Christmas Aftermath!

Legos, Legos, Legos...And helpers to help with the projects.  All the fun of "after" Christmas work!

Christmas Eve 2010

Before the troops arrive!  Things are ready and peaceful! But not for long!

Santa arrives on his blue sleigh.  His hat was a little tight and he hadn't started his beard but other than this, he's in great shape!

 Here he is awaiting the cookies and milk!  Actually he went for the mashed potatoes, big time!

Logan came and said he was starving and wasn't happy until dinner was ready and sitting in front of him.

Ah, finally!  And the menu was: Roladen, Pierogi (which Jake loved!  It reminded him of his Canadian Missionary days.  Who knew??) carrots, red cabbage, green bean cassarole, cole slaw, salad, potatoes, Jamie's wonderful rolls, Scandinavian Rice Cream with raspberry sauce and drinks.

All generations are here tonight.

And now time for a little pageantry.  Baby Jesus sans swaddling clothes...We do the best we can!  Notice Tyson in the role of "Harry Potter".  It was Logan's request, because he would be Joseph this year!

Birthday soul-mates share a moment before the madness begins!

And now the madness!

Ty is moving so fast we got sort of a double exposure going on here!

Lots of gifts for all and Logan can never get enough!  He reminds me of Brian when he was little!

Shake, Shake, Shake

The grandkids are getting really excited to open their gifts. Right about now, they are at their other grandma's having a family Christmas party.  They will be here in a little while and we will have our dinner of Roladen, Pierogi and such.  After we will have our little Christmas program.  Logan wants to be Joseph this year, as I menetioned earlier and Tyson was assigned the part of Harry Potter...oh well.  That's kids for you.

The last week as they all three came over, the presents under the tree have been a big temptation.  They look, they shake and they shake some more.  They have been guessing and snooping.  Brecklyn saw one for her dad and shook it and asked me if I had gotten Jake some "deodorant" for Christmas and if that was in the package she was shaking.  I said, well if you think he needs it, we can surely get him some.

Then One Foggy Christmas Eve

Yes, it is a foggy Christmas Eve, but I see a sign  of blue sky as the sun starts to break through.  It is funny as earlier this week we had lots of snow.  It looked like a white Christmas was sure to be, until the rain hit and never stopped!  All the snow melted and the signs of it are where the snow plow stacked it up and on some spotty areas.  But at least travel will be effortless.  Although we are not going anywhere! Merry Christmas!

Not a Creature Was Stirring

Except the mouse in Spencer's house.  Yes, it's been a mousy Christmas week.  We got three again and hopefully that will be it for a while.  Since our kitty, Sadie passed away last Dec., it has been interesting!

Only Logan! Or the last of the One-liners...

Yesterday Logan and Ty were over in the afternoon and Spencer was watching them..  I was doing my shopping.  Apparently Logan did something he shouldn't and Spencer said "Logan, better not or Santa will just bring you a lump of coal for Christmas."
Logan said, "what is that".  Spencer said, "Well, you know those black things at the bottom of  the barbeque grill, that's what they are."

Logan's reply, "Oh yeah, I want one of those!"

In-laws, Out-laws and Visiting Teachers

Jamie and I are visiting teaching partners.  We have been visiting the same two ladies for quite a while now.  Today the lesson was on Family History, so we started to talk to one of our ladies about that and she said her late husband was Oneida Indian....this perked up Jamie's ears as her cousins are 1/2 Oneida.  Julia mentioned that her husband was from Oneida, WI.  So of course, Jamie and I were very interested because my sister-in-law Kim was from Wisconsin and they were also Oneida Indians.  Well, it turns out that Kim, my sister-in-law went to BYU and did cornhusk dolls with Julia's sister-in-law and they knew each  other here and in Wisconsin.  Then Julia's late husband's aunt is Kim's visiting teaching lady.  What a small world...
A sample of Kim's beaded picture frames is shown below.  For some reason the pictures wouldn't go in the right direction.  Sorry...Kim's Cornhusk dolls are on the bottom. Here is her link: http://arts.state.wi.us/static/folkdir/nishimoto1.htm

These pics would not turn.  Don't know why. 

Prayer-Try It, It works!

Last week I went with my parents and Tyson to the German concert.  On the drive home, Tyson mentioned how he was looking forward to the Motab choir concert with David Archuleta.  We had been lucky enough to get tickets.  No sooner had he said that then my cell phone rang.  It was Jamie.  She had called to give me the news that she had lost the Concert tickets....Great...  But I thought, there is still time to find them, it was 5-6 days away still.  So she looked and looked with no luck and I think she basically gave up on looking.  I told her to pray and said I would, too.  I don't know if she did or not.  But I did. 

About the same time, I lost some papers.  I went to work thinking they were in my office, no.  I thought, I must not have looked well enough at home, no, I still couldn't find them.    So it went for a few days.  I was frustrated but not too badly, because with some effort, I would be able to gather the information on the papers again.  It was just so bothersome.  But the tickets couldn't be replaced. 

