01/20/24
We have a lot to share with you since our last newsletter.
We visited Descanso Gardens and experienced their incredible Enchanted Forest of Light.
We closed the purchase of our investment home on December 7th and dove straightaway into getting it ready for guests. It’s definitely intimidating spending so much money getting ready while not yet making any money. We should be ready to share it with the world in a couple of weeks!
A few days later, Hannah got super-hot tea spilled on her legs, which scalded one of them and burned a lot of skin off the other one. Hannah couldn’t walk for a week, and two of the kids got sick that week. Some supportive friends graciously accompanied us to the emergency room, and in the following week, a sweet, retired nurse from church came to our house and helped change Hannah’s bandages and monitor her healing. Others brought us meals and generally encouraged us. Thankfully, Hannah is 95% healed now, and we are very grateful for our supportive community.
Despite Hannah’s injury, we hosted our 5th Annual Crisp, Carols, and Cheer at our home. We had a wonderful time enjoying some treats, good conversations, and singing together. If you missed it, you can enjoy some Christmas Carols I recorded at www.hansonhomes.net/carols. I’d especially love for you to hear my arrangement of “Carol of the Bells.”
The kids all continue growing as musicians, and they all performed in the Christmas recital and concert with Foothill Musical Art, a program that offers band, choir, strings, keyboard, and guitar for homeschool students.
Several of us were sick right before Christmas, so we canceled our travel plans and had a quiet Christmas at home.
In the first week of January, we all went to stay at our investment home in New Albany, Indiana, which we’ve tentatively named The Sapphire House. We found lots of things we wanted to fix to improve the experience for our future guests. Everyone pitched in on projects, except Annaliese, the baby. She especially loved climbing the three stories of stairs, which was Hannah’s least favorite part of the trip. We accomplished a lot, learned a lot, and made memories.
Evangeline asked to go on a bike ride and asked if we could try to make it to Trader Joe’s, which is a longer ride than she’s ever done before, and we made it. It’s wonderful to see her confidence grow. She picked a stretch goal, almost turned back 70% of the way there, pushed through the resistance, and made it.
We’re thankful to be home, well, and able to catch up on some of the things that have gone unattended during the chaos of the last month.
Blessings until next time!
