Mother's Day Skype ... 2014

Mother's Day Skype 2014

.... Our family portrait until Christmas time!!! I LOVED this Skype.  Elder Robertson was so relaxed and happy.  It was so wonderful to see how much he is enjoying being a missionary and all of the trials and blessings that come from serving.

We also got to see his companion, Elder Martin.  They are really good friends. I loved seeing how they interacted with each other.

This is the screen shot I got when I asked them to pose.  They have their conference ties on.

Here they are in their Conference Ties.

When I expressed that I was worried about not being able to set up Skype time and my fear of him not worrying about it as his comp has skyped home in March for the British Mother's Day, he reassured me that he would not think like that.  I think he loves me!! haha  It seems like just yesterday that we said our goodbyes, but years since he's been home.  It is such an unusual feeling.  I can report there were no tears shed this time. I was just so happy seeing him so happy!!  I really must share time with the others at Christmas. I always plan to walk away, but it seems physically impossible at the time!!

Well the time was not long enough, and I could have spoken to him all day.  I couldn't hang up either, and so left that to his youngest brother, Thomas to do!!

Just 8 months until Christmas Skype, which will actually be our last missionary Skype with Elder Robertson.  That seems like his mission has just gone by soooo fast!!

His email on the Monday was brief as not much had happened over night, thankfully!

Here's parts of it ...

Obviously after our long chat yesterday, I don't have much news either. Skyping doesn't make me that homesick. It does make me realise how much it means to me to have such a great family and how much I really do miss you, but not homesick.  

Today, we'll be going out with Stephan Schmidt and "Elder" Nakken and his family. I'll have to nip home to get my camera as I forgot to bring it. I do however have my other SD card with me with my photos on, so don't worry... you'll get a couple today. Other than that, I'm doing well as you've seen. Having lots of fun and working hard.

The picture is me and elder meyer with the GML or ward mission leader ("Gemeinde Missions Leiter" auf deutsch). I'll send you a couple more photos in other emails!! 

Anyway, I hope you're all doing well, Iove you all loads and miss you!!

I told him no packages until I get photos, I guess it worked!! haha

These are from his last area in Luzern, enjoy the pics!!!

Luzern, Switzerland

Elder Robertson and 'C' who was recently baptised!  They are such close friends.

Elder Meyers, C and Elder Robertson after the baptism

Early morning email!!

Last week the mission was blessed with a mission tour from Elder & Sister Dyches.  I was so happy to hear Elder Robertson's excitement of the forthcoming conference in last weeks email.

Yesterday at church, Elder Dyches and I made eye contact as he sat down on the stand.  He went to stand up and looked at the clock, there was only 5 minutes to go before the meeting started.  He decided to jump up to come and see me anyhow.  I leapt out of my seat and met him half way: which ended up right at the front by the pulpit where he threw open his arms and gave me a hug by proxy from Elder Robertson.  I was so grateful   who am I kidding, I was gratefully ecstatic!! haha

As missionary mums, (and I might add, some dads) we become scavengers of information and anyone, anytime and anything who may have seen, heard or touched the mission or missionary ... we want to collect it all!! Elder Dyches gave a lovely report on how he (Elder Robertson) was doing and I was really touched that he would take the time to report back, especially with so few minutes before the meeting started!!  What amazing leaders we have to to consecrate so much to serve us and our missionaries.

Photo thanks to Sister Miles!!! .... It's like playing 'Where's Wally'!!

This week he emailed me before I got chance to send mine.  I usually do Sunday evening but thought I'd have time to do it Monday morning .... ooopps!!

I've managed to have a little time emailing back and forth this morning.  It's meant I have most of my questions answered, but there's no sniff of a photo!!

His main concern with the area is finding people to teach.  I've suggested he try and get some ward activities up and running.  It's a good place for us to bring our friends and family, to unify as members and where the missionaries can meet our friends and should they be interested in hearing about the gospel, it can go on from there.  He is hoping to reconnect with a few people in the area that he has met recently.

He loves serving with Elder Martin!

Service Projects

I was asked in Church on Sunday, 'Are you Elder Robertson's mum?' I think she was surprised at how excited I was to meet her, poor girl!! She has been very kind in feeding the missionaries and providing them with service projects.

A member in Basel who introduced herself on Sunday.

It's always good to meet friends they make whilst serving as it makes you feel close to your missionary!

Email Monday came and I am so impressed with Elder Robertson, despite his short emails home, lack of information and photos and that he doesn't answer any questions, he has never missed one Monday's email.  It's always good to hear from him.

This week, he talks a bit about the service opportunities and projects in the area.  

We've had a good week this week. We've had a lot of service projects going on here in Basel. I'm still aching from one of them as we played sport in the morning then helped move a load of furniture for a member moving house and then helped an investigator move his self made shed as best as possible to the other side of the garden. I was finished after that. I still am, but it was fun being able to lend our services.  We had a pretty cool experience last week as we were on a really packed train, due to delays, and then decided to give up our four seats and offer them to elderly women standing around. It was only a small act of service but as one woman got out she slipped Elder Martin 50 francs for the favour (probably to split between us all) but it was interesting to see such a large worldly blessing for such a simple act of service that used to be expected only a few years back. 

