Week 28

First off, THANK YOU so much for all the birthday wishes!!! It was so great to hear from you all! I am so grateful for all the LOVE!!!!
You all are so great! 

This week has flown by pretty fast and I'm actually ok with that.....

First day with no tights!!! HOLLAH!!!

I was on a split last week with Sister Fuller in Coburg. I seriously love Sister Fuller!!!! She is so hilarious and it was just fun to be around her.
Definitely needed!

Split pic with Sister Fuller!

We also had a good lesson with one of our investigators, Dana. She is persian and doesn't know German too well so communication is a little difficult. But one thing really stood out to me as we taught her about baptism and the sacrament. She kept referring to the sacrament as "Taufe" which means baptism. She kept saying that we get baptized every week when we take the sacrament. We tried to expalin it a little more clearly with simpler german but I though that was a really interesting way of looking at the sacrament. Do I think of the sacrament as another baptism for me? How cool to think that every week we can be "washed clean" and start over. I am so grateful for Dana and what she taught me that evening. 

Massive amounts of chocolate and haribo that I am sending home......maybe my family will share haha!!!!

I can't really remember what happened on the other days but my birthday will require an extensive explanation so sorry that will be the majority of this email......

This is my "It's my birthday" pose.....

Friday was my birthday! Hollah! We woke up and the phone calls began. The Feucht elders called us 2 min before our alarm went off and sang Happy Birthday to me. Sister Miller and I were kind of cranky slash half asleep haha! Elder Weidmann (my district leader from Dortmund) called me! His english is so much better and my german has improvd so it was actually the most productive phone call we have had together haha! Sister Miller made me crepes for breakfast....of course with nutella! Then we went to meet a member who actually lives in Nurnberg. She was an hour late so we sat in a field and did language study. It was an absolutely beautiful day!
Yay for nice weather on your birthday!

Language study in a field.

We had a nice little brunch with this member! She is seriously so nice! Then Sister Miller said we needed to be at hauptbahnhof by 2. I had no idea why but I never ask questions haha! On the bahn ride there I got a phone call from Mimi, who was the mini missionary that served with me for a week in Dortmund. She drove all the way down from Darmstadt to Nurnberg to surpirse me for my birthday!!!

Mimi and Luka!

The cake mimi made me

Her and her boyfriend Luka were a little late so all we could do was eat cake in the car as we drove to Neumarkt because we had to meet the Elders there. We all went with the elders to a park to chalk the plan of salvation. We ended up teaching this huge group of young muslim kids. They were actually pretty rude but it was quite a sight to see.

Birthday brunch!!!

Later Sister Miller and I made our way home to our apartment. As we walked up the stairs I saw that someone had heart attacked our door for my birthday. It was from the Feucht Elders. So sweet. The hearts even had gliter on them! And our neighbor had seen that it was my birthday and left a box of chocolates for me!

The elders heart attacked our door for my B-Day!!!!

Overall, it was a pretty good day! I was very tired by the end of it but I will never forget my birthday on my mission!

This leather jacket was on the "please take" table in our ward building
...totally took it!

I hope you all have a wonderful week!!!
Thank you again for all the birthday wishes!!! Love you!

-Sister Madsen

Week 27

Yep I'm just gonna say it.............It's my BIRTHDAY on friday!!!! Wooooooooooo! It's crazy how the smallest things get you pumped on your mission! This past week has kind of been like when I got my mission call. "Oh, you want to make an appt for next thursday?...oh, that's the day before my birthday." haha or like, "Can we come back on friday?.....that's my birthday." haha! So special......I just love birthdays!

The view of Nurnberg.

This past week has been pretty crazy! I feel like I was all over the zone. We had zone training which means in order for the Sister Training Leaders to plan we had splits! Woooo! I LOVE splits! I was in Feucht and then Nürnberg and then Coburg (a two hour train ride away) and then back to Nürnberg and then finally home to Feucht. I was on a split first with Sister Hansen! She is awesome and we had a lot of fun together!!! And then I was with Sister Diethelm!! I love Sister Diethelm! She is like my second comp because we are always on splits with each other. That's fine!!

On my split with Sister Hansen.....yep Eis is sooooo good!

While we were on our split we ran in to two girls. Some background: about a month ago Sister Miller and I sat across from these two girls on a bahn. They were so giggly and happy. We literally didn't say anything but we were just super smiley to each other. As they got off the girl said "you see everyone at least twice in your life." So then this last week Sister Hansen and I were walking down this street and I saw these two girls. They started laughing so hard and they were shocked that we actually saw each other again. We ended up talking for about an hour, gave them a Book of Mormon, and exchanged numbers. They are seriously so nice!
It is crazy that we saw them again! Love it!

