These are a couple of sea otters in Valdez harbor

                                      Bald eagle on the mountains surrounding Valdez harbor

                                Congregation of seal lions in the Prince William sound area

          Bill, JoAnn and Jim on the bow of the cruise ship Lu Lu Bell in Prince William sound with a large blue iceberg in the background

Bill and Jim at the harbor in Valdez

 

The first hint of fall in Alaska when the birch trees start to turn yellow on a single branch

Bill (Jim's brother) came to Alaska for a one week visit this past week. We began his visit by fishing for Arctic greying although that was not very successful on the Chatanika river. We borrowed some fishing gear from a local and at least Bill fished the interior of Alaska which very few visitors have a chance to do. We did have more success panning for gold and he brought home a few flakes of the yellow metal.

Bill had a chance to come with us to our institute class in the town of Healy, next to Denali park. He also attended our Pearl of Great Price Thursday evening class here in Fairbanks.

We also spent  a day in Denali park seeing brown bears, Dahl sheep and moose. The scenery is always spectacular and the is a definite change of colors in the park as fall approaches.  

We did spend a bit of time driving to Valdez harbor. We presented a fireside on the sacred objects of the book of Mormon to their branch Sunday evening. We had the opportunity of staying with a great LDS family that live there in Valdez. The salmon were running and filling the harbor and surrounding rivers. Black bear were coming down to eat their fill along with the seagulls that finish what the bears do not eat. Valdez is truly  a spectacular place with majestic mountains rising above the deep port city.  Thompson pass that leads into the Valdez area not only sports a glacier but holds the record for greatest snowfall on any road in north America.

We boarded a small cruise ship and spent a day visiting the Prince William sound. It is filled with sea life of all kinds including hump back whales. The tour concluded with a visit to the Columbia glacier that comes down to the sea and has a vertical wall of ice that calves (breaks) of into the sea. It is quite a spectacular sight. 

Bill felt like he had a small glimpse of what a senior missionaries life is like as well as seeing some of the sights of the vast state of Alaska.

 Jim and JoAnn

PS  We have been asked to speak in the Granite View Ward on Sunday, Oct. 14 at 9:00 AM.  That will give us a chance to catch our breath after getting home.  





 Elder Spens and his brother Bill

 We found some blueberries!

 Kaitlyn and Eddie are going to be married in the Salt Lake Temple next week.

 A visitor means another trip to Denali Park.

 Denali Park was originally set aside to preserve the Dahl sheep like these high on the mountain.

 A grizzly bear mom munching on grass to build up fat for winter.

 Here are her two lazy cubs.  It's beginning to look like fall in the park.

 How many Ptarmigans can you count?  (It's Alaska's state bird.)

Try out this recipe for blueberry pie.

We have had a fun and busy week.  Bill flew into town, so that gave us the opportunity to show him around a bit.  We had a chance to try our hand at panning gold and showing off the oil pipeline.  On Wednesday we went to Healy for Institute class.  We were pleased to have three students and one nonmember there.  Bill was happy to make some thoughtful comments as well.  

Thursday was Institute class in Fairbanks.  We always enjoy meeting with the young adults and sharing the gospel with them.  I made a big batch of chicken enchiladas.  It's fun for me to see the students enjoy the food so much after classes.  

On Friday Bill wanted to try his hand at fishing.  We asked the experts where we could fish close to Fairbanks.  The best suggestion was the Chatanika River.  It was a cold and wet day.  At one point the thermometer read 47 degrees.  Great weather for someone visiting from the hot Salt Lake valley!  Bill tried several spots with no luck.  However, Jerri Olsen had told me of a place she likes to go to pick blueberries, and since she was out of town and we were very close, we gave it a try.  Berry picking is the Alaskan thing to do in August.  Last year we didn't know what to look for.  I think the spot we found had been picked already, but we still got enough berries to count.  If you want a real Alaskan experience, try the blueberry pie recipe.  

Today, Saturday, we drove to Denali Park and took the bus to the Eielson visitor's center.  The clouds were hanging very low on the mountains and it was a bit chilly.  The colors have started to change a little.  It's surprising how much things change here week by week.  There was even snow on the tops of some of the lower mountains this week.  We enjoyed our trip and were able to see a lot of the park animals.  

