ella Huerlimann who lives in a rest home in Beringen. It was her birthday today and we wanted to take her a gift, but also to meet her. We tried to visit her a month or two ago, but she wasn’t in and when we tried to call her, she hung up on us. Since then we found out she is supposed to have the mental capability of a ten year old. When we arrived at the rest home, we knocked on her door and she answered it. We found Ella to be a sweet little old lady who was rather surprised to see two people standing there. We introduced ourselves and asked her if we could come in and visit. She declined saying that she was just about to take a nap. We wished her a happy birthday and gave her a box of cookies and a wash mitt after which we talked for a few minutes. Ella remembered some of the members in the branch and specifically mentioned Silvia and Sylvain Gardedieu. We asked her if we could come back and visit her on another day later in the afternoon when she wouldn’t be napping. She said we could and wished us well.

We returned back to Schaffhausen and, since we had a couple of hours before our meeting with Emely, we went to the Broki Haus again to see if we could find the little oil lamps we saw there the other day. Our lesson with Emely was on the parable of the ten virgins, five who were prepared with oil in their lamps and five who were not. We weren’t sure which Broki Haus they were in so we just guessed. We guessed right and were able to find them, but they only had two and we wanted three, one for Emely, one for Katia and one for Kathleen, the other daughter. Of course we bought a couple other small things so we took them home, dropped them off, picked up the day planner we had forgotten and went to the appointment.

Our lesson with the DiPaolos went really well. We started off reading the scripture, Matt. 25:1-13, and then showed her the painting of the ten virgins. The poem that went along with the painting was written by Gayla Prince and Monteen Gordon which I tried to translate into German a year and a half ago. But the lesson went really well and they were excited to get the little lamps in which to collect oil they earn from keeping the commandments. We told them they would earn extra oil if they came to Church. They said they wouldn’t be able to come this next Sunday because of something the father wants to do, but they’ll make an effort to come the next Sunday.

When we left their home, we wanted to go buy a loaf of bread for Sylvain and then go visit him. He loves bread and, even though he asks for bread with his meals, they forget to bring him any so every time we visit, we take him some. However, when we went to MIGROS, we saw they had milk on sale, 10 liters for 9.50sfr. We were out of milk and were hoping it would come on sale again. Not one to waste an opportunity, we bought twenty liters of milk along with the loaf of bread. The milk is irradiated and doesn’t need refrigeration so we bought enough to probably last us the rest of our mission. We took it home and then continued on with the loaf of bread to visit Sylvain in the hospital.

When we entered his hospital room, we were pleased to see he was working in the twelve step to recovery workbook, reading scriptures and writing down answers to the questions. He said he had just reread the first four steps to get it all fresh in his mind again. We had a good discussion and introduced him to the fifth step which is about confessing. He is prepared to do whatever it takes to overcome the alcohol problem. The doctors told him he had two options to continue therapy. First was that he could live in the group home where he has been living and come into town three times a week to see a psychologist. Second, he could enter a clinic where he would have to stay for at least nine months until his program was finished, or maybe even longer, if needed. He has resisted long term programs in the past, but this time he has made the decision to do it because during the day he can work on the clinic farm or do other meaningful work to occupy his in-between therapy time. Tomorrow he’ll meet with people to see if the county will pay the expense of the in-patient treatment. Silvia, his wife, is thrilled he has made this decision and thinks it’s a big step forward for him.

We’re always looking for ways to help Paul and we saw an opportunity with the milk being on sale. We barely made it in through the doors before they closed them for the night. We bought another case of ten liters to take to him and then we went home.

We called Silvia earlier and left a message on her answering machine to let her know we made an appointment with Carla Sprenger for Thursday. She returned the call to work out the details of where to meet and when. I was talking to her when the cell phone rang. Diana answered and it was Charlotte thinking that we called her first and was returning our call. We hadn’t called her, but Diana had a nice long talk with her about her going to the temple to get her endowments. She’s been a member for a year now, just got her patriarchal blessing and is excited to go to the temple. After I got off the phone with Silvia, Diana handed the cell phone to me and I talked to her for awhile. While I was still on the phone with her, Sandro DeMarzi called on the other one and Diana had a nice talk with him. He had been to see Sylvain today also which was nice to see he was getting support form others besides us. Sandro also told Diana about his date with Angie and that she has invited 350 people to her baptism next Sunday. The room won’t hold even a third that many, so we’ll see how many really come. It would be nice to fill it. While she was talking to Sandro, Elder Bentley called on the cell phone wanting to know if we had any progressing investigators. I told him we had three, Emely, Roger and Jasmine. With the warming weather he said he has finally managed to overcome the illness that has plagued him for the last several months. All of these phone calls were going on while I was trying to write our journal, but the interruptions were welcomed although it has taken a lot longer to write it. And now it’s bedtime.

