Splits on Splits on Splits

Well this has been quite the crazy packed week! On Monday after emailing we headed over to a YSA's house and had some dinner before everyone else started to show up. After everyone had gathered at the house we walked over to a nearby campsite and had a campfire and roasted marshmallows and hot dogs and played guitar and sang songs. It was a really Køstleg experience and reminded me of all the many bonfires I had with me and my friends in high school. There's something about being out in nature gathered around a warm fire that just brings people together and make some of the strongest bonds. Literally love it and it's totally worth the fact that everything in our apartment smells like campfire. We were then given a really cool spiritual thought about angels being all around us and how everyone at the bonfire was an angel too. It was way rad. 

Tuesday was Eldste Carver and Søster Hutchins birthdays. We had a birthday lunch of Caesar salad and cinnamon rolls and then had an awesome district meeting afterwards. Then later we went over to a members house for hamburgers, cookies and ice cream. We also had a way cool spiritual thought at the end of that meal where we went around and kind of bore testimony on different aspects of the gospel or on life or just shared something positive. It was really cool to hear about the good in everyone's lives. It was really inspiring and uplifting. 

Wednesday we had our first missionary meeting with our new ward mission leader. It was a really cool meeting and he even took the time to give us a quick rundown on Norway's history which was different but way cool. We were able to come up with some new ideas on what to do better as missionaries to help out the investigators, less active, and members here in the Stavanger area. It was way good, then it was time for another split. This time we were to have the Nordstrand Søsters (Petersen my old companion and Søster Eart) come here to Stavanger. They flew in Thursday night and left Saturday morning. It was another great splits. I was able to spend a lot of time with Søster Peterson as we taught a Jehovah's Witness and then met back up with the other sisters and one of the young women who had served a mini mission with søster Petersen as well. Søster Petersen and this young woman were then able to teach Sister Hutchings and I a very powerful lesson on the gospel of Jesus Christ. It was really cool to act as an investigator during that teach and to see those two girls really listen to the spirit and give such a powerful lesson. I can only say how touched we all were from that lesson of course as quickly as the party started with the Nordstrand sisters it was suddenly over and they were headed back to the Oslo area to keep killing the missionary game over there. 

Saturday as we were out contacting we ran into a cool free little art museum and decided to take a break real quick and check it out. We got some great pictures from that experience as well. We ended the week off with a wonderful Sunday meeting where we had the privilege of participating in primary and hanging out with all the cute little kids there, one of which will be getting baptized this upcoming Saturday. Then we had the grand finale at dinner at a members house where we had wonderful food a good spiritual thought and discussion and a great bonding time. All in all it was a crazy packed week but a great one as well!

Klem
Søster Blankmeyer 

Beautiful Bergen

This past week we were able to go on splits and visit the sisters in Bergen! It was such a blast. I was so glad we were able to make our way out to Bergen again. It's such a beautiful city in Norway and the people there make it even better. If I had more time here in Norway, I would totally want to go and serve there. Luckily enough for me, I've been able to go and visit these past two transfers. Before we left for Bergen though we went and tried back at an apartment that we had knocked on last week and had told us to come back another day. It's really kind of crazy because in Preach My Gospel, it talks about contacting people who have recently had a baby, moved to the area, or experienced a death in the family. Well this contact had all three. We had knocked on her door and asked if we could share a quick message and she told us she was interested but her husband was out of town attending his dad's funeral and she was trying to feed their new baby so she asked us to come back another day. Well we decided to try her again before heading out to Bergen.  She let us in this time and we were able to teach her a little bit about The Book of Mormon. Come to find out she's actually from Romania where her and her husband just recently moved from and they both come from religious families. She was very interested in what we had to share and was really grateful for the free copy of The Book of Mormon that we gave to her. It was a really cool experience and it just goes to show that one, Preach My Gospel knows what it's talking about and two, Heavenly father is preparing people here in Norway and placing them in our path. It's honestly so cool. We committed her to start reading The Book of Mormon before our next visit and then we were off and on our way to Bergen.

