The Jensonian

Happy News!

2012-02-06T11:09:00.000-08:00

Hello, everyone!

Well, a lot happened this week, but the best part is that Sister Bognar and I are staying together for another transfer! It´s the best possible news we ever could have gotten! Seriously, the past six weeks have been the best of my mission, and now I get six more!

We were scared because a couple of new Sisters came in and neither of us wanted to be trainers (since we both trained last time) but we´re both among the oldest Sisters in the mission, now. I´m only one transfer "older" than Sister Bognar.

Anyway, it´s a beautiful day. Really cold, but the sun is shining, and I think spring will come early!

Sorry this email is so short. We´re healthy, happy, and having the time of our lives! Miracles are happening!

Lots of love,
Sister Jensen

Living like a Narnian

2012-01-30T05:34:00.000-08:00

Hallo,

We had a pretty great week! We talked to a lot of really cool people and have lots of appointments with new investigators set up for next week, which is always a good feeling. (Although, statistically, about 50% of all appointments fall out, but that's why we make back-up plans!)

I just wanted to share really quickly how much the Book of Mormon means to me. I read something in Ether a few days ago that I want to share:
"And behold, I prepare you against these things; for ye cannot cross this great deep save I prepare you against the waves of the sea, and the winds which have gone forth, and floods which shall come..." (Ether 2:25)
In this verse, it's talking about how God literally prepared the people to cross the ocean to the promised land, but I though it fits really well figuratively as well. The 'Great Deep' can also represent life. The waves try to bury us, the winds blow, and the floods come. But God knows all of that, and he will "prepare us against these things," so that we can "have light when [we] are swallowed up in the depths of the sea."

There is so much to learn in the Book of Mormon. And the best part is that it's not just beautiful literature that could possibly be true. It is true. It comes from God. And that means that when it says in the Book of Mormon that there's life after death, there IS life after death. When it says in the Book of Mormon that prayers are answered, prayers ARE answered. When it says that keeping the commandments of God will lead to happiness, it WILL lead to happiness. When it says that Christ is real -- and that he really came, and that he really saved us from sin, and made it possible to change -- then it's true. We can count on it, and we can live like it's true.

There are so many different opinions and philosophies in the world, and if I tried to test them all out, I would get so confused and twisted around, because a lot of them make sense, at least partially. But luckily, I don't have to! I can trust every word on every line on every page of the Book of Mormon.

Sometimes I just want to go up to people, hold up the Book of Mormon, and say, "You should read this book. You don't know it yet, but it will change your life. I said goodbye to my family for 18 months just to give this book out to people... for FREE, for heaven's sakes. What can you lose? Read it, and ask God about it!"

Something I hear almost every day is, "You can't know that there's a God. What proof do you have that there's a God?"
To that, I quote Alma and say, "What proof do you have that there's NOT a God? "The scriptures are laid before thee, and all things denote there is a God; even the earth, and all things that are upon the face of it, and its motion, and also all the planets which move in their regular form do witness that there is a Supreme Creator."

There's a quote from C.S. Lewis, from one of the Chronicles of Narnia books, that says, “I'm on Aslan's side even if there isn't any Aslan to lead it. I'm going to live as like a Narnian as I can even if there isn't any Narnia.” That's how I feel about my faith sometimes. People can say what they want, but I'm on Christ's side, and I'm going to live like a Christian, no matter what.

I love you all so much! I hope things are going well at home. We're still hearing stuff about Mitt Romney every day. I'll have to study more about it when I come home.

All the best,
Sister Jensen

Singing In the Rain

2012-01-23T09:05:00.000-08:00

Guten Nachmittag!

Diese Woche war AUSGEZEICHNET! (awesome week)

We had so many miracles that I don't even know where to start! We were running around like crazy and contacting every person who came into view, and there were so many times where I just thought, 'I am in exactly the right place at the right time. Only God could be organizing this.' Also, I don't know why, but I just feel such a LOVE for Germans! It came on really suddenly, but for some reason I just feel this super deep love for Germany and Germans and the language and the weather and everything. I feel like I'm living in a dream!

It was really rainy this week, but we went contacting along the Rhine a lot, and it was so cool, with the stormy weather and all. I'll send pictures next week. And we talked to so many cool people who were just out there, in the rain, staring at the river and contemplating life. I realized that coming on a mission is probably the most selfless thing I will ever do. I'm always tired, I'm usually cold, people point and stare and laugh at us, (or think we're Jehova's Witnesses), and yet something about the whole experience is just so satisfying. And it's so worth it when I can bear my testimony of Christ to someone and see that light in their eyes glow a little brighter. That probably sounds really cheesy, but what the heck. I'm a missionary. Most of what I do is a little cheesy. :)

I read the coolest talk this week, and it really helped me change some of my attitudes about life. It really helps me to get up every morning and just be excited for a new day!
'Forgetting those things which are Behind', Kenneth Higbee
http://lds.org/ensign/1972/09/forgetting-those-things-which-are-behind?lang=eng

Sister Bognar and I are having such a good time and working hard. We tried this diet last week, it involves eating this really weird cabbage soup. But after a few days we were like, 'Oh, forget this, let's go get milkshakes.'

We also had Zone Conference this week, and I had an interview with President Schwartz. It had been 6 months since my last interview. He gave me some suggestions and said some things that were exactly what I needed to hear.

Anyway, I love you all so much. I come home in THREE MONTHS. I'm kind of freaking out! Oh well, I have lots of work still left to do before I come home.

Oh, Sister Bognar says hi!

Lots of love,
Sister Jensen

Seeing Seeds Getting Harvested

2012-01-09T09:44:00.000-08:00

Hallo!

Well, it's been a really good week! Everything is going really awesome with Sister Bognár! We found lots of new investigators last week, we taught more, and we're just having tons of fun together! Even though the weather is pretty gross (rainy and windy), we're having a good time. She cracks me up. My German is getting better, too, because we always speak in German together, and her German is awesome.

What I wanted to talk about, though, doesn't have anything to do with what's going on right now, but about something from six months ago, in Friedrichsdorf. There were two people I worked with in Friedrichsdorf who I grew to love. Peter and Karin. They both just became so dear to me, because they were among the first people I ever taught, way back with Sister Thaden, and I saw them pretty much from the beginning, and taught both of them the whole nine months I was there. I saw both of them make so much progress. Peter, for example, never prayed, because he said he wasn't even sure if God was there, and praying to him felt like talking to himself. By the time I left, he prayed every day, his faith was stronger, he had more hope and light in his life, and he felt the influence of the Holy Ghost in his life. He also came to church every week. With Karin, it was similar. I saw how much she changed the more she learned about the gospel. But even though they both made so much positive progress, neither of them were baptized while I was there. There were so many times that I thought, 'They'll never fully accept Christ, they'll never be baptized,' but I loved them so much that I couldn't ever give up on them.

Well, this week, I got a package from Peter with a nice Christmas present and a card that said, 'Thank you for being a star that guided my way' (but in German). He still isn't baptized, but it's so nice to know that I helped someone and brought them closer and actually made a difference in their life.

Then, last night, the Friedrichsdorf sisters called and said, 'You'll never guess what happened! KARIN is getting baptized on Saturday!' I couldn't believe it! I was like... jumping around and laughing and was so happy! Sadly it's too far away for me to visit for the baptism, but I'm just so excited for her and happy that what I taught really did make a difference. Some people just need more time than others, and we just have to be patient and love them and genuinely want what's best for them. In missionary work, we're always talking about 'planting seeds', and that sometimes you don't ever find out what happens to the people you teach or talk to, but you still do it, in the hope that you're 'planting seeds'. Still, it's so rewarding to see what happens to a seed you planted. :)

Anyway, that was the highlight of the week. We did have one other... *ahem*... interesting experience. We taught one of our investigators about tithing, and she said she didn't have any problems with it. But then, yesterday, during fast and testimony meeting, she got up to bear her testimony, which started thus: "I have made a huge mistake. But actually, it's not my mistake... it's the missionaries' mistake." (We knew, already, that no good would come of the rest)
In any case, she then said that there was no way she could ever pay tithing, and that the church seemed so nice and friendly but that it asked too much of people. Then she said that she could never be baptized, because tithing was too hard of a commandment to follow, and that it was our fault, as the missionaries, for waiting so long before we taught it to her. Luckily the ward was pretty good-humored about it.

That was pretty much it! Talk to you next week, love you all,
Sister Jensen

Hello Wvweyone

2012-01-02T05:45:00.000-08:00

Hello everyone!

This week was the best week of my mission! I have a new companion, Sister Bognár, and she is so awesome! We get along so well. We're already having so much fun and teaching more and finding more. Seriously, this is the best companionship since Alma and Amulek.

Sister Bognár is 23, from Kerekegyháza, Hungary, and she is SO funny! She plays volleyball and loves missionary work. She already served in Düsseldorf before (from Feburary until July), so she is excited to be back and already knows the members and some of the investigators. My companion, Sister Hansen, went down and took her place in Darmstadt, and Sister Bognár came up here! It has been so great these past few days. I know great things are going to happen here!

I attatched a photo that we took at transfers in Frankfurt. I'm on the right side standing next to Sister Hansen (red jacket) and Sister Römer, my old companion. Sister Bognár is on the far left, with the purple scarf. President and Sister Schwartz are in the middle. Oh, and for Grandma and Grandpa Jones, Sister Bulloch is also in this picture (third one in from the left).

On New Year's Eve we were home by 6:00 pm and had some time to relax and set goals for the new year and stuff. New Years in Düsseldorf is kinda crazy. They have a lot of fireworks that sound like weapons (like machine guns and bombs and shotguns and stuff), and they were going off all night and it sounded like World War Three. The next day we were up and fresh and heading to church by 8:00 am, and the busses and trains were full of drunk and hungover people, haha.

Yesterday, Sister Bognár and I were out doing some door-to-door, and just singing songs for people, and we met some super nice people. With one lady, we sang her a song and then told her that we knew God loved her and was always there for her. She almost started crying and said, 'Yes, I hope so, but sometimes hard times come and it's hard to believe that.' She lost two very close loved ones this Christmas, and was really doubting if God was even there, and we just told her we knew that he was there, and that he cares. I know that's true. I'm glad to be here, bringing light and hope to people, because I know I couldn't live without it. I know there's a God, and he wants to hear from us, and we can pray to him at any time and pour our heart out to him, and he will be there to comfort us.

I am loving life, loving the mission, and feeling great! It was so nice to Skype over Christmas and see Mom, Jess, Matt and Melinda. I love you all and pray for you, and I hope everything is going well!

Have a happy new year!
Sister Jensen

Happy New Year

2011-12-27T14:38:00.000-08:00

No new general e-mail from Kristin this week. But, we had three way skype with her and her brother on Christmas day and she looks beautiful. It was fun to listen to her speak German with her brother. She is not being transferred and so you may continue to snail mail her as previously:
Sister Kristin Jensen
Hermann-Dornscheidtstrasse 20
40470 Dusseldorf
Germany
I received her "trunky" letter from the Frankfurt mission office and her release date is April 25,2012. I am sure I will be posting more e-mail from her after the new year which will contain information about how you can contact her beyond her stay in Dusseldorf.

Wishing you a blessed New Year!
Kristin's Mutter

2011-12-19T09:48:00.000-08:00

Christmas in Germany

2011-12-19T09:35:00.000-08:00

Hello everyone,

I must say, all the missionaries here said Christmas was the hardest time of year, but we've actually had a really good time. I'm coming to realize that you can look at missionary work during Christmas time one of two ways: either that there's a lot of stuff you can't do at this time of year, or that there's a lot of stuff you can ONLY do at this time of year! We've done a lot of carolling, Christmas street preaches, and other random little Christmas ideas, and I think diversity has kept us sane. It is pretty cold and dark, though. We don't see the sun a lot. But other than that, it's been alright.

In Germany there are three days of Christmas. Heiligabend (Christmas Eve) is the big one, but then they have First and Second Christmas days (the 25th and 26th), which most people use to travel and visit family. Everyone has work off on these days, and pretty much everything is shut down; all the stores and restaurants and such. We are very well taken care of for the three Christmas days. There is a lady in our ward who was called to organize our eating appointments, and she really took her calling to heart! I don't think we even need to buy groceries this week. And, on top of that, the ward bought us a real Christmas tree! And the relief society came together to give us some of their old decorations and lights. We have the most decked-out missionary apartment in history.

I'm going to attach some photos from the Christmas market. But just know, the pictures don't do it justice. Half of the magic is the music and the way it smells. It's like pure happiness.

Saturday I got my 'trunky papers' in the mail (asking about my flight plans going home and such). I can't believe how fast time has flown. Oh well, I still have four months left, and I'm going to make them awesome!

Love you all, thank you for all the support!
Sister Jensen

Kevin's Baptism

2011-12-12T09:37:00.001-08:00

Hallo Familie!

Highlight of the Week: Kevin's baptism

Kevin is a really amazing kid, 20 years old, who learned about the church through a friend. His friend brought him to Institute, and the whole group of young adults welcomed him and befriended him. He had a pretty hard home life, and his family is not at all accepting of him joining ANY church, let alone the Mormons, but to him, the Institute center became his home, and the young adults became his family. He started reading the Book of Mormon, and by the time he reached Mosiah he knew it was true, and that it came from God. He is so solid and faithful! He'll probably be a bishop or stake president soon. Kevin sort of became everyone's investigator. There were three sets of missionaries teaching him, including us (because he lived in one place, studied in another, and came to Institute in Düsseldorf). Everyone loves Kevin, and his baptism was such a wonderful experience. There were so many members and missionaries there! I wrote a medly for his service ("I like to look for rainbows" mixed with "I know that my redeemer lives") and Sister Hansen wrote a guitar part, and we sang it for him.

Other notable events:
- We had a really successful ward Christmas party. Lots of members brought their friends, and everyone had a great time! The primary kids were adorable.
- We had a street preach with our district in a park, and got some great contacts out of it.
- I got separated from Sis. Hansen. She hopped into a train, and as I tried to hop in after her, I tripped over an old lady, and the train pulled away. It was pretty ridiculous, haha. Plus it was on a Sunday evening, so the trains only ran once every half hour. While I waited for the next train, though, I got a contact from another guy who was standing on the platform.
- Everywhere we went this week, we had appointments fall out, but every time we had an appointment fall out, we met someone else who we normally wouldn't have ever met. God moves in mysterious ways
- I'm trying to get better at contacting on trains, even when I only have a couple of stops to talk to the person across from me

I love you all! Have a wonderful Christmas!
Sister Jensen

12 days of Christmas project

2011-12-05T12:05:00.000-08:00

Hi everyone!

Hope you are all having a good December so far; I've been hearing about some crazy storms back home! Hope you're all staying warm and safe. It's starting to get really cold, but no snow yet. Just lots of rain. I'm sure it's around the corner, though.

Highlight of the Week: our 12 days of Christmas project
(see attatched picture)

We picked four families in the ward and did a little project with them. First, they picked a friend or neighbor who might be open to the gospel. Then we made up a package of Christmas gifts, quotes, and scriptures (all Christ-themed) that they could deliver secretly every day for 12 days, leading up to Christmas. We had a lot of fun putting it all together, and the members thought it was a great idea. The plan is that we'll go over with them on the last day, when they reveal themselves, and we'll sing them some Christmas songs and share a thought. Then we'll ask them if they want to learn more, and the member will invite them to church!

Other than that, it's been a pretty cold, hard week. We don't have a lot of investigators at the moment, and so we have to spend a lot of our time tracting, which is kind of hard around Christmas time. We try to do a lot with the Elders. It's nice, having another set of missionaries in the same city. There's a big push in our mission right now to try new, creative ideas. We've thought of a few, but most of the ones we dream up are either expensive or could get us arrested. So we're trying to brainstorm, haha. (If anyone has any sweet-awesome ideas that can be done with 2-4 missionaries, let me know! :))

I'm also attatching a picture of some protesters we met in Bahnhof. There was a big group of them in masks, making a statement against Scientology.

Love you all,
Sister Jensen

New address

2011-11-28T09:32:00.001-08:00

Hallo,

Highlight of the Week: The Jastram Family!

We contacted a couple who live right across the street from the church building, in the same building as a member couple in our ward. They are so cool! They have strong beliefs about family, and they are honest seekers of truth. We've been meeting with them this week, and they have so many questions! It's really a great experience, teaching them.

I'm getting really excited for Christmas. Yesterday was 'First Advent' in Germany. Every Sunday for four Sundays before Christmas they celebrate Advent, where they light a candle and sing Christmas songs or tell stories. So yesterday was the official start of the Christmas season. Sister Hansen and I, and the Zone Leaders, are celebrating by going to a historical Christmas market by a castle in Solingen. Christmas markets are a big deal here. We've already seen a couple but haven't had time to visit them yet, so today is exciting!

We're doing a really cool Christmas program with the Elders. They both have great voices, so we have a program where we sing Christmas songs and read from the Bible and the Book of Mormon and go door-to-door with this program. We're starting it up officially this week (we practiced it yesterday) so I'll let you know next week how it went!

We had a great Zone Conference with President Kopischke from the area presidency. He really inspired us to seek after the prepared people and bring them closer to Christ.

Don't have much time, but I just want to tell you all that I love you and miss you. I know I'm supposed to be here now, though. I'm learning a lot and I feel like something big is about to happen here in Germany. I hope I can help bring it about!

Here is my new address:
Sister Kristin Jensen
Hermann-Dornscheidtstrasse 20
40470 Düsseldorf
Germany

Love you all!
Sister Jensen

From Kristin's mother

2011-11-21T12:24:00.002-08:00

Sorry that Kristin did not send her new address but I will post it as soon as she send's it. In the meantime, please send letters to her using the mission office address. If there is anything you want to say to her quickly you may e-mail me at barbaraellenjensen@gmail.com and I can tell her in the e-mail I send her that she will receive Monday after Thanksiving. Thank you to all for putting up with me adding my own post. Kristin's mutter

First week in Dusseldorf

2011-11-21T12:24:00.001-08:00

Hello everyone,

This week was my first full week here in Düsseldorf. It's a pretty big city with 600,000 citizens and 4 missionaries (us and the Zone Leaders). A little overwhelming! Especially since I don't know this area at all, and Sis. Hansen has only been here for 6 weeks. This area needs a lot of work. This area took a pretty big hit to the work last cycle (part of the reason I came on a split here two weeks ago, and I suspect part of the reason I'm serving here now -- long story) and it's struggling quite a bit. We have almost no investigators. It's going to take a lot of building!

We have a really cool Christmas program we're working on, so we should be staying pretty busy through the holidays, which is good. I enjoy working with the Zone Leaders. They're pretty stellar Elders.

I'm also finishing training Sis. Hansen. Our mission uses a new training program which involves an extra hour of study every day, which means on a 'normal' day we don't even leave the house until 13:00. We're still trying to figure out how to work everything. I'm kind of missing my old companions. I think the weight of responsibility really hit me this week. I'm just trying to power through it and not get discouraged. I really do know that great things are going to happen in Germany with missionary work, and I want to do my part to help bring it about.

Lots of love,
Sister Jensen

Transfer

2011-11-14T08:17:00.001-08:00

Hallo!

Highlight of the week: I can't pick one! So I'll just summarize:

- I'm getting transferred back to Düsseldorf, and I'll be with Sister Hansen again, but this time officially! (Which means I'll have all of my luggage this time). This means I'll be in Düsseldorf for Christmas, which Matt informs me is pretty awesome! I'm excited because Sister Hansen sings like an angel, so we'll spend a lot of the Christmas season carolling and singing. I'm really excited about this assignment. It's sad to be leaving the awesome Drit here in Hamm, but we knew it had to break up anyway, and I can't imagine a more awesome place to go. Plus Sister Hansen and I got along really well the week we were together, and she's a hard worker, so it should be an amazing transfer!

- Sister Gardner is opening a new Sisters area, Dortmund, and training there. This means we'll still be within a close enough distance to go on splits together, and we'll see each other at Zone Conference next week!

- Zone Conference is on Thanksgiving day, and the Europe area President will be coming for a mission tour, which is exciting. It's crazy to think that last Thanksgiving I was in the MTC!

- Tomorrow I'll be going down to Frankfurt for the training meeting (technically I'm half-training Sister Hansen, because she's still a golden).

- On Friday we had the craziest service project ever. We spent a few hours at a member's house cleaning her clown collection. She has hundreds of clowns. She had a whole glass display case full of them, and they'd all gotten dusty, so we removed each clown and cleaned them individually. It was actually really creepy. I'll have to send pictures home.

- Our investigator came to a stake relief society activity, and she had a great time! Her kids love everything to do with church, and on the way to Dortmund she told us that her girls wanted to be missionaries someday. We thought, 'Great! Now we just need to baptize you all first' :) She met lots of members at the activity, which is always the best thing. Missionaries come and go. Members are the ones that investigators need to form relationships with. Members are the ones who need to be there to answer questions and pick them up for activities and support them through hard times when the missionaries aren't there. Being on a mission has really made me realize what kind of member I want to be when I go home.

- Today, P-day, we went to Padderborn to go bowling with our district and check out a really beautiful cathedral there. We went into one of the echo-y cloisters, where they have really good acoustics, and we sang some hymns. It was beautiful!

