Jungfrau above Grindelwald; Diana & Madeleine; Robert, Diana, Silvia & Sylvain Gardedieu.

AUGUST 4, 2010 WEDNESDAY

After my walk this morning we spent some time going through things deciding what to take, what to throw away and what to leave behind. Where did all this stuff come from? We have been careful not to buy much, but it seems to have multiplied while we weren’t looking.

Diana called Suwang, our little Thai friend from Altstetten, to tell her goodbye and that we were leaving in a few days. She did everything she could to convince us to come visit her, but we just don’t have time. It would take most of a day to make the trip both ways and have a little time to visit. She was sad, but understood finally. She said she’s come visit us in America.

Madeleine needed some help to move a few things in her apartment and Diana promised her we’d come today to do it. We arrived in Schwamendingen about 1:30, did what we could, and then came back home for our appointment with the Gardedieus this evening. Madeleine is another friend who is hard to say goodbye to, but she is in the good hands of the Schwamendingen ward members.

We got home at 5:00 and were able to collect a few things to take to the Gardedieus, rest for about thirty minutes and then we were off again. We arrived in Schleitheim at 6:30 then walked the fifteen minutes up the hill to their home. Sylvain had a wonderfully delicious dinner prepared for us consisting of a traditional green salad with a viniagaret dressing, poached fish covered with a shrimp sauce along with a side of basmatti rice. We had a great time talking about our time together while we were enjoying the meal. They both asked us questions about our mission experiences, beginning with our application and then the MTC training. They both would like to serve a mission as a senior couple, when the time is right. The time went all too fast, but before it got too dark, Silvia insisted on taking a phot of us on their front lawn. Silvia gave Diana a red silk scarf with an Edelweis flower design on it. She said each flower represented a prayer that had been offered in their behalf. We finally had to say goodbye because we needed to catch our bus. We’ll see them at least one more time at Church next Sunday.

We got back home at 10:15 p.m. and before we could start our journal, first Roxsan skyped us, but she couldn’t hear a thing we were saying. Then Rebecca called and we talked to her for fifteen minutes and then Roxsan called us back. This time we could communicate. It started to hail there and Rees went out and brought in hailstones and some were as big as quarters. And that about brings us to the end of our day.

Paul Hunziker; Diana, Robert, Elders Neuffer (bending), Bushnell, Sills, Dahneke; Bears in Singen

AUGUST 3, 2010 TUESDAY

After we posted our journal last night we noticed our phone blinking which meant we had a message waiting. Elder Neuffer had left us a message telling us what our assignment was for tomorrow’s district meeting. He said he was sorry he didn’t get us the assignment sooner, but he wasn’t as sorry as we were. Diana’s assignment was to pick the opening song and say the opening prayer. My assignment was to provide training in the German language to increase their ability to teach. So, being it was too late to get something prepared last night, I spent the morning preparing. That meant this morning Diana was on her own to make the sloppy Joe mix and get the rest ready for lunch today for after our district meeting. I prepared a list of idioms in English with the German counterpart with the goal that they match them up. I finished in time to shower and get ready before the missionaries arrived fifteen minutes early. Diana had everything ready, too, and the sloppy Joe filling was absolutely delicious (she had me taste test it).

Elders Bushnell & Sills and Elders Dahneke & Neuffer all arrived at the same time and, since we were all present, we began the meeting early. Elder Neuffer needs some practice in preparing an agenda, giving assignments, remembering who he assigned to do what, and conducting a meeting in the right way. With time he’ll learn all of these things and be a great leader. He asked Diana for the opening song and then asked me to offer the opening prayer which was actually part of Diana’s assignment. But, respecting the office of the district leader, we obediently did what he asked us to do without the slightest hesitation or correction. By the end of the meeting I knew he had forgotten what he asked me to do. After the meeting was over I asked him if I could give the German tip next week because I already had it prepared. It dawned on him that he’d totally forgotten my real assignment, apologized profusely and assented to my request.

