Cool white

December 4, 2006 (7:20pm)
17º F, Light snow, W wind 8 mph.

Good evening,

So the snow totaled about 6" on Friday. There is a 2"x6" board resting on edge on the deck and the snow is flush with the top edge. Now it has settled a bit, but still close to the edge yet. As it turned out, I didn’t need to park the van at the end of the drive, but rather be safe than sorry. Walking out to get it, the silence was loud. Not a thing stirred anywhere. There were a lot of deer tracks all over the place, but no other tracks. One pair of young deer walked up the driveway toward the house, then a short distance from it, turned into the pine plantation. Today the snow also has many rabbit tracks everywhere. There even are the tracks of a cat from somewhere. No raccoon or possum tracks though. Yesterday when we came home from church, a flock of about 24 wild turkeys crossed in front of us, just before turning onto Winding Road. Had to slow almost to a complete stop before the took wing and flew into the woods on the opposite side of the road. Today we had the same flock, I think, cross just as we came up Winding Road. It is cool to see so many of them now.

The temperature also has stayed down. Wind chills below zero for the past couple of days. For the last three days, the temperature at 5:00 A.M. was 6-8º F with a rather strong wind. Really cutting through. The daytime temperature has been close to 20º F and the sun has been out when the snowflakes were not falling. It still is about the prettiest place in God’s green earth. We love it.

The holiday meal at church was not well attended this year. Only about 20 folks showed up, so we don’t feel so bad about not being there. I took the turkey breast, stuffing, and gravy up to church then drove to Green Bay to pick up what we intended to on Friday. Today we got the boxes going to the Netherlands filled, wrapped, and to the postoffice for shipping. Probably will get them sometime within the next 6 months or so. We hope! Oma sure had fun packing all of the packages inside. Me too.

December 5, 2006 (4:20am)
3º F, Partly cloudy, W wind 11 mph wind chill -11º F.

Good morning,

My head stopped on me while writing this yesterday and I stopped. Sometimes it is just like someone flipped a switch somewhere between my ears and nothing really works well.

It has been a cold night and the wind I back up again. We had a bit of light snow yesterday and got it cleaned up just in time for more to fall. We are expecting 1-3" more tonight. Originally it was supposed to arrive early this afternoon, now they say around midnight. Hope they are right about the postponement as we need to drive to Milwaukee today. Really would like to have the snow come after we are home again.

Margriet has everything together to take today. We are taking the entire file along, just incase a surprise or two pop up. I don’t think there should be much of a problem, other than the drive, this time. All of the information is already in their possession - we hope. We plan to leave a bit early not knowing what the parking arrangements are this time. In the past there has been a lot of construction in the area. Hopefully most of that is completed and there is some semblance of order again. Not holding my breathe though.

I got the first package of information for the Churchwide Assembly for the ELCA in August. Since I am one of our Synod’s delegates, I have been wondering what it is I should be doing to prepare. From the cover letter, there will be several more packages coming for me in the future. Guess it is time for me to start accumulating information into my head. The package contained a book for me to read, with three chapters I am supposed to focus on. Suspect I will hear more about those later. Our Conference is sending three delegates ( one male, one female, and one clergy) down, so I am hoping we will car pool for the drive to Chicago and I am not the driver. The assembly is a week long and I presume it will be again broadcast on the internet as last year’s was. I am looking forward to the week of Assembly, but not the big city or leaving my Woman home. We have some time to work on that.

Chatted with Brenda a bit yesterday and it sounds like all of the kids (big and little) in the country are excited for what we call Saint Nicholas (they don’t but I can’t spell it) coming. She had to end the conversation to get the boys dressed to go outside or some such. She also sounded excited too - of course. This is not celebrated much in this country anymore, only Christmas Eve/Day. Too bad, as it is a neat heritage and tradition.

Time to get a-going.

In Christ My Saviour,

Chris <><