- I talked to a lady on the street last week and we had our first appointment with her a few days ago. Her name is Jahne, and she's really cool! When we went over, she had just found out that her father was in the hospital, so we prayed with her, and the spirit was so strong. She is about 32, studying and working, and very interested in the purpose of life. Sister Jackson and her new companion will have to keep working with her, and I'll find out later what happens. So much of missionary work is planting seeds and never really seeing what comes of it. I wonder sometimes what it will be like to go to the spirit world and meet all the people I talk to on a daily basis and see what their story became. I've heard some crazy stories about people giving out pass along cards or copies of the Book of Mormon, not thinking much of it, and it changes peoples' lives. Everyone please pray for Jahne and her father.

Well, those are the highlights! I love being a missionary. I love this work!

Alles liebe,
Sister Jensen

Sunday

2011-11-07T20:12:00.001-08:00

Hello everyone!

I have an amazing story to tell you! First off, let me preface it with this: Sundays, as a missionary, are the most stressful days of the week. None of this 'day of rest' stuff. It's a normal workday, where we have appointments and go out tracting and such. Also, you never know which investigators are going to show up for church, and sometimes you have to leave during the meetings to pick people up, and then you have to make sure your investigator's kids are in the right primary class and having a good time and not having separation anxiety. Then, inevitably, we end up teaching one class or another. And every other Sunday, one of us gives a talk. Plus, we're always trying to catch members before they go home. So basically the only time we get to relax is during the sacrament. And even then, you usually have to keep investigator's children quiet and occupied by drawing with them or showing them pictures.

So yesterday was yet another normal Sunday. We hadn't reached anyone Saturday night or Sunday morning, so we were pretty sure no one was going to be at church, which is always sad. But then last minute, right before Relief Society, we managed to get a hold of two people, and we arranged to have one investigator pick up the other. We quickly threw a Sunday School class together for them, and then later when we walked into Sacrament, our investigator Tim was just sitting there, too! It was awesome! But the best part was that halfway through the meeting, two strangers walked into the meeting. We talked to them afterwards, and they said they were just looking for a church to attend. They had already tried two churches that Sunday but they didn't feel comfortable there, so they were about to go home when they saw our building. It was awesome! We told them a little bit and set up an appointment to teach them this Wednesday. Then we broke our fast at a member's house and did doors in their area, and had some really cool contacts there, too. Then we were able to reach an inactive lady who we've never caught at home before. By the end of the day, we were so tired, but so happy. It was one of those days when I just LOVE being a missionary.

We also taught an English class on Wednesday. I teach the 'Intermediate' level, and my class consists of four really old, adorable ladies who love America.

Today for P-day we went to IKEA! I felt like I was back at home. A really cool lady in our ward took us to look through the showrooms and get Swedish meatballs.

For Halloween we carved pumpkins. It was awesome.

This coming Saturday is transfer call day. I think all three of us are in denial. We know that one of us will get transferred, because next transfer there's an even number of Sisters in the mission, so there won't be a need for a set of three. Nonetheless, we are sort of pretending that we'll all be together for Christmas. This transfer with Sister Gardner and Sister Jackson has been my favorite on the mission, I think! The work is going so well, and we get along, and this area is awesome.

I love you all so much! I looked back through old photos a few days ago and got a little wave of missing my family and friends. But I love being here! I actually wrote a song about missionary work :) I don't really have a way to attach it though. Maybe later. Love you all!

~Sister Jensen

P.S. The guy doing emails right next to me has the most ridiculous mullet I have ever seen. I think I'll slip a pass along card into his bag secretly.

Back in Hamm

2011-10-31T11:22:00.000-07:00

Hello, all of you wonderful people!

Sorry that the past few weeks have been so crazy. I have been seriously neglecting my letter writing and emails! They have been piling up and piling up. One of these days I am going to sit down and write you all back, I promise.

Highlight of the week: I'm back in Hamm!

Düsseldorf is a beautiful city, and I had lots of fun with Sister Hansen (Sister Schenk's golden). But man, am I glad to be home! The whole week was pretty stressful. I had packed really random stuff into my suitcase, it turned out, and so I had like three coats, and my first aid kit, but no skirts and shirts, haha. Bad planning. And because Düsseldorf is so enormous, we were always running after trains and getting lost. It also didn't help that Sister Hansen had only been there for three weeks, so she didn't really know her way around, either. But we miraculously made it to all of our appointments, and we so some really cool miracles along the way. I was able to commit an investigator to baptism, and to bond with a less-active girl who felt totally lonely in the ward.

Sister Schenk is now out of the hospital. We worked together in a Drit for a couple of days, but now she's doing okay, so I was able to come back home! I'm really glad to be back here. I would love to serve in Düsseldorf, or to serve with Sister Hansen again, but maybe under more normal circumstances next time, haha. It was frankly pretty weird to serve with Sister Schenk again. I kann tell that I've changed a LOT since we last served together.

Oh, also, while I was in Düsseldorf, I got to go to a meeting in Frankfurt with Elder Gonzales from the presidency of the 70. It was such an inspiring meeting! I have a lot of new ideas for missionary work now, and I'm stoked to start putting them in practice! It occurred to me that missionary work is basically PR. I thought, 'Why haven't I been treating this like a PR campaign all along?' After all, the messaging is already set up, we just have to target it to the right audience and put it in the appropriate channels.

Thank you all again for the love! You are all so wonderful. I pray for my family often. :) You're in my heart.

Lots of love,
Sister Jensen

P.S.
Mom - What is this about you getting marriage proposals from Laotian men? :)
Jessica - I got your letters, both the one sent to Friedrichsdorf and the one to Hamm! Thank you for the totoros ^_^
Grandma Jones - I got your letter, too! Thank you so much. My companions love your elegant handwriting.
James, Kelsey, and Zoe - I laughed so hard at the package! I can't decide which part was my favorite. Probably the glow-in-the-dark dinosaurs. You are such amazing people. Also, Sister Hansen saw the picture of Lauren Watt and totally knows her! Hope your enjoying Florida, Kels!
Love you all!
~Sis.J

Temporarily transferred

2011-10-27T08:09:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone,

Not much time to write today, I'm getting sent to Düsseldorf today! Random adventure. Not sure how long I'll be there, but probably no longer than a week. President called last night and told me to pack ALL of my stuff, which I did (faster than I've ever packed in my life) and then this morning he told me I only need a week or so of clothes.

I don't know hardly anything about Düsseldorf, except that it's huge, and that's where the fat kid in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is from. Sister Schenk had a medical issue so that's why I'm going, to take her spot for a week, and stay with her companion (who is a golden -- only been here for 3 weeks, so it's like I'm mini-training! Haha)

I'll write more detail next week. This week was really amazing and I wish I had time to tell you some of the awesome stories! Aaaaahhh being a missionary is the best ever!

Love you all,
Sister Jensen

Mormon.org

2011-10-17T17:48:00.001-07:00

Okay, I already sent off the family email, but then I discovered the coolest video on Mormon.org! So maybe you can add this as a post-script, mom or Jess, whoever posts the email to the blog.

http://mormon.org/me/5233/Brandon/

It's the lead singer of the Killers (artists of "Mr. Brightside," "When You Were Young," and "Human"), one of my favorite bands! He uploaded an "I'm a Mormon" video about himself. All of those videos are cool, because they're about real people, but this was especially cool, because Brandon Flowers is such an awesome musician, and the Killers are such a great band!

Love,
Kristin

Nicole coming to church

2011-10-17T17:42:00.000-07:00

Hallo!

The highlight of the week: Nicole coming to church

We had a really good lesson with our investigator Nicole, and at the end we invited her to come to church. She's never come before, even though missionaries have been meeting with her for a while. So this time we looked up the bus times for her and arranged to meet her at the bus stop and walk in together. We also planned out a "greeter" and a "caretaker" (a member to meet her at the door and say hello, and another one to sit next to her through the classes). On Sunday, the bus came... and went. No Nicole. At first we thought she had just bailed, or slept in, but just in case we started walking in the direction of her house. A few minutes later we realized we had no idea where we were going (because we've never gone to her house from the direction of the church), so Sister Gardner said, "Let's just say a prayer to know where to go, and then we'll keep going." We said a prayer, kept walking for a bit, turned a corner and about 30 seconds after turning the corner we ran into Nicole! She had missed her bus and had started walking, but she was sort of lost, so it was really good that we had met her halfway! She had a really good time at church, and a lot of members came up to her afterward to get to know her. Everyone was super friendly, and one person even invited her over for Family Home Evening tonight, and she's totally going!

Other notable events:
- We went up to Münster for a district meeting, and afterward we were all starving, so we went to this Döner Kebab place, and I was really excited because I was craving Falafel, and Sister Gardner had never had them before, so we shared this HUGE plate of Falafel, and by the end we both felt pretty gross, and so neither of us wanted to eat the last one, and Sister Gardner said, "I don't want the last falafel! They make me feelawful!" hahaha I laughed SO HARD, hahahah. Maybe you just had to be there.

- I went and anmelded (registered) myself as a citizen of Hamm, and they had a bunch of old license plates in a scrap heap, and I asked if I could have one, and they gave one to me! Coolest souvenier ever, and also free. The coolest part is that in Germany, license plates have the first 1-3 letters of the city on it, and then the license plate number, and so for Hamm it says HAM in big capital letters.

- I called Sister Römer and got an update on our investigators, and oddly enough it made me homesick for Friedrichsdorf. I miss my investigators and I worry about them all the time, or I think of things I want to teach them, but they're not my investigators any more. Plus, I was in the Friedrichsdorf ward longer than any other ward since I was 17. At school I was always moving back and forth, never staying in a ward for more than a few months, or moving somewhere else for the summer. The Beavercreek ward was always my "Home" ward, but I hadn't been there in a long time, either. Friedrichsdorf was the longest I've stayed in one place for years. I kind of miss it. But Hamm is amazing, too, and I love my companions.

- We biked through the most epic rainstorm the other day, but it was worth it because we had a really good experience doing doors, and we were able to visit an inactive member. I think they took pity on us because we look so pathetically soaked. I was glad for that big black raincoat mom bought me for the mission.

- We had something called "Dedicated Zone Finding," where everyone in our zone does finding time (doors or street contacting) at the same time, each in their respective areas, for an hour, and starts and ends with a prayer. We went to the fußgängerzone (like... pedestrian shopping area) and at the end of the hour we had two new contacts and an appointment for this week! It was so amazing. We could really fell the faith of the whole zone working together. It made me realize that, on a much larger scale, that's what we do as a church. When we're all pulling our faith and resources together all at once, and working towards the same thing, we can accomplish so much more, even if it's just by supporting/encouraging. Just like the prophesy in Daniel says, this gospel WILL one day roll forth and fill the whole earth. Nothing can stop it. We can either be a part of it, or we can miss out! I'd rather be part of it.

Well, those are the highlights. I love you all! Hope all is well at home!
Alles gute,
Sister Jensen

Hamm

2011-10-10T13:15:00.000-07:00

Greetings from Hamm!

It was a crazy week, but I LOVE my new area! My new companions are awesome, and it's actually kinda fun being in a Drit (trio) again.

Really quick, for everyone who asked, here is my new address:
Sister Kristin Jensen
Kirche Jesu Christi (<<-- Must be included)
Bokumerweg 210
59065 Hamm
Germany
(And don't worry, letters sent to my old address will find their way to me. Sister Römer said she'd forward them on.)

I really like Hamm. It's a bigger city, and there are no contacting restrictions! I didn't even realize how awesome it is to be allowed to walk out your door and immediately start contacting. Because of the weird proselyting restrictions in Friedrichsdorf, I've never really experienced that. Another benefit is that the apartment is enormous! It actually has multiple rooms! Haha. And it is decorated with very 70's decor. Like... olive green paisley, fringed lamps, lace curtains, and a burnt orange couch. It reminds me of Harold and Maude. We even have an ORGAN in the apartment. I'll have to send pictures. :)

So, a little detail on my new companions:
Sister Jackson - She's 2 cycles younger than me on the mission, and a lot of fun. She's from Oregon, actually! Medford. But she grew up in Heidelberg on the military base, and then lived for a while in Nevada. She's still struggling with German a little, but she's fearless!

Sister Gardner - 2 cycles older than me on the mission. We get along really well and have a lot in common. She's actually one of the sisters that I've always thought I'd like working with eventually. She is 23, and a nurse. She's from Logan, UT.

Oh, another really cool thing about Hamm is that the whole city is obsessed with elephants. Jessica would love it here. There are elephant sculptures everywhere! I guess Hamm is home to the largest glass elephant in the world, and because of that the city has made elephants it's symbol. So far I've seen at least 20 elephant statues around the city. And quite a bit of elephant graffiti.

We've been crazy busy since I got here. There's lots to do. A lot of it is working with less-actives. This area doesn't have a lot of investigators, but we'll change that soon. We have a lot of really cool ideas. For example, next week we're starting up an English class and running an article about it in the newspaper (with a picture of us! :) ). We're also going to start attending bible study groups in local churches. Not to crash the party, but just to get to know people who are already interested in religion. Stuff like that. I'm excited!

I loved General Conference, particularly the talk from President Uchtdorf from the first session. It helps me to think that God loves each of us, he knows our worth, and no matter where we are, he can find us just fine. No matter where we are, the people around us are God's children and all have the same goal (whether they know it or not) to return to live with Heavenly Father. Nothing is worth getting in the way of that.

I love you all! Thanks for the support.

Love,
Sister Jensen

P.S. If any of you RMs have good, creative ideas for finding people -- things that worked in your missions -- please email or mail them to me, and we'll try them out!

Being Transferred

2011-10-06T15:08:00.000-07:00

Hello everyon,

I have very little time today, but I'm getting TRANSFERRED! For the first time! I'm going to a place called Hamm, near Dortmund, Germany. Sister Römer served there and says it's realy nice. I'll be in a Drit (two companions instead of one). We're heading to Frankfurt in a few minutes.

Conference was amazing! The whole ward got a kick out of the Frankfurt Tempel story, especially because there is NO WAY anyone could get from Portstraße to Friedrichsdorf in 10 minutes, haha.

It was pretty emotional for me to pack my bags. I am going to miss the ward and our investigators a lot. And Inge is going to get baptized in a couple of weeks and I wont be here!

Well, have togo. Love you0 all!
Kristin

Pinewood Derby Car

2011-09-26T08:13:00.000-07:00

Hello,

Highlight of the week: The Pinewood Derby!

Pinewood Derbies are not common in Germany. In fact, I think this may have been the first one ever. It turned out to be such a cool activity, though! Sister Römer and I even made a car (we got permission from Präsident Schwartz). We also brought two of our investigators, and there were tons of other non-members there, and everyone had a great time. I'm coming to realize that the spiritual conversion is the most important part of missionary work, but we're also responsible for a certain amount of social conversion to keep people strong in the church. :)

We also had Zone Conference this week, and we went all the way to Heidelberg. We didn't get to see much of the city, but what I saw from the train was beautiful. We had a mental health doctor at the meeting who told us all how to avoid discouragement and avoid negative thoughts. It's called, "Learning the language of faith and hope," And it's a whole mental process, that basically means changing all negative thoughts to positive thoughts. For example, when someone corrects my German (which Germans are shameless about doing, by the way. Like... interrupting while you're bearing testimony to correct your grammar), instead of feeling embarrassed or belligerent, you think, "I like learning new things" or "I take correction well." Or, for example, if you're getting annoyed at your companion (which, *ahem* never happens... of course...) you make it positive, like "it's not that important" or "our differences make us a good team". And in the morning, you look in the mirror and say positive, uplifting things, like, "I'm unique" or "I do many things very well" or "My companion and I are going to have a great day!". It's all a little cheesy, but it actually helps a lot. I recommend it!

Also, something that just made my day, I just wrote my email to President about ten minutes ago, and he just called me to say thank you, to answer my questions, and wish me a great day. He's such a wonderful, sweet man. He even gave me a HUG at Zone Conference because of my birthday in August!

Well, I love you all. Coming on the mission was the best decision I ever made. When it comes right down to it, the purpose of life is to have joy and prepare to meet God. I'm always touched by scriptures that say we'll stand before God someday. I often try to think how I want to feel at that time. I don't want to feel exposed or ashamed of anything. I want to feel totally confident. I want to smile and feel comfortable in God's presence. And my job at the moment is to help other people prepare to meet God, too. I spend every day trying to find people who are humble and open-hearted enough to change their lives so that they can feel confident in the presence of God when they meet him some day. What a cool job description!

Lots of love,
Sister Jensen

P.S. I am attatching some photos of our AWESOME pinewood derby car. Our investigator Peter helped us make it, and he

Second picture

2011-09-05T15:27:00.000-07:00

Technologically challenged mutter having difficulty posting 2 photos :(

The Bahn Strike

2011-09-05T15:19:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone,

Highlight of the week: the Bahn strike!

(that's only half sarcastic.) The trains here went on strike, which meant that we had many unexpected delays, a few appointments we had to cancel, and quite a lot of time wasted at train stations, but it actually turned out to be a blessing in disguise! On Friday, we were waiting at the Bahnhof, and we got into a conversation with someone from Peru, who was here as a school teacher. We gave her a book a Mormon and the phone number for the missionaries in her area. Then, later, as we were stuck at a different Bahnhof, we got into a conversation with a woman who knew a member in our ward, and drove past the temple almost every day. She had quite a few questions, and we're going to set up a temple tour for this week with her. Then, later, stuck at yet another Bahnhof, we met a student in Frankfurt who lived literally across the street from the temple in Colombia, and also had a lot of questions! We got her in touch with the Frankfurt Elders and they're working with her now. It is just so cool to see how anything, no matter how frustrating or annoying, can also be an opportunity!

Another AWESOME thing, which will most certainly be my highlight for next week, is that Elder Bednar is coming to our mission! I am so excited! It's actually tomorrow morning! This is double exciting because it also means the whole mission will come together for a mission conference, so I'll see my whole MTC district again, and all of the Sisters will be together at once.

We also had a baptism yesterday, and Sister Römer and I sang again. We brought one of our investigators to the baptism, and it was so cool! He felt the spirit so strong, and afterward, he said that he wants to be baptized! He is such a cool kid. 18 years old. He has such a sincere heart. I don't think I have ever seen him not smiling. Please pray for him! (his name is Leonel).

Well, that's about it! Love you all,
Sister Jensen

P.S. Happy Birthday Melinda!

Two pictures from Kristin

2011-08-30T12:26:00.000-07:00

The post yesterday was Kristin's email plus one picture. This new attachment should have two pictures including one of Kristin and companion rainsoaked. Posted by Kristin's technologically challenged Mutter.

Post birthday e-mail

2011-08-29T11:01:00.000-07:00

Hallo, wonderful family and friends!

Well, the highlight of the week was... sorting the recycling.
...
...
...
Okay, I'm just kidding. The highlight was of course my BIRTHDAY! :) :) :) :) I'm 22 now! Thank you all so much for the cards and letters for my birthday! I don't think I've had that much mail my whole mission! It really meant a lot to me, and I felt so loved. I love you all so much! I'm including a picture of my birthday schrine I made on my desk (if your card isn't in the picture it's because I got it this morning in the mail.)

We got our transfer calls and I am staying here in Friedrichsdorf with Sister Römer! We're actually really excited about it. Part of me wanted to see a new area, but at the same time I love being here, and I've gotten so close to the members in our ward that I can hardly imagine leaving. Sister Römer threw me such a wonderful birthday. She made me breakfast and bought me a really cute sweater (which was very puzzling, actually, because I thought, "When did you get this without me noticing? We're basically superglued together at all times!") and she even wrote to all of her friends and people in her home ward and told them it was my birthday, and so I got a bunch of really nice cards and notes from people who had never even met me! It was so nice of her. She's awesome.

Another cool thing just happened as we were sitting here emailing. A lady from the Phillipines came up to me, and asked me where I got my hand sanitizer (the one Matt and Melinda gave me that hangs from my bag) because she had the same one. Then she asked if we were mormons. She recognized our nametags because in the Phillipines there are like 20 million missionaries. I told her my cousin went on his mission there (Alan). Anyway, we offered to come and visit her family and talk about the gospel, and she said yes! We're going there on Wednesday! So cool.

One more thing: There was a ridiculous storm in Rosbach, a dorf in our area, and in the time it tooks us to bike from the train station to our appointment, we were completely soaked. Our investigators were laughing so hard. They said, "We thought you would for sure cancel with this weather! We thought, 'There is no way they're going to bike to our house in this storm'" Haha! Two points for dilligence! Anyway, so our investigator's wife threw our clothes in the dryer and gave us pajamas to change into. I can definitely say that was the first time I've taught a lesson in pajamas. Also, what she gave us were like... short shorts, and I thought, Hmmm... how should we handle this? I really don't want to explain garments right now. Luckily we were able to make it work, modesty-wise, and we had a really good lesson.

Well, this email is long, enough, I think. Enjoy the attatched photos! Thank you, again, for making it such a wonderful birthday! Love you all!

Sister Jensen

P.S. Photo No.1 is of us after the rainstorm
Photo No.2 is my birthday schrine, haha. And yes, I got a bottle of champagne from an investigator. Time to teach him about the Word of Wisdom!

