Monday, December 16, 2013

A Birthday and Hurricane

Hey family and friends,

- It was Sister Peterson's birthday on Tuesday. I decided to break the
rule about not getting up before your companion to surprise her. I
blew up glow stick balloons, decorated and waited outside the bedroom
door until her alarm went off... then I rushed in with the glowing
balloons (it was perfect since it was still dark outside) and sang our
favorite birthday song in Danish. Ha ha, it was WAY fun :)

We had a Christmas Zone Conference this week:
- Sister Peterson and I sang O Holy Night between training. We were
nervous. She sang alto and I sang soprano. The arrangement we have is
super high. The highest note was a high C, but I think it turned out
well.
-We ate the traditional Danish Christmas meal which I have explained
in earlier emails :)
-President let us all watch a movie called Ephraim's Rescue as part of
the conference. It's about a pioneer trek. There is this part in it
when a girl and a guy kiss. It was really funny because as
missionaries, we don't watch movies that aren't missionary/church
related and don't date/kiss anyone so we can focus on our purpose
while here. You could just feel the room fill with the awkwardness all
40 of us felt, ha ha. But yeah, that was pretty funny.

- We met with Frely again. We had originally planned on talking about
the Restoration of the Gospel, but plans changed while we were there.
Sister Peterson opened up her scriptures and showed her a Picture of
her Family. That sparked the idea for me to pull out the one picture I
had of my family from my Grandma's baptism. I showed Frely and then we
started talking about following in the Savior's example (faith,
repentance, baptism, gift of the holy ghost and enduring to the end).
It was cool how it just led right into that.

- We had another lock-in this week. A hurricane was in the area, so
President told us we had to stay in the rest of the day. It was some
pretty crazy wind outside! We were talking to a lady the next day and
she said the storm blew her bike over while she was riding with her
kid in the back! Scary!

- We've killed 63 spiders in the Roskilde Apartment so far

Well, that's some of what went on this week...

Oh and this is a cute little clip about the true meaning of Christmas
that I wanted to share.

http://www.mormonchannel.org/video/mormon-messages?v=2874125972001

Love you all so much!


Søster Orgill
Soccer (as they say in the U.S.)


Beautiful sunrise at 8am
Accidently turned on the mixer when I set it down...



Toe warmers :) Thanks, Mom and Kim and Will!


Do Stockton and I look alike?

Monday, December 2, 2013

The Viking District... minus our district leader, Elder Hammond
The full district








The Domkirke






Making a wish on the 9 months left.

Chestnuts popping in my face.... haha :)

9 months


Stopping for Lunch / 9 months


Familier og venner,

Happy December!
It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas around here. We got to
stop by the lighting of the Christmas tree here in Roskilde the other
day. It was so fun. They were selling churros, they had an elementary
school kid group singing Danish Christmas songs on a stage and an
orchestra all dressed in Santa like outfits. Oh and they have hung up
artificial trees and lights all over the shopping streets. We went
with Frely, the lady we ran into last week on the street whom had
given us directions before. She is so nice. She did end up reading the
chapter we had invited her to read and said it was like the bible.
We're meeting with her again this week.

We had a district activity last Wednesday and got to visit the Viking
Ship Museum (where they have pieced parts of 5 viking ships that were
found in the beach here). We got to learn about vikings and dress up
like them, too!

After that, we ate lunch at a bagel shop that's kinda set up like
Subway. It was just us 6 missionaries at the restaurant, so he asked
us lots of questions about what we believe. He is Muslim and thought
the Book of Mormon sounded interesting. We gave him one and invited him
to read Moroni 10. He said he would, we're going to go back sometime
to see what he thought.

Then, we visited the Domkirke. It was really cool! All the Kings and
Queens of Denmark are buried there. It's cool to see the influence of
many different centuries in the one building.

Sister Peterson and I have officially been out for 9 months. So, I
stuck with my molten lava cake tradition and we made a wish on our
last 9 months, how we want them to go :)

Hope all is well in the U.S. and that you all had a great Thanksgiving!

