What Happened to Fall ??

 Yesterday we bought our Thanksgiving turkey, prepared our menu for next Thursday.  Spent the afternoon in the backyard having a "play date" with the CCI trainer and another CCI puppy and 2 other rescue dogs in training.  A little windy but not too bad.  I woke up to take the dogs out this morning and this is what I see - CHRISTMAS SNOW.  No joke, we got a foot of the white stuff over night.

 Here is a picture of our birdbath and you can see for yourself, there's over a foot of it !!

The view looking towards the Wasatch Mountains as the sun was just starting to break.  There's still some more activity to the East.

Then 15 minutes later when the sun came over the mountains you get the full effect of what our neighborhood looks like this morning at 8:00.

 While it was lovely and serene, I don't think Dave was too happy about having to deal with it.  I bet the next house he builds WON'T be on a corner lot.  He now has 3 times the sidewalk to clear.

 Our young flowering pear trees were doing their best to stand upright under the weight of the snow.

But, Dave gave them a shake.  Our neighbor across the street his branches were almost touching the ground.

On the bright side the one who truly ENJOYED the whole event was Balsa.  It was her first real snow fall and she had a blast running and jumping.  Trying to pick up the snow and carry it around.  It was up to her belly, but she didn't care.  I would bring her in to warm up, and she was ready to go out as soon as she warmed up.  She is our little snow dog.  Good thing she's black so we can find her in the deep stuff.

Stockholm Sweden

In September, Dave received an invitation to speak at a user's group that was being held in Stockholm.  It was being held on the day of our 7th anniversary, so Dave said "guess what, we're going to Sweden for our anniversary this year".  The company that asked Dave to speak paid for his ticket and the hotel room, so we only had to pay for my airfare.  We decided to stay an extra 2 days and make it a mini vacation.  We left Salt Lake on Tuesday and came home on Sunday.

Because of the time change, we arrived in Stockholm on Wednesday afternoon.  After checking in at the Diplomat hotel, we walked around and found a small local restaurant and had a lite lunch of soup and sandwich.  We relied on the waitress' limited English and luckily it was a delicious meal.  On Thursday, while Dave was in conference all day, I walked around Stockholm taking in the sites and doing some souvenir shopping.  The exchange rate was not very good and things are so very expensive. The first photo is the fountain at the center of town.  Our tour guide said whenever the country wins their soccer games the men all dance in the fountain naked and drink champagne to celebrate.  The city is quite a mix of centuries old buildings and modern new buildings.  A lot of Russian influence is everywhere.

At the lower end of the center there is a huge train center called Central Station.  It is very much like the NY Central Station.  The 2 upper levels have shops and restaurants, and the lower level has the trains, and bus depot and many fast food eateries.  The people are moved very efficiently by water taxi, bus, train, and autos. 

The second photo is looking across the water inlet towards our hotel.

 As I was walking back towards our hotel, I came across a large outdoor market.  There were farmers selling fresh fruits, vegetables, flowers of every kind, handmade clothing, dried fruits and dried vegetables, nuts and everything imaginable.  The farmers were from every nationality, and it was a melting pot of different languages.  Very few spoke any English.  I purchased a small bag of trail mix.  And looked at some handmade woolen gloves.  Now I wished I had purchased the gloves, they were so well made and would have been very warm.  I made my way back to the hotel with my souvenirs to share with Dave all that I saw that day and what all I purchased.

On Friday, Dave and I took a Viking history tour.  Our guide picked us up at the hotel early in the morning.  We drove out through the small towns and made lots of stops at areas where Vikings lived and learned stories about how they lived, worshiped, governed the societies, and had their stories on stones translated for us.  We learned that their religion was mostly based on Hindu.  They were not ones who were sailing around raping and pillaging the countryside communities, but rather farmers and merchants who lived peaceful lives.

We stopped mid-morning at a quaint farmhouse for a snack of coffee or hot cocoa, homemade apple juice, fresh made chocolate brownie cake, apple crumb cake and cookies.  The cost was 50 crown each person, the equivalent of about $8.50 each person.  Not being a chocolate person I only had the apple juice and a couple bites of the apple cake.  They were all made by the farm owner and her daughter.

 Later we stopped at the town of Sigtuna for a lunch break.  Dave and I ate at a small Italian restaurant.  We had a cup of soup, sandwich, and a juice drink.  Our bill in US dollars was $70.00  YES you read it correctly seventy dollars for 2 lunches.  I told you earlier, everything is every expensive in Sweden.

While we were in Sigtuna, we also visited the Viking museum.  It was interesting to see the various items that they had on display.  All the pieces were in excellent condition.

We also made a stop at a couple of churches build in the 1500s.  And were able to visit some grave sites dating back to the 1500s.  We heard some wonderful stories about some of the people buried at the various churches and saw the different architect features as the churches were expanded over the centuries.