We arrived there Thursday night, talked and caught up a bit and then we noticed they had a ukulele in their apartment, so we sang some songs and went off to bed. The next morning splits began and I was able to start out with Søster Gagon and visit some members I had visited last time I was in Bergen so that was pretty cool. He then went back to the apartment for studies and lunch and it ended up being a great morning. By the time I got finished with all that, it was time to switch companions, but it was also almost time for sports so we decided to just all get changed into our sport clothes and then go knocking on doors nearby the soccer field. It was a really nice day and so everybody was out doing yard work since it's hard to come by a sunny day in Bergen. It made for some really cool knocking experiences we decided to do it all together and make it like a little group activity. It was way sick. I had never done missionary work like that before and so it was cool to learn a new way. It was just like four girls out to do service and people responded very well to it. It was way cool. I think maybe we were less intimidating in our normal clothes or seemed more legit with four rather than just two people but either way it was different and fun. It was also really cool because that's totally something that anyone can do. You can get together as just a group of friends or a church group and go out and try to find people to serve. Regardless of religion, service is a great way to show our fellow humans that we care and are willing to spend some of our time and energy for them and it's so rewarding. I challenge you all to go out and find someone you can serve. I promise you it'll be worth it. Have a great week!

Klem,

Søster Blankmeyer 

The 17th of May- Independence Day!

This past week we celebrated Norwegian Independence Day and it was such a blast. This was my second time celebrating 17 May here in Norway and I really just love it so much this is going to be something that I Aill miss very much next year when I'm back in America. There's just something so special about celebrating Norway and I think I've been really blessed to have experienced it twice now. Last year I celebrated Independence Day in Ålesund with my companion and a couple of my friends there.  We woke up that morning and got ready to go and see the parade with our friends. We walked to the spot we had pre-determined and watched the parade. It took a few hours and then the entire parade was over. In Ålesund after the parade they had some races and tents set up to see and buy your little trinkets from. After all of that we went to a members house and watched an approved movie, played some games and had a great night. That was my first independence day experience and obviously my second was spent here. It was a very different experience this time around in Stavanger.  Ålesund is a small enough city that they can get through all the different aspects of the parade within a few hours and call it good, but here in Stavanger they split it up into three different parades.

This past 17th May we woke up, got dressed, took a bus to meet up with the elders, and then walked to the city where we would watch the first parade with all of our fellow missionaries and some of the board members as well. We had a pretty good sized group as we stood and watched the "kidparade" of the students from all the different schools marched by and chanted or marching bands played some music for our entertainment.  It was so cute to see all the little children dressed up in their traditional costumes and waving their Norwegian flags. We had a few members from the ward in this first parade and so it was fun to hear the whole group cheer them on as they walked past the group of Mormons at the parade. After that was over we worked our way over to a members house to eat and hang out before the next parade.   We had some good food and then it was time to go and see the "Russ" parade.  The "Russ" parade is held by all the seniors in high school and they all wear their russ pants overalls and hand out there Russ cards to all the little kids/elders at the parade. That one was a rather quick parade and so we were back at the members house in time for the cake and dessert to be served. We ate some more, played some games and then we were off to watch the final parade of the day. The last parade included all the sports dance teams and everything else in between. It was a great way to finish out the day and it ended up being a great Independence Day in Norway yet again.

It was cool looking back on it all and seeing that even though they were very different experiences they were both celebrating the same incident and they were the same where it really counts.  In both places you could see the love and respect other people had for Norway and for its history and traditions and for their fellow citizens. I have never seen so many happy Norwegians in my life then on 17 May here in Norway. It's truly incredible. I hope you all enjoy the pictures from all the different parades and from my last independence day here in Norway. It was such a blast and I loved it so much and it will be an experience I will never forget. To end off, it's tradition to sing Norway's national song.  I hope you all enjoy. Have a great week!

"Ja, vi elsker dette landet", in English, "Yes, we love this country" is the Norwegian national anthem.

It is commonly referred to as only "Ja, vi elsker", "Yes, we love". The lyrics were written by Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson, and melody by his cousin, Rikard Nordraak.

The first verse goes like this:

"Ja, vi elsker dette landet,som det stiger frem,furet, værbitt over vannet,med de tusen hjem,elsker, elsker det og tenker,på vår far og mor,på den saganatt som senker,drømmer på vår jord,på den saganatt som senker,senker drømmer på vår jord."

Roughly translated to English:

"Yes, we love this country,as it rises forth,wrinkled, weather-beaten over the water,with the thousand homes,loving it, loving it and thinking,of our father and mother,of the saga night that lowers,dreams upon our earth,of the saga night that lowers,lowers dreams upon our earth."

