Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to all! On this special day, you all, the members of my seminary family, are especially present in my thoughts and prayers. I hope that your respective Christmases are full of blessings.

There is a chance of a white Christmas here, so that is exciting :)

Take care and Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!!!

Love, Jenn :)

Blizzard!!!

The snow has started falling here in Eastern Colorado. We are hoping that we can get out Christmas Day as we head to Spokane.
If you go to this web site http://www.goyuma.com/ then find the Yuma Cam link you can see a current picture of Yuma. If you click on the recent link you will see pictures from the last 24 hours.

Since the whole state of Colorado is shut down we took a few pictures from out in the front of our home.

Armstrong's Christmas Open House

Our first Christmas in Yuma!

We took our Christmas Card picture before we headed out to school & jobs one morning, and as small towns go I had at least two people tell me they saw us taking the picture that morning!

However our Church family and the town in general have been super welcoming, and supportive of Harold in his role, of the boys as individuals, and of Megan as her own person! In fact many times Megan has been introduced only as Megan Armstrong...and then they ask if she was recently married to one of the "Armstrong boy's"(large family of Armstrong's in town). To cut down on confusion, Megan has since started introducing herself as "Megan Armstrong, wife of Pastor Harold at the Presbyterian Church"!

Here is Josiah and Silas helping making goodies for the open house. Josiah is still proudly wearing his Steelers gear even though we are deep in Bronco country!

Megan as usual made a bagillion cookies, and we increased our turkey count this year for the party from two to three! Here is a picture of one the beauties! And old trusty turkey fryer luckily didn't get lost in the move.

Here are some pictures of our open house spread! We had more room to work with! We missed seeing you all, but we did have a familiar face! Matt Gearke joined us from Denver! We wish you all the best this Advent season as we prepare for the Hope of Christmas Day!

Beer IS theology

Time to open the brew


This has been sitting around in the family room in bottles for the last week or two.


Apparently one adds a bit of sugar for a final finish from the yeast which leads to carbonation before bottling.


There is a certain level of anticipation at this moment. Its about 4 pm on a busy Saturday spent running Christmas errands.

We went to a tree farm this morning and then split up - the boys to brave Santa Rosa Ave where all the big box stores are zoned and I to Trader Joes (on a Saturday afternoon no less!) The local TJ near the house is not as busy as the Marin location and people are nicer to each other with the carts in the aisle thing. None the less...

We're ready for this beer.


First, Bill takes a sip













Beer is good.

Beer is absolutely one of the signs that God loves us and wants us to be happy.

Home made beer is a sign that God loves us a lot.







Time for some more theology.



Amy Moiso sent a link to a great website:

http://www.calvinus.ch/

Behold I am Doing a New Thing

Behold I am Doing a New Thing

Well it's my last day here -- feels very weird to say the very least!
Here's how you can find us next:

Stephanie & Jim Croom
2795 Riley Ridge Road
Holland MI 49424

Western Theological Seminary
101 E. 13th Street
Holland MI 49423
stephanie@westernsem.edu

Love to you all
Merry Christmas
Happy Everything!

Bless your hearts!
steph

Not in Kansas anymore

Remember way back in April when our class had that debate about the invitation to the Lord's Table at baccalaureate? The same topic came up in my ecumenical theology class today; we were discussing who is invited to receive communion in various traditions and contexts. All was going along swimmingly until we got to some of the African students. "In order to receive communion in my church," one student said, "you have to be at least 12 years old, you have to be baptized, and you can't have more than one wife."

Hmm.

It gets better: even though a baptized polygamist husband cannot receive communion, his baptized first wife can.

His other wives, baptized or not, can't.

Perhaps we should have included this stipulation at our baccalaureate service?!?

Oklahoma is OK

Hello all! I have been meaning to post for quite a while, but complacency and hoping for something more exciting to report kept getting to me. Anyway, I am doing alright here in OK, and the search for a call continues.

I am in conversation with a church in Salem, NY, which is upstate, rural near Vermont. They are great people, but I am trying not to get my hopes up too much...however, I really do feel like this is a call. So, keep them and me in your prayers please.