Monday at about 3:00 am I woke up...my very first thought was the papers are in the hall closet on top of some recipe books.  I was too tired to get up and check so I didn't, but then my next thought was, if only I would know where to have Jamie look for the tickets.  Instantly a weird thought came to my mind.  It was to tell Jamie to look in her holiday decoration bins.  Strange thought.  But OK, I would tell her.  In the morning when I got up I went straight to the closet.  Lo and behold...yes, my papers were exactly there.  OK, I thought, I will tell Jamie to look in her holiday bins.

After work, I had to drop a check off to Jamie.  She wasn't there, only Tyson.  I gave him the check and said, Ty, tell your mom to look in her holiday bins.  He said he would and did so.  Later that evening, I walked Logan home from our home and by then Jamie was there and I mentioned to her about the bins.  She sounded like she wouldn't be doing that and she had pretty much given up on the fact of finding the tickets.  So I went home.  Nothing more I could do about it.

In the morning as she took the kids to school, Tyson asked her to check the bins.  So she agreed, OK, she would do that.  She did.  Guess what? Need I say more?  Say your prayers and have some faith.  Someone up there really is watching out for you.

Christmas Luncheon

Here we are on the way to the Church Office Building.  We stopped for a Photo-op and we asked a passer-by to take a pic of the four of us.  We are from left to right, Gerda Bals, Sylvie Pysnak, Sonja, and Barbara Bell.  We are standing next to the Tabernacle and in front of the big nativity.  We were anxiously awaiting our 15 meatballs and shrimp luncheon, but were disapointed in not getting them this year...:( Oh well, so we had ham and chicken nuggets or something like that.  It was OK, but not as good as years past.  We have always enjoyed our luncheons and kind of joke about some of our past ones where Heidi sat on the food which was on a chair, we all spill on each other and get all messy and etc. etc.  This year, no fatalities.  But afterwards we all had to go to Human Resources to do some paperwork and of course, for the second time, the program was not working.  However, somehow after about 1 hour of trying, they got it up and going again.  Since it took so long, we called Ruth, our boss, and I said, that we had all decided to do a little shopping after the luncheon since it was such a nice day.  We would be back later when we were done.  Ruth said we were all fired.  So we gave the phone to Annette, the human resource person, who said to Ruth, she was re-hiring all of us.  It was kind of funny, helped to relieve a little stress to have a good laugh once in a while.



Memories From Long Ago or It's a Small, Small World

Today was our employee and missionary luncheon at the Church Office Bldg.  We have a devotional speaker who is usually one of the church authorities, as was the case today.  Our International floor was sitting together on one table.  On my table was our missionary Hans Arndt.  I told the others about a little story from long ago that Elder Arndt had told me and my coworkers told me, "You need to put that on your blog for safe keeping".  And so here I am doing that.
Here is the little story.  My dad, Heinz Hoeke grew up in Freiberg, Sachsen and shortly after the war worked at a printshop there.  About that time Hans Arndt's family in Berlin sent him to live with friends in Freiberg.  He stayed right across the street from my dad and in fact at the relatives of my dad's, the Henkels.  Hans told me one day that my father's mother asked him to take a warm lunch to my dad at his place of work.  Now after all these years he came to work as a missionary at the Library and got to know me and reacquainted himself with my dad who also comes to the Library to do private research for clients.  It is a really small world and you never know when you will run into people that you knew from so long ago...I think it is really cool!

Grandma, I'm Your Neighbor!



Well, being that it is Sunday, it is normal for the grandkids to come over for lunch after church.  Today was such a day.  Logan spotted a container of Piroulines on the counter that were going to be a little gift.

Logan asked, "Grandma, I'm hungry. Can I have one of these?"

I said, "Sorry, Logan, they are for the neighbors."

His reply, "Grandma, I am your neighbor!"

Camera at Church

OK, so I had to take a picture of my cute grandson, Ty at church.  I have always got a camera there because I am supposed to photograph the ladies for the Relief Society Directory.  Well, OK, he won't be in the Directory, but what the heck. 

Here's his class waiting to go in to the Primary meeting area.

This Is Not Your House, Grandma!

Yesterday was Thanksgiving.  It was a cold day outside but the sun shone.  We were invited to the Hofheins' for dinner.  It was a really delicious meal and we had a very good time.  I have to tell you a little secret though...After Arden's sister cut the pink fruit salads that are shown above on the counter, Brecklyn went over to them and decided they looked really nummy, which they were.  So...she took a really good lick of one of the salads and I said, "Brecklyn, don't do that!"

Afterwhich I got the response, "This is NOT YOUR HOUSE, grandma!"  Can you just see her saying that in the picture???  So I guess I am only allowed to be her grandma at MY HOUSE....  I doubt that I will keep that in mind, however, she is still my granddaughter no matter where or whose house we happen to be at...