Klem,

Søster Blankmeyer 

Preikestolen

Wow on Monday the district decided that we all wanted to go and hike Preikestolen. I seriously recommend that you all go and Google Preikestolen. I guarantee that it won't have the same affect as if you had hiked it yourself. But it'll give you all a little more background. In order to make this adventure happen and still have time to email home, some serious planning had to be done. Luckily our district leader is a champ and got right on that. He, with help from the district, was able to find buses, figure our times and who to invite and so on. We got it approved by President Hill, since it's a rather intense hike up to a major cliff and we were good to go. 

We woke up rather early Monday morning in order to get ready and send an email or two before meeting up at the docks by 7:30-ish in the morning. We would have to take a ferry and a bus to get there. We met at the docks at 7:30am, got our tickets, and were off. With our P-day ending at 6 PM we knew we would half to get up and down this mountain pretty quickly. I believe we gave ourselves the average  two hours to get up, 30 or so minutes at the top and two hours to get back down. This was pretty good time to hike up and down Preikestolen, About the average actually, but everything had been planned perfectly so that we could grab the right bus back to the ferry which would put us back in Stavanger with just enough time to email home. 

One thing you all need to know about the Stravanger area is that it rains quite a bit. The forecast had said only in 11% chance of rain on P-Day and so we figured that was pretty good chances for us to have a nice, rain free hike up Preikestolen. We got off the ferry and onto the bus and everything was perfect, but as we neared Preikestolen we started to see some raindrops on the windows and some rain clouds in the distance. It was all a bit of a bummer, but we didn't let that get us down. Heck, we were in beautiful Norway about to hike one of God's beautiful creation that people come from all over the world to see. How amazing is that? 

The bus finally dropped us off at the bottom of the mountain in our group.  We said a quick prayer and laid a few ground rules to ensure a safe and fun hike up to the top and then we were off. We had a couple of avid runner's in our group and so they kind of took off as the rest of the group, for the most part, worked their way up the mountain together. It was actually a really cool experience. I have never experienced anything quite like it. It was not the easiest thing I've ever done, but I would gladly do it again. There's something about being out in nature, in God's wonderful and majestic creations, that makes you think and ponder. 

I've been reading a book entitled "Light in the Wilderness- Explorations in the Spiritual Life," by M. Catherine Thomas and in this book she has an entire chapter devoted to 'Nature's Holy Plan: Nature Wakens Man From the Dream.'  In the beginning she quotes William Woodsworth and his poem "Lines Written in Early Spring." She goes on to talk about nature and the purpose there of. She says something that I have grown to love. She writes,"... I have been brought to tears by the love shining through it all. And more then enlivened, I have known that I was alive in Christ; I have known that I was beholding life expressing it's joy in the "midst of the power of God" and that I was witnessing "God moving in his majesty and power" (D&C 88: 45-47).  I have begun to understand the purpose of the spirit in nature. She goes on to say that, "natures role is to arrest man's attention so that he can hear that voice from heaven."  I truly believe that is why God gave us such beautiful nature here on the earth. 

While I was on the top of that cliff, I thought to myself how beautiful and grand this mountain and the waters beneath are and how God took the time to create such beauty for us because he loves us. And if he is willing to take that time in order to give us a beautiful place to live, how much time and love did he put into making us the beautiful spirits and people that we can be. At the end of her chapter on nature Thomas says, "the purest beauty is always moral. Wordsworth had noticed what Lussegran did - that the light in man and nature were the same light, we're of one piece, and flourished only in love and moral goodness. Wordsworth writes that he had come to recognize the nature "The anchor of my purest thoughts, The soul of all my moral being." Nature stairs us so deeply precisely because it's spirit is continuous with the soul of our moral being; it addresses an aspiration in us. The divinity in Nature calls to the Divinity in Man to awaken to that beauty in himself if which is "a thousand times more beautiful than the earth on which he dwells," even as he must wade through the turmoil and pollutions of the earthly life; for man's essence is "of quality and fabric...divine."  We find man placed in Nature's lap so as to delight him, enliven him, and awaken him to his divinity." That is what nature is truly about. 

