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December 7, 2009

Hi Family,

Another week come and gone and time is going pretty quick. In just three days will be my 6 month mark (not that I'm counting, it's just important to know the date all the time and it's not like you can just forget important days, like when I entered the MTC and such). I have yet to receive my package. Today is the tenth business day so I really hope I get it today so I can enjoy it all day because it's P-Day. If not, I'll definitely get it this week in time for our road trip to Joensuu.

We spent last weekend in Savonlinna. We actually went up Friday night because Sunday was Finland's ''Itsenäisyyspäivä'' Independence Day. On Independence Day we're not allowed to go tracting or anything so there wasn't really any work we could do, thus the reason we went up on Friday to get more than just a Saturday afternoon's worth of work. It was a really good trip. We met with a lot of members and got to know them a bit. They want missionaries so bad in their own city. We'll see what happens next change if they get some. It's pretty cool because Savonlinna has a real life castle! It's pretty sweet. We just drove past it because we didn't have any time to go and play around inside of it (because we're missionaries). Maybe in the future I'll be in Savonlinna and will get to take a P day and check it out and take a bunch of pictures.

This week is going to be a pretty standard week. We are going to Joensuu Saturday through Sunday, but other than that we'll be here doing our normal thing. Our investigators are doing ok. Right now our most exciting person is our blind investigator. A few weeks ago we were considering dropping her because she wasn't progressing but she suddenly took off and is praying about baptism! If she keeps progressing like she has been things are looking pretty promising. The other investigators still all have a lot of potential, we just need to help them realize we're not just neat guys who talk about Christ. There's a LOT more to it than that. We do what we can.

I just thought of something: my Schwab Check card expires in March, so I'm not sure what I need to do to get that taken care of. The Visa card expires soon too, FYI.

That's fun you get a new calling. Maybe you shouldn't raise your kids to be good and then maybe you wouldn't have to worry about having responsiblity :)

It's so weird because it doesn't even feel like Christmas time. Days just come and go without really any mind to what time of the year it is. To think that I started in June when it was warm and sunny is weird. Maybe it's a good thing because time is just kinda a blur. Doing the same stuff everyday really has a numbing effect on everything.

So we're still not entirely sure what the deal is with Christmas calls. We're meeting with our Branch Mission Leader this week to figure out where we will be for Christmas. I'll let you know next week how that'll go down.

It's lame because we don't have any snow at the moment. The Finns are all angry about it and so are we. There was that crazy warm streak that melted everything and it's settling back down into the normal cold/freezing temperatures it should be at. Hopefully we'll have snow within the next week. We do get to go to Rovaniemi again for a District Meeting. I think the plan is to go up on the 23rd and we'll be able to see Santa leave to go around the world and stuff. It's going to be sweet! And they'll have snow!

Wow Bri is getting married eh? That's cool. If you happen to see her/talk to her tell her I say congratulations. It's good to hear that Brandon got married too.

Hmm the stores we shop at aren't really that exciting. We shop for food once a week on our p day at this store called Prisma. It's basically like the Finnish Wal-Mart. Not too exciting. For other shopping (like for souvenirs and such) there isn't much in Kuopio. There's a department store called Sokos which is a pretty big chain here that has all sorts of stuff. I don't know, all we really buy is food. We did buy a vacuum (from Prisma) a few weeks ago because ours almost exploded. 100€ later we have a new vacuum! It's got serious suction power. The grocery stores do have a much bigger selection of dairy, sausage, and candy though for sure. It's kinda cool. Tell me if you get the package I sent. Hopefully it'll get there before Christmas.

Oh one other thing. If you'll be able to track down David Mauler's address in Denmark I would appreciate it. That kid hasn't written back to my last letter when he was still in the MTC and I've been expecting a response so I need to get on his case. Thanks. I haven't heard back from Young Tai either...

Ok time is up again so I guess I have to go. Christmas is in less than 3 weeks! It's kinda funny because we get our change calls the day after Christmas and then change day, when everyone moves, is the next week. So whoever gets a change will be in one place for Christmas and in another for New Year's. Kinda funny. Well I'll talk to you all next week!

Love,

ELDER GRIMM

November 30, 2009

Family,

I'm glad the basement is making progress. Hopefully the water test thing doesn't destroy the house or something.

No I haven't been in a sauna but I have seen what they look like. They were banned for missionaries a few years ago after too many bad incidents happened. As for piano, no I haven't had to play any songs/hymns for anything. Yeah I've played a little bit for fun at the church or something but not really much else. There are actually a lot of Finns, maybe just the members, who are very musical. They take care of all the music so we don't have to worry about it, or at least that's how it is in Kuopio. In fact, they have a special musical number every Sunday by different people from the ward. In fact, this new family just moved in a couple months ago and the dad is one of the best players I've ever heard in my life. He's pretty quiet but he's way cool. He and his wife are very young but he's already a doctor and they're probably loaded. We'll find out for sure on Thursday because we're eating dinner at their house!

I haven't gotten the package yet but our mail doesn't come until about noon or so so maybe today. If not, for sure this week which will be sweet because we're going to Savonlinna this weekend and it would be sweet to have some new conference talks for the drive. I actually haven't mailed my package home. We had some stuff come up last week so we didn't really have time, but today we're doing it for sure. It may or may not get there for Christmas but we'll see! The mission home address is perfect for the alternate. They'll either forward it to me for however many euros it would cost or they'll hold on to it and bring it to me at the next Zone Conference which is in about 2.5 weeks. Either way I'll get it!

Christmas in Finland is pretty similar as in the States but they, of course, have their own little tradition things. They actually celebrate on the night of the 24th and Santa comes in person to deliver the gifts. I'm not exactly sure yet how that goes down but I guess I'll find out. As with most big holidays here, the Finns celebrate by isolating themselves from the outside world. Kinda like what I like to do. So on the 24th, the 25th, and the 26th, everything is going to be dead. On those three days we hang out at members' homes and do whatever they do for those days. On the 25th also we get to do the calls home. Because we still don't know whose home we'll be in for the 25th, we don't know when we'll be able to do the calls so I'll keep you posted. People don't really decorate for Christmas. Some people will put some lights up or candles in windows but that's about it. In the city center they put up a huge Christmas tree with lights that change. It's pretty cool. They make a bunch of food just like we do and do gifts and stuff. Elder Pettus said last year at Christmas the members they were with gave them socks and soap and stuff like that which was very nice. It's kinda funny because there isn't really anything we need that we can't get with our MSF and as missionaries there's only so much we can do anyway. I guess it's easier that way.

We actually have 6 investigators at the moment, the most I've had since coming here. They all definitely have potential, the trick is meeting with them more often than we currently are. The perfect situation would be teaching them at least 2-3 times a week but it's hard because people are so busy, we're lucky to teach them once a week, if that. It's getting better though for sure. We have 2 families, our blind lady, a guy from Africa, an older lady who lets in the Jehovah's Witnesses and Pentacostles too apparently, but it didn't seem like she liked them very much, and also a lady who teaches music at a school here. They're all very nice and good people, we just need to help them act on what they're being taught.

