9/30/2013

So, this week we got transfer calls. It's been ridiculously confusing with the visas coming, then not coming, then coming Again. My head is going to explode! haha So, this is what's happening with me. I will be staying in Vejle with Sister Ripplinger and Sister Orgill will be going to Roskilde to open the area. I am super excited for her, but i will definitely miss her! It'll feel weird without her. This is where it gets confusing. Sister Ripplinger and i are for sure staying, but then one of the sisters didn't get their visa, so we were going to be a tri with sister Mcvey until the last visa came, but then we heard that the last visa came, so no more tri! Yay! My Whole mission has been in a tri so far, so it'll be nice to be a normal companionship. But then, this morning, we got a letter from the mission office that we were going to be a tri with sister Rigby... So, we don't really know what's going on. So, this week will be a bit interesting haha

This week has been kind of crazy! All of our Schedules have been really off with the Whole visa and transfer mess going on. Then, we got a piano from one of the Ward members... kind of. They couldn't get it up the stairs to our Apartment (good ol narrow European staircases) so right now it's sitting in our neighbors garage... haha hopefully they don't mind!

Yesterday was kind of exciting for us. Number one, sister Orgill is leaving, so we had tons of Pictures, goodbye hugs/handshakes, and a few tears were shed (the Ward just LOVES sister Orgill) Number two, we may have guilted a less active that we have been working with into coming to church because it was sister Orgill's last week here:)Kind of a quiestionable tactic, but it was our only hope. We have been working with him for the last six weeks. (he is the guy we went to legoland with a couple weeks ago). This week we decided to get him involved with our missionary Work. He came with us on Tuesday to Jelling and Give to visit less actives in the Ward. He felt so good that he could help out and we promised him Blessings left and right. Well, i think it worked. It was totally worth listening to him sing "crazy horses" by the Osmonds for 4 hours straight... haha So when we guilted him into coming to church on sunday, we only had to beg a Little, and he came! I know he felt the spirit while he was there. At one point, i looked over at him, and he was trying to hide the fact that he was tearing up. It was kind of strange because he's this HUGE guy (everyone says he looks like he's our body guard) and i have never seen him calm. But, the spirit was so strong at church, and the members were so welcoming to him, that he told everyone "See you NeXT week!" We are thrilled! It is so wonderful to see that testimony rekindled in an individual. IT's one of the greatest feelings to know that they have that light inside of them and it is starting to shine Again.

Well, that was my week in a nutshell. Busier than ever, but oh so fullfilling. I hope that everyone is well and i hope you all have a fantastic week!

Kærlighed,

Søster Erin Handley

9/29/2013

Hej alle!

I hope this email finds you all well! Thank you for your love, support and prayers this week! I really can feel that extra help as i go through my week!

THis week was a crazy one! We were barely in our area. We had zone training in Odense, which was an amazing experince, then we had the opportunity to go to the Copenhagen temple while we were in Copenhagen to take a language test to renew our visas. I love the temple! (For those of you WHO have been through the temple, i would highly recommend that you watch The Blessings of the House of the Lord by S. Michael Wilcox. It's from BYU Education week 1999. Amazing talk!)

Our week ended absolutely wonderfully with the baptism of Anne. Anne has a really neat story. My first week here in Vejle, at Ward conference our bishop asked all of us missionaries to Work to find someone WHO was ready to receive the gospel and be baptized on the 21st of September. He had prayed about that day and he said that day felt right. So, we went to Work. We taught lessons left and right and invited all of our investigators to baptism. none of them accepted, except for Annelise. They had found her a few days before i got to Vejle and had invited her to the baptism of an 8 year old boy in the Ward. She loved the baptism and the feeling she got from it. At the baptism, we challenged her to be baptized on the 21st of September. She told us that she would love that! So, we taught her all the lessons and introduced her to many members. The members were so welcoming and so helpful to Anne. She feels as though she is part of the Family now. She's had members calling her, texting her and answering all of her questions. It was perfect! So, after six weeks of working with Anne, she was baptized. It was a wonderful day and the spirit was so strong!  Nothing beats the feeling of helping to bring one of our Heavenly Father's children back to him. Now, I am not by any Means taking any sort of credit because i am not the teacher here, but it was such a Blessing to me to be able to be a part of helping Anne feel the spirit and to have the Blessings of the gospel in her life.

Well, that was my week! I hope everyone has a fantastic week!

MVH

Søster Handley

9/16/2013

Hej Alle!

I hope everyone had a fantastic week this week! I'm sorry if i didn't get to answer some emails. Our time this week was a bit short because we are going to legoland! Yay! THe best part is, we're going with a less-active hoping to build that relationship and get him comfortable enough with talking about the gospel so they'll come back to church!

This week was kind of up and Down with us dropping an investigator for the first time. IT was kind of a strange feeling, but it had to be done. He just wasn't progressing and only wanted our visits for the "hygge" (Danish Word that has no direct English translation. The closest thing to it is "cozy" or that good feeling you get after a good visit with Family or friends).

