Oh there's Sunshine, Beautiful Sunshine

This is mostly for my family but if any of you friends out there want to lurk feel free.

I have said so much about the snow and cold that I thought that I better write something about the beautiful weather that we have had this past week. The sun has appeared everyday!! It is still cold but not snowing. In fact, we warmed up to 30 something a couple of days and it felt great.

We were driving out of our condo parking lot the other morning and I just had to take a picture of the snow shovel guys. Only this time they weren't on the sidewalk they were on the roofs. It is an amazing process to watch them. They don't clear the complete roof but only certain spots. I'm not sure why but I guess they know what they are doing.

We drove on downtown and I saw another group of guys on a store roof top. There was one guy on one side of the roof and he was tied by rope to a guy on the other side of the roof. I guess if one slips the other one is supposed to be strong enough to hold him up. I'm sorry I couldn't get a picture of that process because it was quite entertaining.

I am also including a photo of my favorite sign in town. The trees behind the sign are usually so loaded with snow that you can't read that the sign says Hot Springs. I just look at the snow and say really? Hot? Where? I know it is not quite as good as Scott's "runs with scissors" sign that he found on a shop in town but I still like it.

We have been out and about meeting people and getting acquainted. We are teaching a young hispanic man who speaks very little english and we of course speak no spanish so it is pretty fun. We did find another hispanic young man that joined us this week to translate. We also talked to a young man named Will at one of the local stores that recognized our name badges and asked us about geneology. We gave him the church web site familysearch.org and he is pretty excited to get to work tracing his ancestors. He thinks that he comes from royal birth because of a blood disorder that he has that supposedly was passed down from royalty. He and his mother have been trying to find a way to trace their geneology so hopefully this will give them a way to do it. We also hooked him up with the family research specialist here in Steamboat.

We have also been making hats for the kids here. A few of the hats I have used as an object lesson when we visit the homes and leave a message with the families. I give the children "thinking caps" and ask them to think of a way that they can help their family to be happy. Then I tell them that every time they wear their hat it should remind them to make good choices in helping their family. The kids are loving the hats and one mom told me that she has loved asking her son to put on this "thinking cap" and remember what he decided to do. We will see how long this gimmick lasts.

That's about it for this week. Love you all.

Welcome to 2009!! Happy New Year

Sunday morning January 4th.
1. 6:00 roll out of bed (not hard on our air matress).
2. Get ready for PEC mtg. Update the progress report for the last week and make copies.
3. Prepare the car:
a. Slip on knee high rubber boots, tuck in suit pants.
b. Put on heavy over coat and hat.
c. Open door and step out side. WOW! What is the fog? Oh it is my warm body stepping into
the -17 degree outside air.
d. Down to the car sweep off 8+ inches of snow.
e. Scrap off ice that is under the snow on the windshield. What is this that is not coming off?
Oh it is on the inside of the windows.
f. Better start the car and warm it up (rrrrhrrrrhrrrrh) finally kicks in and starts running.
I don't blame it really I don't feel much like running in this weather either. 5 minutes,
10 minutes, 15 minutes inside windshield still frozen but I can see. So off I go, still
with fog on every breath.
4. Three minutes later I'm at the Church, and the second person to arrive. That is the way it is
going to be today, everyone and every meeting is going to be late. Still it is a
great day and the members are warm and friendly.
5. We came home and cooked a turkey, ate dinner and off we go again.
6. I gave a follow up lesson to a new member. WOW!
7. Make a couple more stops, no one home.
8. Came back home. Read a couple charpters in Book of Mormon with Lynn. Yes a great Day.

Today is Monday and it is much warmer. It is a whopping -10 degrees outside. It is going to be another great day here in Steamboat Springs.

Christmas in Steamboat

Scott, Kristie and Lacey on their way to Steamboat Springs

From Scottandkristiechristmas08

Kristie and Lynn infront of our condo.

From Scottandkristiechristmas08

Present time. Lynn's turn.

From Scottandkristiechristmas08

Hal opens his first present.

From Scottandkristiechristmas08

Later we took a drive up the mountain in Steamboat Springs.

From Scottandkristiechristmas08

Scott, Kristie and Lacey on our drive.

From Scottandkristiechristmas08

A slide show of some of what we saw.

Then and Now

When we arrived this what it looked like.

From Hal and Lynn's BLOG

Now this what it looks like.