God gave us this nature and this beautiful world to remind us of our very own beauty and help us to remember our divine nature. I realized as I sat at the top of Preikestolen that life is not always easy, and neither was that hike, but that our reward is truly beautiful. That we are all sons and daughters of the living God and that even though we may feel small in comparison to all of his creations, we are precious and he loves us more than we can ever come to comprehend in this life. I'm grateful for the opportunity that we had to go and hike Preikestolen and for the knowledge that I gained from nap experience. I am thankful for not only the beautiful nature all around me, but, most importantly, the beautiful people that surround me. I love you all!

Klem

Søster Blankmeyer 

Magic of Musikk

All right, well I know that this blog post is coming a week late but I've never missed a blog post yet and I figured better late than never. I wanted to share with you all my highlights of my first full week as a missionary in Stavanger. On Monday, April 24, we were able to participate in family home evening with the young single adults. This particular family home evening was held at a members home who just so happens to have a plethora of musical instruments. We were to have a night where we would all gather together and sing songs and enjoy the beauty of music. It honestly ended up being one of my absolute favorite family home evenings that I have attended here in Norway. 


This particular member is part of a band and quite honestly a musical genius and had found some songs for us that were easy enough to sing and play along with. It was awesome and afterwards we were all done singing and playing we all had some fantastic Norwegian waffles. That was my introduction to family home evening here in Stavanger as well as my introduction to a lot of the young single adults here who are truly awesome. That family home evening ended up being the highlight of my week and got me thinking a little bit more about music and honestly the joy that it brings into my life and the lives of others. I didn't see a single frown at that activity. Everybody at the activity was smiling and laughing and having a good time and enjoying the music.  

As a missionary I don't have access to different types of studies but I know there have been many studies on the effect that music has on us as humans. I can testify that music really does have an effect on us and I think that is so beautiful. Coming together for a family home evening activity with all of the young single adults brought a lot of joy to a lot of people including me. I really do have such a love for music. Anyone that truly knows me knows that I have such a love for music I have always been that person that listens to music as I get ready for the day. As I go throughout my day and honestly up until the very end of the day. I am also not really that biased to different genres of music either. In my personal opinion, I think that if a song makes you happy that you should listen to it. Everyone has a different taste in music but I think it's safe to say that everyone has at least one song that makes them happy. Music in general just makes me happy. I've spent pretty much my whole life listening to music and learning how to replicate and create my own music through varying instruments and I've seen the difference it can make in peoples lives. 

I've actually seen the effects of music all the time while out here on my mission. I've been lucky enough in my last couple of areas to have had someone leave behind a ukulele that I could use to play and sing with my companions and it's honestly been a major blessing. It's maybe a little bit weird to think that playing an instrument and singing some songs could relieve so much stress and create some much joy, but it really truly does. 

There's something about the fact that music is a form of art and creating something so beautiful can bring so much joy that it is so cool to me. No wonder God gave us the gift of music here on earth. What a blessing that truly is. It also a blessing to be musical. I think if we are blessed with the talent of music, that we should share it with others. That may sound very hypocritical of me seeing as sometimes I myself am shy about my music, but I've seen how sharing my music with others has brought a lot of joy and peace. I'm literally so grateful for music and for the blessing it has been in my own life and the lives of others. Music is magical and it truly makes a difference. 

I had another really cool experience with music this past week during my first full Sunday here in Stavanger. I'd love to share it with you all before I go. During sacrament meeting on Sunday The relief society aged women all got up and saying a musical number "Ostore Gus" Or "How Great Thou Art" in English and that was such a cool experience for me. It was one of the most beautiful musical numbers I have ever heard. I was sitting out there in the audience not really knowing any of those women who were up there singing and yet I was able to feel so strongly of their spirit and testimonies. It was really beautiful singing and music but what was honestly more beautiful where the singers and then musicians it was a really cool experience for me to sit in the audience and truly say to myself, "Wow! what an absolutely beautiful musical number." I didn't know any of those women personally, but I knew they all had a story and had all gone through life's ups and downs and throughout that journey had chosen to put their faith in God and that is really what that musical number was all about. It wasn't about the practices or anything else really. It was about why they were singing that song and how it applied to their stories and lives and all of that combined brought the spirit so strong which is what made that beautiful. 

I guess my challenge for you all this week it's just share your musical talents or testimony or something that you find beautiful with someone you care about. I know if you do this it will bring peace and comfort to the both of you. I'm so grateful for the gift of music and for the opportunity that we have to share that with others. I'm grateful for this week for reminding me of the blessing of music and for reminding me most my many blessings in general. I love this gospel and I love you all so much make it a great week!