Sorry but my time has run out. Ask the questions I didn't get to answer next week and I'll start with those (ie daily schedule and such).

Love you all lots and have a suurenmoinen week!

Hyvää Joulua

Love, Elder Grimm

letters home

November 23, 2009

Hi Family,

First off I did shake Santa's hand. It was after the picture and stuff and we didn't even know they were filming us until after the whole thing was over. I have no idea what the word was that he said. If you notice though, his English was very good but he had an accent. That's what the Finnish accent sounds like when they speak English. It's just kinda broken sounding and isn't one that would be cool to have, unlike Scottish or English or something. Yes I've been told that I'm the tallest in the mission and Elder Pettus happens to be the shortest in the mission. Kinda weird.

We did take pictures at the Arctic Circle line, but there was snow so you can't really see it...I sent pictures last week so you should have them hopefully this week or something.

Right now we don't have any Finnish missionaries. We did have one when I got here but it was his last transfer so he's done. We do have missionaries from Sweden, Russia, England, and one from Latvia. We had one from Canada but he's done as well. Everyone else is American.

For Thanksgiving, we don't have any plans to do anything. The further north you go the more ''Finnish'' the people get. We don't have the money or the time to do anything special on our own. Apparently Friday night a family will be doing a ''Thanksgiving'' dinner or something at the church I think. The daughters and their son speak English alright but the parents don't. We'll be in Oulu for our District Meeting Thursday night and Friday so we might not be back in time for the dinner thing anyway. We'll see.

I'll give you the instructions for how to call and stuff when Elder Pettus and I figure out what times we'll be available to do the calls. Basically you will be calling to us. The rate number thing they give us to give to you is supposed to be less expensive or something so I'll give that to you when we know what we're doing.

I think I had to apply for some of the Utah scholarships but I don't really remember. That was like 2 years ago! Which is more time than I have left here! I honestly don't remember when I heard back from BYU either. If Danika can get her application in by the early deadline that'll be very smart. Yeah I had to get a Bishop AND Stake Presidency interview. Mine was with President Jones.

Our apartment is pretty simple. Ours happens to be very old. The apartment itself isn't too bad but the bathroom is the worst bathroom I've ever seen in my life. Dad remember my bathroom when I had to live in Heritage Halls? Times that by like 7 and then you have our bathroom. The problem is there isn't really any way to clean it. Stuff is just stained and cleaner doesn't do anything. However, other missionary apartments have some sweet bathrooms. That's just part of living in Kuopio. It's different to because the showers in Europe, or at least in Finland, are different. It's hard to explain so you might have to wait until I can get pictures sent or just when I come back.

We switch off eating together or just whatever we want individually. We usually do a 2-3 meals a week together, like meatballs and rice or chicken or something like that. This week we're going to make some Taco soup out of the recipe book that Sister Brown gave to all the missionaries at my first Zone Conference.

Oh yeah we got the change information so I can tell you how everything is now. There weren't a whole lot of changes/transfers made. Only 3 new missionaries came in and like 4 went home. Next change, however, there are 8 coming in and none going home so there will be changes like crazy! Everyone in my group is still in their greenie city but I'm the only one that is still with my trainer. I'm not sure what that means. Maybe I need the extra training. Probably. They did switch up the Zones and districts as well. There are now 3 zones instead of just 2. We are in the ''North Zone'' (go figure) and are in the Oulu District. Elder Empey and Elder Ranzenberger are in my Zone still but Elder Schoof is now in the Tampere Zone. Elder Empey is also in the Oulu District with us so I get to see him on Friday too. Other than that President had to call a new AP (assistant to the President) because his old one's mission is over. It's crazy to see some of these people going home because when I got here they still had like 3 months left, but I've been in the country for 3 months already. It's going pretty fast. With Christmas coming up it'll go even faster!

I'm sure whatever is in my package will be sweet. There's not really anything that we need here we can't get with our MSF so anything from home just makes life more fun. I did finally get a couple letters at the end of last week. One was from Seth and he sent me some pictures so that was cool.

My license will be a European Union license but will be marked as being from Finland. They look pretty awesome.

The basement is looking good. I'm excited to check it out.

It's ridiculous. We had a pretty good amount of snow and then it all melted away last week because it was and is so warm. It's ok I guess because the members tell us that they'll have a meter of snow come January/February. I guess we'll have to wait and see where I'll be when that time comes.

Well my time is running short because I read both emails so I hope I didn't forget anything. I probably did so just ask them again next week and I'll remember. Sorry siblings I didn't respond individually. Next week! It sounds like you're all having fun and doing well in school. Keep it up. Don't fight either. The last thing I'll need when I get back is stress because of tensions. Start now and be happy and nice!!

Love you all lots!

Elder GRimm

ps We're mailing our Christmas packages today so they should get there within a month (hopefully)!

November 17, 2009

Hi family,

So I'm not really sure what the deal is but I must not have received the email you all sent to me. I got the one from Lars and the one that asked about my journal/photo album (by the way yes I am keeping a journal and right now I think I'm set with the album I have, I haven't added any pictures to it yet because I don't have any to add).

Hmm ok so I guess I'll just tell about what's going on here. So we had change calls on Saturday and, much to our surprise, neither of us are getting transferred. We won't find out who else is going where until Thursday when we receive the change information in the newsletter. It's kinda nice because we don't have to worry about packing or moving or anything and the members here are cool. Three different families have already offered to have us over for Christmas so we'll have to figure that out somehow. Since I'll be here for Christmas I'll give you our address so you can send the package straight here:

They'll put a notice slip through our mail slot and then we just go to the post office and pick it up there.

So we have a bit of snow here now. It makes the city look really cool and when we drive through the forests it's way cool because everything is covered with snow. We're going to Joensuu this weekend so I'm looking forward to that drive.

Last week we met Joulupukki! Hopefully you were forwarded the picture we took with him. If you notice we gave him a Book of Mormon and he's holding it on his lap. Rovaniemi was a sweet city. It was a lot of fun staying up there for a couple of nights. I managed to get pretty much all of my Christmas shopping done when we were at Santa's Village. It was so sweet. This morning we went to a picture print store so I can get you some pictures finally. I'll mail them out today or tomorrow. Next Monday we're planning on sending our Christmas packages home so be ready to get it in like a month or so.

So the one investigator who was about to join the Lutheran Church turned out to be not as interested as he seemed to be. But, we did meet another guy from Africa from the same neighborhood who came to church for the whole 3 hours, is coming to play volleyball with the members tomorrow and said we could teach him again. We'll see where he goes. He's lived in Kuopio for 6 years and speaks Finnish better than I do. Hopefully he'll be a good one.

