Lead thou me on...!

October 25, 2010
Greetings loved ones! WUNDERSCHÖNE WOCHE! (Wonderfully beautiful week!)

THE CLOUDS ARE SO BEAUTIFUL HERE! So huge and dark and my favorite. The snow should hit in 2 weeks or so, but these fall days are the calm before the storm and Im constantly pinching myself, and 70 times a day telling Sister Singer 'today is such a great cloud day!' It even got to the point she said a couple mornings ago, 'hey Sister Rasmussen, I think you would really love the sky right now...' its just so incredible to me to get out of the moment you are in and its kind of a 'stop and smell the roses' kind of mindset, but more of 'stop and wonder at the clouds' because I feel the Lord so close, it always brings life back into perspective when you look at the clouds, realizing our divine identity as children of God, and he is so close, watching and assisting in our righteous pursuits.
Sister Singer and I taught the plan of salvation a lot this week. 3 times I think, and so its been kind of a theme. It was really a cool experience last night teaching a new investigator Xaing. He is a student at the Berg Uni getting his PHd in Geo something or other. We street contacted him and had met with him once before last night, he is from china and has NO concept of God, he is very scientific and logical but as we taught him, he had a lot of sincere questions and teaching him was so incredible. You could tell he was really applying it personally, he kept asking questions like 'so if there was a man who.....ladida' like we dont know hes talking about himself. He was really into it and aske how God answers prayers if he isnt here with us and asked how to pray and the spirit was so strong talking about the Holy Ghost and how the Lord will answer our questions.  He said he would pray and try and notice the Holy Ghost when he prays. He then asked (this is after a 50 minute lesson on the plan of salvation with the whole puzzle and all) 'well if there is only one God why are there so many christian religions?' PERFECT transisition into the next lesson....seriously?! he really asked that question, it would have been perfect for a missionary training example of a perfect lesson or something, i just felt so blessed to have been there and be able to explain to someone their divine identity!
That was really the eye opening thing to me, we are teaching people here the whole point of life! We are making people aware of the great plan our loving Heavenly Father has for us, telling them they are a child of God and a perfect son of God died for them and their mistakes. Its such an incredible thing to give people this knowledge and help them see a bigger perspective of life! Seeing someone realize wow, life isnt just about going to school to get a better job to get more money to buy more things.....realizing how trivial and short term that is compared to, wow Im here to remember the plan I knew before this life and to learn patience and charity and love and do the things Christ has asked us to do.....it makes everyday so much more meaningful! I feel so blessed to be here in Freiberg being able to share this eternal amazing message with people that will listen!
We had a couple moments I thought of home.....one being in English class, we had explained what PB&Js were, and we brought them to class! They definitely have never heard of them and a few people made an 'ew gross why would you eat something like that' face, and some LOVED IT! (Myself included) We then were given a german recipie for something like meat soup in bread bowls, and then the 2nd counselor said they had an 'überraschung' haha i think thats how you spell it, anyway a SURPRISE for us....we went into the gym and they were grilling bratwurts practicing for the christmas play. 1. The brats were amazing with sanf and ketchup 2. YES THEY ARE PRACTICING FOR THE CHRISTMAS PLAY...on October 21st! They go CRAZY at Christmas....huge christmas productions (oh im secretly hoping I get to stay here another transfer for Christmas....wow that would be amazing!) but pretty cool. Our ward is the greatest.
We also had an amazing miracle moment for missionaries......we were walking (like always) up to a contact and obviously we try and talk to everyone we pass, but as we were walking up this hill Sister Singer was in the middle of like a really cool spiritual story and there was a man walking towards us walking the other direction and I misjudged him assuming he wouldnt want to talk to us, 50 yrs old, cigarette, stern look on his face, so we walked past him with a Guten Tag and kept going with Sister Singers story....well like 20 seconds later we heard 'Zwei madels!' and we turned around, not really knowing what this old guy wanted.........so we walked back to him and he said 'You have talked to me before and Ive been thinking about what you said... and I want to learn more...' so we set up an appointment! So we turned around and kept walking and were speechless! Yes that really just happened! Cant believe it! We see litle miracles like that everyday here, and I can feel the saviour so close!
I hope everyone has a lovely Halloween weekend! There isnt much festivity here so have some fun for me, we are going to the Bishops house next monday for fhe with a less active guy and i wanted to carve pumpkins but I dont think its going to happen....so...someone carve one for me! ;)

Serving a mission is the best thing ive ever done and I love it so much, I am so blessed and I am eternally grateful for your love and support, THANK YOU. Für alles.