On Saturday morning, Dave and I visited a Vasa Museet.  A museum build around the Vasa ship.  This is a ship that sank in the Stockholm harbour in August 1628.  In 1961 the ship was recovered and reconstructed.  Our tour guide, (the same guide from yesterday), said that because the ship sank exactly between where the salt water and the fresh water come together, it was preserved because none of the salt water or fresh water creatures would swim in that area and eat at the items.  The ship was recovered and the museum build around the ship.

A you can see from Dave standing next to the anchors it was a very large ship.  Here I am next to a small replica of the ship.  Only one item was gold was on the ship, it was a very small ring.  But everything was in excellent condition, even the china survived the sinking.

Next we toured the castles of Sweden.  There are a total of 7.  We were allowed to take lots of photos of the exterior but no photos of the interiors.  We saws fantastic artwork, and our tour guide told us the history behind the paintings and what the painting meant.  We found out during one of our snack breaks, that our tour guide used to be an art appreciation teacher at one of the high schools.  It all made sense to Dave and I then why we were getting so much history with the tour - ahh.

This is the current castle that the prince and princess live in, when they are in town for Parliament duties.  It is located in downtown Stockholm.  We arrived in time to see the changing of the guard, but didn't get any good pictures, because of all the crowds.  It draws a lot of people, just like when we were in London.

At the end of our tour, the guide stopped in "old town" at a pastry shop that has been in business since 1524 and still operates today.  This is a photo of the coffee pot that they have used since 1524 and it still works.  Our guide heard us talking about it being our anniversary, and he inquired of the shopkeeper about the availability of any "Princess Cake."  It is the specially of Sweden.  They had only 1 piece left in the back, and he purchased it for Dave and I and had them box it up and gave it to us to take back to our hotel room to enjoy.  He told us and anytime we could get "Princess Cake" to buy it and always remember Sweden.  It was very good.  We enjoyed that evening after dinner, while watching TV in our room.

On Sunday morning, we left Sweden around 11:00, and arrived in SL on Sunday evening around 6:00 pm, (because of the time zone changes).  We spent 17 hours traveling to get home.  It was a long flight, but we have lots of photos and many memories.  It was a good anniversary.

Ian's 12th Birthday

This year our grandson, Ian, turned 12.  He is now officially a Tween!!  How will we ever survive.  He now is entering the age where for the next 10 years, he will start to think he knows more than any adult.  For his birthday celebration, he picked his favorite restaurant - Texas Roadhouse.  We had a gathering of 25, seated at 6 tables.

 When it came time to saddle up on the birthday saddle, Ian is not one bit bashful.  He milks it for all it's worth.  He is the life of his own party.  Afterwards we went back to his other grandparents house for Ian's favorite birthday dessert - pie and birthday presents.  OH BOY.

 The first present Ian opened was from grandpa Dave and grandma Barbara.  And guess what - it was exactly the gift was was hoping, for the brand new Halo game.  Wonder how we knew??

Ian got a lot of good gifts from everyone.

 He was so happy to get exactly what he wanted.  But then, he always gets what he wants from grandma and grandpa.  Somehow they just always seem to know what Ian and Trevor wish for.  They must be mind readers.  Or maybe mom sends them emails - hmmm.

Here's Ian and grandma showing everyone how to "hang loose" like they do in Hawaii.  These two are best buds.  Have been from the time Ian was only 1 hour old.  Will be FOREVER.

It was a pretty good birthday for Ian.  It was a good day for everyone who attended.

Open House

Dave and I held a small open house for our friends and family.  Everyone has been asking when we were going to invite them over to see the house, so we opened up the calendar and just picked a date - Saturday, October 2nd.  It didn't occur to us until later that it was also the weekend of General Conference and most people go out of town, until we had already sent out the invitations.  But oh well !!  A few people sent their regrets.

 The day arrived and we were a little worried that the weather wouldn't co-operate, we had planned an outdoor B-B-Q.  It called for rain, but  mother nature smiled down on us and it was a glorious day.  The sun was shining and there was a slight breeze, (just enough to keep everyone cool).  We went ahead and set up the deck and prepared the food, (grilled shrimp, pulled pork sandwiches w/ cole slaw, veggie tray, tomatoes from our garden, salad, lots of different drinks, cupcakes, and eclairs).

 Right on time at 4 pm the guest started arriving.  We had friends travel from as far away as Layton and Spanish Fork.  In total 14 guests made the trek to spend the afternoon with us.  We all ate, told stories, laughed, and had a great time.  A few had to start heading out around 5:30 for the evening conference talks and mass service.  A few stayed until 7 pm.  And the weather was PERFECT.  Our table umbrellas came in mighty handy.  Dave had a wonderful time giving everyone tours of the house, explaining how we came up with the design layout.   And at the end of the day, no one noticed that I forgot to put out the cocktail sauce for the shrimp and the eclairs.  As everyone was leaving their comment was, "Let's do this again".