New Pictures of Irene's Wake

These are some pictures that the young Elders loaded on my computer of some of the things that went on during the aftermath of Hurricane Irene. The youngsters in the yellow vests are from the ward we attend here.



In retrospect, we have had a great change of heart in many of the local people here because of the work of these young adults and children. We are thankful for them for what they do.

Well today we celebrated Joseph Smith Jr's 206th birthday. It was a beautiful deal and we had over 400 people come to the site tonight. It was hectic, but wonderful. We have had a 'Mr. Well's' winter so far. It has snowed 5 times this winter and up until this last one, they have all melted away. The pictures are of this winter...all of them. You will see that there is snow and green grass.
The two ladies in this picture are Sister Charchenko and Sister Fisher. We went to Randolf to go shopping for Christmas and this is after we went to lunch. Awesome aren't they?!!!!

A Beautiful Winter Day.

Things are pretty slow here now with the cold weather and the snow. Most of the snow is gone, but it still slows some folks from coming. We are seeing mostly non-members now that come to see the lights and we do very little guiding of tours. We talk a little about the gospel, but most don't want to hear anything about Mormonism, even though they think we are really a cut above when it comes to putting a good foot forward. They all are impressed with how nice the place is kept and the peaceful feeling they all get when they come here. I always love to go to the site myself.

Another Fabulous Sunday

We got a message that a woman who is less active wanted us to pick her up for church today after backing out about 5 times in the past. We were excited to be able to take her. She canceled once in the past because a member of the Stake Presidency was going to be visiting her and she was nervous and had to fix up her place a little. The man's name from the presidency was President Bush. Another member of the presidency's name is Tom Sawyer and they were going to visit two other members of the ward whose names are Dick Tracy and Dan Boone. These are all totally honest real names. I've met two of them. I don't have any new pictures and so you will have to make do with these.

Mr. Wells' Winter

Well, it is Sunday again and I have been a little remiss in posting. That is because it is getting quite busy with everybody coming to see the 180,000 lights that are here now for the Christmas season. Yesterday, we had almost 200 come to see the lights and the nativity scenes we have in the visitors center throughout December. I will try to get some good pictures of the paintings by Simon Dewey. They are gorgeous. Here are some of the lights that I could capture with my wannabe camera.
As you can see, we have snow now. It has snowed three times this winter and each time the snow has gone completely except for this time and even most of that has melted.
When Junius Wells came to put up the monument in 1905 the locals here called it "Mr. Wells' Winter" because there was no snow then either, otherwise they wouldn't have been able to put up the monument. We are having a Wells winter.

Sunday at the "Memorial"

We had a great day today. It was Sister Fisher's birthday and we celebrated it with the young missionaries here. Elder Barnes' birthday was the 2nd, so they celebrated together with some of "Paul's Ribs". It was delicious.
We had over 100 people come through the site this evening and it was great. We got to do a little missionary work and give a few tours though they were difficult with the numbers of people that came through. A good day for all. The boys have been calling to wish their mother a happy birthday.
These pictures are where we go to church every Sunday. It is a beautiful place.

December 1...What will it bring?

Well, we are into our 'busy season' where it has been predicted that we will see an onslaught of visitors. We were on the sight from 9:00 AM until 4:00 PM and between the two of us we had two tours. I sure hope it gets a little busier than that. I have been doing a little drawing and here are a couple of the missionaries and some other friends that are here at the sight...well actually I wish the little guy was here but that is just a picture a friend sent to me. Isn't he cute?!!!...unlike the other pictures.

Today was the big day here in many ways. We had the largest crowd here since we have been here...about 350. We had the small pageant that shows the nativity scene and we had two sheep and a donkey. There was supposed to be a llama dressed in drag as a camel, but it didn't make it. These pictures of the lights didn't turn out very good, but I'll include them tonight and take some more tomorrow with another camera. The day was wonderful.

