Wednesday, December 23

My teeth are really clean. I went to the dentist this morning. It sure felt good. After that I went to the Mall of America to pick up some last minute shopping things.

I spent much of the rest of the day wrapping presents and enjoying being at my parent's house for Christmas. My dad does a great job decorating the tree and my mom gets out all her Nativity scenes. She collects them and I have given her many over the years from the places I have lived or visited. There are a lot now.

My brothers and sisters are coming over on December 24th for dinner so dad started to get the table ready today. The bells in the middle of the table belong

to me and my sister. My mom gave them to us when we were little. Mine are the 12 days of Christmas and my sister's are a Nativity scene. My mom is doing some of the cooking that can be done early, including my favorite, rice pudding.

There is a big snowstorm coming this way. It was supposed to begin snowing around four in the afternoon. By 9:00 it was already coming down pretty hard. I am glad I don't have to go out driving!

Tuesday, December 22

I finally got some Christmas shopping done today. I spent over two hours in a bookstore! I got books for everyone in my family. All the adults get funny books, but I bought a variety of different books for my nieces and nephews. Some of the books I bought were books that we have read in grade 6 this year. My nieces and nephews are giving me lots of suggestions of other books that I need to read. I ordered a few of them and hope that I can read them out loud in class when we get back.

After the shopping frenzy I went to my brother's house for the annual Christmas cookie decorating party. I was very excited because it was my first time. I have never been home in time to go before.

My sister-in-law, Susie, makes TONS of sugar and gingerbread cookies and then invites all the family members from her side and my brother's side to come over to frost

them.

Susie collects cookie cutters. She has a huge amount and one of the fun things about the day is trying to figure out what each cookie is. Some are easy but others are pretty difficult to figure out. As the day goes on, our guesses get sillier and sillier. The decorating does too.

It was fun, but also messy. It is a good thing they have a dog. She kept going around and licking all the frosting off the floor.

Now I can't wait to eat them!

Sunday, December 20

How would you like to spend all your waling hours in a darkened movie theater? That is exactly what I did today. I got to the theater at 9:45 in the morning and left at 10:30 in the evening. What could possible hold me there for that long? The Lord of the Rings Trilogy.

About a month before I came to America my nephew wrote to ask me if I wanted to come see the movies with him, his friends and his dad. I loved the movies so thought it would be great.

We had to wait outside in a line to get in the theater. The line went out the door and down the block. Some people were dressed up like characters in the movies, others carried pillows from their beds. It was going to be a long day.

Each movie is over 3 hours long, so we had to plan our bathroom breaks. The management of the theater brought in pizza and hot dogs from outside. It wasn't the most nutritious day of eating....

It was fun to watch the movies in a row, but I had to admit, I fell asleep in the middle of the second one. I still had some jet lag.

When I finally came home that night I found out that the Vikings had lost their last regular season game. Everyone in my family was mad.

December Holiday

Home at last. The flight was long, but nothing can beat walking off a plane and into the arms of my oldest nephew who came to the airport to pick me up with his mom. Friday was pretty much a blur as I was pretty tired, but I did manage lunch at one of my favorite Minneapolis eateries, Matt's Bar and Grill. My first food in America, a cheese filled Jucy Lucy hamburger. Yum.

I fell asleep in my chair at 6:30 and finally went to bed at 7:oo.

On Saturday I got to spend a dad with just my dad. We ran a couple of errands and stopped my by aunt's house for a visit and then headed to our neighborhood movie theater to watch a special showing of a movie called Battleground. It is a movie about the Battle of the Bulge during WWII.

After the showing the owner of the theater had planned a Q and A session with vets who had actually been in the Battle of the Bulge. I invited my dad to go to this event with me because he is very interested in WWII as he was a teenager during that time.

Every vet who came to the theater that day got to attend for free. It didn't matter if they were veterans of a war or veterans of the military. They were all honored after the Q and A including my dad.

It was very interesting to listen to the men talk about their experiences. One man said that he went through the war with a picture of his girlfriend and now she was is wife of 62 years! She was sitting right behind us. Another man told about getting Trench foot, when your feet get wet and freeze and then turn black. On more told about the first time he was injured.

One man from the audience, a vet from Viet Nam, who was a retired history teacher asked the men to be sure to record their stories so younger generations would know and remember. Looking at the men on stage, all in their late 80's, I had to agree with him. There aren't many of these guys around anymore and when they are gone, so are the stories.

I was glad to be able to share this time with my dad and talk to him about his memories.