Kaitlyn and Eddie had a reception here in Fairbanks before leaving next week to be sealed in the Salt Lake Temple.  After a reception in Salt Lake, they will be going to Missouri where Eddie is from for an open house there.  They are a wonderful couple.  Kaitlyn has come home to Fairbanks the past two years from BYU and has been a wonderful part of the branch.  Like so many others, they will be going away to finish school and start their lives together. 

On the home front, our grandaughters Gabi and Cate turned eight years old this week.  Cate was baptized today on her birthday, and Gabi is in Brazil visiting her grandparents there.  When her dad, Daniel, flies to Brazil next week, she will be baptized there.  It makes us so happy to see our grandchildren make the choice to be baptized and become members of the restored Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.  The missionary work continues to go forward here and we love serving and sharing our testimonies of Jesus Christ.

Have a wonderful week,

JoAnn and Jim

 Kaitlyn and Eddie's quilt with a lot of blueberry prints.

  This is our kale garden here in Alaska doing very well.  It is an excellent climate for cool weather crops and along with the long hours of sunshine things do very well.

   This is our kale garden a few days latter after a moose had eaten a good portion. We do not always see the moose that travel through our yard but the evidence is irrefutable.

 Cameron, Gary and Matt who have been in the YSA group from the time we started almost two years ago.  They have all served faithfully in the branch presidency.

Rose and Taylor who both actually knew each other and grew up in Barrow but have re-connected here in Fairbanks and now are engaged to be married. They have not set a date yet.

Mushrooms are popping up all over the forested land and this one is coming up from under the deck in front of our apartment.

A tree used to grow here in this plot at the institute the tree died and now it serves as a  zucchini patch.

                                        President Olsen and his wife Jerri in our apartment.  We have become great friends with both of them as they are our closest member neighbors.

The weeks go by as days as we enter the last month or so of our mission service here in Alaska. We have begun to train in earnest our replacement couple the Hulls. They are a local couple who will be serving a stay at home service mission and will be taking our place on the 20th of Aug. However they will be off to Utah for the marriage of their youngest daughter Kaitlyn in the Salt Lake Temple. When they return we will have about two weeks to complete training with them and then our service here will come to an end. After nearly two years in this calling we finally feel like we are starting to understand how to accomplish the supervision of the early morning seminary and the directing of the institute program as well. Both of these programs are truly great systems for the salvation of the youth of the church. They are not just nice programs but are now vital to the youth of the church and it has been a great privilege and honor as well as a spiritual blessing to both of us to have served in this mission calling for the past two years.

Like any missionary we will leave with mixed emotions as we have come to love the people and especially the YSA of the church here in Alaska. The church continues to grow here. Investigators are baptized and the church is continually being introduced to new people. We have the great opportunity of teaching investigators in our institute classes on a regular basis. The young people bring their friends and the missionaries teach them the official lessons and we teach them the unofficial lessons of whatever the institute curriculum happens to be. The spirit will however, often direct us to teach certain things when investigators are present that hopefully will meet their individual needs.

The Olsens whose basement we live in are on a three week vacation to Utah and than on a cruise ship to return back to Alaska. So we are house sitting for them. However, a new law clerk and his wife and their dog are living upstairs temporary until they find a place of their own. It is not as quite as it might have been if we had been here alone for three weeks.

We actually shipped some stuff home and I have been getting our winter tires ready to mount on our car for the return trip. We will be driving the AlCan highway on our return trip so it will be like a road-trip vacation at the conclusion of our service here. We are certainly looking forward to reconnecting with family and friends upon our return.

Elder and Sister Spens(Jim and JoAnn, Mom and Dad, Grandma and Grandpa)

 Our zone missionaries just before transfers.