Hi from Kristin's mother and latest e-mail from Kristin

2011-08-22T08:39:00.000-07:00

Kristin's birthday is August 27 - be sure to wish her happy birthday. Mutter

Kristin's latest e-mail:

Hello,

So first off: This is the last week of this cycle (Europe is transitioning to a new missionary schedule, so we had a shorter transfer than normal), and I think I might get transferred, so for the time being, probably best to send mail and such to the mission office:

Germany Frankfurt Mission
Corneliusstraße 18
60325 Frankfurt am Main
Germany

Other than that, not much to report. We had a pretty good week, the weather was gorgeous, we had an investigator come to church yesterday, and I discovered that the grocery store near us sells my favorite yogurt! What more can I ask for in life? :)

Another REALLY cool bit of news: http://newsroom.lds.org/article/mormon-ads-new-york-city
Stuff like this is my dream job. This is what I'd love to be doing when I get back. Oh well, we'll see what the future holds!

I love you! Thank you for all of the letters and support. The work is hard but very rewarding. Coming on a mission was the best decision I ever made in my life.

Love,
Sister Jensen

Two Splits and a Funeral

2011-08-15T12:22:00.000-07:00

Hello,

This week was pretty awesome! We're working on a couple of really cool projects at the moment, which we fit in whenever we have spare time, but it's cool because what we develop will be used for the whole mission. It's kind of hart to explain, but basically we're working on a program for the missionaries to work more with members, so we're writing up some workshops and stuff. So far it's been really fun.

I also had an awesome split with Sister Cannon last week, and tonight I have another split with Sister Bognar, the other sister from Darmstadt. Actually we're sort of having a sleepover with the Darmstadt sisters tonight, because they're coming to the temple with us tomorrow. And then tomorrow Sister Römer and I are going up to Dortmund (a few hours away) for a funeral. There's a woman in our ward who passed away, and the funeral is in Dortmund. None of her family are members, and the Relief Society was worried that no one would come to the funeral, so we got permission to leave our area and go support, sing a musical number, help out with food, etc.

I finished reading the Book of Mormon again, and I was struck with what a wonderful gift it is. Sometimes I forget how miraculous it is that we have the Book of Mormon. There are so many glorious, life-altering doctrines in it that I think I take for granted. We are teaching a woman right now (who reminds me strongly of Jessica, actually) and we gave her a Book of Mormon, and when we came back she had already read the introduction, witnesses, and a bit of 1st Nephi. She said she had started reading it every night before bed because it made her feel peaceful. She has a lot of questions about what happens after death, and it occurred to me that the Bible is pretty vague about what actually happens. When you read in the Book of Mormon, however, Alma 38-42 or so, it is so clear and answers pretty much any questions. That, combined with what we learn in D&C, paint such a clear vivid picture of God's plan for us. We're so lucky that we live in a time where the fullness of the gospel is on the earth.

Love you all!
Sister Jensen

Returning lost iPhone to grateful owner :) :)

2011-08-08T09:38:00.000-07:00

Hallo,

We spent our P-day in Frankfurt with our district, so I don't have much time to email! Gotta head off to an appointment soon.

Highlight of the Week: We found someone's iPhone lying on the street in Friedrichsdorf and called a few contacts until we found the owner. They were really grateful and drove down to pick it up. We noticed that the background picture on the phone was an adorable family photo of a young couple and a little daughter. We thought, "They would be great Mormons!" so we prepared a passalong card to give them along with the phone. When the husband drove up, he saw our name tags and probably knew right away who we were (everyone in Friedrichsdorf knows the temple), and he asked us a few questions, and we offered to come by and talk about what we believe, and he said yes and gave us his phone number! We're really excited.

Also, I'm going on another split with Sister Cannon this week, which I'm really excited about! This time she's coming up here to Friedrichsdorf, which should be fun. For sisters, splits are basically really spiritually pumped-up sleepovers.

Well, I have to run. I'll send pictures we took today next week. We went up on a really high tower in Frankfurt and got pictures of the whole city and skyline and everything.

Love you!
Sister Jensen

New Cycle

2011-08-01T17:02:00.001-07:00

Hi everyone!

Things are going well here in Friedrichsdorf! The weather is finally warming up, we found a couple of new investigators last week, and we're both healthy and well. :)

The Highlight of the Week was a spontaneous temple tour on Saturday. The temple called us and said that there was a non-member woman by reception who wanted a temple tour, and only had about half an hour. Normally we're not in Friedrichsdorf after 11:00 am (we're not allowed to proselyte in Friedrichsdorf, so we go to other cities to work), but luckily on Saturday we had gone back for something and so we were able to bike down to the temple really quick and do a tour. At first the lady seemed really cold and defensive, and a little annoyed that she wasn't able to go inside the temple, but during the tour she completely changed. She softened up and smiled more, and when we showed her the temple video she was even crying. It was a really good, spiritual experience. At the end she asked where she could learn a little more about the Church. She lives in Hanover, which isn't in our mission, but we got her contact information and we're going to put her in touch with the missionaries there. It was so cool!

I also got an AWESOME package from Grandma Jones this week! I was especially excited about the brown sugar, and the Rieses peanut butter cups. :) I shared the Rieses with my district and they were almost uncontrollably excited, haha. Thanks Grandma!

We also have some new Elders in our district, and they're all really awesome missionaries. There are actually a couple of Elders who were best friends before the mission, and now they're serving together! So cool. That would basically be like if Kelsey or Hailey was serving in my mission and we got put together. And the crazy part is that our mission president had no idea they knew each other! It must have been inspiration. They were so funny at our district meeting. We've nicknamed them 'the Sunshine Elders' because every time we see them they're grinning from ear to ear and laughing and just look like they're having the time of their lives.

We have one new sister in our mission, Sister Gates, and she is adorable. Sister Schenk is training her. Sister Römer and I went down to Frankfurt for the street preach to welcome the new Goldens. I had a couple of really awesome conversations on the street with people who were stopped to listen to us singing. Music is one of the most powerful tools we have as members/missionaries, I think. Music invites the spirit so much.

I'm also attaching a photo of me by the Freidrichsdorf Zwieback sign. I don't know if I've mentioned it before, but Friedrichsdorf is famous for this stuff called Zwieback, which is a food that supposed to have all sorts of health benefits, you can eat it when your sick, etc.. Basically it's just really dry bread that they toast twice, but everyone around here swears by it, haha.

I love you all!

Sister Jensen

Guten Nachmittag

2011-07-18T07:48:00.001-07:00

Guten Nachmittag!

This week was pretty cool. Sister Römer and I have been getting to know each other a little better, and having lots of fun. This whole week it has been POURING down rain (in July! Crazy. Must be the Second Coming.) But we're mastering the art of riding bikes with umbrellas.

Highlight of this week: Mission Leader Council. They always invite one companionship of Sisters to come, but I had never been before! Part of it was just talking about numbers and how each of the zones are doing, but we also talked about Europe as a whole and how missionary work is going, and what plans the Europe office has, and it was fascinating! Apparently things are going really well, and there are a couple of countries, Portugal, for example, where missionary work has just taken off and they went from having a couple hundred baptisms a year to a couple thousand! Germany will be next :) We gave a talk in Relief Society and Priesthood about missionary work yesterday, and now the members are really getting excited, and everyone is catching the vision!

Please pray for missionary work here. Pray that we can find the people who are ready. Also, please pray for our investigators, especially the da Luz family, the Quiring family, and Peter. We could really use your faith!

A couple in our ward got sealed this weekend (they've been married for almost 10 years), and we helped make the wedding cake and decorate the church building for the party afterward, and then we gave a temple tour to the guests who couldn't go in the temple. It was a really cool day! It made me think of Grandma and Grandpa Jones, getting sealed after so long being together. The Spindens (the family that got sealed) were so happy! You could just tell they were glowing inside. So cool!

Sister Römer is helping me tons with my German, and I'm helping her with her Englisch. It's kind of cool to not be the only one making ridiculous language mistakes all the time, haha. But my German is getting way better! And she's also teaching me a few phrases in Swiss German, which is actually an entirely different language. When Sister Römer talks to people in Swiss German, I have no clue what she's saying. It sounds cool though!

That's about it. Hope all is well at home! I heard the last Harry Potter movie came out last week! Hope it was awesome. I'll be stoked to see that when I get home.

Love you all,
Sister Jensen

Louis Got Baptied

2011-07-14T16:43:00.000-07:00

Hallo,

Highlight of the week: Louis's baptism!

It was so cool! It was such a beautiful service. Almost the whole ward showed up for his baptism. All the members love him already, which is really good, because now he has lots of friends to keep him active in the church! :)

We also went down to Frankfurt for another baptism right after ours. The Elders in Frankfurt were teaching a really cool girl about our age, and she came up for a temple tour one week, and she said it really helped her feel the spirit, and after that she decided to get baptized! She asked Sister Schenk and I to be there and sing at her baptism, but then Sister Schenk got transferred, but luckily Sister Römer can sing, too, so we did that.

What else... oh, so we had interviews with President Schwartz. He is such a good man. So far, I've never seen him not smiling! He gave me some really good suggestions and advice. After our interviews, he and his wife came back to Friedrichsdorf for Louis's baptism, which was cool.

Other than that, not a whole lot to tell, just staying busy! It's been crazy hot here. We've been eating a lot of frozen grapes. It's our new favorite thing.

Love you all,
Sister Jensen

New Companion

2011-07-14T16:38:00.000-07:00

Hello!

Highlight of the week: A day in Darmstadt

I had a really fun split with Sister Cannon last week, down in Darmstadt (hometown of President Uchtdorf). We made some really awesome contacts on the street, and we made mexican food for dinner. Germany has zero good mexican restaurants. It was so awesome to see Sister Cannon again.

Also, we had a meeting on Friday where our new mission president and his wife (President and Sister Schwarz) introduced themselves a little and gave a very inspiring spiritual thought. They are a really nice couple. President Schwarz doesn't speak much English, so from now on all of our meetings will be in German.

I also have a new companion now. At the Friday meeting, we found out that Sister Schenk was going to be transferred out of Friedrichsdorf. That night she packed all of her stuff and on Saturday we travelled to her new area where I said goodbye to her and picked up my new companion. The sad thing is that Sister Schenk is now really far away, way on the other side of Germany, so I probably won't see her for a long time.

My new companion is really nice, though. Her name is Sister Römer. She's from Switzerland. I'm attaching a picture of us that we took at the temple this morning.

Love you all,

Sister Jensen

Another awesome week

2011-06-27T20:09:00.000-07:00

Hallo,

Well, yet another awesome week! As always! Sister Schenk and I are having an awesome time.

Highlight of the Week: Ninow's goodbye party (see attatched photo)

President and Sister Ninow end their mission this week, and my new mission President arrives on Wednesday. We had our last Zone Conference with the Ninow's last week, and Sister Schenk and I wrote a little song for them and performed it, and then yesterday the Assistants organized a surprise party at the Ninow's home. There were about 10 missionaries, including us, and it was really sweet. We sang "God be with you 'til we meet again" (Sister Ninow cried) and presented them with a scrapbook from all of the missionaries. It must be very emotional for them. They've been on their mission for three years!

Lots of other eventful things happened apart from that, though. First of all, Sister Schenk's stalker showed up at church again yesterday. Have I told that story yet? There's a creepy old man who was in her old ward in Frankfurt, and he wrote her a love letter, and then started showing up at our ward building here. A couple of the brothers got him to leave, but Sister Schenk was still a little shaken up. We talked to President, and he said he might have to transfer Sister Schenk to a new area if it continues, but he doesn't want to do that, obviously, so Sister Schenk is writing her stalker a letter telling him she's not interested, and to leave her alone. He also now has a restraining order on our church building, which should help as well.

Other things of note:
- We taught primary yesterday and they were so cute. There's a four-year-old boy from England who told me he wants to marry me. It was adorable.

- I'm going on my first ever split this week! It's pretty rare for sisters to go on splits, because we're so spread out. Anyway, I'm really excited because I'm going on a split with Sister Cannon!

- We celebrated the first day of summer by breaking out our winter coats and scarves again. It was freakishly cold! But today it's 35°C (about 95 degrees) and feels like real summer, haha.

Love you all!
Sister Jensen

Busy busy busy

2011-06-15T08:29:00.000-07:00

Guten Tag!

Sorry my email is coming so late. We almost didn't have p-day this week! But we've been fabulously busy and lots of good things have happened.

Highlight for the week: We got transfer calls and Sister Schenk and I are staying together!

We were both so excited. We had actually called President on transfer call day, with news about a baptismal date we had just set, and we purposely called a little later in hopes that he would just go ahead and tell us if we were moving or not, and so we got to hear it direct from the source! A sneaky tactic I think I'll try to employ every six weeks, haha. But then of course I'll have to have lots of baptismal dates to tell him about. Which could happen, the way things are going! the work is really going well, and we're meeting with so many cool people.

Another awesome experience was on Saturday. Sister Schenk and I went to a baptism in Frankfurt, because it was for someone who Sister Schenk had taught when she was there. We did a musical number for it, as well, which reminded me very strongly of when I was little, and Jess and I sang at everyone's baptisms, haha. Louis came with us to the baptism, and he said he really felt the spirit, and it helped him to understand baptism.

Louis is doing great! He has such strong faith. He reads in the Book of Mormon every day, he hasn't missed church yet. I think he's really on track to find his answer. I think the most wonderful thing about our message is that everyone can find out for himself if it's true or not. No one has to take our word for it. I think some people are afraid to, because it would mean that they would have to change their lives, if what we are saying is true. But there are so many people out there who have been looking so long for answers, and for truth, that they'll do anything to know. Those are the people God speaks to!

So our p-day has been sort of spread over three days (a few hours at a time), but we did have time to go to a really cool park where they took a bunch of old, historic buildings from all over Germany, packed them up, and shipped them to a park really close to where I live. They built a little city out of all these old houses, so it's like a museum, but a whole city. They even have actors who dress up in 1700's clothing and walk around, churn butter and all that jazz. It was really cool! I'll try to attach some photos.

We went with an investigator, and Brother and Sister Orum from our ward drove us. Brother Orum is from Denmark, and he reminds me SO much of Grandpa Jensen. But with a really thick accent.

Well, that's about it! I'm having such a good time. We had a couple of days where everything seemed to be going wrong, and we missed every train, and every appointment fell out, etc., and we were pretty discouraged, but we talked about it, pepped each other back up, and now it's going great again! Satan will have to find a better way to get us down. ;)

I love you all! I hope all is going well back home!

Sincerely,
Sister Jensen

God speaks through the Book of Mormon

2011-06-07T10:38:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone!

Highlight of the week: Louis!

This was such an amazing story! There was a man who walked up to the church during the week, two weeks ago, and a member talked to him and the next week brought him to church. We met him there and started teaching him last week. We asked him what prompted him to find the church, and he said:

"I lost my job and left my wife and son in Italy to come here and find a job. A family from Nigeria took me in [Louis is also from Nigeria]. I was in their living room, and I cried to God asking him if he really cared, and if he did, why I was having so many problems. Then I saw the Book of Mormon lying on their coffee table. I picked it up and opened it to a random page. I read the words, 'now is the time for your troubles to be over.' Later I tried to find the verse, and I can't find it. I told the family, 'Where is this church? God has spoken to me through this book, and I have to find this church.'"

Needless to say, he found the church, and luckily an English-speaking member drove up just as he arrived and was able to talk to him. The woman that took Louis in is Sister Dirisu, an inactive woman in our ward, and she had just gotten back from Africa two days before she met Louis. It is just so amazing, a miracle really, how everything worked out! It strengthened my testimony that the Lord knows every single person on this earth. He doesn't see us as one big mass of people. He watches out for every person, and he hears every prayer.

We're meeting with Louis again tonight. He was at church yesterday and he bore the most beautiful testimony about the Savior, and how loved and welcomed he felt in the ward.

Anyway, lots of cool things happened this week, and we found a few new investigators, but that experience is really the one that stands out.

The other really memorable one was that a man invited us in as we were going door to door, and it turns out he's a big Evangelisch preacher with a huge congregation, and he grilled us for about an hour and a half on what we believe, the bible, the final judgement, baptism, you name it. It was so hard to not argue with him, which is what I would normally feel compelled to do. But instead we just calmly explained what we believed and bore humble testimony, and the spirit was so strong. At the end, he said, 'You're not at all what I expected Mormons to be.' (Yes! That's the goal!) and he said we could come back any time.

Thank you all for your prayers and support! I'm praying for all of you.

Lots of love,

Sister Jensen

Exhausted, but happy.

2011-05-31T04:02:00.001-07:00

Hello everyone!

I have come to realize that the most satisfying days for me are the ones where I come home super exhausted, knowing I've worked hard and well, and flop into bed and fall asleep instantly. A couple of nights ago I actually woke up around midnight still kneeling at my bed, having fallen asleep while praying, haha.

The highlight of the week: 4 investigators came to church yesterday.

And we only expected one! The other three just walked in completely on their own. Two were people I have never met before, but we're going to start teaching them this week!

Also, Sister Schenk and I sang in church on Sunday. We did an acapella version of 'I feel my Savior's Love' in German, with harmony, and it went really well!

What else... oh, the other day we were at an appointment in Rosbach (the furthest north city in our area) and it went late so we missed our train, but we had an appointment in Ober-Ursel that we had to get to, so I suggested we bike back to Friedrichsdorf, about 1/3 of the way there, as fast as we could, and try to catch our train connection. But just as we were passing Friedrichsdorf we could see that the train had already left, so we said, 'Okay, let's bike to the next city and catch a different train!' but then we didn't catch it, so we ended up biking all the way from Rosbach to Ober-Ursel, which is about 30 km, and then we missed our train coming home, so we biked back to Friedrichsdorf from there! In total I think we biked 35 km that day, which is the same distance as a marathon! (Although luckily we didn't have to run it, haha).

A couple of people you could pray for this week:

Emmanuel - He's 14 and decided he wants to be baptized. The only snag is that his father was a member and is now inactive. His dad even served a mission, but now he's sort of against coming to church. He's letting us teach Emmanuel, but pray that his heart will be softened. Sometimes it's hard to bring the spirit into our lessons, because his dad is really sarcastic and tries to trip us up in what we're saying.

The de Luz family - SUCH a cool family! We've been teaching them for about 4 weeks now, and the wife is severely pregnant. Like... the baby could come any second. Pray that everything will go well with the baby!

Okay, that's pretty much it. I love you all!

Love,

Sister Jensen

Best week ever!

2011-05-28T13:48:00.000-07:00

Hello,

This week was awesome! The highlight was: we taught more lessons and found more new investigators this week than in any other week in my whole mission so far!

Man, everything just seemed to be going right this week. We had a lot of "finding" time this week, which is always pretty exhausting, but we just had a good attitude about it, and it was amazing! Sometimes we go hours at a time with nothing but slammed doors in our faces, but it is so worth it when that one person stops and listens to you and realizes that you have the answers to the questions they've had for years and years.

A couple of really cool experiences:

Last night we were going door to door, talking about happiness, and a lady poked her head out her window and I shouted up to her, 'What does the word 'Happiness' mean to you?' and she just stared at us for a few seconds and then said, 'Um... just a moment, I'll come outside.' All of a sudden I was panicking because I didn't know what to say next, but when she came outside I just said, 'when we understand who we are, it makes us happy' (I felt like I was quoting a Michael McLean song, but oh well). We asked her who she thought she was, and she said, 'I've been asking myself that for a long time.' We taught her, gave her a Book of Mormon, and then made a return appointment.

We were still sort of in shock as we turned the corner, and there was a man there, and we started talking to him about the Plan of Salvation, and we asked him what he thought happened after death, and he said, 'I've been asking myself that a lot lately.' Almost the exact same answer! We taught him and made a return appointment with him, too.

I had a couple of really, really hard days this week, too. Sometimes I get into slumps, and I just feel exhausted and down and not wanting to work, and not believing that anyone will listen to us, but luckily Sister Schenk always helps me to refocus and be happy again. And then the next day, when she's struggling, I help her! I suppose we go two-by-two for a reason. :)

Well, that's about it. So many cool things are happening in Germany. There are some awesome prophesies about missionary work here, and they're starting to happen!

Also, my President Ninow goes home in a few short weeks, and we'll have our new mission president, President Lehi Schwartz (A native German from Nürnberg). It'll be sad to say goodbye to the Ninows, but also exciting to see what changes will come!

Love you all,

Sister Jensen

P.S. Grandma Jones - Thank you so much for the Kool-ade! It arrived intact! I laughed so hard when I saw it, haha. I'm going to use one as a bribe for the Elders. I don't think they'll be able to resist Kool-ade. :)

Zone Conference

2011-05-16T21:58:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone,

It's been such an awesome week! The highlight was.......... Zone Conference!

Zone Conference is always fun, because we get to see the other missionaries and catch up with them, but more than anything, it really builds me up and gives me renewed energy and inspires me! Although it's a lot like what they said in conference, about how General Conferenced is there to 'comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable', haha. Same with Zoko!

Sister Schenk and I also got new haircuts, which was fun, and I dyed my hair a new color, too. Gosh, this week has felt like a month! I just flipped back through my planner, and it feels like an eternity since I last emailed. I don't even know which experiences to share, because so many cool things have happened in the last week!

Oh, we have bikes now, so I feel like a "real" missionary now. I even biked through a rainstorm yesterday! We have girlie bikes so we can ride in skirts.