On Tuesday we got to see the queen of Denmark. That was a neat experience! She was right infront of me, close enough for me to touch her! We got lots of great Pictures of that :)

This week we had a wonderful experience with working with the members and receiving referrals. So far this transfer we have only received one refferal. We have been working so hard with the members to build their trust and to get them excited to do missionary Work. Many of them have started to share their testimonies with colleagues, friends, neighbors, Family, etc. but it seemed that once they shared their testimony, they were done. But, that is not the case! So we prayed  and prayed and brainstormed and asked and asked. Nothing was coming of it until one day, we put together a spiritual thought for a Family we were having dinner with that night. We used D&C 18:10, 15-16, the Starfish poem about making a difference, and some real life experiences. We shared it with this Family. The spirit was so strong as we shared and bore testimony. At the end of this appointment they gave us two referrals! We were just blown away. But, we did not stop working to receive more referrals. We visited other families in the Ward and challenged them to think of one person that we could teach in their home. We have many potential referrals we will be following up on. Then, out of the blue we received two media referrals, and yesterday in church, one of the members sought us out to give us a referral that he is excited to help us teach. That is a total of 5 referrals received this week. We will be working very hard to contact them all as soon as we can. It is difficult because they are all spread out over out area, but we feel so blessed to have received them and feel that they are prepared. We are excited to help meet and teach them.

So, NeXT week is transfers. As of right now, we have no idea what will be happening, but we do know that our companionship will definitely be affected by it since we are the tri. I will let everyone know as soon as i know. I hope you all have a fantastic week!

Kærlighed,

Søster Handley

 We got to see the queen of Denmark! Isn't that neat? I got a great Picture, which i attached to this email. It was so cool! She had very Little security, so i was standing right in front of her! I could have reached out and touched her. So neat! 

We saw the queen in Jelling, so while we were there we saw the Jelling Stone. It was so neat! That is the Christening of Denmark. It's got a Picture of Jesus on it. You have to look really really hard to see it, but it's there. Pretty cool, huh? 

9/9/2013

Hej Alle! I hope everything is well with everyone! I'd like to start out today by thanking everyone for their support and their enthusiasm about missionary Work. It gives me great joy to hear and see all of the great missionary miracles happening everywhere because of the faith and excitement of the members. Keep up the good Work!

This week was pretty crazy with splits, zone training, lessons and the baptism of an 8 year old girl in the Ward. Literally every second was planned out for us. But, as it is in the life of a missionary, lessons fell through this week and not everything went quite as we had planned for it to go, but great Things come of those inconveniences.

One of these inconvenient moments happened when we were on the bus going to a members house for dinner. A lesson had fallen apart just before that, so we were a bit early coming to the area. We were sitting together on the bus in a Little area with four seats. A man got on the bus and took the fourth seat by us. He asked us why we were so happy. A missionary's favorite question! We explained to him who we were and why we were here. He really liked our answer and proceeded to tell us about how he was trying to find God in his life Again. As we talked (this was an extremely long bus ride) he told us about some of the trials he has been through in the past two years. He's had it pretty rough! This man broke Down crying in this conversation. We could tell that he was embarrassed by this, but we just comforted him and let him tell us what was going on. We talked to him about the plan of salvation and how God has a plan for every one of us, and that God loves him as an individual. He told us that it felt amazingly good when we told him that, so he invited us to come over and teach him more. We called him the NeXT day to set up the appointment and he was just so thrilled that we were serious about it! I love those tender moments like that. It makes me so excited to be a missionary and to bring people this glad message of the restored gospel.

One other story from this week. Saturday night my companion randomly fell ill. One minute she was fine, then the NeXT she had a really high fever. We decided to go in early so she could rest up. As she was getting ready for bed she had a sudden case of the chills. She was shaking so bad she couldn't even talk and could barely move. She almost passed out a couple of times, so Sis Ripplinger and I got her into bed. We took her temperature and it was 39.5 C. Thanks to the conversion Tool on our phone, we discovered that her temperature was 103 F. Not good! We got her chills to calm Down, then we called the mission nurse for help. She gave us a few Things to do to help, then made sure we were going to get a priesthood Blessing. We called the bishop WHO sent two close priesthood holders over. They gave her a Blessing and almost instantly she said she was feeling better. Her fever was still 103, but she was able to get to sleep after that. Søs Ripplinger and i didn't get much sleep that night because we were watching søs Orgill so closely. We had the night doctor's number out and ready just in case. But, Sunday morning, Søs Orgill woke up and felt 100%! No fever, nothing. her only complaint was that she was a little tired, but she was up and her happy, morning person self. That, to me, is a huge testimony of the power of the priesthood. There is no way that she could have gone from so sick with such a high fever, to feeling completely normal the NeXT morning. I am so grateful that we have access to the priesthood, literally God's power, here on the earth today. I feel so blessed that i can have access to that after just a phone call. It really is amazing that any worthy male WHO has made the baptismal covenants can administer that power. I am so grateful for that power in my life. It hit me this week just how amazing it is.

I hope everyone has a wonderful week this week!

Kærlighed,

Søster Erin Handley

 At the midevil festival with a fun German couple

My companions and i while we were waiting for a bus! Yay! Someone told us that we are like Napoleon ice cream. We've got Vanilla (me) Strawberry (Søs. Ripplinger) and chocolate (Søs Orgill) Fun! Haha

 Me next to a canon on the ramparts in Fredericia above the moat. SO cool!