We have an appointment with our blind investigator tomorrow. We decided it's going to be the ''do or die'' lesson. If she isn't willing to act on what we teach her and try and find answers to these things we can't really do anything. The sad thing is is that she loves it when we come over. Maybe if we drop her for a while and then in the future some missionaries make contact again she'll be ready. We'll see what happens tomorrow!

I've got a great streak of not getting mail going. If it continues through tomorrow it will have been one month. Maybe I'll set a new mission record!

Hey how did that activity the sister missionaries did with you turn out? The one that had you pick a few people and then after 21 days one of them would be ready? I'm curious because that's something we've been trying to get better at is encouraging the members to do missionary work. It's hard though because it's scary asking for referrals and trying to help them do the work. We basically tried the same thing that the sisters did with you on Sunday and then yesterday we tried a similar thing as well. Luckily the members here are cool so they were pretty willing to try some stuff. The hard thing is to help the members realize that we're not there just asking for names and friends, but we're there to offer them any help they think they need. We have this really good little DVD called ''Finding Happiness'' that we show them. It's only 5 minutes long and we use it sometimes to show to people who may be interested in the Gospel. It basically gets people thinking about life's purpose, family, and where they can find those answers (from us). Maybe you've seen the DVD before but yeah. That's something we've been doing lately.

Yesterday we had 2 Dinner appointments. One was in a town called Leppävirta, about 50 kilometers away. We were there to help a member do a school presentation to a class of students. That's part of the curriculum in schools here: to learn about Christian religions. The presentation basically covered everything we believe and such in a nutshell. It was fine. Afterwards we ate at the member's house with his family. It was pretty good. Then, only an hour after we left there, we had another dinner appointment. I thought I was going to throw up I ate so much food. The problem is that a)the food is good and b) they say (this is the translation) ''if it tastes good take more.'' So if you don't take more you are implying that it doesn't taste good. We survived though.

Well that's more or less all that's going on right now. I bought a sweet backpack when we were in Rovaniemi and I'm glad I did. The one I brought was great, it was just really big. This one is much narrower and designed for walking and stuff. It's a really nice one too (the brand is called ''Haglöfs'') so it'll last through the mission and it's sweet looking so I'll be using it at college as well (it's red and black so it will match well at the U).

Yup so I guess I'll hear from you all next week. Love you all lots!

Love,

ELDER GRIMM

Santa gets a Book of Mormon

The missionaries in Finland presented Santa with a Finnish Book of Mormon

(notice the book in his hand)

Dallin was in Rovaniemi this past week for a district Conference. After his meetings on Wednesday, they went to the Arctic Circle and saw Santa. A nice sister sent this picture to us as well as a link to a video of them presenting the Book of Mormon to Santa.

If you watch the video, you will notice that all of the missionaries shake Santa's hand except for Dallin. Hmmm, hopefully Santa will still visit him at Christmas.

It's so fun to see Dallin since we have only seen one picture of him since he arrived in Finland. He is on the left on the back row (the tallest elder). What a handsome elder!

Aaron tried to post the video to the blog but so far it hasn't worked but you can go to this link to see it: http://s879.photobucket.com/albums/ab359/diannecall/?action=view&current=41-005.flv <http://s879.photobucket.com/albums/ab359/diannecall/?action=view&current=41-005.flv>

Finnish Chocolate, traveling, and Santa

FINNISH CHOCOLATE

Disclosure: Dallin writes to each one of his siblings at the end of the general letter. I don't include these since they are personal to the kids.

Still no pictures. Hopefully soon.

November 9, 2009

Family,

Yes another week has come and gone and yes I've already been out for 5 months! Crazy. We were in Turku for Zone Conference and it was awesome. We did splits and I went with one of the newer greenies who's even younger than our group. It was the most fun tracting I've had ever AND it was really productive. We gave away a Book of Mormon/got his phone number, got someone who said we could come back and a third lady who ''promised'' to call the missionaries. Not too sure about the last one but the first two people I listed were pretty good. It was fun. I was able to hang out with Elder Ranzenberger a lot. He thinks he and I are going to be put together next change. That would be sweet.

Yeah so about the changes. We get our change calls on Saturday so we'll see what happens. I wouldn't mind staying here at all because then I would get to stay with the ward that I already know through Christmas. But whatever. Elder Pettus and I think that he's going to get transferred because he's never been with a companion for more than 2 changes and he's already been here in Kuopio for like 4 months. I guess we'll have to wait until Saturday! Either way though I won't be able to email on Monday because we have a ''school present'' thing that will be during the day so even if we don't get a change we won't have our Preparation Day until later in the week. You can still email me by Monday though just in case because things can easily change.

Our blind lady is doing fine. She's a pretty slow progressor but we've been very straight and direct with her the last couple of teaches so she knows exactly why we're here as missionaries to try and pick things up. I think she's just had the idea (like so many people do) that we're just good people who talk about Christ but they don't always realize that it's a LOT more than that.

So get this. We found a new investigator last week. He's about 25 years old and is married, a perfect candidate, he AND his wife. What's interesting is that he's planning on being confirmed into the Lutheran Church this month but after we met and talked with him about the Book of Mormon, he's pretty interested in it. Hopefully we'll be able to crash the confirmation party and bring him into the right church. We've been praying hard for him so we'll see how it works out.

We take turns driving the car. I don't have to get my license until next summer so I'm good for a while. They do have a few different rules. Overall the roads are pretty decent and such so it's nothing too crazy.

Yes, the mission home is the place to send the package BUT depending on when you send it, I could give you my address once I know where I'll be for a while and then you could send it directly there. I'll know next week and I'll tell you where you should send it.

Hmmm, letters...I kinda don't remember what those look like. I'm currently on a dry spell and haven't gotten anything in about 2.5 weeks. I'm feeling some this week though so I'm not too worried about it. Yeah Jaimie still writes. In fact, she's the most consistent. I'm still waiting to hear from Dave and Jess. I'm not sure what they're doing these days.

Yes non romantice Josh Groban stuff is ideal. That said, all of his stuff is pretty romantic. I mean seriously, have you heard his voice? No but seriously February song is good and so are the other non romantic ones. He has songs that are hard core, clearly romantic and some others that are just inspirational (ie February Song, Don't Give up, You raise me up...) and those are good. I hope that helps clarify. If not ask me for more clarification. As far as General Authorities, I really do like Uchtdorf and Monson but they're all good. The older stuff is perfectly legit too.

This week we're going to Rovaniemi! AND because of train schedules and how freakin far away it is we get to stay there for 2 nights! Elder Empey from my MTC group is there and so is Cason's twin, Elder Heelis. It's going to be sweet. District Meeting will be great and then we get to go to the Arctic Circle where Santa lives! Did you know he is fluent in 17 languages (I think it's 17)? My Finnish is getting better every day. Maybe we'll baptize him.

It's been pretty cool. We've had a few warmer days and it's been snowing a little bit but it's still in that awkward inbetween time. It just needs to get freezing and snow already!

Shoot I'm almost out of time so sorry to the siblings for getting a shorter message.

