New Year's Eve

Well, Alida has already rung in the new year while we're just starting our day here. She called, wishing us a Happy New Year, from a dinner cruise ship in the Sydney Harbour. She was so excited and said the fireworks were spectacular and they were enjoying a 30 degree C. summer night on the water! I caught these shots on TV. Amazing to think that she is cruising around down there on the other side of the world as we simultaneously watch the same fireworks on TV in our own home. And that we can actually talk with her by cell phone on the other side of the world. I don't understand the technology at all, but enjoy benefitting from it in this way.

When it was our time to ring in the new year, we hosted a games night for people from our church. The sjoelbak and crocinole came out and we also had Tribond and a new version of Monopoly going.

Two Amazing Blessings!

My blog is called "Counting My Blessings..." and the other day I was reminded of two wonderful blessings in my life. I know, the picture isn't very exciting, but the blessings are amazing!


Last week I went to the podiatrist to have my old orthodics repaired and molds of my feet made for new orthodics. As I was walking to the medical building I was reminded of the first time I went to this clinic in 1999. At that time I wasn't sure I was going to be able to make it from the car to the clinic! I had damaged my feet by the way I spent so-o-o many hours gardening on my haunches, putting stress on the balls of my feet. That summer I could hardly walk. And I panicked thinking, "What if I won't be able to walk anymore?!" Fortunately the orthodics have made a huge difference and now I can walk for miles and go hiking and enjoy being outdoors. That experience made me appreciate the blessing of orthodics and the blessing of being able to walk.

I've also often thought about the blessing of eye glasses. Just two little pieces of glass, ground to a specified shape, put into a frame, can make such a huge difference in my life. Without my glasses I can't see much. I wouldn't be able to drive. I wouldn't be able to enjoy seeing all the beautiful views that I can see with my glasses. So another amazing blessing in my life - eye glasses and the ability to see.

Thank you, Lord, for enabling people to come up with these small inventions that make such a big difference in the quality of life for so many people!!

Flower Stamp Collection

As a kid I started saving postage stamps from all over the world. Then my collection lay neglected for many years. A few years ago I decided to limit my collection to plant and flower stamps. So now when the flower garden is covered with snow, I can enjoy all the flowers in my stamp collection.

We have a few German missionaries living in the basement apartment at our mission. And Germany has a whole series of flower stamps right now, so the missionaries have been saving them for me (above).

And here are some U.S. flower stamps (above).

And some Canadian ones.

Visit from Anna & Karen

Anna was so-o-o excited to find a tacky Christmas sweater in Alida's bins! She's invited to a tacky-Christmas-sweater-party this coming week, but since those events are so popular (at least in the London area) there were no tacky Christmas sweaters left in the second hand stores, so Anna had given up hope of finding one. And voila!!! Alida's first-prize-winning-tacky-sweater to the rescue!

Relaxing by the fire place...

Christmas Day at Opa & Oma's

Christmas Day

While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born, and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn. Luke 2: 6, 7.


The angel said to them, Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. Today in the town of David a Saviour has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord.
Luke 2:10

Christmas Eve

This afternoon, while we were together opening presents, Alida called us. She had just come home from her night shift ( 4pm our time) and was ready to crawl into bed for Christmas Day. She called so that she could talk with us as we opened her package of gifts for us. So here we are talking with Alida and showing off some of the gifts she sent us. Rosemary is wearing her new pashmina (shawl), Melanie her bangles (and new pyjamas from Mark & Rosemary and necklace from Ellie)...And here we are chewing on the "lollies" (snakes), and showing off the Australian gold coins, a flower calendar and the intentionally "tacky" Australian flip flop fridge magnets.

First we each talked with Alida individually and then Mark put us all on speaker phone and we all talked together. So we got to be together with the whole family for a while (50 minutes) after all!

How Many House Plants Do I Have?

The other day as I was watering the plants, I thought, "I wonder how many house plants I actually have?" So I counted them. Fifty-seven house plants! I love having plants around - and books too. We have wide window sills in all six of our basement windows and have two bay windows on the main floor, so lots of space for plants.

A lot of them don't look all that great right now because I haven't had (taken) much time to care for them properly. They've been brought in from outside and I'm just keeping them alive right now. Maybe one of these days I'll make it a priority to give them some more TLC. Then in the spring I take cuttings and start up new plants for the garden.

When the Christmas cactus, geraniums and impatients get flowers and look good, I bring them upstairs where we can enjoy them. For the rest most of the plants stay in the basement until spring planting time.

