Happy Easter

Today we celebrate the resurrection of Christ. The past week has seen me very busy at church. In the Catholic faith we start our Easter Celebrations on Holy Thursaday with the washing of the feet. Twelve people are chosen from the community to represent the twelve apostles and the priest reinacts Christs washing of their feet.

On Friday at 3 pm around the world Catholics gather to celebrate Good Friday. Here we venerate the Cross. While to non Christians around the world the cross is just a piece of wood to millions of Christians of all faiths it is a symbol of the agony that Christ underwent in order to fulfull God's plan.

Saturday night the church is dark, but magically comes alive with the light of hundreds of small flickering candles. On this Easter Vigil night, the priest blesses the fire we use to light the alter candles, lecturn candles, and of course the Easter Candle. He also blesses the water used for baptism that night (last night we had two adult baptisms, and confirmations as well). Finally after 40 days of Lent, we can once again sing Alleluia and the church rang with bells to celebrate that fact.

So between getting ready for all the services at church, the rush to get the children at school finished most of their work, and my busyness around the house I haven't made a post or visited anyone in awhile.

Both our boys are home, there was a bit of a scare that one of them would not be able to come and I will fill you all in on that in my next post (if I get up early enough I manage to get on the computer for a little while at least). I also hope to fill everyone in on other happenings around our little nest.

I will finish this off by wishing each and everyone of you a Joyous and Blessed Easter. Hope you all enjoy time with your families, and friends.

God bless.

Election Finally Over

Well, Sunday's Parish Annual meeting went pretty well all told. One gentleman (and I use the term loosely) always asks the same questions. Seems he always wonders why we pay for the salaries of three priests. He always gets the same answers but never seems to understand what he is being told.

We didn't have an election this year after all. Shucks and I was looking so forward to the excitement it could have generated. Oh well at least all positions except one are filled and that one I will keep working on.

The weather has turned for the better and our snow piles are rapidly disappearing. However the city looks very dirty right now.

This is all that is left of the 6 foot snow pile in our front yard. The back yard is still under about 3 feet of snow, but I can tell it is disappearing a bit every day! I can hardly wait until it is all gone and the yard is dry enough to play in the dirt.

Off to visit everyone. Hope you all have a wonderful evening. God bless.

Busy Finishing Projects

The past week has seen me getting two days off of work, and what better way to spend my day than completing a couple of my unfinished knitting and sewing projects.

Well to be completely honest I just started the sewing project. I am planning on making a denim quilt for our family reunion. We are supposed to bring something for a silent auction and I figured this would be perfect. I tried to do something different than usual, but it took many days to make this one block, I think I will use it in the center of the quilt and just do what I normally do when making one.

This is a picture of the one block I made. It did turn out very nicely, but was way too time consuming. I should be able to use it as the center of my quilt however.

My knitting needles were also clicking away. I still have one scarf on them, but I hope to finish it up tomorrow. Here is a picture of the scarves that I have completed so far. I am slowly but surely using up the scattered balls of yarn in my stash. These scarves will go in my gift closet to be used for Christmas or other holidays next year.

The weather took a turn for the worst over the past week. We got more snow and the temperatures plunged down to the -20 C overnight. I thought that I could use a few ponchos to use underneath my coat for some extra warmth. These two ponchos are so easy to make and only take 3 or 4 100 gram balls each to make ( depending on the thickness of the wool a person uses). They were a great deal of fun to make and I think I may make a few more out of a thinner yarn for those cool spring evenings.

Too many projects and ideas running through my head. I do hope that I get a chance to finish a few more before the weather changes and calls me outside to the garden.

Well off to visit all of you. Everybody have a wonderful evening. God bless.

I Just Don't Understand

Most of you know from my last post that I have been trying to figure out a way to get new people involved in church ministry. Well, after praying on it for a few days, I decided.....Hey it's our annual meeting and elections coming up in two weeks (one now) and what better way to get people involved and some new faces on the council.

Well unbeknownest to me, someone had asked our Grand Knight (I asked him to chair the meeting as I was in Vegas and he had done a stint as Chairperson) to let his name stand for Vice Chair (which he has also done before).

This is me tearing my hair out. I spent a week getting names of people willing to stand for various positions. People who have never been asked to do anything in the church before (trying to get more involvement of the younger folk) and I had people saying, "Well I thought P____ would be the next Vice Chair!" Now what don't these people including P_____ think "let their name stand for nomination" means? Here I am trying to get more people involved and all they want to do is recycle the same old group. Oh well it seems that I can not win for trying.

Right now I think I have half the parish council mad at me, but in my heart I know that I am doing the right thing. It is time for a massive change of the old guard (not that I am one, I am known to be a rebel) and I am really going to try and see that it happens (if God wills it).

Well off to visit you all now. Have a wonderful evening. God bless.

Another Week Gone By

Slowly, but surely the winter is disappearing. The sun is coming up sooner in the morning, I no longer have to drive to work in the dark, and it is still shining now at almost 6:30. It seems as if spring is really going to arrive after all.

I thought that I would share a picture of one of our fantastic sunsets. This picture comes from a brochure where we went on a fishing trip in Northern Saskatchewan.

I think from this you can see why our license plates say "In the Land of the Living Skies". It is also the reason I picked the name of my blog.

Today I attended a meeting for our Church Deanry area. Looking at all the people around the table I suddenly realised that the Church as I know it is changing. We are all aging and so far none of the younger people are stepping forward to take up leadership positions. I shudder to think what will become of us a few years down the road. I already juggle too many hats in my church community and was hoping to hand off a few in the next year or so.

We are doing some stewardship things in our parish to try and get some fresh faces involved, but so far nothing has been achieved. Today I suddenly realised that if I want new and exciting ideas, it may just be that I have to go out and beat the bushes, talk to the youngsters and get their input. I have a Parish Council meeting this week and plan on bringing up my idea. I know our priest will jump on board, it is the others that I am a bit concerned about!

Well off to visit all of you now. Everybody have a wonderful evening. God bless.

A Drawing

Well, I figured a week was long enough to leave my give away on before drawing. So today when Harvey got home I started my draw. First I wrote all the names on slips of papers, folded them and put them all in this green bowl.

Next I got Harvey to draw out a name for me. This is the name he drew out of the bowl. Mary you get the purple pillow. Congratulations. Email me your address and I will get it in the mail to you.

Then I started thinking...... These pillows are so cute that they deserve to live in a home where they will be loved and used. I asked Harvey if he would draw another name for me. The person chosen out of the remaining names will get the pink pillow. Here is the name Harvey chose.

Kelli, you are the winner of the pink pillow. If you could please email me at jackielou01@hotmail.com with your address I will get this in the mail to you. Don't use the link as it doesn't work...guess Windows no longer supports hotmail. You will have to cut and paste it into whichever mail you use.

I would like to thank everyone for entering my give away. This was lots of fun, and I hope to do another one in the near future.

Off to visit everyone and let the winners know about their prizes. Everybody have a great evening. God bless.

My Pillows Are Finished

Last night I stuffed the embroidered pillow cases and sewed them shut. They turned out very nicely.

I would like to offer one of them as a give away. Anyone that posts a comment on this post will have their name entered into a draw for the pillow of their choice.

Well off to visit you all. Everybody have a wonderful evening. God bless.