The last is me with the meat Loaf i made all by myself with no recipe. I was pretty proud of myself haha

I hope you enjoy!

9/2/2013

This week was fantastic! We had so many miracles this week, and even squeezed in a fun day! It was fantastic!

First for the fun stuff. We got to go to a midevil festival this week. It was absolutely amazing! It took up almost a Whole block (When i say block, i mean bigger than temple Square sized block). They brought in dirt to cover up all the cement to make it as midevil as possible. Everyone there was dressed up, tourists and workers alike! My inner nerd came out. They were selling midevil wares everywhere. I almost bought a dress, but then decided that it's not missionary appropriate... too bad... My favorite part of the Whole thing was the jousting! I felt like i was in a knight's tale! It was fantastic! The knights did all of the jousting games and they held it like they would a real jousting tournament back in the 16th Century. The coolest part of the Whole thing was that a lot of the Buildings they were using were originally built in that era... awesome!

So that was fun. We got lots of fun Pictures and had a blast with the Whole thing.

This week we had one miracle story that i would like to share. IT starts off with quite the disapointment, which is why i think i like it so much. It's always darkest before the dawn, right? Well, anyway, we were a bit early to an appointment, so we decided to go visit a lady in the area who had previously rejected us. On our way, we saw one of our other investigators. We decided to go up and say hi. We were not expecting what came our way. He went from being so excited about our NeXT appointment when we last saw him, so telling us that he no longer wanted to meet with us! NO! We were devastated! We were so excited for his appointment, and we had such high hopes for him.

After getting dropped, we continued on to this lady's Apartment. we expected her to just reject us like last time, but when we knocked on the door, she was so excited to see us, and she let us in! We came in and began talking to her. after about 30 seconds she broke Down crying. We didn't quite understand what was going on, but then she explained to us that she had just gotten in from the doctors where they told her that the cancer she has has spread to most of her vital organs. They don't know how she's still alive, but they told her not to expect to live any longer. But, she said that as soon as the doctors told her the news, she said she knew that there was a reason that she was still alive and there was something that was supposed to happen before she died. When we knocked on her door, she knew we would be the ones to help her. Well, we wanted to make another appointment with her, but the NeXT week was completely filled up. Literally every minute of every day has some sort of appointment or training or something. But, we remembered that we had just been dropped by our other investigator, which opened up an hour of the week. We offered to come back that day and time, and she said that was the only day she was home from the hospital. She is so excited and anxious to learn about the gospel and to see how we can help her. I am amazed at how the Whole situation worked out. Heavenly Father really does know his children and He knows exactly what they need at exactly what time. I am so  humbled by the Whole experience.

Well, i hope that everyone has a great week! Look for the tender mercies from our father in heaven and remember them. Love you all!

Kærlighed,

Søster Handley 

8/26/2013

This week has been a bit up and Down, but we'll focus on the positive this week :)

So, the great news. We have a baptismal date! :D I am crazy excited! It's with a lady that Sister Orgill and Hadley had met with once or twice before transfers happened. We've been calling her and texting her to keep in contact and answer questions. We invited her to the baptism of an 8 year old boy in the Ward and she loved it! We invited her to be baptized and she got so excited! We set a date for the 21st of September. She went around and told everyone that she was going to be baptized and that she was so excited! The only problem now is that the Dane's go all out with their baptisms, and i don't know if we missionaries can go all out like that for her. They had crazy amounts of food and a laminated program. It was crazy! But, i think she's just so excited to get baptized and recieve the holy ghost that i don't think it will matter.

So, the second counselor in the bishopric is crazy good with music. He can play just about any instrument he picks up! We had dinner with his Family last night, and they showed us all of their musical talent. It was amazing! As we were talking to them he mentioned that a band here in Denmark called him and they want him to be their pianist. Crazy! They're the Fenders, or the Fenors or something like that. It was pretty exciting. OUr second counselor might be famous!

THis week we had a tender mercy. Two, actually, in the same day. First, we were trying to find the houses of two less actives which were supposed to be on the same street. Their houses didn't exist, so we stopped to ask a lady WHO was outside if she could help us. She was so sweet! She and her daughter dropped everything they were doing to help us. They even ran inside to Google map it for us so we could see where they lived. It ended up being on the other side of town. It was so sweet! They were very helpful to us. Then, as we were leaving their house, we went to catch the bus. The bus stop we were trying to get to was a ways Down the street, but the bus was already coming! So we ran to catch the bus. We were definitely not going to make it, so the bus driver stopped and let us in. We got on, thanked him, of course, then we realized that the stop we were trying to get to didn't even exist! The bus driver was just kind and picked us up out of the kindness of his Heart. I was so touched by the generousity of both the bus driver and the Family that helped us out. I love all of the tender mercies our Heavely Father gives us :)

I hope everyone has a great week this week! Thanks for all of the letters and love and support i've gotten from everyone!

Kærlighed,

Søster Handley

8/19/2013

Hej Alle!

