Well, here I am, a year later!!  Its been a busy year.  I had problems with my blog and when I had someone try to help me, and a big Thanks to that person. But some part of it disappeared into Cyber space and probably will remain there forever.  But I will come back to it later sometime after I talk to my sisters again about Christmas memories. 
This is Jan of 2013.  The past year I was too busy to do blogging but I will be retiring on Jan 31 of this month.  So hopefully I will have more time to just ramble on with some of my thoughts of my life in Canada growing up in the rural area of Glenbush, Saskatchewan.
Just wanted to try the system and bring things up to date.  I have been working full time at RMH.  But when Lana and Matt moved to Harrisonburg in May of 2012 I started thinking about reirement.  Since Glen is younger than me, I needed to carry the insurance till his 65th birthday which is in Feb.  So I have been taking many days off so Lana could 'Sub' at the City schools, when she gets called or she accepts.  So here I am with 3 weeks left to work, but only 10 work days.   I love this schedule but am ready to be OFF full time. 
Today was one of my days off.  No alarm to wake me.  But at 7am the phone rings.  My first words out of my mouth were "Lana must have gotten a call to Sub".  Sure enough, so I hurried made coffee and rushed out to her house to pick up the kids.  We got home and Craig called saying Shannon had a headache due to a injury at a Basketball game.  So I had 3 grands.  I had thought of baking cookies so that when Grace leaves my house and asks for 2 cookies for her to eat on the way home.  She likes Peanut Butter cookies.  So I mixed up a batch and was doing 3 test cookies.  Well, what do you do while those are baking??  So I told Shannon and Grace they could play with the dough like play dough.   Would I have told my children that?  NO.  Now that I am a grandma, I am more relaxed and always let the grands play with bread dough.  I wish, I had been more like that when my children were small.  Any how, the cookies turned out good, Shannon was a big helper and Grace made cookies into balls also.   I was carrying Glen most of the time and so Shannon transfering the hot pans was a big help. 
Also, Shannon took Grace out on the trampoline for at short time.  It was in the 50's and till now I have been going on the trampoline with Grace but was glad Shannon could help out with that also.
We just had a great fun day!!!  Glen and I had a little Pacifier game going, and he seemingly enjoyed that.  Neither of Lanas' children napped good today, so she had tired kids to take home. 
Well, then this evening I went a Wednesday meeting and supper and had a good time. 

Christmas memories from the past.....

I asked my siblings for memories of past Christmas'. This is what my brother, Ben, sent to me. 

Now what do I remember about Christmas. I remember it was always an exciting time just before leading up to Christmas, looking forward to the family being together. I remember going to church to practice singing etc for Christmas eve, and then Christmas eve, receiving the bag of candy and /or oranges, and we looked forward to that , as a treat like that was fairly rare. Then Christmas eve, having a cold meal-ham, mousse, other. Also the visits with Werstrohs and enjoying games with the family particularly monopoly.  The decorations that were put up in the house, the streamers and bells. I can remember the baking Mom would do, all the sweets and chocolates, candy. Also something that I haven't seen or tasted for years would be the Haluva that Dad would cherish. I remember with fondness, partaking in Artichoke school concerts and yes the Caboose rides , either to church or to concerts or just to go visiting.

With respect to gifts, the two most vivid memories of gifts would be the year Peter and I got a battery operated caterpillar, and also the year we got a BB gun. With the BB gun we did not waste any time going out and testing our aim on birds etc. Then also with respect to activities, there was skiing, skating and also being pulled along the ditches with ski s on.  Oh I do remember one christmas, and I am not sure how old I was , receiving  my first pair of skates. Mom & Dad not being too familiar with skates , were excited about having bought me skates, but didn't know that the pair they bought for me were goalie skates not regular skates. Non the less I was excited about the skates.

I am trying to remember whether you and Glen were ever home at Christmas time and the farm.Something tells me you guys were out there one time in winter. I remember proudly the first Christmas Betty came to Mom & Dads on the farm at Christmas time.

Any way many of the memories are very general and not too specific on incidents.

It would be nice sometime to sit around as a family and share stories.

The bottom line is that even though the times were tough and there was not a whole lot of flashy and expensive gifts, I have very fond memories of Christmas with friends, family and relatives, when the spirit of Christmas was very genuine.