Building One Brick at a Time

Querida Familia y Amigos,

I seem to have been designated as the author of our blog.  By the time we get home from our double-header meetings…one in Le Seu and one in Andorra we are pretty thrashed, but President Fowers isn’t done for the day.  After a quick bite he goes back to the “capilla” to meet with his counselor and take care of tithing.  So as it turns out, I generally write the blog while he his gone.

One of our goals for this summer is to try to help the members get into the habit of participating in some kind of activity every week.  So we have scheduled something special week, either for the youth or the entire branch.  This week we planned an pot-luck Branch Dinner (Cena de Rama).  We just wanted to create a forum for our members to get together and enjoy each other’s company.  To avoid the heat we didn’t start until after 8:00 p.m. so we all enjoyed the sunset together.

Cena de Rama at the Farmhouse

Hermana Jeanette Lasley really didn’t come to be a tourist, but rather to have a mission experience.  We have kept her very busy.  She has spoken in Sacrament meeting (twice), taught the Youth Sunday School Class, become my ever-ready visiting teaching partner and given powerful testimonies.  Her last responsibility before she goes home this week, was to present a special fireside on Temples.  We have 6 members that are preparing to attend the temple this December for their own endowment.  Hermana Lasley gave a beautiful lesson on the joy, spirit and purpose of the temple to the group in Andorra and will do a repeat tomorrow evening for our Le Seu members.

Between our busy work schedule, we did get to see a few touristy sites including the church, bridge and ice well in ARFA, Aristot with its magnificent mountain-top vistas and the ancient Bastida church. 

ARISTOT, the top of the world.

Sweet Friend at ARFA Bridge

Just the Right Size...for the miniature ice well door.

Church of the Week--Village of Bastida

Elder Domingues was made the District Leader for the Lleida District this past transfer so he organized a preparation day activity with his district to spend a bit of time in Andorra.  We didn’t have much time, but we did a bit of exploring of a very old bridge and church in La Massana before we shared a quick lunch together at a roadside picnic spot.  Our missionaries are a hard working group that deserves a fun day in the backwoods of Andorra, which is the perfect formula relax and revitalize them to press forward in the work.

Lleida District together High on a Mountain Top

Hoorah for Israel!

Hermanas Anderson and Clark

Roadside Picnic

Today was special for me ( Elder Fowers).  I was able to ordain Jordi to the Aaronic Priesthood.  He is 60 years old, and has been a member for about 5 years now.  He has been going through a difficult divorce and custody battle for his 6 year old son.  He has spent a couple of nights sleeping at our home. Amid all of this turmoil in his life, he has turned back to God, become active in the church  and is bringing his son to primary. He gave a wonderful talk in Sacrament meeting on Father's Day.  I believe reactivation work is what many are called to in these troubled last days.  We feel such joy in seeing them come back and become stronger than before.  Zion is built one brick at a time.  Today we added another brick.

In our wanderings this week we ran into this Escuela National, built in 1923 in the little village town of Bastida.  Oh how I wish I could have wandered through the classrooms, but the doors we locked.  Every afternoon this week, big old thunderstorms have come rumbling through.   We have had such magnificent pictures of clouds…here are a couple of our favorites.

Escuela Nacional

Bygone Years

Thunderhead

View out farmhouse window.

Every week as we write this quick snapshot of our weekly happenings, we always feel so incredibly blessed to be entrusted with the care of this humble, tiny Branch in a hidden corner of His kingdom.  But we find it really isn't hidden from His watchful eye...we see miracles everyday. If you just take a moment to reflect, you will notice them in your lives as well.

Con Mucho Amor,

Los Fowers

Couples Conference

Querida Familia y Amigos,

We had a whirlwind, not-stop week.  In fact, I was so tired after our double meetings last night that I just could not stay awake to write the blog. 

The first big event of the week was our Married Missionaries Conference that we hosted here in Andorra.  When other plans fell through for another venue, we volunteered to have the 11 other couples that are in our mission (including 2 senior sisters) join us in exploring the wonders of Andorra.  With that said, you can imagine the weeks of planning before they arrived…hotel reservations, meals, travel arrangement and etc.  Our farmhouse was filled to the brim as we rejoiced together in our service.  Here is a quick picture walk through a glorious three days…

President Dayton instructing us during training.

Juan and Carmen's antique collection

Exploring ARFA Chapel

Ringing the bell, inside the ARFA Church

Inside the Ice Well

President and Hermana Dayton by ARFA Bridge

Joy of being together.