I hope you all had a wonderful week this week! Mine was pretty crazy with transfers and all that comes with that. Too many train rides with too much stuff!

This week i got transfered to Vejle. I am in another tri with Søster Ripplinger from Brigham city (she served in Odense before and was in my MTC Group) and Søster Orgill from Texas (she served in Vejle and was in the MTC Group right before mine, but came to Denmark one week before). I can tell that we are going to have a wonderful companionship and get a lot of Work done.

Vejle is wonderful! It is absolutely beautiful and a bit more modern that Aalborg. Some parts of it actually remind me of a really green salt lake. The members here are just perfect! They are all so excited for missionary Work! On sunday they all sought us out, introduced themselves and made sure we knew that we were welcome in the Ward. Most of them offered their services in one way or another. It was fantastic! I was just blown away by their support and excitement.

Yesterday i had the oppurtunity of speaking in sacrament meeting along with Søster Ripplinger and an elder that was just transfered here too. They told us 5 min before sacrament meeting started. Agh! And guess WHO was first. THis sister! So, i got up there, not really knowing what to say. But, when i started introducing myself, the Footsteps poem came to my mind. I happen to have a copy of it in Danish from Søster Christensen, so i pulled it out and read it (i just hope everyone could understand). The poem is about this man WHO has a dream that he could look back on his entire life and see that there were two sets of footsteps in the sand through most of his life. Those footsteps were the Savior's footsteps. But, the man noticed that during the hårdest parts of his life, there were only one set of footsteps. The man asks the Savior why this is since the Savior promises to be with us always. The Savior answers and says that during the times when there were only one set of footsteps, the Savior was carrying the man. I've read the poem a million times, in English, because i just love it. But, when i read it just then, in Danish, it hit me harder than ever before. All of a sudden i could look back on my life and realize all those times that were so hard for me and when i felt so alone, I wasn't. The Savior was right there, carrying me through my trials and helping me overcome. There was no way i could have gotten through some of those Things all by myself. The savior was the one helping me, carrying me through when i couldn't on my own. It was a great testimony builder for me to read and understand that.

Vejle has also come with a few interesting experiences. Like all the cute Little frogs we find! We've taken lots of Pictures with frogs :)

One day we got to the door of one of our investigators. We were there for a lesson and we were all ready and confident for this lesson. We knocked on his door and he yelled for us to come in. So, we opened the door and started in, but then we looked up and saw him in his bathroom door. He had just gotten out of the shower and decided to greet us. AGH! So we hurried and shut the door(didn't see anything, just so you know). A few seconds later he opened the door back up, this time in a towel and ushered us in. We just walked in with our eyes to the floor and waited for him to get changed. haha Welcome to Denmark! It was quite the experience! The good thing is, we had a great lesson with him and felt the spirit. He's excited for our lesson NeXT time, and he promises to be fully clothed before our appointment NeXT time-

Sorry about all the random Capitals. THis computer has a Little auto-correct thing that capitalizes and changes the spelling every time it thinks it needs to be changed. Kind of annoying, but nothing i can do about it since everything is in Danish haha

I hope everyone has a great week! Work hard and enjoy your summer!

Kærlighed,

Søster Erin Handley

To start with the questions:

Selina wants to know just how home sick you are?

Honestly, not very much. It's not that i don't miss you all and don't think about you, it's just that i'm here and i need to be here. IT just wouldn't feel right being home right now. Not to mention we are WAY too busy to even think! haha

Have you celebrated any holidays yet?

 We have celebrated Holidays like the 4th of July, but none of the Danish Holidays yet. There have been Danish Holidays while we've been here, but they're all celebrated late at night and may not be entirely missionary appropriate. But, once October-November comes that will change.

Have you been able to see the ocean much?

 We have driven by the ocean quite a bit, but haven't really seen it too much. We're much closer to the ocean here, so if we find a way there, we will definitely visit.

Have you seen many farms?

 There are farms everywhere! Right as you get outside the main city, it turns into farmland. Our Ward covers a lot of farms right now too. It's called the Fredericia Ward. We see lots of lambs and cows everywhere :) I like to tell people that we live on a farm and they love that, but when i say farm they think of a dairy farm or a potato farm, so i tell them it's a for fun farm :)

Do we send letters to a new address?

 I have only sent you the address to the mission office. They take all of the letters you send to there and forward them on to me wherever i am. I figured that is easiest for everyone and it only delays Things by a day.

How do you like your new companions?

 My new companions are great! one is from Brigham City and the other is from Texas. We get along really well and we all cam to the land at the same time, so that is fun. So far we're working together really well and i can tell that we'll get a lot of Work done. Oh, and they both love peanut butter :) This will be a great companionship! :)

Vejle is great. THe Ward is fantastic and they are all pumped up for missionary Work!  We live on the biggest hill in Vejle, and the hill is actually pretty big. Crazy! It's so steep that it is illegal to ride your bike on it haha. A member of the Ward wants to go to legoland with us one p-day. After we buy our bikes i think we're going to do it. She is the only member in her Family so it would be perfect to go with them.

I love you! Have a great week!

Kærlighed,

Erin

8/12/2013

Hej Alle!

