Dear family:

I boldly announced that the computer was mine this evening, and thereby have no further excuse for delaying in writing to you, other than I don’t know where to begin. I’ll try to follow some consecutive order, but before I do, there are a few family milestones left over from the summer that never got mentioned in previous letters that I made note of on a scrap of paper. I mention them here in case we need to know these things fifty years from now. The first is that Ben gave up his "bedtime blankie" this summer. Just prior to his fifth birthday I suggested that he should give it up when he turned five. He thought about it for a few minutes and then said he would give it up when he was six. But actually, it disappeared without being noticed or mourned by anyone but me.

Similarly, my old faithful Laneco grocery store closed down this summer. I now have to travel farther afield to a store with less efficient check-out clerks. It’s funny, I know, but I feel a bit homeless without a grocery store. Quite a few people have gushed to us about the grandiose new Wegman’s that has opened up in the township. It is not close to us, but Mom and I intend to take a sightseeing trip there some day soon. Fortunately we have our wonderful little Sim’s neighborhood store to keep us from starving.

Life has gone on, of course. We welcomed Mom and Dad home on October 4^th. They were the last to come down the airport hallway, and we had become concerned that something was wrong. We asked the flight crew and they immediately assured us that the only problem was that the Feavers had had too much to drink! We made quite a scene in the airport – they brought leis for us, we had flowers and balloons for them. Ben’s first question was whether they wanted all of the balloons for themselves. After a dinner out with Uncle David (where we gave the leis to the happy restaurant personnel) we returned home – which for Nana and Poppa meant staying at our house since theirs was under renovations, not to mention without furniture.

Those days have been busy, but so wonderful to have them to share with. The first priority was to get Dad established with the medical community here. Their first taste of culture shock was the more officious way that medical care is managed here, compared to the informal Hawaiian style. We also took care of a myriad of details – new licenses, parking permits, and all the little things that are involved in a major move. In spite of all the run around, Dad improved daily and was benefitting from the cooler climate. His blood sugar came down to normal and his shortness of breath was gone. He was promptly taken off medical leave and put to work teaching Latin to Christopher.

There have been plenty of special events. Our daily routine seems to revolve around looking for lost items and coordinating schedules. But each week is punctuated by interesting diversions. Many of these involve the Lehigh students and their social events. We have had students over for meals lots of times, as well as for movie nights. There have been several concerts at Zoellner, and we had quite a crowd for the night we went through a corn maze. Our family has done corn mazes in the daytime before, but the Lehigh gang wanted to try one at night. Ben was eager to go along, too, but had serious reservations once we were out in the middle. Fortunately David has a good sense of direction and we made it out in decent time.

I had one night out with some women in my church to see Princess Diaries. We are all mothers of boys, and figured we’d never get our families to watch it, so we had a ladies’ night out. We had the theater to ourselves, so it was a lot of fun.

Of course, you are all more interested in news about the boys than about my gallivantings. I’ll start at the top.

Peter. Peter is the major newsmaker in the household. No sooner did he recover from his sprained ankle than he broke his clavicle in a collision with another player. This started yet another round of doctor’s visits. He managed to once again heal fast enough to catch the latter part of the soccer season, scoring a total of four goals for his team. His team was favored to win the districts, but lost in the first round in a heart-breaking upset. (Hearts weren’t the only thing broken. A number of the players were injured and one even ended up in the hospital.) I caught most of his home games but since the away games are often quite a distance, I usually didn’t see those. However, one beautiful fall day I decided to jump in the car to watch his game against Wetherly. I was feeling a rush of sadness that Peter’s senior soccer season was ending. I had no idea how far away Wetherly actually is (past Jim Thorpe) and had serious questions about whether the car was in fact up to the challenge of the mountains once I was on the way, but the drive through Lehigh Gorge was stunning.

Peter continues to exasperate his mother by things like having his senior picture taken in his favorite "Do Nothing/ Avoid Criticism" tee shirt and not getting his driver’s permit. If he’s smart he’ll butter me up because the school bus drivers are going on strike this week and he’ll need a ride to school.

Christopher. I think all of you get Christopher’s newsletter, so you know exactly what is going on here and in his life. His current project is a massive vocabulary list. I’m a little fuzzy on its purpose, but there is no question about it being his passion. If nothing else, it is a distraction from his assigned project; namely, a major research paper on the history of mahogany in furniture making, and the dreaded geometry. He started attending the 4-H Veterinary Science club, something he has wanted to do for a few years, and hopefully will join the local homeschool chess club, as well. I should comment here that Christopher’s main hobby appears to be eating. He is unquestionably in the "hollow leg" years.

Stephen. Yesterday marked the end of Stephen’s soccer season – one of those "character-building" seasons. He turned twelve in October, and though his birthday was nearly lost in the shuffle, he managed to come out of it with a new bike. Somewhere in the house he has hidden a massive amount of Trick or Treat candy. He and his friend Joseph went around both Bethlehem and Wescosville dressed as elves from The Lord of the Rings. This past week we went on a field trip to John James Audubon’s home. Stephen proved to be a talented scout, as he led his group out of the woods on the nature trail. He has been practicing with his bow and arrow outdoors, and his harmonica indoors. Stephen would probably describe school as a necessary evil, but he loves the daily reading time when Nana reads missionary stories aloud to him.

Ben. Benjamin has taken to public prayers which, I blush to admit, are the kind that the Pharisees made popular in Biblical times. They always begin, "Jesus Lord, help us to have a good time…" after which follows a long list of anything he can think of doing. Once in a while he shows potential as a Pentecostal preacher. "Show us the way, God, show us the way!" Then, when he is finished, he sidles up to me and asks, rhetorically, "Wasn’t my prayer the BEST?" On the way to a service in which David was preaching, he asked, "When is it my turn to speak up front?"