Love always,
Søster Orgill

P.S. Next week, we are going to Tivoli for p day so the email next

week may be very very short.

Monday, November 25, 2013

Sister Orgill and Sister Petersen

Picture with the man who plays the Savior in 
“Finding Christ”.


A Familiar Face/ Forgotten French

Familier og venner,

We walked outside this morning and saw the ground was covered in snow…
actually it’s more like little pieces of hail everywhere… I wonder if
it will ever be powdery snow (that’s my favorite kind). It was only
day one of snow so only time will tell, but hey, that means Christmas
is around the corner! Good thing our ward is planning a Christmas
party that we can invite people to. We are excited for this month
since we can be pretty creative with finding people.

One miracle from this week: we had about 30 minutes before an
appointment we had with a new member. We decided to ring the call
boxes in the areas apartments and see if we could talk with anyone who
would let us in. It was getting dark and the street was all wet… so
there weren’t many people out of the streets. We rang a bunch of call
boxes. One guy let us in, but then he told us he was not interested.
We walked back outside and then we saw a lady who looked familiar.
Three weeks ago, we had seen her on the street and asked her for
directions to an address we were looking for. We said hi to hear and
retold her that we were missionaries and we visit people and share
more about the Savior. She said we could visit her sometime! It was
way cool. So she gave us her address and we made an appointment.

The appointment went great! She is wicken. We talked about the
similarities and differences between what we believe and invited her
to read 2 Nephi 33. We are going to meet with her again this week :)

The same night, we ran into a man who only spoke French. Sister
Peterson told him I could speak French. I tried, but I could not even
think of a word in French! Finally, I thought of one word… “pourquoi”
which means “why,” but I could not even think how I could ask why he
was here. We gave him a Mormon.org and that was it. Wow, so much for 5
years of French… After he left, I just kept trying to even think of
one sentence I could have said in French, only Danish words were
coming to mind. The only thing I can think of is that maybe because I
was called to speak in Danish, not French? Hmm… oh well, maybe I can
restudy French one day :)

Also this week, we sang in church again. We sang Joseph Smith’s First
Prayer (in Danish) to the tune of Come Thou Fount. Elder Hammond
played the piano, I sang soprano, Sister Peterson sang alto and Elder
Metcalf, Elder Carmack and Elder Ockey sang Tenor and Bass. It went
well and the ward asked Sister Peterson and I to help sing with the
primary in the primary program next month and we will be singing at
the ward Christmas party, too. We sure sing a lot here, but it is a
great way to bring in the spirit.

Jeg elsker jer!

Med kærligste hilsener,


Søster Orgill

Tuesday, November 19, 2013

Together again...and visit to the Roskilde Cathedral

Great to be back together! Can't believe we are all on Sjælland! 
The typical Orgill sandwich picture and hoisting up 
the former MTC district leader.
The MTC district- reunited, without the Icelanders

Attending a funeral in the
Roskilde Cathedral
 Lutheran Church of Denmark
with Priest Ingrid Salinas



The Star mural with Ingrid Salinas a friend of
my mom's from when she was in high school.


This was a tough dandelion! We accidently got off at 
one or two stops too early, but it was a nice walk to
Svogerslev :) Clear skies, a little chilly

Really cool parking lot that has Christmas lights 
that look like stars above the cars! :)

Thanksgiving, Family History, a Funeral

Kære familier og venner!

I hope all is well for everyone reading this. I am assuming most of
you are preparing for the Thanksgiving holiday.

Last week, we had a combined zone conference and had a mini
Thankgiving celebration consisting of a turkey bowl (American
football), zone training (great talks, inspiration and setting new
missionary goals for the month), Thanksgiving dinner (I just missed
the Orgill cranberry sauce and the pies in every flavor thanks to Stu
every year) and then, a talent show! My companion and I let 5 other
sisters in a remix of the song Give Said the Little Stream. It ended
up turning out pretty cool, and the great acoustics were a plus, too!

Another fun thing this week: This lady in my ward made tortilla soup
since she wanted to make a recipe from home :)

There were so many great things that happened this week.