Landing for Meinau; coming into Meersburg; most of our missionary group in Romanshorn.

MAY 24, 2010 MONDAY

We were up before 7:00 so we could be ready to catch our train at 8:31 for our trip to Romanshorn. We made our lunches, stuffed them into my backpack and were out the door by 8:10 to catch the bus at 8:11. We forgot our cell phone and wanted to go back and get it, but we didn’t want to miss the bus so we went without it. It turned out that we didn’t need it anyway.

We made the hour and a half trip to Romanshorn where everyone was going to meet. When we got off the train, we were surprised by Elders Wolf and Ross who were there ahead of us. We waited together until the others arrived twenty minutes later. It seemed half the people getting off the train were missionaries, seventeen in all which made twenty-one total. The senior missionaries were Pres. & Sister Matern, the Walkers, Larsons and Charlotte. In addition there were four sisters and ten elders and, the surprising things was, we knew almost all of them. After a false start we finally figured out what we wanted to do and where we needed to be to catch a boat that took us on an excursion around Lake Constance (Bodensee in German).

Pres. Matern checked with the harbor master to find out how much it would cost and when we got on board we expected to pay 9:00sfr. each for the trip. We were standing in the ticket line with Elder Wolf who, when a ticket checker came by, asked again how much it would cost. He told us that the policy had just changed so that the trip was free with the Swiss Transportation Pass that all the missionaries have. That was even better news for all of us.

We were on the ship for about four hours and went to the following ports of call: Romanshorn, Altnau, Bottighofen, Kreuzlingen, Mainau, Uhldingen, Meersburg, and then back to Kreuzlingen where we got off. The day was picture perfect with full sun and no clouds. On deck it was a little bit cool while underway and we didn’t bring jackets or sweaters. Even then it wasn’t too uncomfortable and, when it became just a bit too chilly, we went into the cabin to warm up. We saw a lot of other tour boats and car ferries plying the waters as well as other personal sized watercraft and sailboats. The sandy shores and grassy parks were filled with sunbathers, picnickers and campers. When we pulled into the harbors to let people off and some back on, we got close up views of medieval buildings, castles, government buildings, monasteries, convents and such. Some harbor fronts had many stores and shops with hundreds of people moving about or eating in the open air cafes. It would have been nice to have had the time to get off and walk around, especially in Meersburg, but we had to stay on the boat and be content to look as we passed by.

We ended out boat trip in Kreuzlingen and when we got off, there it was staring us right in the face. A golf course! But alas, only a mini golf course and full too, so it wasn’t much of a temptation. At this point most of the young missionaries separated themselves from the adult group and where they went, we don’t know. We’re sure eventually they made their way back to their assigned areas. On the other hand the Materns, Walkers, Larsons, Charlotte and one set of elders walked to the train station and boarded the next train for Schaffhausen. We had a lively discussion as we traveled and got off at Schaffhausen, enjoying the scenery as we traveled along. We’ve ridden this line many times, but it was new for the others. The train follows the Rhine River from Kreuzlingen to Schaffhausen. At Stein Am Rhein Elder Walters jumped off the train while we were stopped, to take a photo of the castle on top the mountain and we weren’t sure he would be quick enough to get back on before the train took off again, but he made it with time to spare.

When we got to Schaffhausen, the Materns had made up their minds to go get some ice cream, and that we did. We’ve been past these open air cafes many times., but have never been tempted to sit down and order anything. We knew it would be expensive and it was. Sister Matern ordered lemon cheesecake for 9.50sfr and got a piece that was surprisingly small. I ordered two scoops of pistachio ice cream for 6:00sfr and the scoops were quit small, too. Diana was satisfied to finish drinking the water she brought with her. Anyway, we enjoyed what ordered and had a nice time watching passers by while sitting in the shade.