Congrats to HAILEY WRIGHT! I heard the wedding reception was a blast and beautiful, cant wait to see pictures! Good luck to waterford vb this week at state! Congrats to Topher and his healing collarbone :) and HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

-Sister Rasmussen

Tischtennis....brownies....Freude....CHURCH!

October 18, 2010
What a great week! Agree? The weather here is cool and crisp, leaves are COVERING the sidewalks, its misty in the mornings and yet the sun is shining...sometimes there are really cool grey rolling clouds, but yesterday and today the sun has come out and its been just perfect. Sister Singer and I thought it seemed like 'perfect turkey bowl' weather. Everyone is saying it should snow in the next two weeks.....eeek! Im excited! Its going to be so beautiful, I for some reason think I will be putting my foot in my mouth being excited for it, but I guess we will enjoy the weather as it is and stop wishing for the future. Either way its starting to smell like winter and its time to buy some good boots.

We made a lot of progress this week, especially with Li and Ding Ge. Ahh there is so much to say, so last week we had invited Li to be baptized and she responded in her sweet chinese german english 'Liebe Sisters, I am going to be honest. I dont want to become a mormon.' So that was...well not so great, BUT we then recommitted her to pray, to pray to know if the Book of Mormon is true, etc..  and invited her to this 'Tischtennisturnier' on Wednesday. She said she would pray and also be waiting for us outside her door at 17 to walk up to the tournament with us. So we showed up that evening and she poked her head out the 4th floor window and said 'here I am' haha Oh you would love her English, its so cute. She also said, is it alright if I bring some friends? We said of course, and DING GE walks out of the building haha, our two investigators are chillin now, (if you didnt remember, we had contacted them completely separately, and here were are, all friends) Also their other friend, her son and her mother came with us to the ping pong tournament. There were a lot of people from our ward and Li played great! Ding ge and I just laughed the whole time and wow Germans do everything right, they had a trophy, and two medallions for the 2nd and 3rd place winners....crazy...for PING PONG! haha, anyway, we then had an appt with Ding ge for Thursday and Li wanted to come too, so they said they would walk with Sandy up to the church and meet us there the next day. 

So Thursday Sister Singer and I taught English to our hilarious 9 Germans, we brought American chocolate brownies, very chocolatey and delicious, they loved them and wanted the recipie.(we also gave some to the streulings and she wanted the recipe too...! Guess its a good one!) We then met Ding Ge, Li and Sandy and they brought their Books of Mormon. We opened with a prayer and asked how they had been doing with praying...Ding Ge (who had no previous religion at all) said she had prayed twice and we were very proud and excited, we also asked Li (who ís baptized Evangelish and has a lot more knowledge of the bible and christ) said, 'yes I prayed about what you said and I want to keep looking for the truth, zu wissen die wahrheit' BAH! Coolest response ever and we were so excited! So we reviewed of the importance of prayer and then watched Finding Faith in Christ in Chinese.....after it was finished there was some confusion with the translation of the word 'faith' in the chinese, something to do with 'confidence' and so Li was teaching Ding Ge what faith was.... not just defining it but really bearing her testimony of faith. We then read a few scriptures about faith and Li told us what Jesus Christ meant to her. It was really great to have both of them there to clarify and explain faith in their native language. We then talked about how faith is an action word and to show our faith we cant just say 'i believe' and then go on doing nothing, we have to help it grow, and we talked about the seed. Ding ge then chimed in, like us we have to have water and earth and sunlight, we need to work on our faith.' (perfect answer) It was then cool when we were talking about our human hunger and our spiritual hunger and just like we need to feed our physical body, we need to feed our spirit. and we laughed because a couple weeks ago they had taught us how to say 'I am full' in chinese...it sounds like 'ooo bow la' so we were saying we want our spirits to be saying 'ooo bow la' and then Ding ge said 'so after church we can say Thank you Heavenly Father Ooo bow la' how SWEET! So they both committed to showing their faith and to pray and read the scriptures, we gave them a chapter to read and also invited them to church. They said theyd come and I said 'you can wear a skirt if youd like' and Li was kinda hesitant like...mehh I might.... and then Ding ge said, so can we meet here every Thursday? How often does the invetsigator set up the regular appointments!?!?