November 2, 2009

Hi,

Last week was pretty freakin busy, only because we were in Kuopio the entire week but then we went to Savonlinna on Saturday/Sunday. It's a cool little town. Write down the ''Savonlinna'' story so when I get back I can tell you all that went down because it's way too much to try and describe/tell in this email.

On Wednesday we get to go to Turku for Zone Conference! We've been looking forward to it since the last Zone Conference 6 weeks ago. It's going to be a lot of fun.

Yeah we ate lunch with our new Branch Mission Leader. He wants to eat lunch with us every week at the University of Kuopio where he goes to school. When we met him there he told me that Danika had sent him a message and he thought that was cool. He's a stud.

We had another lesson with our blind investigator. She's making progress, slowly but surely. We did meet a couple of people last week who seemed really interested so hopefully we'll be able to meet with them this week sometime when we're not in Turku.

It was pretty freezing all last week. It's definitely more humid here than in Colorado but I don't think it's nearly as much as in Missouri. I don't even notice it that much at all. But it's still freezing. I did buy some mittens with my MSF about a month ago for like 4€ and I also bought a scarf with my MSF for like 7€. The gloves I brought are pretty warm, the mittens just keep my hands a bit warmer because my fingers are kept together. Depending on what we're doing I'll wear one pair over the other. Other than that I don't really need anything. We did find this shop that sells these really nice white shirts, European style, which means the collars are ''wider'' and they are pretty sweet. This store sells them really cheap, only like 30€, where most places they're like 50€+. I might get one and have that be my ''nice event shirt'' for Zone Conference and stuff because my other shirts are already showing a little wear. They're doing great thus far though, I can make them last for sure. I am considering getting a different backpack, one that's a bit smaller, lighter, and just easier to handle for our daily activities. I don't know if I want to or not because the bag I have now is in great shape and I like it, it's just a bit large. To get the backpack that I want would cost about 30€ and I'm not sure if that is an MSF expense or if that would come out of my own pocket. I don't know. They don't have the right one in Kuopio anyway because there are like NO shops here at all so I guess I don't really need to worry about it for a while. Don't worry, I'm not spending lots of money. I have a hard time buying a candy bar let alone anything else. Anything I get is well thought out and necessary!!

Finnish is still plodding along. It is weird about the ''thinking in Finnish'' thing because a lot of the time when we're talking to people, you just understand what they're saying. I don't have to translate the words into English in my head, they just make sense and I know what's going on. It's weird. I've had a couple dreams in Finnish. Also weird.

There's really nothing I can do about getting pictures to you unless I get transferred or something. None of the computers we have access to are any good and to print them off at a shop is pretty expensive. Don't worry I'll figure something out! The computers at the church are currently being worked on and hopefully being replaced, then I might be able to email pictures. We just don't know when they'll be ready for use again.

Ha Halloween here was a joke. Basically it's just an American holiday. I hear that in Helsinki or in bigger cities they actually do stuff but up north, definitely not. It was actually some other holiday on the 31st. ''All Saints Day'' which is basically like our Memorial Day, but it's not only for veterans, it's for EVERYONE who has died. Kinda cool. In Savonlinna we were walking past a graveyard and there were candles everywhere on the tombstones. It was pretty cool looking.

We had our DST thing a couple weeks ago. We got to ''sleep in'' an extra hour! I, honestly, did not sleep very well the last hour of the night because my body clock wanted to get up so bad.

October 26, 2009

Moros Perhe,

Yeah so I forgot to tell you last week that we were going to Helsinki for a couple of days for a ''Language School'' thing for the missionaries who have been out for 6 weeks (myself and my MTC group). It was pretty fun because I got to see them again, especially Elder Ranzenberger. He's the best. We were met at the trainstation by a couple of the Helsinki elders who told me that Sister Nelson had been asking about me so they suggested we stop by because they lived pretty close. It was fun to talk to her for a bit and stuff. Don't worry about that going to my head. I don't even know how they found out anything about me and I know my Finnish/missionary skills are still very much in the developing phases. VERY MUCH SO.

Yeah we travel a lot. Elder Pettus and I do especially because we have two visiting cities, each of which is like 2 hours away by car. We're going to our second visiting city, Savonlinna, this weekend. Between our visiting city travel and any conferences/meetings we have, we do travel quite a bit. Pretty much every week we're somewhere different for at least a couple of days. We get to go to Rovaniemi (the city on the Arctic Circle where Santa lives) on the 12th of November for District Meeting! It's going to be sweet!

I haven't been able to go to the temple yet. In fact, I haven't even seen it yet. While we were in our language school thing our companions got to go though.

Transfers aren't until the week of 16th of November, so we still have some time together in Kuopio.

The work is going pretty swell. Our blind investigator came to sacrament meeting yesterday which was awesome. She's still our best investigator and is coming along. Last week we tried to be pretty direct and forward about praying about the Book of Mormon and she said she would so we'll follow up with her this week. We have some people we're hoping to meet with this week so hopefully we'll get some new investigators from it. A couple of them seemed pretty promising.

Finnish is still coming along. Every day it gets slowly better and better. Yesterday we learned some slang from one of the members. Yeah.

That's good to hear that David and Jess went to the temple. They had told me they were going to go this month but I HAVEN'T HEARD FROM THEM! If you get a chance, tell David and/or Jessica that I would love to hear what's going on with them. Seriously.

So dad bought a mini chain saw. That's ok because it was fun doing it all manually because it builds character. Speaking of building and weight, I am getting heavy! I came into the MTC weighing about 165. I left them MTC weighing about 169. I am currently 179-182, depending on the time of day. I for sure think part of it has to do with the food, but I also think it has to do with the fact that we actually exercise every morning where I do push ups and sit ups and stuff. I'm definitely getting stronger/bigger, so Connor, if you don't want to get owned, start bulking up bud. Remember mom, when I said I was going to come back HUGE? It's well on it's way.

I'm glad you're going to the temple pretty often. That's a good way to get some sweet blessings. I wish we could go more often but oh well, nothing we can do about it.

We're just waiting for the snow to come down. It's hovering just above freezing so any snow we do get just melts off pretty quickly. Elder Pettus and I did get our socks from the bishop's wife in Joensuu last weekend. They are legit. I took a picture of them so I can show you sometime. That was probably our last time in Joensuu together so it was a nice way to leave: with our awesome socks.

October 19, 2009

Moriens Perhe

Ok so another week down in the month of October. Yesterday was Seth's birthday, so we celebrated by going to Joensuu! Just kidding, but we were in Joensuu again this weekend. I gave a talk to all 18 of the members and it went pretty smoothly.

Last week went by super fast because we were only in Kuopio for like 4 days. It was pretty sweet being in Oulu for District Meeting. Oulu is WAY bigger than Kuopio is. As always, it was sweet to see other missionaries and talk with them a little bit. The only bummer is that we didn't get into Oulu until about midnight the night before the meeting so we didn't get much sleep so the the train ride home we were out of it for pretty much the whole thing.

