April 22, 2019 The promised land of Karlstad

Shots of Karlstad

Sorry I didn't have a chance to write last week, let's see if I can remember a few details from the last two weeks of whirlwind missionary work...

Karlstad has been an absolute dream and I couldn't think of a better area to be my last. The branch here is made up of about 20 members, mostly older people, who I absolutely love. Everybody has such a unique personality and their own quirks that just seem to fit right together. Karlstad is also incredibly beautiful. It sits right on the great lake of Vänern and is surrounded by Swedish forests. It's really been warming up here which means everything's turning green and we broke out the short sleeve shirts! It's honestly pretty incredible how you don't realize how little sun there is here during the winter time until spring comes and you're filled as energy as the sun now stays up until 8 pm. It doesn't even get dark now until 9:30 which is super nice.

Hopefully that gives you a bit of an idea of the area. To make it even better, I'm with Elder Olson who's a fantastic missionary and a blast to be with. He and his companion managed to give out 60 copies of the Book of Mormon last transfer, so we've been going around and following up with all of those people and meeting new ones along the way.

This week we got to travel 2.5 hours on the train to Göteborg (Gothenburg) for companion exchanges. It's been literally a year since I left Göteborg, so it brought back some great memories. I

Exchanges in Göteborg. 

For our morning exercise

 we decided to go on a run 

and conquer a mountain.

love traveling on the train because I'm in love with the land and nature of Sweden. I could honestly sit there for hours just staring out the window and pondering the creation.

A couple weeks ago Elder Olson was approached by a man who asked if he comes from Utah. After responding to the affirmative, the man said that he had been to the US and biked from the east coast to the west coast, passing through Utah, so he recognized us as missionaries. He and his wife invited us to dinner at their house on Monday and we had a fantastic lesson with them about the Restoration of the church. They don't have any believes themselves, but they asked a bunch of geat questions and were

Elder Olson and I

fascinating in reading the Book of Mormon to see the way God would have us live our lives. We're going back for dinner again on Thursday, and feel blessed to be able to continue teaching them. They're amazing people!


Äldste Sirrine

The six man apartment crew before I left. 

The mission office will be missed...