Part of the meeting involved spotlighting someone. Because we are going home soon, Elder Neuffer focused on us this time. He passed out two pieces of paper to each elder and asked them to write something about us, fold them and then give them to us. Diana read them one by one and this is what they wrote:
“You’re always willing to share what’s important to you.”
“Sister Larson, your meals and sweet spirit always brightened our day. Your German is pretty darned good, too.”
“Elder Larson, you’re like a father to us. The help, guidance and haircuts were all extremely appreciated.”
“Senior couple Larson, it’s gonna get warmer when you leave. Why? Because you’re so cool! Like cooler than the underside of the pillow cool.”
“You have been a great strength to our district as missionaries.”
“You set a great example for other missionaries and those you meet.”
“The Larsons are a hard working, missionary, married, converting team; they are very good examples and are......”
“Every time the Larsons get out of bed in the morning, Satan says “Oh, crap!”
“You guys work so well together you’ve never been transferred away from each other.”

What great missionaries we have. We gave each one a red T-shirt with the white Swiss flag on the front and the word Schweiz (Switzerland) on the back. They all seemed excited to get one and wanted a district photo wearing them.

After they were gone we got our stuff together to go visit Paul. We bought him some groceries yesterday, when we went to Erzlingen. We took him some frozen chicken, hamburger, butter, milk, cans of soup, flour, leftover sloppy Joe and a couple of buns. He was happy to get it, but was especially happy to see the butter. He said he’d run out a couple weeks ago. There’s a story that goes with the hamburger that shows the Lord is in our lives a lot more than we think. He cares about us and helps us with our decisions, if we pay attention. And this time we did. As we were looking at the hamburger deciding which to buy, we first selected the mixed meat kind (beef and pork) which was about fifty cents a package cheaper than the beef hamburger. Anyone who knows us would expected we would buy the cheapest and we actually put the mixed meat kind in our cart. But then we had a change of heart and put it back and got the all beef kind. Why? We didn’t know or really think about it, we just did it. When we got to Pauls and took everything out of the sack and put it on his table, he looked at the ingredients and was glad to see that the hamburger was all beef. He said he was allergic to pork. How’s that for a testimony builder.

We spent an hour and a half with him listening to his life’s experiences as well as talking about the gospel and the influence Jesus has had in our lives. He gave us a card that he’d made himself as a token of his appreciation and hoped we’d remember him after we returned home. We won’t ever forget Paul.

We had a little bit of time after we got home to prepare for our next appointment which was with Claudia Clavadetscher. We had a good meeting with her, bearing testimony of the truthfulness of the gospel and teaching about the first principles and ordinances of the gospel. We read and discussed 2 Kings Chapter 2 focusing on the priesthood keys, recognizing and sustaining prophets. We read and discussed the story of Naaman and Elischa which teaches us to have faith, repent, be baptized by immersion and be cleansed by the Holy Ghost, and that we all can open our mouths to proclaim the gospel as did the young Isrealite girl who had been taken captive. We read most of 2 Nephi 31 and then invited her to follow the example of Jesus and be baptized by someone having the authority of the priesthood. We didn’t quite get a commitment, but she said she’d come to Church next Sunday. We feel she is close to baptism and hope the missionaries replacing us will be able to help her make the final step.

When we got off the bus at our stop, we talked to a young black man who was looking for an address in the area. We spoke to him in German, but then he asked us if we spoke English. We switched to English and, before he took off to catch up with his friends, we gave him an English Book of Mormon. He was in too big of a hurry to get an address or anything.

Back at home working on our journal, we received a call from Markus Wachter, the husband of Dora, who is a less-active member in the Schwamendingen Ward. Elders Stucki & Christensen had just been there and told them we were leaving soon. He called to chastize us for trying to leave Switzerland without saying goodbye to them. We told him we wouldn’t of let that happen, but were waiting for them to call us as they had promised the last time we visited them. We both had a chuckle and then at the end of our conversation agreed to meet in the airport just before we leave on August 12. We wish he’d make the decision to be baptized which would help Dora to become more active.

And that kind of sums up our day. All in all, a good day.

