Svenson's Annual Christmas Sing-Along

Every year we love going out to Chesterville (about 40 minutes NW of Cornwall) to the home of Walter and Sherry Svenson. He used to be the Stake President, but now they run the Family History Center. They are both very talented in music and love to host a holiday sing-a-long for ward members,
family, and even non-member neighbors.  Their daughter Felicity plays the piano.

They clear out all their furniture and set up folding chairs in the two adjoining rooms- the living room and dining room.

Sometimes, so many show up that Brother Svenson has to sit on the stairs.

And, of course, we EAT! Everyone brings something, but Sister Svenson always cooks a ton too!

It sort of reminds us of the sing a-long that Musetta Mortimer in Antioch used to have in Dec. every year.  It really is fun and reminds us that we just don't get too much opportunity to sing Christmas Carols very much, unless we MAKE the time.  Plus, when the non-members there, it was a great chance for us to talk about the Savior and our church!

Christmas Conference

Every year we have a 2 day Christmas Conference for all the missionaries in the mission. Since we have half the mission one day, then the other half the next day - We come up to help with the luncheon and stay at the mission home that night so we'll be close to come back for the second day.

All the senior couples come to help with the luncheon and since this is Christmas, it's usually a big one.

Turkey dinner with all the fixings.  Here's the kitchen help from one of the days - other couples come the other day, but some of us do both:  (E.Bendio, E. Cannon Sr, S.Arhets, S. Cannon Sr, S. Howard)

E.Howard, Mahaffey, Arhets, and S. Jarvis:

A quiet sitting down moment, while the Missionaries are in watching their movie, just before they come in to eat lunch:  (Sister Cannon, Sister Cannon Sr, and Sister Howard - who is in charge)

Sisters always start the meal.... always allow our elders to be gentlemen....

Sister Gutierrez and Sister Cantu came all decked out with their Christmas tiarras.

Then come the ever-popular skits by each zone:

Our zone did 2 dances.... one WITH the sisters (since there are only 2 in our zone)

then they did an all-elder Hukka dance!  It was amazing!  Leading it were the AP's - E.Bagnall  and Teuira - who is from Tahiti.

It was so loud that the people in the kitchen even came out to see what was happening! ha!  Then they have the white elephant gift exchange. President reads a story and every time he says "right" or "left" they have to pass their gifts that direction. At the end they open and then go around the room and each missionary get to keep to trade it one time.  Sister Cannon likes to clown around during this time:

President Cannon and Daniel the Elf hand out presents to each missionary...a cookbook and apron with "CMM" on it.  We needed a photo with Daniel too.  (He does this every year)

When we went back to the Mission Home that evening - we gave President and Sister Cannon their presents from us. We gave Sister Cannon a ton of Taco Bell Green Sauce packets (which she loves but can never get because there are no Taco Bells in Canada- but there is one in Massena, NY when we

go to get groceries each week! )  We also gave her a picture mouse pad.

We gave President Cannon a Missionary CAN-MAN with his name tag on it.

The CAN-MAN was made by our downstairs neighbor- George Kelly. (He usually makes them to look like famous Hockey players - complete with jersey colors, name and logo designs)  This was the first time that he'd ever made one with a suit on!  (Little did E.Mahaffey know that I secretly ordered one to give to him for Christmas)

Senior Couples' Christmas Dinner

Sunday evening we drove up to Montreal to the Mission Home for the Senior Couples' Christmas dinner and white elephant gift exchange. Sister Cannon always sets a gorgeous table - even with paper plates!!

After dinner President Cannon started the white elephant gift exchange and of course, Sister Cannon started the picture taking!   (on couch: S.Conway, E&S Allen, E.Bendio)

(below: from left: E&S Bendio, S.Cannon, E.Jarvis, S. Arhets)

We had so many there. This is the first time we've ever had this many senior couples. We have 11 couples now - so there is 22 of us... The Howards were not there on this night.
below from left: E. Mahaffey, S.Jarvis, E&S Cannon Sr., E.Cheney

From the gift exchange I ended up with a can of maple syrup (which was a highly sought after item) and E.Mahaffey ended up with a Penguin-decorated roll of duct tape (which must NOT have been so highly sought after since he ended up leaving it there!...he says by accident...hmmmmm)
We had made a Christmas card for both this dinner and for the people in our Institute classes.  Here is the one from the Institute class - they were the same except for the writing.

