Merry Christmas from Craig and Kathy

2018 Christmas Letter

I haven't written a blog in a year. I'm not sure how often I will write a blog, but I thought I would send this out as a Christmas Letter this year.
The Motorhome has been sold and we now own two homes. One in Crown Point, Indiana and another small Park Model that we purchased in Wellton, AZ.

Since we no longer own the Whale, I have made a change in the name of the Blog from, "Tales of the Whale" to "Tales of the Way". Considering that we sold the RV, we didn't think we would be traveling as much, BUT... we have.

We feel blessed to have a home here with all of the good friends we have made over the past 5 years.  We live in AZ from late Oct to April.  Park Models are small, but compared the the Motorhome, we have plenty of room.
We usually spend Christmas with Mom in Las Vegas, but this year we are staying here and enjoying the Park's festivities. We'll go up to see her in Jan to take down her decorations.

 Christmas lights and hanging flower baskets is not something we used to see.

We drove 1900 miles in late Oct. to get here.  I'll try to highlight through our time in Indiana.

We worked with our son, Jeff, doing projects for Bethel Church Ministries.  They keep us very busy, but we were still able to get in a trip to CO in May for Carter's HS graduation.  He is our third graduate.

Carter with his siblings, Cooper, Collin and Kyra.

In June we celebrated our 48th Anniversary with good friends, Vern and Kathy in Michigan.  We always enjoy our time with them.


In July we attended my 50th Class Reunion.

In late July our Colorado family joined us in Indiana for a reunion.  

 We enjoyed some pool time at Jeff and Rachel's.
We also spent a few days at Pine Lake, Indiana getting to do some swimming and boating.

Our oldest son, Todd.

Cooper, Ty, Haley, Kyra, Kristen, Collin and Carter

It's not easy to get all of the grand kids together, but we did get a few to cooperate.
Craig flew out to Las Vegas to help Mom fly back to Indiana for three weeks to be a part of the family gatherings. Each year there is a large Hoffman Family Reunion.  This year, it was at Lake of the Four Seasons in Crown Point, Indiana.

Mom enjoyed her time in Indiana (her home town) and then, Todd flew with her back to her home in Las Vegas, NV.

We tried again for a complete family picture, but we were still missing some.

We made it out on Jeff's friend's private pond to fish a few times.

In Sept, Craig's brother, Chuck and his wife, Pudge, came for a visit.

We made a long drive to Ely, MN to fish on Moose Lake.  We were right near the Canadian border and it was beautiful!  Todd and Jeff joined us for part of the week along with Jim and Marie V.  They are old time fishing buddies.

Sunrise in MN

As the summer drew to an end and our time in Indiana we really enjoyed the family time that we could fit in.

Todd, Jennifer, Kathy, Rachel, Kara, Jeff, Craig and Ty.  They all get pretty irritated that I want to take pictures, but these are precious to me while we are away.

We had a very busy last few weeks in Indiana wrapping up projects, but we were able to pull out for the 1900 mile, 2 1/2 day trip to Wellton, AZ and Tier Drop RV Park.  These were some of the faces we were anxious to see.

We got settled in to the Park Model and a couple weeks later we drove up to Tempe, AZ to meet our daughter, Tana and her daughter, Kyra, who was running her last Cross Country Meet.

My younger brother, Dave, lives in Scottsdale, so he drove down to have dinner out with us.  It's always good to see him.

Tana and her daddy.

We drove to Mom's in Las Vegas (300 miles) for Thanksgiving.  

We had a nice dinner out instead of cooking. Mom's friend, Minerva, joined us.

We decorated Mom's place for Christmas before heading back to AZ.

I LOVE the sunrises of AZ. Just in case you hadn't noticed.

We have spent the last three weeks remodeling our "Arizona Room" and turning it into our bedroom with it's own bathroom.

We installed new flooring

 

 Craig had to do some tricky maneuvers to install the new plumbing.

I just came back in from a walk outside to hear a wagon of Carolers singing to us all for Christmas.  What a wonderful season remembering the birth of Jesus, Emmanuel, God with us!

Merry Christmas and New Year Blessings to you!!

Craig and Kathy