On Tuesday, we were walking down the street and noticed an elderly
lady standing on a ladder trying to clean her windows. We asked if she
needed help. She said she did not, but then we just started to tell
her a little about who we were and that if she ever needed anything,
we love to do service. She found out we were Mormon and got really
excited because she said her great uncle was mormon and she had found
some things about her ancestors on FamilySearch.org that she wanted to
show us! She invited us in, we chatted about it, shared a hymn, she
gave us some saft and then invited us back. We are so excited to help
her find more about her family!

On Saturday, we met my Mom's friend from high school, Ingrid. She is
so nice! We had planned to come and meet here. She ended up having to
be in charge of a funeral since she is a Priest and we got to go. It
was really neat to attend and witness more Danish culture. They had
real candles in the church on every bench and a row of flowers down
the aisle. A large majority of the program was singing. The program
consisted of lyrics to all six of the hymns we sang. We are glad we
had the opportunity to be there.

It was interesting talking to Ingrid because she had not known prior
what church we were members of, but as I was talking to her she told
me she was surprised that my mom had changed religions because when
she said she could remember that my mom was a devout Baptist. I told
her that I didn't know that, but I did know my mom is very dedicated
and true to what she believes and that it must have been right after
Ingrid went back to Denmark that my mom started attending The Church
of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and found out for herself it was
true. She's put her whole heart into the faith she has and continues
to share it with others. I'm so grateful for my mom's example to me.

Sister Peterson and I talked with Ingrid a lot of our beliefs,
including what happens after death, the role of baptism, the schedule
of a missionary and the process of getting a mission call. She is such
a sweetheart and had made us bread, took us out to lunch at this cute
cafe and showed us around one of her Cathedrals. It was gorgeous! I
told her that it was the most beautiful one I had been into compared
to the ones I had seen in USA, France and England. It's true though.
Possibly because of the star mural :)

Anyway, it was a great week!

Hope all is well wherever you are reading this.

Love always,


Søster Orgill
Roskilde Beach and cows, ha ha :)

Free bread, spit and meeting Tomas

Here are some things that have happened this week:

1.Visited the city Køge (which is also in our area) so we could go
meet some less actives and previous investigators

-Ate dinner there at a pizza place. The owner came up and gave us 2
free pastries after we were finished and then gave us a loaf of french
bread to take home! So nice of him. We left a mormon.org card with a
thank you note on it and will definitely be back!

-This seven year old on a scooter saw us coming down the street. He
put his hand up as to have us stop. We stopped and asked what we could
do for him. He stood for a minute in silence and then spit on my
companion and then just stared at us. Ha ha, we had no idea what to
do. We laughed and were confused. Then, I realized I didn't want him
to have a bad impression of the church since how many times do you see
sister missionaries in your life? So I pulled out a mint and gave it
to him and told him it was from the USA. He was surprised. Looked
curiously at me, licked it and then put it in his mouth. I told him to
have a nice day and he told us to as well. I think he was blown out of
the water that we were nice to him, so I'm thinking he now has had a
good experience with missionaries and maybe he's remember for next
time he sees us :)

2. Met Tomas Kofod, the actor who plays the Savior in "Finding Faith
in Christ". We took a group pic with him... coming soon and he thanked
us for all the work we do here as missionaries. He was so nice! He
also apologized that his hair is a little longer right now since he is
playing a role in Les Miserables pretty soon.

3. Door contacting this week:

-A guy answered the door and hid behind it the whole time, we talked
for about 5 minutes. We are pretty sure he didn't have clothes on
since he hugged the door the whole time, we could only see his face
and neck.

-Talked to this lady that could not even really remember her name it
seemed and she just bent down and spoke through a crack of the door
the whole time.


But things are going well. We have a busy week planned and are excited
for more adventures here in Roskilde (and Køge). I know Heavenly
Father wants me here at this time and that his timing for everything
is so perfect.

Love you all!

