Stripling Trees Behind the Swiss Temple

After our time in the temple, we walked around behind the temple on the temple grounds, and we had some great fall fun. The trees were swaying in the breeze, and it was quiet and peaceful. Our boys loved it.

Family Temple day at the Swiss Temple

Going to the temple can be hard, but the St. Gallen Stake makes it just a little bit easier for families with small children. Every other month, the stake sets up a stake temple day, where the stake blocks off the entire day for the temple, and they watch the kids while the parents go to the temple. So we rented a car and drove the 2.5 hours to Zollikofen Switzerland to enjoy a Saturday at the temple. The stake has a whole morning and afternoon's worth of activities set up for the kids, with a theme and different stations and everything. This month the kids had games, sports, and activities that had to do with how they use their bodies to do things. So they played sports and talked about what their little bodies could do. They rented out a nearby gym at a school and they played basketball, climbed ladders, jumped on trampolines, etc. Everett was super excited, and at the end he told us "Let's go to the temple again." We also were informed that we should pack up a lunch for everybody, and we all ate together after the session. We all had a great time, with one exception. For the nursery-aged children, they had a "Kindergarten," which is identical to nursery. As we expected, Liam struggled. Well, struggled is probably not the right word. Liam cried. The women up there mentioned that he stopped a few times when they played with animals and sang a few times, but for the most part, he cried. We returned from the session to alligator tears and a runny nose, but within a few minutes he was back to his cheery self. As a disclaimer, this temple is EXTREMELY international. It serves Switzerland, parts of Austria, Germany, France, Italy, and other countries, I am sure. The session was in French, and there were people from all over the world in the temple. It is such a special place. It feels like the Church's UN, or something, and it is so great to feel the strength of these super strong saints.