GOLDEN WEB

One of the items that Richard brought home was this picture: Golden Web by Alison Kobylnyk of Victoria, BC. This is art made with materials. I've taken this on an angle so you can see the wonderful spider web detailing. As soon as I saw this picture I knew where it would hang.

Here it is hanging above my bed in the blue room. The colours in the picture just make the room pop. It is as if this picture was made for this room.



This is a gift from Aunt Moneca and I love it, one would almost think she had seen this room and knew exactly what it needed to finish the rooms decor.

The other gift that I am thrilled with are the windchimes from Mom. If you go to this website:
http://seagifts.com/chimofwesbyw.html
you will see what they are like. I've wanted a set of "Westminster" windchimes since Mom received hers on retiring from work it was at that moment I knew which chimes I wanted to have hanging in our yard. Richard is going to hang them high on our home because things are not that safe left out in your yards. But I will still hear them and enjoy them for years to come.

Once the chimes are hung I will post a picture here.

What happened on the way home!

Once Richards nose is pointed t0wards home he drives as long as he is able, which is, more often than not, the rest of the way with very small breaks for snacks, bathroom and maybe a catnap. He will also work out a route that would miss major cities and lots of traffic.

Richard arrived home on Thursday morning at 8:30. He had dropped Aunt Moneca off, at her home in Salmon Arm, B.C., at Noon on the Wednesday. In theory he should not have been home until late Thursday afternoon.

This trip was true to form instead of using the major highways he took the less traveled ones, which didn't matter until he reach Saskatchewan. He decided to use highway 3 and reach Prince Albert from the north. What he didn't know was there was road works on that highway. He made a decision which proved to be a bad one for our vehicle.

I gather as he turned onto highway 3 there were three pilons across the road, which only left one small open lane on the opposite side of the road. There were no signs to give him any details, the one side was quite a bit higher than the other so his thoughts were the pilons were to indicate the difference in road height. There were tracks on the right side so he moved over to the right side so he wasn't driving towards oncoming traffic. The road surface felt weird but he figured that it had been oiled to keep the dust down. This was quite a long stretch and several vehicles passed coming from the other direction which would have meant he would still have had to move over to the right of the road.

To cut a long story short our car is now covered in tar, not a few splatters of tar, but a thick layer at the bottom and splattering up to the windows especially on the drivers side. you will see from the pictures, our car is black so it is a little difficult to tell. Let me just say that our hubcaps are not black but a mat silver.


This is the passenger side hubcaps are the correct colour but look at the lower section of door, see how black it is and the bottom of the bumper.

This is the drivers side, I know it looks very clean but that intense black is tar, check out the hubcaps and tire, the bumper and back light, all this is tar. The splatters are on the windows.

Here is a closer look at the back tire. We have yet to get an estimate on having this mess cleaned off but we believe it will be between $500 - $1,000.

The lesson here, it does not always pay to go the fastest and less traveled route.

Church Programs Wrap-up for the Summer

I have never truly got used to Church programs stopping during the summer. You would think after all these years in Canada I would understand that summer time means holiday time. Our congregation has several groups; the voters meeting (which usually consists of the council and committee leaders) held their last meeting in June and will not have another one now until September.

Next to wrap-up for the summer were the Golden Agers. We were invited to have a picnic at Hilda's acreage. The day was a little on the windy side but several of us ventured outside to play bocce ball and another fun game, which was new to me, Bolo Toss or Ladder Golf;
http://thefuntimesguide.com/2005/10/bolotossladders.php
Several of us also took time to walk around Hilda's property admiring the many different plants and trees.

We picnicked inside on lawn chairs as it was a little too windy for most of the seniors to sit outside. There were a few brave ones, mainly the men, who sat on the deck. I joined the ladies inside as you can see. I still have my hat on, by now I was suffering from 'hat head' after being outside playing games.

We managed to tire Richard out and here you see him having 40 winks. The ladies thought that was funny and teased him just a little.

The last order of the day was to have cake and ice-cream. As I've said before you can't have a celebration with out a cake. They celebrated everyone's birthday that fell during January to June. We also gave special recognition to those who have not missed a Golden Agers gathering from September 2008 to June 2009.

The next group to wrap things up for the summer were the LWML. The ladies met at the church for supper which was catered so everyone could sit and enjoy the evening.

