Potato Bar for MLC

OK, this is the last of our grapes. The grape on the right in this picture is a large grape. 

The one on the left is one of the giant size grapes. They are on the same little bunch.

On Monday, the smell in our office was really bad! We have been having a problem for a several weeks now. At first I thought it was like when a drain dries out and the sewer smell can escape into the room. I couldn't find any floor drains, but I ran water down all of the sink drains. 

Some days it seemed better than others. We tried to figure out who to call to come and fix it. I went over to the Aula, but when I went the person who I needed to ask wasn't in that day. Steve tried emailing someone he thought was who to ask, but he didn't hear anything back. 

We have been so busy, that it never seemed to get to the top of the list of things to do. 

On Monday, Pres. Lehtinen tried calling the number he could find near the building door. It wasn't the correct number, but they said that they would have the correct person call and they would come and check it out. We waited all day, but no one ever called or came.

We went to Valio Aimo (a warehouse type store) to buy some food for MLC. 

We also bought some supplies for the office.

When we took the things to the office, the assistants were there and they said that they had to get something in the little closet and the smell was super bad in there. We emptied out the closet.

We thought maybe we had found the source of the smell. 

I vacuumed and mopped the floor, and we dumped all of that water down the drain in the sink. 

In the meantime, Elder Shurtz was trying to find the source by sniffing. 

He thought it might have been the mop head, but he said it actually smelled good.

I think the smell may have been coming from the drain and other than putting water down it, 

there was still not much we could do about the smell.

We were surprised to wake up on Tuesday and discover that it was only 29° F. The frost made everything quite beautiful. I especially thought the rose bushes were pretty.

I had been asked to be in charge of the dinner on Wed. for MLC (Mission Leadership Council) at the mission home. I thought that I had better get as much ready ahead of time as possible. On Tues. we took our crockpot over to the mission office and I made chili. At least that helped mask the sewer smell.

Two people did come by to check out the problem. They looked all around in both of the bathrooms and the closet. They said that we needed a plumber and they would call one to come by on Thursday.

On Wed. we had to go over to the galleria area so Elder Shurtz could reactivate a fuel card, and I had to pick up a package from posti in Citymarket at the mall. When we were walking under the tracks, we noticed a sign that we had not ever noticed before about the train station. It was in braille!

We left the office about 2:00 to go to the mission home to start cooking. 

I saw this lovely painting of mushrooms on the fridge.

Emma, sometime if you are wanting a gift idea for me, 

I would love to have you paint me a similar painting!

I love seeing this type of mushroom in the wild, even though they are very poisonous.

For the dinner, we had baked potatoes, chili, sour cream, cheese, salsa, broccoli, ranch dressing (which was a big hit with the missionaries - thanks to the Bridges who left it for us). We also had a fruit salad with apples, pineapple, mandarins and grapes. I made rice krispie treats for dessert.

While I was finishing the meal preparations, Elder Shurtz went to pick up Elder Eriksson. He is the missionary who has been in our mission waiting for his visa so he could go to South Africa Johannesburg mission. He would be flying out the next day. This is the visa that was at the embassy in Sweden and we had so much trouble trying to get it picked up and delivered to us in Finland. Elder Eriksson started working on his visa 9 months ago!

It was especially fun to be there when Elder Eriksson arrived. Only the assistants knew that he was coming for the dinner. His trainer and he were so happy to see each other. It was very sweet.

The dinner was well received by the missionaries and they all seemed to enjoy the meal.

It was also nice to be there while the missionaries all sang the mission song. 

I think that they did this as a special goodbye for Elder Eriksson.

One of our sister missionaries is Sister Cope. Elder Shurtz wondered if she might be related. 

They discovered that they are 2nd cousins once removed.

On Thursday,  the plumber came and he said that some of the seals at the base of the pipes were old and hard and that at least one pipe was too short. He left to go purchase some things and then came back and worked on it. He said that he thinks the smell should go away, but if it is still bad on Monday, we need to call back and he will come and try replacing the seal at the toilet. He didn't want to do that if we don't need it because it is more involved and we wouldn't be able to use the toilet for at least 24 hrs.

Thursday evening, we went to the temple. 

It was fully dark when we came out, but the temple was beautiful!

On Friday, we were a bit late going for our walk, but the lights were still on. As we walked out of the forest, we could see that it wouldn't be too long before the sun would rise. It was a beautiful sky, although the picture really doesn't do a good job of portraying the colors.

A little later in our walk as we looked back towards the forest, 

we could see some of the color of the trees, and the lights were still on.

The office smell seemed to be much improved by Friday. We are hoping the problem may be fixed.

Friday night as we were walking from the office to our apartment, we noticed that in the little park like area near our apartment building, that all of the trees were gone and they had been digging things up.

