Christmas 2008

Christmas this year has been very different for Teri and me. We have in all past Christmases remained home, had our tree, had various members of our family over, had Christmas dinner and woke up to the fascination of the arrival of Santa Clause over night. This year though, we decided we would leave home for Christmas and after various ideas we decided that we would love to go to Almont, Michigan and spend Christmas with the Callender family who we have had only one Christmas with years ago when they came to Oregon. Besides that we sure missed our four grand kids there.

Our plans made, we looked forward to the visit and being with them Christmas morning in their home. The day before our early morning flight out of Portland we stayed in an airport hotel so we would be sure to make it in good time without having to get up too early in the morning. We hoped our flight would leave despite a very unusual, for Portland, snow storm and after checking into the hotel we went online to print the boarding passes for our flight. The flight was canceled due to the weather. Some flights were getting out but most were grounded. In our case the plane that we were to fly out on never made it to Portland due to that flight having been canceled so we of course could not leave on a plane that was not there. Talk about disappointed.

Sadly we were not the only ones disappointed about our not being able to make it to Michigan. Our wonderful grand kids were very unhappy about it. Fortunately we were able to book another flight in January to go for a post Christmas visit. As an added benefit we will be there for Mandy's birthday. Bonus!!

Well with our canceled flight we were staying in Oregon without a tree and with no plans for Christmas at all. Happily Becky came to the rescue, inviting us to her home for Christmas Eve, stay overnight and wake up in their home with them and their kids. It was wonderful to be with them and share in their Christmas traditions. This Christmas we had opted to give all the families money instead of buying gifts but since we were staying overnight with the Rohrer family they gave the money back and we went shopping. It was so much fun and we are so appreciative for this wonderful gift of Christmas joy.

Family Photos

Winter Blast

White Christmas

Teri and I were planning on going to Michigan to spend Christmas with our family living in Almont. However we are now in the middle of the third worst snow storm in Oregon since weather has been recorded in this state. Needless to say, our flight did not leave PDX so we remain home for Christmas. As it turned out it is good that we could not leave Portland because if we had we would have been stranded in Chicago which was our lay-over city. They are having a worse storm than we are so if we did make it into Chicago we would likely still be there. These are a few pictures of our White Christmas wonderland. These pictures were taken when there was just over a foot of snow but a few days later there was over three feet of snow at our home.

Mediterranean Vacation - Rome days

November 1st, 2008 is the day we finally began our Mediterranean vacation including a wonderful cruise and trips to cities in Italy. We wanted to do something special to help celebrate my 60th birthday and since I had most of my life wanted to go to Italy we felt this would certainly be the ticket to a grand celebration. The red-eye flight to Rome was not the most pleasant experience but I have to say it was worth the sleepless night with the worst leg twitching had by both Teri and me. We even took sleeping pills that only made us want to sleep even more but sadly we could not. There were, if I remember right, 22 of us on this trip including Hope and Larry Fredrickson, Scott and Lauri Fredrickson, Leo and Barbara Fredrickson, Bobby ST. John and her daughter Kristi, Becky and John Wyatt, Brad and Lorraine Janeway, Kandi and Rick Hanson, Hal and Joanne Salway, Tara and Lance Brooks, Rick and Iva Curry and Teri and me. I think I got them all and that count does come to 22... Sorry if I spelled any of your names wrong. Our first nights were spent in a fine little hotel that although it was OK, was nothing to write home about. Not a problem since the trip was not about the hotel rooms, although we did later stay in some pretty nice ones. Fortunately we got over or really didn't experience any jet-lag so we were in great shape to head out on the subway in search of the Roman coliseum. The subway ride was an adventure all alone and we expected that on leaving the subway station we would have a good walk before actually seeing the coliseum but to our amazement as we ventured back to the surface and opened the doors of the subway station the coliseum stood proudly in front of us. I cannot even begin to adequately describe my wonder in actually being there and seeing it with my own eyes. I had longed to see it since I was in grade school and it certainly did not disappoint. We took a guided tour with Brad and Lorraine learning much of the construction and use of this monument to the ambitions and tragedies of our race. As amazing as this structure is it is also very sad to think about those many people that were killed there for the perverse entertainment of the Roman citizens. Following our tour we went to do a tour of Palatino, another marvel of ancient times. There is so much history on and beneath that hill where buildings were built upon buildings covering a very long period of history. There is even a palace or more accurately named a summer home of Mussolini, the WWII buddy of Hitler. (It's the large white building below.) One surprise I had was to realize just how much of ancient Rome still exists and is in use today. It is amazing to walk into and see buildings that are two and three thousand years old especially when the 'old' buildings in North America are no more than two or three hundred years old. Also taking advantage of the subway system we visited places like the Spanish Steps, the Pantheon, the famous Roman fountain, got to eat at a little sidewalk cafe and ate chestnuts roasted on a street corner. We did a lot of walking, went into several Basilicas and just enjoyed Rome very much.

We are so grateful to Hope who put this whole trip together and kept us on track and organized during the whole trip. These notes and pictures just scratches the surface of our trip so to follow in future posts will be photos and information of more of the vacation.

Birch Bay June, 2008

A few years ago Teri and I purchased a time share through Club Regina and have had opportunity to use it in Los Cabos, Jackson Hole, and Birch Bay. The locations owned are in wonderful places and we hope to travel to many more. We love that some of the locations are very close to home with the closest being Birch Bay, Washington next door to Canada. This past June we wanted to go visit Don, Lara and family in Abbitsford B.C. so we decided to go to the Sand Castle Inn in Birch Bay. That location offers a quick hop across the boarder to visit with our family and the inn itself is wonderful and very comfortable.

While there we visited the Peace Arch on the boarder of Washington and British Columbia, something I had done in my youth but had never done with Teri.

Don and Lara came down to stay a couple of days with us at the Inn where we had fun barbecuing and playing on the beach.

One odd thing about the Sand Castle Inn is that some of the bedrooms do not have curtains. These picture shows the extent taken to block out the light in Don and Lara's room.

Sophie

No words required.