Yeah I've been taking my vitamin D tablets. I hope they're helping, I'm sure they are. That's probably why I'm not sick.

Oh I'm glad the chocolate made it to you all fine, even if it took almost 2 weeks. I had written a little note with a description of the chocolate that I was going to put in your envelope but I sealed the envelope before I put the note in. The Fazer bar is the standard, most famous Finnish chocolate and is pretty good. The Panda stuff is pretty good, a slightly different kind of chocolate but it's pretty good too. I'm glad the Robinson's got the letter. Dallin is the really the only person other than Seth, Jaimie, and the Wetherbees who wrote to me so I figured he earned a chocolate bar. Hopefully he'll keep writing!

As far as P-Day goes, we don't really do a whole lot. We email, we buy our food, sometimes we'll go shopping but not too often because there isn't really anything to do/see in Kuopio. We did do a bit of shopping today, though. I bought Danika's Christmas present and I found the Dark Knight for only 10€ so I bought it. In other cities there is more to do but that's about it for Kuopio.

My Finnish has really been getting better. When we were in Joensuu I was actually able to have a conversation with the Bishop and his wife for the first time so that was neat. Every week it gets better and better. Thanks for the prayers.

Elder Pettus and I are doing pretty well together. We're both excited to have a good rest of this change. We've gotten to know each other quite a bit better over this last week so that will only help our work get better.

Rough week, splits, conference and jam

Dallin had a rough week but as always is optimistic.

Moriens

Alrighty another week down. Last week was probably the hardest week I've had since the start of my mission. We did a lot of work, went to a lot of places but our results were very limited. That's ok though because I have to remember that, especially as a missionary, we don't always see the fruits of our labors. In our book, Preach My Gospel, it talks about how no good work goes unnoticed. I guess those are just bonus points for the future or something.

This week should be pretty awesome. Last week we got the Suomen Valo, which is the newsletter that we all get with the change information and announcements and such. We are now in the Oulu district, the furthest north one. I'm with Elder Empey in the same district so I'll get to see him of Friday when we go to Oulu for a District Meeting. Our District Leader and his companion are coming down here Wednesday night to go on splits for Thursday. That'll be sweet because splits are always fun.

Church yesterday was awesome. We are really starting to click with the members so that's sweet. We've been tracting/teaching with them as much as possible. One guy is actually President Brown's secretary for this area of Finland even though he's only like 25. He actually served his mission in Denver when we lived there so he knows the area as well as the missionaries we knew (Elder Beckett...) He's a total stud so he's the best to go tracting with. I'm pretty sure he'll be the first Finnish General Authority someday.

Yeah so for Conference we got to watch all the sessions except for Sunday night because they don't show that here because of the time difference. We just watched it at the church. They had a room set up for English so we watched it and all of the youth (all 4 of them) came and watched it with us in English because they speak English pretty well. Yeah it was pretty sweet.

My Finnish is still coming along. I can more or less hold a conversation on my own, depending on the topic of discussion. I can't express myself fully by any means but it's coming along. We've been speaking Finnish much more often with each other too so that has really been helping a lot. Keep those prayers a comin'! Tell the rest of the family thanks for the spiritual boosters.

Yes in other news I now like a lot more foods I previously did not like. Let me list them: jam, bananas (just straight bananas), fruity yoghurt (not with chunks), that's about it thus far. Yeah crazy I know and my tolerance will only increase.

The Language is coming along

Letter from Sept. 28th:

Another week come and gone already. We were in Turku Wednesday night to Friday afternoon for Zone Conference. It was pretty sweet. Turku is quite a bit bigger than Kuopio and we were with the whole North Zone which was pretty sweet. There were about 20-25ish missionaries so it was cool. I got to see the Elders Ranzenberger, Empey, and Schoof. They're doing well as far is I could tell. Elder Ranzenberger is over is Vaasa, just across the water from Sweden, so everyone there speaks Swedish. He said he hasn't taught a single lesson in Finnish, only English. We had some cool meetings at conference and then we had a finding activity for a couple of hours. We were all assigned areas to go around Turku to do street contacting. The people there are totally different than in Kuopio. It was crazy. The craziest part is that I understood MUCH better what they were saying in Turku. In Kuopio I can get a vague idea of what's going on, with very few specifics. In Turku it was the total opposite. It was crazy and cool at the same time. Of course I didn't understand everything/everyone but overall my level of understanding was WAY more. They just speak differently. It's interesting. I think I mentioned it before but in Kuopio a lot of people speak ''Savo'' which is the accent spoken in the east. It's hard.

Letter from Oct. 5

We are also now part of the Oulu District, which is sweet because it's the farthest north district in the country. So for District Meeting in a couple weeks we get to travel up there to Oulu or maybe to Rovaniemi (where Santa lives). We're excited for that.

Conference was pretty sweet. We even managed to bring one of our investigators (who happens to be blind) to a session. She liked it so that was good. I'm already excited for the next Conference sessions.

Finnish is definitely getting better. We were in Jyväskylä on Friday for companion exchanges so that was really cool. Once again, I understood people WAY better there but it is coming along here as well. Thanks for the prayers, without them missionary work would not happen here.

First Area is Kuopio

Sorry for the delay in the update. Dallin's first area is Kuopio. It is about a 5 hour train ride north of Helsinki. We might as well let Dallin tell you about the area, so here are some excerpts from his last few emails:

This one is from September 7th:

It has steadily been getting colder and colder each day. It was rainy for a few days last week, including Sunday, so that was a party trying to stay dry while walking around. We do now have a couple of investigators! One is a former investigator that we found in the Area Book thing (it just has records of everyone in the area basically). She needs to stop smoking and then she should be ready for baptism so we'll have to see if we can't get that process rolling a bit faster. The other ''investigator'' is actually a little family we tracted to. We set up a return time and taught them the first lesson and gave them a Book of Mormon. They said they would read and pray about it so we'll see how that went next week when we go back. We're still unsure how interested they really are but if they read and/or pray about the Book of Mormon that should trigger something. We do have another appointment tomorrow with another lady. We also tracted to her and she said we could come back tomorrow (tuesday). What's interesting is that when she opened the door her countenance was totally different than all the other people we had talked to that day. She was basically ''glowing.'' Hopefully that's a good sign. It just felt good to talk to her so I'm excited for that tomorrow.

Our apartment is pretty small. Kitchen, bedroom, living room and bathroom. Pretty standard. I don't know when I'll get some boots. It's really an optional thing if I want to get them or not so we'll see if I decide that I really need them or not. My shoes have been great so far, though. I haven't heard anything from the other 3 yet. We'll see them at our zone conference in a couple of weeks though so that will be fun. Our car is fun. It's really small and a manual, like every other vehicle in Europe. We take turns driving and it's kinda fun. My US license is good for like a year so I won't need to get one for several months, luckily so in a year I'll get it, probably.