I hope that this email finds you all well and happy. :)

We got transfer calls this week. We all know where we will be for the next 6 or so weeks of our lives :) That's happy! Søster Bishop is staying in Aalborg and Søster Hadley from our MTC group will be moving up from Vejle to be her companion. I will be moving down to Vejle to be companions with Søster Orgill and Søster Ripplinger. So, Søster Hadley and I will be switching places! haha The ward members are going to have so much fun with that! I will be in another tri because president says i'm good with working with people. This will be 8 companions in just over 4 months. Crazy! I don't know if i'll ever be in a normal companionship! haha I go down to Vejle Tuesday night.

This week was crazy busy! We had apointments every day this week, multiple a day. We haven't been busy like this for my whole mission! It's great! We haven't had any time to even think! IT has been fantastic. I hope it will be like this in Vejle! We met with Dorte again this week. She is such a strong person with such a great faith in Christ. The problem is that she doesn't think that she could be important as an individual to someone so important and so powerful. She's scared that it's too good to be true. But, i know in our lesson with her she felt God's love for her. Now it's up to her to recognize and accept. We also had lessons with Viktoria and a new investigator named Søren. Our lesson with Viktoria went really well. Søren is a new investigator we got off of a potential sheet. He is perfect! He was so open and so willing to read and to try out Moroni's promise in the last chapter of the Book of Mormon. Sadly, i will no longer be a part of teaching any of these wonderful people. But, there will be more wonderful people waiting for me in Vejle.

On thursday we had our zone training. Amazing, like always. It was all about listening and letting the Holy Ghost be the teacher. It reminded me of a quote given in a talk in the MTC (i can't remember who the original author of the quote was). "The problem with most teachers is that they think they are the teachers". So true! We can talk and talk all we want, but it doesn't do anyone any good unless the spirit is there and we let the spirit have silence so he can talk. It was an amazing conference. 

After conference we went bowling. It was a blast! Although, i did think it was kind of funny that we are all the way in Denmark with so many cool things to see all over the place, and we went bowling. haha But it was good fun. It was kind of strange, though, since we wore jeans to go bowling and we looked and felt like normal people... so strange... haha It was a blast! 

And thus was my week. I hope everyone has a great week this week! Work hard and be happy! Love you all!

Kærlighed,

8/5/2013

Oh boy, what a week! Lots of cool things happened this week and now everyone is coming home from summer vacation so now our schedule is going from empty to full! Yay! Every missionary's dream!

First little miracle of the week: We found gifflars for 2 kroner this week. 2 KRONER! That's unheard of! Usually one bag of gifflars, on sale, is 10 Kroner! I was so excited! Gifflars are a Swedish snack. They are like mini cinamon rolls, except a million times better. They have them in cinamon, chocolate, blueberry and, my favorite, vanilla. I was ecstatic that i could buy 5 bags of gifflars for the price of one. :D

This week we had an appointment with a girl named maria.She is so ready! Last sunday she paid fast offerings because she is not a member yet and wanted to pay tithing in some way. Crazy! She went to Festinord this year(an efy for young adults in the scandanavian countries). She was telling us at this eating appointment that she didn't want to leave because she wanted to feel like that all the time. We told her "you can when you have the gift of the holy ghost!" She really liked the sound of that! And, it gets better. She asked us to bring a Norwegian Book of Mormon. We found out that she wants to give it to a non-member cousin! She's not even a member and she's doing missionary work! The only problem now is that her mother doesn't want us to push her too hard so we can't invite her to baptism yet. Her mother is a member. Gah! But, her mom is a great member missionary. SHe's given us many refferals, so i can't complain. I can see that she just wants her daughter to be ready to accept because she wants her to have it in her life so bad. 

Another cool story is that we found a new investigator totally by accident! We were trying to find a less active's house, but i accidentally read the address wrong. We went to number 10 instead of 27. Kind of a dumb mistake, but totally inspired! They want us to come back and teach them about how we can be with our families forever! It's amazing how guidance comes and we don't even realize it.

I hope everyone has a wonderful week! Thanks for all the letters and emails of support from everyone! 

Kærlighed,

Søster Erin Handley 

7/29/2013

Hej alle!

This week was a pretty crazy week! Sister Christensen was on splits with all the sisters on Jylland and Fyn this week on splits because she is sister training leader.(Jylland is the big part of Denmark that attaches to Germany and Fyn is the island between Jylland and Sjealland, where Copenhagen is) So, that meant that Sister Bishop and i were all alone for a whole week. Agh! On top of that, we had all of two pappointments planned for the whole week. Two! Sister Bishop and i had to start with literally nothing and build up from that. Oh boy was it hard work, but we did it! We had lots of neat experiences too, like when we contacted people in the park and were able to communicate with them. We got turned down every time, but we never gave up :)

One neat experience we had was with a new investigator. The Elders found her and got her as a new investigator, but she is in our area and she is a single woman so it's easier and more practical for us to teach her. I am so glad that we have the oppurtunity to teach her! She is an inspiration to me! This lady has slowly been losing use of her legs over the past year or so because of a surgery gone bad. Now she is in a wheelchair and can't walk more than a couple of steps. You'd think that someone who went from 100% mobility to almost none in such a short amount of time would have a really hard time with it and would be bitter about it, but she is the happiest person i have ever met! Her attitude is that she can't control what's going on, so why worry? And God trusts her to have this trial in her life, so she feels honored that He can use her in her position. All she wants is to be able to help the people around her and she doesn't expect anything back. Amazing! As we sat and talked to her, she basically taught us a lesson instead of the other way around. Her knowledge of the scriptures was amazing and her understanding blew my mind! She was the sweetest lady with the biggest heart. I am so excited because we get to meet with her again tonight. I want to be like her one day and have the amazing attitude that she has.