We also went out to this super far away part of our area this week. There are a lot of little dorfs (tiny towns) in our area, and since we don't have a car, there are parts of our area that I still haven't seen, even though I've been here for five months. But finally we went to this tiny town called Glashutten (Sister Thaden always called it Outer Darkness), and it was so misearable! Haha. There's only one bus that takes you there (a two-hour ride), and once we got there we realized there was only one main street, all the shops were closed, and the place was swarming with bugs and mosquitoes! We visited a less active there, did some doors, and then waved goodbye forever. The next pair of sisters can visit it in a few months. :)

We have been doing a lot of contacting this past week, and it is hilarious to see how people react. Some people have the craziest excuses to hang up on us. I was talking to a man through his Klingel (like... doorbell/intercom thing) and he said, 'Oh no, sorry, I've been kicked out of the church' and we said, 'Which church?' and he said, 'Uh, whichever one yours is' and we said, 'Do you know which church ours is?' and he said, 'I've been kicked out of EVERY church!' and then hung up, haha. There have been some other funny ones, too, but I can't remember right now.

Also, everyone thinks we're Jehova's Witnesses. In fact, some real Jehova's Witnesses actually thought we were other Jehova's Witnesses, and got all excited when they saw us, until they realized we weren't from their church. That was an interesting conversation.

This week has been so busy, and Sister Schenk and I are having so much fun! She has a really pretty soprano voice so we sing together while we're going door-to-door, and we're constantly laughing, and it just makes the work so much fun.

I hope all is going well at home! I love you all!

Sincerely,
Sister Jensen

P.S. I attached a photo of Sister Schenk and I (note the matching outfits, haha. I borrowed some of her clothes).

Love,
K

Sorry it's a week late...

2011-05-16T21:56:00.001-07:00

Hello!

Well, the highlight of this week: Mother's Day Calls!

It was so great to talk to Mom and Jess yesterday. Our mission is allowed to use Skype now, so I actually got to see the both of them! It was so much fun. It went by waaay to fast, though. I wish we could have talked for a few more hours!

I picked up Sister Schenk, my new companion, last week. Right from the start we are getting along really well, and we have a lot in common. She served in Frankfurt for the last two cycles, and she learned a lot there that I think is going to help this area a lot, and already we're seeing a lot of success!

We contacted a referral last week for a really cool family, the de Luz family, and we've already met with them twice and have another appointment for tonight! The spirit is really strong in all of their lessons. I'm also learning tons about contacting (street contacting and doing doors and stuff).

It's really sad that Sister Thaden is gone, though. :( She was also so awesome. But I'm sure she's really glad to see her family again. Right at the end of Sister Thaden's mission, Friedrichsdorf started to see a lot more success, tons of temple tours, a lot more lessons, etc. I think it helped a lot, because then Sister Schenk and I were able to hit the ground running.

I really feel a lot of hope that things are changing for the better in Germany. There are a lot of cool prophesies that missionary work is going to explode here, and I feel like it has already started! I just need to do my part here in Friedrichsdorf, and I know we'll start finding a lot of people who are prepared and ready for us.

I love you all!
Sister Jensen

P.S. I'm cutting my hair short again today! I'll send pictures next time. Love you! Bye!

Amazing week!

2011-05-03T20:34:00.000-07:00

Hallo,

Highlight of this week: We taught more lessons this week than Friedrichsdorf has EVER SEEN before! (at least in the last year, after that it's hard to tell because the boundaries were different)

We had an AMAZING week. We soooo busy and running around the whole week, but we got a lot done! We did 7 temple tours, we had a bunch of appointments with less actives, and we had a few really spiritual lessons with Karin, and during one of them she said she wants to get baptized! She said maybe in August, but hopefully before then because I want to be there. It was just such a great week! I'm really glad, too, because it was Sister Thaden's last week and I wanted her to end on a high note. It was really touching to watch her say goodbye to everyone, because she was here for HALF of her mission, and she did so much good in this ward.

Oh, and I also found out who my next companion will be, and I'm really excited because she is super nice. I've met her a few times. And she's a native German speaker! (she's from Salzburg, Austria). Sister Schenk is her name.

Well, I'd better go. Can't wait to talk to you on Mother's day, mom!

Sincerely,
Sister Jensen

Last week with Sister Thaden :(

2011-04-30T22:15:00.001-07:00

Hallo!

So this week is the last week of this cycle, which doesn't mean a lot for me since I'll be staying here in Friedrichsdorf, but it means a lot to Sister Thaden, who is GOING HOME! It's crazy. We've still been really really busy, but she is also trying to pack, and I'm trying to get the apartment all cleaned out for the next sister. I'm pretty excited to find out who my next companion will be, but I will miss Sister Thaden like crazy. She was such a good trainer!

Well, the highlight for this week would be Easter, I think! We had a really wonderful church service on Sunday, and Karin came and she really felt the spirit. She was even tearing up at some of the Easter songs we sang.

One cool thing about Easter in Germany is that everyone gets 4 days off work! On Friday they have 'Karfritag' (good Friday?), which they get off work, and then Saturday and Sunday, and they also get 'Ostermontag' (Easter Monday) off work! It's pretty crazy. For the last four days, EVERYTHING has been shut down, except the bakeries, which seem to be open all the time no matter what, haha. People make a pretty big deal about decorating for Easter, too. They to Easter Trees, just like Christmas Trees, except the ornaments are all decorated eggs. And sometimes they're not trees, but just like a vase of branches. They're really cool, though! I think I want to bring that tradition back to the states. :)

Anyway, we changed pday to today because of Easter, and all of the stores being shut down. But today our whole district is going to Frankfurt and we're going to watch a soccer practice, get lunch, and then go to a museum. Should be fun! Our district leader is also going home this cycle, so we're doing lots of fun stuff together.

Well, I need to keep this short, but I love you all! Glad we all had the chance to think about Christ this weekend. Keep that fire and love for Christ burning all week long. You never have to wait for a holiday to appreciate the Atonement and the Resurrection. It really is a wonderful, miraculous thing. I am so grateful for my brother who sacrificed so much for me, and for all of you, so that we can live again after this life, and be together as one big family forever.

Love you all!
Sister Jensen

Smuggling Missionaries

2011-04-18T20:23:00.000-07:00

Hallo! Guten Tag!

Gosh, I don't even know where to begin! This was one of the best weeks on my mission. It's hard for me to even think what the highlight is! But I guess I'll say: smuggling Books of Mormon into China.

Okay, that sounds more skullduggerous than it actually was. But it was a really cool experience! Here's what happened:

We were giving a temple tour, and half of the group was Chinese. They were all nonmembers who were there for a wedding, and were having a tour because they had time to kill during the sealing, since they couldn't go in. We had no idea the party would be half Chinese, but luckily one of the Chinese men spoke English, so he translated for the rest. Usually when we do temple tours for a wedding party, we try not to push religion too hard, because they're already tetchy that they're not inside the temple for their son's wedding (or best friend's, or sister's, or whatever). We just explain the temple, show them a short film, and then wait with them in the annex until the sealing is over, answering questions if they have any. This time, though, we left the group with our joint teach, Sister Vollath (a really nice old lady in our ward), while we ran some quick errands.

Sister Vollath told the Chinese man (the one translating) about the Book of Mormon. By the time we came back, he was very excited and said he wanted to read a copy. We had a couple of English and Chinese copies of the Book of Mormon back at our apartment, and we offered to run back and get them, but the sealing was almost over, and then they had to leave to get to the reception. And the man lives in mainland China, so we couldn't very well have missionaries visit and drop one off once he got home.

We ran as fast as we could back to our apartment and loaded up our bags with everything we could find in Chinese, which wasn't a lot, and then ran back to the temple, praying the whole way that he would still be there. It normally takes us 40 minutes to get to church and back, walking briskly, but I think angels must have been pushing us or something because we made the trip in 10 minutes. And you know me, I'm not exactly an athlete.

When we got back, the wedding party was still there, taking photos. We must have looked crazy, all windblown and sweaty, but we found the Chinese man, and gave him a Book of Mormon in Chinese, Simplified Chinese, and English (plus a couple of brochures in Chinese). He was very touched. He kept saying, 'Such a gift for me, such a gift.' He read the intro page, right then and there, and then said, 'I can learn a lot from this book.' Then he said, 'I want to bring my wife here someday.' Sister Thaden said, 'To Germany?' and he said, 'No, to the temple, so we can be sealed.'

I can't even tell you what that experience meant to me. I doubt I'll ever know what happens to him. All I know about him is that his last name is Chong, but I bet there are about 10,000 Chongs in China. But I am at least glad to know that we were able to touch his life and give him a Book of Mormon. Brigham Young was converted because he got a Book of Mormon from a friend, who got it from a relative, who got it from another relative, who got it from a missionary. So who knows.

Oh man, and that was only ONE cool thing that happened this week! I don't even know how to summarize the rest, and this email is already pretty long. Here are some of the other highlights:

- Our district did a temple session together, and it was France week (France doesn't have a temple yet so some of them come to Frankfurt) so the session was in French, haha. It sounded beautiful!

- I gave a talk in church yesterday. I was super nervous, and I'm sure I made a ton of German mistakes, but it was cool because our investigator was there.

- We gave two other temple tours, apart from the wedding one, and they were both HUGE groups! One group was from an Evangelisch church. It was the pastor and 25 of his congregation. I think he was trying to show his congregation how ridiculous we Mormons were, but I think it backfired, because a bunch of people from the tour have been calling the temple because they want to learn more. Temple tours are so wonderful. They really invite the spirit and I think people can feel the love and peace on the grounds.

- Sister Thaden and I tried on Dirndls last p-day after emails. (Dirndls are like Lederhosen for girls. Traditional German attire). I've decided if at all possible, I'd like one for a souvenir.

- Sister Thaden goes home in two weeks! I am going to miss her so bad. We have had such a good time together. I hope my next companion is cool, too.

Okay! Love you all!

Sister Jensen

P.S. Sorry for the lack of pictures, lately. I lost the cord for my camera somewhere in the MTC when I moved. But I just found out the Internet cafe has a card reader! So I am attaching two photos:
1. The Chinese family from the temple tour (note the Book of Mormon he's holding!)
2. Me, in a dirndl.

Love you!
-K

Sorry, I don't know how to rotate the first one so it's not sideways... :( -Jess

Trespassing Missionaries

2011-04-18T20:21:00.001-07:00

Hallo!

Highlight from the week: trespassing on my neighbor's balcony

So the story here is that I was on our balcony shaking out our rug, when my CTR ring slipped right off my finger and landed in the bushes on my neighbor's balcony below us. So we went downstairs and knocked on Herr Strabel's door, but he didn't answer. We weren't even sure he lived there any more, because we haven't seen him in a while. Anyway, Sister Thaden said, 'Oh well, just forget it.' But I said, 'I can't! It's my CTR ring, and my grandma bought it for me!' (It's a really pretty CTR ring, a German one, that Grandma Jones got me for Christmas.) So anyway, I went outside, and to Sister Thaden's embarrassment I crawled through the bushes, got up on this little ledge thing, and managed to climb onto the balcony railing and sort of roll/flip over it onto the balcony, haha. All in a skirt, too. But I got my CTR ring! It is safely on my finger as I type this. Nothing like a little light trespassing to start off the morning.

We also had Zone Conference last week, which was cool. This transfer, a lot of my MTC friends are in my zone, including Sister Cannon, so we took lots of pictures and carpooled over to Burger King together afterward. Burger King isn't quite as good here as in the states. The restaurants are way nicer-looking, but the food isn't as good. Same with McDonalds.

Oh! We also got two referrals this week! That is pretty much unheard of for this area. In some areas, they get tons of referrals from members, church headquarters, etc., but here it's like pulling teeth. But we got two referrals and were able to contact them, and they were both home! It was like magic. We're aiming to get return appointments this week, and to start teaching them.

We also went out to Kronberg and Königstein this week, two of the richest cities in German! I think Königstein is actually one of the richest in Europe. It had some of the most BEAUTIFUL houses I have ever seen. Our bishop Br. Klebingat lives there. Actually, he's not our bishop anymore, because he just got called as a mission president to the Ukraine, Kiev mission. It's pretty cool, because he actually bought the land for the Kiev temple that was dedicated last summer, so he knows a lot of people there.

On another note, it turns out I am allergic to Germany (or at least some of the plants here). I have never had springtime allergies before in my life, but I was sneezing and miserable for most of the week! The worst part was that all I had to treat it was Benadryll, so when I wasn't sneezing, I was falling asleep in appointments, haha. But luckily I got some medicine from the apotheka, and it's been working pretty good.

Yesterday we had Stake Conference, and afterward we went to a Afghani barbecue with our investigator, Estael. I really like the food and culture from Afghanistan! It's fun. Although I don't think I'd like to visit. They were swapping horrifying stories about the Taliban, and close shaves they'd escaped (almost getting shot for not having their heads covered, their homes getting raided, and stories like that.). Crazy stuff.

On the way to Stake Conference, we passed a bunch of huge cherry orchards in full bloom! It was gorgeous. It looked like snowballs all over the hills. Spring is really in full bloom here. Everywhere we go we see beautiful flowers. And they have these trees here (magnolia trees, I think) that bloom with these huge flowers on them. You should google it. I'll attach pictures when I can.

Well, that's about it! It's been a pretty awesome week. I love you all!

Sister Jensen

13 Doors

2011-04-04T21:02:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone!

Well, lots of good things happened this week, but the highlight was: General Conference!

Oh man, I'm sure lots of people have the same feeling, but I felt like a couple of the talks were speaking directly to me! It's so wonderful that we have the chance to hear from the prophet and apostles. I felt really inspired. We watched the Saturday morning session live (at 6:00 pm Saturday evening here), and then the Saturday afternoon session the next day, and then we watched the Sunday morning session live again. We will see the last conference session in a couple of weeks after Stake conference. I think my favorite was Dallin H. Oaks' talk about the importance of desire. But all of them were so good!

We got the chance to do service for a lot of people this week, mostly cleaning houses. First we helped a lady who has a new baby, and is suffering post-partum depression. We've actually been helping her once a week for a few weeks now. It's her first baby and her husband works late every day, and she was feeling really lonely and stressed out. Then we got to help an inactive woman from Russia. We've been teaching her every now and then, but I don't think she realized how much we care about her until we showed up to clean her apartment.

Actually, that's a funny story. So we asked if she needed help, and she said, 'If you're willing, I really need to clean my doors. I haven't cleaned my doors in over six months!' And we were both kind of like, '...doors?' I don't think either of us had every really cared about the state of our doors before, but she seemed pretty concerned about hers. So we were like, 'Okay.' She just has a tiny, cramped, one-floor apartment, so I thought 'How many doors can there really be?' It turned out she had 13 doors! In a tiny apartment! It was kind of ridiculous.

What else... oh, and then today our p-day is a little shorter because we were walking home from buying groceries and saw our relief society president cleaning someone else's house, so we stopped in and spent a couple of hours helping her. It turns out it was supposed to be a relief society activity -- cleaning this old lady's house -- but no one else showed up, so Sis. Zonardo was going to do it all herself. Good thing we walked by!

Well, I'd better get going. Thank you all for the letters and emails and support! I love you all.

Sincerely,
Sister Jensen

I can't remember what week we're on now, and I don't really have a good title for this post.

2011-03-28T21:31:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone,

Well, we had a great first week of this cycle! I don't have a lot of time to email today, but I'll tell you some quick highlights:

- Sister Thaden and I made homemade pretzels, and they were SO GOOD. Our ward has a potluck every fast Sunday, which was yesterday (because of conference this weekend), and we brought delicious baked goods.

- I took my mission driving test and passed (woo hoo! Actually it was really easy. Mostly just learning what German road signs mean). Getting a license in Germany is really ridiculously hard and expensive if you're a German. It costs thousands of dollars and driving school is pretty hard. Luckily, with an American license it's pretty easy to translate over, and way cheaper.

- We had a good lesson with Falko this week. He's a newly baptized member, but we have a hard time getting him to church. Anyway, he loves to study the scriptures and conference talks, so we gave him a bunch of our favorites for him to read, and afterward he promised he'd come to church next week to watch General Conference.

- Everyone here has these weird pink rocks in their house, so we finally asked what they were, and apparently they're made from Himalayan salt, and when you have lamps or candles in them, they give off all this healthy salt air or something. I've come to discover that Germans are really into weird health things. Especially when it comes to food. Some of it is pretty cool, but a lot of it is just out there, haha.

- We gave a temple tour on Saturday to a bunch of younger kids, which was fun. My favorite part, though, was when we were talking about the Angel Moroni statue on temple. I asked, 'Why was Moroni important?' and a little kid up front said, 'Because he was a really good trumpet player!' Of course. Why didn't I think of that?

Anyway, I'd better get going. Hope all is well back home! Love you all!

Sincerely,
Sister Jensen

Sis. Thaden's Birthday

2011-03-21T18:58:00.000-07:00

Hello, all!

It's a beautiful day in Germany! So beautiful that Sis. Thaden and I are going out picture-taking. So I'll make this brief.

Highlight of the week: Sister Thaden's Birthday!

It was awesome. I made french toast for breakfast and decorated the apartment while she was still sleeping, which was fun. I also organized a surprise birthday party at the church. By the way, it is super hard to plan a surprise party for someone who is with you 24/7, haha. I had to make all of our plans while she was in the shower. And then later we went up to Usingen and had a barbecue with the elders in our district. It was really fun!

Also, we got transfer calls on Saturday, and Sister Thaden and I are both staying together, which is really good news! When we told Karin that we were both staying, she got really excited and hugged us and said, 'I have been praying and praying so hard that you would both stay!' It made me feel really good to know that the Lord is aware of his people and watches out for them. Also, it is Sis. Thaden's last cycle on her mission, so in 6 weeks she'll go home to the states. In mission terms, this means she is going to 'die' in this area, and I am going to be the one to 'kill' her. :)

Oh man, a ridiculous eating appointment from this week: Friday we went to Sis. Vollath's, and she gave us the most DISGUSTING food ever. it was a mixture of different cold salads. Potato and tuna, egg and mushroom with curry, feld salat with rancid olive oil on it, and a side of ASPIC cubes. Do you know what aspic is? I only knew from watching 'Julie&Julia'. It is beef jello, basically. Nasty, cold, beef jello. Hahahaha. It was an experience I'll never forget.

Well, that's about it! It's a beautiful day, things are going great, our mission had 6 baptisms last week, and we're getting a lot of good work done here!

Hope all is well back home!

Love,

Sister Jensen

P.S. Grandma Jones - Yes, we're allowed to read Church News articles. Thank you for the one you sent! I'll write more in a letter.

Marburg

2011-03-21T18:54:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone!

Highlight of the week: Marburg!

Sis. Thaden and I visited Marburg last week with a couple of elders. Marburg is BEAUTIFUL. It has a really pretty river running through it and lots of old cathedrals and a gorgeous castle on the hill. The best part, though, was that I got to visit Sabine and Rahel Garsche, a family that Matt taught when he was here! I guess Rahel was only like a year old when Matt served here, but she's now 9 years old and baptized, and Sis. Garscha is still strong and active in the church. She had lots of awesome pictures of Matt as a missionary and of Mom when she came to visit. I brought photos of Matt, Melinda and Adelaide, and she was really excited to see them. I don't know if she already knew you were married, but she was really excited and said that Adelaide is soooo cute. :)

Also, I heard about Japan on Friday. So sad. We were down in a subway station and they have these big news screens and they kept showing pictures of the water pouring over the country and sweeping stuff away, and the earthquake shaking buildings apart. We heard something interesting, though. In one of the cities that got hit really bad, there were 8 missionaries living there, and all 8 are now accounted for and okay and everything. In that same city, there are thousands of people still unaccounted for, but all 8 missionaries are okay.

This week is the last week of this cycle, so transfers happen next week. We should get transfer calls on Saturday to find out if we're staying or going. Sister Thaden doesn't have a lot of time left, only 7 weeks! I kind of hope we stay together until she leaves.

We had a couple of really good lessons with Karin this week! She is getting an operation today, and on Saturday she asked for a priesthood blessing, and she said that she felt really comfortable and not so scared anymore. She has a lot of health problems, but she is the funniest, most feisty woman ever. She used to be Catholic, but she said that she always struggled with the teachings, because she didn't believe a lot of what the Catholic church taught. So about 10 years ago, she was sitting in the church listening to the preacher, and I guess she had just had enough, and so she stood up, called them all hypocrites who were perverting the bible, and stormed out, haha. Then she decided on her own to stop smoking and drinking, and a shortly thereafter the missionaries found her! It's so cool to see how the Lord prepares people.

We're also still working with Estael Said, the lady from Afghanistan whose son we're teaching English to. She has really been struggling with the Book of Mormon because they don't have the whole thing translated into Persian/Farsi, so the stories don't make a lot of sense, and although she speaks German pretty well, reading the German Book of Mormon is really hard for her. So this week, we started reading the Book of Mormon with her out of the kids version, the one with the pictures and the simplified language. It was so cool, because the stories finally clicked for her! She didn't understand, for example, why it was okay for Nephi to kill Laban. But when we read the story with her, she finally understood the reason and it all made sense for her. It was really cool! We're thinking of buying her a children's copy so she can read it at home.

Oh, speaking of which, a couple things that I'm really excited about. At the temple store here, they now have a Doctrine and Covenants DVD (well, a set of like 3 DVD's) that has some cool stuff on it, like the full length Joseph Smith movie! The one in the Legacy theater! It also has Legacy and Mountain of the Lord on it! It's so sweet, though, because it only costs 3€! Like $4.50! For all three movies plus a bunch of other cool stuff! You should check and see if they have it at Deseret Book, too. We've been waiting for the Joseph Smith movie to come out on DVD, but we thought it would be $7-10, maybe more here in Europe. Also, the Carinessa II tops will arrive to our temple store in about a month, which should be awesome. You'll probably get them back home before they make their way here. Maybe you already have them?

