So here is my Christmas letter. I decided to snail mail a letter to those in my life who don't do Facebook etc. And for the rest of you, here's the Christmas update:

I debated writing an annual letter that you send snail mail. With updates on facebook and emails
and such it seems kind of redundant. And, after all, is my life really that interesting? Why would anyone want to know
anyway? I didn’t write one last year—I guess I was unmotivated and thinking the same thing. . . Well, I decided to go
ahead and send out something a little more personal than quick quips on a social site. So what’s been happening on
the farm . . .

Well, we still live on Philip’s home place and continue to make it cozy and functional. We have lots of renovation projects going—digging up the foundation to waterproof and insulate it and put in a drainage system to quickly drain away rain water. As Jerry said, “When Philip is done, this will be the best foundation in Buffalo county!” My husband is meticulous and amazing in everything that he does, which can cause this project to be quite time consuming. All this outside foundation work must be done
to fix the major renovation inside of the basement to seal the leaks and make it usable.

Anna (5 on Jan 1) and Aaron(3) are growing and having fun being best friends who love each other—and at times don’t act like
they love each other. Anna has started “Pooh Bear Preschool” as we call our homeschool environment. She loves learning and is a
joy to teach. She constantly asks questions—many of which I don’t know how to answer. She keeps me on my toes and
causes me to learn things in order to answer her questions. She is a born leader who takes charge if sheperceives no one else is in charge. She is nurturing and helpful with her brother—though he doesn’t always want to be mothered by her. She loves singing,
socializing, silliness, and Sunday School.

Of course Aaron is right there with her learning too. He mustn’t be left
out, you know. He is every bit a boy. He just hauled off and tackled me one day! It hurt too. I think we’ll need to get him involved in football. Do I see a defensive lineman in his future? I just remind myself to “feel the boy love!” Like his daddy, he is meticulous about how things are. He places things back where they go and insists that things be a certain way. In a way, he can be quite stubborn about it, and can get quite angry if things don’t go the way he thinks they should. He loves tractors, cars (especially Cars 2), trucks, blocks, dirt, gravel, and harassing his sister—and sometimes mommy, too. He loves wrestling with his daddy. He is very sweet, tenderhearted and thoughtful, too.

Living at a beautiful homeplace with lots of trees enables us to take lots of nature adventures. The North partcalled “the Jungle” and the South part called “the Great Forest” are excellent places for tree climbing, bug observing, looking for lions and rhinocerouses (Anna
wanted that last one added in there), following animal tracks and bird watching. Last spring, we had a Great Horned Owl make a
nest in our back yard and hatch an eagIet. That was lots of fun to watch; although I may have enjoyed it more than anyone else. I figure a day isn’t good if we all haven’t got all dirty. This is a little more difficult in the winter. . . But , life is good and God has blessed us with our home and our lively little ones.

Speaking of little ones. . . . we do have our family livestock—three Siamese cats, 17 chickens, and lots of
mice. With the house foundation under construction we have the “Mouscapades” programming that I wish would end. Oh the stories I could tell about the mice in my house. You know, Beatrix Potter makes mice look nice and cute in her many tales, but they are NOT!

One such Mouscapade story goes like this. . .
Twas the day before Thanksgiving and all through the house, there was peace and there was calm in anticipation of
the fun family events in Phillipsburg. Aaron was napping and Anna was amusing herself. I was preparing to make the foodstuffs
to take to my mom’s when I went to the back porch closet to get some ingredients; when what to my wonderingeyes do appear but to find that a creature had gotten in there (or to a bag of potato chips). Upon closer observation,I noticed my Swiffer duster dealies were strewn about. My skin began to crawl as I realized what must be done. I had to unpack that closet to find the invader and remove him from the premises. And, I had to clean the mess that had been made by this vile little creature.

I began unpacking when mouse number one shot out of the closet, past my foot and through a hole by the back door.
At my startled screaming, Anna came running, “Mommy what’s going on!?” To which I said, “The Tale of Two Bad Mice” is playing out in our house! (The one Beatrix Potter story where mice are portrayed as naughty). So, I continued to carry out this cleaning
scheme with even greater resolve when I pulled out a large gift bag. I look down inside and peering back at me is mouse number two! I open the back door and chucked that bag as hard and as far as I could. Now I never knew mice did this, but that
mouse charged me! He came right back towards the back step, hopped up each one (me screaming the whole time) and dove into a
hole in the concrete. By the way, I’m not a screamer. These things don’t usually provoke screaming fits. . . .

By this time Anna is truly concerned and I am quite frazzled. Then, I just started chucking stuff out the back door.
I didn’t care what it was, it was sent flying out the door. And guess what happened. . . Mouse #3 ran out of the closet and behind the cat litter box. At this point, Harry the big Siamese cat -who really is more like Garfield in nature -is on the back porch with me. I yelled at him, “Harry get the mouse!” (He didn’t respond to my command—stupid cat!) So, I start pulling things away from the wall
and this fat little mouse just sat and stared me down. Me--having a showdown with a mouse! Harry did nothing. I attempted to shoo the mouse towards the cat. To no avail—the mouse went down the same said hole as mouse #1 and about didn’t make it because he was so rotund. Thoroughly dismayed, I finished the cleaning, seeing no more mice for this episode of the mouscapades. However, with the aid of traps and with no help from the cats, the mice are now deceased—and the holes are soundly sealed. And as for me, I only have a mild case of PTSD.

While it is fun to tell the amusing tales of our lives, we have had some serious and significantly life changing
events in our year. The most notable came on August 3rd. Jerry (Philip’s dad) had a massive stroke and passed away a week later at the age of 67. This was a shock to all and there really are no words to describe an event like that.
We are all coping in our own way. We made it through the first harvest without Jerry L. We had help from neighbors and hired a couple of guys to help out as well. Up until September when he pulled the combine out of the shed, he’d never sat in the driver’s seat of that great machine. This was Jerry’s love and joy—running the John Deere combine harvesting, and he was excellent at it. Philip ran trucks, drove grain cart and kept the augers filling bins. This year, Philip sat in the seat and harvested for the first time. The kids and I rode with him the second day he was running, and that is when he told me he’d never ran the combine until now. Philip had ridden on his Dad’s lap year after harvest year, learning so much that he was able to hop in the seat and harvest this fall with his own son on his lap. And so, the baton passes from one generation to the next full of a rich heritage. We mourn what was lost when Jerry breathed his last. We appreciate the legacy he has left behind. We press on to live a life worthy of the ONE who we celebrate most of all this Christmas season, Emmanuel—God with us.