Can February be here already?

We can't believe the time is slipping by so fast! We had a great month in January and not much snow at all. We even had some spring-like weather in the middle of the month. Lately it has not snowed much, but the sun doesn't shine either. It is just kind of grey, just winter. We look forward to spring. There are a few birds that sing in the trees around our apartment building. The Center for Young Adults here in Graz will soon be an official center as we have completed the 4-month preparation period. We have a good group of young adults here and they are so great to work with. We are really enjoying ourselves! We especially enjoyed ourselves during the tour through a chocolate factory a few weeks ago. We could taste and taste and taste all we wanted. It was great!

Merry Christmas

We are thinking of all our friends and loved ones at home this time of year, but we are happy to be serving here. It is a blessing to celebrate the birth of our Savior with these wonderful people. This Christmas card winter scene is the view from our bedroom window. All it needs is a horse covered with jingle bells pulling a sleigh with Elder Jeppson and I riding in it waving to everyone.

We hope that you all have a wonderful Christmas. We are so grateful for this time of year to remember the birth and life and example of Jesus Christ. His great atoning sacrifice is the greatest gift of all and is available to all who will come unto Him. May you all be blessed with His spirit in your home and lives this week and all during the coming year.











This photo with the Weihnachtsmann was taken at the ward Christmas celebration.

Happy Thanksgiving!

We have both had coughs and congestion. Gene got over his rather quickly, mine has been hanging on for a few weeks. Things are getting better, though. We did have a couple of really nice days last week that felt like Indian Summer. But now it is rainy and foggy, and one of these days it will probably snow here. We keep busy with our missionary assignments and are totally happy to be serving here. The young people that we associate with are super and we really enjoy mingling with them. We have so much to be thankful for at this season of Thanksgiving. The Lord truly blesses us abundantly in so many ways. We are especially grateful for our family and the way they support us. We will surely miss being with family this Thanksgiving. We will be with our fellow missionaries in this zone in Vienna, though on Thanksgiving Day and will enjoy meal there together. We wish all of you a very Happy Thanksgiving.

Autumn is over!

We have surely enjoyed the autumn season here. There are so many varieties of trees which have turned colors at different times and it has been beautiful. The oak trees near where we walk to get from our apartment to the streetcar dropped thousands of acorns and now all the brown oak leaves are on the ground. Last week there were leaves coming down like snow. It was beautiful, but kind of sad at the same time. There are a few larch trees in the woods next to our apartment building. They look like evergreen trees in the summer with green needle-like leaves, but they turn yellow and then kind of an orange-yellow in the fall before they drop off. We walked through the woods and found a short cut that really turned out to be a longer way to the grocery store, but it was beautiful. The ground was totally covered with yellow and brown leaves.

We have been watching this maple treet outside our balcony gradually turning from green to orange. Now, almost all the leaves have fallen off of it. :(

Below is a photo of the larch trees.

Klagenfurt and Graz

On our P-day last week we went with some of the YSAs on a walking tour of the Graz old city. Clara obtained tourist pamphlets for all of us (our in English--very helpful) and led us through the streets pointing out sites and landmarks. We ended up with a trip up to the top of the Schlossberg (a small mountain in the middle of the city from which the Grazers defended against the French in early 1809 (or thereabouts, I don't have that pamphlet we me right now). The kids took the stairs but we cheated and rode up on the tram. It was a beautiful sunny day, but a little hazy as we looked out over the city. We had a great time together and I'll post a few photos from that excursion.

The clock tower on the Schlossberg from inside the top floor of a big newly-remodeled store in Graz.

Taken from on top of the Schlossberg, looking out over the city to the NW.

We gave talks in church on Sunday and I'm glad to have that over with. I talked a little about an article in the September Ensign entitled Bringing Christ into Our Home. I hope you all read that. If not yet, please do so. I am impressed with how the mother used the document, The Living Christ, Testimony of the Apostles, to teach her children more about Christ. I decided if a 4-year-old can memorize that document in 4 months, surely I can as well. So I have started to memorize it in English. After that I will memorize it in German. I suggest you consider using it in your family as she did, starting in December--Christmastime. What a wonderful gift to give your family. She said how the atmosphere in her home changed, more peace and love and she herself had more patience and love for her family and others.

Elder Jeppson has a cough, but he does not feel sick at all. As we go on other buses, etc., in search of members that are not known, we realize that we have it pretty good when we can get on the streetcar and not have make any transfers to get from our place to the church. We have seen some other parts of the city and I am starting to realize just how big this city is. We had rain on the weekend, but have had several sunny, but cool days in a row. So, here are some photos:



This is the plant (yes it is a living plant) that Pres. and Sis. Husz brought me the day that I prepared lunch for the visitors who came from Stuttgart, Vienna, and Klagenfurt for a training session here for the Senior couples serving in Centers here in our mission.

The view from our apartment balcony, looking to the west. It has been fun to watch the trees gradually turning from green to yellow and orange. These trees lost a lot of leaves during the rain and are not now so lovely as they were the day this photo was taken. Too bad fall can't last as long as summer.