Elder Dyches is visiting the whole mission this week. We'll be seeing him on Wednesday. All the missionaries in Switzerland will be coming together in Zürich for the occasion. It will be great to be able to see everyone again and be spiritually uplifted at the same time. I can't wait to see what topics will be spoken about and what effects it may have considering the upcoming changes within the mission. There's been many changes recently in District and Zone boundaries.

Time has become quite the pressing matter in missionary work, and is especially in these the "last days". Knowing that our time is limited and that the time will come as expressed in the scriptures when the harvest will be over and there will be no more harvest, it is an interesting consideration of how the time we have as a missionary can be used and what would be more effective.  

I do struggle at times as I am constantly finding myself in appointments with only Spanish speaking people and through a translator and the presence of all four of us, I struggle to be an effective tool in the hands of the Lord. I'm recognizing the differences a certain situation can make in the effectivity of the spirit. I'm trying to now get a new feeling of how I fit into these new situations and can really bring the spirit into these circumstances, knowing that there is not just one way in which the spirit works.

I got a photo from another missionary mum of the four Basel missionaries together at a dinner appointment this week ...

Elder Robertson. Carr. Martin and .... ooops!! Need to learn the fourth missionary's name! 

Because of Him

Did you get a chance to check out the video the church had posted on mormon.org concerning Easter? I thought that it was a good one and we shared it a couple of times as a spiritual thought and then everyone saw it at church. I would recommend checking it out for family home evening if you haven't yet.

We had used it for Family Home Evening already.  Watch it, it is full of love and hope! 

Having to rely on the lovely Wes for photos!!
Elder Martin, Elder Robertson & Wes

This week I still haven't any photos from Elder Robertson, but his friend's parents live in the area so whilst visiting, he took this.  They'd been playing football with a couple of youth in the area.


Everything is going great here in Basel. The focus of missionary work seems to be very member orientated in this neck of the woods, so we are getting a good number of eating appointments. I did gain a couple of kilos these last few weeks but the waist bands are holding out fortunately. Clothing is all still holding out and I'm good for shoes, though I can see me throwing one of the pairs away after summer as I don't expect them to last that long, I have been wearing them more and so they appear a little more tattered than the others. 

(ME:I'm thinking don't throw them, I want to bronze them!!   ) 

Yeah, we had a few potentials at the football activity, we met them last week, they turned up and asked me if they could play and so we invited them to and told them that they could come back evey week if they wanted to, so they came back again this week. Hopefully we'll be able to get to teach them soon. The football activity is quite an old thing, we did it whilst I was in Reinach and normally its not too successful as we can't get many of the youth or YSAs out to it, partly because there's not too many of them, but it has its uses obviously.

Easter package ... ready to hand over to Stephan in Basel

Easter was great. I did get the cards thanks for them!! The members were thin on the ground on Sunday though. We got a lot of chocolate so we're all up to our necks in it and sweets, which isn't too good for some of us. Elder Pugh is now back in Reinach. His companion returned on Friday. So with everything that been going on this week its been a bit crazy. We all took turns with Elder Pugh in Reinach fulfilling our exchanges to help the work go along and then organising the switches in between appointments.

Heber is being a good missionary!

Hump Day

This week will mark the year mark of Elder Robertson's missionary service.  Generally the males serve for a total of 2 years whilst the females serve for a period of 18 months.  It is known as 'Hump Day'.  I was wanting to do something to mark the day so I enlisted the help of some friends and family and asked them to take a photo of themselves holding a particular letter, eventually spelling 'HAPPY HUMP DAY ELDER ROBERTSON'  I was so grateful to those that joined in and really put a lot of thought into what they were doing.

Our immediate family spelled out the 'HAPPY' part.  We tried to do our letters that showed our own interests.

Heber 'H' with his guitars
Dad with 'a' shaped cookie, he loves cooking/baking and cookies!
Me the mama with 'P' made out of lights
Thomas also with a 'P' and jumping as he never sits still
Matty with a 'Y' out of lego ... he and Elder Robertson have a joint love the lego!

But on it's own it would not have been as effective as the whole thing, so thank you to everyone who took the time in their busy schedules to add to the 'Happy Hump Day' banner.  Here's the finished thing ....

Happy Hump Day Elder Robertson

This week it seems like Elder Robertson has been looked after well in Basel and has had a dinner appointment every day.  I am so thankful for the members there for taking care of him and Elder Martin.  He's happy he's putting on a bit of weight! =)

My first week in Basel has been a good one, we've been busy though not much has happened. All of our "investigators" disappeared just before I arrived so we have to formulate a plan to find some more. We're working with some cool people, mostly members, and hoping to receive more referrals from them. As a missionary that's one of our biggest goals; to get referrals from members and work with them to bring their friends to the truth. Me and Elder Martin get along very well. Elder Pugh is now working temporarily with the other companionship in Basel, so there's five of us in the apartment. It's quite a laugh in the apartment.