We saw the Materns and Charlotte off and then walked through the old town with the Walters until their train came fifteen minutes later. They really wanted to see the Rhine Falls, but decided they didn’t have time and promised to come back another day. While we were walking with the Walters, we ran into Roger who came to Church yesterday and said hello to him. We reminded him that we’d be out to see him in Buch sometime Wednesday afternoon. With nothing left to do we went home ourselves. We called Carla Sprenger and made an appointment to visit her on Thursday afternoon and the rest of the evening we busied ourselves with writing our journal entry, reading the scriptures and preparing lessons for Emely tomorrow, Jasmine and Roger on Wednesday and Carla on Thursday. In between those we have a meeting each day with Sylvain and need to visit Carla Wigger on Wednesday for her birthday. We can’t forget about Paul either, nor Michael Hartig’s birthday on Sunday and Angie Lloyd’s baptism Sunday evening. It’s good to keep busy. And that’s the tnder mercy for today.

Before we posted this entry Roxsan called on skype to say hello. It’s always good to see and talk to our kids and to see our two newest grandsons, Nathan who is two and Truxtn who is five or six weeks old. She said there was a heavy snow in Sandy this morning. Gardeners weren’t happy.

Sister Pietroboni who knitted these caps and booties from the yarn we bought for her. The caps and booties are for babies in Africa, we think. Brother and Sister Hoenle, Paul and me with Diana taking the photo.

MAY 23, 2010 SUNDAY

Sunday morning is always an early up for us, prayer at 6:30 and then a long walk to the Church for me. I normally have at least an hour and a half of quiet time to work on the computer filling out our weekly report. However, today was their branch conference and the meeting was scheduled to start at 9:00 instead of 9:15. Pres. Flammia came extra early to prepare for their pre-sacrament meeting meeting with his presidency and Pres. Bolt and with his wanting to chit chat, I didn’t get much done after that. Shortly after Brother Wigger and Brother DeMarzi came and finally Pres. Bolt. When they were all there, even though I was still in the room on the computer, they started their meeting. I overheard Pres. Flammia ask Pres. Bolt if it was alright for Elder Larson was in the room. He said it was, but I responded that I couldn’t understand their Swiss German anyway. They all got a chuckle out of that one. I was almost done anyway and I really didn’t feel all that comfortable being there, so I closed the computer down and left.

Diana had to come on the 8:31 bus this morning instead of the 8:51 bus because of the early start time. On the way in she had a good chat with a woman who’s last name was Wiedmann. We met at the bahnhof and walked up to the Church. Today the chapel was full with branch members and stake visitors. Pres. Hitch Bolt and Kathy were there as well as Guido & Erika Weibel from our old Schwamendingen ward. It was good to talk with them again. Kofi Safo-Adu came and near the end of the meeting, Roger Ojingia, one of the referrals from Elder Dahneke, came in. He stayed for the rest of sacrament meeting and then stayed for priesthood meeting. Fortunately Yvonne Grimske sat by them and did the translation which saved me from having to try and do it.

Ward conferences are always very special and the Spirit is always present. I helped David Flammia pass the sacrament after which the stake leaders gave wonderful well prepared talks. Peter Kahn talked about the third member of the Godhead, the Holy Ghost, and his role in the Plan of Salvation. Sis. Weibel talked about the duty of parents to teach their children and focused on the fourth Article of Faith. The next speaker (didn’t get his name) told the story of an eagle that was injured as a young bird before it learned to fly. A farmer found it and put it in with his chickens and it grew up thinking it was a chicken. A hiker came by one day and was surprised to see the eagle on the ground pecking for it’s food like the chickens. He couldn’t understand why an eagle would be satisfied to be on the ground when it could fly in the heavens. To make a long story short he tried and tried to teach the eagle to be an eagle and capture it’s heritage of being the king of the sky. Over and over again he tried to teach the eagle to fly, but it always went back to what it knew, pecking in the chicken yard. Finally, after a lot of work and a lot of tries, the eagle learned to fly. The counsel he gave was to stop living in the chicken yard of life and realize we are the sons and daughters of God with the seeds of Godhood planted inside us. Sister Stemmer spoke on staying on the small and narrow path and holding fast to the Iron Rod. The next speaker spoke about the Abrahamic Covenant and how all who are accepted into the Church are added to the posterity of Abraham and are included in the covenant. Pres. Bolt as the last speaker spoke on the theme, “by your fruits ye shall be known.” He used the parable of the “sower” to illustrate the seed is the Word of Christ and people are the ground. What we sow we also reap. At the beginning of the meeting he took the time to recognize Paul Hunziker as having been newly baptized and welcomed him into the fold. That was really nice and thoughtful.

