Christmas time is here

Christmas is always a very hectic time. Many places to go and not a lot of time. This year we tried to minimize the number places that we went so that we could stay longer at the places that we did go. We spent Christmas eve with Steve's Grandma and Grandpa on his mom's side. Christmas day we started at his dad's house that morning and then went to my mom's house around 1pm. We opened presents with our immediate family and then around 4pm the extended family came over for more presents and dinner. My mom did a great job as hostess - the food was great, the house was beautiful, and we all had a great time. Steve, Jacob, Rob, and Matt played dominoes while Rachel, James and Maria played Guitar Hero. Grammy and Pa kept Kaylee happy - not hard to do. Just sit still and give her a warm place to lay. The day after Christmas we tried to go to AB for a brewery tour, but it was closed. We detoured to Kate's new apartment in south city. It is really neat - large room with tall ceilings. It has a lot of character. Our christmas was nice and we hope yours was too!

Click here for christmas pics

Honduras

November 4 - 11th, I went to Honduras on a surgery mission trip. My good friend from work Bradie went with me. We performed ear nose and throat surgery. It was an experience like no other. We Stayed in the bishop's home and "worked" at the only hospital in town. I didn't know this before we arrived, but we were not in a nice area. It is very very poor and a little dangerous. Our group was driven any where we wanted to go by the bishop's driver, Rolando. Any restaurant or shop we went to had armed guards at the doors. Despite the danger, we survived unscathed. The preparation was almost tiring than the work. We had to make all of out own packs, make all of our own instrument trays, and find all of our own supplies. We washed the our instruments by hand once in honduras. The pictire of the blue bowls has the cleaning solutions. The ones we brought are all old or almost broken. It is amazing what you can work with when yhou have no other choices. We had to make do with in a lot of areas - suture, dressings, drains, OR table, cleanliness, etc. One of the best experiences we had was at the orphanage. We visited an orphanage that was run by some nuns. These kids are almost all the the product of inscest and would have been killed if not for these ladies. They raise money for the place by sewing. The kids were great! Everyone of us had at least two kids hanging on us. They were so much fun and really loved playing with us. It was not all work and no fun. We went out a couple of nights for some cervezas and anafres - Honduran nachos. They were wonderful. We had so much fun - I would absolutely go again!

I have posted some pictures - approach with caution if you have a weak stomach. There are real surgery pictures.

Let it snow!

The first big snow of the year happened on Dec 16th, my birthday! It was so pretty, but it changed our plans. We were planning on going out to dinner with our family and friends, but it was very icy and dangerous. We rescheduled to the day after. I still had Steve get the camera out so that we could get some great Pics of our house in the snow!





Click here for pics

Welcome

Hi everyone and welcome to my new blog.