Greetings in the name of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, and in whose wondrous coming (advent), we celebrate this joyous season!

We have not done a Christmas letter for a number of years and it is by no means easier this year, but we will at least try for a digital version. Again, we have had such a full and rich year, it is difficult to summarize in a few paragraphs. First our children:

Oliver

Oliver at the Butterfly Pavilion – Westminster, CO.

Oliver moved into an apartment in NE Rochester in March. He likes being back in the city again, has a bike to help get around, and makes good use of his gym membership. He worked at Best Buy for a while and helped us out a lot with lawn mowing and other yard jobs. He is looking for another position in Rochester this winter. In November, he turned 21, and got to open a time capsule gift of letters and mementos from when he was just an infant! Sadie reminds him now that he is her babysitter.☺

Evan

Evan’s 5th birthday party

Evan has grown so much this year – physically and in his speech and understanding. He is such a combination of things – silly and careful, loving and independent. Unless Oliver is visiting, he is the big brother in the house now! Evan turned 5 in February and had his first birthday party with a number of his friends over for a special inter-galactic mission and almost-party-crashing visit by Darth Vader! ☺

In May, he got his preschool “diploma” from Churchill school where he went 4 afternoons a week, riding the bus to boot. On Fridays, he had a separate speech class in town that went through June. The educational finale this year has been home-school Kindergarten that Jana pulled together and started up in September. Bright Acres Academy is rolling and I love getting home from work, seeing the school filing container on the table, and hearing about what Evan did that day.

Also in September, Evan joined the local chapter of Trail Life USA as a ‘fox’ trailman. This is a wonderful nationwide program that is only in its second year in Rochester. On one of our outings, we got to visit Mystery Cave, which Evan really liked. He’s also in his 3rd year of Awana at church as a “Sparkie” and has impressed us with his ability to memorize Scripture verses.

Sadie

Sadie would find where mama mouse hid her babies and bring them to us

Sadie is a very talkative, sweet little girl with a great memory and winsome personality. She turned 3 in March and her love for unicorns has not abated all year. She also loves all types of live animals, so it is a treat to have close-by outings of the Oxbow Park zoo and the Quarry Hill nature center. In the spring, we ‘adopted’ a stray cat that showed up at my sister’s place. It wasn’t very long before she had 5 kittens! And our basement was overrun with the playful little creatures. We kept the favorite kitten (‘Midnight’) of Sadie and Evan and the rest we found homes for.

One of the best playtime investments this year was 5 yards of sand. Sadie spent many days with her siblings playing on the pile all summer, though the amount of sand she managed to bring back in the house inside her clothes was amazing. It was a long time coming, but Sadie was able to start Awana this fall as a “Cubbie” at church. So now she gets to go with her big brother and wow – can she learn verses! We have a CD that plays in the van with Evan’s verses – so she gets those down-pat (to-song) as well as her own. Also this fall, she started ballet dance lessons on Monday evenings and what a cute dressed up little dancer she is! When I lie on the floor for some walk-on back massages by the kids, she likes to “ballerina” off by back and over my head. ☺

Aidan

Aidan is inching bigger than the very hungry caterpillar

This little bundle of romping energy turned 1 in March. His smile and personality floods joy into our hearts every day. He does not want to be left out of any action so he tries hard to keep up with Evan and Sadie, but he enjoys doing his own things too – lately it has been playing with toy cars and trains. He has been learning a few words and can copy some of the things we say. His signature expression is “Mo, mo!” while making the sign for more whenever he likes something and he wants you to give it to him again (a la yougurt) or do it again (especially kisses). ☺

He has certainly been the little traveler this year. He flew with Jana over Easter to the San Diego/Escondido area of California for a relative’s wedding, and he was along for our Thanksgiving road trip to Colorado and New Mexico – that was quit the drive and we ended up staying a few extra days in Julesburg, CO and Ogallala, NE while or van was being repaired. Now it’s fun to see him smile whenever we say “Ogallala” or “Abiyoyo” (from the folktale story) to him. At the end of June we all went for a family vacation on the Superior North Shore with some friends from Texas – we love the area and it was fun getting to take the kids for the first time. Of course, Aidan will also be along for our Christmas travel to Arizona – and ready to let the wrapping paper fly. ☺

Family

The kids in a wagon at Ba-ba & Grandpa’s

We are so humbled and grateful for how God has blessed us each year and now in 2015. Helpful grand/parents that we can visit during the year as well as other family and friends are such a blessing. I continue to work at IBM on a product called PowerVC, and Jana runs the day-to-day household. We continue to teach 4-5 year old Sunday school, and we started a “community group” Bible Study early this year that meets at our place with some dear families from church in our area.

Extracting honey in September

We actually started two small family businesses this year! First, Jana became an independent distributor for Young Living essential oils. This is something we are comfortable standing behind because (1) Jana’s work is education-based as this product area requires in-depth knowledge and experience, (2) it’s an alternative (‘compliment’ might be a better word) to the expensive and big-pharmaceutical-controlled industry. Young Living gives you a therapeutic way to take care of your family without harmful chemicals and Jana loves to share/network what she has learned with others.

Second, we started Our Bright Acres – initially, as an online outlet for our Bright Eyes Honey label, and possibly for other things in the future. It’s also a communication outlet for different topics – like this letter. ☺ It has been a great learning experience getting a web site up and going, but getting into the honeybee “hobby” a little deeper this year has been even more interesting. We ran 5 new hives on my parent’s property in Iowa, and the colonies all did quite well on the basswood trees and other forage in the area. We sold out of our honey pretty quickly, but if you would like to be added to an email list for when we have more available (or some other product), please let us know.

We wish you a joyous Christmas and a wonderful New Year!!!

Our 6th Anniversary

A unicorn birthday cake from auntie Suz

Fishing with uncle Darren

A “litter” of kittens – in more ways than one

Backyard get-togethers!

Sawing wood at historic Forestville village

Stranded in Ogalalla, NE!

Hiking at Quarry Hill park

Brother bonding!

Sweet ladies!

Treated to the Albuquerque BioPark Aquarium

Hiking out to check on the bees

Vacation on the north shore with the Cases

Testing out uncle Cory’s mtn bike

Cousins – part 1

Cousins – part 2