Monday, December 28, 2009

We hope you had a
Merry Christmas!
And we wish you a
Happy New Year!
These are some of the ice candle holders
that I made as gifts this year.
I picked the wrong year to go with an ice craft
because it has been so warm.

Our Christmas tree
has ornaments from all over the world
and from special people in our lives.
We see things from Kenya, Vietnam, Laos, Ethiopia, India...
...gifts from friends and relatives
...plus things we have made ourselves.
For us, looking at the tree is a trip down memory lane.

These three had more holidays than I did
so one day I returned home from work and
found them playing Settlers of Catan.

We saw some some friends from
years gone by and faraway places.....


We were able to read to Natalie and Everett.





We know that some of our friends are going through rough times and we want to assure them of our continued prayers and support. We wish everyone good health, safety, peace and happy relationships in the New Year.

Sunday, December 06, 2009



MCC Manitoba
Craft and Bake Sale

There was a great turnout for the sale. It happened in conjunction with Ten Thousand Villages and their Christmas promotion.
Lots of people brought baked goods and lots of people came to buy them. I haven't heard the final count but they made a lot of money for AIDS kits.



Conrad and I sat at a booth selling kits (below). The focus this year was on health kits and AIDS kits. The health kits include a toothbrush, toothpaste, nail clipper, hand towel and soap all in a hand drawstring bag for $7. We were encouraging people to buy a few and in honor of their friends and family. They would get a card to explain the gift and the kit would go off to needy people all over the world. We were able to tell stories about giving out kits and how happy it made the recipients. We sold about 70 of those.

The AIDS kits are $140 and include sheets, towels, Vaseline, body powder, rubber gloves (for the care givers) and $100 which goes towards medicine and training for the health care workers. We didn't sell that many of those but that's OK because all of the proceeds of the entire sale went towards AIDS kits. We assured people that if they were buying crafts or baking it was going to a good cause.

Oddly enough, quilts didn't go that well at the sale -- and there were some beautiful ones. Not to worry: the team will box them up and bring them out for the Spring Sale. Quilts usually sell quickly in Spring.

Below are two quilts that need a special home.
Baking for Bake Sales
This year we have been asked to bake for two Christmas bake sales. The first was the MCC Manitoba fundraiser sale and the second will be one for Erik's graduation party as part of school.






We baked 10 different things for the MCC sale.
It was a lot of fun and a lot of work.
I've decided for the school sale,
I'm going to specialize and just make a lot of a few things.
We'll see how that goes.
Progressive Supper


We were part of an International Student Progressive Supper again this year. Last year we had all men but this year we hosted women from China (plus their Canadian driver). Many students who come to Canada never make it into a Canadian home-- even if they are here for years. This supper is supposed to remedy that.

We were their first stop of the evening so we started them off with Wild Rice Soup and Butterhorn Rolls. I chose the wild rice because it is unique to Canada and something that perhaps they have not had before. That was the case this evening; some of the women had heard of it but most had never tasted it.

Conrad is learning to say "What is this?" in as many languages as he can and on this night he managed to get one more language (Mandarin) in his collection. I'm not sure how many he has by now, but he can ask it in quite a few languages.