Grayson also had a little "solid" food for Thanksgiving for the first time.  I don't think his was quite so tasty and appetizing, but at least it was edible, maybe??

Well the day after Thanksgiving is my set-up Christmas day.  Usually I go all out, but Spence didn't want me to work as hard due to the fact that I have been having some health issues and so he wanted me to "Reduce and simplify"  and I did much to my own disapointment.  I felt sad about it.  Maybe things will be better next Christmas...

Well, as we were setting up, Logan came over and his "thing" is to play Legos.  Just like Brian ....

Here he is in the thick of things.



Brian's Day

Brian's favorite restaurant.  Can you guess what it is?  No, not Chuck-a-rama, but close!  It's Golden Corral!

Look at Gray's sad face...No food for the hungry.  It shouldn't be too long and you can have it all!

A trip to the dentist will fix this, maybe??

A Night At The Ballet

So tonight was Brecklyn's big performance.  She did great!  Even little Grayson enjoyed his first night of "culture".

Here is our Prima Ballerina in the Grande Finale!

Here is Tiny dancer after the fact and ready to go home.  The older groups did a great job.  I always get a little teary eyed for some reason...

One On One With Logan

Logan wanted to have some one on one time now for quite a while now.  Today grandpa took Tyson to the gun show and felt Logan was not really old enough for this activity.  Grandma had lots of errands to run, and so asked Logan if he wanted to come along.  He said, yes.  And so as we drove he was much more quiet than Ty, so I had to kind of start some conversations.  I asked if he knew what next month was? 

"No," he replied. I said, "It's Christmas".  "Oh," he said. 

 I asked, "Do you know what Christmas is?" 

"I don't know," he replied.  I said, "It's when you hear about the Christmas story and you kids act it out.  With Joseph and Mary and the shepards and the wise men and....." 

"And Jesus", he said.  Yes! OK!  I asked "who do you want to be this year."  "Joseph, and Tyson can be Jesus". 

I replied, "I think maybe Grayson would be better in the Jesus part this year, what do you think?"  "I don't know,what about Harry Potter?"  So does this mean our Christmas Story will have a bit of strange twist this year???  I hope not...I am kind of a traditional type grandma...

So we ran one of my errands and lo and behold, close by he spotted the errand store of his dreams.  It was Toys R Us.... He loved everything and I asked what he would like.  He looked and looked and loved everything he saw. But he chose Cars.  And then I got a huge lesson on the names of all the cars.  I hope I can remember, because I forgot Mater/Mator (whatever) was Lightning McQueen's best friend.  I should be given time out  for not knowing.  Logan was so surprised that grandma did not know this very important fact...



Then we went to Sonic for lunch.  I wanted to show him what "drive-ins" were like back in the "olden days".  It was fun, but after I got home I noticed I had not been given credit for the coupon I used.  Such a deal...  After we arrived home, there was a small package that I had been expecting.  And guess what it had ???  Poppers! What fun!!!

Here Logan proudly holds up his gift that he personally picked out for Grayson.  So Grayson will be Santa for Christmas.  I bought this at Penney's for $2.00.  Now that is a good deal!

Who Knew??

Yesterday on the bus I was sitting in the front seat talking to someone that had asked if I was working and at the library on the day of the shooting.  We talked about that and somehow got to talking about Elizabeth Smart's trial.  I mentioned that I had seen her downtown as I was walking on my lunch break to Zion's bank on Main Street.  She was in the white get-up walking behind a man and a woman.  I took a double take because they looked so ridiculous and I could see she was around teen age.  I remember thinking, oh that poor girl, she has the weirdest parents in the world.  My bus driver joined the conversation and said she was the bus driver that had them on her bus the day they found her.  Apparently they kept calling her on her phone system to get informtion but she too, had no idea who the girl on the bus was.  Interesting, isn't it?

It's My Turn

After church Logan and Ty came over.  They were at the table and Logan said, long time ago you took Ty somewhere and now it's my turn.  It has been a long time now grandma!  So it has, Logan!  What would you like to do?

All To Ourselves

This is an interesting shot, wouldn't you agree?

Took the 2 oldest of the grandkids to Pioneer Village.  It was a lovely sunny, warm Nov day.  Jamie had given me a coupon for admissions and I still have $30.00 left.  I will be going here forever, I think.  Unfortunately only the big train ride was going and the houses and the activities were closed.  So we could only walk, look, etc.  They loved the wooden train.  They want their own in the backyard.  OK, Jake, start building!

Please notice the sign on the ladder....My grandkids were being intentionally defiant here, I might add...  Notice the spelling of "Ladder"...Who wrote that anyway?

As you can see, we had the whole place to ourselves.  The weather was perfect and we could only look.  How sad..But we made the best of it and I hope that they still enjoyed the day.