This week we helped with a wedding. A couple in the ward was divorced a couple of years ago and got re-married on Saturday. We helped get everything ready for the wedding and reception. They had it outside the church under a few pretty white tents. It wasn't a big wedding, but it was absolutely gorgeous! And the ceremony was amazing. It was so cool to see two people who have had such a hard marriage re-commit to each other and to start fresh. They have three beautiful young daughters and now they are all one family together. I don't think i've ever seen a more beautiful sight than seeing them all standing together after the wedding. They got some really cute pictures of all of them after when it had started to rain. They were all under one big umbrella laughing at the rain. It was super smbolic because in Denmark, it is lucky for it to rain on your wedding day because weddings are joyful and if you can laugh and have joy in the rain, you can get through the hard times together. IT was perfect! I wish them the best of luck.

Well, that was my week. I hope everyone has a fantastic week!

Kærlighed,

Søster Erin Handley

 To answer your quetsions...

What kinds of food are you eating?

I am eating lots of Danish foods, like pork patties wish gravy, kartofler (potatoes, but they have mini potatoes here. Love them!), amazing hamburgers (they make their buns and pickles fresh, and all of the greens are fresh out of the garden), hotdogs (not like american hot dogs), and yesterday we ate some vietnamese food. So good! The only problem is my skirts that used to be big on me are becoming smaller and smaller... haha Hopefully we can bike in my next area so i can fit into my clothes!

Have you eaten anything you don’t like, like Mexican or sea food?

I've liked most of the stuff we've eaten, actually. Haven't really had any sea food, and the mexican food here is not mexican at all, so i don't think i can really count it haha

Do you have any good stories?

This week while i was helping get the yard for the reception ready, they gave me a flame thrower-like-thing to burn all the weeds inbetween the cracks of the sidewalk. So much fun! They don't worry about fires here because it's so wet, so i went burn crazy! It was great! I can't really think of any other stories right now. We've kind of had to take it a little easy this week because of sister Bishop's back. I'll let you know if i have any crazy stories for you :)

I'm glad the house didn't flood and i hope you don't have any more problems with it! I kind of liked our basement... Good thing we've got great neighbors!

It's been pretty warm here these past couple of weeks. It wouldn't be too bad, but they don't have air conditioners for their houses... so it's miserable. It's in the 80's i would say (it's hard to tell because we don't have a thermometer, and nobody measures in farenheit here). Plus, the humidity is KILLING me! So it's a good thing i bought some summer shirts in missouri!

Thanks for keeping me updated on all that Tooele news! Sounds like everyone's all ready for stock show. Fun! And the Boekwegs really do have a full farm going on! haha I bet Courtney is loving it!

Thanks for all of your support! I hope you all have a wonderful week! Let me know how everything goes with stock show and all of that fun! 

7/22/2013

Hej Alle!

This week has been full of ups and downs with all of us being somewhat sick at some point this week, and my one companion having issues with her back that landed us in the ER so that she can get into the doctor within the next month... got to love socialized medicine haha She's fine, just in pain all the time. We're doing everything we can to help her out and we'll be returning to the doctor soon, hopefully.

Yesterday was quite the miracle day for me. It started out pretty hectic with us trying to help one of the Ædlstre get ready to move on to another area. It's still three weeks from transfer day, but Ælsdte Ludlow from my MTC group got his visa, so the third Ældste from Aalborg is moving to open a new area with him. Yay! Miracle number 1 :) So that took up most of our morning. Then, we got a text that was sent the night before but we didn't receive until that morning that told us that we were supposed to teach gæsteklasse during sunday school. Agh! We had no time to prepare anything at all before church. After sacrament meeting, I went to gæsteklasse with the Ældstre's investigators while Søster Bishop and Christensen went and set up appointments real fast before we taught. I waited and waited for them to come to gæsteklasse, but i realized that they would not be coming when they were 15 minutes late. I had to teach it all by myself, in Danish. AGH! I was terrified out of my mind! So, I asked one of the Ælsdtre to pray that i knew would say a really long prayer. While he prayed out loud i prayed in my heart that Heavenly Father would help me teach this lesson. I told him that i was just going to open my mouth and talk and he would put the words i needed to say in my mouth.  I told him i was putting my trust in him 100%. When the prayer was over, i opened my eyes and looked at the headings of the two lessons we were supposed to cover in the manual. It was the Holy Ghost and Prophets. I just started talking about how we can use the Holy Ghost in our lives and how we listen to the prophets and follow what they say, but we use the Holy Ghost to find out for ourselves that what they say is  true, just like we do in every aspect of our lives. Words kept rolling off my tongue. I asked questions and everyone was participating. All of a sudden, i could understand what they were saying to me! It was amazing! I was in complete awe the whole time. After, one of the investigators told me that my Danish accent was very good and the Ædstre told me that they were very impressed with how it all went. I am so grateful for a Heavenly Father who hears our prayers and keeps his promises to us. I couldn't have done that alone, even in English. The gift of tongues is real and i see it every day. As much as i hate it in the moment, i am so grateful that Heavenly Father pushes us to become better and to realize our potential. The decision to go on a mission is the best decision i have ever made. I never would have grown in these ways if i hadn't. I am so grateful for a living prophet who guides us and for our loving Heavenly Father.