Well Sunday we went out to the road waiting to see them walking up the street.....didnt come...didnt come....and then we saw li in a cute tan skirt and boot and her hair was all done up and oh it was such a cool experience seeing her faith in coming to church. We welcomed her warmly and asked how she was and she said 'ich fühle mich wohl' meaning I feel comfortable or very welcome....and then she pulled her book of mormon out of her purse during sacrament meeting! Apparently Ding Ge had accidentally slept in and re committed to last week, but WOW! So great!

I hope all those stories made any sort of sense...if anything just know that Li and Ding Ge are doing great, progressing and are SO funny. I will send some pictures next week.. hope Kasandra can put them on the blog or something. It so incredible being on a mission and meeting these people and knowing, wow I am going to talk to these people for the rest of my life! Church is so great, I really feel like I am in my home ward....everyone is so friendly and there are already so many inside jokes between us and different members. Its really funny too, all the members want to hang out with us! haha-last week we went with the streulings on p-day to the sechishe sweiz, today we went with Schwester Fröbel shopping at TKMAXX in Chemnitz (which let me tell you is THE place to shop here in Saxony...youve never shopped til youve shopped in a TKMAXX in Germany :) and then another member, Schwester Hartz (with the blue hair) she said she would love to go hiking with us next week, hahah, so we are booked. 

We are super stoked for that, because Schwester Hartz' husband isnt a member so maybe we can build a cool friendship and some trust with him....who knows what will happen! Also the list to feed us was just updated and wow the members here are SO loving. Its such a blessing to be a missionary in the Freiberg ward!!

Sister Singer and I are having such a blast together....we laugh so hard, bending over holding our stomachs....I wonder what people think driving by, who would want to talk to such friendly sisters!!? Its a constant adventure, talking about the gospel, bearing our testimony to everyone we meet, laughing with members, being rejected left and right, praying, bearing testimony, laughing and praying some more....its such a lovely life and I am so blessed to be here. Thank you immensely for all the support and love and prayers....it is very much felt and needed! Have a grrrreat week! Good luck building the kingdom over there! We'll do our best over here!

-Sister Kimberly Rasmussen

ps Congrats to Nick Coombs getting engaged! and HAILEY RAE SCHROEDER is becoming HAILEY RAE SCHROEDER WRIGHT THIS THURSDAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! CONGRATULATIONS HAILEY RAE! Wish I could be there!

we were moving mountains long before we knew we could..

October 11, 2010
'There can be miracles....if you believe...' Yes that is from the Prince of Egypt soundtrack and that song is SO TRUE. Sister Singer and I pray for miracles everyday and we believe they will come...and then THEY DO! Do you know what the definition of a miracle is? Welp in the bible dictionary on 2/3 of the way down it says 'a miracle is the natural results of the messiahs presence' (actually the bible dictionary officially says) 'the natural results of the Messiah’s presence among men' ... Isnt that COOL! The NATURAL RESULTS. Well its true, Sister Singer and I had an especially cool miracle on Saturday night......