After the meeting many members introduced themselves to Roger and made him feel welcome. We confirmed he was the referral we’d received from Elder Dahneke and found out a little about him. He is a refugee living in Buch, the same place where Godwin lives. We made an appointment to visit him on Wednesday and bring him the English Book of Mormon that we knew he wanted. He stayed for priesthood meeting and the lesson this time was on Chapter 10 which covered the holy scriptures. I translated for Roger, but most of the discussion was not something that someone would be able to understand who was visiting for the first time. Rather than translate the actual discussion I took the opportunity to teach him about the bible, Book of Mormon and the Doctrine of Covenants and, of course, about Joseph Smith, revelation and prophets. Before he left he said he would come to Church every Sunday. We are excited to have another investigator we can work with.

After the meetings were over we made a beeline for the bus to get home as quick as we could so we could cook lunch before the Hoenles and Paul arrived. Bro. Hoenle had to attend the after conference meeting which gave us about an hour to get things ready. We made noodles with a chicken and gravy sauce, a scrumptious green salad and buttered carrots. For dessert we made the strawberry pie which turned out pretty good, too. Everything was ready when they got here and we had a pleasant time eating and talking. When the meal was over, we had an hour long discussion on the Plan of Salvation. Even though Paul has a pretty good understanding of the gospel, it’ll help him to go over the lessons again to reinforce what he knows.

When they left, we got our things together and left to visit Sylvain in the hospital. When we arrived, he was waiting for us and came out to meet us. Rather than go to his room we stayed outside on a bench in the sun and talked for an hour. Today was pretty hot for a change and we hope we didn’t get sunburned. We gave Sylvain the French BM we promised him as well as an exercise bungee cord, some envelopes from Silvia, a loaf of bread and a box of thin mint cookies. Yesterday he said he had three goals: first, he wants to overcome the alcoholism; second, he wants to be worthy to go with Silvia back to the temple and; third, he wants to someday come to America to see if he can help Justin with his problem drinking.

We got back home in time to meet with Kofi who comes on Sunday evenings to get help with reading English. A few days ago Silvia told us she saw Kofi take a cigarette from a friend and smoke it. Tonight our strategy was to use D&C 89 as the text for reading. In this way we could teach him about the Word of Wisdom while helping him with his English. We always start and end with a prayer. As we gave him the background of what we were going to read, we asked him if he had any problems with the W of W. He was very forthright is admitting to starting to smoke again after having not smoked for a long time. We talked about it and he said he wanted to quit again and he felt he could manage it because he did it once before. He just had to decide to quit. We helped him make that decision.

Other things we did today was report our numbers to Elder Bentley. We also talked with Charlotte about our excursion tomorrow. We’re going to meet at the Romanshorn Bahnhof at 10:18 and decide from there where or what we all want to do. The Singen elders called wanting to know if they could come to Schaffhausen and spend the day with us visiting the Rhine Falls. We told them we were already booked, but we arranged to do it next Monday with them. Elder Dias called from Ravensburg, Germany, to see if he could come get his haircut tomorrow. No, but we agreed he could come next Monday, too.

This whole day was a tender mercy; we can’t pick out just one or two.

Police doing some training; police car and ambulance.

MAY 22, 2010 SATURDAY

This morning we started off the day by calling three referrals Elder Dahneke gave us after their street contacting activity last Wednesday while their companions held their zone council meeting. Two of their referrals gave them either a bad phone number or a bad email address. The other one didn’t answer his phone. We’ll try him again. We called another one we got some time ago, but still didn’t find him home either. We also went through our own list to see if we could contact them and make appointments and/or invite them to Church. We left a message with Martin Hedinger (he never answers his phone). Kofi didn’t answer. Jasmine Hunziker answered and we made an appointment with her for next Wednesday morning. We talked to Priska Staehelin, but Michael didn’t have his new work schedule yet so we’ll have to call her back after next week. We also texted Agnes and Angie Lloyd to let them know we think about them and keep them in our prayers. Angie texted back to let us know she is going to be baptized May 30 and invited us to come. We responded back that we’d be delighted to come and to count on us.