It sounds like Grandpa had a beautiful funeral. Give my love to everyone, especially Grandma Donna.

Anyway, that's about it for this week. Love you all! Write when you can, and don't forget to send recipes! :)

Love,

Sister Jensen

Weaponized ice cream

2011-03-08T21:15:00.000-08:00

Hello everyone,

Sorry I didn't write yesterday. P-day was pushed back because yesterday was Rosenmontag (Germany's equivalent of Mardi Gras) and all the stores were closed. It's carnival season, so we see a lot of people in costumes, but other than that it's been pretty quiet! It looks a bit like Halloween, actually.

I was sorry to hear about Grandpa. I sent a note to Mom to be read at the funeral. I love you all, and my prayers are with you. At least Grandpa is reunited with Dad, and they can keep each other company. I hope Grandma Jensen is doing okay. Give her my love.

Highlight of the week: Weaponized ice cream

So this was pretty embarrassing at the time, but in retrospect kind of funny. So Sis. Thaden and I were getting ice cream, and I was trying to tell the guy to put it in a waffle cone, and he gave me a weird look like he didn't know what I was talking about. So I pointed to the stack of waffle cones and he finally got what I meant, and he started laughing really hard, and so did Sis. Thaden. I guess instead of saying 'eine Waffel' (a waffle), I had been emphatically telling him to put it in 'eine Waffe' (a weapon). Hahahahahaha So that's the joke that Sis. Thaden has been holding over me the past few days. 'Can you put that in a weapon, please?'

Oh, another great moment this week was on Friday: we were waiting at a bus stop, just the two of us and another lady, and the bus was taking forever. Apparently it was taking too long, because the other lady walked a few feet away, crouched down, and started peeing on the sidewalk, haha. Like, through her pants. We were trying SO HARD not to bust up laughing, haha. The she got up, totally unfazed, and put on her coat (luckily a long one), and walked off confidently.

Something else I keep forgetting to mention is that fanny packs are considered pretty in style here. Not kidding. We spot at least ten a day. Like the cool-looking guys, who you can tell think they're hot stuff, wear fanny packs. It's funny because Kelsey sent me a fanny pack for Christmas, as a joke. But now I can totally wear it and be cool! Hahaha. (Don't worry, I won't really.)

Also, we went up to Wetzlar yesterday for a housewarming for the Elders, who got a new apartment. It is really pretty up there. A lot of gorgeous countryside and cool old-looking towers. We're going up again on Friday to visit a member in Marburg who wants to meet me (because she knew Matt). Should be cool!

Well, that's all I've got time for. I love you all. Again, give my love to everyone at Grandpa's funeral. It really is a comfort to know about the Plan of Salvation, and that we'll see him again. I had an interview with President on Sunday and he gave me some really beautiful words of comfort.

Lots of love,
Sister Jensen

Carnival Season

2011-03-06T17:26:00.000-08:00

Sorry this is so ridiculously late! We've been stealing internet from the neighbors, and for some reason they had it shut off this last week. Anyway, here it is! -Jess

Hi everyone,

It's a gorgeous day today! Sister Thaden and I just got back from Frankfurt, where we played soccer with our zone. It was lot's of fun! I'm already sore, though, haha.

Highlight of the Week: The Restoration DVD

If you haven't seen the 20 min. Restoration movie yet, the one that came out a few years back, you should watch it! It's a great depiction of Joseph Smith's vision and the early history of the church. We ran out of copies a while ago, but we got a box at Zone Conference. We have now watched it with two investigators, and both times it really invited the spirit and helped them understand the Joseph Smith story. We watched it yesterday with our investigator Peter, and he LOVED it. He was taught by missionaries a while back but lost contact with them, and he was really struggling with Joseph Smith and understanding why he was important. I think the video really helped him. It's a great movie!

Also, Germany is heading into Carnival season, which is pretty intense here. In some areas of the mission they actually pull missionaries out and have them stay somewhere else around Carnival time, because the festivities get really intense, and some cities aren't safe/good for missionaries to be in while the parades are going on. Luckily, it should be pretty quite in Friedrichsdorf. On Thursday they have a funny holiday called Altweiberfasnacht, where girls go around with scissors, and anyone they find wearing a tie, they chop the tie off and give the guy a kiss. They warned us about it at ZoKo, and advised the elders to wear a scarf to hide their ties, haha.

Also, at ZoKo, I won an award! Just a small thing. They have this missionary development program in our mission, where you can earn different levels based on tasks you accomplish (study topics, Book of Mormon reading, german study, etc.). I earned the 'Basic' level, and I got a little certificate and a Toblerone :)

Well, that's about it, nothing too exciting! Pretty slow week. We had some really good lessons, though, and a few really nice eating appointments with members. We're trying to get more people excited about missionary work.

Hope all is going well back home! Love you all,

Sis. Jensen

Week 17

2011-02-21T20:36:00.000-08:00

Hello!

Highlight of the week: Sister Baird's Sons (let the auction begin)

This was so funny to me. So we were at the temple, just having finished a temple tour, and started chatting with a lady in the visitors center. She was talking about how her sons, Ryan and Johnny, had fallen away from the church, and she wanted advice on how to help him. We weren't sure exactly what to say, but we gave some suggestions, and she just kept shaking her head and saying, 'No, no...' and then she got all excited and said, 'I know, I just need to get them MARRIED to a nice Mormon girl!' and we kind of laughed a little and she said, 'Seriously! Do either of you know anyone who could marry my sons?' Sis. Thaden and I just looked at each other, going 'Uhhh....' and she said, 'She would need to be a nice girl, and speak a little German, and she doesn't have to be really pretty, but it would be nice if she was sort of pretty. In fact, if she wanted to come to Germany and get to know my sons, I have a nice apartment she could stay in. And then she could pick which son she wanted to marry!' hahahah. We were trying so hard not to laugh, but she was totally serious! Then she was talking about how great her sons were, and attractive, and had good jobs and stuff. I jokingly said that maybe I could email my family and see if anyone was interested, and she said, 'Do that! I just need to get them married. Here's my phone number...'

Anyway, so here's the classified ad:
For sale: Sister Baird's sons (Ryan or Johnny)
Age: 31 and 33
Location: Karlsruhe, Germany
Looking for:
A nice mormon girl (or two!) willing to come live with Sister Baird and pick one of her sons to marry.

Oh, man. Awkward. Anyway, that's about the most exciting thing that happened this week. There's not a lot of news to tell, since I just emailed a few days ago, but we did have a couple of awesome temple tours, and a great lesson with Karin! (pray for us, we're teaching her the law of chastity tomorrow). It is ridiculously cold here this week. I've gone back to three pairs of tights and two scarves.

Another funny thing, there's a song that just got really popular here (maybe it is there, too?) and we hear it everywhere. In fact, it just played here in the Internet cafe a second ago. It's a sort of catchy techno song, and the only words are 'Barbara Streisand', which are repeated once every ten seconds or so, haha. At least, we think it's saying Barbara Streisand. Maybe it's actually a random German phrase that means cucumber sandwich or something ridiculous.

OH!!!! I forgot! We did do something really cool last P-day! We went to this awesome museum called the 'Dialog Museum' in Frankfurt. It's a museum all about blindness. We met up with the elders in our distrikt and we did this tour called 'Dialog im Dunkel (conversation in the dark)', where they take you through this maze/obstacle course in pitch black. You seriously can't see a thing. And they give you blind-people canes to feel your way around with. They take you through normal things like buying fruit (and you have to feel/smell everything to know what it is), crossing a street (having to listen for the different clicking sounds from the traffic signals) and ordering stuff at a bar (good thing euro bills are different sizes!). It was so much fun! Plus our district is hilarious, so it was fun to hang out with them. Anyway, they have Dialog museums all over the world. Google it!

Well, I think that's it. We're doing pretty well here. We could still use recipes, though. :) Especially a recipe for Chocolate Chip cookies that doesn't use brown sugar, if such a thing exists. There's like... no such thing as brown sugar here.

Love you all! Hope all is well at home!

Sincerely,
Sis. Jensen

Week 16 (I think... Right?)

2011-02-19T08:23:00.000-08:00

Hello everyone!

Highlight for the week: I got to see Sis. Cannon again! YAY!!!!!!

So on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday this week, we had our training meeting, which was actually really awesome, but also exhausting, haha. It went from 8 am - 6 pm all three days, and we did TONS of roleplays and practices, and my brain was exploding with German by the end, haha. But I learned a ton! It was really cool that I got to be there, actually. They invited all of the sisters in the mission, but not all the elders. Only the zone leaders, district leaders, A.P.s, etc. But anyway, since all the sisters were there, I got to see Sis. Cannon (one of my MTC companions) again! I missed her so much.

Also, all of the missionaries at the training meeting got to go to the temple on Tuesday, which was so wonderful. The whole day was a little stressful, and cramming information into our brains, and then at the temple it's just so calm and relaxing and uplifting. Also, I did everything in German this time! I totally botched it, but the german lady helping me was really nice, haha.

Oh, hope you all had a happy Valentine's day, by the way!

Okay, I have to tell you about our investigator, Karin. She is making so much progress! She has now been to church three times and stayed for the whole thing last time. She loves sunday school. Last week, she also asked for a blessing (she's having an operation in March), and she said she felt really good afterward. But man, we had a huge scare last Sunday! So, Karin was investigating the church a few years ago, but she stopped because she came to church and some random lady hugged her, and it was too much. She's just a little skittish. So we've been really careful. But on Sunday, we were sitting in sacrament meeting and the bishop was giving a talk, and he said, 'Karin Breda, will you come up here for a moment?' I think my heart actually stopped. All the blood went out of my face. But yeah, he called her up, in front of our ward of like 200 people, and had her GIVE A FIVE-MINUTE TALK. I almost died. I was praying the whole time that she wouldn't like... stop meeting with us after. But it went okay. The worst part, actually, was afterward, because everyone like... swarmed on her. She looked a little shellßshocked. The whole way home she kept saying, 'That was a little to much.'

We saw her again today, though, and she seemed fine! We were just glad she made a return appointment with us. Anyway, we taught about the word of wisdom, and the only problem she has is that she still drinks cappucinos. She stopped drinking and smoking a long time ago. She said she just likes the taste of cappuccinos and it's part of her morning ritual and stuff, but we taught about the blessings that come from living the word of wisdom, and she committed to live it! We were pretty excited. We gave her a bunch of hot chocolate packets so she could drink that instead. :)

Well, that's about it. We'll have P-day again on Monday, so I'll probably email again then. I also have Zone Conference next week, which is cool. This cycle has been really weird, schedule-wise, what with the 3-day meeting and then now ZoKo. Kind of fun, though!

Love you all,

Sis. Jensen

Training Meeting

2011-02-12T08:02:00.000-08:00

Hello!

It's not my p-day, but I got permission to email home quickly and let you know that I won't be emailing on Monday. I'm going to a three-day training meeting! Should be fun. Actually, I hear they're pretty grueling, but I should learn a lot! Anyway, my p-day next week will be on Thursday or Friday, so expect my actual long email then.

(I guess in the past, when they've postponed p-days, concerned parents have freaked out and called the mission office to see why missionaries didn't email home, haha. Don't worry, I'm not dead!)

Things are going great up here!

Love you all,
Sis. Jensen

Beer Shoes

2011-02-08T20:50:00.000-08:00

And the highlight for this week is....... SISTER THADEN AND I ARE STAYING TOGETHER!!!!!!!!

We got the call this morning, and we're staying here, together, in Friedrichsdorf. I had a panic attack this morning thinking, 'crap, what if I get transferred?' Luckily, though, we're staying. So all's clear with sending letters to my same address (Hugenottenstrasse 4-A). I'm really stoked. Sis. Thaden and I have so much fun together. Also, I get the feeling like there's something we still have to do together. Maybe there is someone we're supposed to find and teach.

Things are still going well with investigators. In fact, we had three investigators at church yesterday! (A new record for us). It was wonderful. Yesterday was Fast and Testimony meeting, which we were a little nervous about, because you know how there are always a few people who get up and share a really weird testimony? Or they share false doctrine from the pulpit? Well, we have a few of those in our ward, haha. But everything went well, and the testimonies were beautiful, and the spirit was really strong!

Oh, so a couple interesting stories from this week:
1) I went to my first ever German funeral.
It was pretty much like a normal funeral in the church building. It was really small, though. Only about 12 people came. A man in our ward recently lost his daughter. He gave the eulogy. It was pretty intense, actually. Apparently his daughter had fallen away from the church, gotten into drugs and alcohol, and totally alienated everyone from her, which was why the funeral was so small. He ended his eulogy with, 'And THAT is why you ALWAYS listen to your parents. Amen.' There was quite the awkward silence afterward. The graveside part was interesting, though, because his daughter was cremated, but they still buried the urn. We were glad we were there to support the family, though, and we helped with the food/dishes afterward.

2) Beer shoes
So we have been visiting this inactive lady once every couple of weeks, but every now and then she starts acting very strange. This past week, she apparently made a huge meal for us, because she thought we were coming (though we hadn't made an appointment or anything) and then flipped out when we didn't come. We went to her house yesterday to see if she was okay and apologize, and her husband told us that she was mentally ill and had secretly stopped taking her medication. He was pretty frazzled. Midway through our appointment he was like, 'Oh, I'm sorry, would you like something to drink?' and he went in the entry way to get us some soda and knocked a bunch of glass bottles of beer off a shelf, which shattered on the floor near where we'd taken our shoes off, and soaked our shoes in BEER hahaha. Sis. Thaden got the worst of it. She picked up her shoe, poured beer out of it, and gave me this horrified look haha. Her shoes still smell like beer. We went to church right after, smelling like beer, I'm sure. Pretty funny. Well, more funny in retrospect than it was at the time, haha.

3) Transfer calls
So in addition to finding out I'm staying, we also found out that we're getting a new district leader! Our old one, Elder Collins, goes home on Wednesday. Our new district leader is Elder Hoffbauer, a native Austrian. I'm stoked because now we'll probably get to do district finding in MARBURG!!!!!!! (I've been looking for an excuse to go there ever since I found out how close it was). Our old district leader was opposed to going there, but Elder Hoffbauer loves Marburg, so my chances has improved. I'll take some pictures for you, Matt!

4) My new daring haircut
Actually, it's not that daring. But the daring part is that I cut my hair myself! I bought some haircutting scissors last week and gave myself a trim. Sis. Thaden helped. I was actually terrified to cut my own hair but it turned out to be quite cathartic.

Well, that's pretty much it. I hope all is well back home! Sounds like some crazy stuff is going down in Egypt? I got your email, mom, I'm printing it out to read later.

Love you all!

Sis. Jensen

7 missionaries stuck in an elevator.

2011-01-31T23:49:00.000-08:00

Hello everyone!

Just a heads up, it's the last week of the cycle so starting tomorrow if you have letters to send, hold on to them until I find out if I'm getting transferred or not. It's not likely, but just in case! We get transfer calls on Saturday or Sunday, so next time I email I'll know if I'm staying in Friedrichsdorf or moving. I hope I stay, because we have a couple of awesome investigators and I don't want to hand them off to someone else!

Highlight from this week: 7 missionaries stuck in an elevator.

This was hilarious. So our district was all together in Gießen, doing district finding / getting dinner. They have this big main street that you take a bridge to cross, and we were like, 'Hey, let's just take the elevator.' So we all got in, and right about halfway between floors, the elevator got stuck. Also, it was an outdoor, glass elevator, and the stairs wrapped around it, so everyone going up and down the stairs was like staring in at us hahaha. 7 people, all dressed up in suits/skirts, stuck in an elevator. We were laughing so hard. I have some great pictures. Anyway, so we used the emergency phone thing, and they were like, 'KEIN PANIK!!!' (Don't panic) which was hilarious because we were just sitting there cracking up. Maybe through the emergency phone it sounded like screaming. It was a little embarassing when fire department came down the street with lights and sirens and had to break us out haha. We had one native German with us, Elder Hoffbauer, and we just had him talk for us. It was bad enough without everyone thinking we were American tourists or something.

What else... oh, so I officially anmelded (registered) today. In Germany, every time you move to a new city you have to anmeld as a citizen of that city. So I'm now a legit citizen of Friedrichsdorf, and I finally got my passport back from the office, too. Cool stuff!

Well, today is P-day, so we did some of the normal stuff, grocery shopping and such. After emails we're going to get some Wurst for lunch and do some shopping. Then tonight we have a cool route planned through Ober-Ursel, one of the cities in our area, where we're going to go by on former investigators and do a little door-to-door proselyting. This week has been a tough one for proselyting. It's been so cold and gets dark so early that we've been lacking in motivation a little. However, we know this is the Lord's work and that we're where we need to be! Sometimes when I think about what we have, I feel an urgency to share it. Think about all the things we know, as Latter-day Saints: we know there's a life after death, we know that God is our father and loves us, we know how to communicate with him through prayer, we know that we can repent and change no matter how many mistakes we've made, we know that we existed and had personalities before we were born, and we know that this life has a point and a purpose. Basically, we know everything we need to know to have hope, happiness and confidence! How can we not share that?

Oh, another thing, I am seriously lacking in recipes. I didn't think to bring any! When we're not eating with members, we end up making the same food over and over. So if you happen to write me a letter, grab one of your favorite recipes and stick it in :) Particularly, Mom, if you could send me the biscuit recipe from your cookbook, the big, red, plaid-looking one (or I think mine is still at home, except mine is pink. better homes and gardens? I think?). Also, your cornish pasty recipe. I know, I've asked you for it so many times I should have it memorized by now, haha. But anyways. Recipes are appreciated!

I think that's everything. Again, sorry I've been slow about responding to letters. The past couple of P-days we've had appointments during the day and had to end our P-day early (p-day normally ends at 6:00 pm, but if we have a lesson or a dinner appointment we have to get back to Friedrichsdorf early and don't get much time for writing.) But know that I love you all so much! Thank you so much for the letters and pictures and everything!

Lots of love,
Sis. Jensen

A couple people-specific notes:
Grandma Jones - I got both your letters this week, thanks! They're averaging 5-6 days to get to me. Not bad.
Jessica - I hear you found an awesome apartment! Hope all goes well with that. Send me pictures when you move in.
Kelsey & Co. - Thank you for the pictures. I died laughing at some of them. Good luck with grad school apps.!
Hailey - Thank you for the Friedrichsdorf weather report. It helped us greatly!
Mom - Thanks for the emails! I especially enjoy the bits of German you include :)

Temple Tours

2011-01-26T01:31:00.000-08:00

Hello everyone!

I've decided to start doing a highlight for every week. This week's highlight: Temple Tours! We did 4 of them!

So a little bit about temple tours:
We take the investigator around the temple grounds and show them some of the symbolism (sun, moon and stars; the stained glass window; etc). Then we go to where there's a good view of Moroni and we talk about him a little bit, and who he was and such. Then we take them into our ward meetinghouse, which is on the same property, and we show them the baptisimal font and the chapel and such, and talk about baptism and the sacrament. Then we show them this really cool villa, also on the temple grounds, which has some historical significance. Then we show them a film that was made before the temple was dedicated, so they can see what the inside of the temple looks like, and the celestial room, and all. The film was made in the 80's, so it is super old, but it's good. We pause it at parts to explain what goes on in the temple. Then afterward we talk about it. They are some of the most spiritual lessons we have. I love doing temple tours. We gave our investigator Karin a temple tour and she said that she likes the idea of being baptized for her mother and father, who weren't really religious.

Anyway, so temple tours are awesome.

Oh, another funny thing: Everyone here thinks we're Nuns. Hopefully they at least think we're trendy nuns. Or maybe some kind of nun hybrid that's allowed to wear color. But nuns here go by Sister, too, and they're not uncommon to see.

Something really hard this week was that another investigator, Herr Kohlmann, totally rejected us on Wednesday. He's an older guy, and pretty cool, but he read a lot of anti-Mormon stuff online about how Joseph Smith was like... basically a Cassanova. Then he went on about how he was meeting with the Jehovah's Wittnesses now. I was really down about it. We asked him if he had prayed about it, and he got right up in my face and yelled at me, saying, 'Why should I?' and stuff. Sis. Thaden gave me a really good pep-talk afterward, though, and I feel better. Still sad that he didn't accept our message, though.

Oh, so if you get the chance, re-read President Uchtdorf's talk, 'Of the Things that Matter Most'. It's so good. It talks about the four most important relationships in our life, and just has some really good advice. Also, everyone here LOVES President Uchtdorf. I mean, they love all the apostles, obviously, but Uchtdorf is like a rockstar here. Also, everyone seems to have met him or is related to him or something. There is a Sister Uchtdorf in my ward, actually. Not sure how she's related. Everyone also loves Arnold Schwarzenegger (not sure if I spelled that right). Everyone asks us if we think he'll be the next president. They're really sad when we tell them he can't because he wasn't born in America. Maybe they'll change the law before then haha.

Mom and Jess, I got your letters! All three on the same day, actually. Thank you for that.

What else... oh, so my trainer, Sis. Thaden, comes from a huge family (5 sisters and 1 brother, all older, and all married. She has about half a million nieces and nephews) and she mentioned once that she missed peanut butter (they don't really have it here. If you ever find it, it's super expensive), and her mom and two of her sisters sent her huge packages for Christmas with tons of peanut butter things in them. Reices pieces and peanut butter cups, peanut butter cookie mix, Butterfingers, and a total of three huge jars of peanut butter hahaha. It's extreme. We're set up for life, I think.