Klem,
Søster Blankmeyer 

Change Is A Good Thing

 

All right everyone if this hasn't been one of my craziest weeks out here on my mission as far as traveling goes, I don't know what has. I started this week up in the north of Norway in the beautiful city of Tromsø and then went from there to Stavanger and then to Oslo and finished up back in Stavanger. It honestly was a pretty exhausting week but as I was debating what to write about this week my companion Soster Hutchings gave me a great idea. As I was kind of running through the highlight reel of my week we realized the major differences that I've been seeing already between Tromsø and Stavanger. It then got us thinking how crazy it is that two major cities here in Norway could represent the country so differently. It was crazy for me to think that last Sunday I was a missionary for a branch up way north that had on a good day and average of 5 to 10 people and that wasn't even a part of a stake. Now I'm serving and Savanger which is pretty big and belongs to a stake that had stake conference yesterday which hindered church attendance and yet still had double the amount of members then the Tromsø branch. Now I'll put it out there real quick that I am not saying that one is better than the other or vice versa just trying to show the different dynamics of these two areas. It's just kind of crazy to me to think how different all of my areas have been and not just regarding the dialect they speak. It really is such a cool experience though, because up to this point I have been able to serve in five completely different areas in Norway and I know they have all kind of felt like their own mini mission. 

Pretty much with all of my moves I've had to make some serious adjustments and basically re-learn Norwegian so it's felt as if I've been in five different missions, but I'm not complaining. It's been really cool for me to see all of these differences in these areas and be able to learn so much with each move and each companion that I've had. It's already been such a blast with one of my best friends Søster Hutchings in this wonderful area of Stavanger. Just from my short time with here (even though technically we knew each other and lived through the MTC together for six weeks) i've been able to learn so much. I love Soster Hutchings! She is a blessing in my life along with all of my past companions and all of the people I've met while in Ålesund, Asker, Kristiansand, Tromsø, or even Stavanger. I haven't met too many people here in Stavanger yet, but I am excited to get to know them all because I know I have so much to learn from them. It's exciting, like it honestly is so exciting to me that we are also different and every culture and everyplace is so different and that we can always learn something new from the people or place we are surrounded by. Honestly, how cool is that? Actually it's been really awesome being companions with Søster Hutchings because we started our missions out together and here we are towards the end of our missions and we have both changed a ton. Don't worry. We are still homies, but we are also no longer the people we were at the beginning of our missions in the MTC. It's really cool to see that we both can understand and speak Norwegian and that we both kind of know what we are doing. 

Like best friends do, we have been catching up and learning about each other's mission since we have been put in different sounds and stuff for the past year and learning about all of the joys and struggles and all that we have been able to learn in all of our different areas that have helped us to become the person we are now.  It's been way cool to see that change and differences and learning can all be good things, I'm excited to see what the rest of this transfer brings and how it will help to shape me into the person I want to become by the end of my mission, or even the end of this transfer. Which reminds me Sister Hutchings and I are both sister training leader's together this transfer and we are both determined to help the sisters we are over to reach their goals and be the person they want to be and I'm so excited! We all have dreams and hopefully have made some goals in our lives and I know how helpful it has been for me in my life to have someone to support me to accomplish my dreams and my goals in my life. I'm excited to pay it forward. 

Well considering I've been in and out of my area this past week I don't have too many things to share with you all so I figured I would just leave you all with a funny story that happened to me this week and then next week I'll hopefully have some more material to hit you up with. This week we had a leadership conference in Oslo and we had some time to kill after the meeting so Søster Hutchings and I go out to talk to people in kill some time. This man ends up stopping us and asking me where I'm from. He goes on to say I'm beautiful and that he would like a wife that looks like me (subtle 101) and then proceeds to invite us to coffee. I tell him that we are Mormon missionaries and don't drink coffee and he's all over the fact that I'm a good Christian girl. We end up inviting him to church in Oslo and say our goodbyes as he goes in for the kiss. Thank goodness for companions because Hutchings pushed him back and we were able to go. Pretty funny experience though. I hope you all have an absolutely fantastic week. Love you all!