My companions never showed up to gæasteklasse, and i found that they had their own little miracle as well. They had found and talked to one of the less actives that had been less active for more than 5 years that had been bullied and had some major emotional trauma from her childhood. She had been terrified to come to church, but they were good friends to her and made her feel at ease.

I hope you all have a fantastic week! Stay strong everyone and remember that Heavenly Father loves you!

Kærlighed,

Søster Erin Handley :)

7/15/2013

Hej Alle!

Oh boy, what a week! So many exciting things happened! A bit up and down, but you can't enjoy the good without the bad.

This week we had zone training. We had media training which was great. The only problem was, the whole thing was in Danish, which would have been fine, but they made me wear the little translation thing so i could hear the English translation, but the guy translating didn't seem to care at all, and just kept saying "Oh, he just said something about faith. That sounds important" or "He just said a funny joke, too bad you wouldn't understand it" Rude! haha So i didn't get a ton out of it. Good thing we did role plays in English.

We got 3 new investigators this week, which was great! The only problem is i think two of them will be dropping us soon because they are muslim... but, I am hopeful for the last one we got :) His name is Ivan and we found him while we were finishing knocking an apartment complex. It was my turn to begin the approach, and as soon as he answered the door, i noticed that both of my companions had completely backed off, and my trainer had hidden behind the door! Ah! So, i did all i know how to do, i bore my testimony. I said a silent prayer in my heart for help. I told him about the Book of Mormon, about what it contains, and the promise that Moroni gives at the end, that if we read it ourselves, and pray to know for ourselves that it is true, we will recieve an answer. Then, i asked him about his faith and if course i couldn't understand a word he said back, so Søster Christensen stepped in to help. But, he said that we could come back and teach him more! :) So exciting! I know that that was the Lord's way of letting me know that i can talk to people and i can teach them about the gospel, as long as i rely on Him.

So, our ward mission leader isn't exactly our biggest fan just because we're sisters. He's hard on the Elders too, but he's definitely on their side and doesn't hide that. So, we decided this week that we weren't going to give him anything to criticize about so he wouldn't have any excuses :) He randomly texted us and asked us how many push-ups, sit-ups and crunches we could do. None of us actually knew for sure, so we all dropped down and did some push ups so we could tell him in the middle of the parking lot. (I'm not going to tell you how many because sadly, with all of these delicious Danish pastries and other foods, my strength is decreasing and my waistline is not haha) Needless to say, we got a lot of weird looks. There were three 20 year old girls that randomly dropped and started doing pushups in the middle of the parking lot. We must have been a sight! Sadly, the text was not for us and H.C. just laughed at us for even trying. Now we know to work on our pushups and situps so next time we will be much more prepared. Next time, H.C., next time...

Well, it was a good week with lots of good experiences. I am learning a lot and growing in many different ways. Thank you to everyone who sent me letters this week. I very much appreciate mail and i will do my best to write back as soon as we get some time on a p-day. Love you all!

Kære,

Søster Erin Handley

7/8/2013

This week was crazy! I feel like i say that every week, but i really mean it when i say it! Wow! So up  and down, but ended on an up note, so that's all that matters :)

So, this week we gained 3 new investigators, but then lost one of them. He wasn't super positive to begin with, so we were kind of expecting it. But, we also know he'll come back. We also lost the less active who we weren't even sure that she was a member. The missionaries before us told her to read D&C before she knew the Book of Mormon was true... Bad idea! She had some big questions and instead of asking us or turning to the Book of Mormon, she turned to the internet and found a site set up just like Mormon.org, but it was all about being an ex-mormon. So, she watched one of those videos and believed every word of it. Stupid anti-mormon stuff... Gah! Oh well. She'll come back once she realizes that she's not happy.

On a happier note, we got an investigator we weren't expecting in church. That was cool! She came with one of her friends and is now investigating. She's very interested and very excited. Thank goodness for members who invite their friends to church!

Søster Bishop and i also had an interesting time. Søster Christensen had to go to a leadership training in Copenhagen, so we were left all by ourselves in Aalborg. Gah! Two Greenies and no trainer! But, it turned out to be a really great two days alone.We only got lost once and found our way back like pros, and we got everything we needed done exactly as planned, with a little extra time for is. :) But, on the second day, all but one of our appointments fell apart, and in the one that didn't, the investigator dropped us! Gah! And no, that was not our fault. He was jus obsessed with money. lame! But, Søs. Bishop and i successfully pulled our schedule together and made appointments all by ourselves! We are basically pros!

