Weekend

We left for the family prayer service for Bruce's grandma on time on Friday but 15 miles out Bruce remembered he had forgot his CPAP and he cannot be without it. We had to turn around and go back for it which put us 15 minutes late for the service. They waited for us. We felt bad about that. It was a nice service and Thelma looked very nice. Samantha had a lot of questions-one being "Why did she die?" I told her that she was old and she had been sick but now she's with Jesus in Heaven and that's a good thing. She seemed to be okay with that response. She did say it was sad-it is.

We stayed at Thelma's house Friday night-no one else was and Bruce's parents already had a full house so we stayed there so we wouldn't have to drive back to Bismarck and turn around and be back early for the funeral. Bruce and I stayed there the first Christmas we were married since we had to be in Linton early the next morning and Thelma made us a big breakfast. She loved to feed people and she was a great cook-no one can make better potato salad or gravy. She loved having guests too.

The funeral was very nice and there was such a large crowd. I think everyone was thankful the weather was so nice-last year at this time we had our first blizzard-what a difference. We went to Bruce's parents for the rest of the afternoon and evening. It was nice to spend time with family and the kids really enjoyed playing with their cousins who they don't see often enough. Every time the phone rang though it was weird knowing that it wasn't Thelma. She called many times a day to check what was going on and to let Joann know the latest news. We are really going to miss her.

We won't know for sure until Gerrit's pre-surgical visit on Wednesday morning if he'll be clear for surgery on Friday. I think he will be and we're making plans that we'll be leaving for Minneapolis. I'm getting things in order for my parents to watch the other three while we're gone.