We were on our way home...we stay out until 9pm everynight, so we were walking through the cobblestone gorgeous innenstadt, quaint little city a few streets away from our little apartment and we saw two people in front of us. so we had to pick which one to ansprach...I said 'okay, old guy or young guy?' We went with the young guy. We proceeded to ansprach him and bore our testimony of God and his love for us and asked him what he believed in....he started giving us a somewhat normal response that most people give without a religious backround..'yeah I dont believe in God..' but we kept talking...and kept talking....HE then asked if we wanted to take a seat on the bench. (Yeah! I know! NO ONE does that) and so we did and proceeded to ask him what it would mean to him to know he has a heavenly father who loves him, etc etc, he asked questions like 'how could God help us?' 'why then are there so many religions?' (Yeah I KNOW- GOLD RIGHT?) oh and ps this was all in like the FASTEST German ive ever heard...anyway we talked to him for about 25 minutes and then said 'well we would love to meet with you and explain this a little more, and help you build your relationship with God and teach you how to pray etc' and he (in the most sincere response ive ever heard) 'ya. Gern!' he then said something like 'wow i cant believe you would do that for me, like super grateful that we would offer to help him with that....of course we responded 'well of course! That is why we are here!' We exchanged numbers and said 'okay well we will call you sometime next week!' and he said, 'yeah Monday.' Wow. MIRACLE RIGHT!?! So there are really prepared people and the natural result of the lord's presence among us. So please pray for Felix and his progress!

The other very important miracle Sister Singer and I witnessed this week....we made 7 layer dip! haha...well attempted to...without refried beans, taco seasoning, or guacamole....but it was GREAT! We both had been craving it and we took some pictures, hope I can get them to you, it was a great dip and you Americans should be proud. So last p-day Sister Singer and I took a train 45 minutes outside of Frieberg to a small place called Holzau right by the Czech boarder and walked through the forest...it was SO BEAUTIFUL, HUGE trees, fall leaves, definitely 'sweatshirt' weather and we walked by a river and saw sheep and even went to the boarder and took some pictures but DONT WORRY I didnt leave the country :) Hope I can get those pictures to you as well....

TODAY we were invited to go with this awesome temple missionary couple, The Streulings, on their P-day adventures with a cool German brother from our ward, Bruder Liepsure. We went to the 'Switzerland of Germany' where the Elba river turns and there is a really cool hike/view of the GORGEOUS green, German land. It was a little foggy/misty and then the sun burned it off and it was perfect crisp weather. We had a great time being lead by the seasoned Bruder Liepsure and laughing at our American traditions of having to take pictures every 5 steps.....and it wasnt only me, it was all 4 of us Americans...it was gorgeous, the views reminded me of the grand canyon, except for not red and a LOT more trees. Hopefully you can see pictures. It was so beautiful and I really felt the spirit looking at the beautiful views. 

If you come here, youve got to go see the Sweiz of Sachsen.. We then went to a cool 'summer castle' of August the Strong who was the ruler of Sachsen forever ago, and there is a 3 mile long park with gorgeous trees and a maze made out of hedged bushes right along the Elba river...it was such a blast and a blessing to be with such friendly loving people!!

We have the FUNNIEST experiences every Thursday evening at 6:00---- ENGLISH CLASS! haha, its hilaroius. 6-9 German men and women between 40-60 years old talking about what they are wearing, what color their vests are and trying to order food in English is a HOOT! My favorite two lines have been.... 'So you could just call a clock...a WALL WATCH?' haha. Well...yes I guess you could! and also we went around the room after teaching these people how to order off the menu asking them what they would like to order....we got through about 5 of them and then sweet Gesila proceeded to give her order....and ended with saying something like 'and for deesert I would like a sleese of pee.' . . .  hahahaha yes she meant to say 'a slice of pie' but the germans pronounce the second vowel so it came out sleese of pee. Oh it was so hard to keep a straight face and say yeah, so close, actually its sLICe of piE. Oh it was great, I sure do love them. 