Greta, Andreas, Bea, Susan, Manuel; Greta, Dorothea, Carla, Vivian, Lukas, Andreas; Singen bear

AUGUST 2, 2010 MONDAY

Since today was P-day and we didn’t get to bed until well after midnight last night, we slept in a little this morning. However, I was out the door for my morning walk by 8:00, this time up the road towards the Herblingen Castle. I go as fast away from our apartment as I can get within a half hour and then turn around and come back. Along the way I do about four reps of modified pushups and try to break my record each day. Today I made 85 pushups which beat the previous record by five.

When I got home, we checked the emails and saw one from Neide. She wrote to tell us that she wouldn’t be able to attend the temple until September 4 at the earliest. She asked us if we could stay that long so we could go with her. We had to tell her we were already registered with Switzerland to leave on August 12 because our visas had expired and we couldn’t change it. We didn’t promise, but we told her to let us know when she’s ready and the date is set, and we’ll try to come back, if we can arrange it.

Diana cut my hair and then I was barely able to get ready in time to catch the bus. It was Diana’s P-day to choose something to do and she chose to spend it in Singen, Germany, just to see what was there. We’ve been there several times for conferences, but never had time to look around or explore. We met Charlotte at the bahnhof and then traveled together to Singen. We walked around town exploring different stores, but we didn’t buy anything until right at the very last. Diana had 4.35 Euro in small change, mostly of the copper variety, and wanted to get rid of it. We stopped in a bread store and bought some butter rolls for .15 each which was less than half of what they would have cost in Switzerland. We were hungry, too, so we went into a grocery store and bought some nectarines, blue berries, pistachio milk and some sliced bread to snack on. For some reason there were a lot of bear statues placed throughout the town and, of course, that demanded we take photos of them.

By 3:30 we’d had enough and climbed aboard the train bound for Schaffhausen. On the way there Diana decided we needed to go to Erzlingen to buy some more groceries from the Penny Markt store. Most of what we bought we’re going to take to Paul tomorrow when we visit him including two bags of frozen chicken, two packages of hamburger and several pounds of butter. To that we’ll add several liters of milk and some chocolate wafer sticks. I bought some more Mueller Milk, yogurt and fruit while Diana bought some chocolate mint wafers for gifts when we are invited to dinner. When we had as much as I could carry, we went on home. At the Schaffhausen Bahnhof Charlotte caught her train and we caught our bus and went home.

We had a couple of hours to change, put together a spiritual thought and then we left to go to our dinner appointment with the Flammias. When we arrived, Philippo was standing out on the sidewalk and greeted us as we got off the bus. We should have suspected something, but naive people that we are, we didn’t. We hadn’t eaten all day expecting to be treated to a dinner tonight. As we went into his house we heard singing coming from his living room and we saw Dorothea and Greta sitting on the couch. I thought maybe we were interrupting some kind of meeting or something, but we found out soon enough that the singing was for our benefit. The branch had organized a surprise going away party for us. Now how sweet is that? We really didn’t suspect a thing.

Rather than each of them having their own home evening, they had one together. The opening prayer was said and then the time was turned over to us for the spiritual thought. We showed the 20 minute film, The Bridge which is about the atonement. After that we played a few games, had dessert and then visited for quite awhile. Susan Flammia made sure we won a few prizes including cookie cutters in the shape of Switzerland and edelweiss, and Carla Wigger and Sister Troesch gave Diana go-away gifts, too. Carla’s was cookies, chocolate and a little glass angel. Sister Troesch gave her a small beautifully hand stitched cloth to put on a table. We were really appreciative of their thoughtfulness. We’re going to miss them.

Everyone left about 9:30 except the Flammias, of course, us and Yvonny and we sat around and talked until 10:00. Yvonny took us home, but before we left, Pres. Flammia asked Diana and I to speak in sacrament meeting again, each for about ten minutes. He left it up to us to decide what to talk on which always makes it harder, at least for me.

It drizzled most of the afternoon and was still drizzling as we got home. It was a great day

Draw bridges at Lenzburg castle; edelweis, the Swiss flower; Lenzburg castle on the hill.