From Hal and Lynn's BLOG

Along with the snow there is a significant difference in the temperature.

Oh Come All Ye Faithful

The Steamboat Springs Ward Christmas Party Friday December 19, 2008 was a big success! We went over to the church about 3:30 pm yesterday to help setup and decorate for the ward party. The Bishop was there by himself trying to set everything up. We started putting the Christmas tree together and then Brother Davidson and his two boys came and helped. The men all worked to get the stage brought in and set up and the lighting figured out. Jan Schumman, the Bishop's counselor's wife, showed up with her car filled with decorations from her home to put on the tables and what seemed like an impossible task to get done by 6:00 ended up looking very festive. It is so fun to be needed. The program was really nice with a couple of the singers with talent at professional level. The food was great and all seemed to have fun.


In addition to a good turnout by the ward members there were several non-members in attendance.

George Hernandez that we had met with for the first time earlier in the day also came. We had gone over to his place with Holly Fielding & Alberto Rosales (Alberto only speakes spanish) to give George a video. We ended up giving him the Video and a Book of Mormon lesson and he committed to read and pray. George speaks a little English, so it was interesting having Holly interpret as we taught. We invited him to the Ward Party and he came.

Holly Fielding teaches violin and two of her non-member students performed and their mom came to the party and to see them play.

This is the entire Primary plus a few friends. Small but mighty.

This seems to be the look of this season. Apparently no green Christmas for us.

Please tell it like it is!

Ok, so those of you who know me well know how I feel about stores that sell women's clothing sizes 14 and up. They have these cutesie names that drive me crazy. I'm sure you've seen them but I will refresh your memories, here are a few. Pretty and Plump, Encore, And More, August Woman, Woman's World just to name a few. Personally I would be happy if they would tell it like it is and make my size easier to find by just posting the sign to read large size clothing or something that really tells the true story. It's not like I don't know that I wear a large size or that I can hide that fact from the other shoppers in the store. They know what size I'm searching for.

I have the same issue with the weather reports here in Colorado. I want them to just tell me what the temperature is. No... instead they say things like this...today's temperature is going to be a high of 20 but it will feel like 5 degrees. Or..... today's temperature is 17 degrees with a wind chill factor of -8 degrees. Whats up with that, if it feels like 5 degrees just say is it 5 degrees. And if the wind chill makes it -8 degrees just tell me it is -8 degrees.

Ok, that's it for today, just trying to figure out how cold it is really going to be.

We're dreaming of a "green Christmas" just like the ones we used to know!

Our first snow
and it snowed again the next day

and the next day

still snowing!

and still snowing

One day of sunshine and it is snowing again today

Everyone says this is just the beginning so get ready for more.

We are pretty much settled in here and are continuing to learn our way around. Driving in the snow is a different experience for us but Hal is doing well with my instructions from the passenger seat. I am sure that he is getting tired of me telling him to slow down. Last night we were invited to dinner at a ranch house north of town. That was a bit of an adventure driving out there. It was a really beautiful drive but on a dirt road so now I know why all of the cars around here are so dirty. Ours had stayed clean until last night.

We have been getting acquainted by trying to attend a few community events. We went to a Christmas boutique at the Lutheren church and met some very nice people. It was one of those boutiques that not very many people were in attendance and so we felt like we had to buy something but couldn't find anything that we wanted. We did finally see a cute metal star Christmas ornament and some cookies so we didn't look like total losers when we left.

The downtown shops are very fun to go through and since Hal is in a suit and me in a skirt we really stand out in the crowds. A couple of the merchants told us that we are really over dressed for Steamboat. Everyone is casual here. Oh well we are certainly making our presence known.

For a couple of days we spent time at the hospital with a young man named Alberto. His appendix burst and he didn't get to the hospital until it was almost too late. He was a very sick young man and has suffered some brain damage due to the incident. He was very agitated and the hospital staff was having a hard time keeping him calm and getting him to eat so they were asking people to come and sit with him. We finally got him to eat a little night before last. He was afraid to eat because he thought that it was food that made him sick. He doesn't speak much english and we speak very little (like none) spanish so it was fun to try to communicate with him.

We are still trying to figure out what to do on these cold snowy days but I'm sure that will come with time and as we get used to the weather. We kind of feel like we aren't doing enough yet.

We would love to hear from any and all of you. Our email address is hfl@garlic.com that seems to be the easiest form of communication these days.