Here are just a few enjoying their meal. After we had eating we shared stories about our lives and had some fun with jokes and humourous articles that Gerdie had found. Pat brought everything to a close with a responsive Bible reading, songs and prayer.


These are our LWML ladies who will meet again in September. While the ladies were having their time together at the church Pastor invited the men to our home for an impromptu men's gathering where they drank beer, ate junk food and after a game of ring golf outside they watched Richard's sport highlight tapes that he has made over the years. I gather they had a good time although no pictures were taken.

The one event I am so happy will continue is the Sunday morning Bible Study. There are members who will not attend just because they aren't used to having Bible Study in the summer so our numbers are down but what a lot we are learning as Pastor opens up the parables to us.

Summer is here and families do many things together, but let us not forget that Christ should be first and foremost in our lives and Sunday Services will continue as they should.

10th Anniversary

Richard has been a Pastor for ten years and our congregation celebrated with him by having a special luncheon. It was not possible for this to be a surprise as Richard does the bulletins each week and it was requested that he put an announcement in the Bulletin for this occasion.

As you see Richard is sitting in a chair while Brian Maier read the small devotion that is printed in the Lectionary for such an occasion. Just as a Candidate on the occasion of his Ordination sits on a chair in front of the congregation it was only fitting that Richard should once more sit on that chair during the devotion.

Unknown to Richard our Lutheran Life (Faith Life) chapter of the congregation wrote to Faith Life to inform them that their Pastor was celebrating his tenth anniversary. In recognition of this faith Life sent a cheque to be presented to Richard at this celebration. What a wonderful surprise. Brian Poir did the presentation.

Brian had a few more words to say then he past things to Pat Rocheleau.

Pat asked me to come forward where she presented me with a tray of annual plants for our garden in acknowledgment of my support to my husband and his ministry these past ten years.

And of course you cannot have a celebration without a cake. To add to the memories Verna did not know how to spell our last name. She did not realise that like her last name begins with 'sch' our's ends with it in true German form.

Pastor cut his cake, it was his special celebration so he cut the cake alone.

Prince Albert Relay for Life is

On Friday May 29th I took part in the Relay for Life at the Harry Jerome Track in Prince Albert. This is an annual event where teams come together and walk around the track all night each member taking a turn or several members of the team on the track at a time. This all done to raise money for the Canadian Cancer Society.

Marjorie from our church felt I should take part so I signed up with Helen, Marjorie and Julie (Julie was unable to join us). There are many different coloured t-shirts handed out, the survivors of Cancer are yellow. Team members are white or they dress up in various constumes, committee members are orange, volunteers are blue.


Here we are waiting for the event to begin. Although the sun was shining the wind had picked up and was very cold. I was determined to have fun so I wore my fancy leg cover. It is supposed to be green lightening Richard says it looks like mold. I also had on a lime green t-shirt but had subsequently covered that with my sweater then the survivors t-shirt.



After much standing around while the various committee members and dignitaries gave their speeches, this was hard on me as I find it harder to stand still than I do to actually walk. We had various groups represented as our escort around the track. The RCMP Officers in their Red Serge. City Police, Firemen, Sea and Air Cadets and several other groups that I now forget. Two survivors carried a white banner on which each survivor taking part had outlined their hand with their name and how long they had been cancer free written in the middle. I have now been cancer free for 8 years.


Here we are doing our victory lap. As you can see I used my hiking poles to help keep me balanced I also find they allow me to have more stamina to take part in such activities where I need to do a lot of walking (for instance shopping).

The next set of photos show some of the teams that took part in the actual relay. One or more members of the teams would be walking all night. As the sun was going down it was getting colder. I had already finished my lap and was sitting down with Marjorie's extra jacket on and a blanket around my legs. It was hard to take pictures from this location so I finally went closer to the track to take these of the teams.


The name of this team is the Saskatchewan Penitentiary.
This team had several youngsters and they all wore top hats and tails and carried canes they looked so cute.
This picture really doesn't do the Legal Eagles justice! They wore black gowns with their white wigs and bird beak on the forehead.


These are only a few of the 80+ teams that participated. Once everyone had circled the track once the official relay began. We went off to the Survivor's tent to have a bite to eat and a hot drink to warm up. Once we left the tent we did another lap of the track.