Sis. Thaden only has a little while left, so we had thought we'd just stay together until the end of her mission, but Sis. Curtis (who I think I mentioned before? She's the wife of my old branch president at the MTC) emailed me saying that there are two sisters who got fast tracked at the MTC, because they already speak German, which means they'll probably come in this transfer, and there are only so many trainers here in the field, so it's possible that that could scramble things up. For all we know, we might get transferred at the end of this cycle and someone else would finish my training. I kind of hope not... Sis. Thaden and I are having so much fun together! But it will all work out no matter what. I'll keep you posted.

This week, I have learned the joy of ACHIEVING GOALS!!!!!!!!! (Yes, I'm that excited about it hahah). We broke a couple of records this week, for contacted referrals, inactives taught, and total lessons taught. I've also set some goals for personal and German study, and it's satisfying to meet them.

So, your assignment this week, set a goal, write it down, and then make it happen!

I love you all so much. Thank you for your support!

Love,

Sis. Jensen

Week 11

2011-01-26T01:28:00.000-08:00

Sorry this one is a week late. I didn't have internet for a while. -Jess

Hello family!

I'll preface this by saying that I have very little time for email today, so it's going to be short (sorry). We are in Frankfurt today to do a little shopping, and we met up with the sisters from Offenbach, who are awesome.

So a couple quick notes:
- Germany is awesome.
- My German is getting way better already!
- I apparently giggle in my sleep.
- I have already eaten my weight in sauerkraut.
- I gave my first temple tour a couple of days ago, and it went really well!
- I am having such a blast with Sis. Thaden!
- We made pizza last night with fococcia bread as the crust and sauteed mushrooms, onions, cherry tomatoes, and gouda.

um, so that's all, actually.............. But I love you!

Love love love,
Sis. Jensen

Chillin out in Germany

2011-01-10T11:49:00.000-08:00

(Sorry for the lame pun. :P)

Hallo!

I have now been in Germany for almost two weeks! (although I'm technically now on 'week 3' of this cycle). Germany is so cool! I can't get over it! And my ward is so wonderful. They keep us really well-fed. On Saturday we had three eating appointments. We didn't plan to have that many, but everyone we visited insisted on feeding us. By the end of the night I felt like I was going to explode haha. So, just to prepare you, if I start looking fatter in pictures, that is why.

New Years was fun here. I guess in Germany New Year's is like... just an excuse for delinquincy haha. Did I already tell you about this? Kids go out and set off lots of fireworks and then graffiti stuff. Seriously there is so much graffiti here. Some of it is really cool graffiti, though. As missionaries, we're supposed to go back to our apartments by 6:00 pm on New Years Eve (so we stay out of trouble haha) but we had a teaching appointment so we were out a little later. I can't remember if I already wrote about that, so sorry if that's repeat.

Oh, and postage just went down so now it's only 0.75€ to send a letter to the U.S. (when you convert that to dollars, it's still cheaper than sending from the U.S. to here!)

I had Zone Conference last Tuesday which was cool. I got to see Sis. Dietrich from the MTC again. Sis. Cannon is in a different zone so I didn't see her. I got your Dear Elder, mom. It was waiting for me at Zone Conference. With Dear Elders, it turns out they just get printed out in Salt lake then put in a normal envelope and mailed to the mission home, so I guess it's not any faster that way. It was good to hear from you though!

It is freeeeeeezing here! I can't feel my feet half the time haha. Sis. Thaden and I were out going door to door a couple of days ago and there was a thermometer on one of the houses and it was -11° C. Not sure what that is in Fahrenheit exactly, but I do know that it was way too cold to be outside in a skirt! I layer two pairs of gloves and several pairs of tights to stay warm. (thank you for the extra tights, mom!)

It's a little hard to contact people here, partly because of the weather -- no one is out and about outside, and no one wants to open their door to us -- but we do have a couple of investigators. We also work with a lot of inactives. It makes me feel good to teach them, because that way when we can't find people to teach, at least we're strengthening the ward and bringing people closer to Christ. Sometime I'll have to tell you more about the people we teach. They're cool!

Oh, so my ward is about 1/5 english speakers. They have cool headsets for people to listen to translations of sunday school. There aren't a lot of Americans, but there are lots of British families, or like... one parent is from England and the other from Germany. We have an eating appointment tonight with a British family, and they have the most charming accents. One of our inactives should be coming to dinner, too, so we have a cool lesson planned.

It's so awesome to be here and tracting and teaching and being a real missionary! Seriously, cold and all, it is so awesome. I love it. I'm studying like I've never studied before, and doing lots of hard work, and I love it. The church is true!

I love you all! I haven't gotten around to writing a lot of handwritten letters yet, but I hope to soon. In the meantime, I love you all so much, I hope everything is going well at home, and have an amazing week!

Tschüß!

Sis. Jensen

Is it week 9 or 10 now? Oh well, it's Germany time!!!

2011-01-04T11:50:00.000-08:00

Hi everyone!

I am in Germany!!!!!!!!!! AAAAGGGHHH!!!!!! So cool! I love it here already. But man, it is cold. But beautiful! It snowed a bunch yesterday, but mostly it's just been windy/cold.

I have been assigened to serve in Friedrichsdorf, a pretty small town ('dorf' means like... village) north of Frankfurt. It is cool because Friedrichsdorf is where the temple is! I haven't done a session yet (my distrikt is going next week to do one) but I pass the temple every time I go to the church building. It's beautiful! If you are trying to find Friedrichsdorf on a map, the closest big-ish city is Bad Homburg.

My new companion is Sister Thaden. She is awesome. She only has a few cycles left, so I'll probably be her companion for two or three transfers, here in Friedrichsdorf. She is really cool! I'll try to attach a picture of us together. Her German is really good and she's been here for 4 cycles, so she really knows the members/investigators and she knows her way around.

Before I forget, here is my new address:

Sister Kristin Jensen
Hugenottenstrasse 4-A
61381 Friedrichsdorf
Deutschland

A few things about sending letters:
1. This is the address for my actual apartment, which means a couple weeks before transfers, you probably shouldn't send anything there just in case I get transferred to a new apartment. In my emails I'll be sure to mention when transfers are coming up, so that you wait to send letters.
2. Dear Elders, and letters/packages sent to the mission office address, will stay in the office until I have zone conference or interviews or something in Frankfurt, they don't forward them to me or anything. So I guess for letters it's best to just mail them to my apartment.
3. Letters have to have my name on them, or else they won't put them in my box. We don't have a mailbox number or anything, just our names on the slot, so make sure any letter you send says 'Kristin Jensen' in there somewhere haha.
4. Mail from the U.S. to Germany takes about 1-2 weeks, according to Sis. Thaden.

So, I have decided that Germany is cool. Actually, a lot of it is like Oregon. Except way more snow. Sometimes I forget that I'm in Germany until I notice that everything around me is written in German haha. A few other things are slightly different too. Like light switches look different, toilets have these weird flush buttons, all the sidewalks are stone or brick instead of concrete... stuff like that. The town I live in is really cool. It really looks like something out of an old movie! OH. Police sirens here ARE SO COOL. Everytime one goes off I feel like I'm in 'The Bourne Identity' or Anne Frank or some other movie. It's so bizzarre. Instead of being like "NYEEEEAAAAAARRRRRRRR" like they are in America, they're like "oooooEEEEEEooooooEEEEEEEoooooo". (Sorry that's the best I can describe them hahahaha).

Oh, another cool thing: I've been able to us my spanish here! So far I have had dinner with two families that speak Spanish. Except I've forgotten a lot of spanish words. But it was still cool to speak a little spanish with them, even though we just spoke German most of the time.

Church yesterday was fun. All of the members were really friendly. I even worked up the courage to bear my testimony in church. Apparently I told the congregation that "Jesus killed for us" instead of "Jesus died for us" but other than that it went okay hahaha.

My district is cool too. I had my first district meeting last week and afterward we went out for pizza. Oh by the way, German food is sooooooo good. I love the yogurt they have here. And the cheese! I'm going to experience my first döner for lunch today (it's kind of like a doner kebab, I've heard. Anyway, everyone talks about them and so I've been excited to try one for a couple months now).

President Ninow and Sister Ninow are really cool people. I had a quick interview with President Ninow my first day, and he gave lots of really good advice. They took a picture with each of us and I gave them your email address, Mom, so I'm hoping he emailed you? He said they normally email parents to let them know their kids arrived safe. Anyway, hope that got to you.

Oh man, jet lag was lame. Luckily that's over now. My first three days I was soooo tired all the time.

Well, this email is super long already so I'm going to cut it off there. I hope everyone is doing well! I love you all!

Love,

Sister Jensen

A few specific notes: (Jess, you can post these on the blog if you want, or just make sure they get to people)
Grandma/Grandpa Jones - Thanks for the CTR ring! I opened it on Christmas and it fits perfectly! And I wear the slippers every morning while I study :)

Jess - Sorry I haven't written in a bit. I have a letter to send you, I just need to get some German stamps first.

Matt - Did mom tell you about sister Braaksma(sp?)? My host sister in the MTC? If not, ask her to tell you. It's a pretty cool story.

Okay, I love you all! Tschüß!

Week 8 (Next email will be from Germany!)

2010-12-24T21:55:00.000-08:00

Hallo!

Meine Gute, Ich bin SO BEGEISTERT fur Deutschland! (I'm so excited for Germany!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

First off, I want to thank everyone for the letters, packages, postcards and dear elders. I'm convinced that I have the best family in the world. I love you all, and I pray for you all!

This will be my last email until I get to the mission field. I only have 4 days left! Today is p-day, tomorrow is Christmas eve, so the schedule will be a little different so our teachers can spend time with their families, Saturday is Christmas (Merry Christmas everyone!) and they keep us pretty busy that day, then we have church/interviews on Sunday, and then I leave at 5:00 am Monday morning! The people going to Berlin don't leave until Tuesday. I'm really sad to leave my district. I love them so much, and half of them aren't even going to the same mission as me! We have epic plans for MTC reunions though. In two years, hahah.

So some cool stuff has happened this week. The highlight was going to the MTC talent show try-outs. Yes, we are having an MTC talent show. The real deal will happen on Christmas day, and it should be really good. But the auditions.... well... hahahah let's just say it was like American Idol, but mormon style. Meaning that there were lots of really talented people, but also people singing renditions of the 12 days of Christmas replaced with MTC lyrics. ("FIIIIIIVE CTR RIIIIIIINNGGSS!!!!!!!") It was hilarious hahaha. Plus we had to wait for 2 hours before my companion got to try out so we saw a lot of acts.

What else, oh, it snowed here like crazy. It snowed non-stop for a day and a half. A lot of it has gotten washed away by rain, now, but a bunch of missionaries that were supposed to leave this past Monday got delayed and had to stay at the MTC until yesterday. Apparently snow is hitting Germany pretty hard, too, and the Frankfurt airport was closed for a while. So the fields really will be white!

Oh, and thank you so much for the package, mom! I loved your daily planner with all the inspiration stuff written in it :). I have a funny story about the Nutella, though. So Sister Cannon and I have been joking about Nutella ever since we got here. We both LOVE Nutella. It's our guilty pleasure of choice. We were talking about how we love Nutella on everything, and by the end, I think Sister Cannon was dreaming about Nutella. She kept saying, 'Ugh, why don't they sell it in the bookstore? I NEED some Nutella!" and then, lo and behold, what was in your package? A HUGE JAR hahahaha we about DIED laughing. She said, "You told your mom, didn't you?" hahahah. It was perfect. We took it to breakfast so all the elders could have some on their bagels and bananas and stuff.

Well, my brain is really scattered and I can't remember what else I was going to tell you...

Oh yeah! So I thought you might be interested to know that in the 61 days I have been here, we have sung 'Called to Serve' 24 times. (half in German, half in English).

Well, I love you all lots! Wish me luck in Germany!

Kristin

P.S. Matt and Melinda - I loved your package! I got it forever ago and I sent you a glowing letter about what awesome siblings you are and how cute Adelaide is, but I think it probably got to VA after you left. I love you lots! Thank you so much!

Week 7 (11 days 'til Germany!)

2010-12-18T00:29:00.000-08:00

Guten Tag!

It's getting closer and closer to Christmas, which means my departure date is coming closer too! All of us are getting really excited, but also really nervous. Also, a sister going to Berlin (my old roommate, Sister Risemay) sent a letter to me yesterday. She has been in Germany for about three weeks, and apparently it is sooooooooo cold there right now! In her letter she said, "Yesterday, the high was 20 degrees Fahrenheit, and the temperature is supposed to plummet next week." Yikes! I'm really excited, though. And it's already been crazy cold here in Provo, so I don't feel totally unprepared.

So a couple of exciting things happened this week. First of all, I got called to give a talk in Sacrament Meeting, which was cool! I think I told you already, but the way they do it in my branch is that everyone prepares a talk in German, and then right after we take the sacrament, the Branch President calls two people at random to come up and talk. In a way it was kind of nice, because I didn't have time to get psyched out! I just walked up there and gave it! A bunch of people complimented me on my German afterward, which made me feel good.

Another cool thing is that we had the BYU Men's Choir at the MTC for the Fireside on Sunday. They are AMAZING. I love men's voices. They sang a bunch of Christmas songs and showed some really cool video clips and such.

We also got a new roommate on Tuesday, Sister Nieman, who is also going to Frankfurt! She is already fluent in German, though, so they fast-tracked her and she moved into a different zone, different branch, and different room even. But we had fun for the two nights she slept in our room. She's a convert, so she shared her conversion story and everything with us. It makes me excited when I hear conversion stories, because soon I'll be the missionary in those stories! Yay! Aaaaaagh I can't even believe how soon Germany is!

Also, I got a really nice Christmas email from the Stake Presidency today. If you see President Lundgren soon, tell him thank you for me. It was really nice. Maybe I'll forward it to you, Mom.

What else..... Hmmm.... Oh, so I don't have my travel plans quite yet, but they're supposed to be here tonight or tomorrow morning. I was hoping I'd have them in time for me to email them to you, but I guess I'll just write them down and mail them to you with my handwritten letter, Mom. I hope I have a long layover so I have lots of time to talk!

Okay, well that's about it. My testimony is growing and filling me up inside. I love the MTC, but I can't wait for the field, life is good, and the Church is true!

I love you all so much!

Love,

Sister Jensen

Week 6

2010-12-11T01:19:00.000-08:00

Hi family!

How are you all? Thank you all for the letters and Dear Elders! This week has been so awesome. I'm getting really excited because we get our travel plans by the end of next week! It's crazy how fast time is flying. I can't even remember what all happened this week to write about it.

We're officially not required to wear tights/nylons anymore, which caused much rejoicing among the sister missionaries. Except... now I actually kind of love wearing them. But in summer it'll be nice.

Did you all get to see the First Presidency devotional? The Christmas one? They broadcast it here on Sunday, and I really enjoyed it. Especially President Uchtdorf talking about the Grinch :)

So we have taught lessons in German twice now, and both times were sooooooo bad hahahah. I mean, we can talk just fine, but the volunteer investigators speak much better German than us, so we panic every time they ask questions. Also, there's one volunteer who comes every week, Herr Cuvelier, and somehow we ALWAYS manage to teach him haha. We have taught him three times now, but each time he's a different investigator so we have to pretend we've never seen him before. This week he decided he was Muslim, so we had to explain God and Jesus Christ to him, and how they were different from Allah and Muhammed hahahahah IN GERMAN. Afterwards we just laughed so hard. Sometimes the TRC (where we teach the investigators) is borderline humiliating. But we learn so much every time, and it's always funny afterward.

What else... oh, so Mom, I wanted to tell you about Sister Curtis. Sister Curtis is our branch president's wife, and she is really good about checking up on us girls, and coming and making sure we're healthy, and visiting our residence halls to say goodnight to us every Tuesday, stuff like that. Every time we see her we get about five hugs from her. She reminds me a lot of Sister Harlon, actually. I should send you a picture. Anyway, she told us this week, "Everyone, I want you to write your mothers and tell them that if they're worrying about you, Mom Curtis is looking out for you." hahaha. She is so sweet. So anyway, just know that she is giving me proxy hugs for you.

Well, that's about it, I know I'm forgetting stuff but my laundry's almost done anyway. If I get my travel plans before next time I email I'll let you know what time I have my layovers and where and all of that.

I love you all so much!

Sister Jensen

Week 5

2010-12-08T00:05:00.000-08:00

Okay, sorry again! I'm really late on posting this one. We'll have another one in just two days. My apologies...

Hallo, familie!

Wie gehts? This week has been yet another wonderful week at the MTC! The Christmas lights are up on the campus, and it finally snowed a ton, so the atmosphere is feeling very festive! I made a red and green paper chain to decorate our classroom, and each day we rip off a link -- counting down until the day we leave! I'm starting to get really nervous/excited now that I'm past the halfway point. I'll be in the field in no time!

How is everyone back home? I hope you're all happy and healthy! EVERYONE got sick here. Like half the MTC at least. I finally caught it, despite my plethora of vitamins I was taking. Man there was just no stopping it. The worst part is that when someone gets sick and has to stay in bed, the companion has to stay home, too, and since there are three of us, and we all got sick at different times, we ended up missing quite a bit of class last week. But luckily we're pretty much all better now!

Another district in our zone left, going to the Alpine mission, so it's pretty quite with lots of empty classrooms on our floor, but that will change soon since we're getting 30 new missionaries next week! I'm really excited. I hope there are some more sisters coming in. On our floor we have all the German speaking classes, Icelandic, Dutch, Danish and Swedish. At the far end we had Portuguese but they're all gone now because they finally got their Visas. Apparently portuguese visas are sehr hard to get. The floor below us is mostly Russian speaking, which is fun haha. We have turf wars.

Hmmm.... what else.... Oh, for devotional on Tuesday Julie B. Beck came! She is so cool. All of us girls were so excited, and elders were like, "Who is Julie B. Beck?" hahahaha. She gave the coolest talk, too. By the end, the elders were all saying, "Man, maybe I should watch the relief society broadcasts from now on, because that was awesome!" hahahaha.

Oh, so we had our very first TRC teaching appointment in German! It was SO NERVEWRACKING. Oh man. At the end we were like shaking and one of my companions looked about ready to cry. Needless to say, we are not pros at speaking German yet. I mean, we can say a few sentences, but nothing prepared me for our "investigator" asking me to explain things like unpaid clergy and why we don't do infant baptism. I have soooooo much to work on! Seriously, I sometimes I get really discouraged because I just want to be fluent and be able to say everything I want to say, you know? But it's coming along. We have 4-5 hour periods at a time where we're only allowed to speak German, and I'm always surprised at how much I can say. We're going to do some serious practicing for next week's TRC, so that we don't fail so bad next time.

I'm still loving the MTC! I'm learning so much every day. I wish everyone could come here, just so they could feel the spirit that's here. It's wonderful.

Oh, one more random thing: I did sealings for the first time today! (Missionaries are only allowed to be proxies for children) It was very cool! The provo temple has about 14 sealing rooms haha.

Jess - I'm adding to your assignments: I also need the lyrics to 'God rest ye merry gentlemen' and 'Oh come oh come emmanuel'. Pretty please? :3 Love you!

Grandma - Thank you for the pillowcase! I snuggle with it every night and think of you. I'm writing you a letter today, too, and you should get it soon. Love you!

Mom - Sorry to hear about your travel plans getting cancelled. Glad you got some work done, hope you have something fun planned to celebrate your hard work!

I love you all so much!

Smile!

The church is true!

Love,
Sister Jensen

Week 4 (Turkey day!)

2010-11-27T00:22:00.000-08:00

Good afternoon!

It is a beautiful bright, cold day in Provo! The sky is blue and the mountains are covered with snow (although the ground is clear down here).

It's a little strange to be in the MTC on Thanksgiving day, but also wonderful. To explain why it has been wonderful, so far, I will share a quote with you from this morning's devotional:

"We are here to be your family today. We don't want anyone to be homesick. Today, the Holland's are your family." ~ Jeffrey R. Holland

Yes, we were privaledged to be visited by Jeffrey R. Holland this morning! His whole family came, actually! Including his wife, children, and all 13 of his grandchildren! We never know who the devotional speakers are going to be until they walk in, but we had heard a rumor that it might be Elder Holland today, and he holds such a special place in my heart. So, even though it was freeeeeezing outside, I went wiht some of the other elders/sisters in my zone and waited outside in line for two hours just on the off-chance that it actually was him speaking today. And it was! We actually had a lot of fun. My feet were soooo numb, but we spent the whole time singing hymns and by the end we had the whole line singing. So anyway, I was sitting three rows back, dead center! Not 10 feet away from an apostle of the Lord! He gave the most wonderful talk, too. And there were a couple of times he stared straight at me and smiled! :) :) :) :) :)

Anyway, Elder and Sister Holland wanted us to feel like they were being our families today, and so they both talked (and it was really sweet. I could honestly write this whole email just about the devotional! Aaaagh maybe I'll photocopy my notes and mail them home). So in going with the Holland family theme, they had their grandchildren get up and sing a primary song, and they were sooooooo cute! Seriously adorable. It was funny because all the elders were laughing by the end and all the sister were tearing up haha. It was so wonderful. I have felt so blessed every time we have a devotional, because it feels like I'm getting extra general conference, only better, because they're saying things directly aimed at the 2,000-3,000 of us here at the MTC. I love Elder Holland!

