week 30 Touring Stockholm with Ryan and Sara

To begin with, we were so grateful that Hurricane Irma wasn't as devastating as many of us feared she would be.  We were so happy to hear from our friends, the Gillands, who are serving in the Jacksonville Florida Mission.  I found their recent post especially interesting, as they discuss the way the church prepared for the storm, keeping communication open, evacuating, and preparing to serve others.  It helped me understand how the church can report so quickly on the condition of missionaries wherever a natural disaster occurs.  I thought it may interest you, too, so with their permission, I am linking you to their blog, http://letsswimwithgators.blogspot.se.  Week 13.

We haven't heard a definitive word on our condo yet, but, thankfully, Vero Beach didn't suffer too much this time.

Monday morning I looked out the window, as I ate my breakfast, and thought, my friends ought to see this:

School buses don't exist in Sweden.  Everyone just takes the public transportation.  Students are given  bus passes and ride with the local commuters.  These are high school students, but we see middle school students, too.  I  haven't seen any elementary students on busses yet.  We have a school in our neighborhood and I have only seen students riding bikes or walking with friends or parents.

My latest Swedish cooking adventure was Chokladbollar, or chocolate balls.  In the stores and bakeries they are called chocolate bombs and some are as big as a cannonball! They are simple to make with simple ingredients:  butter, sugar, chocolate. vanilla, oatmeal and coconut.   Another hit with the missionaries.  Is there anything they don't like?

(They aren't so pretty here, but someone described them as a cross between a truffle and an energy ball--mmmmm!)  ( The ones sans coconut are John's, but really, they can't be nearly as delicious!)

Ryan (my nephew) wrapped up his week of auditing in Vårgårda and spent Friday night with us.  Saturday we picked up his wife, Sara, at the airport and ventured into Stockholm.

Every time I look at a cityscape, I am awestruck with the beauty of the architecture.  

 John is a great guide and had planned a quick tour of the capital city using all the modes of public transportation:  bus, train, tram, and water taxi.

We were in the depths of the subway system, and the elevator proved it!

A highlight of our trip was a visit to the Vasa Museum.  (John didn't have his camera, so we will post more and better pictures, with a little history, when we visit it again.  It is a must-see, so Trevor and April, plan on it!)

 The Vasa sunk in 1628 in the  Stockholm Harbor, and was raised in the 1970s.  It is an unique artifact in amazing condition considering it is 400 years old and spent over 300 years in water.

The stern's magnificently detailed carvings were meant to impress any enemy of King Gustav's power.  (There were originally brilliantly painted, too.)

(John has posted a few other pictures of our tour on Facebook, mostly taken from the water taxi. Check them out.)

It was so nice to have Ryan and Sara here!

 We stopped by the temple on our way to church this morning.

These lovely flowers (in the temple parking lot) seem to be some type of geranium, judging by their leaves.  

After church today we had a potluck. What a spread!  The theme was "food from around the world" and it was perfect!  Many brought favorites from their native countries.  I enjoyed listening to the men joke that their hot sauces (from Chile and Spain) weren't really that spicy, while the Swedes were claiming their mouths were on fire.  Others, smiled with pride as people ate their traditional foods.  One sister saw us split a pitepalt (barley and pork dumpling) and said, "Oh, they are delicious! But you must eat it with lots of butter!"  (There's nothing lo-cal about traditional Swedish food, that's for sure!)

Best of all, as we ate together, we were reminded that we, from different lands, are "no more strangers or foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints, and of the household of God"  (Ephesians 2:19).  One of the things that reminds us of the truthfulness of this church is that it is same wherever we go.  Here in Sweden we hear the same truths being taught, the same songs sung, the same spirit felt.  I made that comment in Sunday School today and one of the counselors in the bishopric (an impressive man who has only been a member 3 years) said that was one of the things that really impressed him.  When he went home to Africa, after joining the church here, he met missionaries on the street, told them that he was a new member, and asked where the church was.  When he attended, it was the same, and his testimony that this was Christ's church was reaffirmed to him.  So it is with us.  We are so grateful to be "fellow citizens" with the Saints in Sweden!