Merry Christmas 2007
Another year has passed. This year we don’t have as many fantastic and funny stories from adventures in foreign lands, but our wonderful journey continues. Our recent paths have been marked by natural cycles of season changes, migration of Canada geese, the coming and going of amazing people, and enrichment of local traditions and culture, which bring us to another Christmas when we remember that Christ has blessed our lives, as have you.
Amelia, who just turned 2, is now a little girl. She loves to have her finger- and toenails painted, loves bunnies and is fun to watch as she (waddle-) runs down the sidewalk. She is learning to speak and mimics Monica’s intonation in answering questions with “Yeethsssss!” and expressing her affection for something cute with, “O-uh”. She sings around the house and rushes to the door to give us hugs whenever we come home.
Riley is now in kindergarten and can be heard counting in Spanish in his room as he plays with his Legos and coloring Monica’s made-to-order coloring pages of cowboys, Roman soldiers, or knights. He has the Rawhouser-recessive early-rising gene and is always dressed first. He and Conrad had an idyllic MN summer playing outside for hours every day riding bikes and digging in the dirt until their skin became permanently stained.
Conrad is now in second grade in Emerson Spanish Immersion school. He loves to use his Spanish, but doesn’t love getting up early enough to be at the bus stop at 6:37am! This time constraint has helped our family to be more organized though. He has recently taken interest in owls, and proposed that our student housing cooperative buy a few owls to take care our burgeoning squirrel problem. He got four supporting votes!
Monica has been developing several talents, including reading (not of the Dr. Seuss genre), making baby slings and jewelry, baking whole wheat bread from our food storage wheat, and jogging in the mornings. She also coordinated another adventure at the MN state fair, a trip to see big ice chunks floating into the bay at Duluth from Lake Superior, & a trip to Nauvoo, IL which has been restored by our church to how it was in 1840′s before the pioneers crossed the plains. She also went with her girl friends to Jane Eyre at Minneapolis’ Guthrie theater.
Hans is now in the 2nd year of a PhD in business at the U. of Minnesota. He has enjoyed his simple life of riding to and from school year-round (he crosses the Mississippi at a different bridge than the collapsed 35W), reading while exercising on the elliptical machine at the U., studying, and doing research. He’s been blessed to do write and present on social entrepreneurship and attend conferences in Atlanta, Chicago, and Philadelphia.