Missionary Farewell Party

On Family Home Evening we had a Missionary Farewell Party for Regina Menken, one of our Council members. She left yesterday for the MTC in Preston, England where she will be trained for three weeks and then serve in the Germany Munich Mission.

Regina had fun opening the gift bag of goodies for her mission.


Regina's non-member, childhood friend joined our group to sing and dance for the party.


JAE's Council Members, Regina, Antje, Caro (president) and Aaron. We will miss Regina!



The banana splits made a big hit! Only those who had been to America knew what they were.

More Outreach Activites

Antje is sitting at the Outreach computer and desk in our office, where she spends a lot of time working on lists, programs and newsletters.


Sister Wells is waiting for our Student Council to show up in this same office.


The cookies and popcorn are ready for Film Night in our Outreach Center Lounge.


One of our Institute teachers, David Lehman, and students enjoying an after class snack.

Our Institute Opening Social

We are at our post, the wonderful Dresden Ward Kitchen. This is where we will be spending much of our time (except for the hours spent shopping for food) as we prepare meals and snacks for our Outreach Center. We will have one hot meal before Institute and snacks for Family Home Evening, Sports Nights etc.

We love our German aprons!

We had a wonderful program which included a beautiful string trio by some of our JAEs (Young Single Adults). Daniel Menzel, Aaron Jentzsch and Magdalena Heller. There is lots of musical talent in this Ward.


This shows some of the food that was served. Everyone brought a dish to eat with the BBQ steaks and bratwurst. We (The Outreach Center) provided the real food (fruits & vegetables) and the meat.


Here is a JAE, Sister Gill, Sarah, a current investigator and the missionaries. Sarah is taking the Book of Mormon class we are teaching in English. She is from China. We have several Chinese investigators and new members.


Aaron and his father, President Jentzsch (our Stake President). Aaron has recently returned from the Munich Mission (which includes Austria). He is one of our most active JAEs and a member of the Institute Student Council. This is one of the 5th generation families, who joined the Church in the 1800s.

Let the Games Begin !

This was our very first Outreach Center activity. It was a Sports Night. Group table tennis was the most fun. Sister Gill and Sister Wells actually did quite well, each winning a couple rounds. President Borcherding called our phone during a game looking for our Stake President. Sister Wells ran down two flights of stairs looking for him. He wasn't there. She then brought the phone back to his first councilor, President Schmidt, who was playing with us. We heard him on the phone to our President laughing and telling a great story. Since we did not understand a word, we found out later at Zone Council that he was totally amazed that the two sisters were running around the table so easily with no sweat and not out of breath as he was doing both. We just didn't take it so seriously. Now we know why he kept asking us if we exercised everyday.

Andreas, Antje, Marco, Selina, and Florian.

Selina and Marco.

President Schmidt, Florian, his son, and Marco.

See how they run!

And run! President Schmidt was determined to win.

Florian was to leave for the MTC this day. He had given his talk in Sacrament meeting and then got a mandatory call to the military service. He could not get out of it. He will serve 9 months and then should be able to go on his mission.

You don't see Sister Gill because Sister Wells can't remember to take pictures.

A Few of Our New Friends

We have made many friends.

This is Natalya Bogden. She is from the Ukraine. She invited us to her house the very first Sunday we were here. She speaks only Russian and German. After church we went with her and her Russian mother (who only speaks Russian) to her home. We walked through a big beautiful park across from the church as she carried on a one sided conversation in German. We smiled laughed and hugged each other. We then got on a tram and went across the Elbe River to the other side of the city. We learned a lot about getting on and off and stabilizing our selves on the trams. We didn't move fast enough getting off and had to get off at the next stop and catch another one back. We lost our balance as the tram started , one of us went down and the other one lost her purse, scriptures and books. We finally got to the apartment building and had to go up 6 flights of stairs to her home. She fed us a Russian lunch of Borscht and some kind of a meat patty with some fresh peppers and cucumbers. This is the only place we have had fresh, raw vegetables. They do not generally serve them at meal time. Natalya's 18 year old son arrived and realized that we were not communicating very well. He did some interpreting for us and wondered how we had been together all day with out a common language. Hugs and smiles go a long way.


This is Antje Urban. She is on the JAE (Young Single Adult) student council. She has been our guardian angel. She was at the train to meet us when we arrived in Dresden and has been taking care of us ever since. She is a convert who was able to attend four years at BYU Idaho, graduated and worked a year in South Carolina. Her English is perfect. We are in the beautiful park across from the church.


This couple is very dear to our hearts. Marco and Selina Schulze were next to invite us for dinner. They are newly married and both served a mission in Greece. They speak English fairly well, in fact he is our interpreter for Sacrament Meetings. He has helped us in other places too. He told us his family knew President Monson and President Uchtdorf and they had entertained them in their home. Come to find out his grandfather was mentioned several times in President Monson's book "Faith Rewarded". This book tells about the faith of the Eastern German saints during the time they were behind the Iron Curtain, under Russian rule. He is 5th generation Mormon. These two have given us special attention.


This little family invited us to dinner the week that Sister Gill was ill. Sister Wells went by herself. Mateusz Turek, his wife Adrienne and 3 year old Miriana were delightful. He is from Poland and she is German. They met at a singles grand activity in Gorlitz, a city half in Poland and half in Germany. Their common language was English until he learned German. This little one can communicate in German and Polish. We had a Hungarian Goulash that he made. It was really tasty.


Here is Heidrun Lehnert . She is newly baptized. She was the first to talk to us and interpret for us when we arrived at our new ward. She is single and lives with her 9 year old son, Paul. He reminds me of my 9 year old grandson. You will see him later. She is musical and can play the piano, flute and accordion. I love her German folk music. I went to her home to give a new member lesson with the sister missionaries. The Lehnerts do not have much but she served a simple, delicious soup full of vegetables. Sister Gill did not go because she was still getting over her illness. We will go together this week.

Shopping with the Elders

We needed to shop for a bulletin board for our Outreach Office and for food for the Institute Opening Social. We coordinated with Elders on their shopping day. We stopped at a big home improvement store that was very brightly colored on the outside.

When we went inside we felt very much at home......look and see if this is not Home Depot. Of course the signs have strange words on them.


This was the only other difference. Here is a beautiful backerei (bakery) inside. These stores are everywhere. We are getting good at passing them and not being pulled in to the wonderful baked goodies.


It is totally amazing what can be put into a very small car, five adults, groceries for all......and a bulleten board. We missed getting a picture of Sister Gill in the front seat with bags of groceries piled around her. Where there is a will, there is a way.

Our Missionaries in Dresden

We love our missionaries. They are all from Utah except Elder Jungling who is from Oregon.

Sister Fitts, Sister Parker and Antje (the best missionary YAE)


Elder Jungling helping his companions (Zone Leaders) prepare for Zone Conference. If you look closely you can see the other 2 balls up at the top of the picture.


Elder Schreiner burning CDs and Sister Parker sending her sister an email for her birthday on their P-Day.


Elder Jungling getting a hair cut from Sister Fitts.


Sister Wells getting the cut hair off Elder Curtis. He was trying to give us a German lesson.