What a wonderful Thanksgiving. We ate with three other missionary couples, the Schucks, the Johnstons, and the Charchenkos. We had, as you can see, a fabulous meal and good conversation. We always have a great time together. To say we are thankful seems so weak when we consider the feelings we have about our situation.

The weather has turned to white here and it is beautiful...though difficult. We are going to have to get snow tires put on the car. With 6-8" of snow fallen on the place, it is obvious that we will have to have something more than what we have on the car to be able to make it work. Though we are only 1 mile from the site, it is a difficult mile...at least the first 1/5th of a mile. Isn't this beautiful?!!

This is a picture I drew for Elder Chen as he had requested. I didn't like the picture at first, but now I really like it. This old talent is coming back as I work at it. Tell me what you think this picture denotes. The temple...to save you time looking it up, is the Las Vegas Temple. That is where Elder Chen lives...well, not right there but near there.

Well, I haven't posted anything for a few days because I have been under the weather...I have had pneumonia and/or bronchitis. I am getting better rapidly because of a blessing that the FM missionaries(Gene and Mike)gave me. We are really getting slow now, but still get a few tours...based I believe on how badly we want them and how fervent and sincere our prayers are. I am including some of the beautiful things from here. That's right...one of the most beautiful things is that we get to study the scriptures etc. everyday. We discuss concepts and principles that we read about and it is fantastic. The next picture is just one of our site.

There is a man in the ward here by the name of Bro. Dunkle. He coaches a cross country team for a tech school somewhere nearby. He brought a young man to church today from his team. He wanted the young fellow to meet me and have me take him on a tour. He was hoping for an athlete connection of some sort. Though I was not on duty today, they asked me to take them on a tour. I did and testified to the young man that Joseph Smith was a prophet and he restored the gospel in this dispensation. He was an unlearned young boy of maybe twenty and so I tried to structure the tour to meet his need. He seemed very interested and the young missionaries were there and filled in a little on the gospel at a level he could understand. We showed him a short clip about "life" and "purpose". He was very interested and wants to come back next Sunday to watch the Joseph Smith story. I am excited and so are the young missionaries. That's them in the picture minus the one on the right of the picture...he has been transferred.

You will notice that I am not posting everyday, because we do have to work now and then. The days are shorter now, so we have more time off. We actually miss going to the site because we want to have people come so we can talk to them. We have gone with the young elders to a lady in the ward whom we will be fellowshipping back into activity. She has had a tough time of it, but is a nice person and would like to come to church. We will be taking her each day.
We have to go out into the country to get her...well the whole place is out in the country, but this is a little more out in the country. The bears here are no real threat because we have guys like this one that help out!!!! What do you think?

Now...I will need some comments on this one. This is a monument (headstone) in the Hope cemetery just outside Barre, VT. Maybe the caption to this should be "Just wait a minute Charlie, you're not gone yet!" or "One more beat honey, then the house is mine!" Who would think this is an appropriate headstone? No...Shugga!!! Okay...maybe this will do it. "Just be still you %#@&*, the poison will kick in any minute now!"

OUR DAY IN MONTPELIER...THE CAPITAL OF VT

We took the young Elders up to Montpelier today for a district meeting. While they were in their meeting, we drove around the capitol and took some pictures of churches and some of the old houses and interesting buildings. Our next adventure will be...you'll have to log in to see on the next posting.

ONE HUNDRED SIXTY THOUSAND LIGHTS!!!

The "FM" group are hard at work stringing of 160,000 lights. One of the church employees said that is about 10,000 more than last year. These good people are readying the place for the celebration that starts the day after Thanksgiving. There will be a lighting ceremony and then a live nativity scene. There will be a donkey, two sheep and a llama. It will be 'cross-dressed' to look like a camel!!! Notice the missionaries helping Sister Starley. She is one of the Facilities Management missionaries. Wonderful lady. Great missionaries.

Great Barns of New England!

Our last "P" day was one where we went to the countryside and took pictures of some of the great barns of New England. These are a few of them. Two are my favorites...which do you think they are? Let me know. Elder Fisher