Tuesday, December 18, 2007
Monday, December 17, 2007
Christmas Letter
Here is a copy of our Christmas letter FYI!
The Andersons wish you God’s blessings for the Holy-day season and throughout the New Year. It certainly has been a whirlwind of a year! We did not travel last Christmas but enjoyed the quieter pace of Christmas and look forward to having a busy fun time with family and friends.
Winter 2007 was FUN. We had lots of fun snow and time to play in it! Collin and Hans participated in Basketball clinics and Erin did gymnastics. Alan has not chosen an activity or sport yet. Collin continues in piano and got to learn some fun songs like the theme to STAR WARS and the Battle Hymn of the Republic.
Spring 2007 came too early and then left. A beautiful wheat crop came out of dormancy and then got frozen Easter weekend. It was predicted to be the best crop in years and yet it was so badly damaged that it ended up being the worst crop in decades. On top of that there was such a shortage of “good wheat” that many scrambled to get seed good enough to plant for 2008. Then it rained and rained and the farmers had a hard time getting the summer crops into the ground! Sigh, the farm year stunk, BUT GOD is so amazingly faithful that there is just nothing to do, but TRUST HIM! The willingness to do so, pleases HIM and He blessed our guys with the strength to endure the adversity. Sometimes the slow insidious trials can stretch us in different ways than the catastrophic. Is it really ironic that we are participating in 2 different Bible studies: Trusting God (Jerry Bridges) and Believing God (Beth Moore)??? Both are excellent and I highly recommend them! Praise His name!
Summer 2007: We had a slow lazy summer, well the kids and I did! Chris worked his tail off! We went to the pool, the park, the ball field, the library and worked the vegetable garden. Mostly we just goofed off! Hans played baseball and loved it. He did a great job and was a natural batter. We had a lovely trip to Colorado for a family vacation. Went on our first camping trip with Uncle Bob and Aunt Marlene, who were so awesome and patient with us!!! (for details check out the blog!) School came way too fast, even for Mom who kept dreaming of all the scrapbooking she’d do when all the children were in school. NOPE
Fall 2007: All 4 children head to school. Alan is in all day kindergarten, Hans in 2nd, Erin 4th and Collin is in 5th grade. We make it through all the Open Houses and get all the school supplies bought. So why is mom not scrapbooking? A part time counseling position opened up at Sterling College. Long story short, I recertify, get my license back and head off to my first out of the house paid job in 7 years! It’s been an adjustment, but I am amazed at God’s timing! His sovereignty is more than we can ever fathom. Remember those summer crops we had a hard time getting in the ground well the corn was not good, the milo was great. Somehow, we managed to make it with enough to see us through another year. I don’t know how God does it! I am so thankful for a husband that just does not give up & a God who has mercifully chosen to bless his hard work!!
Year’s End: As we come to the close of the year we are enjoying some wintery weather, deer hunting, Christmas music and caroling. Chris got 2 deer this year and he is still in the midst of processing it. For more updates on our lives check us out on the web at: http://www.christeri.blogspot.com/ my scrapbook website will move to http://scrapbooksbyteri.embarqspace.com/ I will continue custom Scrapbooking in the new year, but on a limited scale.
That is our lives in a nutshell, well a big nutshell.
Ephesians 3:20-21 Now to Hhim who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to His power that is at work within us, to Him be glory in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen
Merry Christmas to you and yours!
In Christ’s Love,
Winter 2007 was FUN. We had lots of fun snow and time to play in it! Collin and Hans participated in Basketball clinics and Erin did gymnastics. Alan has not chosen an activity or sport yet. Collin continues in piano and got to learn some fun songs like the theme to STAR WARS and the Battle Hymn of the Republic.
Spring 2007 came too early and then left. A beautiful wheat crop came out of dormancy and then got frozen Easter weekend. It was predicted to be the best crop in years and yet it was so badly damaged that it ended up being the worst crop in decades. On top of that there was such a shortage of “good wheat” that many scrambled to get seed good enough to plant for 2008. Then it rained and rained and the farmers had a hard time getting the summer crops into the ground! Sigh, the farm year stunk, BUT GOD is so amazingly faithful that there is just nothing to do, but TRUST HIM! The willingness to do so, pleases HIM and He blessed our guys with the strength to endure the adversity. Sometimes the slow insidious trials can stretch us in different ways than the catastrophic. Is it really ironic that we are participating in 2 different Bible studies: Trusting God (Jerry Bridges) and Believing God (Beth Moore)??? Both are excellent and I highly recommend them! Praise His name!