After a trip to Switzerland last weekend, we had some Swiss Francs left over and so I sent them onto Elder Robertson, he was very grateful ... Switzerland is very expensive!! 

Origami Shirt made out of Swiss Francs (CHF)

Overall he's had a great week, enjoying the new ward and area, his new companion and the other missionaries in the apartment.

'C' was confirmed on Sunday and so we are extremely happy for him to have had these experiences and of those experiences yet to come.  

'C' is baptized

Elder Robertson in Luzern

This week has seen Elder Robertson transfer from Luzern to Basel.  I know he has loved Luzern as he has served and loved the people there.  This ends his time with Elder Meyer (who he trained and loved) and sees him starting his time in Basel serving with Elder Martin.

He was able to travel back to Luzern on Sunday to see a 'C' be baptised.  They have become really good friends as they have shared many spiritual experiences together in the last 7 months.  I am reminded of one of my all time favourite scriptures "Wherefore, he that preacheth and he that receiveth, understand one another, and both are edified and rejoice together." D&C 50:22  It is such a joy to see the people we love enter the waters of baptism.

We were able to drop some packages for him with a friend he made last year whilst serving in a neighbouring area.

Us with Stephan

It was really good of him to help us with getting packages to Elder Robertson.  He understood that weren't to see each other and made sure we were able to keep the rules.  After a short chat and lots of thank you's, he told us we had to leave because Elder Robertson was meeting him at the train station to collect them within minutes.  So we left, me with tears in my eyes at the realisation of just how close he was and we continued on our way to Bern.

Elder Robertson said in his email how he was weird to think we had just been there ...

It was nice to look at the things he would be looking at for the upcoming weeks/months.

He had received the conference ties I'd sent to him and Elder Martin to his apartment ...

Conference Ties

'It was funny to turn up to Basel with all of my stuff and then find the ties there. They were great. Both Elder Martin and I are grateful for those.'

Loving Luzern and catching up ....

So sorry, the blog has been neglected the last few weeks.   I'm just going to throw the highlights into one post to catch up.

Hold on .... it's coming!

17 Feb 14

He was very happy to be staying in Luzern.  He loves the area and the people.  The weather is nice enough he can leave the apartment in just a jumper.

He'd had a full week, " ...  we had zone conference all day on Tuesday, a temple trip on Thursday and a Finding Day on Saturday, in which helped us find 15 new contacts for our area that we can hopefully start teaching this week.  One of them actually came to church yesterday, got a book of mormon and we will begin to help him to know more about the church and our message during our appointments on Tues. and Thurs. this week. We also have many member appointments and have a lot to do otherwise this week. Tuesday especially seems jam packed which I love!!

He and Elder Meyer are really getting on well.  I love to hear how unified they are.  'We had a very spiritual appointment with him [C] on Saturday after the finding day. Elder Meyer turned to me after the lesson and thanked me for my testimony and mentioned how he really felt the spirit, which for me was humourous as I had felt the same about his testimony. Our method of teaching is improving greatly and there is increasing unity between us. I'm very pleased about all this, especially as there's been a little bit of a theme going on about pefection being our goal, but not an immediate expectation, and instead to concentrate on the continuous refinement process of improvement. 

24 Feb 14

He starts off with telling us about his good week: 'My week has been a good one; Elder Meyer and myself are doing the best we can to improvise and get as much done as possible. It's been tough. It feels a little counter-effective having certain things happen that take us away from the missionary work in our area; long travel times, and a choir practise before the Saturday session of Stake Conference .... it makes it seem a lot more difficult to hasten the work with such a restrain on the short time period we have already. Nevertheless we had a good number of appointments and a lot of member contact which I'm chuffed about. The area is definitely improving ...'.

Unfortunately we haven't met 'C' recently. He was ill this week and with the Saturday session of Stake Conference, an appointment wasn't possible. We do however have two arranged for this week and this week seems to be like a  good jump back into the usual flow of things, even as if we are just continuing onwards from where we left off a week previously without the oddities of life getting involved with this important work. Hopefully we'll be having many appointments and great spiritual nourishment for not only ourselves but those we teach too. 

I'm quite pleased for Heber and his ordination to the office of Elder. He does seem to be making fantastic progress and development spiritually.  

Letters came from Thomas and Matty this week.  Although he'd still like to hear more from Heber. '...he (Heber) did write to me this week and Matty sent me a considerably longer and somewhat more detailed e-mail than usual. They are all growing into fine young men indeed!!    

That's great that both Ammon and Ashley are both heading in that direction and are making great progress!!  

I've learnt how important my personal studies are so I can find the answers, know what I believe, and teach the truth with the convincing evidence from above to let these people feel the spirit and the honesty and undeniable truth contained within The Church. This truly is His Church and this is His gospel. Jesus Christ is our Saviour and Redeemer, the very Son and only Begotten of God that came to earth to relieve us from the burdens we are to carry in this world. To know that alone is so great a blessing, to truly begin to understand His Atonement.