STEEPLES AND STATUES AND FLOWERS

DEAR DENMARK WEATHER, 

I would love to pack my winter coat and boots, put away my warm scarves and mittens, and wear my light jacket, but you are not cooperating.   SPRING NEEDS YOUR HELP!  Unfolding buds and splashes of yellow daffodils and forsythia push the cold spring limits without your warmth, and the days are noticeably longer.  But you are stubborn. You are hanging on to the cold like a sticky-fingered child. Even the sun has retreated and hides most days behind fat clouds.   Really?

Defiantly, we spent a morning snapping pictures in the cold. (Don't let the blue skies fool you.  Blue does not equal warmth.)  Some of our favorite Copenhagen sights can be summed up in three words: red roofs and steeples. From the air, red dominates the roof scape; but add copper turrents  green with age, and  black slate towers poking up like hat pins across the skyline.  Some steeples are stiff with importance while others are pure architectural whimsey.  All are beautiful.  Here is a smattering.

Three for one - Statue,  Steeple and Red Roof

A few of the steeples in Copenhagen, plus one church in Iceland

Copenhagen is also full of statues.  Hundreds and hundreds.  Many tower majestically in the streets, on squares and waterfronts and in parks; others are hidden inside museums and churchyards or cluster around fountains.  Bronze statues oxidize and turn a dusty green shade; marble statues, smudged dark in the folds with age,  still blaze in the sun.  In the collage, you will notice the absence of the most advertised statue in all of Copenhagen: the little mermaid. Pure tourist PR and most unimpressive.

E V E R Y W H E R E

At least the flowers can brighten the cold weather, and the streets of Copenhagen have an abundance. Every single street has a flower shop with racks of flowers trundled out every morning, every day, all year round.  And every grocery has flowers spilling out the door to wind through on your way in.  No matter the season.   And they sell them all.  Most customers leave with a grocery bag looped over one arm and a bundle of flowers clutched in the other.    I have never been in a Danish home without fresh flowers or small plants lining windows and table tops.  Tall, lanky, huge orchids are a particular indoor favorite. Flowers are definitely a blessing in this cold climate even though they are grown in greenhouses.

I WILL MISS THIS

Monday we start training the new office couple and I am counting on the weather to  be on its best May behavior so they don't get scared off.  They are coming from hot Arizona and spring here can be a shock.  Just saying.........

LASTS

We are starting to tick off the last agenda items before we head home.  We shipped a bunch of packages today to the USA, so things are starting to look a little bare in our apartment.  Lots of nails.  No pictures.  We had our last zone conference a few days back and so that means our last feeding of large groups of missionaries,  our last instruction from President O'Bryant and our testimonies to the missionaries.  It was a tender moment..........

Zone Conference at the stake center at Maglegårds Alle

Last Zone Conference in Den Danske Mission for us.

Our last Zone conference picture, and of course, Elder Buxton is no where to be found.  Off picking up 25 large pizzas. I am far left.

 

A couple of crazy Sister and Elder shots.  You would think the sun was shining or something after a long winter.

Sister Baggaley, Sister Hughes and Sister Sorensen

Sister Petersen and Sister Dietch

Elders Reed, Erickson, Jeppson, Lex and Jensen

Kitchen Crew:  Me, Sister Jenson, Sister Hall and Sister Shurtliff.  I will miss working with these ladies.  They are the best!

Next week, we will have our last transfers and our last group of departing and arriving missionaries. A hectic few days, but some of the most enjoyable.  We will miss the busy days.  Elder Buxton will soon be pacing at home in Mendon.  If anyone has any ideas...............

QUIRKY STUFF

It is April!!!  Wow!!!  Our time is drawing short.  When I get home, I am going to publish my blog in book form and want to include memories of missionary moments, people we've met and places we've seen.  Customs.  Favorites.  And "Quirky"  things we don't typically see in Utah.  So the next few posts will be  a mish-mash of things I want to remember.

PASTRIES  (well of course)

How do you pick just one?

The words  "Danish Pastries" does not even begin to cover the width and breadth of the term. Multiple bakeries on every street and inside every grocery store display their goodies behind big class cases: fruit tarts, pies and cookies,  muffins and sweet rolls.   Stuffed with jelly and creme fillings or almond paste and topped with whipped cream just waiting to mustache your lip and add a few pounds.  Think buttery, flaky, melt-in-your-mouth layers.  Think cinnamon.  Think works of art.  The shelves are filled  and emptied every day.  Evening rush hour brings crowds buying bread for supper and sweets for breakfast.  You have to take a number for service for Pete's sake!  We met a visitor from Utah who brings an extra suitcase when visiting and fills it with Danish pastries to freeze until he can come back again.   Addiction.

TRANSPORTING LIL'UNS

Portable beds no less

The ride of choice for babies:   gigormous buggies which convert to strollers .  They are everywhere. You see moms, dads,  grandmas and au-pairs wheeling these down the streets.  Stair-less escalators accommodate them as well as buses.  A whole section of the bus is reserved for strollers and buggies, and the bus actually lowers on one side (hydraulics) so it is easier to enter and exit.  If the bus is crowded and you are standing in a buggy area, you move.  Buggies get on and off first.  Everyone knows these rules and no one bats an eye or complains.    AND parents will often leave sleeping children outside a cafe or church snugged up in these sleeping bassinets.  Yes.  True.

Deluxe Buggy

The nursery school version of the buggy.  You'll often see a procession of them out for some fresh air.  And refreshingly, men are behind the buggies as much as women.

Bike Transport

When the kiddos can sit up,  they bob along on the front or back of mom or dad's bicycle. The tiny ones are almost always asleep with chin on chest. Ninety per-cent of children from age 2 (or younger) attend nursery school or kindergarden.

Christiana Bike

Then we have the all-purpose carrier.   All sizes of children, whole families, dogs, groceries, home repair supplies, big screen TV's and neighbors can wedge into what is called a Christiana Bike.  The front section swivels to make turning corners easy.  Plastic covers on fancy ones zip up in bad weather to make a snug trek to school.  Pricey, though.

To be continued...............