1970=.docx

3936 Silver Beach Ave.
BELLINGHAM, Wa., 98225
Christmas, 1970

Seasons Greetings:

This has been a year that we have been waiting for for a longtime. George finished his Ph.D. in sociology at the University of Wisconsin in Madison. We all went back to Madison at the beginning of the summer, camping along the way in Glacier National Park and in various roadside camps. In Madison we rented a small cottage on the shore of Lake Mendota. For much of the summer David went to a program for the retarded (until he got pneumonia) and Todd went to a recreation program run by the school district in a nearby school. The summer was enlivened by trips to see the grandparents in Wausau and a trip to Milwaukee to see the Baraboo World Circus Museum Parade. Toward the end of the summer we enjoyed watching Mary Ann’s younger brother, Herbert, get married. Less than a week after the wedding George finished his work at the University and we again headed West, camping along the road and spending an extra three days in Yellowstone National Park. They boys loved camping, especially when we cooked over an open fire and had dinner in the dark.

Earlier in the year, over Easter vacation, Mary Ann took a vacation on the Monterey Peninsula. During that time George took care of the boys so Mary Ann could enjoy her visit with so many of her friends in and around Monterey. George still works for the Governor’s Advisory Committee on Mexican American Affairs and this job (voluntary) takes him all over the state of Washington. Sometimes he has to fly to the Eastern part of the State two or three times in a single month. Since he is also active on the local 0E0 board this gets him involved in work with the local Indians, with the senior citizens and with many other such groups in the county.

Mary Ann is active in work with the retarded and has accepted a position on the board of one of the local organizations. While the programs for the retarded in this county are better than many there is still a lot to be done. Next year we will be even more active in that field. David just loves his schooling and is now reading even more than before. He is learning to swim better and goes to a recreation program for the retarded on Saturday afternoons. David also goes to a speech therapy program here on the WWSC campus two afternoons per week at which time Todd is left off at the YMCA where he gets swimming lessons and also gymnastics training. Todd is doing OK is school. He is no genious but rather just a normal healthy kid who is perhaps more ready to engage in a fight than his teacher (or mother) would care for. It is probably a matter of self defense, then, that causes Mary Ann to go to the YMCA three mornings a week for exercise, paddle ball and swimming, so she can keep up with the rest of the family.

This fall we moved the old pioneer log cabins that George bought earlier in the year in the northern part of the county. They were built in 1867-1870 and were made of hand hewn cedar logs (or planks). We hope to reconstruct them in our woods and use them. We are tentatively thinking of making one of them into a guest house-study, another into a garden workshop and tool house and the other will be reconstructed as a pioneer dwelling with antique artifacts. George is going to cut shake for the roofs of the three cabins since the “old-timer” from whom he bought the cabins also sold him a lot of old growth cedar that can be cut up for shake.

We have also contracted with an architect to design a house for us to be built up in our woods. Altogether we have about seven acres of beautiful woods, bordered on one side by the school that Todd attends and on another by the city water department tank. We are planning to “garden” the woods with wild flowers. George is working out a plan with the city and the school for the development of a nature laboratory for the children in the school next door.