Mini-vacation!!

Jim and I just got back from a little mini-vacation up to Edmonton and Camrose. It was so fun and relaxing! We started out on Wed., got out of Calgary before the freezing rain started and made it to the hotel at about 12:30 P.M. and was able to get our stuff into the hotel right away. Then we hit the mall (West Ed) and shopped til we dropped!!! Ran into Carol and her three girls shopping for a wedding they are going to have in June. Kaele's boyfriend, Roger and Michael stayed home and bonded. Thursday afternoon we started out for Camrose, stopped by Dale and Sally's and had coffee with them and then went to Joy and Orville's for supper. What a gorgeous home they have and we just can't believe how they can hold down two full-time jobs and then paint these houses and get them ready for occupancy on the side. Amazing amount of work. It would boggle my mind to try to co-ordinate colors and rugs and hardwood and trim and what kind of windows and doors to put in, so many details and yet it all comes together so beautifully. And besides that Joy can get some awesome deals on things, she loves it. It was fun visiting with them. After supper, we had a great game of scrabble (they have scrabble nights with friends every once in awhile, instead of Mexican train which is the game of choice in Calgary, it is scrabble) Got home around 4:00 P.M. Friday (after a slow drive on slippery roads from Camrose) and then got ready to go out to Heather and Duane's and visited with Miles, Arlene and Brittany. They live two doors down from Heather's. What a nice evening!
Today, we are relaxing in front of the fire. Going to do abit of shopping later on.

Olson Get-together!!!

Just got back from the church. We had an Olson get-together this afternoon and of course it was fun to see everyone. Particularly Steven and his new wife and three-month old baby son named Jarvin. First time meeting his beautiful Ethiopian wife named Jeruselem (they call her Jeru) and is she ever a sweetheart. Jarvin is such a handsome baby too with big dark eyes and a dimple when he smiles. Vivian was here as well, came with Grant and Debbie so it was fun to see her. She is doing well. Ron and Delaine with some of their crew, Brent and Tanya and four kids, Kevin, Luke and Zane, Jarle and Judy, Cherie and Dave and all their kids except for Jarod, Patty and Darryl and their four, Lisa, Alicia, James and Emma, Nat, Tim and Melissa and their three. Jim and I went up this morning and set it all up and decorated the basement, had candles and Christmas table cloths, napkins and plates, made a cranberry punch, had goodies and finger food. I took lefse which was a hit and made some double date cookies like Gramma Olson used to make especially for Ron. Then had butter tarts, shortbread, lemon bars, no bake bars and another type of gooey yummy squares with cherries and nuts in it. Everyone brought something so it turned out great. I guess we were there about 4 hours. Heather and Duane didn't make it back from Camrose in time to see everyone. They came just as Jim and I were finishing cleaning up.
Grant and Debbie will be leaving for Mexico on the 17th of Jan. to attend the wedding of their youngest daughter so they are looking forward to that. And I guess they will have a reception for them sometime in March in Innesfail so hopefully we will be able to go.
Gramma was able to attend the Candlelight service on Christmas Eve. O how she enjoyed that and everyone was happy to see her. Denise, her friend who plays scrabble with her and is a care-giver to some of the residents came with us too. After the service we went up to Gramma's room and watched with her the DVD we gave her (Gaithers in South Africa), had tea and lefse, then came home to open our gifts. Christmas Day she was able to come to our house and have koomla, ham and risegrot so she enjoyed that. She did pretty good. She finds it harder now to transfer from the wheelchair to the car.
And now I am going to go watch a movie and besides that I have rambled on and on.............

MAKING LEFSE!!!!!!

Guess what my hubby and I have been doing this morning????? Making LEFSE!!!! We had two grills going.....I rolled out the dough and he turned the lefse!!!! To my daughters....next time you all come home, we have to have lefse making party. It is so fun, flour all over, sometimes there are holes in the lefse but no matter, it is all good. And this is not the potato lefse I am talking about, it is the "krotekake" with the whipping cream and butter filling......very rich, lots of calories but so, so tasty. Very, very Norwegian!! I made "No bake bars" (the bars you made at Nanc's baby shower, Sue) and lemon bars as well this morning. And then I am making a rice, curried salad for the party at Laura's where we construct gingerbread houses and we see who can be the most creative!!!! And we eat and eat and eat!!!!!
We had a great time at Heather's last night and we will post some pics!!! It was kind've crazy, you know the type of crazy where you have two hyper grandparents, two parents who have been working all day making it nice for us (bless their hearts) and 4 excited kids (Kalle loved the paper) so we didn't even turn the computer on. But we will!!! It will have to go on Heather's blog.

Party tonight!!!

We are going to party at Heather's tonight. It is going to be our Christmas Eve with them a couple days early because they are heading up to Camrose on Sunday so we get to watch the kids open some of their gifts. It is a beautiful, sunny day today, unlike Colorado. We talked to Larry and Irene last night and Larry had been out shoveling all day, Stephan's flight was cancelled (he was supposed to fly out today). He did get another one on Sunday afternoon so hopefully he will get there then. Julene (she had gone down early) and Irene couldn't go Christmas shopping because of the snow!!! Snow, snow and more snow but apparently is moving east today. Larry said they have a huge drift in their backyard so when the grandkids come, they will have fun building a fort. Remember Nanc a few years ago when we had all that snow and we spent the afternoon outside. It was so much fun. You made an awesome fort even with shelves inside where you put candles and lit them.....so cozy. Then we spread our huge Canadian flag over the top and took some pics. It is rather brown around our city now, not too much of the white stuff here. So I can really sing, "I'm dreaming of a white Christmas!!" We are also planning a get-together with all the cousins, aunts and uncles, brothers and sisters on Boxing Day at the church to meet Jarle and Judy's new little grandson born in Ethiopia, little Jarvin. Also Aunty Vivian will be coming down as well from Grant and Debbie's. It will be fun to see everyone. So now I must go and get my salad ready to take out to Heather's so bye for this time..........

