Wednesday Word - Blessings

The view from the 13th floor of Hotel Scandic in Copenhagen, Denmark
as we viewed it from our room before leaving for the airport

A week ago today Sandra and I were flying back to Canada after a wonderful three weeks spent in Norway and Denmark.  Our travels had gone without a hitch - until we were about to go through customs at Toronto airport and Sandra's wallet with passport and boarding pass was missing!  We had only an hour and a half to make our connection to Regina so it was iffy if we were going to make it with complications like that!  However, Sandra had photocopied her passport and had a copy in her suitcase.  The officials at the airport accepted the copy as her photo ID, issued a new boarding pass and we were off to our gate.  When we arrived there the attendant had just left the desk and was heading towards the plane so we assumed that boarding was over.  We must have looked a bit frazzled as another passenger came over and assured us that boarding hadn't started yet!  That was very good news.  We didn't have long to wait and soon we were settled on the eighth plane of our trip and on the last leg of our journety.  When we arrived in Regina, Sandra reported her loss to the authorities and we went our separate ways, she to Frontier and me to Milestone for an over night stay before driving home to Torquay on Thursday.  All's well that ends well - the missing wallet was found and returned to Regina airport a couple days later.

For the first time in a month I am home alone!  One Monday when I drove down to Ambrose to pick up our US mail, I realized that I was alone for the first time in several weeks when I got in Kiwi and drove off by myself.  It was great to be surrounded by family and friends but now it is good to have a few hours of peace and quiet all to myself.  A good time to catch up on my blog!  Maybe I'll be back on schedule on Wednesdays and Sundays.  It's a good discipline for me to ensure that I write regularly, and hopefully good for you readers so you don't have to check for a new post every day.  There might be occasional surprises but I guess that's okay too.

I keep wanting to say "We" when I go to write but must remind myself that "I" is the pronoun that defines me now.  So I must say "I" had a house and yard full of family this past weekend.  Clare and Kirk brought their campers and the rest were in the house for a total of ten adults and nine children.  The girls had the meals organized for the three days so meal making was all taken care of.  Ardis, Kris and Stacy also brought many goodies so we were well taken care of.

Johnson breakfast on Friday

Friday saw the moms and children head to Crosby, ND for the fun activities on Main Street - bouncy houses, bargains in the stores and on sidewalk sales.  Grandma gave each of the kids American money to spend so they paid for their swimming and had fun shopping uptown.

On Saturday the men took the bigger kids golfing in Crosby, the moms went  "back to school" shopping in Estevan and the grandmas stayed with the three youngest girls.  Ava is 6, Jamie 5 and Ashley 4 so they had lots of fun together. Ardis, Kris and Stacy had a good visit with Aunt Viola in Estevan. In the evening we had a belated birthday party for Jamie who turned five on July 31.  The kids had fun decorating their cupcakes.  It's a good thing they did it out on the deck with all the sprinkles!

Happy Birthday to Jamie

Our annual sevice at Salem Lutheran took place on Sunday at 10:30.  Fifty people turned out for the service with visitors from Edmonton, Estevan, Midale, Regina, Birch Hills, Prince Albert, Weyburn, Lampman, and Torquay area.  Our family didn't stay for the picnic lunch as it was a bit of a challenge to pack for 19 people!  We stayed around and visited after the service and took pictures.

Four members of the Andrew Tenold family
Ilene, Bernice, Dallas and Maxine

The last two weddings at Salem Lutheran Church
Kirk and Shauna (Fornwald) Johnson in 2000
Gerald and Maxine (Tenold) Olson in 1954

The Johnson Family
Kirk, Kris, Shauna, Elaine, Stacy, Ardis, Laurel, Greg, Jodi, Clare

Ardis, Kris, Stacy
Ava and Samuel Johnson
(flowers picked & arranged by Ardis and Kris)

Bell ringers - Ava, Ashley and Jamie

Kris, Ardis, Elaine

We spent the rest of Sunday at home, just enjoying being together.  Todd and Kristy put together a beautiful tribute to Howard on youtube.  As we watched it, we laughed and cried together.  It ended with Howard's prayer for his family that Todd had recorded when he and his dad took their father/son trip to London and Paris in 2009.  Thanks, Todd and Kristy for sharing this special weekend with us in this special way.

Monday morning saw Ardis, Kris, Stacy, Sam and Ava packing up to return to Edmonton.  We want a longer visit next time so plans are to get together again at the Crosby threshing bee the third week in July next year.  We hope they can stay for a couple weeks then as three days goes by all too quickly.
Laurel, Eric and Ashley left in the afternoon to join Greg and Dawson who left on Sunday so Dawson could attend a friend's birthday party.  Shauna and Laurel were busy all morning washing up bedding and towels, making beds and vacuuming floors.  Jodi had to see an optometrist about a possible stye on her eye.  It was a stye as well as a blocked tear duct so she got a prescription for that and the swelling went down fairly quickly with hot compresses and salve applied three times a day.

Kirk went back to Lampman on Sunday evening as he had to work on Monday.  He came back for the camper and his family on Tuesday afternoon.  Carter was excited to be out on the combine that afternoon with Clare!  In the evening we enjoyed an overnight visit from cousins, Jeanette and Dave Domes from Qualicum Beach on Vancouver Island. Clare and Jodi's good friends are Quentin and Dawn Domes. Dave is Quentin's uncle, a small world!

And that brings me to today.  I tackled the pile of mail that has gathered over three weeks so have a  few bills and other business to take care of.  Tomorrow afternoon I have appointments with a lawyer and a dentist.  I don't know which one will hurt the most!

So life goes on and I feel that my soul has been somewhat restored after the three week holiday with my sister.  We met so many wonderful people, saw such beautiful scenery and spent such a relaxing time with Todd and Kristy and other friends and family.  I am content to stay here at the farm for awhile and have no plans to be anywhere else until after Christmas.  There are many corners in my house that need to be decluttered so I would like to make that my fall project.  I'm hoping to get some maintenance work done on the house too.  But now the washer just signalled that it's finished it's job so I'll leave you and throw the load in the dryer.  Hope to see you back on Sunday.