Fourth Sunday of Advent

This evening we had our traditional annual intergenerational Christmas pageant complete with fluffy sheep ears stuck to hairbands, bathrobes, and tinsel halos. It was cute, hilarious, authentic and profound in its simplicity.

Pineapple Upside Down Cake

Here's this afternoon's baking experiment. It actually worked and tasted good too!

Wish I'd Brought My Camera!

I wish I had brought my camera to work with me today! It was so gorgeous out! After work I decided to walk around downtown from my work to Yonge & Bloor to catch the subway there. The wind was swirling around and snow was coming from the sky and the rooftops. And it was exciting, invigorating and gorgeous out! All those beautiful old buildings at the University of Toronto! The headlights of the streetcars in the swirling snow! Lots of people wrapped up in scarves, hats, heavy coats, plowing through the deep snow on the sidewalks, all going somewhere... I loved it. And then all of a sudden I realized I was right by Mark's work, so I popped in there and saw the plastiscene characters he was making and photographing for a computer game they are creating. Again, wished I had my camera. And all the beautiful little white lights in the trees along Bloor in Yorkville... Beautiful. The subway was jam packed and so was the bus, but being jammed in there along with everyone else was also part of the excitement of participating in the flow of life in the city. Came home, in from the cold, to the delicious smell of freshly baked bread. Mmmm....

Nutritional Scoring System

Here's something interesting that I ran across in the September 2008 issue of the National Geographic - the NuVal™ Nutritional Scoring System.

"The NuVal™ System is a food scoring system that allows consumers to see – at a glance – the nutritional value of the food they buy... The NuVal™ System scores food on a scale of 1 to 100...."

Apricots, aspargus, beans, blueberries, brocolli all rate 100 and it goes all the way down to bugles, pretzel twists, and other processed snacks which rate around 1 or 2 points.

...The Nutritional Scoring System summarizes the overall nutritional value of food... to quantify the presence of more than 30 nutrients – including vitamins, minerals, fiber, and antioxidants; sugar, salt, trans fat, saturated fat, and cholesterol. The system also incorporates measures for the quality of protein, fat, and carbohydrates, as well as calories and omega-3 fats. The NuVal™ System also takes into account how these nutrients influence health...

Fruits & Vegetables
Scores range from 24 to 100

Meat & Poultry
Scores range from 24 to 53

Seafood
Scores range from 36 to 87

Frozen Vegetables
Scores range from 23 to 100

Canned Vegetables
Scores range from 3 to 100

Salty Snacks
Scores range from 1 to 52

Cereal
Scores range from 4 to 100

Kind of interesting. One way to get an idea whether you're feeding yourself nutritious foods or filling yourself with empty calories. For more information check out http://www.onqi.org/

Christmas Assistance Rush at the Mission

In the seven years that I've been working at the mission, this is the first time that I was not directly involved in the Christmas Assistance program. It was a huge relief to be able to pass the responsibilities and phone calls on to volunteers who were in charge, but there was also some regret at not being right in the thick of it like other years. Mostly a feeling of relief, though...

The mission registered about 160 families and matched them with companies, family groups, office groups, and church groups that adopted the families for Christmas by providing gift certificates, food vouchers and stocking stuffers.

I'm glad that the families receive this assistance. At the same time I have a hard time making sense of all the crazyness and business and stress of this program, and of what this all has to do with the meaning of Christmas as I understand it. There is also the irony of wishing each other the joy and peace of Christmas as everyone gets stressed out over all the things that now come along with the Christmas season.

When I really believe in something, I can gladly pour lots of time and energy into it, but this is one program that I've always struggled with. I'm not sure quite how it happened that this year it wasn't considered to be my responsibility. I think roles changed during the few years I was away. Any way, this year I supported the volunteers by tracking all the donations, clearing the rooms to give the volunteers and staff space to work, and by keeping other things going while most people were focussed on this Adopt-a-Family program. But like I said, even though it was a huge relief, at the same time it has left me with very mixed feelings. I think part of it is that I've watched some people very graciously help out without grumbling and I wonder why I can't just bite the bullet and be just as gracious and about it.

Third Sunday of Advent

Interesting Weekend So Far

Well, it's been a weekend full of variety so far. Yesterday I visited two senior members of our church. One of the ladies lived in Australia for 35 years before moving to Canada so I brought my Australia trip photo album along. It took us over two hours to see all the pictures because they triggered so many memories for her. It was wonderful to hear her stories and to relive our trip.

This morning I tagged along with Gerard on his grocery shopping rounds because we have a brand new No Frills store in our community. While he was shopping I wandered around exploring the store. It is huge! and there is so much choice! Kind of overwhelming.