Elder and Sister Jarvis had just arrived that evening!  They are the parents of our Stake President in
Canada - President Eric Jarvis.  The Jarvis' are from western Canada...Edmonton, maybe?

We always have such a great time when we get together as senior couples!

Back: Pres. Cannon, Elders Allen, Bendio, Saintonge, Arhets, Cheney, Mahaffey, Jarvis, Cannon Sr,
                  and Conway.
Middle:Sisters Cheney, Bendio, Saintonge, Arhets, Allen and Cannon.
Front:  Sister Cannon Sr., Conway, Mahaffey, and Jarvis.              (Howards were absent)                                                                                                                                                                                          

Elders for Christmas

Our Hawkesbury elders spent this weekend with us at our apt. (normally they come every other weekend). We were afraid, though, that since they came this weekend, we wouldn't get to see them before Christmas - so we gave them their presents early. We put up their stockings with ours:  Elder Boone Smith on left from Lehi, UT (we have to use first names because there are 4 other Elder Smith's and 2 of them also have the first inital of "B"_)  and E. Ballard from Arizona.

For their presents we bought each of them their favorite food that they can't buy here in Canada. Since we go over to the states & shop in Walmart, we could get them the foods they love. Here is Elder
Smith opening his.......                                                      and Elder Ballard reacting to his.....

                        

And here they are with their treasures: E.Smith with American Cheese slices and E. Ballard with "POST" Raisin Bran... the only kind he likes! ha!

It's the little things, eh?

Ward Christmas Party

Elder Mahaffey and I were put in charge of the Cornwall Ward's Christmas Party this year.  We had a big Creche Festival with people showing about 25 Nativity Sets.

There were hand puppet ones:

And wooden ones:

Clay and ceramic ones:  (We bought the top ceramic one in Quebec )

paper cutout and stained glass ones:

and even needlepointed and German ones:

These tables were set up for all the desserts that we asked everyone to bring:  (wouldn't you know I'd get a picture of the EMPTY tables, but not one with the TONS of desserts that came!)

There was a giving tree:

People in the ward had taken a glittery stocking from under the tree all during the month before and then brought it this night with a gift card attached to the back and put them into the stockings on the wall.
We ended up getting more than $700 in cards to help the people in the ward.

Then we had a beautiful program.  The Primary sang in costume  (but, since I was backstage directing
traffic and doing last-minute repairs on costumes, no picture!)  The Cornwall ward choir sang:
   (Front: Scott McIntyre, Muriel Bower, Dianne McIntyre, Gaile Hynes, Judy Willard, Branchaud              daughter, Lydianne Lupien, Marlene Lupien
    Back:  E. Mahaffey, Tim Willard, Larry Spinella, Barbara Bilodeau-behind Gaile, Sam Bilodeau,
        Sherry Svenson-behind the Branchaud girl, S.Mahaffey  )  pianist & director: Felicity Svendson

several people played musical solos and then E.Mahaffey showed a wonderful slide show he had done with narration depicting Christmas in Jerusalem and Christmas in Zarahemla.  Then we showed the DVD of the Christmas Story - which had been shown at the First Presidency Fireside last year. It was so wonderful!  To end, Sam Bilodeau sang O Holy Night in his beautiful baritone voice! Then we ate our way through 3 long tables - stuffed full with desserts.  Our neighbors George & Jean Kelly came with us and commented how touched they were and said they had really felt something here. The ward, as always, was so wonderful in making them feel welcome.  It turns out this way every time we bring investigators.  They make it wonderful to be a missionary!  The evening turned out wonderfully!

Photo Shoot

Today ended up being a beautiful day outsider with the little bit of snow having fallen last night.
So, we took advantage of the only snow we've had and decided to go over to the Merpaws and use their cute sled for our Christmas Card picture this year!  We can't decide between:

But, in the end, we thought the one with us wearing all the winter gear looked more CANADIAN.... and we had, after all wanted the sled in the picture... so we opted for number 2.
Then we had the Merpaws get in:

And, then... all four of us:

Connie & Sheila Merpaw have become such great friends and we have grown to love them so much.
I'm going to make this photo into an ornament for them and give it to them for Christmas! At least they will remember us ONCE a year!  ha !  Of course, no photo shoot would be complete without our photographer getting into the picture and hamming it up:

Brother Gerry Mazerolle was good enough to come & be our photographer. He is a counselor in the Bishopric and such a good man.  So... now we're set with the Christmas card picture... now to write the rhyming newsletter and then address them all.... I love this time of year!