I guess the only other news is that I have gotten a black lab named Knox. He turned a year old at the first of the month. He is super sweet and we are training he to be a service dog for me. Currently he weighs 90 pounds, so he is a sturdy, good guy to have around for balance! Here is a pic of him when I first got him in August...I need to get more I know :)



Anyway, I think that is all for now. Congrats James!!!

Love to you all, Jenn :)

Winter Wilburland

Greetings from our Wilbur winter wonderland. As I sit and type it is snowing outside and the Peanuts Christmas album is playing. I can't remember a Holiday season that I have enjoyed this much.

Lars and I had a wonderful but short trip to the Bay Area for Thanksgiving. We had time to stop by the seminary, say "hi", and get a much needed burrito fix at Mi Pueblo. We also had a short visit with Elizabeth. It was nice to see family and friends again.

Things are in full swing at the church. There is a busy holiday schedule and I am so happy to have a place to work and worship during advent. This Sunday is the children's christmas program which happens during worship. Then caroling at 4pm and a chili feed afterwards. Next Sunday I am doing a sermon with my harp believe it or not. I am going to play a medley and preach in between the pieces. I think it is going to be really neat.

Lars is still looking for a job. There is not much out here but I am confident that something will come up sooner or later.

I got a new robe. The super cool skirt kind that we all said we would get when we get ordained. It just came last week so this is my first Sunday with it. Hopefully it goes over well. It is really feminine and flattering, cut to fit me, and has shiny inserts that show when I walk. Princess!

Finally, Santa brought Lars and I an early gift this year. A new puppy named Milo! He is a mini dauschaund and is very sweet and cute. The cats are still getting used to him and everyone is working on boundaries but he is sure the cutest thing I've seen in awhile.

Hope all is well with everyone, miss you, love you, CONGRATS JAMES!!!!!!!

Love - Heather

God Says Yes to Me

Behold I am Doing a New Thing

Found this poem in a Theology of Ministry paper this afternoon...love it! Hope you'll enjoy it too! Maybe you're already familiar with it - in that case, my apologies for repeating.



God Says Yes to Me
Kaylin Haught

I asked God if it was okay to be melodramatic
And she said yes
I asked her if it was okay to be short
And she said it sure was
I asked her if I could wear nail polish
Or not wear nail polish
And she said honey
She calls me that sometimes
She said you can do just exactly
What you want to
Thanks God I said
And is it okay if I don't paragraph
My letters
Sweetcakes God said
Who knows where she picked that up
What I'm telling you is
Yes Yes Yes

Lessons and Carols - The season has begun!

Not only did the manage to have L&C without us - they did it bigger! It was beautiful and wonderful and great to see Cheryl and Elizabeth and James - also Steve and Elenor Whitney, Will and Becky McGarvey and Deborah Johnston, Joy Church, and... everybody!

The new thundering herd of students has swelled the choir to the point where they sat in chairs in the chancel surrounding the strings (strings!). The choir did almost all the oldies/goodies. James said he couldn't look at Elizabeth during O Magnum Mysterium because she was mouthing the words and weeping. Cheryl and I were further back - but I closed my eyes just to hear/feel that rich lift. My hands were dancing. The choir has tenors this year!!!! It was fun to hear O Holy Night rather than sing it although I'd rather be singing all of it... It might be sappy but its still fun. (and if you can't be sappy during Christmas then what is the point?

.... Stephanie did great with This Little Babe. I think it might have been challenging to have the choir so deep in the chancel but it went well. As fabulous as Stephanie did - and she did very well - my memory brought Heather's harp back into the room. And speaking of memory, as we finished singing the hymn, Hark the Herald Angels Sing, with its power soprano descant, Cheryl and I turned to each other and instantly agreed that we missed Amy Moiso very much.

Inspired I am sure by the work done previous years, Lisa Wraith put some some very color intense banners.

Dan, bless his heart, does indeed invite the alumni to come forward for the full on heart string: Still of the Nightfall. We had to stop hugging each other so we could sing.