AUGUST 1, 2010 SUNDAY

I almost decided not to go in to the church early this morning, but because I needed to unlock the door for Michael, I overcame my moment of weakness, showered, shaved, got ready, offered our morning prayer together with Diana and was out the door by 6:50. I carried the bag that had the suit, ties and sweater I was giving to Michael in it, but it didn’t slow me down much. I arrived at the church at 7:30 and started filling out our weekly report. Michael normally arrives at 8:00, but this morning he didn’t come. What? He didn’t come and didn’t call me? Oh well, it was better to get the report done and not have to worry about it later. By the time I was finished it was about time for fast and testimony meeting to begin, but when I went down to greet everyone, Paul Hunziker wasn’t among those present. I found out he was ill and couldn’t come, so that meant I had the Sunday school lesson by myself. Dorthea picked up Diana on her way which is always nice for Diana because she doesn’t have to ride the bus, and nice for me because I don’t have to run down to the bahnhof to escort Diana back up the hill.

There were many missing from the meeting today because of vacations, illness and such so our numbers were few. After the opening song, prayer and sacrament came the testimony part of the meeting. When Pres. Flammia conducts, he not only bears his testimony, but also gives a talk which takes ten to fifteen minutes or so. Members who bore testimony following him were Diana, me, Sylvain, Brother Pederson and Dorothea which took up the rest of the time. All too soon came time for Sunday school to begin. It seemed no sooner had we started than it was time to close. Where did the time go? And why didn’t we have time to cover everything that we should have?

Following the meeting Dorothea dropped us off at home. For lunch we heated up a frozen pizza Paul had given us a couple of weeks ago and then read the Doyles and Kroffs blogs that we were too tired to read last night and then came the emails. After that Diana took a nap while I got a spiritual thought ready for Dorothea tonight and the Flammias tomorrow night. We also printed off some of the photos of Mary Elia’s baptism for her and for the Neidharts, who were the ones that made first contact with her. We left for our 6:00 dinner appointment with Dorothea at 5:45 not remembering the buses don’t run on the same schedule on Sundays as other days. As a result we were seven minutes late.

Dorothea had a good looking green salad ready for us when we arrived and so we didn’t waste any time saying the blessing and getting started. Following the salad, she cooked a thick pork chop for each of us and served it along with seasoned rice and sauteed peppers. We thought we were done, but then she brought us in another plate of rice with a stuffed tomato on it. She explained that she had planned on just doing the pork chops, but forgot and made the stuffed tomatoes. She didn’t know what to do with the pork chops other than cook them for us, so we ended up with both. It was all very delicious, but it was way too much, especially for us who are trying to keep from gaining weight. The dessert after didn’t help me very much either. When she asked Diana if she wanted dessert, Diana said no thanks. Dorthea forgot and dished her up some anyway. The dessert was two scoops of ice cream with currants and raspberries. Since Diana has given up sugar, and we didn’t want to hurt Dorothea’s feelings, I ended up eating the four scoops of ice cream (mine and Diana’s) along with my berries. Just what I needed, not! It was all delicious and we appreciated her kindness, but I’ll have to fast tomorrow to make up for it.

Dorothea came with us Friday to visit Carla Sprenger and someway she got the idea during that visit that Diana and I would sing The Lord Is My Shepherd in Sacrament meeting next Sunday. So after dinner we practiced singing it over and over. Dorothea decided she would sing with us, making it a trio, rather than try to play the piano accompaniment. We’ll try and sing it a capella. This ought to be good! Finally, Dorothea got out her violin and played us a few songs on it. She hasn’t played it for a long time, but she still plays very well.

Before we left Elder Neuffer called to get our teaching statistics for the week. We told him we were just on our way home and we’d call him back when we got there. Dorothea insisted on driving us home rather than letting us wait for the bus. It was just about dark (9:15) and the fireworks had just started. Today is the Swiss national holiday celebrating the founding of the Swiss confederation. They celebrate it just as we celebrate July 4. When we got home, we called Elder Neuffer and gave him our numbers. We also sent an email to Pres. Condie to give him an update on our status (we’re still alive). We got a message off our answer machine from Silvia inviting us to dinner on Wednesday evening. We’ll call her tomorrow to confirm.

