The Ford Crier: A Holiday Edition 1996

To All Our Family and friends on line

Here's the yearly newsletter I usually send at the holidays. This year we only sent hard copies to our friends without email addresses.
This Year at the Fords: After spending 1995 in Germany, we returned to Wisconsin in January. We left California and drove across the southwest through Dallas in order to visit Jim's parents for a few days. We arrived just in time for sub - zero degree weather in Madison. Our third child was due on February 25th. Jim informed me that because it was Leap Year, he thought it would be fun to wait until the 29th to have the baby. I thought he was crazy! Monika Katherine had the same plan as Jim.
She held out through 5 days of off and on labor and was finally drugged out on Leap Year Day! Luckily for me my mother was staying with us. She made my week of labor as bearable as possible with lots of shopping, foot massages, and fast food!

 

In March, after three weeks of pampering, my mother had to leave me to figure out how to mother three daughters all on my own. I cried all the way home after dropping her off at the airport Well by April, I felt comfortable enough in my motherhood to start up my business with Creative Memories again. At the beginning of June I was ready for a break and a little indulgence, so it was off to grandma's house! The girls and I spent a wonderful three weeks in CA. Erika turned into a little mermaid, Jessika learned a few words (finally) and Monika basked in the adoration of her second cousins, aunts, uncles, grandparents and great-grandma, Emma.

On July 27 I sent the first Ford Crier through e - mail. After finding myself writing the same notes to several different addresses I decided to start a simple weekly family journal I also wanted the opportunity to write somewhat creatively. I haven't been able to be very creative since having Erika 6 years ago -- no painting, printing or drawing I discovered that sitting down at the computer to write was as much a creative release as sitting at an ease. It is just as enjoyable and just as frustrating

In September Erika began First Grade. She is the youngest in her class and has managed to keep up with most of the kids. She loves going to school and playing. Her biggest problems in life these days are deciding what to wear in the morning and what to for lunch. She wants me to pack lunches with candy, instead of getting her hot lunch every day like her friends. The peer pressure has begun to infest her mind. Her biggest problems in life these days are deciding what to wear in the morning and what to do for lunch. She wants me to pack lunches with  candy, instead of getting her hot lunch everyday like her friends. She these wants days are deciding what to wear in the morning and what to for lunch. Jessika and Monika don't miss Erika at all while she is at school. They have each other as well as a little boy, Eli, that I watch 3 days a week.

 

In October, Jim left for a couple of conferences, one in St. Louis and another a week later in Augsburg, Germany. We missed him very much for nearly 3 weeks. While I was a single parent, the good people at our church prayed, cooked and baby-sat for me. God blessed me with a mother who can afford to call long distance often and good friends near by.

In November Jessi turned two and Erika turned six. We threw a huge bash at a pizza parlor. I planned the party without Jim, which is to say without much restraint. There were 25 kids there. I don't have to say such else. I should say that the girls enjoyed themselves. Isn't that what really
matters? For Thanksgiving we had a nice lunch with several single people, a couple of who were international students. Although we missed seeing the extended family, the holiday was very peaceful without traveling, especially since Monika has decided she hates sitting in a restrained car seat.

December will bring us full circle to our annual trek to California for Christmas in the sun. Last Christmas my parents gave us a nativity scene. It has become a source of great interest for the girls. Presents are always from those who love us most. What greater gift is there than the love of God through His son, Jesus? May this holiday time be one of peace and remembering all that is good and holy.

 

Illness of the Year: This prize is awarded to Jessika for falling off one bed and onto the bed frame of another and having had four stitches stuck into her forehead in April. It wasn't her first stitches and it wasn't our first time in the hospital emergency room. During that visit, Erika passed out and Monika was passed around to all the nurses while I tried to help hold Jessi down.

 

JIMS CORNER:  Now whether you are at home, school or the workplace, perhaps you could take the time to meditate upon this Christmastide prayer taken from the Book of Common Prayer: Almighty God, who hast given us thy only - begotten Son to take our nature upon him, and as at this time to be born of a pure virgin; Grant that we being regenerate, and made thy children by adoption and grace, may daily be renewed by thy Holy Spirit; through the same our Lord Jesus Christ, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the same Spirit ever, one God, world without end. Amen.

 

As this will be our last issue until mid January, I wish you on behalf of the Ford Crier staff a frohe Weihnachten, a sch'ne Silvesterfeier and agl ckliches neues Jahr!

Jim, Teri. Erika, Jessi. Monika