 More missionary fun

New sister missionaries for the Young Single Adult Branch

It's been a week of goodbyes and hellos.  On Monday we had a breakfast with all the missionaries in the zone just before a lot of them left to drive to Anchorage to receive new companions and new areas to work in.  We have been so blessed to be able to get to know these great missionaries.  Our zone leaders stayed the same and the district leaders, but we have a lot of new missionaries to get to know.  We now have four sister missionaries in the area and two have been assigned to our Branch.  It's the first time we have had sisters in the branch since we arrived.  They are very excited and have already hit the road running with teaching appointments and lots of visitors to meet.   

On Saturday we attended the funeral of Bro. Mario Gho who died suddenly in his home last Sunday.  Brother Gho was a wonderful man.  He and Sister Gho had been missionaries at the Institute and Sister Gho was teaching institute classes when we arrived.  They invited us to join their family for Thanksgiving dinner just a month after we had arrived.  They have a wonderful family.  Bro. Gho was a kind and gentle man who was always smiling and had a twinkle in his eye that made you know that he was glad to know you.  It's hard to see dear friends leave so quickly.  Mario and Carol Lee had the great opportunity to work in the Anchorage temple together.  Carol Lee was so excited when they received that call.  It's a big commitment to work in the temple that is over 350 miles away for several days each month.  

Today our Branch Presidency was released.  It has been such a great opportunity to work with Randy Olsen in the Branch as well as being his downstairs neighbor.  He has such a love and enthusiasm for the gospel.  I know he has helped so many in the branch become stronger.  Our new branch president is Pres. Terry.  We will have a short time to get to know him.  Gary Holyoak who was a counselor was also released since he will be going to Utah to school in a couple of weeks.  At least I have one more chance to accompany him and Emily next week when they sing in sacrament meeting.

Our classes continue to be one of the highlights of our week.  It is a special blessing to have a student come up to you after class and tell you that the lesson you taught was just what she needed.  We cooked about 11 quarts of minestrone soup and it was totally gone by the end of the night.  (We have had a rainy week, so soup was just what was needed.)  I really enjoy helping with the Munch and Mingle we have on Sundays after our meetings.  We feed about 60-70 people every week.  There is a great committee that is working hard to make things work out without being in the kitchen on Sunday.  I've never baked 30 pounds of potatoes at once before. 

We also had a chance to watch the Pioneer Day broadcast from Salt Lake on Saturday evening.  Several of the young people along with one of the new investigators came as well as a good representation of missionaries.  It was a beautiful program.  

Every day we are more aware of the short time we have left here in Alaska.  There is so much to prepare for next year in seminary and for fall semester in institute.  We are grateful that Pres. and Sister Hull are going to be taking our places and that they have been involved in making some of the decisions that will really affect their service.    With it being a service mission for them, Pres. Hull will still remain in the Stake Presidency.  

We love our association here with the young people.  They are strong and determined.  We are so grateful for the gospel that gives purpose and direction to our lives.  When we loose loved ones, we can be comforted in knowing that this life is not the end.  Families are forever and we are all God's family as well.

With love,

JoAnn and Jim

                                        Fire weed field view 150 miles north of Fairbanks on the Dalton highway

                                                   After dinner with Fairbanks friends.

                                  Tim with his wedding quilt in the institute director's office.

                                            Close view of the great quilt made by Sister Spens.

                  This is a viny blue flowered weed that grows along the roadsides in Fairbanks

                                 Our cool weather garden of kale. It is great in salads and sandwiches.

                        Missionary fireside choir plus 3 YSA sisters practicing before the fireside.

We have enjoyed another great week of missionary work, institute class teaching and training of new early morning seminary teachers. We also started training our official replacement couple the Hulls. They are a local service live at home couple who will be taking over our position on the 20th of Aug. We had our first training session with them this week. They also attended the training sessions for the early morning seminary teachers. This training for the first time since we have been here was conducted via a video/computer connection from our new coordinator Scott Beams. In the past all of the training has been entirely done by us. It will be a great strength to the seminary program to have  a professional S&I coordinator to do training here in Fairbanks. I don't know why they did not have such a position in the past few years here in Fairbanks especially with us serving as new to the entire program.