Med kærligste hilsener,


Søster Orgill

Monday, November 11, 2013

Cool house slippers at the Borups house :)

Book tree we found and added a
Mormons Bog to the Collection ;)


The district at the Ward Halloween party that we 
have just been informed will be annual from now on!


Halloween day!

Halloween Dinner at Tina's

We got mail today in costume on the way to the ward party

Us with Naja :) and the cool background Sini in our ward made

Our district after the Ward Soccer Activity

 Cute puppy at the Borups' house

Lockdown and Halloween party



Lockdown and Halloween party

Last preparation day it was SUPER windy. I really thought we were

going to get blown away or tree would fly out of it's roots and hit us

or something. I kept telling Sister Peterson that I thought the wind

was so strong that something might hit us, but she doubted it. Then,

we found out that there was a hurricane near! We were talking to this

man while waiting for a bus and the wind was just going wild and was

shocked we hadn't heard anything about it yet.


We got home and then received word that President did not want us to

go out the rest of the evening because it was too dangerous. Pretty

crazy!

On Halloween, we had a dinner appointment with Tina and her mom! They

were so sweet and made everything perfect for the occassion, They also

required us to dress up, so we ended up just being 50s girls. And for

the spiritual thought we talking about Trick or Treating, but about

how with the Savior, there are no tricks and that we need not fear.

Isaiah 41:10. Then we sang How Firm a Foundation (In Danish).


The Halloween party was a success! I was so nervous because we had

only suggested the idea 3 weeks ago and the missionaries were in

charge of it, the members helped out so much! For dinner: Chilli over

rice, salads, bread, cupcakes and apple crumble. We had face painting,

bobbing for apples, mummy wrap, musical chairs with Halloween music

and then casting plates of whipped cream at the missionaries (the

elders' idea). Naja came and loved it!


Pretty crazy week, but we did find two great potential investigators

who invited us to come back, so we are going to meet with them this

week.

Life is beautiful.

-Søster Orgill

Monday, October 28, 2013

The progress of a member's heart shape bench carved into a tree!

Waiting for the bus after district meeting


Toni (our landlord's cat) came 
through the window during
personal studies

Efterår in Denmark

Somehow Elder Hammond and I ended up matching at church.
Sister Peterson thought it was so cool and made us take a picture.

The Dutch guy who gave us free donuts 
and chatted with us about the church

This week in Roskilde...

Mine familier og venner,

This week in Roskilde...

On Monday night ate dinner at member's house in Køge. It is more of
the country out there. It is so beautiful and was really fun. It gets
darker earlier now so we even got to see the stars on this little
watchtower they have :) They are carving a heart shaped sitting bench
into a tree right now, I'll attach of the picture of what it looks
like right now. It's not finished yet, but I thought it looked way
cool.

We went to this little Europe outdoor marketstand festival that they
had hear in Roskilde. Stands were selling sausages, olives, pesto,
pastries, cheeses, clothes and all sorts of stuff from Italy, the
Netherlands, France, Finland... Way cool. We walked by one Dutch donut
stand and the man there told us that he wanted to give us free donuts
because we were servants of Christ. It was way nice of him. We chatted
about our beliefs and then he wanted to know what we did as
missionaries. We told him we usually try to look for some common
ground to start with, then he asked us to try approaching him with our
message. It was cool. He lives in the Netherlands. We invited him to
visit Mormon.org.

I was on splits in Gladsaxe and we went over to dinner at this nice
lady's house who will be leaving soon to serve a Family History
mission in Salt Lake. She made a typical Danish Christmas meal for us:
Flæskesteg (pork that kind of has a crispy layer on top), boiled
potatoes, rødkål (red cabbbage that is sweet and vinegary, way good),
pickles, beets, and then for dessert, risalamande (kind of like a rice
cream pudding with cherry sauce on top... apparently at Christmas time
they put a whole almond in there and who ever gets it wins a prize).
So the point to this story is that I was trying to cut the pork and my
knife slipped off and as a result, rødkål landed in my lap and on the
table and on the floor... ha ha yeah. Somehow, my companion for the
day and the lady we were eating with didn't notice so I tried to scoop
things causally back on my plate and into my napkin for anything else
that still remained on my skirt or on the floor ha ha. It was WAY good
though! Oh my goodness. I might have to continue that Christmas
tradition... :)