We needed to go grocery shopping today to get a few things for lunch tomorrow after sacrament meeting. We’ve invited Brother & Sister Hoenle to come help us teach Paul the new convert lessons and before the lesson, we wanted to have them to lunch. We called Paul to ask him if he needed us to pick up anything for him while we were in Germany, but he declined the offer saying he didn’t need anything right now. We made the trip and bought mostly stuff for a salad, but also some strawberries to make a strawberry pie for dessert and some boxes of thin mint cookies to give away when we’re invited to dinner.

When we got to Erzingen, we had to walk past a little flea market to get to the grocery store so we had a look at what they had. We bought nine of the little metal plates with names of towns on them that people nail on walking sticks. We saw a large cut amethyst geode for $250 that we would have liked to have bought, but it was way too big and heavy to be able to get it back to the states.

This evening we visited Sylvain in the hospital again and he seems to be doing much better. He’s been doing some serious thinking about his life and he really does want to make some changes. While we were there, we got to know his roommate a little. We met him yesterday while we were there and we promised to bring him a book. Tonight we gave it to him so we’ll see what he says about it when we go visit Sylvain tomorrow night. Sylvain made the comment that now he’ll probably have to answer some questions. We hope he does.

The tender mercy is that Silvia called Jasmine and invited her to the branch BBQ on Monday and today when we talked to her, she said she would go if at all possible. That’s very encouraging and helpful if Jasmine can get to know and make friends with our members.

Photos of Schaffhausen.

MAY 21, 2010 FRIDAY

This morning we called the mission home to see if we could get a large print Book of Mormon in German or a BM on tape for Charlotte Kunz. We had a lunch appointment with her and Silvia at 11:45 and wanted to get something that would be easier for her to read or listen to in lieu of reading. She has some sort of eye disease that makes it difficult for her to read so an ordinary BM is out of the question. Elder Walters called back and said they had a BM on tape but didn’t have a large print one. We are going on a sight seeing trip with them on Monday and he’ll bring the tapes to us then. We asked him to also send a case of Books of Mormon because we are almost out. He said he would send the BM’s with the AP’s to the zone conference on May 28.

Just as we were about to leave for our appointment Silvia called with some disappointing news. She called Charlotte just to make sure she was coming and Charlotte said she forgot and had something else scheduled and couldn’t come. We decided we’d meet anyway and use the time to talk about other people we’d been working with and when we could reschedule Charlotte. We had a nice visit and got a lot accomplished.

On our way back home we stopped at Migros to buy a baguette to take to Sylvain later today because he complained the hospital didn’t bring him bread with his meals. He loves bread. We took it home and then prepared for our meeting with Emely Dipaolo at 3:00. She and her mother, Katia, were waiting for us and they always make us feel welcome. Our meetings usually last an hour and we always have a good discussion. Emely is always attentive and gives good answers to questions during the discussions. Today we reviewed the Joesph Smith story and there was little she didn’t already know. If we could get mother on track to bring her to Church on Sundays and get father to give his permission, she could get baptized. This Sunday Emely will be away to some kind of camp, but Katia said she’d try and come.

When we left the Dipaolos we wanted to go visit Sylvain, but we forgot to bring the baguette with us. Rather than spend the half hour to go home and get it, we decided we’d buy another one and go directly to the hospital. We got to Sylvain’s room just as he was eating his evening meal. Sure enough, there was no bread on his tray. He was glad to see we had brought him some. We had a good half hour visit with him and then we came home.

Tonight we finished filling out the Baptismal Report Form on Paul’s baptism and then started working on the Returning Missionary Information Form to send back to the mission home. We’re supposed to list the full names of our stake president and bishop, but the ones listed in the stake directory don’t have middle names or initials and we’re not sure if it’s Dan or Daniel Schilaty. We emailed the stake executive secretary to get their complete names.

