1999 Christmas Letter

Christmas 1999 (and New Year’s, Valentine’s Day, etc.-at least it isn’t Easter yet!-printing this 8 Mar 2000) Hello to you All!

This have been an event-filled year for the Crossetts of East Thetford, Vermont! Late in December we took Jonathan to the temple in Washington as he had received his mission call to the Belgium Brussels mission. He discovered that President Roueche had served as mission president there. We also took JonE to the temple during February vacation then shipped him off to the Missionary Training Center early in March�a week early so he could visit with Janus, Laura, Grace and Christopher before entering the MTC. He had spent the previous fall working at the Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center doing lots of computer jobs for the good folks there. When he entered the MTC he spent two months improving his French as he was assigned to the Belgium Brussels Mission. He was called as District Leader and got to have some extra leadership training. The first few weeks he was there in Provo he also worked in the Media Center which is where the Church advertisements’ 800-numbers send you. He really enjoyed the time he spent in the Media Center. He completed his training and left for Brussels in May. His first area was in Lille, France, then on to Dunkerque, France and now he is in Arras. He has had lots of great stories to tell us…the most intriguing one was that he got to drive one of the trains�though not the TGV (the super fast trains that run in France), thank goodness.

Robbie has been active in school, in music, in the school musical and in soccer. He was in the Winooski Valley Music Festival again this year. During September and October he was in the chorus of “The Garden” an allegorical oratorio by Michael McLean and Bryce Neubert. He has a wonderful bass voice which he is also using this basketball season opening each varsity home game with the national anthem as part of a quartet.

Megan has been serving her mission in Venezuela and returned home on 14 December to celebrate the holidays with us. While on her mission she served in several areas in and around Caracas as well as spent two months serving on Curacao where she learned a second new language-Papamiento. She tells the history of that language as being first used by the slaves that lived there so that their masters could not understand the slaves’ conversations. Of course, that was a long time ago. She said Curacao was a beautiful place. For several months while in Caracas she worked in the National Family History Center doing data entry into Personal Ancestral File software in which many Venezuelans are recording their family genealogies.

Christopher spent a rather full year in Logan, Utah where he worked as well as was enrolled at Utah State University completing his bachelor’s degree in Accounting in December. Anyone know of any jobs available to a hard-working go-getting sort of man?! He is planning to return to graduate school in the fall for his MBA. He got a job doing broadcasting at KUSU-FM 91.5(Utah Public Radio). He works Friday nights and Saturday mornings, so this works out great for him to do his homework. He was also able to come home for Christmas in Vermont, to our very great pleasure. One day of the vacation he and Janus spent in South Royalton with cousin Jeremiah Curtis pulling down plaster and lath in the south end of the home where Grant L. M. Corwin and his family were born and raised preparatory to the wiring being upgraded. Christopher also spent a day with Robbie tearing down our barn, and two days burning up the remnants as well as cutting and burning some dead apple trees. The pyromaniacs in the family had a great time!!! Now Christopher wants to cut down a good many more of the large pines in the dooryard. We may be able to keep him away from them, if we are lucky!!! He is a great hand with a chainsaw.

Janus is pouring his blood, sweat and tears into school at Utah Valley State College and work at Auto-Soft in Salt Lake City, as well as spending every “free” moment renovating/rebuilding an old house in Salt Lake with a brother-in-law. Laura spent time working as an extra in three movies this fall as well as one episode of “Touched By An Angel”. I believe our former car, a nice brown Toyota Camry wagon that now belongs to Janus and Laura, also had a part in that episode! Grace is growing up and talking up a storm. She loves to have stories read to her and she is really extremely bright….no kidding! This is not just Grandma-talk. In conversations with her you may say something to her and rather than just repeating back what you have just said as do most 2-nearly-3-year-olds, she will give back to you the next step or even further out. She is an independent thinker at this young age. We look forward to see what she will do in the future. She will sit and listen to as many stories as one will read, and not get edgy….! And besides all the above�she is just plain adorable! With a cowlick!

Bob has had a busy year…. so what else is new!! One of the big things he did this year was to take a group of Boy Scouts from church on a 50-mile hike along the Appalachian Trail in Vermont. The weather was record-breakingly hot and humid and the group used ALL the gatorade that had been brought along and nearly expired anyway. Bob wants to do another section of the trail next summer….maybe even upping the ante to 100 miles. He has spent a good deal of time with his computer systems at Thetford Academy, and also has taken two courses at Lebanon College this fall about webpage design. He made many trips to Washington, DC to continue his service as an ordinance worker in the temple there. He took Megan down two days after she returned from her mission�a trip they both enjoyed immensely.

Pattie’s year has been pretty tame though she did go to the CES Old Testament Symposium at Brigham Young University in August and spent 10 days with Janus and Laura. She continues to work on Linus Project quilts from time to time and is currently finishing a quilt for Bob. This fall she has been on IV therapy for the Lyme disease and� after a big fight with the insurance company, and several LONG days going to the hospital for the medication� she is now back at home continuing the IV meds herself and will complete the dosage in mid-January, hopefully. Hooray! After that, one more round of oral antibiotics should bring an end to eighteen months of antibiotics. At least this is the dream. Reality may include more IV meds…

Great-Grandpa John Crossett’s health took a turn for the worse in March and culminated with him entering a nursing home in Barre in June. Great-Grandma Marjorie Crossett had a hip replaced in June and, for a while, was recovering in the same nursing home a few doors down from Great-Grandpa. She is well-recovered from the surgery and goes to visit Great-Grandpa every day her health and the weather cooperate.

With much love and best wishes from us all-Bob, Pattie, Janus, Laura and Grace, Christopher, Megan, Jonathan and Robbie.