More Colorado Pictures & Quiet Christmas

I had to show you a couple more pictures from Colorado. The one is of "BIG DON" a hunting buddy of Jerry's with my sister next to him, just so you can get a good idea of exactly how TALL he is. Big Don was the nicest guy and had some great stories to share. When I went to hug him, I got a stool or chair to stand on to make it a little more even. :o) Everyone got a big laugh from that. He loved to give us a hard time, so we had to do something for him.

The other picture is of our nieces and nephews playing spoons. It's kind of tradition, when we get together to play some games... Spoons is one of the crazy games we play. The object is to get 4 cards of the same, and try to grab a spoon WITHOUT anyone else seeing you. Once they notice a spoon is gone, LOOK OUT....They even let us older aunts and uncles join them at one point. Guess who won??? (the oldies :o)... We had a lot of fun. I love being together and playing games. That was one of the things we did, as kids growing up, especially when we would get together at Grandma and Grandpa's house for Christmas.

Trip to Colorado

For those of you who don't know, my oldest sister, Wanda (in the blue) lost her husband, Jerry , Dec. 9th after he had a heart attack while clearing the snow from their driveway in Trinidad, Colorado where they lived over 20 years. They had LOTS of friends and adopted family there. The town showed my sister overwhelming support and love. They showered us with all kinds of food, a nice discount at the hotel where a lot of us stayed, lots of beautiful plants and flowers, cards and phone calls and a ride to and from the airports for some of us.

It was nice to get reacquainted with some of Jerry's relatives that I hadn't seen in over 40 years. We had our good times and sad times. Jerry loved camping, hunting, four wheeling and his dogs. He worked for the State of Colorado for many years. We had lots of the state employees and his hunting and camping buddies stop by and share stories about Jerry. We had lots good laughs and it was fun to hear how much Jerry was loved and will be missed.

I'm not sure how these pictues will come out, but they are: my mom and Wanda..., Wanda and her neice Tammy, from Montrose, Colorado, ...Jack (Jerry's brother), and a hunting buddy, Brian (nephew) and I were fixing sandwices for the 30 people that came for lunch.... Then my neice, Hannah (red hair) with my youngest sister Glenda, brother Ron & I, ... then some of people at the tables we had set up to help acomadate everyone. It was awesome!

Look what jumped out of Santa's Sleigh!

I guess this Moose jumped out of Santa's sleigh and landed right in our front yard on Christmas morning. :o) It was fun to open our curtains this morning and see him laying about 10 feet from our front door, with the snow falling. What a sight.

Tom is busy making some green chili stew today. Vaughn is here with us and we're having a pretty quiet day, kind of un-traditional. Usually we're going somewhere. Tom has had a sinus infection and BAD caugh for the past week a half. He's finally starting to feel beter, after some antibiodics and stronger caugh syrup that helps. MERRY CHRISTMAS FROM ALASKA TO YOUR HOME!! WE LOVE YOU ALL!

JoAnn is in Colorado and Vaughn is staying with the dog and me for his birthday. My mother and Lindy sent the same birthday card to Vaughn and he ask me if the two of them shop at the same card store,ha!! The temp to day is 6 below 0 ,clear and no wind and still dark at 9:30 am . Angel is having a tough time with Jo gone and having to put up with Von and me. She and her sisters and brothers are in Trinidad for the oldest sister Wanda's husband pass away this last week. Pray for them thanks. Laurie the new camera looks good, we have had so much fun seeing the pictures you take . It gives us a chance to see you and your family grow and change thanks. Lindy the picture of you Lonnie and Laurie on your blog really warms my heart and the pic you and Laurie took of Deb and Christy and both of you where fun to see. What a great family. Lindy we are so very proud of Rick , we have and will keep him in our prayers.

Birthday Train Ride

For my birthday, Vaughn came in town and Tom took us out to dinner, at one of my favorite places, Applebees. Tom got me a gift certificate to Bed Bath and Beyond. I can't wait to use it. Fun, Fun!!

Once we finished eating I went to the airport to pick up my best friend Karleen. She is from a small village in Alaska that doesn't have many stores, so we went shopping till we dropped, going to Walmart, REI, and a couple other places.

Saturday morning bright and early @ 5:00AM the alarm went off. We needed to be at the Train station by 6:00AM to go on the Holiday Train to Seward, Ak. There were about 450 people on this special train trip. The train was decorated with lights and other Christmas decor to make it more festive.

We started out about 7:00AM got our breakfast... OJ, yogurt, granola and a croissant and coffee for my friends and tea for me. For the first couple hours of the trip it was dark outside so we just talked and got acquainted with some other friends that were on there also. Once it got light out side then we could see a lot more and it was absolutely beautiful going over the passes to Seward from Anchorage. We got to see new country that we don't see when we drive down there.

About half way through the trip, a couple guys brought their guitar and auto harp into our section of the train and we sang Christmas carols. That was fun! Then.... Santa came to our train and we got our picture taken with him while singing more carols. I especially enjoyed the auto harp. Mom Nogle gave me an auto harp a few years ago, and I played it for a while, but kind of forgot about it till now. I'll have to get it out and start practicing again. It's beautiful.

Once we got to Seward, there was a big craft fair we went to, then the buses took us down town and we walked around for a couple hours, shopping, ate lunch, walked some more and took a few pictures then caught the bus back to the train that left at 5:00 headed back to Anchorage. By this time it was dark again, so we ate some more and played some cards and other games that some of the other people had on board. The time went rather quickly and we returned back home abut 9;30 pm. It was a long, fun filled day. It was a new experience for both of us.

Sunday, I was bushed!! Karleen had to go shopping without me. I took her to the airport about 3:30 pm.

She had gotten several Christmas items together for gals and guys to send to Iraq. Sunday night when she returned to King Salmon, about 13 friends of hers got together and put together 75 Christmas stocking to send to her son in Iraq to distribute to the troops in his unit. That was AWESOME!! I know they will appreciate them!!

Beautiful Christmas Tree

I'm just sending a BEAUTIFUL CHRISTMAS TREE to all of you who might not be able to get one. This is one of our neighbor's tree, and I was trying to capture some of the glistening frost and snow that was falling from the sky. This was one of our rare sunny and bright days with the temperature of about 5 degrees. There was a slight breeze so some of the ice crystals was falling from the sky and it was unbelievably beautiful, and peaceful.