I still did miss you all a lot, though. It was expecially hard last night, because as I was falling asleep all I could think about was how if I was still at school, I'd be waking up the next morning to Grandma already working on the rolls, and I'd go help Grandpa get the folding chairs from the attic and then I'd chat with Grandma while I washed dishes and set the table. I've spent the last 3 Thanksgivings with Grandma! (maybe 4? I can't remember.) Speaking of which, can you make sure to forward this to her? She sent me her email address but I keep forgetting to bring it with me to the computer lab. And tell her I like nuts, but I'm not picky either way (she was asking about Christmas fudge).

Hmmm.... what else... well, this was my schedule today:

6:00 am - Laundry

7:30 am - Breakfast

8:00 - 10:00 am - waiting in line

10:00 - 12:00 pm - Spiritually FEASTING on Elder Hollands words!

12:00 - 1:30 on - Literally FEASTING on Thanksgiving lunch*

NOW - Emailing! (and having MDT/study time)

2:30 - 4:00 - Service project**

4:00 - 5:00 - Sack dinner in our room

5:00 - 6:00 - Thanksgiving program***

6:00 - 8:00 - [Project?]****

*Thanksgiving lunch was awesome! All day yesterday all I was driving people crazy with my talk of yams. ("Do you think they'll have yams? They'd better have yams. I reeeeally hope they have yams. Hey, you, do YOU think they'll have yams? I think they'll have yams. What if they don't have yams?!?! I think I"ll start a mutiny if they don't have yams.") For some reason I just really strongly desired yams. And guess what? THEY HAD YAMS!!!!!!! :) :) :) :) Hahahahahaha. We had turkey and mashed potatoes/gravy/cranberry sauce, green beans, and pumpkin pie. Granted, it was cafeteria style, and not necesarily the most delicious, but I was impressed! The food here isn't super good, usually, probably because they have to feed so many people, but it was decent today!

**We're not sure what the service project is. Probably putting together first aid kits for kids in Africa or something.

***We also don't know what the Thanksgiving program is going to be. My guess is some musical number and some speakers.

****Yet another mystery! the greatest mystery of all is what we'll do after 8:00 pm. A missionary's day usually goes until 9:30 pm and then you go back to your room and get ready for bed. If we have actual free time, it'll be like an unprecidented miracle hahahahah. (they keep us super busy here.)

Oooookay, I need to hurry because I only have 6 minutes left on the clock. I love you all! So much! I hope you had lots to eat today. Thank you all for the letters! Oh, that's another thing. I didn't have much time to write letters today. Normally Thursday is my p-day, but since it's also Thanksgiving I don't really get p-day this week. So, everyone, if you don't get a letter from me, it's not because I don't love you! Especially you, Matt and Melinda. I keep meaning to write you back and I keep running out of time! But I'll write you letters soon. I really enjoyed your letters.

I LOVE YOU! SO MUCH!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Happy Thanksgiving!

With lots of love and hugs,

Sister Jensen

Week 3

2010-11-21T23:33:00.000-08:00

Sorry I'm a little late posting this one. -Jess

Hello family!

Today is yet another beautiful P-day. The weather here is gorgeous!

So we had an exciting week. My room originally had 6 girls in it, but on Tuesday three of them left for Germany! I was really excited for them, but our room is really quiet now without them. But anyway, they're in Germany now (Berlin Mission) and we got a new roommate yesterday. Her name is Sister Dye, and she's pretty cool. But yeah, three whole districts left this week, which means our branch is now about half the size it was. We'll get more German speakers in a couple weeks though.

Oh, so speaking of my branch, everything is in German! The Elders bless the sacrament in German, we sing in German, pray in German, and even in testimony meeting we had to speak German! It's kind of amazing to me how much I can already say. Also, they call the speakers by surprise, so you never know until after the sacrament whether you'll be speaking or not. Everyone prepares a talk on that week's topic (guess what! In German :)) in case they get called up. It's so stressful haha. But it's good, too, because I learn a lot by writing a talk. And they only have to be 5-10 minutes long.

Another cool thing my companions and I did today: there is a morning excercise class, JUST for the sisters, which is awesome, because it's stuff like yoga and kickboxing, and who wants to do that with Elders watching? Anyway, so we went this morning for the first time, and we did pilates, and it was super fun! The only downside is that it's at 6:00 am, and afterwards you only have about 20 minutes to shower and get ready for class. I think we're going to keep going, though, if for no other reason than that they play REAL MUSIC during the class!

Music is definitely the one thing I miss a LOT. We can't even listen to MoTab here. I brought a lot of CDs and music on my iPod, but apparently while you're at the MTC you can't even listen to that. They say it's so that when you get into the field it makes you appreciate music more, plus they've had problems with people coming in from the "outside world" with non-church music and so they decided to blanket ban music in the residence halls. But at the excercise class they play music!

I was keeping track yesterday, and I figured out that I sing, on average, 10 hymns a day, and pray at least that often (as a group. Not counting personal prayers, of course, which are occurring with ever-increasing frequency as the German gets harder.) I spend about 3 hours studying the scriptures, daily. I study teaching for 1-2 hours every day. The rest of my time goes to German! I love it so much. To me, it is a beautiful language. I love the sounds. Even the harsh-sounding ones. It's so fun to speak. My district has a new hobby: yelling in German. Hahahahah so fun. Suuuuuuch a good language to be angry in. (WAS BEDEUTET IHNEN?! NEIN! NEIN!)

Well, I'm running out of time, which is probably okay because I can't think of anything else to say. In general, this week was just another awesome week at the MTC! Love my companions, love my district, love my teachers! The food is starting to get a little boring, but I get to have all the Grape Nuts I could ever want for breakfast! Yessss!

Here's the missionary purpose in German:
Andere Einlade, zu Christus zu kommen, indem wir Ihnen helfen, das Wiederhergestellte Evangelium Jesu Christi anzunehmen. Dies Gescheit, Glauben an Jesus Christus und sein Suhnopfer uben, umkehren, sich taufen lassen, die Gabe des Heilege Geistes emfangen, und bis ans Ende ausharren.

On that note, I love you all! Talk to you again next week! (Thanksgiving!)

Sister Jensen

p.s. pardon all the spelling mistakes.

Week 2

2010-11-11T23:43:00.000-08:00

And now we bring you the second installment of The Life of Kristin the Missionary, by Jessica Jensen (soon to be a major motion picture!):

Guten Tag!

How are you all? I hope everything is going well at home. I have looooooved all of your letters. Mom and Jess, thanks for the Dear Elders! Those are always fun because they print them out and hand them out at the end of the day, and it's cool because I know you wrote them just a few hours ago! So fun.

So I am continuing to LOVE the MTC! It is such an amazing place. And I'm learning German crazy fast, which doesn't make sense because the way they teach here is insane and would never work in real life were it not for the Gift of Tongues. Seriously. I look at our syllabus and I'm like, "No way." We do things in a day that took me weeks/months to learn when I did Spanish. It helps that I'm in class ALL DAY EVERY DAY hahahahah. But apart from that it is so amazing to have so much spiritual development. I have several hours a day to just study the scriptures or study Preach My Gospel. I'm also working my way through Jesus the Christ which is such a wonderful book. It is helping me understand the Savior and the political/cultural environment during his life on earth! I"m learning lots of cool stuff about the temple, too.

Speaking of which, I went to the temple earlier today! We go once a week (on P-days) and it's really nice because it's a beautiful walk up there, and we get to go all together as a district. Also, it's free for misionaries to rent clothing, and they actually have really pretty dresses for the Sisters. :)

Oh.... what else...... OH! Mom, you'll appreciate this: I met SHERI DEW on Sunday! It was sooooo cool! Man she is such a strong woman. She came and talked at a fireside and they had all the sisters sit way up in the front, since we probably were way more excited to see Sheri Dew than the elders were. So yeah, I was literally in the front row staring strait up at her, and afterward we got to go talk to her and shake her hand and such, so that was cool.

Also, Elder Bednar came on Tuesday! That's our second Apostle in two weeks! (M. Russell Ballard was last week) I feel so blessed! I feel spoiled, actually. To get to hear two apostles speak directly to us is such a blessing. Elder Bednar's talk was super doctrinal and made so many things I've been studying completely clear in my mind. He is so smart. But one of my favorite quotes from the night was, "I don't have what it takes to be an apostle. I'm not strong enough, I'm not smart enough, I just don't have what it takes. But in the strength of the Lord I can do ALL things." It gave me chills. He also talked about some really practical things, like how to answer really tough questions from investigators (like if an investigator askes about polygamy or something hard like that). At the end he gave us a beautiful apostolic blessing.

My companions continue to be awesome. We have so much fun. I'm going to have rock hard abs just from all the laughing we do. I can't believe I've been here for two weeks already! New missionaries came in yesterday (although none going to Germany) and I was like, "Hey, new elders! Wait, that was US. Two weeks ago."

Oh, so I didn't have a lot of time last week to go into depth, but I'll fly out of Salt Lake on Dec. 27, so I'll still be in the MTC on Christmas and it's very unlikely that I'll get to call home :( but I will get to call home from the airport, so hopefull I'll have a really long layover somewhere and can just hop on a payphone. It'll be interesting to spend two holidays here (Thanksgiving and Christmas) and see what it's like. I'm a little sad that I won't be in Germany by Christmas, but the really cool thing is that I'll still be with Sister Cannon and Sister Deitrich, and they are already such good friends. So we'll make it fun. Plus I hear rumors that they have a really cool Christmas program planned, and they keep you really busy on holidays so that you don't sit around and mope hahah.

By the way, my teachers here are so cool. Bru. Naumann has only been home for 2 months (did I tell you this already?) and Bru. McCracken has been home for about a year, and he just got engaged! They're super fun. We goof off in class a lot and have all these inside jokes and stuff, and I feel like they're just another couple of elders. It's weird to think that they leave the MTC and go into the *outside world* after class hahaha.

Okay, I only have five minutes left on the clock, but I just want to say that I love you all soooooo much! I love getting letters from you. I hope everything is going well. Keep me updated on things at home and give all the pets snuggles for me.

The Church is true! I can't believe I'll be in Germany in less than two months! So exciting!

Lots of love,
Sister Jensen

Change of Command

2010-11-07T21:40:00.000-08:00

Hello everyone! This is Kristin's older, more attractive sister, Jessica. Kristin's a missionary now, which means I have COMPLETE CONTROL OF HER BLOG. Mwahahaha! I could use my newfound powers to post embarrassing stories from Kristin's childhood, or turn this blog to my own evil purposes, but instead I'm just going to post all of the e-mails that Kristin sends to us while she's on her mission. I hope you enjoy them! (P.S. Everyone knows that Kristin's really the more attractive one. :P)

Here goes the first one:

Hallo, family!

This is my first MTC email! It's actually really stressful because I only have 30 min. to write and there's a GIANT COUNTDOWN at the top of the screen hahahaha. So basically you should send letters via Dear Elder.com because that way I can spend my whole 30 min. writing instead of reading. (By the way, thank you for all the Dear Elders mom! I love getting them and hearing from you, because I miss being able to call you!)

So I've said it probably a million times already, but the MTC is AWESOME! I love it here! I love everything about it! (Except perhaps the food, which is like.... cafeteria food and probably sooooo bad for me haha. But even that is awesome because I eat three solid meals a day instead of snacking all the time. Off topic! ;) )

So: cool stories. M. Russel Ballard was here on Tuesday! He gave the devotional and his talk was wonderful! He gave a lot of really good advice about being a missionary. I was inspired. Here is one of my favorite quotes from his talk:

"Our purpose as missionaries is to take people out of the darkness of the world, or the despair of the world, or wherever we find them, and make saints out of them." That's my goal!

German is coming along really well! I'm learning it suprisingly fast, actually. It must be the gift of tongues. The spirit is so strong here that I feel like I'm constantly immersed in it. I love that I have so much time to just study the scriptures.

Another awesome thing about the MTC: the Elders are such gentlemen! I don't think I've had to open a door since I got here. They're always holding doors, and smiling and being so nice. And at dinner they always take our (mine and my companions') trays for us. At breakfast today we started to stand up with our trays and the Elders in our district actually yelled at us, hahaa. It was funny. They were like, "Sisters! Sisters! What are you doing? PUT THEM DOWN." hahaha and they took them for us. It always makes us feel really special. The ratio of Elders to Sisters is ridiculous. Like at least 10:1. The Elders in my district are so wonderful. Hard to believe they're recent high school grads. When I got here I felt so old, but now it's just fun. We're all good buddies already. One fun thing about Elders holding doors is that we're all learning different languages, so I'll say "Danke!" (thank you, in German) and they'll say, "De nada" back (you're welcome, in Spanish). And people are always coming up and contacting us on the sidewalk to practice bearing their testimonies to us in Japanese, and we'll bear ours in German to them (I'm getting really good at bearing my testimony in German, but I still struggle with vocab sometimes because there are things that I want to say that I don't have the vocabulary for.) This really is a wonderful place.

Sorry I'm bouncing all over the place in this letter. Mom, I just wrote you a pretty long one with more details and stuff. Today is P-day, which means I get to wear pants! Wooooo! P-day ends at 6 pm though and then it's back to class! Right now I'm doing laundry. I went to the temple this morning with my companions.

MY COMPANIONS! They are wonderful. I have two companions. We're in a 'drit' (or trio) which is pretty common for sisters, actually. There's another trio of german sisters in our room. (we have six girls to a room, three sets of bunkbeds) We have so much fun. We are always laughing. My companions are Sister Deitrich and Sister Cannon. Mom, Sister Cannon is the girl I was emailing before I left for the MTC, and she's super cool. We have a lot in common and our personalities are so similar that we work really well together. The three of us are all really goal oriented, so we're making lots of goals and staying on track with them, which really helps! Right now we're working on a goal to read the BOM before we leave. I'll send pictures of them when I get a chance.

Okay a few more random things:

- the German hymn book has 'Come thou fount of every blessing' in it! English does not.

- I'll still be here in the MTC for Christmas. I depart for Germany Dec. 27.

I'm running out of time! Aaagh! So much more to say! I'll write letters and write more next week.

I love you!

Mom, I sent this to jess, but I'm not sure I have the right address. Make sure she gets it and let me know if she has troubles putting it on my blog.

Love you!

Bye!

- Sister Jensen

Mission Clothes

2010-10-21T19:25:00.001-07:00

Since I leave for the MTC in FIVE DAYS (panic!) I'm packing all my stuff. But before I pack away my mission clothes, here are a few pictures so you'll know what I'll look like for the next 18 months.

Shopping for skirts was a lot harder than I thought it would be. I almost gave up all hope of finding skirts that were long enough and resort to muumuus. Lucky for everyone, I found some cute skirts in the end. I got most of them from Sorella Bella.

These are not the shoes I'll be wearing most of the time. My real mission shoes look like the kind diabetics wear. They're so ugly. But soooo comfy.

Just five more days, and then it's auf Wiedersehen! I'm so excited!!!!!!

Down the Rabbit Hole

2010-07-30T15:38:00.000-07:00

I’ve been obsessed with Alice in Wonderland lately. I decided it was high time I read the book, and I quickly fell in love with Lewis Carroll, as well as his original illustrator.

To me, New York City is quite a lot like Wonderland. It’s confusing, there are strange people and it’s easy to get lost. But it’s also fun, exciting, filled to the brim with imagination and becomes exponentially more enjoyable if you’re willing to just “go with it.” Who knows, maybe next time I eat one of those street-vendor falafels it will make me shrink or grow.

In any case, I decided to have an Alice in Wonderland-themed day (or perhaps Kristin in Wonderland), where I visited all of the Alice locales I could find around New York City.

The first stop: the famous Alice in Wonderland statue in Central Park.

It’s a particularly charming statue because there are always children climbing on it. I think it’s rather appropriate. The man who donated the statue wanted it that way. It’s in honor of his late wife who “loved all children.”

Next up, after a looooong stroll, I stopped in at the 50^th street station (on the 1 line) where there are some fantastic Alice in Wonderland murals:

I ended the day at an adorable café called Alice’s Tea Cup (102 W 73^rd Street), where they had every kind of tea imaginable, delicious sandwiches, highly tempting desserts and – of course – a lot of awesome Alice memorabilia.

The Queen of Hearts made some tarts. And I ate them. (Shh, don't tell.)

A couple of days later, I met a poet in Washington Square who did “poetry while you wait” and I engaged him to write me a poem. When he asked for a subject, I said, “New York City as Wonderland.” He busted out this awesome poem:

Deutschland!

2010-07-11T19:40:00.000-07:00

I realized I never blogged about getting my mission call to Frankfurt. I'm really excited to go to Germany! So excited, that I made a Germany inspired collage today, which I'm actually quite proud of:

I am also trying to teach myself German, and with the help of Rosetta Stone it's coming along quite well. I can now say some very useful phrases, such as:

Ich heiße Kristin. Die Fahrrader sind gelb. Diene Katze is auf dem Tisch. Ist das Ihr Hut?

(My name is Kristin. The bikes are yellow. Your cat is on the table. Is this your hat?)

Obviously those are key phrases to know. I figure I'll be completely fluent by next week.

The Cathedral of St. John the Divine

2010-06-16T15:51:00.001-07:00

So, I was on my way home the other day and went one subway stop too far so I had to walk, but I was glad I did, because on the way home I discovered this AWESOME cathedral!

So then I turned the corner to get a better look and discovered that it was only a side building to a much bigger cathedral
It’s called the Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine. Luckily I had my camera on me, and I was able to join all the Asian tourists in some picture-taking.
Also, I’m pretty sure that’s George Washington in the middle of this door:
In the back they had this really cool sculpture garden, the most awesome of which was this epic sculpture of St. John:
I’m pretty sure St. John is holding a giraffe. Don’t ask me why. Here’s a more epic picture:

Where I Live

2010-06-06T11:29:00.000-07:00

I finally have pictures!

It’s Sunday so I’m going to try to catch up on all the things I meant to blog about. Anyway, I’m all settled in now and I snapped a few pictures. This is where I live:

And this is where I work:

This is my room:

The furniture, most of the decorations, and even the bedspread belongs to the girl I’m subletting from. The Beatles poster is -- of course -- mine. It’s the only decoration I brought with me.

Here’s the outside of my building. I’m on the top floor.

Here’s the view! Lovely lovely.

More posts coming; I did some cool stuff this weekend.

NEW YORK!

2010-06-01T20:26:00.001-07:00

I'm here! It's very surreal, actually. Every time I get on a subway I feel like I'm secretly in a movie.

I don't have a lot of pictures yet (it turns out I brought the camera without the memory card. Fail.) but needless to say, it's awesome! I walked past the Empire State Building on my way to work this morning and nearly wet my pants. Also, my apartment is across the street from Central Park. Literally across the street.

Work is good so far. Everyone is really friendly, and the projects they're working on sound really exciting! My boss actually gave me and the other intern tickets to the Yankees game today, which was pretty awesome (the Yankees won). Anyway, kind of a short random update.

New hero: http://www.thesartorialist.com/photos/52710Bike06610Web.jpg

I want to make these: http://smittenkitchen.com/2010/06/root-beer-float-cupcakes/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+smittenkitchen+(smitten+kitchen)

this was me in high school: http://xkcd.com/747/

These are tea towels, and they are ADORABLE:

http://www.todryfor.com/towel.asp?id=66

http://www.todryfor.com/towel.asp?id=189

http://www.todryfor.com/towel.asp?id=191

And that is all.

The Gorgeous Gorge

2010-05-27T13:34:00.000-07:00

Since I’ll be leaving Oregon soon, Jessica and I took a trip down the Columbia River gorge so I could get my fill of green. It was BEAUTIFUL. We started in Troutdale and got on the Historic Highway and drove past dozens of waterfalls. There are 66 waterfalls in The Gorge – some small, some big (like Multnomah). We mostly stopped for three: Latourell Falls, Shepperd’s Dell Falls, and Multnomah Falls, of course!

The drive itself was stunning, surrounded by forest, catching glimpses of the Columbia River and the occasional flash of a waterfall. To give you a taste of the loveliness, I’ve put together a collage-o’-green:

At Latourell Falls, I decided I’d get as close as possible to the base, which was cool because the wind the waterfall generated was pretty intense. I also got completely soaked by spray, though. :)

Multnomah Falls was beautiful, as always, and Jessie and I took turns taking pictures of each other up on the bridge. Here are my favorites:

(Jessica, lookin' cute)

(Me being a dork)

All in all it was a lovely trip and the perfect way to see some of the gorgeous Oregon landscape before leaving for New York City. The best part was that I got to spend some fun time with Jessica!

The Dead Poets Society

2010-03-13T10:50:00.000-08:00

Last night Kelsey, Jessie and I had a double feature that also included us eating soooo much little Caesars. We watched ‘The Dead Poets Society,’ which I had never seen before, and I decided it is one of my new favorite movies. It was pretty emotional, though. Particularly at this part:

Robin Williams was phenomenal, although sometimes he was quite crazy, like in the scene below.

Also, I couldn’t get over how tiny and adorable Robert Sean Leonard was!

Afterward, we watched ‘The Devil Wears Prada,’ which was a night lighthearted follow-up after the heavy experience of ‘Dead Poets.’ Although, it led to us wondering: Anne Hathaway’s mouth is enormous, but it seemed extra enormous in ‘Alice in Wonderland.’ Did they digitally make her mouth larger, like they did with Helena Bonham Carter’s forehead, or is her mouth actually just that big?

