December 30, 2007
First of all, how we love the letters and cards written by family members, sent to the mission home and delivered to our door by the local Sister Missionaries. It is one of the highlights of the Holiday season. Thanks to everyone who participated - we have read and reread each one several times.
A few days before Christmas we spent some time in Washington D.C. going to the temple and seeing the sights. A highlight was attending a National Symphony Orchestra production of Handel's Messiah at the Kennedy Center. The music and the Kennedy Center are both beyond words.
The two highlights of any Christmas away from home is (1) the opening of gifts from family members. We even watch the mail each day (when the FedEx truck pulls up to the apartment complex we watch his every move) and each gift is special to us. (2)The phone calls we receive on Christmas day/evening. We did a little calculating and found that we spent about 3.5 hours on the phone - and enjoyed every minute.
Even here in Virginia we continue a long time family tradition of anonymously helping others - this time by delivering fruit baskets, complete with a lot of extra "lettuce", to a couple of deserving families. Since it was broad daylight and I don't run that well anyway we told the people an anonymous person had ask the missionaries to deliver the baskets and we didn’t know where they came from or what the baskets contained - that seemed to work!
Our Christmas dinner is a little smaller than last year but just as fun. Guests include Gail Smith, an older single lady, Sarah, a SVU student from California who could not afford to go home for Christmas and John Nurnberg and Barbara Van Kiken (don't ask me why they keep separate last names, but they do), a married couple (she is a professor at SVU) who have no children and no family close by, also her mother passed away recently. The six of us have an excellent turkey dinner and then take turns talking about our most "memorable" Christmas. I talk about our (Brent included) Christmas day trip (and trying to find a place to eat in Great Falls) from Craig's home in SLC to pick up Roger at the Lethbridge Airport that evening. Mom tells about making, with Kathy's help, a special anonymous Christmas dress for a ward member. Gail talked about Christmas in the mission field - the Netherlands. The Newburg/Van Kiken's tell this crazy story about John proposing marriage - and Barb accepting - even thou she knew a second suitor was flying in from Seattle to spend Christmas week with her. What happened during that week would be worthy of a Julia Roberts movie. After dinner we spent a pleasant afternoon playing Chicken Feet/Mexican Train.
We hope each of you had a great Christmas and don't forget to check out the Cottle Blog (I hear there is a new puppy in Seattle - hope to see some pictures on the Blog). Also check out some dumb riddles – a new one each day this week – where else, but the Cottle Blog!
Love
Elder/Grandpa/Dad Cottle
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