During the evening and night there would be entertainment. While we were still there they were shaving heads of those who had raised money for this event. One girl had raised $11,055 to have her hair cut off. Even though it was getting to be very cold I was glad I was there to witness this event. There were 200+ survivors signed up for the victory lap but many did not show probably due to the weather.

I decided I would like to walk the track again, this time to find my luminary.


This is my bag. They have a special coating on the bags so they do not burn, then holes in the sides, sand is placed in the bag and a candle. At 10:30 pm they would light all the candles. The bags lining the track were either for those who are survivors or in memory of those who have lost their battle with cancer. Marjorie told me she wrote 800 of the bags, she did this one for me and wrote the inscription on the bottom.

As we walked around the track we looked for her mother's and husband's who had both lost the battle and her's. We also looked for a few other luminaries of other family members of her friends or church people.
Hear I am standing behind my luminary.

At 10:30 the Luminary Ceremony began. The Prince Albert Highland Pipe Band played Amazing Grace while the candles were all lite. Then there was a minute of silence while we remembered all those who had lost the fight. After that Megan Fournier sang Ava Maria. I was not able to get a picture of the sign once it was lite up but you can imagine how moving it was, not only to see these all glowing but also all the bags around the track. They would be left burning all night.

By the time we left for home, around 11:00 pm, I had actually walked the track three times, not all at once, but at various times in the few hours we were there. I've had trouble getting back to walking any distance this year so I am proud of my accomplishments during this activity.

Snow in May

Not only can you see the snow we had yesterday but you can also see our house. Two days ago we had temperatures around 20 degrees Celsius, today the temperature is -2 with snow on the ground. It matches how I'm feeling, I have my first cold in at least three years.



As you can see all the trees that we wanted removed are now history. The City came and took out the Maple by the house and pruned the three that are left. We still have the two Spruce in the front and another two in the back. The house should be able to breath and maybe the rot in the siding will slow down.

You would be amazed at how much brighter it is inside our home. No longer do we have that closed in feeling. Now we can see out the windows we plan to utilize the porch during the summer. Our couch, that would not fit inside the house, we will put on the porch through one of the side windows, which we can now access with the trees gone. The freezer we will move to the other side of the porch so we can utilize the larger window. We will fix the coffee table and put that out there in front of the couch, put a table cloth over the freezer so it can act as a table. Richards bike we will store in the basement or shed depending where it will fit.

Spring Clean Up

One of the biggest jobs outside is the spring clean up. So this week I began the task of raking up previous years leaves and grass cuttings. I started on Wednesday and the first picture shows how much I accomplished first time out . I began at the Maple on the side of the house, which the City is supposed to be removing for us and managed to get half way down the length of the house on the East side.

The following day I began at the same Maple but this time worked towards the avenue. These photos do not really give a true idea of how much leaves and grass is actually being raked up.

Friday I gave my body a rest and began again today, Saturday. I finished raking under the spruce, again this tree will be removed, and worked towards the Maple in the corner, which the City will prune for us. I cleaned from the sidewalk around the power pole and Maple creating another pile of leaves etc.


My efforts for today were not complete, I began raking the other direction across the front of the property. I cleaned under the Spruce and the other side of the Maple and worked towards the next Maple tree. By this time I was beginning to ache so decided to try another activity.


Still in the front yard. Having no success finding the ice chipper, Richard probably locked it in the shed and I don't have a key, I use the ice chipper in the Spring and Summer as an edging tool, I made do with the spade. We wanted to know how far our front sidewalk went and so I scraped out the overgrown lawn edges only to find out that it does not go very far from the step near the Maple trees. There is a chance there could be another step here and I need to dig down further to find the path but I don't think that is the case.
As I was already in the front with the spade I figured it would be a good idea to the lawn at the front sidewalk. This is my efforts for today, there is a good six to eight inches of grass grown onto the sidewalk. I worked back to the same level as my pile of raked leaves and called it a day. I'll suffer tomorrow for my efforts but seeing the yard beginning to look clean and a little cared for is well worth the pain of the next few days. It's weird but I have always done the raking from the moment I first lived in a house with a garden. Neither my first husband nor Richard have ever been predisposed to do any raking, without my efforts it would never get done. Come to think of it I believe I did a lot of the raking when I was a child too.