Still on splits, I went to a 12 ½ year (copper) wedding anniversary
party of this lady who is half Indian and half Canadian, he husband is
a Dane. Way fun and quite the cultural party. We had Indian food
there, it was so good! She is an investigator in Gladsaxe and invited
the missionaries to her party. It was kind of funny at first because
her friends asked if we even knew her, then they realized that she was
friends with us (well, my companion at least since I didn't know her),
but it was cool because we got to have a lot of discussions about the
church and many people asked about our beliefs and why we had come on
missions.

And yesterday... Some new callings were made in the ward, as a result,
there was no one to teach the 7 to 8 year old class at church, so they
asked Sister Peterson and I if we could teach it. A little
nerve-racking since we found out right as we were walking into
sacrament meeting, but it was fun. It was on how we can show our
parents we love them (through obedience). It was fun. We colored
family trees and drew pictures of each family member on them, told
each other about our families, told each other how we have seen our
parents show that they love us and made a short list of how we can
show our parents we love them. We then talked about Nephi and how he
was always obedient to his parents. At this point, we lost their
attention, but then we got it back by playing Simon says and relating
it to being obedient. Ha ha, it was kind of hard because I realized I
didn't know how to say things like "hop" or "jump" or "touch" (like
touch your head) in Danish. I should try to learn more Simon says
vocabulary :)

I love October, it's a beautiful time of the year (everywhere! no
matter where you are, in my opinion)

My favorite lesson to teach? Probably still and always The Plan of
Salvation. The purpose of life on earth and Heavenly Father's perfect
plan for us.

Love you all!

Med kærligste hilsener,




Søster Orgill

Roskilde

Kære familier og Venner,

Things are going well in Roskilde, we are still trying to set things
up, meet people and learn how to use the bus system here. Our ward is
huge! It is the biggest in Denmark and the members are really excited
because the last time they had sisters serving in the ward was 10
years ago.

The ward mission leader has asked that the missionaries join the ward
in playing soccer each week and to invite investigators for easy
fellowship. It's kind of funny because Sister Peterson and I are the
only girls that come. My goal is to be more confident in soccer by the
time I leave here, luckly Sister Peterson helped explain the rules to
me and gave me pointers even while she was on the other team.

We live in the basement of a really nice lady her in Roskilde. She has
an apple tree that she lets us pluck apples from. What does that mean,
we can cook tons of things with apples, too. Way, fun! I love it!
Maybe we can even make something to bring to less active with apples
:)

We had so many miracles last week, but I will just share one today.

We were looking for a member's apartment because we were supposed to
meet with her so she could give us a map of Roskilde, etc. We were on
the right street, but kept looking everywhere for her apartment number
and could not find it anywhere! We asked like 3 people for directions
and they all gave us obsure directions... bascially, no one knew where
it was. Ha ha. So then, we saw a lady walking just up the street from
us and we decided to ask her. We ran up to catch up with where she was
and asked for directions in Danish. She looked slightly creeped out/
surprised so we tried to explain that we just needed to figure out
where an apartment is. Then she said, "no, you don't understand... I
grew up Mormon." It was amazing! It turns out that she had just
recently moved, but hasn't been to church in a long time. She invited
us to come over sometime and gave us her name and address! Way neat!
We are excited to meet with her and felt so blessed to be a part of
the Lord's plan.

I love my companion. Sister Peterson is awesome! I feel like I am
growing so much this transfer. We made a goal to try and only speak
Danish from now on because we really want to try and improve. The
thing we are going to focus on as a companionship is to act on all
promptings we receive. What I love most about our companionship is
that we are always trying to serve each other. We take turns making
each others bed, doing each other's dishes (without the other
noticing), just random acts of kindness. Life is so much better when
you can make others happy and they can also receive more joy when you
take the time to let them serve/help you as well.

I hope all is well where ever you are! I love you all so much!

Love,


Søster Orgill