After some phone calls, I went to see how our refugee family was doing. They arrived a month ago and were moving into their own apartment today. It was exciting and rewarding to see all the things I had helped to coordinate over the past year, come together today.

This year I couldn't find the ginger bread heart Christmas decorations at Ikea , so I decided to bake some myself. I think I'll have to find a different ginger bread man cookie cutter because mine turned out looking more like turtles or little martians than ginger bread men. At first I wasn't going to hang them in our tree, but felt sorry for the poor little guys so I hung them up after all.

Then this evening we went out for dinner at Richtree and enjoyed some delicious food! It was a real treat! On our way home we took a few detours to see Christmas lights.


And now I'm going to curl up with my book for awhile, near the Christmas tree, with some good music.

Journey to Justice

Instead of having worship services on Sunday evenings, we have "Life Together" which are adult education sessions covering topics submitted by the various teams in our church. For November our Diaconal Care Team submitted the "Widening the Circle" course put on by the Race Relations Committee of Classis Toronto as an anti-racism initiative. It is an effort to help us recognize racism and how it can be a stumbling block to outreach in our increasingly racially diverse communities. In one of the sessions we watched a DVD called, "Journey to Justice" produced by the National Film Board of Canada. I had no idea there had been so much prejudice and segregation in Canada! This video is a real eye-opener.

"Journey to Justice pays tribute to a group of Canadians who took racism to court. They are Canada's unsung heroes in the fight for Black civil rights... Focusing on the 1930's to the 1950's this film documents the struggle of people who refused to accept inequality. These brave pioneers helped secure justice for all Canadians. Their stories deserve to be told."

I highly recommend this 47-minute DVD!

Alida's Mini Tree

I dug around in Alida's stuff and found her little mini Christmas tree and decorations, and put it up in our TV room in the basement. Makes it look nice and cozy down there too at night.

Sunday Nursery

On Sunday it was my turn in the baby nursery. For some reason the toddlers came to our room too, and they realized that in the adjoining Parent's Room they could check through the big window to see what the adults were up to in the sanctuary. I love this picture especially of the little guy in the middle who could just peek over the edge of the window sill.

Ten Thousand Villages

"Ten Thousand Villages provides vital, fair income to Third World people by marketing their handicrafts and telling their stories in North America. Ten Thousand Villages works with artisans who would otherwise be unemployed or underemployed. This income artisans earn helps pay for food, education, health care and housing." - Mission Statement of Ten Thousand Villages

On Saturday afternoon we walked over to a local Ten Thousand Villages sale and saw lots of beautiful and interesting crafts.

How would you like to have your salad spoons looking at you all the time?

Oh Christmas Tree, Oh Christmas Tree...

Here's Gerard quickly growing a Christmas tree for us this afternoon. It only took about 10 minutes!

An hour later...

And here is the first package, that already arrived all the way from Australia!

Taste of the Philippines

For the last year and a half we've had a "Taste of...." dinner at our church about once every three months. The purpose is to celebrate the growing ethnic diversity of our membership and to learn to understand and appreciate each other's cultures. So far we've had Tastes of Trinidad, South Africa, Eastern Europe (Ukraine, Russia, and Lithuania), Ecuador, and this past Sunday The Philippines. The hosts of the dinner provide recipes a few weeks in advance and at the dinner they introduce us to their country. This past Sunday we had banana leaves as placemats, the Philippino flag on display, and the tablecloths on the buffet table were the colours of the Philippino flag. Rose and Dixon told us about their country of origin, using a Power Point presentation with lots of photos and information. They played their music and we shared the Philippino food that we had all prepared using the recipes provided.

So this time I chose a recipe for Pakbet, which is basically stewed vegetables that are served over rice.

Usually I choose recipes with familiar ingredients used in unfamiliar combinations. This time I decided to be a little more adventurous so we had to buy some unfamiliar ingredients. In the picture below from left, around the top and to the right you will see ground pork, (purple) eggplant, (white) garlic, (green) okra, (yellow) onions, (red) tomatoes, (green) bitter melon. I didn't even know what to do with the okra and the bitter melon - peel them? take out the seeds? So I called our Philippino neighbour for advice. It all worked out and, as usual, the dinner was a very interesting experience! And it's always fun to try all the new foods and to get together to socialize over dinner.

First Sunday of Advent

In keeping with our annual tradition, this weekend we put our advent candles in the front windows and prepared an advent wreath to use with our devotions at the kitchen table.

A Waterfall of Icicles

More from this Past Weekend