We had a really mission altering, testimony altering experience last wednesday...we had an appointment with a young guy Alex to whom we gave a Book of Mormon and set a return appt with...so this last week was the return appt and he said he had a strong feeling that the Book of Mormon wasnt true, that it was actually dangerous and proceeded to tell us . . .  well why he thought that. It was sad but also so exciting to bear my testimony boldly and with the spirit of the absolute truthfulness of the Book of Mormon and the joy that the contents of that book have brought to my family and the truthfullness of a living prophet and a living church with the priesthood! The power of the Lord on the Earth! Alex was trying to have us prove the Book of Mormon and its validity by the facts and the physical information that we have today and I was almost embarassed by the little I knew about the FACTS of the Book of Mormon-how many pages, how long it took Joseph Smith to translate it, where the plate are now, where exactly lehi and nephi actually lived on the American Continient when they got here etc etc and then I realized thost things...arent important. We arent taught those facts in the Missionary Training Center. We dont try and physically prove the validity of the Book of Mormon to people. Its through spiritual validation that we know if its truth. We are taught in the MTC how to introduce the Book of Mormon and how someone can know of its absolute truthfulness is a personal testimony from our Heavenly Father himself of its truth, through the Holy Ghost. That is the only way. Not by the historical facts, etc, no one can gain a testimony by the facts, but only through the spiritual personal experience of knowing its truth through the feelings of the spirit....so warm and so big throughout the whole body it almost feels like your body cant contain the joy and peace and excitement of knowing and FEELING the truth and along with that the knowledge of our Father in Heavens existance and eternal and infinite LOVE for us. Wow and that is what I get to think about, talk about, pray about, all day long every day.....wow the mission is THE BEST!

I am so blessed to be here in gorgeous Freiberg and to have Sister Singer, to experience miracles like finding people looking for a relationship with God, but not knowing where to find it....like Felix. Its going to be another exciting week, we have invited Kristina and Li to start praying about baptism and Ding Ge is coming to Institute this Thursday with Sandy! Wahooooo the work is growing and the kindom is being built all over, especially here in Freiberg!

Thank you for the love and letters, congrats to Hailey Schroeder getting MARRIED ON OCTOBER 21st!! Hollie GOT HER MISSION CALL!! and Topher didnt DIE in a scooter accident! What a great week :) Who knows what miracles this week will bring....... . . . .

Tschüssy!

-Sister Rasmussen

Lord, I would follow thee....

October 4, 2010
WASNT CONFERENCE AWESOME!?!? Yes. Yes it was. We watched the Saturday Morning session at 6:00 Saturday night and then the Saturday afternoon session on Sunday at 2:00. Music and the Spoken word at 5:30 and the Sunday morning session at 6:00, they will reshow the Sunday afternoon session in 2 weeks for sunday school and relief society (so no I didnt watch it from 10pm til midnight) but we had the COOLEST EXPERIENCE! We invited all of our investigators to come watch Music and the Spoken Word at 5;30 Sunday night by saying things like 'one of the biggest choirs in the world is giving a concert!  and then adding, oh and it will be broadcasted from Salt Lake City...' So we didnt know who would come or not, but we had arraged to go with two of our investigators, our two chinese students, Ding Ge and Li. We walked to Ding Ge's and they know eachother, so we had a great walk in the crisp fall air the four of us laughing and talking heading two the church right next to the temple. 

We had said things like 'so this concert is going to be great, and then afterwards there is this special meeting where the prophet and other church leaders will speak to us' and they both kind of responded, we have to go home and get ready for school tomorrow...la di da. So we just blew it off, well when we got to the church there were 3 people there from our English class! (arent members) and THEN we all got seats in the chapel where they were projecting it on a big screen and Kristina and Istavan (our German and Hungarian couple we are teaching) came in! They sat in front of us and then another lady, Erika, from our English class came in with her mother and son! So there were 10 people there! AND GUESS WHAT! They stayed for the WHOLE THING! 2.5 hours . . . Li dozed off during one of the talks, but it was cool to stand up and sing with all of them and have our amazing ward greet them and make them feel welcome. So yes I watched that session in German and I got the jist of all the talks, I took 4 pages of German notes so I must have gotton something! But it was a very different experience for me watching conference with investigators and realizing that every talk is so simple, simple that most investigators can understand it. The coolest part for me was afterwards; Istavan, our very talkable, crazy Hungarian man who says he wont pray and has a mind span of a goldfish sat through the whole thing, joked around with us and then came up to me and said 'bis zum nächtes mal' meaning until next time! Meaning they want to keep meeting and learning more and oh wow it was a great great session for all of us.