We also had the opportunity to review a masters thesis presentation from Cameron Bodly who is a physics student at UAF. His presentation was on acoustic and shock waves and was very interesting at least to Elder Spens if not so much to Sister Spens. Cameron is completing his degree and leaving Fairbanks. He is representative of the  many YSA we have come t know and love for a season then they leave to go off to school, go on a mission or get married. There are only about half a dozen YSA that are here now that were here when we arrived almost two years age.

We continue to have the opportunity to teach visitor/investigators that come to our institute classes. They are usually invited by YSA friends. One commented after class this last week that she loved to come to "institution". They always have to learn the LDS culture and terminology. We gave a copy of the Book of Mormon to an older brother who has been attending our class in Healy (the city at Denali Park).

President and Sister Beesly have been in Fairbanks this week as well. They came for training and to do interviews with the young missionaries. We had our "interview" at the Pikes Landing restaurant over dinner on Friday night. We spent a great hour by the Chena river just talking with them. The senior couple interviews are quite different then the young missionaries.

Sister Spens had the opportunity to go on splits with the sister missionaries on Sunday and that was a first for her.

On Sunday evening we had a well planed missionary fireside with music from the missionaries and instruction from President Beesly and from President Duval. There were several investigators present, recent converts who spoke, and a UAF chemistry professor who will be baptised soon was there as well. The church is growing surely and steadily as people continue to find the gospel. Conversion is always an amazing process and is truly a miracle. Our specific assignment is not proselyting, however, we seem to on a regular basis have people cross our path where we have the opportunity to either introduce them to the gospel or teach them through the institute classes. We have been and continue to be truly blessed in our missionary assignment here in Alaska. The more we work here the more we realize that this is exactly the place that the Lord wanted to send us to serve for these two years.
                                                                                                                    
Elder and Sister Spens

Adam and Aubrey's ring ceremony with Pres. Olsen

Another trip to Denali, this time with Richard and JoDel.

A mama grizzly bear and her cub.

The same mama bear with her twin cubs.

Fourth of July slip & slide in Nenana.

Wearing plastic bags over your clothes makes you slide further.

This is Elijah, Emily, and Cory, all Branch members and great friends.

On the train getting ready to try our hand at panning gold.

Gold Dredge #8 just outside of Fairbanks is an old gold mining machine.

The bridge over the Yukon River with the pipeline along the side and continuing out in front.

A view of the Yukon River.

We made it to the Arctic Circle.

It's been an eventful week.  Richard and JoDel (my brother and sister-in-law) arrived just after midnight early Monday morning.  Of course, it was still light and the sun was just setting.  They told us that when they left Minneapolis (a crazy leg of their trip) that it got lighter and lighter as they flew North.  We were delighted to have them come share our mission for about a week.  

Monday we showed them around a little and then they helped us prepare for the ring ceremony and small reception for Adam and Aubrey.  Jim even "gave away the bride."  Richard and JoDel helped prepare the food and set up for the reception.  It was amazing how things fell into place just in time.  It was nice that more friends were able to come and be part of the celebration.  Originally they were going to get married on July 2.  I think that they were very pleased with the outcome.

Tuesday we had planned to go to Denali National Park.  It was supposed to be great weather, but it poured rain on us the whole 100 miles to get there.  We were blessed that the rain stopped and the sun came out.  We took a bus into Eielson, an 8 hour round trip, hoping to see the mountain and some wildlife.  We did see a caribou and the tips of Mt. McKinley above the clouds.  I was beginning to feel disappointed that we had not seen more wildlife.  However, we soon began to see grizzly bears.  In all we saw three mother bears with two yearling cubs each, a mother bear with 3-year-old twins, and a big male bear.  Some of the bears were very close to the bus, and it was fun to watch the cubs play and wrestle with each other.  Our driver said it was the best bear day she had had in seven years. 

Wednesday was July 4th.  We drove to Nenana to watch the town play in all kinds of races.  There were bike races, egg carrying races, egg toss contests, pie eating contests, three-legged races, gunny sack races, soda pop scrambles, and a sawdust scramble loaded with $200 in coins.  It was a great small-town celebration.  After the festivities, the Verhagen family invited all of us to their home for a barbeque.  We had a wonderful time and Richard and JoDel felt right at home.   There were about 15 to 20 of the young single adults from the branch there.  After dinner they set up a huge plastic tarp in the yard and turned on the hose for a slip & slide.  They all put on plastic bags over their clothes and even soaped themselves down to slide longer.  It was fun to watch.  We really enjoyed the fun.

