Monday, November 30, 2015

Thanksgiving at Our Place

We celebrated Thanksgiving tonight with the temple missionaries.  I did two turkeys, stuffing, potatoes and gravy.  Everyone else brought the rest and it was a delicious, traditional Thanksgiving dinner.  We found all the things we usually have at home.  I brought Pepperidge Farm Stuffing with me, but everything else they bought here, including the pumpkin for the pies which can be hard to find.
 Left to right:  Jim and Norma Brooks who live right by us, but are in the records preservation area.  Don and Kayla Hansen, Sue and Brett Manwaring, Don and Dorte Taylor, Bodil Furbor, Ole and Lisa Ravn-Petersen and Pres. Nils Erik Nilsson.  This is basically our Family Home Evening group.



This is the wind up course: pumpkin pie, pecan pie, apple pie, fruit and vegetables. A fun evening.  We are so grateful for our missionaries.

Sunday, November 29, 2015

Wedding Part 2

Sarah and Ulrik's Family and Friends Dinner was at a lovely hotel in Helsingnor,  You could look out the window and see Kronborg Castle as well as the lights of Sweden just across the ocean.





 Jesper and Mette (who looked beautiful) and the Bennys, an LDS family, that Ulrik stayed with a year as an exchange student in Pennsylvania.
    The tables were beautiful and the service excellent.
Duck was the main dish....The color and texture are a lot like beef.
  The same customs as last week: silverware drumming  on the plates you stand on a chair to kiss. Stomping feet, you kiss under the table.   Lots of talks and skåls." Hurrah, Hurrah, Hurrah" while holding your glass in your hand.  Everyone joins in.
 Leave your partner alone and anyone can line up for a kiss.

   Jim used the excuse of taking an older sister home to miss the dancing which began at 11.30 and went until 1.  At 1 they brought out bread, cheese, polser etc.  Most got home about 3 a,m,  A real Danish wedding celebration and a lovely evening.



Saturday, November 28, 2015

The Wedding - Part 1

Sarah Paulsen and Urik Bernskov were married today by Jim.  He received his permanent ministerial authority today but had temporary authority for  last week and this week's weddings.
  We are good friends with both sets of parents and Sarah lived at our home in Salt Lake for 9 months last year.  We thus have been included in all the celebrating.
  The wedding was at 11.30 and they walked out to rain....hopefully they got a few good pictures.
They went directly to the Nitivej Chapel for the reception.  Once you have your wedding dress on, you stay in it all day here,

 The decorations were unique and just enough to turn the church into a party.  A member of the church in the decorating business did them..  Another member  in the catering  business, along with good friends did the food.  Everything was lovely and well done.
 This is the beginning for this super couple and also just the beginning of the wedding celebration.  We are going to the wedding dinner tonight from 6 pm until after the last food is served at 1 a.m.    There is a program throughout the whole night.  Tomorrow's post  will be The Wedding - Part 2.

Friday, November 27, 2015

Black Friday

  I don't remember there being a Black Friday in Denmark ten years ago.  Actually I don't even remember there being one last year.  Either way, I'm pretty sure it is an imported idea. Interesting that it falls on the same day as in the US.
     These are just a few of the ads that come in our mailbox every week.  We were in the temple all day, so didn't get to enjoy the excitement out on the streets, but they said the traffic was terrible.
Inside the temple it was lovely and we saw a lot of people we don't usually see, plus there were two couples from Germany for the week.  Being inside the temple is such a blessing.

Thursday, November 26, 2015

Thanksgiving

Denmark does not celebrate Thanksgiving, but many American living here do.  We will celebrate with the temple missionaries on Monday.  Among the many things I am grateful for are the temporal blessings such as plenty of good food, home and health.

And wonderful eternal spiritual blessings: family, the gospel, and the temple.


 

Wednesday, November 25, 2015

Inco

Hunting for a Thanksgiving Turkey, I was directed to INCO, a cash and carry food store.  To call it a store doesn't really give the right idea.  It is more of a food city.  I have never been in such a huge store and this was 90 % food.
 There was the usual shelf products
A whole room of fresh meat...
 Fresh Produce room

 Cheese room. There were hundreds of different kinds..

Fish room...Plus a frozen food room, a cleaning supply room, a paper products room, and others I probably missed.  It really was an experience.

Tuesday, November 24, 2015

Relief Society Christmas Party

The Gladsaxe 1st and 2nd Wards held a combined Relief Society Christmas Party tonight.  It was fun, well planned and carried out.
  After the welcome,we first enjoyed æbleskivers with sugar and jam.  You buy them frozen and just warm them up.  They are very cheap this time of year and everyone serves them.
Those who had brought candles, etc.  made center pieces and the rest made Nordic ornaments, drawing on small wood circles.
They stopped this at a given time and we played the dice game to distribute the 10-20 Kroner ($2-3) gifts we each  brought.
We finished off with ris a'la mond.  A good party and it was fun to visit and connect with so may.  I actually knew most of them or at least recognized them from the temple.