It rained a lot during the night on Friday night. We were happy that it was not raining on Saturday morning, so we could go for a walk. We walked over to check out the construction/missing trees. It looks rather bare without the trees along both sides of the walkway that you can barely see in front of the benches. It used to be that the trees covered up the bottom half of the buildings.

We did find a sign that said the renovation would be done June 2024. 

We are not sure why they would tear something out now when it will be a muddy mess and then frozen. We think that they won't really be able to do much renovation until March or maybe even April. 

We are sad about all of the trees being gone, but we are interested to see what happens.

We walked over by a new building that is near our office building. There are still some constructions fences up, but it looks like people are now able to go in and out of the building. There is a small river near where we were walking. We thought it was interesting how they have built in some chairs and chess/checkers tables by the river. It looks like a lovely setting to have lunch in the warmer weather.

I wanted to do some shopping on Saturday. We started at the secondhand store. We stopped for lunch and then drove to the Helsinki outlet shopping center. I wanted to visit the Marimekko store. I have seen some of the marimekko fabric at the fabric store and it costs 46 € per meter! I had heard that you could get some of the prints for 15 € per meter at the outlet. 

Marimekko is a Finnish design house renowned for its original prints and colors. The company’s product portfolio includes high-quality clothing, bags and accessories as well as home décor items ranging from textiles to tableware. When Marimekko was founded in 1951, its unparalleled printed fabrics gave it a strong and unique identity.

I was hoping to find some of the very iconic and well known prints such as this one, 

but they did not have any like this.

I was able to find some that I liked that was in the 15 € category, and I also found a very bright piece called Juhannustaika (midsummer magic) that I really liked. It was 30 €, but I decided to get it anyway. They were having a sale and it was also put in a B category now (whatever that meant) and it ended up costing less that 20 € per meter. I was excited with my finds! 

Almost as exciting was the fact that we were able to figure out the parking. Parking is one of the more difficult things here. Many young missionaries and many senior missionaries get parking tickets because it is so difficult. It is such a panic-y feeling to come to a parking lot and see a large sign explaining parking with very LONG Finnish words that we have no idea what they say and don't have time to use google translate as we drive in because there are other cars behind us who seem to know what to do and they just want to get in. I just happened to notice very small print in the top corner that had English words that I thought said 1 hr free. We also were able to find the place to pay for parking and verify that the 1st hour was free, and we were able to check with the machine as we were heading back to our car to make sure that we didn't owe anything. 

We stopped at a couple of grocery stores on our way back to our apartment. I noticed this Halloween display as we were turning into the grocery store parking lot. I had to take a picture because it is so unusual. Besides in the ward, where they are planning a trunk or treat activity, there is very little mention of Halloween here. It is a holiday that they really don't celebrate. 

We have had Christmas candy and foods in stores since the beginning of Oct.

It is getting dark earlier and earlier each day. 

On the way back home we could see the last remnants of sun and it made for an amazing sky. 

We enjoyed getting MarcoPolos from Amy and Tim who had gone south to watch the annular solar eclipse. We also got a picture from Wayne who was at the SL airport. Thanks for sharing with us.

From Wayne at the SLC airport:

From Amy in Delta a shadow using a pin hole viewer (the person shadow looks weird also):

From Tim in the middle of nowhere - camera through sun filter lense:

Today after church, there was a potluck. I took this picture right after the prayer, but by the time I got to the front of the line to get my food, the table was filled with many, many more dishes.

It was truly an international affair, with many different types of delicious foods. 

We saw one little girl that had tomatoes and marshmallows in her bowl. 

Good thing her mother also filled a plate that I'm sure she shared with her.

It was fun visiting with some of the members.

It was 1:50 when we were walking to our car. Look at how low the sun is in the sky!

The colors are not as vibrant as those we have seen this year in Utah, 

but we are still enjoying the changing leaves.

We wanted to make some cornbread. We had a difficult finding some cornmeal. We could find what we thought was cornstarch. The Finnish words were what google translate used for cornmeal, but just feeling the box and slightly squeezing it we thought it was cornstarch. We finally found some that we thought was cornmeal. It was much finer than the cornmeal at home, but it looked and tasted good.

We enjoyed being able to watch Hyrum and Melissa's Sacrament meeting by zoom. 

Hyrum saw sustained as the Bishop in their ward and Melissa and he 

both had a chance to share their testimonies in the meeting.

We also enjoyed getting a Marco polo from Amy's girls singing their songs 

from their primary program and saying their parts since we can't be there to hear them.

We also enjoyed talking to Stephanie's family on a video call.

Sunday 15 Oct 2023 sunrise/sunset times

Espoo Finland 8:00am to 6:13pm for 10 hrs 13 min of daylight

Provo Utah 7:37am to 6:46pm for 11 hrs 10 min of daylight