This was taken from the bus on the ride to Klagenfurt last week. This village had a layer of snow from the storm the day before.

Elder Byers, E. Jeppson, E. Phelan, E. Sever in Klagenfurt after the street display contacting session.

The Klagenfurt Dragon

We've been here a month

I need to get better at posting regularly! We are doing very well and are feeling at home here. I'll post a few photos here so you can see our surroundings a little. We have had lots of meetings and training sessions and now we are busy working with the young single adults and the missionaries. We took a bus to Klagenfurt this week for a district meeting and a street display and contacting. We didn't have rain, but it was a little cool and cloudy. We enjoyed seeing the countryside between Graz and Klagenfurt. Klagenfurt is higher and it has higher mountains, a little more like Innsbruck. Many of the trees are colorful now and we even saw snow on the side of the road at the highest point. Here in Graz we have had cool weather and some rain. Actually, we had two straight weeks of no sun and we really appreciated the sunshine when it came back. The ward members here (this is the largest ward in Austria) are very nice and seem happy to have us here. We feel very blessed to be able to serve here in this area. We love Austria and the people here. Here are a few photos:

This was taken on the train ride soon after we left Salzburg to come to Graz in September.

This one is further along that journey. Austria is always green and this was such a gorgeous day to take this journey. We took the train to Vienna a few weeks ago for interviews with the mission president and it was rainy and foggy that day. But all of Austria looks a lot like this, just not high mountains everywhere. Graz had a lot of shorter hills and valleys in between.

We went to Vienna the first Sunday here for stake conference. This was taken from the bus as we crossed the Danube.

This is the LDS church building in Graz. It is located on the West side of the city and we live on the East side of the city. It takes us 1/2 hour on the street car, with 12 minute walk from our apartment to the streetcar, and then about a half block walk after we get off the streetcar.

This was taken just after we got off a streetcar at out end station in St. Leonhard (the area of the city in which we live). The streetcars are all painted differently, often with advertising for a shopping center or a business. The next few photos will show the surroundings we have as we walk home.

After we walk around the corner we look up towards where our apartment building is. The building cannot be seen in this photo, it is too short - only 5 floors. The tall building just barely visible behind the tree on the right is located just to the north of our building.

After we walk along the street for aways, we cross a little bridge over a creek and then start up this asphalt path past a kindergarten playground. Now we are climbing.

So, this is the view we see as we walk on fallen leaves, gravel, over tree roots and many fallen acorns (we took a shortcut on an unpaved path) up to the sidewalk to turn left and walk up that sidewalk.

What we see as we start up that sidewalk. At the far end of the row of cars on the right we will cross the street and start climbing the stone steps.

These are the stone steps. Up where the sun is shining (about the middle) they make a slight turn to the right and continue up.

At the top of the stone steps we cross a little parking lot and there is out building, kind of a grayish-light blue color. We live on the middle floor on the north end. Notice the tall building with orange balconies to the north of our building that was in the first photo after the streetcar.

E.J. unlocks the front door of the building. The little name plates to his left each have a button by them. People who come to visit push the button and a doorbell rings in the apartment. We pick up a phone and talk to them and if we want them to come up, we press a button that unlocks the door to the building. There is another doorbell outside our apartment door.

I took photos of the inside of our apartment, but you don't really want to see them. I thought I might put in the one showing our toilet room (really, it is no bigger than a stall at a public restroom) but then thought, never mind. We get along OK and just remember, it will get better!

Until next time I get around to posting -- Auf Wiedersehen.

Our first week in Graz

We have been here 8 days now and are pretty well settled in and used to our surroundings. We did get connected to the internet and our telephone is working. Now we just need to get a new washing machine (the one here is not working properly and it leaks a little) and that should happen this coming week. We went to Vienna on Sunday for stake conference. The ward here chartered a bus and we rode on that. We are getting used to streetcar and bus riding instead of having our own car, but it is an adjustment. When we go shopping, we are limited to what we can carry onto the streetcar and then what we can carry on the walk to our apartment. Gene carries most of the load. He was hurrying to get to the streetcar that was almost to leave and didn't see a curb and tripped and fell, out flat on his stomach (but with style). He landed on the clothes drying rack we had purchased and didn't get hurt, or even scuff his shoes or pants. He said all that was hurt was his pride. He was a little stiff and sore the next morning, though. We did make it on the streetcar, but we now have a rule that there will be no running to catch a car; we will wait for the next one if it leaves before we get there. It was, again, another witness to us that we are being watched over and cared for. We are enjoying beautiful fall weather here, with a day of rain on the weekend. We go out in our shirtsleeves when other people wear jackets. It is somewhat humid, so even when it is cool outside, the walk uphill to our house keeps us plenty warm. I'm happy that we will have a while to get used to this climate before next summer. Hopefully the heat and humidity then won't do us in. We shall see. That's all for now, folks.