Tonight we called Claudia Clavedetscher, a former investigator whom we’ve met once and scheduled an appointment with her for June 2. We called Michael Bartelt, Priska’s boy friend, to make another appointment with them, but he wanted us to talk to Priska who will be available after 10:00 in the morning. We tried to call Martin Hedinger, but got the usual answer machine. Franz Meier didn’t answer his phone either. Jasmine Hunziker didn’t answer so we left a message for her to call us. And so ends our day.

Workers applying stucco (most buildings are stucco); me in front of hospital; the sign on the tower says, "stupid, open your eyes."

MAY 20, 2010 THURSDAY

This morning we did some preparation for the meetings we have scheduled for tomorrow, one with Charlotte Kunz together with Sister Gardedieu and one with Emely Dipaolo. We will meet with Charlotte and Silvia for lunch at Migros and while we eat, we’ll use English to help her get used to speaking it. Silvia suggested we use German when we do the teaching part of our meeting so she would be able to concentrate on the message and not on understanding English. We won’t have much time for the lesson so we’ll have to decide what principles to teach and how to approach it. While we were reading the scriptures and studying, we put in a load of wash.

We got a call from Elder Talley telling us that our transfer goals we turned in yesterday were not complete. In addition to the verbal goals he wanted goal numbers. We spent time calculating what our goals for the next six weeks should be and this is what we came up with: investigators with baptism dates (2), Investigators at Church meetings (5), lessons when members are present (11), other lessons (12, referrals (3), new investigators (1), lessons with converts and/or less-active (15). If we can meet all of these goals, we’ll be happy.

We received a letter from the mission home today detailing the information about our release. It’s hard to stay focused when we keep receiving things that remind us we’re getting close to going home. In the letter was a form to fill out with the name and addresses of our stake president and bishop, our travel plans, nearest airport, our email address and etc.

Sylvain was admitted into the hospital yesterday and he’ll have a lot of dead time on his hands. He likes jigsaw puzzles so we went to a broki haus and found two good ones for not very much and took them to him. He seemed to be doing okay, but looked bored and tired. After his visit we went to our appointment with Paul. He’s always fun to visit because he’s always got something to say about his life. He talks mostly non-stop, but when we talk about the gospel, he’s learned to listen and just add comments when it’s appropriate. Dorothea gave us an old DVD about the Rhine River and Lake Constance she wanted us to see and Paul had a player that would play it. He was kind enough to let us see it this afternoon. It was pretty boring, but now we can give it back to Dorothea and tell her we viewed it so as not to hurt her feelings.

We got back home at 6:30, got the rest of the clothes out of the dyer, got a bite to eat and settled in for the night. We called Madeleine to see if she’d been released to go home and to find out how she was doing. We called her home phone and she didn’t answer so we left a voice message. A few minutes later she happened to called us from the hospital. She is making progress, but not as fast as she’d like and not as fast as the doctors expected. She’ll be in the hospital at least another week. Her cell phone ran out of minutes and she asked us to facilitate buying her some more so she can communicate from the hospital. It’s cheaper to buy minutes for her cell phone than it is to use the expensive hospital phone.

Tender mercies were that as elevator arrived and the doors opened so we could get on to go up to Sylvain’s hospital room, he stepped out. If we hadn’t of met then, we probably wouldn’t have had our visit with him today. The other one is that Madeleine returned our call even though she didn’t know we had just called her home phone.

MAY 19, 2010 WEDNESDAY

The garbage can under the kitchen sink was overflowing with empty bottles and cans we save for recycling so this morning I sacked them up and on my morning walk I put them in the recycle bins at the Herblingen shopping center. I finished my walk by returning home and then showered and shaved and got ready for the day. The zone leaders called last night asking if we’d be sure and have the chapel unlocked so they could hold their zone council there this morning. Rather than take the bus I decided to walk there, too. I should have started a few minutes earlier because when I got to the church, most of the missionaries were waiting outside the door. Fortunately, it wasn’t raining at the moment. I let them in and then waited for Elder Bentley and his companions to arrive so I could give him the key to bring back to us after the meeting was over. When they arrived, he asked me if I had our transfer goals for him. He needed them for this meeting. I had to swallow hard and tell him we’d forgotten to write them. I gave him the key and then hurried to the bahnhof to catch a bus home.

While I was out, Diana got her studying done as well as the rest of her morning preparations. As soon as I got home we wrote out our transfer goals, printed them off and I made the trip the second time to the church to drop them off.