At the castle in Nurnberg!

To be honest....I don't really remember too much of the week...haha! We went and saw a castle last p-day with some other missionaries.

The group at the castle!

I've discovered German Eis (ice cream) and have developed a perfectly normal obsession. I am not wearing a coat today because it is 16 degrees Celsius today! Yay for the sun!

Bruder Bopp made us lunch after church on Sunday and we ate outside!
It is absolutely beautiful weather right now! 

We went on a heart attacking rampage and I would be completely fine if I never cut out a heart again haha!

Heart attacking everyone and their dog! My hair looks a little haggard......

Oh and I forgot! Sister Hansen and I did a 3 hour shift at a street display in Nürnberg. It was seriously so great! They just had a table with Book of Mormons in all sorts of languages. Sister Hansen and I gave out like 20 BoMs. I love street displays because you get the opportunity to bear your testimony but you have to make it pretty short and concise!

At the street display in Nurnberg.

I love the Book of Mormon!! And people can tell that it comes from God just by reading a few verses. I know that it is the word of God. It truly testifies of Christ. We can come closer to God by reading and studying it! How blessed we are to have this book and to know that God still speak to us today!
God loves us!

I love the Book of Mormon!!!!!!

Overall it's been a great week!
I'm going to enjoy my last week of being 21!!! Gross! 

I hope you all have a SUPER week! Happy Pi Day! Eat pie in my behalf!

Love you!

Sister Madsen

Week 26

First off, I want to thank you all for the emails!! Seriously so sweet! You know what, I am going to drink all the hot chocolate I want and wear my glasses! haha! But really......THANK YOU!!!

Sometimes we wear night caps, retainers, and glasses at the same time. Real winners!

I'll give you a run down of the week/ highlight of each day:

Beer tour......my boyfriend!

Monday: half-zone pday! We went on this tour of the underground tunnels of Nuernberg. It ended up being a tour about beer! So it was hilarious to see all these missionaries learning about how beer is made haha! 

The sisters after the tour!

Tuesday: Zone leadership meeting. Since my comp is the Sister Training Leader I GOT to go.....haha! It was really good and I learned a lot. Sister Diethelm and I went "finding" for an hour while they had a second meeting. The first girl we talked to took a BoM and we got her number. Yay! 

The joys of having coordinating meeting with the elders outside
because we can't be inside the church together...freezing!!!!

Wednesday: We finally met with one of our investigators, Donna. We went with a member from our ward and while we were waiting outside Donna's door for her to show up, a persian man said we could wait in his room for her....um.....no thank you...haha! Seriously hilarious! We had a really good lesson! Her room was like 500 degrees and we drank herbal tea (not my favorite) but the spirit was so strong! 

Lilli's Baptism (president's granddaughter).

Thursday: We did some visiting teaching splits. Had to drink more tea.....while one of the ladies left the room Sister Miller downed my tea for me. So nice! haha! We also had "Sport Abend" at the church. Our GML set up a volleyball net outside of the church. Seriously the only day that wasn't warm and sunny was thursday but we still played anyways. It was fun! 

It's apparently campaign season in Feucht!

Friday: Sister Miller and I sent out 34 letters to the zone! That's a lot of envelopes to lick!! I took quite a while but there is no feeling like dropping 34 letters in the mail box (wow....I need to get out more) haha! We have to be in early to our apt from friday to tuesday because of a German holiday called "Faschings" (I think that's how it's spelled). It's pretty much like halloween but I have no idea which day it actually is. Germans like to party!

Awkward first DDM pic of the transfer.

Saturday: We helped out with this stake YM/YW activity. It was some activity with an airplane and the three degrees of glory. The sister missionaries were flight attendants. Later that afternoon was Lilli's baptism. Her family invited like 50 non-members and a lot of them showed up. It was really great!!! We have a couple return apts from it.

The flight attendants.....Sister Miller hates matching but I LOVE it!

Sunday: Fast Sunday....hunger haha! A sister who finished her mission a couple weeks ago came to visit. She opened Feucht for sisters last May. Everyone was so excited to see her! She came with her parents. I just watched her parents as she bore her testimony in sacrament meeting. They are so proud of her. I was of course bawling the whole time.

Group pic after the Beer tour.

It's been a good week. I am sick again.......gross! I hate being sick but Sister Miller is very patient and cares more about me getting better than I do. 

So, I guess that is good!

I hope you all have a wonderful week! Love you all!

Love, 

Sister Madsen