We have experienced the tender mercies of the Lord through the hands of the members here in the Schaffhausen Branch as well as the Schwamendingen Ward. We are truly fortunate to be serving a mission among them.

The Swiss Temple; Elder & Sister Larson with Charlotte Stoecklin; Irene Moeller-Russo and Bishop Alvin Schwendener with Charlotte.

JULY 31, 2010 SATURDAY

The alarm came sooner than we wanted, but up we jumped to get ready for this long awaited day. Actually, I was the first to get up at 4:30 and after I was done with the bathroom, Diana was up at 5:00. No time for breakfast, but we put some apples, nectarines and pears in my backpack for later. We caught the bus at 5:47 for Schaffhausen, the train at 6:07 for Zurich, switched to another train that took us to Bern and switched to another train that took us to Zollikofen. From there we walked to the temple and arrived at 8:20 which gave us time to greet everyone, members and missionaries alike, then change and get ready for the session. Elder Vincent and his companion were there as promised as well as another companionship. Charlotte was already there and had completed the other ordinances that needed to be done before the session began. I wondered as I sat in the endowment room how Charlotte would react to her first time going through to receive her endowment. A wonderful feeling of peace came over me that bore witness to me that this is the Lord’s House and His work, and that I didn’t need to worry about Charlotte. After the session was over she shed tears of joy that she couldn’t hold back. It was a day that she will always remember and neither will we. The temple president, knowing it was Charlotte’s first time in the temple, invited her to sit in on a sealing session so she could experience that ordinance, too. Charlotte’s husband died seven years or so ago and she looks forward to the time when she can be sealed to him.

Before we left the temple grounds everyone took a lot of photos and then we divided up into cars and went back to Charlotte’s. Diana and I rode with Rolf and Christa Aeberli in their BMW and on the way back they took us to the Lenzburg Castle. We’ve ridden past it many times going to and coming back from the temple, but have never had the opportunity to stop and explore. We parked in an underground parking lot at the base of the hill and then walked around the “old town” before we climbed the hill to the castle. We love walking the old narrow streets and in this town, there were many evidences of the old walls that used to protect the town in Mediaeval times. Portions of the walls were incorporated into newer buildings.

The hike up to the castle was accomplished via a portion of cobblestone road, then paved road with an occasional shortcut using steep granite stairs. We took photos of the castle from different angles and elevations as well as overviews of the town of Lenzburg. Right before we entered the castle we walked over a drawbridge, the first one we remember seeing. The one we walked over was for horses and wagons, but next to it was one for only people walking single file. We went inside to where we could look into the courtyard, but because we didn’t have enough time (we would have needed several hours) and the cost was too much for the few minutes we did have, we looked and then returned to the car and went on our way.

By the time we got to Charlotte’s at 3:00, most of the people who were at the temple (except for the missionaries who had to stay in their proselyting areas around Bern) were there. We joined in the celebration and had a good time renewing friendships. Mary came and brought a lot of food for tomorrow’s get-together and, while she was there, we gave her some more of her baptism photos she requested. We talked with Pres. Bolt and Bishop Schwendener who said they had meetings scheduled with Neide to interview her for her temple recommend. Hopefully, Neide will be able to go to the temple next Saturday. Pres. Bolt said he’d already made arrangement with Brother Locher to organize a session for her next Saturday. If all goes well, Pres. Bolt will give us a call and let us know for sure.

We arrived home about 6:30 fairly exhausted from today’s emotional highs and the side trip to the castle. But no rest for me. Paul called and said he’d be at Church tomorrow ready to give his part of the lesson. We talked for about a half hour on the phone. After that I spent another hour and a half working on my part of the lesson and his part as well, just in case he needs some help. Teaching lessons in Church is not my favorite thing to do, but when the Lord calls, we answer. Right? Hopefully, the members will learn something and won’t have to suffer too much.

We forgot to put in our blog yesterday that Leroy Lloyd passed away the other day. We don’t have any details, but it’s sad to lose one of our great scouters and a good friend, too. He’s done so much good in his life and influenced thousands of young men.

The tender mercy of the Lord today is that Charlotte was finally able to receive her endowment. She realized the things you work the hardest for, are all the more precious and sweet.