Engagement Photos

2009-10-18T17:28:00.000-07:00

No, not of me. I actually took some engagement photos on Saturday.
These two seriously deserve to be together. After a rocky relationship, my roommate Maren will {finally} be getting married to her perfect guy. They are so cute together, and Kelsey and I were more than happy to take their engagement photos. Plus, Kelsey and I were co-conspirators in setting things up on the night Blake popped the question,
so we feel an invested interest in their success as a couple :P

Basically, we just took pictures while they were cute all over the place. We just said, "Stand by that tree and look cute" and they did, and we took pictures. Here are a few of my favorites:

Burberry ad, all the way.

We took these pictures up at Sundance, where Maren and Blake first fell in love. The fall colors were beautiful! I was just glad it hadn't snowed up here yet.

It was a struggle and a half getting this picture, haha.

This pictures is true love!

Okay, before you judge me, this next picture was not for serious, haha. Kelsey and I are always making fun of tacky engagement photos, so, of course, given the opportunity, we HAD to take a few. This was my favorite (and, sadly, I have actually seen someone use this exact pose as their engagement photo):"Yep, this is my ring. It's obviously more important than either of our faces."

All in all, it was such a fun experience, and I can't wait for Maren and Blake's wedding in December!

Crème brûlée

2009-08-23T21:25:00.000-07:00

Kelsey and I had a cooking adventure. It started like this.

Kelsey: "I want to bake something"
Me: "Yeah, something delicious."
Kelsey: "Like creme brulee, haha, j/k."
Me: "...let's do it."

We looked up the recipe, and discovered that all we were missing was chocolate chips and whipping cream (which we got from Smith's), and some ramekins. Note: We did not in fact know what ramekins were, or how they worked, so we figured mugs would work as effective substitutes.

This is me lining the "ramekins" with chocolate. Also, it meant that I ended up eating a lot of melted chocolate. Mmmm...

Then we made the creamy custard stuff that goes inside:

Kelsey did an A+ job at stirring.

And we looked gross from being at the pool.Finished! It had to bake for quite a while, and then afterward it was supposed to chill for something like FOUR HOURS, so we stuck it in the freezer for a bit and then ate it.
It turned out pretty delicious, actually.

Crafts!

2009-04-05T15:30:00.000-07:00

Perhaps it's just because it's spring, but I am feeling so happy and sunshine-y! All I want to do is plant flowers, wear bright colors, and do arts and crafts all day. Two days ago I made some adorable paper crafts--homemade envelopes, stationary, mailing labels, etc. I write a lot of letters, and I'm excited to use them!
I found inspiration with some fun templates and printables.
I especially had fun making the matching stationary. I just printed a second envelope and cut out bits of the pattern, glued them on, and used a ruler to make the lines.

Here's another little craft I did yesterday: This is a baby shower gift for my cousin, who has a little girl due this May. I didn't have wrapping paper or ribbon, so I improvised with grocery sacks, hemp twine, and shopping bags.

I found the pattern for the pom poms here. It just uses plastic bags! I have millions lying around anyway.

Then, to make my "wrapping paper", I just took used a paper grocery sack from Albertson's. I cut out the bottom and along one side so that I had a long rectangle of brown paper, then I crumpled and re-crumpled it over and over until it was all soft and wrinkly.
I wrapped up the present, tied it with hemp, stuck the pom poms on top, and used some of the leftover brown paper to make a tag. Voila! Isn't it cute? And basically made from recyclable materials.

Wedding Blogs

2009-04-05T13:41:00.000-07:00

I have lately fallen hopelessly in love with bride blogs (don't judge me). I especially love ones that show entire weddings by real couples. Cute stories, lots of flowers, and pretty dresses? What could be better! Anyway, I finally broke down and subscribed to a bunch of blogs on my RSS feeds. After sifting through many wonderful and addictive blogs, I boiled it down to a few favorites:

The Bride's Cafe - Probably my favorite. Gorgeous weddings, as captured by pro photographers (so the pictures are always beautiful). Lots of modern and non-traditional weddings.
Style Me Pretty - This shows whole weddings, like Bride's Cafe. Some really cute rustic weddings!
Snippet & Ink - This has some really cute wedding ideas. It posts daily, some real weddings, some just cute ideas.
{ritzy bee blog} - Some of these posts are just general adorableness, not necessarily weddings. They have cute craft/decoration/detail ideas for home as well as weddings.
Green Wedding Shoes - Yet more cute weddings. Like most of these, it posts daily. I found what may very well be my dream dress here.

I warn you, wedding blogs become addicting almost immediately.
Enjoy!

A newfound love

2009-02-17T14:44:00.000-08:00

So, I have a bit of a new obsession. I'm looking into a program for next winter, which takes students to D.C. and sets them up with internships in their field. The only problem is I'd have to save up some money, so I've started looking at scholarships again, going back to FastWeb and college-scholarships and college board and stuff.

In any case, I've found a new site that is really quite interesting. It's called Scholarship Points (http://www.scholarshippoints.com/). You basically do little activities and earn points, which you can use to enter scholarships. The activities are pretty cool, actually, like reading articles about student loans, checking out FAFSA, taking surveys, etc. It's kind of fun.

The thing I like about it, though, is that the scholarships you enter are mostly drawings (you use your points as entries) so it doesn't take a lot of time, and you're not competing for who has the highest GPA or lowest annual income or anything. Everyone has the same chance, so it's almost like... lottery-style? For this months I entered two scholarships worth $1,000, one for $2,500, and one for $10,000, and all I had to do is take surveys and junk. It's pretty cool. Plus then you don't have to write a bunch of essays or fill out ten thousand applications. I guess it is just leaving it to chance though, which could be a good or a bad thing. Meh.

Anyway, I'd recommend it. We'll see if I win anything, haha.

Conundrum

2009-01-24T16:04:00.000-08:00

Whew! Haven't blog'd in a while. Long story short: I made it home (after a few more cancellations, ending in Delta putting me up in a hotel for the night), had a rockin' good time, slept in every day, ate too much, etc.

Now I'm back in school! I love Oregon--I'm convinced the Northwest is Utopia--but it's nice to be home in Provo again.

Okay, now for my dilemma:
I have long been looking forward to the upcoming adaptation of Sherlock Holmes, which is coming out later this year. It has ROBERT DOWNEY JR. cast as Sherlock Holmes, which basically means that it's going to be hardcore and awesome. I mean, come on. IRON MAN playing Holmes. As if that weren't enough, Mr.-unbelievably-attractive-and-debonaire-Jude Law is playing Dr. Watson. What a duo! So unexpected, and yet I anticipate it to be genius.

I am frankly in love with Sherlock Holmes. I've read every case, as well as seen them depicted by both Jeremy Brett and Basil Rathbone (Don't ask me which one is more awesome. There's no way I could ever decide). The Great Mouse Detective was, and continues to be, one of my favorite movies. I mean, come on. My roommate and I went as Holmes and Watson for Halloween.

So. That being said, you'd think that nothing, nothing could get in the way of me and the midnight premier of Sherlock Holmes, wouldn't you? Well, my loyalty was tested when I found out that Sherlock Holmes was being released on the same day as NEW MOON. November 20th.

Good fan that I am, I decided ahead of time that I'd just pull a double feature. Sherlock Holmes at midnight (because let's face facts, it takes priority over Twilight) and then New Moon at 3am.

BUT, here's the kicker. It turns out the midnight release of Sherlock has been bumped up to Nov. 13th, so no worries! I guess that's what I get for trying to plan my life 10 months in advance. :P

A little bit stranded, but morale is high!

2008-12-21T14:41:00.000-08:00

I haven't seen my family in 189 days (who's counting), so what's one more, eh?

My flight, which was supposed to leave yesterday, was canceled. Wasn't I just speculating about airport catastrophes? Haha. In any case, It wasn't Utah that screwed up this time - from what the airline told me, the runway at PDX is basically a skating rink right now. Ice makes it hard to land planes.

So the new plan is that I come home tomorrow. All of my climactic countdown-ing was for nay. If all goes well I'll arrive in Portland at 4:04 pm.

Although I am really sad to not be home already, here are the consolation prizes:

1) My amazing boyfriend, Scott, postponed his trip home to stay with me while I'm stranded. When I first found out my flight was canceled, I was borderline distraught (I'm not going to lie, I had a little cry, too), but he was over in minutes to give me a hug and cheer me up. He spent most of yesterday and today hanging out with me, even though I was being totally boring doing homework and cleaning, rather than going home himself.

2) My roommate, Hailey, also leaves tomorrow, so I'm not alone in the apartment. Also, this is really the last chance I have to spend time with her. Once she leaves, I probably won't see her for a few years, so it's nice to have a couple more days with her. We've been watching movies and bonding and being ridiculous.

3) It's probably better I didn't fly Saturday. The weather sounded pretty treacherous. In fact, I had just said a prayer, praying for a safe trip home, and literally minutes later I found out my flight was canceled. I'm not going to complain if God's lookin' out for me.

4) I'll still get home in time for Tia's Christmas party, so, as long as we're not all snowed into our houses, I'll get to see all of my high school friends!

5) My sister is picking me up from the airport (something she might not have been able to do if I'd come in Saturday), and we'll have a chance to hang out one-on-one.

So basically, my morale = good.

Let it snow

2008-12-11T08:59:00.000-08:00

NINE DAYS UNTIL I GO HOME FOR CHRISTMAS!

Unfortunately, that means I have only a couple of days until finals week. *shudder*

On a more serious note, when I flew home for Christmas last year, I was stuck on the tarmac for a good two hours or more due to weather conditions. My plane was de-iced twice. Then we had to wait until the runway was sufficiently salted. Last winter was pretty brutal as far as snow went - we were bombarded with it as early as September, and there was a good six inches of snow *still* on the ground when I left for summer break at the end of April.

I know, Canada and Siberia, I know, I shouldn't complain. Screw you.

My point is that for the last three days, the temperature has been averaging between 25-35 degrees Fahrenheit. Snow may very well be imminent. I hope I don't get snowed in at the airport. That would be super-mondo-sad face. Listening to the same 12 Mannheim Steamroller Christmas songs on a loop, rueing the fact that SLC doesn't have free wifi, eating all of my meals at Sbarro, Manchu Wok, or Starbucks (oh, and 'On-the-fly Urban Market', of course), and playing all of those dumb sociology mind-games you're supposed to play with strangers (sitting right next to them even if there's lots of open seats around, doing odd things in elevators, etc.).

In any case, I'm really excited to go home - impending airport disasters or no. The only sad thing is that my roommate is going back to Australia after this semester, so basically won't ever see her again! I don't tend to make it to Australia very often.

Merry Christmas!

Twilight at Midnight

2008-11-21T12:27:00.000-08:00

TWILIGHT.

I have to say, the Twilight movie was amazing. Quite well-done, and very well-adapted. I think we can all agree that certain movies, aka Harry Potter, were crap at following the books, but Twilight accomplished it most excellently.

I honestly was preparing myself for pure cheese covered in corn, and - I kid you not - I thought Edward was literally going to be covered in glitter due to low budget issues, but... it was fantastic! The casting was perfect. I wouldn't have changed hardly anything, with the exception of Jacob Black's wig (HEINOUS! I was more scared of that wig than I was of James).

For your amusement, here is the breakdown of the audience - roughly:
Total seats in theater: 1,960
Number of empty seats: 0
Percent who were female: 92% (I was surprised at how many guys there were, actually.)
Percent wearing twilight t-shirts: at least 40%
Number of capes seen: 2 (one was red and sparkly, though, so that counts as extra)
Average age: 12-16 yrs.
Number of morbidly obese people seen: 14 or so
Number of people who went strait to IHOP after the movie: 44

Number of times we had to listen to David Archuleta's Crush while waiting for the movie to start: 19.
Granted, we were in our seats for about 3 1/2 hours before the movie started, but still, that means Crush was played about 5 times an hour.

Oh, just some other quick facts.

Numbers aren't concrete yet, but last night, in midnight showings alone, Twilight is reported to have made "north of $7 million." It's predicted that it'll hit $60 million over the weekend. (Dateline Hollywood)

Wednesday Morning, the day before the movie came out, 2,000 midnight showings were sold out across the country.

As of Friday morning, Fandango was selling 5 Twilight tickets per second.

Twilight took #3 for most advanced tickets sold on Fandango. It beat out Harry Potter, Pirates of the Caribbean, and Lord of the Rings. #1 and #2 are Star Wars III and Dark Knight, respectively.

34% of polled moviegoers said they took time out of school or work to see Twilight.

If Twilight made $7 million just on midnight showings last night, it's well on track to make bank. At the West Jordan, UT theater alone (where I saw the movie), there were 7 showings last night. Only three of these were midnight screens (12:01, 12:02, and 12:03). The others were in increments of 15 minutes after that but they still looked like full showings.

Basically, I LOVED the movie. I was very much pleasantly surprised, and I have very few complaints. Catherine Hardwicke did a fantastic job, the actors were phenomenal, and I am still jumping up and down like a little girl.

YAY TWILIGHT.

I'm not even ashamed.

2008-11-20T08:43:00.000-08:00

So the movie 'Twilight' comes out tonight at midnight. I'm not going to lie - I'm going. Three hours early. In costume. Not only that, but all 6 showings in town were sold out, as were the theaters in American Fork, Orem, Springville, and Payson. So... just to make my day that much more fangirly, I'm driving an hour up to West Jordan, just to see Twilight.

That's right, I'm a Twilight fan (or Twilighter, Twi-hard, fanpire, whatever classification your prefer. My personal favourite is 'Cullenist'). Honestly, it's not something I generally broadcast. One of those guilty pleasure things. Like my love of Gwen Stefani.

Barstool Economics

2008-11-13T08:55:00.000-08:00

This is a really cool analogy (originally posted by my brother) that I thought cleared up a lot of confusion about how proportional taxes work. It comes from a book by David R. Kamerschen.

"For anyone who doesn't get how unfair our tax system is, here's an awesome analogy. For those of you who do get it, it's just an awesome read!

Bar Stool Economics by David R. Kamerschen, Ph.D.

Suppose that every day, ten men go out for beer and the bill for all ten comes to $100. If they paid their bill the way we pay our taxes, it would go something like this:

The first four men (the poorest) would pay nothing.
The fifth would pay $1.
The sixth would pay $3.
The seventh would pay $7.
The eighth would pay $12.
The ninth would pay $18.
The tenth man (the richest) would pay $59.

So, that's what they decided to do. The ten men drank in the bar every day and seemed quite happy with the arrangement, until one day, the owner threw them a curve. 'Since you are all such good customers, he said, 'I'm going to reduce the cost of your daily beer by $20. Drinks for the ten now cost just $80.
The group still wanted to pay their bill the way we pay our taxes so the first four men were unaffected. They would still drink for free. But what about the other six men - the paying customers? How could they divide the $20 windfall so that everyone would get his 'fair share?' They realized that $20 divided by six is $3.33. But if they subtracted that from everybody's share, then the fifth man and the sixth man would each end up being paid to drink his beer. So, the bar owner suggested that it would be fair to reduce each man's bill by roughly the same amount, and he proceeded to work out the amounts each should pay.
And so:

The fifth man, like the first four, now paid nothing (100% savings).
The sixth now paid $2 instead of $3 (33%savings).
The seventh now pay $5 instead of $7 (28%savings).
The eighth now paid $9 instead of $12 (25% savings).
The ninth now paid $14 instead of $18 (22% savings).
The tenth now paid $49 instead of $59 (16% savings).

Each of the six was better off than before. And the first four continued to drink for free. But once outside the restaurant, the men began to compare their savings.

'I only got a dollar out of the $20,'declared the sixth man. He pointed to the tenth man,' but he got $10!'

'Yeah, that's right,' exclaimed the fifth man. 'I only saved a dollar, too. It's unfair that he got ten times more than I!'

'That's true!!' shouted the seventh man. 'Why should he get $10 back when I got only two? The wealthy get all the breaks!'

'Wait a minute,' yelled the first four men in unison. 'We didn't get anything at all. The system exploits the poor!'

The nine men surrounded the tenth and beat him up.

The next night the tenth man didn't show up for drinks, so the nine sat down and had beers without him. But when it came time to pay the bill, they discovered something important. They didn't have enough money between all of them for even half of the bill!

And that, boys and girls, journalists and college professors, is how our tax system works. The people who pay the highest taxes get the most benefit from a tax reduction. Tax them too much, attack them for being wealthy, and they just may not show up anymore. In fact, they might start drinking overseas where the atmosphere is somewhat friendlier.

For those who understand, no explanation is needed.
For those who do not understand, no explanation is possible."

It's no wonder that America's wealthy want to take their money overseas. If we keep beating them up, pretty soon they're going to jump ship and we'll finally realized, "Crap, they were paying most of the tab, weren't they?"

I'm for a flat tax, personally.

I FORGOT ABOUT THIS!

2008-10-04T22:35:00.000-07:00

I used to watch this 14 times a day and LAUGH EVERY TIME. How on earth did I forget about this? It's pure gold!

EL OH EL.

NaNoWriMo

2008-10-04T19:32:00.000-07:00

November is National Novel Writing Month. It is a beautiful thing, and anyone who has a creative cell in their brain should try it just for fun!

NaNoWriMo home page

The gist is this: in the month of November, you write a novel. Yup, you have 30 days to write 50,000 words. It's exhaustingly exhilarating. I think I've only ever finished once, but it's good fun, even if you don't make it to the end. And when you do make it to the end, it's like you've just invented a time machine and all of your dreams are about to come true. That's how good it feels.

Every year around this time, I start to get that same feeling - the jittery, slightly nauseous feeling of anticipation, and the back of my mind is occupied with the knowledge that NaNoWriMo starts in less than a month. I get an adrenaline rush just thinking about it.

Halloween!

2008-10-03T08:47:00.000-07:00

In short, I love it. I am going as Sherlock Holmes this year, my awesome roommate is going as Watson, and I'm currently planning the most epic Halloween party. I need to decide which scary movies to watch, but apart from that I'm also doing bobbing for apples (yes!), eating doughnuts off a string, maybe frosting cookies, dunno. The party is definitely going to spill onto the quad, though, because I don't have a lot of room in my apartment. I figure the messy/wet stuff should go outside anyway.

And, of course, like any good Provo bash, I'm going to have a Mocktail bar! I'm going out today to get a bunch of mixes so I can practice my bar tending skills. Margaritas and daiquiris are always easy to do virgin, and sparkling cider is always good for 'champagne', but what the heck do you do to a martini to make it virgin? It IS the alcohol. I figure maybe some fruit juice/extract and sprite, and hang a piece of fruit on the side. And then I'll have some sort of pumpkin cocktail, just to be seasonal. I already got a ridiculous amount of cocktail glasses (courtesy of DI. What would I do without thriftstores?)

Aaaannnddd.... that's my life.

Kristin weighs in on the big issues

2008-09-29T18:05:00.001-07:00

This *ahem* press release comes courtesy of my roommate, Hailey. After the House of Reps turned down the bailout bill, we basically vented our spleens at each other. Apparently she managed to glean some quote-worthy material from my rant, because she wrote the following summary of our conversation, and emailed it to her mum:

'Kristin weighs in on the big issues'
By Hailey Oates

since we got wind of the news that the government turned down plans to bail out america in its massive economic crisis, kristin my room mate has uttered many pearlers in her rage at the house or representatives.

here are my favourites, for your amusement:

When I told Kristin that many of the Republican leaders who voted 'no' to the bailout plan because they were worried it would be an act of political suicide in light of the fact that their constituents effectively bullied them because they opposed the bill, Kristin said, "oh, let me cuddle your feelings... FIX MY ECONOMY!!"

Apparently Barack Obama was so sure (as was everyone else!!!!) that the bailout plan would be passed by the house of reps that he only wrote a speech talking about how "today, democrats and republicans in washington have agreed on an emergency rescue plan that is our best and only way to prevent an economic catastrophe"... he didnt even have a backup speech he was that sure the bill would be passed. so, kristin helped by amending the speech herself. it went as follows... "today in congress, we crapped ALL over ourselves. THREW it at the wall. and voted no." (this one's my personal favourite, hope you're laughing really hard... at least she didnt say 'fart', you hate that word)

further declarations of distress fom Kristin:

"cry me a very expensive river, congress!"

"can we just move to Canada?"

hope you enjoyed.

lovely garden photos.

Love Hailey

And there you have it: my thoughts on the recent economic crisis.
High five, Dow Jones!
Punch to the face, House of Reps!

Hammock-Land

2008-09-29T14:44:00.000-07:00

Say there was this massively long hammock, that went from Ireland to Puerto Rico, and people could just hop on from one end to the other, and hang out in the trans-Atlantic hammock? Peoples of the world would be united by good times, plus it would be a cool way to travel. Hop in at the Irish coast, sort of slide to the middle, and then climb the rest of the way, get out, and take a little vacation in the Caribbean!

What if there were people who stayed in the hammock forever? Just chillin' in the middle, selling souvenirs to people who were coming and going. And then what if those people met other people, and fell in love and got married and started a family, right there in the hammock? What if the population grew, and they formed a system of government, and the UN recognized them as their own country: Hammock-Land?

I'll tell you what would happen: Happily ever after, that's what.

...

2008-09-28T18:07:00.000-07:00

I figured it was time I entered the blogosphere.