Gourmet Dinner catered by Aitor

Exploring Añyos Church

Ensign to the Nations

Mountain-top Picnic

We have been blessed with a new Elder at this last transfer, Elder Squires from Pleasant Grove joined us in our work here in Andorra.  He is a pioneer in his family, he is the first to ever serve a mission.  We can already tell that he is a obedient, hard-working, determined Elder.

Meet Elder Squires

Our dear, sweet Hermana Lasley has been with us for more than a week now.  She has been right in the thick all of our responsibilities as missionaries and adventures with the senior couples.  I am not sure how I would have survived the week of food preparation without her help in the kitchen!  She fit right into our group and even joined the Elders in early morning scripture study.

Hermana Lasley studying her Sunday School Lesson 

Earnest Study

Our three Dominican sisters, Daiana, Dariana, and Arianny (try to say those three names quickly!) invited us to join them for their mother’s birthday party.  She is a kind and loving mother and it was fun to watch their interactions.  She is fully supportive of her daughters’ new church.  Perhaps one day, when she is not overwhelmed with the demands of life, her heart may be open to listen to the message of the gospel.

Feliz Cumpleaños

They had a big holiday this week to celebrate Sant Joan.  What a wild celebration it was with fireworks, exploding firecracker and bon fires with flames 20 feet in the air.  Apparently it is the night of the witches, so they burn the fires to scare away the witches.  We were a bit confused about how the all night riotous celebration honors the Lord’s beloved apostle John.

We were just chatting last night, about the changes we have seen since we have been here.  We have quietly watched the evolution of our members as their hearts have changes in subtle ways. The change has been so slight, that an outsider would not be able to see it, but we feel it everyday.  But the greatest changes is in our own hearts. We know that we are guided and helped in the work... the angels go before us.   

Con Mucho Amor,

Los Fowers

The Mission Experience

Querida Familia y Amigos,

Feliz Día de Padre to Elder Fowers!  It is a great blessing for me to serve beside him.  He has such a generous spirit and is beloved of many. Besides being an awesome Dadd, he is a devoted Branch President. I volunteered to write the blog so that he would have time to chat with his kids.  I bought him this little keepsake to remind him of our Spanish farmhouse…

Tractor/Cow Tic-Tac-Toe

It was a very quiet week for us with a lot of prep work at home, so the blog might be a bit short and boring today.  I not sure how we could make our daily missionary tasks sound exciting, but for us they are.  The quiet hour or two that we find in the morning to study the scriptures, prepare talks and take time to thank God for the blessing of being here are a great treasure to us.

We have volunteered to host a Married Missionaries Conference at the farmhouse this coming week, so we took some time last week to organize some sight seeing.  We decided to check out the Sant Climent Church that we had never visited before which has an interpretive center for Romanesque architecture in the little mountain village of Pal.  We decided it was to far out of the way to go there with a caravan of cars, put it was really interesting.  Beyond that we spent a great deal of time preparing menus, shopping, gardening, making reservations and preparing for the gathering of the 11 couples that serve in the Spain Barcelona Mission.

Delicate little wildflowers growing in crack of a rock.

Stone walkway to the Sant Climent Church

Yup, yet another Romanesque Church (12th century)

Sant Climent

Hermana Lasley arrived on Thursday morning early.  For those of you who do not know her, Jeanette Lasley was our neighbor and good friend when we lived in San Diego.  She is a 4’9’’ fireball at the age of 83! We extended an invitation to her several months ago, to come to Spain and have a mission experience with us, especially since she speaks Spanish.  After much consideration, she accepted our invitation to join us for three weeks.  After we picked her up, and found her awake and ready to go, we made a quick drive into the Montserrat Mountains to see the Montserrat Monastery and a bit of sight seeing on the way home. 

Rugged Montserrat Mountains

Our Sweet Friend, Hermana Lasley

We put her to work right away.  She has already been visiting teaching with me, helped me plan menus and given a talk in both of our sacrament meetings.  We are keeping her busy! We have been so delighted and blessed to have her with us.

Hermana Lasley speaking in our Group Meeting

Here is the garden report.  The lettuce is coming on strong and the zucchinis are already taking over the world.  We have to sneak zucchini into our members’ church bags just to get rid of them!  Jose Luis, our member/neighbor is an amazing gardener and come over everyday to watch his garden grow.

Wow, how does the garden grow!

