July 20, 2009 · 2:50 pm

Plane crashes

Tragic accident in Kamsack – plane crash kills Saskatoon eye surgeon.

The story is here.

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Filed under In the News

July 19, 2009 · 7:20 am

A Day With Friends

We spent the day up at Waskesiu with our good friends the Kents yesterday.  The weather was perfect – hot and sunny – perfect lake weather. 

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Waskesiu has become quite the vacation hot spot in this area.  A few years ago there was little development.  Now new and very expensive cabins are going up where there used to be tiny little cabins and shack tents.  In fact there is a “historical” display of these old structures by the administrative centre.  It is indicative of my age, I guess, that this is history I remember – like yesterday.

Anyway, pictures are worth more than words so here are a couple of shots from our day.  There are more over at Flikr.

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Filed under Family, grandchildren, Photos, Travels

July 13, 2009 · 8:01 am

What a good weekend!

All weekend seemed like one big party/visit.  And it was. 

Leo’s brother Paul was up for the weekend so Leo was busy entertaining him.  PAUL visited the farm and saw the llamas that Michelle bought at an auction.  Pets for Kimia I’m sure.  Then he went shopping with Michelle while Leo and the guys watched CFL – Yeah Roughriders!  He came home with some fish which died overnight and some plants which were still living this morning when he left.

Yesterday was Kieran’s sixth birthday party.  The plans were to have a barbeque out at Little Red Park.  It was a beautiful day yesterday and there was not a single picnic table to be had out there.  So just before I left for the park, thinking that was where the festivities were happening, I got a call.  “Can we all come to your place?”  So there you go – always have the house in some reasonable semblance of order for these unexpected occurrences!  We have a nice yard and over the weekend I actually did a lot of weeding and planting and had gotten it in decent shape. 

So we celebrated in style.  Kieran had a good time and that was the main thing.

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Filed under Day to Day, Photos

July 8, 2009 · 9:59 pm

I am a new creation…

This book by NT Wright that is causing me to think is exciting.  I suppose it is exciting to become aware of old ideas presented in new ways that in turn open up new horizons of thought.  God is always so much greater than – well greater than I thought him to be just yesterday.  And so each day of life brings new possibilities; new chances to think in new ways.

Surprised by Hope is about the resurrection.  It’s about the promise of new life and new creation that we have in Christ.  So here are a few quotes that seem significant to me so far:

The challenge is in fact the challenge of new creation.  To put it at its most basic: the resurrection of Jesus offers itself, to the student of history or science no less than the Christian or the theologian, not as an odd event within the world as it is but as the utterly characteristic, prototypical, and foundational event within the world as it has begun to be.  It is not an absurd event within the old world but the symbol and starting point of the new world.  The claim advanced in Christianity is of that magnitude:  Jesus of Nazareth ushers in not simply a new religious possibility, not simply a new ethic or a new way of salvation, but a new creation.  p67

and then a page later:

…the question of Jesus’ resurrection, though it may in some senses burst the boundaries of history, also remains within them; that is precisely why it is so important, so disturbing, so life and death.  We could cope – the world could cope – with a Jesus who ultimately remains a wonderful idea inside his disciples’ minds and hearts.  The world cannot cope with a Jesus who comes out of the tomb, who inaugurates God’s new creation right in the middle of the old one.  p68

Good stuff. 

Reminds me of that chorus – “I am a new creation… here by the grace of God I stand.”

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Filed under Reading, Reflections

July 8, 2009 · 12:52 pm

Riding and thinking along the way

Yesterday by the time supper was over and I had sat down for a bit, the sun came out and I decided that I had better go for a ride. If I slack off on the bike riding, it takes more motivation to do it the next day. Funny how it is that way with good things – or at least with things that are potentially good for me; it takes absolutely no effort to sit in front of the computer and play mindless games.

I really do enjoy the rides. And the sky is usually gorgeous with an orange sum settling below the tree line on the horizon as I make my way home again. Also, there is now a path that takes me down the hill behind the houses in Riverview back to the river path. I ride up the road to the church then go left on the path – The Rotary Trail as it is officially known – the path takes me now past a new housing development and then down the hill. The hill is very steep. It is exciting to let go and take off at great speed. Probably crazy for a 60 yr old woman. But fun. I like it.

Last night when I was riding, I took a slightly different path. I was just a bit too tired to pedal up the hill by the church so I cut in behind Berezowsky School and took a back path that took me about halfway up the hill. A bit less of a thrill but still enough of a descent to let me go fast.

On my way back home last night, I got to thinking. I am reading NT Wright’s book Surprised By Hope. This is some of the fun reading that I can do now that my classes are done for the summer. I really like the way books like this stimulate me to think. As I was riding, I could not help but wonder at all the things that I do not understand. Maybe that is partly why I am in seminary. There is so much to delve into, so much more than I will ever understand but so much that I will enjoy trying to learn. I have some sort of need to spend my time asking questions and then when I do, up pop some more. It seems as if I have an endless ability to ask and such a limited ability to know.

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Filed under Day to Day, Reflections, Studying

July 7, 2009 · 9:50 pm

Computer ailing

Leo took my little laptop down to Saskatoon today to an authorized repair person so that \i could get it fixed on warranty.  There is a problem with the bearings in the fan so a part has to be ordered and all.  Just so happens there are none of the necessary parts in stock – all on back order. (To me that does not sound good – as if there has been such a high need that they ran out.  But maybe that is just my personal sense of loss interpreting this.)  I miss my little laptop already!

But Leo, my dear sweet husband has said that I should just go ahead and use his.  So I have been setting us a few extras on his and here I am.

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July 6, 2009 · 3:14 pm

More good news for coffee lovers.

This is news I am glad to hear.

 

 

Now, if I was only a mouse.

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July 4, 2009 · 1:15 pm

Under the blue sky

I was sitting outside reading through my almost done paper listening to the cries of the gulls and the loud caws of a flock of crows.  They seemed to be doing battle of some kind.

Then far overhead I noticed an eagle soaring high up in the clear blue sky between two pure white clouds.

Beautiful.

I need to be outside more!

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Filed under Day to Day, Studying

July 2, 2009 · 9:23 am

Power is really only temporary

Just got news that a person important in the little corner of the Congo where we used to live, has died in Brussels.  Bemba Saolona. 

If you read French, you can catch the story here.

Leo played tennis with him and his son, Jean-Pierre at Karawa a couple of times. 

He owned businesses and an airline and many plantations while we lived there.  His son is now going to trial for war crimes.  How the mighty are fallen!

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Filed under Africa, In the News

June 30, 2009 · 10:36 am

Way to go kid!

It is very encouraging when a four year old who we treated in the OR comes back in for a 3 month post-OR check with shiny clean teeth, no new decay and a totally changed attitude.

He told his mom that he never wanted t have to go to the hospital again to have his teeth fixed and that from now on he wanted to sit in the “big boy” chair.

He made my day!

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Filed under Dental