Well Christmas has come and gone! It was one to remember for sure though... It is so weird to think that this is my second and last Christmas here in Sweden... And that I flew here to start my mission in the middle of 2015 and now it’s almost 2017! Total crazyness.. but I have loved every minute of it.
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| Christmas! My family knows me too well. |
I would be on here all day typing if I were to write all the stuff that happened this week, so I’m just going to write a quick summary of some awesome things that happened.
It started out with something pretty funny and is the first time something like this has happened to me actually! We were going to go pick up my Christmas package (which was awesome) and I had my package slip, my California and Swedish drivers license and my personal number that all residents of Sweden have to live here. 
The personal number and license should have worked but the guy working there was being.. lets just say un-kind. He was telling me that I needed more information to pick it up and long story short we drove home to pick up another piece of identification, went back and he said that still wouldn’t work even though I had my ID card from the country of Sweden.. SO a lot of talking was going on and he said that I couldn't get my package. (all this was in Swedish) and he wouldn't tell me how I could get it.
The personal number and license should have worked but the guy working there was being.. lets just say un-kind. He was telling me that I needed more information to pick it up and long story short we drove home to pick up another piece of identification, went back and he said that still wouldn’t work even though I had my ID card from the country of Sweden.. SO a lot of talking was going on and he said that I couldn't get my package. (all this was in Swedish) and he wouldn't tell me how I could get it.  |
| Singing song of repentance (christmas carols) to the people of Umeå |
Finally with a little pushing, he said I needed a paper from the immigration office (which I had in my wallet the whole time with my personal number on it, ha ha). He just didn’t want to look at it! Finally he looked at it and said it would do after about 25 to 30 minutes. What makes this story better is that after I got my package, my companion who is from France tried to buy stamps with his ATM card and the guy asked to see his personal number! haha. My companion has a personal number because he is already European! The guy that was working just responded with something like.. "thats your problem.” That's the story and the main thing is, I got my package and my companion got his stamps from another place with out any trouble.
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| Erica Bussman gave us some sweet matching scarfs! |
Christmas Eve! Here in Sweden, they do most celebrations on Christmas Eve. So we got invited to eat with 3 different people and lets just say that is probably the most full I have been in my life! We ate at church in the morning with a member and then drove up to a city that is about an hour away to have Christmas with a Danish/Swedish family... then drove back to finish the night at my grandma away from home, Syster Gunvor Wirtala. All had amazing food.
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| More delicious Swedish Christmas food :) |
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| Some Christmas food |
I must say something about the Danish/Swedish family though... That food was heavenly! haha They are all hunters and fishers. Literally all the food we ate was shot or fished or produced in the village we were in. They had a huge fresh caught Salmon with amazing seasoning and flavor, meatballs made of moose, deer meat, turkey.. All hunted right in their backyard!
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| The coolest Danish and Swedish couple out there. |
Then they had the most amazing cheeses and butter that was produced right in the village as well. It was amazing and it was all so good.
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| Early morning Swedish Christmas sermon. |
The next morning, Sunday morning, we woke up early to go over the the Norin family to drive to a Swedish church and watch a Christmas sermon that has been going on for hundreds of years. It was way cool! Then we had an hour of church and then came back and finished the day off with the Norin Family. They are a nice family and made so much good food! We were able to skype home and see all of our families. That’s always fun :) We even played some songs together that night!
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| This is what I got from the Norin family. This is actually chocolate! haha |
It was a good Christmas and I feel happy with the ones I have had here because this is Christ´s time. We as missionaries are literally representing Him. That’s a big responsibility! During this time of Christmas you can really open doors with people who haven't thought about God a lot in their lives. I have seen that a lot these last few months during the Christmas season. We have three people that are wokring towards being baptized in January because they have hope and feel something different when they come to church and read the Book of Mormon. I know that those people will get an answer.
Christ lives.
Love you all and have a good new year!
Äldste Blackburn
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| Super dooper old Swedsh Church |
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| Worlds largest cheese slicers. |
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| I seriously might invest in some ice skates with all this frozen water. |
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