Joy and sorrow....

Another day of joy and sorrow has come and gone......Yesterday we came to church to listen to the children's program and found out as we walked in that our dear Helen had gone "Home" that morning about 6:oo A.M. Joy because we know she is not suffering anymore but sorrow because we are going to miss her so much. A truly gracious, fun-loving, warm and compassionate lovely lady. Our angel we called her. How appropriate that the little ones were dressed as angels and we can imagine Helen seeing angels for the first time but much more important, she got to see her Savior and was probably singing....how she loved to sing! Not too long ago, the praise and worship group went up to see her and here she was, in her bed just loving every minute and we sang and sang and sang. She did not need words, she knew the words of the hymns off by heart. We got such a chuckle that night because she still managed to get her eye on AJ (our youth leader) and tell him how handsome he was. She asked Bev, "Where is your honey? Oh there he is". She loved Jesus with all her heart, she loved her honey as she called Mark, she loved her children and grandchildren and she just loved people. She would often go to the Care homes and visit and bring cheer and love. She had also a fun-loving nature and a sense of humor that I just loved. She was the only one I knew that felt honored when the young people from the youth group came and toilet papered their shrubs and trees one night......she invited them in for goodies........ she was the only one I knew that at 80 yrs. of age could still dance up a storm and wear a bikini in Hawaii and look good......always ready to hug, encourage and just have fun!!! Janet said yesterday, they are at Peace because this little lady invited them.....we won't know til we reach Heaven how many people she impacted by her life. Our dear Helen.......

Yeah, the Christmas letter is on its way!!!

Finally, the letter is out of my head and into the mail!!! I still have to address some but the bulk of it is done. It is short and sweet this year. That is a huge job done and now the baking will start!! Jim will help me roll out the dough for the lefse and flatbread. It is always so much more fun to work together.
We had a busy Sat. First thing this morning, I addressed envelopes, then babysat Kalle and Nathan while Heather, Siri and Jemma had a practise for the Christmas program tomorrow morning at church. Heather had to make some costumes, like three pine trees the same height as Jemma, and a cardboard boat. Then when the kids went, Jim and I drove out to Millerville to Don and Karen's open house. The day was absolutely so sunny and clear so we got a wonderful view of our beautiful Rockies!! That in itself would have made my day! The mountains sometimes takes my breath away! Of course, the host and hostess made us feel so welcome and their home is so cozy. We came home about 5:00 P.M. and I went right away over to Father Lacombe home where a group of "young adults" from our church did some Christmas caroling for the residents, then over to the Beverly where we walked up and down the halls singing, gathering people as we went. Gramma just loved it. Kim's gramma too. Then we all gathered at Lisa and Andre's house for chili and salads and yummy appetizers! Lisa had made that artichoke dip we had at Nanc's shower. So, so good! And played the gift exchange game where we can steal if we like someone else's gift better. Always a good time!!! Now it is time for bed and how wonderful it is to think that I can sleep allllll night!!!! Yahooooooooooooooooooooooooo

Good-bye, Carol and Rob!

This Sunday was Rob and Carol's last Sunday before they move to Martensville tomorrow. It is sad, we will miss them terribly but on the other hand, it is exciting for them. And we know that they will bless others there as they have blessed us here. Carol is a dear, dear friend as is Rob to both Jim and I and we have had many times of sharing - laughter and tears. How good God is to allow people like these two to come into our lives to enrich and bless. We just pray God's protection, love and guidance as they continue their lives in another province and home.
We love you guys.

"It's beginning to look alot like Christmas"

Yup, it is around here - the tree is up with it's pretty white lights, the Christmas music plays constantly, the rest of the house has decorations all over, the lights are on outside, the advent box has little goodies for the grandchildren when they come over inside each door and they can take one for each day of Dec., the Christmas letter is still in my head but eventually will make it onto the paper and out in the mail, the baking will have to start as well one of these days. We have Norwegian Christmas traditions like lefse, koomla, ham and risegrot on Christmas Eve for our meal, very rich but oh so good, plus the Christmas Eve Service at the church which we all just love, then it is home to a fire in the fireplace, candles lit, singing of carols (we so miss Grandpa Archibald's reading of the Christmas story) and the opening of most of the gifts and usually we open one at a time, from youngest to oldest (it takes forever but how fun) This year it will be quiet as the kids are at their in-laws (we will celebrate either before or after and of course Sue and family and Nanc and Wayne will stay in Fergus) so we are hoping Gramma will feel well enough to come over and perhaps stay overnight. Christmas morning we have the opening of the stockings first thing and when our kids were younger, I would have a treasure hunt for their one last big gift, then breakfast (Norwegian style) in the living-room, again in front of the fireplace eating manderin oranges, Norwegian pancakes (Nanc would usually be the pancake maker) and fried koomla (what could be better!!!!), and we would relax. Christmas dinner is around 4:00 so it is not so rushed. And I never know who might sit at our Christmas table, it just is wonderful to share our Christmas meal with family and friends. I love this season.....and on that note, I just want to wish you all a very Happy and blessed Christmas.