Yesterday was my first day at church in Kuopio. The ward was quite a bit bigger than in Joensuu and they were all nice. A family invited us over for dinner last night so that was nice of them. We had something similar to spaghetti, but with different noodles and different sauce. I started putting what looked like grated cheese (you know like parmesan) but it turned out to be salt. So I had a lot on my food but I couldn't just waste a whole plate of food! It was rough eating it but I made it ok. I ate a lot of bread with butter in between bites to help with eating the saltiness.

We have a super busy week this week. We have a lot of stuff to do, with District Meeting with President Brown and District Conference (it's like Stake Conference) and other appointments and stuff. I'm actually looking forward to it because last week we had no appointments or anything, just proselyting and trying to find people. We did go and help a Brother cut wood at his kesämökki (summer cottage). It was pretty fun. We're going back to help him on Friday and probably next week too.

September 14th (Cath's B-Day...great present!):

!!HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM!! Make sure everybody does what mom says and makes her do nothing that would be stressful!

This last week went by really fast which was nice. I think it's because we were so busy with meetings and scheduled appointments and stuff. We had our district meeting last wednesday and President and Sister Brown came in for that. Then on Saturday and Sunday was District Conference (like stake conference but ''district'' because we're not in a stake). President and his wife were also here for that. Conference on Saturday was pretty much all afternoon and evening. We had a couple meetings, ate dinner at the church with the wards, and then there was a ''talent show'' thing at the church in the evening. It wasn't really a talent show but some musical performances and poem reading. It was a lot of fun even though I didn't understand any of the poems, especically because they were mostly hard core ''Savo'' which is the dialect that is spoken in this part of Finland by some people. Yesterday (Sunday) was the last conference meeting and then we ate lunch with the ward again. We spent the afternoon trying to meet some people to teach. It was the birthday of a girl in the ward (from the family that we chopped wood for a couple weeks ago, which we also did last week too). So they invited us over for cake and to talk with them for a bit and then we went back out to go tracting and stuff. It was just a crazy week but it's good because it helps time pass and it helps us feel like we're actually accomplishing something.

The work in general is really starting to pick up. There's a chance we'll have a lesson every night this next week which would be awesome because we're usually teaching maybe 1-3 lessons a week. If we can get 5 or more that would be way sweet. We did get another investigator last week, the ''glowing'' lady I was telling you about. We had a good discussion with her about our purpose and the Book of Mormon and such. She did tell us that she is a strong Lutheran and doesn't want to change, but she's still interested and she said she would read the Book of Mormon and pray about it so when we meet with her again this week we'll follow up with that. If she did read and pray like she said she would then hopefully she'll have that desire to change and learn more. As long as she's interested in what we have to offer than it's worth taking time to help her out.

So last Monday I bought 3 sweet Finnish ties for a pretty good deal. I got the three of them for 25€ (depending on the exchange rate that's about 30-35 dollars I think). They're pretty awesome. I'm actually wearing one right now.

So, this was the story of the week:

So here's the story of the week. Last night we were tracting and a nice couple let us into their house to hear our message. They were both Pentacostle and listened to our lesson without really any disputations or anything bad. They weren't very interested in the message itself but they loved the fact that two young kids were in a foreign place teaching about Christ and the Gospel and such. We were getting ready to leave and Vanhin Pettus asked the wife if she would say the closing prayer for us. This is the point of the story. So she starts praying fine (of course it's in Finnish so I can just get the vague gist of the whole thing) and it's going fine. But then her voice changes and she starts speaking something that even I know isn't Finnish. She kept repeating whatever she was saying in whatever ''language'' and she was getting quieter and quieter until she ended. We thanked them for their kind hospitality and then got out of there. Basically she started ''speaking in tongues'' during her prayer and it was...interesting. Elder Pettus said that that was only the second time he's had the experience to hear someone do that. But yeah. Creepy. That said, they were very nice people and it was just nice to be let into a home just because that does not happen often at all. So yeah, there's my experience of the week.

September 21st:

We spent the weekend in Joensuu so that was fun. We had a dinner appointement there and it was some chicken soup stuff. It was pretty good. Last Thursday we also had a Dinner appointment with a family in the Kuopio ward. They live like 50 kilos away so it took a little while to get there but they live in a way sweet area in the forest. There is an awesome lake right behind their house and their property is sweet. We had salmon and salad and stuff with them. It was the first time I have eaten fish here, but it was probably the best fish I've ever had in my life. It was sooo good.

We didn't get to meet with the "glowing lady" last week because she was busy but we're going to try to this week. We found another 2 investigators last week so that was exciting. So far the progress of the investigators is slow but that's basically because we've only been able to meet with them once. We keep trying to set up return appointments but they always want to do them like 2-3 weeks down the road. That's kinda how Finland works in general: slow motion. That's ok though, we find more people to teach in the meantime so we stay busy. Eventually it'll kinda roll over and then we'll have several more teaches a week. On average we're getting about 2-3 teaches a week. However, with the new mission plan that is being introduced to the stakes and districts here (and throughout Europe I think) we should be getting 20 teaches a week because the members will play a much more involved roll and we'll more or less just be the teachers. Hopefully it will catch on quickly so we can really build up Finland with the help of the good members here. They're all really awesome.

We have zone conference this week in Turku, which I am really excited for. It's the north zone so I'll get to see a lot of other missionaries including the ones in my group from the MTC. It's usually pretty cold now during the day. We wore our gloves for the first time this week and it was totally worth it.

Sorry there are no pictures yet. Dallin has not been able to transmit any. The computer they are using at the church is pretty old and does not allow he and his companion to connect their cameras. Hopefully, we will have some come in the mail soon.

Landed in Finland

We received a letter from Dallin's Mission President, David Brown. Enclosed was a picture of Dallin & President and Sister Brown. Looks like he got a haircut before he left the MTC. It is a fun thing, but Dallin's Mission President was our Stake President right before we left SLC.

Dallin's P-Day is Monday. We received an email from him and I have enclosed a few messages from that email.

Finland is an adventure, that's for sure. The people are very...reserved. That's not a surprise because we heard a lot about Finland at the MTC but yeah, it's for sure different. I still don't understand anyone. I can pick out 1 in every 7 or 8 words or so so that's good. Yesterday was my first day at church. Even though we live in Kuopio, we actually have another city called Joensuu in our area. It is our ''visiting'' city that we visit a couple of times a change. We went down there Saturday morning and we stay with the piispa (bishop) of the Joensuu branch. He and his wife are pretty funny. He speaks some english but I don't think his wife does. He liked to try and speak English to me but I responded in Finnish as best as I could. Elder Pettus does the same. It's good to speak to the members in Finnish, even if they speak English to us. The branch was a whopping 18 members, including us. It was a totally different experience but it was still good. The members are all nice and one lady even spoke nice clearly to me so I could understand. Piispa and his wife fed us so that was nice of them. Our dinner on saturday night were a slices of bread with mayonaise (how do you spell that?) meat and some sliced vegetables on top. They weren't too bad except we had no idea what some of the meat was on some of the bread. We ate it anyway, just quickly. Sunday dinner was a cheese pasta dish thing that was pretty good. They're the only Finns that we've eaten with so far. Apparently the Kuopio branch is only like 50 active members, maybe with a very high inactive rate so I don't know how often we'll be eating with them. For ourselves we just kinda make whatever. It's pretty similar to college like food but all the directions are in Finnish so I just kinda guess what they say and hope it turns out good. We drove back to Kuopio last night at like 7ish to get home by 9. It's about a 1,5 to 2 hour drive. The sun was setting as we were coming back and it was REALLY awesome looking. The sun was blood red and the sky was sweet. We got some pictures of the sky but we missed the sun. It was awesome.