Summer 2007: We had a slow lazy summer, well the kids and I did! Chris worked his tail off! We went to the pool, the park, the ball field, the library and worked the vegetable garden. Mostly we just goofed off! Hans played baseball and loved it. He did a great job and was a natural batter. We had a lovely trip to Colorado for a family vacation. Went on our first camping trip with Uncle Bob and Aunt Marlene, who were so awesome and patient with us!!! (for details check out the blog!) School came way too fast, even for Mom who kept dreaming of all the scrapbooking she’d do when all the children were in school. NOPE
Fall 2007: All 4 children head to school. Alan is in all day kindergarten, Hans in 2nd, Erin 4th and Collin is in 5th grade. We make it through all the Open Houses and get all the school supplies bought. So why is mom not scrapbooking? A part time counseling position opened up at Sterling College. Long story short, I recertify, get my license back and head off to my first out of the house paid job in 7 years! It’s been an adjustment, but I am amazed at God’s timing! His sovereignty is more than we can ever fathom. Remember those summer crops we had a hard time getting in the ground well the corn was not good, the milo was great. Somehow, we managed to make it with enough to see us through another year. I don’t know how God does it! I am so thankful for a husband that just does not give up & a God who has mercifully chosen to bless his hard work!!
Year’s End: As we come to the close of the year we are enjoying some wintery weather, deer hunting, Christmas music and caroling. Chris got 2 deer this year and he is still in the midst of processing it. For more updates on our lives check us out on the web at: http://www.christeri.blogspot.com/ my scrapbook website will move to http://scrapbooksbyteri.embarqspace.com/ I will continue custom Scrapbooking in the new year, but on a limited scale.
That is our lives in a nutshell, well a big nutshell.
Ephesians 3:20-21 Now to Hhim who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to His power that is at work within us, to Him be glory in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen
Merry Christmas to you and yours!
In Christ’s Love,
Saturday, December 15, 2007
Just a few more ice shots
Our ice storm story is below, but ehre are a few more pictures:
The trees fell over but the sunflowers did not?
The chicken coupe fence:
Tumbleweed on ice:
Restored...
OK, I confess, I blog in groups. Praise the Lord, we have power! It was closer to 6 p.m. and finally blinking lights showed up in our driveway....city utility trucks! Halleluiah! Can you see the expectation on the kids faces? 
The generator was a blessing but we still we are limited power, no TV, laundry, microwave, several rooms were without power etc. So tonight we turned on the Christmas lights inside and out and the children have both tv's and both computers going! We are such pansies!!! I almost feel guilty because there are so many other people who will go the Holidays without power, our prayers are with you. Our generator made it's way over to Mike and Staci's house so they can keep they can use water and the fridge and freezer. We had about 6-8 inches of snow as forecasted last night which made for more pictures:
The generator was a blessing but we still we are limited power, no TV, laundry, microwave, several rooms were without power etc. So tonight we turned on the Christmas lights inside and out and the children have both tv's and both computers going! We are such pansies!!! I almost feel guilty because there are so many other people who will go the Holidays without power, our prayers are with you. Our generator made it's way over to Mike and Staci's house so they can keep they can use water and the fridge and freezer. We had about 6-8 inches of snow as forecasted last night which made for more pictures:
Powerless!
On December 10th KS got hit by quite an ice storm! People were predicting a bad storm (over reacting I thought!). Those way out in the country prepared for power outages...it's common when you live out in the country. We were thankful we lived so close to town, we don't often lose power during such storms....until now. Monday night we started hearing significant size branches fall from trees. Bill and Paula were already out of power and firing up the generator. I woke up at 1:30 am to darkness and cold. Soon after Alan woke up scared because of the pitch black. We lit a few candles and huddled under blankets. I slept fitfully watching the candles. The City Power plant number was busy until 4 am. By 6:30 we had power--phew. I made a pot of coffee, actually 2 and put one in the thermos. At 8 am the power went off again and it's now Saturday at 5 pm and we stil are powerless. Praise God for the generator that Chris bought to help service harvest equipment in the field. He was able to wire it to the house and have minimal power (fridge, freezer, heat and water). That warmed our spirits and our bodies. Until we learned that we probably ruined the furnace running it on low / sporatic voltage. We will see, we are thankful that we should be getting power soon! Here is our tree back by the kennels Sunday afternoon before Monday's storm, we'd had a light freezing rain...
Here os the same tree Tuesday morning! Our chicken coup is buried under the second picture. are buried under it, f ortunately no one was hurt.
Here's the tree in our front yard. It was the first one to go. It was so eerie walking around Tuesday morning listening to everything creek and make noise like it was going to fall down.
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