Farnsworth Forum

For the fourth year in a row we went caroling today to spread a little Christmas cheer and God's love. We sang three carols and shared some homemade Christmas cookies. Joel and Amelia did very well singing. The practice session above, complete with turkey bone "microphone," must have been effective.

Joel and Amelia opened their last fabric gift bag for the 24 Days of Christmas. We started this tradition when Joel was born. Instead of big gifts at Christmas they the children alternately open a small gift each day, and we read a Christmas Bible verse together. It's always an exciting part of December. This was the third Christmas in a row that we roasted turkey. A local church donated turkeys to all the missionary families staying at Missionary Retreat Fellowship. What a blessing. We all stuffed ourselves, even without stuffing! (We had mashed potatoes instead!)

This morning we woke up to a winter wonderland. All of us were very excited! After home school we rushed outside to go sledding. This was our second time sledding this year. Imagine the excitement after four years in the tropics! The children also made some snow angels.

Feliz Navidad y Dios les bendiga en 2011. Please forgive the Spanish greeting; we (except Marisol) need to practice for our return to Ecuador next summer. Thank you for all your prayers. 2010 has proved to be more challenging than we thought. First, we left Guam and Pacific Islands University in June, which presented our family with a HUGE transition. Then Ned's Dad was diagnosed with bladder cancer in September and underwent surgery. We invite your prayers for his upcoming treatments which start on December 27 . Finally, two dear friends died within a couple months. Through all of this we have found God to be as faithful as ever. We have participated in a number of missions conferences and meetings; God has blessed us through these opportunities to refresh existing friendships and establish many new ones. We really thank God for that. Joel and Amelia are thriving in our local church's Awana program on Wednesday nights, and Ned and Marisol attend prayer meeting at the s...

We were pleased to purchase a real Christmas tree again this year after four years of artificiality. It looks so nice and smells so wintry. We all had fun decorating it, too. Enjoy!

And we're not talking about the new Yogi Bear movie! We found these prints outside our house the other day. We're hoping not to see Mr. Bear up close, at least not too close. I prefer my bears at a distance. How about you?

Roadside America is a wonderful place to visit with a complete miniature town built to scale with moving parts and trains going all around. We four spent two hours going around the village twice on two different levels, and Joel and Amelia had a grand time. We highly recommend it. The other part of our field trip was a quicker trip to Cabela's, the world's foremost outfitter, according to them. Their animal displays and fresh water aquarium are "out of this world," and remind us how great God created the world and everything in it.

Two months ago we celebrated our dear friend Melissa's birthday at the local Chinese buffet. Then we went to a hayride and corn maze at the Oley Valley Dairy with our bilingual Baptist Church. Lovely times indeed!

These pictures were taken at a Christmas in October celebration at St. James Church in West Reading. (We're just two months late in posting the photos!) St. James supports our missionary work. We were thrilled to participate in the program with Dr. and Mrs. Jewell. The Jewells have been friends all my life and currently do medical missions in Zambia. Their presentation inspired all of us to "give our all for the Lord."

No, the women in my life did not bleach their hair. We were just having fun one day at my parents' house and wanted to share the joy with all of you. Have a good laugh!