Jensen Family: Happy New Year!

I've gotten a little behind, (actually I'm getting a big behind...did I really eat that whole box of orange sticks? Kelley doesn't like them and I'm the only other one here... hmmmmmm) so I'm just going to try to remember some of the highlights of the past few weeks...

The week after Christmas was very nice and relaxing. Kelley was off of work so we had a lot of time together....which I thoroughly enjoyed! We worked on some projects we are doing around the house to get things ready for Grandma and Camille's family to come.

New years eve was fun. Brenda and Dan invited us all to their house and we had a real nice dinner, then got to visit and get caught up on each other's lives. Sure feel blessed to have this great group of friends.

We have had some real doozer snow storms that left us with mountains of snow and bitter cold temperatures. Kelley spent several of his days off digging out the widows in the ward and other neighbors and cleaning the church walks.

Kelley's dad made these cute things for Sam. In the winter, he gets bored just sitting around, so he does a lot on his knitting looms. He is such a good guy...always concerned about us and each of the kids and how they are doing.

Oh this is the cool shadow box collage Kate gave us for Christmas. She is so creative and clever. Always puts a lot of thought, effort and love into the things she does.

KC's last email was really sweet...
Jan 1, 2011
Kelley Carson Jensen to me

Hey Guys! Happy New Year!!!
We have the office elders in our district so we all spent the night at their house and watched Alice in Wonderland and Bolt last night. It was a lot of fun and now we are here in the office emailing. How did you guys celebrate New Years? Hopeful you had fun. I wish you guys all the best in this next year. Russians are really big into wishing you things on your birthday or on the New Year, they’ll say "I desire you health, happiness, luck, success...."and lots of other stuff. And its all really nice but I never really know what to say back, because I don’t want to wish them all the same things back, but my vocab is only so big, so I usually just say "thanks, you too." with a big smile. Kinda lame, the key is just to be the first to wish, then you don’t have to think of crazy things to wish. Anyway, I wanted to tell you guys about how our Christmas went. Sorry about the call by the way, I will buy a better card in May. So on Christmas we went and ate breakfast at our senior couples house, it was really nice, then we watched a Christmas movie. Then I called our investigator Aleck from Krygistan, and he told me that his aunt wanted to invite me over for Christmas dinner, so he gave her the phone and she invited me in English, because she’s and English teacher. So we went to there house, he lives with his aunt and uncle and they are probably two of the nicest people in the world. The uncle is a teacher of traditional Russian instruments, so he played us some songs on his Garmoshka...its like an accordion but it has buttons on both sides and no piano keys. Anyway, they were both really interested in the gospel too, the uncle was raised as a Baptist, which is way rare here, so I think that things are going to work out with them. We went over to Aydars house but his brother was busy so he couldn't’t meet with us, but told us to come back. We also had some success working with one in active family in our branch. The son is really active but the parents aren’t at all. So we stopped by with a Christmas present(a chocolate bar) and had a nice chat with the mother. She is really nice and wants us to come by more often, President Kremenchuk, our branch president lives nearby, so I think there is a really good chance at helping the whole family get active. So things are going really good here, my last day in Arbatskii will be on the 11th of January, so I'm sad about that. I have really enjoyed serving here and have put my whole heart into making it a good area. But you have to move on sometimes. Everything will keep on running without me just fine. This morning I woke up about 2 hours before everyone else and so I had some time to think and ponder on the past year. It was cool to think about all of the things that happened and all the I have learned. It was the hardest, coldest, most spiritual, most satisfying year of my life. Looking back, I love every minute of it, even if I didn’t realize how much I loved the hard times at the time. I have really grown to love and rely on my Heavenly Father, because he was often the only one who could possibly understand why I felt or what I needed. Missions are the best. Thanks for sending those pictures, its way nice to see Grandma, I hope you can figure out what to do to help her. I hate to think of her being sad missing home, but I don’t want her to fall down anymore either. I will pray for you guys to know what to do. Anyway, I love you tons. Ill actually get to talk to you on Wednesday too, sorry I didnt tell you that our p day was moved. But have a nice few weeks. Love you!
KC
Brenda called on Sunday and asked when I would want to go out to lunch for my birthday. She's so thoughtful! We decided on Monday evening for dinner so some of the working ladies could come. What a fun night! I love these ladies! It was so fun to get to talk and laugh and get caught up on whats going on in each of their lives.
Seems like each of us are dealing with some big changes in our lives right now...some happy, some, really difficult. Just part of life I guess. Makes it easier to battle though, when you have good friends that understand and give you their love, encouragement and support.

I celebrated my 52nd birthday on Tuesday. I had such a nice day...family and friends made is really special. These are the beautiful flowers Katie sent me! Candice came over for lunch and brought me Michael Wilcox' new book..."What the scriptures teach us about adversity" Super thoughtful! She knows how I love to hear him talk!
Candice, Kelley and I went out to dinner that night to PF Changs. Love, love love their food! Had lots of sweet birthday wishes from family and friends....I'm sure lucky to have such wonderful people in my life! That's what makes life worth living!

Did I tell you about the most wonderful gift that Camille and Kellen gave us for Christmas? It's a web cam skype thing! The kids were laughing at me cause I was soooooo excited about it, but when we got it up and running, it was confirmed.....coolest gift ever! I could just about reach out and touch Sam, and Olivia and I were doing a lot of kisses right through the screen!
We were giggling and pulling faces and flapping our lips at each other like we were 4 years old...wait, she is 4. Oh I don't care...we had so much fun!

Then she wanted to see Lizzy...so instead of taking the web cam down, I tried to lift Lizzy up so she would be in the picture. Man she is heavy! and also didn't want to be lifted up! It was pretty funny. Then Camille suggested I move the web cam. hmmmm now that's a good idea!

Anyway, I love technology and my sweet daughter for letting me have the next best thing to being with them!

Look at his cute little double chin...I just want to eat him!