Our Christmas Letter

If somehow I should have sent a Christmas card but somehow forgot you as I updated my addresses, well...here's the Christmas letter I sent out this year. :)

Merry Christmas!

Has this winter storm put you in the mood for Christmas at all? Well...it has me! :) Isn't Christmas fun? I find myself wanting to bake cookies, get the house tidy, wrap presents and such like. I do so enjoy helping people find a reason to smile. And isn't the biggest reason to smile the fact that Christ came to earth, died for us, so that we could be right with God? Doesn't that fact just blow you away and make you realize just whose you are? We are God's, and we are here to show his glory. Let us this season show his glory to those around us. (at least that's what I hope to do!) :)

Anyways, I've been somewhat remiss this year in getting cards/letters/and such like out to people. I seem to keep finding other things to do.

1.Starting to slowly homeschool Justin. Takes time and planning. Sometimes I feel woefully inadequate because I'm not always the most organized person around. But when Justin wants to learn something, we take the time and learn. :) It's fun. I love watching him think. We've done some simple unit studies and do the odd craft. Making wood crafts is where it is at!

2.Lego! Ah this boy just LOVES his lego. He is constantly building robots of one sort of the other. It's good to see him use his imagination. Now to keep him well supplied with Lego.....

3.Bunnies! I raise my bunnies and thoroughly enjoy them. I have mini rex, harlequin, commercial new zealand, polish and holland lops. All have their shining aspects, and well... they also have their 'challenges'. :) It's all good. I'm slowly improving their type and learning the sheer fun that is rabbit showing! :)

4.I've done some limited pet-sitting.

5.We've had some vacation time this year. Unfortunately this summer every time we camped, we had rain. Kinda puts a dampener on things. But it was good to get away. Jim didn't quite get the reading time he needed, so next year we'll do things a bit differently.

6.Justin attends a nursery school one afternoon a week. It goes for two hours. He has fun but every week he tries to convince me that I should stay there.

7.Jim is serving as president of Classis Ontario this year. It's meant extra meetings and some added stress for him. I personally think he's doing a good job, though I wouldn't mind him being home a bit more often.

8.Things in Exeter continue as they have been. Jim continues to pastor, I continue to do the newsletter and to update stuff as it needs doing.

9.I still work at Subway one day a week. It's time for Jim to play with Justin, and time for me to make some needed funds. :)

10.My veggie garden did really really well this year. I was quite pleased. Lots of lettuces, corn (though the raccoons did raid our patch), I tried a new type of cucumber which flumoxed Jim, they looked a bit odd, but tasted good. Tomatoes like you wouldn't believe! My potatoes grew well, and I tried a chinese cabbage this year. I wasn't wildly impressed and won't do that again. It attracted bugs by the bucket load and was not appreciated by the bunnies either. It was so dirty and wormy that I didn't want it either! And we had some butternut squash. Oh boy... do we have butternut squash.

11.Not sure what else to write...it's overall been a pretty good year. Learned lots, cried some, laughed tons, and walked with God. It hasn't always been pretty, but it's been okay.

We do wish you a wonderful Christmas season. Do know that God sent his son to die for YOU personally. He did that so that you could have a close and intimate relationship with him so that you can more fully show HIS glory to the world around you.
Jim, Annette and Justin