Another really great tender mercy this week, Hollie Odekirk who is study abroading in Wien (Vienna) came to visit the temple with her friend Ariel and we got to take them to a couple lessons and to get some Freiberger Eierscheke (really good Freiberg pastry) we also got to do a session together which was really special. The lessons were cool and they are both going on missions so it was exciting to talk about missionary work and being a sister missionary. It was so crazy having Hollie here, it felt so like home, but then I remembered we were in Germany, crazy, thanks for coming Holls!

SOME OTHER GREAT NEWS! SISTER SINGER AND I ARE STAYING IN FREIBERG!!!! >Yes another 6 weeks with my mom (trainer) We were so excited. In our mission we have a big conference call with the whole mission and we all mute ourselves and the APs and Präsident talk to us and präsident reads off the transfers. Its really cool because we hear where everyone else is going. We had all the sister missions and who was where set out on our table and it was neat to see where all the transfers were. Sister Lanctot and Sister Malen are the only golden sisters whose moms are leaving them and they are staying. When we heard 'and Freiberg, Sister Singer and Sister Rasmussen remain.' We jumped up and cheered and hugged and it was a really sweet girly missionary moment (you men wouldnt understand ;) This will be Sister Singers 5th transfer here!!! Thats record breaking we think.... a lot of members have been asking if we found out the calls and so it was fun to let people know we were staying, a lot of hugs and 'thank goodnesses' We sure do love this ward and luckily they love us too. It was neat bringing 10 people to conference, some of the american wives who are living here told us they havent seen that many investigators here ever....yes times are changing and Freiberg is ON FIRE! 

We have some really great miracles coming our way. A cool couple who called the temple and said they were interested in doing geology work have had a couple of appts with us that fell out and one random morning he called and invited us over for tea-- yes they do that here. We have fruit tea and its amazing, I recommend it! Anyway he was really sweet trying to speak english, pretty good actually, he is 81 and hmm his life partner? haha not wife, but lady he is living with pulled out a Book of Mormon they had from 6 years ago when the missionaries came by....they told us they had gone to church twice and it was nice. The say they are 'liberal lutherans' whatever that means, they were SO great and he told us how last sunday he had gotton homesick for his little dorf he was born in about 30 km away and  they drove out there in the rain, he started crying, and showed us a picture of his old home. . . They told us stories of the Hitler days and Hitlers youth and how SCHLIMM the times were, how different. It was incredible to hear the stories from a man who lived through it all. They then told us they were going to a bath in poland for the next 3 weeks because they are old and need some recooperation. IT WAS SO FUNNY when he was trying to speak english and describle the old people pains they have, they said what do you call the shoulder, elbow and wrists....and we said 'joints' and he was so confused and asked a couple more times, trying to describe it differently, and we said 'yes they are called Joints!' he said 'isnt that what the young people smoke?' hahaha, we said yes, same word. It was a funny moment for all of us. Who knew I would be talking to an 81 year old man in Germany about joints and baths in poland? It was great, he then asked for our address and they said they would write us a letter while they were gone! And also said they will call when they return and we can meet again!! So THAT will be a miracle. 

So sister Singer left me on Tuesday for a Trainers Training in Berlin and I joined the sisters in Chemnitz for the day. It was crazy awesome. We had to get up at 4am and run to the busbahnhof and she went straight to Berlin and I went to Chemnitz. It was neat going to another sisters apt and do study with them. Sister Hung is dying (ending her mission) in 3 weeks and Sister Martineau only has this last transfer left, so that was a different dynamic too being with such old sisters, they were definitely NOT trunky and worked so hard, we had three AWESOME LEssons, one with a sweet sweet chinese lady they have been teaching since may who is really close to baptism, then a wenegaraktive (inactive) and we had a really great great talk with her, the power went out when we were there and we were laughing and talking by candle light, we sang I am a Child of God and she ended up giving me an old umbrella because I left mine in Freiberg, she was so sweet and the spirit was strong, the last lesson was a first appointment with a young man and it was SO COOL! He said he and his family were catholic but he was learning about other churches, he was a referral, some Elders had ansprached him on the street and some others in the bahnhof so thats how they got his info. He was super open and caught on to most of the first lesson pretty quick, I bore my testimony and cracked most of the jokes, especailly how I needed sugar in my fruit tea and no one else did, it was so exciting, and i was said to tell him I actually served in Freiberg but have a great lesson next time with the other sisters....anyway, awesome time in chemnitz and the coolest sisters!

