Wonderful Visits and Friends

This has been a fun month as we have had some wonderful friends come to Frankfurt. Michael's Mission President, Swen Swensen and his fun wife, Gretel, arrived to replace Swen's brother, Laird, as our new Medical Advisor.

Anja Eckert stopped by with her cute daughters from Amsterdam, and it was so wonderful to see them again.

Then Greg and Ann Sumner from Provo, and their beautiful daughter, April, stopped over while touring Europe. It was so much fun getting caught up with them.

We loved seeing Marv and Sandy Van Dam (our neighbors from Holladay) on their trip over to Europe. We  enjoyed a lovely dinner at Gabi Harth's home with them.

Alejandra returned from her trip home to Peru. We have continued to enjoy bringing Alejandra and Monica to Church with us on Sunday and enjoy their friendship.

But the icing on the cake was our youngest son, Paul, arriving on May 22 and staying for nine days! We decided that this was the week to see some of  Europe with him, and what a joyful time it was! The world is such a beautiful place, especially when sharing it with someone you love.

The Merry Month of May

How we are enjoying the beautiful, long spring here in Frankfurt. Our German teacher, Sister Enger, took us to a wonderful nursery, Gartnerei Alois Witzel in Kloppenheim, to buy geraniums for our patio flower pots. Balconies throughout the city are now sporting gorgeous, colorful plants. We also started some healthy looking tomato plants and lettuce.

Sister Enger also shared with us another beautiful nursery that is her favorite.

Germans love their gardens. They love to prune plants and trees, and we are enjoying watching the Sycamore trees branch out after their severe pruning last fall They are the last trees to get their leaves, but by the end of the season, their leaves are among the largest. All over Germany we find little plots of land fenced off and used as family garden plots. When families live in tall apartment buildings, they love to retreat into nature. These are two of the nicest garden retreats that we have seen. They are near our apartment.

We have been enjoying getting out into nature, too, and have been biking in the countryside. Saturdays are our getaway days, so we took our first bike trip with our friends the Dearings. We warned them that Lonnie hadn't been on a bike for about ten years, but Gerry is an animal biker.We ended up riding through the Berger Rucken, a forest behind Bad Vilbel on a marathon three hour bike trek to Bad Vilbel, the next town. We rode back along the Nidda River, shared a picnic lunch, then headed back to Frankfurt. Lonnie only crashed once in the bushes and skinned her knee, while trying to avoid a cute old lady, who had pulled out in front of her with her little shopping cart. The next Saturday, Bob and I went on an easier bike ride for about two hours on smoother terrain. Again we had a picnic by the Nidda River. Wonderful, relaxing fun!

 Jerry adjusts Karen's brakes.

Thanks, sweetheart, for getting my bike up that hill.

The fabulous countryside.

Gerry also takes Lonnie to the Flomarkt some Saturday mornings. They are held right on the Main River. There's nothing like the call of "Ein Euro, Ein Euro" to entice me to sort through the giant piles of clothing. You can find just about anything you want at the Flomarkt, and the festive atmosphere is so much fun.

Bob continues to work very hard on the legal issues that arise each day in the office, and Lonnie still loves her teaching. Here is a cute picture of a relay race to teach my "kids" the English names of clothing.

They are singing some of their English songs in a program for their parents on June 1st.

Bob loves teaching his monthly lessons to the High Priests, and Lonnie is enjoying serving as a counselor in the Relief Society Presidency in the International Ward. This is going to be a great experience getting to work with Sister Blacoe, our wonderful German Relief Society President. I just love her!

We are having a fun Hat Fashion Show and breakfast this weekend.

Freienfels Medieval Fair

On Saturday, we headed about an hour outside of town to Freienfels for a Medieval Fair with jousting and performances. it was the warmest day of the year, and we drove past the most beautiful fields of purple flowers and vast swaths of yellow Rapeseed (used for Canola oil). The countryside is magnificent in the springtime. 

Hundreds of vendors sold their wares, and families and friends set up their tents, all in medieval style and in costume. We enjoyed the knights jousting in their chain mail and colors,  the battles, and the magic of the music. Several thousand people attended.

Western Germany (under construction)

Wonderful Friends

We have made many wonderful new friends here in Europe and have enjoyed sharing the Gospel of Jesus Christ with them. On our way to visit the Eckert Family, who moved from Frankfurt, we enjoyed seeing the Temple.  It was a joy to see the Eckerts again. We have missed them. They are very happy with their new job and their new town where everything is close by and convenient. The girls danced for us, and Christian made us a delicious lunch.

Sharing the Gospel creates strong, lasting friendships. Angela Nasswetter is one such friend. We recently attended her baptism, and were all filled with a feeling of great joy. We are so happy to have her as a sister in our ward. She is such a bright and capable woman. She has already designed a blog for our Relief Society in the International Ward to collect recipes from all over the world.

We also enjoy the special friendship of Alejandra, who just returned from several weeks with her family in Peru. She continues to come to Church and to dinner at our home. She is such a beautiful person, and we love her dearly. (Alejandra, in black shirt, with the sister missionaries.) She is studying film, so we always have interesting things to talk about.

We have enjoyed a new friendship with Monika. We pick her up for Church every Sunday. She fell and broke her leg and is in therapy and needs help getting her wheelchair back and forth. What a light she is. She found the Book of Mormon in a sidewalk book kiosk. It had been sent to Germany over twenty years ago by the Jack Ashton Family. She loves reading the Book of Mormon and is eager to learn as much as possible. She wants very much to be baptized and is taking the missionary lessons. We enjoyed calling Jack, as we knew of him. He was the Music teacher at Olympus High School in Salt Lake City. He was so happy to hear that his family's testimony had touched the heart of such a dear woman, so many years after they had sent it.