As far as investigators go, we actually don't have any. There haven't been any in Kuopio for a while now so we are still looking. While we were in Joensuu, however, we tried to meet with someone we had on record in the area book. The area book said they were two guys from Afghanistan who were nice and interested. We went to check up on them but it was just one guy from Iraq this time. He was super nice and invited us in. He didn't really speak English or finnish but still let us in. He is Kurdish and Muslim. He gave us some way good juice and we tried to communicate for a bit until he decided to call his friend who speaks finnish and english. Basically his friend translated for us. We didn't really teach a lesson because of the communication barrier but he said he would like a Book of Mormon. We're going to try and find one in Kurdish, if there is one, and if not we'll get one in Arabic because he speaks that too. We'll bring that to him when we go back to Joensuu. I kinda want to focus on the inactives in Kuopio though because if there are more members, it makes missionary work that much easier, assuming the members help. Hopefully we'll be able to work with some less active members and/or find some investigators. All we can do is contact and tract and call people. We'll see what happens.

I'm still getting into the swing of things. I've pretty much got the schedule down, I'm obviously still working on my Finnish and I'm getting a better feel of when/how to talk to people. That's one thing I wasn't sure about and am still trying to figure out. I'm still somewhat unsure of who we're supposed to talk to and how many people we're supposed to talk to and how many hours a day we're supposed to do tracting/contacting. The first half of the day is scheduled study time so that's fine. So I'm still getting a feel for what is considered a great day of missionary work. Hopefully after a few more days it'll become clearer. We spend several hours a day tracting and contacting and such but maybe it's just different because we don't have any investigators. Only time will tell how things go I guess.

Temperature wise it's pretty nice here. It's getting cooler but it's not bad at all yet. It rained all day yesterday in Joensuu but other than that it's just been overcast, like in Seattle.

I have our email setup to alert me when I get a message from Dallin. I was able to send a few messages back and forth somewhat "live" with him on Monday. He does not have a lot of time, but it was fun to do that for a little while.

More updates later.

On His Way to Finland!

Well, we are on a bit of a high right now. We just got off the phone with Dallin. He had a layover in Denver on his way to Helsinki (via Frankfurt) and was permitted to call us. We were able to talk with him for 2 hours. That time went very quickly!

He is doing very well and is excited to finally get to Finland. He said his time in the MTC went very quickly. It is hard to believe that he has been out for almost 3 months. He had an opportunity to see his cousin Kersti at the MTC right before he got on the bus. He thought that was cool.

He and his companion have already given a few pass along cards out to some people at their gate. He said that Elder Schoof and Elder Empey got their first rejections. Good news is that they are already at work!

His schedule will look something like this: They land in Finland around 5pm tomorrow night (local time). The Mission President and the AP's will pick them up at the airport and take them to the mission home for dinner and interviews with the President Brown. On Wednesday, they will spend time with a set of couple missionaries in the mission home that will get their paperwork in order (i.e. bank accounts, etc.). Apparently, that takes a while. They will be in training the rest of the day to learn about the country and the mission. They will likely head out to their areas on Thursday with their trainers.

It is expected that the four of them will be split up in four different cities: Rovaniemi, Vaasa, Kuopio or Tamperi. We will not know which one he is assigned to until our email next week.

We do know that his P-Day will be Monday, so we won't hear from him until a week from today.

They had a bit of a close call with their luggage. They found out that they could only take 1 carry-on, less than 18lbs and two free checked bags of 50lbs or less each. He had to put his small roller bag inside of the medium sized one so he would not have to pay an extra $100. Too bad I could not pass on my 1K status to him! His two checked bags came in at 49.5lbs and 50.5lbs, so they let them go through. His carry on was 17.5lbs. Good thing we did not send a package to him at the MTC right before he left!

We did send him a surprise package to the mission home that should arrive tomorrow or Wednesday. It sounds like we probably should have sent deodorant. Apparently, they do not have very good product in Finland. I guess that will be the next package.

If anyone wants to send something to him, send it to the mission home. He also suggested that letters should go to the mission home also and they will forward accordingly. I have updated his address on the blog page for your reference.

That's all for now. Please write letters to him!

Thanks!

Last Day at the MTC

Well, today is Dallin's last day at the MTC. He heads out for Finland tomorrow. We will have an opportunity to talk with him during his layover in Denver (it figures). We are very much looking forward to that.

In the mean time, we have some additional updates from his last few emails as well as an email from one of his MTC instructors.

This was from two weeks ago:

Last week in the TRC, Elder Ranzenberger and I had the opportunity to teach not just one, but two real life, 100% authentic Finnish people. What was amazing is that we actually understood most of what they were saying. I think I mentioned last week that Elder Ranzenberger and I are speaking Finnish all the time now, as much as possible so that certainly helped, along with the fact that Heavenly Father likes to help missionaries. It was an awesome experience and probably one of our best teaches, if not the best.

In the RC, Elder Ranzenberger and I love to take incoming calls from people who are calling in to order something. For whatever reason, we always seem to get a ton of people calling in with the wrong number by mistake. We make it a goal to give one of these wrong numbers a Book of Mormon or a DVD about Christ. So far no luck but we're trying. Yesterday, out of the 15 calls I answered in about 1.5 hours, 13 of them were wrong numbers. Crazy. We have been calling some of the same people back over the last few weeks. One lady I've been talking to for a long time is meeting with the missionaries so we're just kind of an in between support group. Her story is quite intense so I'll have to tell it when I get back because I just don't have enough time now. She's doing well though and wants to be baptized so in due time she'll get there.

Oh boy so today our district was selected to help be hosts for the new missionaries coming in today. Elder Ranzenberger and I get to help with traffic so that will be a party. It'll be fun to see all of the new missionaries coming in. The only bummer is we don't get to go to the temple today because it's a conflicting schedule. Sealings last week were really cool though.

Here are some things from his letter last week:

The MTC is just fine but I am ready to move on. Yes Finnish is hard. We have been learning "spoken" Finnish, which is what the people will actually say. It's totally different and kinda scary. For dinner/lunch/breakfast we eat some sort of meat item with a different sort of meat gravy/sauce, depending on the day.