We also got to go to the temple because it was Sandys first time doing baptisms for the dead!!! (Sandy is the newly baptized 22 year old miracle who got baptized two weeks before I got here) and it was so special, the spirit was so strong and I got to see what it would have been like to see her get baptized for herself... oh I just love Sandy, did I tell you she was going to come next october to slc to go with sister singer to conference, but now she is coming next april so I can come too! yay! She is so great.

It was Schwester Houschkas birthday this week too....Schwester Houschka was the 85 year old lady who when she laughs looks like Grandma Dot.... well we had visited her on Saturday and took her the quarck and buttermilk she wanted haha, and so she wasnt expecting to see us the next day, Sunday for her birthday. But we went to her kurzepfleggeheim (old people home place) and called her from the other room and asked her if we could sing to her, and then we walked into her room and Surprised her! She was surprized and laughed at our silly birthday hats, and loved the cards we made her. We also took balloons and had a really great talk. She is so special and has the strongest testimony, I have a picture of me and her, and sister singer and I in the birthday hats yay.

Conference has been definitely a different experience, watching it in a skirt, not on a couch with Kara playing legos (thanks for the pic of the awesome lego house btw Kara ;) and cuddling with kasandra writing down the prophets words, but it was so special, I couldnt write fast enough and it was neat to be with the other old missionary couples from america who are so close to us. They all remind me of my grandparents, so funny, and especially the Streulings, they are from provo, he was a professor at the Y and they are so cute. She is so classy and he is tall and they are so caring. They had us over for dinner last Thursday at their little temple worker apt and were so sweet. Its neat seeing them in the temple too, I imagined Grandma and Grandpa doing the same thing.... :) ANYWAY it was cool watching conference with them and then watching the other session in German. Realizing how the gospel of Jesus Christ is exactly the same all over the world and everyone jokes around how Präsident Uchtdorf always talks about planes, and everyone has a deep love for Thomas S. Monson, it just reconfirms my testimony that he is the prophet for the whole world and for ever nation, ever person on the earth. Wow. He was so motivating when he started off with missionary work! BOOYA! (get going mom and dad, the prophet told you to start getting ready ;) and then was so sweet in the relief society meeting as well, and I loved his words about dankbarkeit = Gratitude. He is 100% a prophet of God and it was cool to learn that his words are more valuable than even the scriptures because they are for OUR time! His words about how to raise a family or ANY problem we have are the words our HEAVENLY FATHER wants us to hear! Wow. We are so blessed to live on the earth with a living prophet! I am so excited to hear what these inspired men said in the Sunday afternoon session!  (Sister singer and I were tempted to ask you all to tell us what they say in the last session, and then invite our investigators to come and be able to say something like 'well if you have an issue about ____ maybe they will address it in conference, because they are inspired, with us already knowing they were going to talk about _____) Yeah did that joke make any sense? well forget it. haha, I am just having the time of my life and am so pumped about missionary work, so if you know anyone thinking about it.......GET THEM OUT HERE! It is so incredible, ha and ive only been out here 1 transfer and my life is already changed forever!


I hope you enjoyed conference as well and are powered up for the next 6 months! Cant wait to get these talks on paper and restudy them and learn more of our Heavenly Fathers guidance for us....you too? :) Congrats to Hailey getting married soon, Syd getting her patriarical blessing,  Kasse getting her mission call and Hollie almost getting hers! We are going to a cool hiking place by the czech boarder today! Yay for fall weather!!!!!!!!!! Have a great week! Talk to you soon.

-Sister Rasmussen

ps No mail this last week! Whats up with that fan club? hehe, no worries, Im okay without it : )

There is a picture of us with our little papers waiting for the transfer call
With James Dzierzon - the cutest little kid ever
With Sister Singer and Schwester Schönherr on the couch at the church, that is who feeds us lunch every week...and some others at the temple