A really, really great day! ! !

November 22, 2006 (2:58pm)
41º F, Bright cloudy, S wind 16 mph.

Good afternoon,

We are really having a great day! Margriet check Astrid and Onno’s website - - - and there were new pictures on it that weren’t there yesterday. We had an email from Astrid a few days ago saying that she would "kick Onno" (according to the translation website) and get some picturers on their website ( http://www.fornax-and-oban.org/foto/2006/ ). In a very nice way, it sure messed up our morning! It took some time to download all of the pictures and to chat about each. Then I had to put them on our memory stick for posterity. Of course we had to chat about them again.

There is at least one Oma and Opa who are very appreciative of them. It still on some level amazes me that we can get these pictures and other communications so easily and quickly. We don’t hear from them nearly often enough, but I guess that would be true if we were face to face with them 24/7! Seems that is a normal wish for Oma’s and Opa’s the world over. Can’t put it into words how much these and the other mean to us.

As you can see, M&M is into mischief cleaning out the Kleenex box, making room for more! Kind of reminds me of a story told about me. Seems when my little brother was baptized, the minister came over to the house. I think for a private baptism, but not too sure of that. Memories get lost as one gets old, even though I was about 2 years old at the time. Anywho, I figured out a way to lock myself into the bathroom and find Mom’s bath powder. Using the powder puff in the container, I proceeded to dust myself and the contents of the bathroom, just as the minister arrived. Eventually Dad broke into the bathroom and saved me from myself. Probably fortunately, I also don’t remember what happened after the event. I do remember that Dad made sure the bathroom door and the door to my brother and my room had a way to open them from the outside when we moved to the house on the south side. Wonder why?

The other picture is of Pim in an activity that I don’t think happens too often in a day. He still is a handsome dude - even when snoring. There is a bunch of other pictures included, mostly of the kids. Pim still looks like the Pim who came to FISKLAND, but a visible stretched version and some more mature. I have a feeling he will be turning some young lady’s heads in not enough years.

Some of pictures are also of Onno’s remodeling skills. The kitchen/dining area has undergone some major changers. One very noticeable change is the addition of a wall. You can’t miss it because of the color scheme! I think I will need sunglasses the next time we go there! Suspect that the color choice might be Astrid’s choice, but really have no way of knowing. Onno is a craftsman, of the "old school" style and really does excellent work. Everything appears to be perfect or better.

Breakfast at Bible study went very well and everyone there was well fed with some excellent dishes. I know I ate too much. We dispensed with lunch a few hours later. Margriet’s bread and cinnamon rolls were a real hit, along with the honey-butter she brought. Fortunately there were not enough folks there to eat all of the rolls and bread, so we (I) had a chance to eat a little bit at home. Not all that much though. The honey-butter all but disappeared too. Good thing there was more of that in the refrigerator!

Finally finished my research for next week’s study and even finished the worksheet for the lesson. Now I have started the next section. It too looks to be a long one. Only four more weeks left of the study. No idea what will be next.

Our Thanksgiving dinner ingredients are all in order. The lamb is in the refrigerator, thawing to be ready for the oven. Margriet baked a pumpkin pie for the occasion. I was forced to smell the baking of it and not experience even a little taste! I think that could be called abuse. I did take a ride to Algoma to pick up a special bottle of wine to go with. This time I got a bottle of cranberry wine. Just sounded good - hope it is. At the price of a bottle, we will not be getting many of them, or much of any wine for that matter. The price of a bottle has really skyrocketed in the past couple of years.

Getting hungry just talking about tomorrow! Of course the ribs I have in the oven might have something to do with that too. They are really smelling good. Baking the very slowly this time. Didn’t get them into the oven soon enough, so we will be having a late supper I think. Oh well!

The weather has been extremely warm. The temperature was nearly 40º F when I woke up this morning. That is about 2º F warmer than yesterday! The weather man is talking of nearly 60º F for a high tomorrow! Imagine the guys at camp are looking for their wool jogging short to hunt it. Not much of a snow cover either! The media is filled with warnings to hunters to get their deer into coolers or butcher shops as soon as possible. We had a similar problem one year when it got up to 64º F about noon one day. Then the temperature took a nose dive, hitting -7º F before morning. Everyone’s gun froze from the high moisture turning to ice. That also was the only time my gun froze. It is a simple action on purpose to eliminate things like that happening. It really is not fun hunting when the temperature is much above 20º F!

Time to get a-going.

In Christ My Saviour,

Chris <><