Bountiful Harvest,  Elder Fowers and Jose Luis

Yesterday, our beloved Andorra Branch President, Elder Fowers drove 2½ hours one way to take 6 of our youth to the seminary graduation and dance.  After our modesty class last week, President helped our three sweet, new Dominican sisters get some skirts so that they could attend.  They were more than thrilled and it was so important that they have the opportunity to interact with a big group of youth from three stakes to experience the church on a much grander scale than our tiny branch.  He got home long after midnight, so he was a bit drowsy in church today.

Dominican Sisters~ Arianny, Daiana and Dariana

The highlight of this week for us was the opportunity to watch two of our newly returning members, both of which have been less active for many years, give talks in church today. Jordi discussed the critical role of fathers and our Heavenly Father. Anita spoke of the gift of the Holy Ghost in our lives. We were in awe of her understanding of the doctrine and the depth of their preparation. We felt like proud parents as we were taught by their renewed light and faith.  God is at the helm and is the master of all we do.

Happy Fathers' Day to all the amazing men in our lives!

Con Mucho Amor,

Elder and Hermana Fowers

Points of Interest...

Querida Familia y Amigos,

Monday, our preparation day, we had a very knowledgeable tour guide who is a lifetime resident of Andorra—Lluís, our newest member in Andorra. He had a day off of school so he volunteered to show us many of the historical sites in Andorra.  We spent that day scurrying from one interesting point of interest to another.  Here is the picture tour:

Andorran tour guide, Lluís

Buddies with  Elder Bown and Domingues

New Discoveries in Andorra

Boys on the Bridge

Font de Roc Del Metge, thermal spring.

Magnificent view of the capital city, Andorra la Vella

Elder Domingues y Lluís--foot race...guess who wins?

Casa de la Vall, built in 1580

As you recall, I got four of the most adorable baby chicks for my birthday.  It turned out that 2 of them were roosters.  Since they weren’t contributing to the egg production we decided that it was time for them become dinner.  With the help of Jose Luis, Elder slaughtered our two roosters and Oh my, they were BIG Birds!  The larger one weighed more that 3 kilos (7 lbs.) Enough with five at the table we only ate half of the big old bird!

One BIG Bird!

Here are your churches of the week… after all, we simply can’t publish a blog without a few ancient churches that we have discovered.  Keep in mind we don’t spend our time looking for them they just seem to appear during our wanderings.

Sant Miguel d' Engolatsers

Sant Creu

Santa Maria de les Peces

Lluís received the priesthood today—the first and only Deacon in the entire country of Andorra. He was ordained by Elder Bown and passed the sacrament for the very first time.  After the meetings he said his last goodbye to Elder Bown, one of his HEROS.  The tears came, and he turned to his mom for comfort. Soon we were all wiping away a tear or two.  Since the time that Bette sat in his Grandmother’s living room and shared the beginnings of our Heavenly Father’s great plan with him, his life has changed entirely!

Saying Goodbye 

Speaking of Goodbye,  Elder Bown is really leaving us after six months in Andorra.  This was his first area, and with our Brigham City connections, we pretty much adopted him.  He is a great missionary and will be greatly missed! (Sister Bown you are welcome to keep following our blog even though he will no longer be a part of it!)

Elder Bown not so happy about his transfer news...
We will miss him!

Cecilia accepted the call as the Young Women’s president this past week and planned her first youth activity this week.  When we first arrived in the mission we had three active youth in our whole branch.  Saturday, we had eight.  It was a delight to stand back and watch Cecilia interact and lead these youth in a meaningful discussion about modesty and then spend the rest of the afternoon eating, laughing and playing games together with them.  What a blessing for us to watch our local members function in their callings, joyfully serving the Lord!

Youth Activity...Amazing

New record attendance today!  Between our two groups we had 45 members and investigators in attendance.  However, we did count the four missionaries twice and along with three members who attended both meetings, but we get our numbers however we can.

Andorra Group Meeting

The gospel of Jesus Christ changes lives.  Whether they are new members or returning members who are finding their way back, there is no greater blessing than watching the light of Christ light up their lives and bring joy and peace to their hearts.  I know this is why so many senior couples serve multiple missions, because once you have experienced the kind of joy that comes from playing some small role in that journey, you simply can’t get enough.   It is worth every sacrifice!

Thanks to all of our family and friends for your love, support and sacrifice so that we can be here trying to make a difference in our little corner of the world.

Con Much Amor,

Elder and Hermana Fowers

Amazing vista and misty sunset over the Pyrenees…

Le Seu Valley

The Majesty of the Pyrenees!