So, the last place we stopped on our way home was this little old lady's apartment. It took her forever to open the door, and when she finally did, we discovered that she was ANCIENT! She was all shaky and looked like she was 150 years old! I was afriad she was going to keel over and die right then and there! But, we sort of communicated with her and told her that we were missionaries coming to visit her. She let us in, and we tried to talk to her, but we couldn't understand much of what she siad because she was so old and shaky. We tried as hard as we could to tell her we'd come back later, but all she said was (In Danish, of course)"I hate americans. You can come back when you learn Danish!"That was all we understood from her! haha So, we told her we'd come back when we learn Danish and that God loves her, then we left. haha

Looking back, there were some pretty rough days this week, but it was a great week. Things are starting to pick up for us, and i can feel that something big is just around the corner. It's coming and were ready for it!

I hope everyone has a great week! Work hard this week and remember that the lord loves you, and i do too!

Kærlighed,

Søster Erin Handley

7/1/2013

Hello everyone!

We had quite the crazy week this week! We were all over the place since Søster Christensen is Sister Training Leader for the area. We went on splits, which was fun, and we did lots of service this week.

So, cool splits story. I was in Horsens with Søster Swett and Bartholomew. Søster Bartholomew was in my MTC group, so our Danish is on about the same level, shich means it's basically non-existent haha. We couldn't understand much of what anybody said all day and we were having a difficult time saying anything in Danish. That's just like every day here. Well, we were walking towards home on one of the mai streets of Horsens, when Søster Swett stopped this older couple on the street. She started talking to the wife which left Søs. Bartholomew and i to talk to the husband. This is quite a bit of a problem since our Danish is quite a bit lacking. As he was talking to us, i suddenly realized that i was understanding what he was saying! It was kind of strange to know what he meant by all of the strange words he was saying. I didn't quite understand every little word he said, but i understood what his questions were and what his concerns were. He wasn't sure if God loved him or why he would alow bad things to happen to innocent people. Søs Bartholomew and i were able to assure him that God does love him, and that even though bad things happen to good people, God has a plan for us and loves us because we are His children. He seemed to really like that answer, and i guess we made a good impression because he wanted to make sure we were taken care of and had food and a place to live. He was very relieved to know that the church took care of all that for us.  We left he and his wife with a Book of Mormon and a pass along card, then went on our way. I could not understand a word the next person we talked to said. To me, that was Heavenly Father's way of letting me know that He is aware of my needs, and the needs of everyone around me. He knows exactly what we need at exactly what time. That man needed to hear what we had to say, and i needed to understand it, so that's what happened. It was a really neat experience.

Yesterday, we went around to visit less actives to let them know that the ward is still aware of them and that they are missed. We stopped by one lady's house, and she opened the door, pants-less. Kind of awkward, but whatever. The next less-active we went to visit, same thing! haha It's just normal here, i guess. Kind of funny. At least the second guy was curtious enough to answer the door with his dyna wrapped around him... haha

This week we went to help the bishop out with his yard. He has been so busy that he has not had any time at all to take care of his garden. Søster Bishop and i took a whole section and weeded it all. It looked really nice :) the Elders trimmed the bushes and did more weeding, and Søster Christensen made the cobblestones look nice. We got a lot of work done for him, and his garden is starting to look real nice. We have another appointment with him for next week. Once we were all done with the garden, the bishop said that he had lunch ready for us. In my mind, lunch is sandwiches, salad, something light. Well, in Denmark, that is not the case when you have guests. He had made two big pans of lasagna for the seven of us to eat, with salad and fruit on the side. He wanted us to finish all of it. haha So, we took the challenge to finish the whole thing. We did! It was great! The only problem, was that we had a dinner appointment for 4 hours later... So, we took our bikes out and biked around, then went to our appointments, and then to dinner. We were still stuffed, but these people had the same expectation of us. Gah! They also made a ton of really yummy food. This time it was potaoes and chicken with whiskey sauce. Yum! We ate it all and were stuffed to the piont we could no longer eat anymore. But, this family had dessert for us too. Oh no! haha So, we all had to stuff dessert into our over-stuffed bellies. luckily this time their kids ate the majority of it, and it was a light dessert of fruit and cream. I don't think i've ever been so full in my life!

The ward mission leader in my ward loves peanut butter. So, this week we had a baking contest with the elders and HC was the judge. Of course we made peanut butter cookies with homemade reese's on top :) They were absolutely delicious! We gave some out to some of the less actives and they were all skeptical of my peanut butter at first, but they loved the cookies and wanted the recipe. I am slowly converting the Danes to love peanut butter. That's the first step to getting them to come to church/get baptized I decided. :) So far, it's working! haha

Well, this week was great. I'm learnign a lot and having tons of great experiences. Hope you all have a great week this week! Love you!

Kærlighed,

Søster Handley

P.S. They have 7/11's everywhere here, and, i found this week, THEY SELL REESE'S! :D

This is me and a fleskasteg sandwich, which is pork with the skin left on. The skin is fried and it is delicious, even though it doesn't sound like it.

There are cute streets like that all over and i love taking pictures of them :)