Guess who i saw today? Tyler King. he's been here for a week now so i talked to him for a few minutes so that was fun. there are currently 12 finnish missionaries here. There are 3 elders in the group that replaces us in a couple of weeks.

Get this, President Brown and his wife (my mission president) are hard core UTE fans! Yeah! Monday was our last day with brother west, one of our teachers, because he was going out of town. He brought in a bunch of pictures and told us a lot of cool stories about finland so we keep getting more excited. Saturday is our last day with our other teacher, brother evans so he'll do something similar: show us his stuff/pictures and give us his last words, so to speak. It's so exciting to think that this is the last email from the United States for 2 years! Ahaha!!

Here are some thoughts from Veli Evans, one of Dallin's teachers:

Hopefully you have heard my name in emails from your son, and hopefully the things you have heard have been nothing but positive. My teaching companion and I had the privilege of teaching Vanhin Grimm while he was in the MTC for 12 weeks. During the last 3 months I have really enjoyed getting to see the spiritual, intellectual, and personal growth in him as a missionary of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

After teaching a group of missionaries I am particularly impressed by I ask each missionary if it would be alright for me to write their mothers and let them know of their current progress, etc.

Vanhin Grimm has been a lot of fun to teach at the MTC. He grasps things very quickly and has learned to speak Finnish quite well. Of the two companionships in his district his companionship is the most dynamic. They teach very well together and have learned to explain complex doctrines in Finnish.

He is the best Finnish speaker of the group and loves speaking Finnish all the time. His diligence has paid off because he is able to teach very well in the TRC each week. I always looked forward to interviews as well because he is always so happy and nice to talk to. His expectations for Finland are exactly where they need to be and he is so excited to go there!

He is very obedient and always seems to accomplish all of his goals each week. He sets extremely high goals and has a very unique way of motivating himself. This diligence is going to make him an awesome missionary in Finland when he arrives. I always tell my missionaries that they only send the best to Finland and I truly believe this. Being in the MTC with Vanhin Grimm has helped me become a better teacher and it has been a blessing in my life to get to know him.

Thank you for preparing him the way that you have. It is evident that he has a strong background and in the gospel.

As a parent, this letter was very much a "pay day". We will post some thoughts after our call with Dallin tomorrow!

2 More Weeks...

Dallin is getting very excited to leave the MTC and head out to Finland. His travel day is Monday, August 24th. We are very excited about this because we are supposed to get a call from him that day during his travels!! We will post an updated address when we have one.

Dallin currently has 3 cousins in the MTC as well. Lars Spjut (heading to Russia), Kersti Spjut (heading to Canada) and David Grimm (heading to Mexico). He has seen all of them at one point or another. Kind of fun!

He was excited to get a letter from his Aunt & Uncle, Darryl & Karin. Please send letters!

Dallin told me how to say, "Snake! I will destroy you" in Finnish: Käärme! Minä hävitän sinut! Nice...

He has sent some additional Finnish words for us to stumble with:

tähti: a star (like in the sky). Suunitella: to plan

tietokone---> computer. It literally translates to a "knowledge machine."

laulu--->a song.

makea---> it means "sweet."

läskii. It means "chubbs" So you can say, "hey, läskii!" Don't really say that, it's kinda mean. But it is an awesome word one of the teachers taught to Elder Ranzenberger and I.

Lakkaamatta: without ceasing.

Dallin & his companion, Elder Ranzenberger have decided to speak only Finnish their last few weeks in the MTC.

Elder Ranzenberger and I actually made a goal to speak only Finnish for our last three weeks here. So far so good. It's certainly not easy all of the time but just in the last two days my Finnish has improved a lot. I'm excited to see how much better it will be in 3 weeks!

So because Elder Ranzenberger and I are speaking Finnish until we leave, we can say," Me puhumme suomeksi lakkaamatta!" We speak in finnish without ceasing! It's a good one.

Dallin has had some great experiences in the Referral Center (the RC):

I have had some more cool stuff in the RC. I actually just talked to a lady yesterday from Washington, MO. She was very adament about the fact that she was Catholic and just wanted a Book of Mormon so she could see what it is. It was a bit of a fun challenge for me to "teach" her without actually "teaching" her. I suggested she read the Introduction of the BoM because it sums up pretty well what it is. (it also happens to outline the logic chain that if the BoM is true, then Jesus is the Christ, that Joseph Smith was His prophet, and that our church is the true church.) Hopefully whoever calls her in a few months will be able to teach her more.

In the RC yesterday during a call back, we were able to teach a lady part of the plan of salvation and it was really good and then her nephew started crying and company came over so she kinda sorta hung up on us. That's satan for you, interrupting our lessons, but the important thing is that she felt the spirit when she prayed and when she reads the book of mormon. We'll keep working on her.

So, please keep praying for him and please send him letters.

More Pictures!

We were happy to receive more pictures this week. The first one is of Dallin and several guys from the same dorm building (and some from our Colorado Stake). On a temple trip, Dallin bumped into these guys. Elder Covey (from his student ward), Dallin, Steven Allred (Tuscany Ward), Justin Schoof (Dallin's roommate & fellow Finn) and D.J. (Smoky Hill Ward).

The next one is of the 4 Finns. Elder Empey, Elder Ranzenberger, Elder Schoof & Dallin.

Lots of language studying is the main theme again! Dallin very much enjoys his teachers (former Finnish Elders). He is learning a lot, working hard and loving it! Well, other than the food.

Here are a few excerpts from his last email:

Finnish is going well. It gets harder everyday because the grammar starts to pile up but I'm understanding it all, it's just a lot to remember. Our Finnish lesson actually went really well. We were really nervous and then were even more nervous when our teachers found out that there were a couple of real life Finnish people there! So, we got to teach a couple return missionaries along with the real Finn. We could understand most of what the return missionaries were saying, but we couldn't understand really anything of what the Finn said. But nonetheless, we were happy with how well we did, considering it to be our first time. We have to teach again tomorrow night so we've been working on that a bit. So far so good. I have learned a lot of new Finnish words actually. I learn about 30 or so everyday. What words do you want to know? Joulupukki is Santa Claus. I did hear that a snake bit Hildi. I hope she is doing better because I need to teach her some finnish commands when I get back. Istu!! (sit!!). Oh this is exciting! I can now roll my r's. I'm still practicing but none of us could roll them when we came in, and we've been practicing and now we can. It's pretty sweet.

The food is, well, edible. Some things are pretty good, other times not so much.

I don't know if there's anything I really need, honestly. We can get most of what we need at the MTC bookstore for a discounted rate, just for missionaries, which doesn't really make sense because only missionaries shop there.

Dallin very much enjoys his companion, Elder Ranzenberger. They get along very well and work hard together. He has a great perspective and is encouraging Cath & I to attend the Temple often...good advice!

He has requested a few things to be sent to him while he is still in the MTC. His U of U Sugar Bowl shirt (I am so proud!) and a bag of jelly beans.

He loves letters! DearElder.com is a great way to write to him while he is at the MTC. Please be sure to send him notes!