Merry Christmas & Happy New Year

Twas the Night Before Christmas and all through the house not a creature was stirring not even a mouse … although we will be if we don’t get going on this years Christmas letter. It has been a full year and it seems to have flown by.

Camping defined much of this year. Since we bought the camper late last fall it could not be used until this spring. We really made use of it and enjoyed the special family time together but also were able to meet up with fiends which made it all the more fun. Starting with our first campout in the front yard we then moved on to Sibley, Whitewater, Lake Bemidji, Moose Lake, LaQue Parle, and Father Hennepin State Parks as well as Lake Independence county park and Tetogatec regional park in Wisconsin. The culmination of camping for us was a two-week trip to North and South Dakota touring the Bad Lands and Black Hills. This was the first extended vacation that our family took. We went out through Fargo/Jamestown and celebrated my mother and sister’s birthdays on the way to Medora, ND and then to the Palmer Gulch campground in South Dakota, 6 miles away from Mt. Rushmore. Sightseeing included Reptile Gardens, Bear Country USA, 1880 train ride, Keystone, Hill City, Big Thunder Gold Mine, Jewel Cave, Mt. Rushmore, etc… We did it all but ask the kids and the highlight was the swimming pools. I feared the worst but the kids did great in the truck on the 2500 mile drive.

All in all there was a lot of fun camping this year. It made a huge difference having the 5^th-wheel especially during the heat of the summer. It wasn’t all fun and games though. In order to fit the camper in our yard we had to do some major landscaping. We took out part of a hill, built a boulder retaining wall and created a pad on the side of the house in order to accommodate the trailer. Fortunately we have good friends that have helped along the way.

Aside from camping Janet and I both had the opportunity to do some things on our own. I was able to take a week off and "road-trip" to Daytona, Florida for Bike Week with a couple of friends. Janet was able to go to Chicago with a couple of her friends as well.

The kids have been busy as well. Cassie is in 1^st grade now. She loves learning and all that goes along with school. She has been taking piano since the summer and just had her first recital. She enjoys swimming lessons and is quite a strong swimmer. Her favorite is Girl Scouts, this weekend they will have a 24hr sleepover Christmas party at the local GS camp. She seems so grown up and confident this year.

Janessa is in preschool again this year, although it takes some prodding most mornings to convince her she's going. She also attends swimming lessons and is quite the wild thing in the water. Early this summer on a camping trip she mastered riding a bicycle without training wheels. She spends much of her time at home kissing her little brother and teaching him the finer aspects of troublemaking.

Ben is running, talking tons and causing about as much trouble as any 2 year old should. He has a great sense of humor, loves his sisters tremendously, but picks on the family pets. He is close to obsessed with his train set, loves "movie shows", and attempts anything his sisters are doing.

Diabetes still dictates where and what we do but Janessa handles it well. In August we decided to get an insulin pump for her and by the end of September she was using that instead of getting constant injections. This has made our lives much more flexible but things are still very challenging and we pray for a cure in the future. On January 19^th we will be participating in a fundraiser walk for diabetes sponsored by the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation (JDRF) at the Mall of America. If any of you are interested in joining us or sponsoring us just let us know.

We hope that this letter finds all of you happy and healthy in this blessed Christmas season.