Merry Christmas

A very merry Christmas to both friends and family alike! What a blessing it is that we get to join the world in celebrating the birth of Jesus each year in December.

Although he is God and human,
yet Christ is not two, but one.
He is one, however,
not by his divinity being turned into flesh,
buy by God's taking humanity to himself.
He is one,
certainly not by the blending of his essence,
but by the unity of his person.
For just as one human is both rational soul and flesh,
so too the one Christ in both God and human.

He suffered for our salvation
he descended to hell;
he arose from the dead;
he ascended to heaven;
he is seated at the Father's right hand

from the Athanasian Creed 

The angel of the Lord told Zechariah that John the Baptist, in preparing the way for Jesus, would turn the hearts of fathers to their children. Christmas has become a time of reflection on family. It is a time to ponder the blessings that have been given to us.

This year much has happened. Abby graduated and went off to join Tori at the University of Washington. Tori spent the summer in Boise doing an internship with Micron and now has a car thanks to Grandpa. Natalie started her great journey to be a speech pathologist at Portland State, and we now have our first family member ever to attend college outside of the state of Washington…go Vikings (a very appropriate mascot for our family). Sophia is doing everything!…cello, computer programming, and taking horseback riding lessons (no we do not own a horse). Jessica is playing a killer violin and is a great bunny wrangler. Alexa is having fun at Ballet, enjoying learning chess and wrangling her bunny. They are loving learning new PE games such as Mushroom Tag and many new twists on old favorites such as Dodgeball. Matthew wins at nurf gun wars, cars, and Out-Foxed which is a “cooperative game” and we aren’t exactly sure how he wins :) Margo is my hero in many ways. She continues to home school, lead a mom’s Charlotte Mason study, and operates a home that seems to have a million moving parts. I continue to work, repair things around our 1905 house, and occasionally pound out an article on Aquietwater.com.