Shurtz Start Two Finnish: Snowstorms and Riisipiirakkas

Our Monday morning walk.

On Tuesday, Sister Leavitt stopped before coming to the office to pick up two packages

from the omaposti automatti lockers.

She got one package with no problem, but the locker would not open for the other one.

She called posti and they said she needed to go between 1 and 6pm when there was a worker there.

We took a little break after lunch and walked over to the omaposti automatti.
She was successful in getting the package!
The omaposti place in in the building you can see between us.

Elder Shurtz got a phone call from the Marjaniemi sisters that they had left their key in their apartment. They were locked out and we took the extra key to them in the afternoon.
They were very grateful!

We had invited Elder and Sister Engle to come for dinner on Tuesday night.

We had spicy or not chicken and sweet potato soup and breads for dinner.

We forgot to get a picture, but grabbed on after the dinner.

It was snowing for our morning walk on Wednesday.

Here you can see the difference between our walks on Wednesday and on Monday.

Even in the snow, we had several bikes pass us. Can you see the bike in the center of the picture?

There was a lot of wet heavy soggy snow in the office parking lot by the time we left just after 5pm.

We are so glad that we have the studded winter tires!

It made for a pretty drive to the temple.

A view of the temple through the car window.

It was fun to see Alan and Ulla Ames at the temple with their daughter and her husband.

The Ames were serving as temple missionaries when we were on our first mission here.

Sister Anttila was also there at the temple.

My amaryllis has lots of blossoms.

On Thursday, we had a riisipiirakka lesson at the office.
Sister Anttila brought riisipurro and the ingredients for the shell and taught us how to make them.

That tapered rolling pin makes it easier to roll the shell dough out super thin.

Don't they look good!

I was very surprised to learn that they need a bath in water and butter when they come out of the oven.

Delicious!

On Friday morning, when I got out of the shower, Steve told me to come and take a picture.

When he walked into the kitchen that morning to make breakfast, he found that

the powdered sugar had jumped out of the cupboard over night.

What a mess!

Elder Shurtz had gone to the Telia store on Tuesday to look for screen protectors for the new phones that he has to use when missionaries have a phone that is no longer working.

He was happy to find that they had some to fit that model of phone.

The best part was the price, 1 euro and 1 cent each. They had two of them. He needed three.

He told the clerk that it was too bad that they didn't have three.

The clerk looked it up and said that he could order one to be delivered to the posti lockers in Prisma.

It was still the same price and there was no charge for shipping!

We had gotten the notification that their was a package in the posti lockers at Prisma.

On Friday morning we decided to stop there on our way to the office.

It is before most of the stores in the mall are open, but the mall itself is open to walk through.

We saw this robot floor cleaner, cleaning the floor.

Success on retrieving the package from the lockers!

We met up with Sister Leavitt walking through the mall on her way to the office.

We linked arms to hold each other up on the slippery walks.
We loved seeing a couple of kids being pulled on their sleds by their parent.

On Saturday, Elder Shurtz did some zoom training on creating a spending plan for using MSF funds.

We did some things around the apartment starting to get ready for the Taylors to come,

plus just some usual p-day type things. Here is Elder Shurtz taking out the garbage/recycling.

Elder and Sister Woodland picked us up shortly after 3:00 to go to an early dinner.

We went to the Factory ravintola buffet in Lippulaiva mall.

We forgot to get a photo at the meal.

Elder Woodland got a couple of photos in the mall.

Instead of Santa, kids were lined up to see Elsa (from frozen). Olaf was there as well.

There was also a little train that was driving around the mall with kids riding in it.

If you look close, you might see it in the background, under the HEMTEX sign.

As we left the restaurant, I saw across the way that there was a Marimekko "pop up".

I asked what that meant. Dave said that they might be a more temporary place

and they sometimes had good deals, let's go see.

I found some dresses to try on. You can also see that Satu was already wearing a Marimekko dress.

(I did end up buying some things.)

That night was the Gold and Green Ball. I didn't know those things still existed.

I guess in Finland they do.

Elders Flores and Larsen were there. I guess that they had performed a number.

We were sad we missed it.

They had the gym all decorated.

There were lots of young adults there.

We found out later that it was also a final activity of Finn Roast

(an activity for young adults from all over Finland and a couple of other nearby countries).

Some of the people were dressed up in very formal attire.
Some were in some very interesting attire....this one probably being the most interesting.

It is hard to tell from the picture, but those are beads on the pants.

It was nice to see some sunshine this morning as we drove to church. It made for a pretty drive.

There is still quite a bit of snow on the roads. Some of the roads have more than in the picture.

We went to the Marjaniemi ward today. We want to visit the other wards in the area before we leave.

I had sent a message to Sister Kakkinen earlier in the week to see if she was going to be there. She said would and was excited to have us come. Sister Leavitt came with us.

The Auras were there visiting as well. They had come to hear one of their young adults speak.

Sister Kakkinen was the one leading the lesson discussion in Relief Society.

We learned that Sister Aura's mother (Sister Tapiola) and her husband were the first Finnish couple to serve in the mission office. I did not know that she had served in the mission office.

Here is a picture of 4 mission office sisters. (past and current)