Thursday we got tickets to visit the Gold Dredge #8 which is a national historic site and to try our hand at panning for gold.  One of the young people offered to get us discount tickets which was very thoughtful.  Each of us found a small amount of gold in our pokes.  They guarantee that you will find gold--at least a little.  That evening we had our institute class and served the pulled pork left over from the wedding.  That made the food preparations much easier.  Richard and JoDel attended class and helped us out again.

Friday we drove to see the Yukon River and as far as the Arctic Circle on the Dalton highway.  Jim had wanted to see the Yukon River before we leave Alaska, so it worked out well for all of us.  It was quite the road trip, but beautiful.

Saturday we visited some more sites in Fairbanks and ended up taking Richard and JoDel to the airport in the evening.  I don't think they ever got used to the light, but I guess we don't either.  It was a wonderful week.  We have come to appreciate how much we love all of our family.  Each one has a special part in our lives.  We are so grateful for the blessings we enjoy because of our family and great friends.  Thank you for being part of our lives.

Love,

JoAnn and Jim

 Our last chance to stay at the mission home in Anchorage.

 We're not sure what these bright wildflowers are.

 Wild geraniums are seen for miles along the highway.

 At the Anchorage Temple.

 These lupines were so beautiful along the roadside.

 The fire weed is just starting to bloom.

 Yellow lupine mixed with white yarrow.

 Some unusual pink yarrow along the highway.

Garrett the crusty summer sailor was home on leave for a week.

The flowers pictured above look like some from someones well tended perenial garden, however they are just the roadside wild flowers that grace the highways of Alaska in the summer. They appear to be about at their peak at this time. The fire weed has just barely started to bloom but will fill the roadsides for most of the rest of the summer. As I have mentioned before living in Alaska is like being in the mountains and forest every day. Our drive to the institute each day is a drive through the woods with a spectacular view of the wildflowers as well. 

This past week we had one of the largest family night groups we have ever had as we met together at the institute building. The YSA want to meet all together probably for social reasons, however the group is so large that they also decided they would divide into three groups for a family night lesson and then socialize in a larger group. We have investigators and non-member visitors coming to our family night as well as the YSA elders. Pictured above is also Garrett who spends his summer fishing for crabs in the Bering sea. His employer has recognized something special about him as a worker on their fishing vessel. He is a recent convert as well as a returned missionary. We did not see him at all last summer. but he had a few days of shore leave and came to sacrament meeting and family night.

We had a good group at our Healy (Denali) branch institute class on Wednesday including two non-member visitors. We enjoy the weekly drive down to Healy and the class is great. We are continuing to seek more YSA to attend the class.

The branch YSA had an assignment to do baptisms at the Anchorage temple so we went down to the temple for what appears to be our last trip not only to the temple but the Anchorage area. We have finally become very familiar with the temple and always meet friends there that we have meet during our mission. We thought we may never be in that temple again, so we were sure to take the picture above standing in the front garden area of the temple grounds. The temple is a great blessing to us and to our entire family and it is wonderful to have a temple here even though we live 360 miles away!

We literally have but two months remaining of our time to serve here as missionaries. We have many things to finish and accomplish before we return to our home in Sandy. We are about half way through the institute summer semester and continue to enjoy the opportunity to be on a teaching mission. We are also in need of training the five new seminary teachers that are yet to be called by the stake that will need to be prepared to start teaching this fall. In-service training and early morning seminary visits have also been a highlight of our mission. We truly love being missionaries and all that that entails and can clearly see that when our service is over we will leave with mixed emotions with leaving the many YSA we have come to love and the other faithful members of the church in the Fairbanks stake which, by the way, may very well be the largest stake in terms of geographical size in the United States. It is probably about three times the size of the state of Utah. We pray for the Lord's blessings to be upon all of our family at home and upon any one else who may read our mission blog. 

Elder and Sister Spens