At the Sacrament meeting when Paul was confirmed, Elder Klaumuenzner asked us if we had filled out the “Baptismal Information Report” form documenting the details of Paul’s conversion. We told him we hadn’t even heard of the report at which he told us he’d send us a blank form. We received it in the mail the other day and we took the opportunity to begin filling it out during the time we had until our next appointment at 2:00. This report isn’t a simple task because we’re supposed to list all of the missionaries who were involved in teaching him. Missionaries started teaching him fifty-five years ago and he had intermittent contact ever since. We researched the teaching records in our apartment and listed all the ones we could find. How was he first contacted? What members were involved in the teaching? What were the main problems he had to overcome? How did he do it? Our meeting at 2:00 was with Paul and so we were going to ask him some of these questions for the report.

At 2:00 we arrived at Paul’s door and, when he let us in, he already had a lady visitor. He regularly invites less fortunate people or people who need a friend, for lunch or dinner or to read the bible together. We sat quietly looking at photo albums he gave us while they finished their lunch. He fixed us all some Black Forrest cake (except for Diana because she doesn’t eat sugar) and while we were eating it, we got to talk a little about the Church. The lady seemed interested in a guarded sort of way, but when asked if we could come by to teach her, she said no. We discussed religion a little more and offered her a Book of Mormon which she accepted. Of course the BM had the Joseph Smith pamphlet in it as well as a few others. We made another appointment for tomorrow and then left and came home.

Sylvain was admitted into the hospital today, but we didn’t know which one. We checked on the internet, selected a likely hospital and called it. Bingo! We got it right the first time. The receptionist connected us to his room when we called, but he didn’t answer. We decided we’d just go visit him, but waited until after dinner time. On the way there in the bus we sat in the seats just behind and to the side of the driver. For some reason as we were going along he asked us if we knew where we were going and the stop we needed to get off on. This surprised us because normally the bus drivers could care less about the passengers. We replied that we did and wanted to get of at the hospital. When we got there, we took the time to thank him for being concerned and as a thank you, wanted to give him a book. He accepted the Book of Mormon with a smile and, we hope, with interest enough to read it. We always stamp our phone number and the address of the Church in them so if he wants to contact us, he can. We went into the hospital and visited with Sylvain for awhile and then promising to come visit him tomorrow, we left.

Back home we saw we had a message on our answer machine. Sis. Gardedieu had left a message that she’d had a good conversation with Jasmine Hunziker today and had invited her to the ward BBQ activity Monday. She also mentioned that if we could set up an appointment with Carla Sprenger in Kleinandelfingen, she’d be able to come with us tomorrow night. We called Carla, but she asked us to call back next week sometime. We returned the call to Sis. Gardedieu to give her the information on Carla and to talk about other missionary related things. We also gave her an update on our visit to her husband in the hospital this evening.

We got a call from Elder Bentley just after 10:00 thanking us for taking our report to him earlier today. He also thanked us for our work. We have always wondered how our work stacks up against other missionary companionships and tonight he gave us a little pat on the back. He told us that for the last six weeks (since he’s been district leader), our numbers have been better than others in our district. The week that Paul was baptized we had a number in every category except one and Elder Tally, our zone leader, told Elder Bentley he couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen that. He said that the mission needs more Larson senior couples. We don’t want to seem like we’re tooting our own horn because we know it isn’t us, but the Lord who’s doing the heavy lifting.

Roxsan skyped us this evening to tell us some good news and some bad news. The bad news was that she was in an accident. The good news was that her reaction was swift enough to step on the gas while the oncoming car driver slammed on her brakes which together avoided a side collision where her baby was sitting in a car seat. Mayleah and Nathan were also in the car. As it was the oncoming truck just clipped the back corner of the van which did a little damage, but fortunately there were no injuries. The Lord continues to watch over our children; it could have been so much worse. More good news was that she managed to reserve a whole week at Bear Lake in August after our mission so we can vacation together as a family. That will be really nice after having been gone for almost two years. More good news is that Nathan’s two year old birthday is today. HAPPY BIRTHDAY NATHAN!

Elders Bushnell (nice haircut), Dahneke (nice haircut), Sills & Neuffer; Elder Bentley getting his haircut.