Monday, November 23, 2015

Jule at Tivoli

We went to Tivoli tonight for Family Night.  The snow was almost gone, but it was cold.  I have been there when it was colder and we got fleskesteg sandwiches, which are our favorites, And we only had to wait 5 minutes for the bus home, so it was a great night.





Sunday, November 22, 2015

Major Adventure

Saturday was a super day in the temple.  We were running all ordinances at capacity. We had an Own Endowment, live sealing of a woman to her deceased parents, big baptism, full initiatory and used both sealing rooms for the 10,00 and 12.00 sessions, plus an extra 2.00 pm session.
  This darling couple, Jonas Kelstrup and Maria Petersen started the day with their marriage, which Jim was able to perform.  He received his marriage authority from the state, just in time.
This was just the beginning of the day as we were invited to their reception at the church, which we couldn't attend as we were in the temple, but also to their private family/friend party in a lovely old farm -turned reception center about 40 miles away, close to Roskilde.
   It was snowing a little as we left, but the closer we got the more snow. We finally made it over small country roads and had a great time.
             
 Age-old tradition, when the guests beat on their plates with silverware, the couple has to climb on their chairs and kiss for the duration of the beating.

When guest stomp their feet, the couple kiss under the table.
 If either the bride or groom are left alone, the opposite sex can line up for a kiss.

  The food throughout the night was spaced around various, talks, tributes, songs, etc by certain invited  relatives and friends.  It was a fun night until we were ready to go at 11.30 and saw this out the window,,
This really doesn't do it justice.  There was over a foot of snow and we were unable to get our car out of the parking lot, let alone over the little unplowed, country roads.  Pres. Olsen offered to bring us home in his big four-wheeled car. We were most grateful as we heard others had to stay the night. We did make it home by 2.45 a.m. but will have to go back get our car in the next day or two.
  Roskilde had to cancel church as they had about two feet of snow, but here in Copenhagen it was only 4 or 5 inches.  By today it was mostly slush.
   This is more snow than we have ever seen in Denmark.
   Since we didn't have a car, we just walked to our old ward here in Frederiksberg and it was great to see old friends again.



Friday, November 20, 2015

New Heights

Our weekends seem to be getting busier and we love it.  Tomorrow we will have our third straight Saturday with a 2 pm session.  Today was a great day with a large group from Aalborg.  They brought 13 to be baptized, filled initiatory and we had big endowment and sealing sessions all day. Tomorrow will be even busier as we have Helsingborg Sweden, and Allerod Ward coming, plus lots of scheduled ordinances.

 Getting to any sort of heights here in Copenhagen involves some form of  an hydrolic lift.  There are all sizes and shapes.

Thursday, November 19, 2015

The Holidays Are Coming

Monday I took a quick trip through town to see what was going on.  Holiday preparations are everywhere.  It was warm enough to be enjoyable..until the rain came and I got drenched.



 Many of the boats on Nyhavn are covered for the winter, but the people are still out including this group of school kids on a field trip.

Wednesday, November 18, 2015

A Long Shadow

I got caught in my first major rain storm yesterday on my bike.  I came home soaked through.  Today however, we had a stretch of sun and I caught this picture of my shadow.  It gives you an idea of how low the sun is in the sky.  This was about 2 pm.  When they talk about "casting a long shadow", I see what they mean.

Tuesday, November 17, 2015

First Thanksgiving

Knudsens have a Thanksgiving Dinner every year for the missionaries.  It is always authentic and delicious.  We had turkey, potatoes, gravy, and stuffing, Danish style, which is more of a meat loaf baked inside the turkey. The cranberry sauce was homemade since that is not really a Danish dish.

 They invited the entire Temple Presidency this time. Usually the invitation just goes to missionaries and foreigners (us).



We had this HUGE apples pie with cream for dessert...We all left thankful for the Knudsens and  appropriately stuffed.


Monday, November 16, 2015

Christmas In the Air

 Taylors had a great Family Home Evening, probably their last here. They had planned so many fun things around Danish Christmas traditions. Dorte was born here and it was fun to learn from a native.
 We made the heart baskets, had ris al manden with cherry sauce, and Dorte gave each of us two little houses with candles.
We missed Kayla. There is a stomach bug that has been making the rounds.

Sunday, November 15, 2015

Parting

This may be the last dinner at Warnsdorfs for the Taylors and Hansens as they go home next month.  It was lovely as usual.
 Also a farewell to most of these beautiful Royal Copenhagen pieces.  Irma's daughter and granddaughter are coming for Christmas and Irma is giving them all they want  to take back to America.



Saturday, November 14, 2015

Crowds

We didn't exactly have crowds at the temple today, but we did have two nice groups from Leipzig, Germany and Krungsbaka, Sweden.  We had four session and two good baptismal sessions.  Thanks to great workers, the sister missionaries were able to get out in time to go to the HUGE Loppemarket at the Forum.  Here there were crowds.

 Sis. Taylor, Manwaring, Brooks and I had a great time and came away with delightful buys.
 We celebrated Sue Manwaring's birthday with take out from the Sorte Gryder and ice cream.