AUGUST 29

We are back home!  We drove into our farmyard a week ago Friday, so thankful to have enjoyed a month of holidays and now safely home.  The problem, where to start in sharing these four plus weeks with you?  

The first week back home has been a busy one with harvest underway and Ashley staying with us to attend VBS every afternoon at Trinity, Torquay.  It was so fun to have her here!  

Kirk came out on Wed. and brought Carter, Lindsay and Jamie with him. Carter stayed to help with the harvest and Kirk came back this past weekend.  He was on one combine and Carter on the other.  Clare and Alan were trucking lentils. Jodi and Abbey were here too and helped with the cooking, much appreciated!  Jamie went with Ashley to VBS on Wed. afternoon.  Abbey and Lindsay made cookies and the four of them iced the homemade Oreo cookies when Jamie and Ashley came home.  The cookies turned out great!

Icing "Oreo"cookies

Now I will go back and start at the beginning of our holiday. 
We left Torquay on July 19 and drove as far as Frontier on the first day. We enjoyed the salad and ribs supper at Alan and Judy's.  It was good to be with them on this day, thirty years since their son Tommy lost his life in a tragic accident.  We spent a restful night there and headed out the next morning.   We stopped in Medicine Hat for lunch and continued on to Sparwood, BC where we spent two nights with Alan's sister, Glenda and Garry.  Donna and Cam had arrived earlier in the week so the three Lutz siblings had their own mini reunion, but we were missing sister Joyce and Wayne.

On our way we drove past the Frank Slide site, an event that happened in 1903, destroying much of the town of Frank in the Crowsnest Pass and taking the lives of seventy people.

 

We also took time to stop at Limbrick Falls.

On this trip I finally got to see this huge truck that is quite a tourist attraction in this mining town.  Alan drove one that was almost as big as this one when he spent three years working at the coal mine in Sparwood.  He doesn't look very tall standing beside the wheel!

On Friday morning we rode with Glenda and Garry for the four and a half hour trip to Spokane, WA.  We checked in at "My Place" where guests from the reunion were allotted rooms for half price! (Thanks for arranging that, cousin Luanne.)

The reunion began with a spaghetti supper at Luanne and Brian's lovely acreage just east of Spokane.  One of the highlights for Alan was this classic juke box, in working order without putting in coins, that played 45's from the 50's and 60's!  His first choice was 
"Young Love".  That was us back in the 50's when he was my first boyfriend and I was his first girlfriend!

 This picture shows the tall and the short of the cousins.  The Toombs family are a short bunch so Alan was questioned a few times as to how he got to be so tall. (he was adopted!) Here he is with his cousin Ray Anderson.  Their mothers were sisters.

 We were very impressed with the beautiful yard where the reunion was held.  Here's one special spot among a yard full!

Family pictures were taken on Saturday afternoon.  Here is one of the  Lola (Toombs) and Walter Lutz family members who attended.

Garry and Glenda, Cam and Donna, Alan and Elaine

It was a very special gathering as Alan hadn't seen many of these first cousins for over fifty years.  Growing up on their family farm at Loomis, SK, his family made yearly summer trips to Spokane to visit Grandma and Grandpa Toombs and many aunts, uncles and cousins in that area.   Saturday evening was a time for sharing some precious memories of those times.

On Sunday afternoon most of the cousins drove to Idaho where we enjoyed a ninety minute cruise on Coeur d'Alene Lake.  There were some fantastic cottages along the shore!  Here we are gathered for a farewell picture after our cruise. 


After the cruise we headed back to Canada and spent the night at Garry and Glenda's in Sparwood.  Cam and Donna left early on Monday morning and we were off after breakfast.  We took the scenic route on highway 22 up to Calgary through the foothills and cattle country.

We arrived at Nancy and Trevor's in late afternoon and enjoyed a BBQ supper with them, Holly and Bram in their new (to them) home not far from downtown Calgary.  They are much closer to work and school so all are happy with their new location.  We also had a quick visit with Todd's friend, Dave Bragg who dropped off a gift for baby Elly Clara. (good thing we could take two suitcases each on Iceland Air as we had one almost full of gifts!)

On Tuesday afternoon we drove up to Lacombe.  Alan needed a haircut so he was referred to the favourite barber of Sandra and Merle's grandsons.  Here he is doing a great job on Alan, with a fun visit to boot!  Megan and Nola took me to their favourite sushi place while Alan waited for his haircut.

Alan getting a trim before heading to Norway

Nola and Megan enjoying sushi lunch.

We enjoyed a visit with Mareena, Gavin, Megan and Nola.  Rylan was spending time at Grandma and Grandpa Sanford's.  We had a good sleep and the next afternoon Mareena drove us to the Edmonton airport shortly after three to be there three hours ahead of our 6:30 pm flight to Iceland and on to Bergen, Norway.

We got rid of our four suitcases at Iceland Air luggage check in, went through security and had a pizza.  We also found out that our plane was delayed in it's return flight from Reykjavik.  That meant that our flight was also delayed by three hours and we wouldn't be leaving until 9:30 pm!  Good thing we had reading material and some snacks along.

Well, I think I'll stop here and continue this saga later.  You've now heard about the first week of our travels, the rest is yet to come!