MAY 18, 2010 TUESDAY

District meeting today was scheduled a half hour later at 10:30 instead of 10:00. In order to be prepared with the lunch we always provide, we started things last night. We already had bought everything we needed except bread and we made that. We also made the cream cheese cake and let it set up in the fridge overnight. So this morning was fairly simple. We prepared a marinade for the chicken, pulled the skin off, and let it soak in the fridge for a couple of hours. Just before 10:30 we dusted it with spiced flour and put it on a roasting tray ready for the oven. We peeled potatoes, put them in a pot with water this time, ready to turn the stove on to cook them. The corn got the same treatment. All was ready by 10:00 and we thought we still had a half hour to get ourselves ready, however, right at 10:00 our door buzzer sounded. Up came the two missionaries from Singen, Elders Bushnell and Sills. They claimed our fearless district leader hadn’t told them of the time change and so here they were. They entertained themselves in the living room while we finished getting ready ourselves.

Right at 10:30 Elders Bentley (DL), Dahneke and Neuffer arrived. Right now three of them are serving together in Schwenningen. After the friendly banter we took our places around the table and our meeting began with a song and a prayer. Elder Neuffer had the mission rule book tip and talked about being prepared spiritually and knowing the German prayer language. Elders Sills & Bushnell gave a presentation on the principle of “Teach to Find” that missionaries should be using in their contacting work. They committed us to practice during our daily companion study time to sharpen our skills. I had the German tip and focused on the dative, accusative and two-way prepositions. I also gave them a list of idioms, one in German and one in English and asked them to match them up. Diana had the closing song and prayer. The song she chose was “The Lord is My Light” (Der Herr ist mein Licht).

During the meeting when the time was right, we slipped out and turned on the oven and burners so the meal would be ready when it was over. While the elders cleared the table of books and stuff, we made the final preparations and then we ate. Everything was delicious even if we do say so ourselves. The missionaries have never had it so good. When the meal was over, our real work began. Diana’s job was to clean up the dishes (the missionaries are always good to help) and mine was to cut hair. Today there were three who needed haircuts, Elders Dahneke, Bushnell and Bentley. By the time we had things cleaned up as much as we could get done with seven people in our small apartment and the hair cut it was 3:00. The elders changed their clothes into work clothes and left to do a service project at an elderly member’s home. After they left we vacuumed, put the table back and generally made things livable again. We must be getting old because we felt we’d done a full days work, at least I did. I took a short nap while Diana checked emails and etc. on the computer. Later on we did some phone contacting with some good results. We found out that Nerina Fleury had made the move to a care center near St. Gallen and the doctors there decided they would try and save her leg instead of amputating it. That was good news. We can now forward her membership record to the St. Gallen ward so she can get support from the members there. We called Irma Egli, an 81 year old inactive member, and set up an appointment for next week to call her again for a definite time to meet. We called Paul and set up an appointment for tomorrow and to see how his birthday celebration went last Sunday. Franz Maier didn’t answer his phone and neither did Martin Hedinger. We left a message on Martin’s voice mail inviting him to Branch Conference next Sunday. By that time it was too late to make any more calls so we quit.

Now that Paul is baptized we asked at ward council last Sunday for help from the branch in teaching the new member lessons. The new member lessons consist of reviewing the five missionary discussions to make sure the newly converted have a clear understanding of the gospel. Next Sunday Karl & Jecelyn Hoenle will be with us to teach him and the next Sunday Pres. Flammia will help. It’s important for the ward to assume the responsibility for the new members once they have been baptized.

Elder Talley, one of our zone leaders, called late tonight asking that we unlock the Church for them tomorrow at 10:30 so they could have their Zone Council meeting there. While the district leaders are in their meeting with the zone leaders, their companions go out street contacting. He asked us to bring some proselyting material (BM’s, brochures & cards) with the address of the church and our phone number stamped in or on them for them to use.

Tender mercies:

Sylvain called tonight also to let us know he was being admitted into the hospital tomorrow to undergo psychological testing as well as evaluate the medications he should have been taking. Hopefully they can help him find a solution to his physical problems which would in turn help with his drinking problem, we hope.

Nerina Fleury is now under the care of doctors who will try and save her leg instead of just amputating it.

Monica’s last email was a photo of her on the Empire State Building after which they are headed home. We wonder if she had any problems getting through customs because we sent a lot of our souvenirs home with her and Chris.