Klem

Søster Blankmeyer 

Dreams Do Come True

So another week has past and our Søster Blankmeyer was so excited about her new area that she forgot to send the blog post on Monday.  She finally sent the blog post, some fun Easter pictures and her NEW ADDRESS:

Søster Blankmeyer
Hillevågsveien 33 #204 
4016 Stavanger, Norway

Wow it's been a crazy week and it's about to be an even crazier one coming up. This past weekend was full of lots of pretty awesome things that I just can't wait to share with you all. After Pday last week Søster Etchells and I went home and started to get ready for our splits to Bergen. Bergen is one of those areas in the mission and honestly in Norway that everyone dreams about being able to go to and visit. I was lucky enough to go from Tuesday to Thursday of last week. Tuesday before we left I received my Easter package and a few letters from my parents and Søster Ralphs I was feeling very loved. We barely had time to run over to the post and grab my packages before we had to run to the airport, so I stuff the letters in my bag and figured I do some good reading on my way to Bergen. Talk about being on cloud nine. I was literally living "The missionary dream". I was headed to Bergen a dream city here in Norway to go on splits with some pretty amazing sister missionaries with a few letters to read on the plane and a big Easter package waiting for me back home. I figured my week couldn't get much better than that, right? Wrong. My week continued getting better and better. Søster Etchells and I knew that we would be having a three hour layover in the Bodø airport on our way back home from Bergen so on our way to Bergen we found ourselves some nice 70 kroner doodle books to entertain us. We were like kids at Christmas when we found those. It was awesome. Soon enough we were on our way to Bergen where we arrived early and were able to catch a shuttle bus to meet up with the Bergen sisters. Pretty soon we were at the very nice Bergen apartment complete with a bathtub! It's been a while since I've seen one of those. Anyways, that was way cool and then splits began.  

 

THANKS FOR ALL THE EASTER GOODIES!

Splits was honestly a party. Søster Gagon and Søster Jones were the two sisters that we spend the day with. I spent the first half of Wednesday with Søster Jones which was literally awesome. I'll be honest, I was pretty nervous when I got called as a sister training leader STL because at the beginning of my mission I wasn't a very big fan of splits myself and so I was terrified of being that person that everyone dreads coming on splits and stuff but that morning with Søster Jones was a really good experience for us both I believe. She was very kind and told me that she actually really enjoyed being on splits with me because I was just myself and that was so good to hear. We proceeded to have a really good study and morning together and even were able to visit a less active couple and help prepare them to get to the temple one day soon. It was awesome. I really loved it. I was truly living the dream, and the dream continues. I spent the next half of Wednesday was Søster Gagon who is just a stellar missionary. I was able to learn so much from her and really enjoyed getting to know her better. It was great. We had a really good day in Bergen with Søster Gagon and Søster Jones and were even privileged enough to see Søster Bennett and Søster Cook who are also serving in Bergen right now. It was a party. Sure enough every good thing must come to an end and as fast as they began splits were over and we were headed back to Tromsø. Six hours plus of travel back home was probably about the only bummer of the whole splits experience, but those doodle books that Søster Etchells and I bought really came in handy. No shame. 

Anyways, that was the beginning of our crazy week and before we knew it, it was Easter Sunday in Tromsø. We were able to spend some good times with the members, the Millers and even got to Skype with the Olsen's. What a treat. We played many a game of good old Wackee Six and I might add, you're talking to the reigning champ right here. All in all it was a pretty event filled weekend I hope you all were able to have a really nice Easter as well. My Monday (today) we figured our busy week was over and that we could start getting back to normal, but boy were we wrong. This past Monday we found out about moves. I was unsure as to whether or not I would be staying in Tromsø for the next seven weeks but Søster Etchells and I figured I probably would. Well let me tell you all that we have a very inspired mission president here in Norway because we found out this morning that I will be moving to Stavanger on Wednesday to be companions with Soster Hutchings from my MTC group. Dreams do come true! Although I really am going to miss Tromsø and the wonderful people here that I have grown to love so much, I'm really excited to be heading to what could be my final area of my mission. I know there is a reason I'm going there and I am so excited to find that out. It's going to be a great next seven weeks. Well, I've got to go run around Tromsø now and say goodbye to all of my friends here and then I have to go and pack and hope I can get all of my bags underweight again. Pray for me! I'm sorry for the lame blog post but I promise to have a nice update next week from Stavanger. I love you all so very much and hope you have such a wonderful week!

Klem,
Søster Blankmeyer