Greg and Clair Love and Cheryl Finch:













Clair on her way home.



Mid-way through the program I figured out why I was having a problem accepting that Advent was under way: I haven't been singing Christmas songs in prepartion this year!




Program Summary (Anthem):
Lesson 1 - Lo How a Rose E'er Blooming
Lesson 2 - Prepare Ye
Lesson 4 - O Magnum Mysterium
Lesson 5 - Candlelight Carol (Rutter)
Lesson 6 - Calypso Noel
Lesson 7 - This Little Babe
Lesson 8 - O Holy Night & Chill of the Nightfall

If you go on Saturday - please post news of who you saw & what they are up to. Elizabeth is doing well in her CPE but as we all know, its very consuming.

James Has a Call

Yes, it's true....
On November 18-19, I had my Candidating Weekend at Elk Grove (CA) Congregational Church. Everything went really well, despite having 'near laryngitis'. With thanks to God, the congregation voted unanimously to call me as their next settled pastor. Today, Dec. 1 is my first official day - although I've been working on the service most of the week. Since Mary and I are singing in L&C tonight and tomorrow night, I had to get a good head-start on Sunday.

This is a very sweet congregation of just over 100 folks. I'd call it "High UCC" as Cheryl can attest, they stand for the Gospel reading, and have other very nice touches to their service. The search committee has been working for 18 months and reviewed 106 profiles. They did an absolutely fantastic job. So...yeah...I'm starting on Advent 1, Year C with communion. (I'll have ordained folks help with that until my own -- hopefully in February or so. Stay tuned!)

There is a fairly large parsonage right next door (for better or for worse) into which one could fit many Hunter Hall apartments. We are looking forward to life there and being able to make it our home. The web address for the church is http://www.elkgroveucc.org/links.html

Friends ask if I'm excited about this and I wish it were that simple. There are about 20 emotions flying around inside my head and heart about this...Excitement is only one of them. Mostly, though, I'm just looking forward to engaging this congregation with all its challenges and bringing everything I've got to my call there. It will be great!

I'll send my new address and phone number in e-mail. In the mean time, I'll still be using the Yahoo account I've had forever. Do drop me a line when you are able.
Blessings to you all,
James

Growing things

While the garden may be coming to an end, there are lots of growing things that can still be cultured in this world.

We decided to make beer for Christmas. This is a honey ale that Bill is working on. He is de-racking the first fermentation.






We live near a place that sells and rents beer, wine, and cheese making stuff. You can buy all the ingredients for various beers in a kit or pull it out of these really interesting smelling bins and kegs.

The first step - after sanatizing the equipment of course - is to boil up the barley on the stove and to boil up and some water in a large pot on a gas burner (the kind that Harold uses to cook his turkeys) outside. Then we add the honey, dextrin and dry malt extract; the barley tea, and bittering hops.

Then the wort (great names for this stuff) is chilled with a chiller thingy which is a coil of copper tubing that runs cold water through the tube inserted into the wort which does that physics thing and takes the heat off the wort quickly. Then we pour it into the gigantic bottle (called a carboy) and stick it in the corner of the living room for a week while the yeast has a minor riot with all the good sugars in the whole mess.

After a week, the goo is syphoned off into a second carboy for a quieter round of fermentation and settling. In another week or so we will syphon off the clear beer and bottle and let that store for a while. I'll let you know how it all turns out.

In the meantime I have started to get serious about making cheese - which was aided and abetted by the discovery of this local store and the tip that Trader Joe's sells pastorized (not ultra-pastorized - that won't form curd) goat milk. We had amazingly firm feta in time for Thanksgiving. I also used some goat milk for the yogurt I've been making for months and decided I like the sweeter taste. On the day we started the beer I was in the kitchen starting the feta, a couple of loafs of bread and a round of yogurt. I'll post pictures of cheese making sometime.

Dana and Audrey joined me for Thanksgiving this year. I took Audrey on a tour of all our growing things. She turned to me and said, "So... got some time on your hands now that you're not doing papers any more?"

Lessons and Carols

December 1-2
7 pm
Stewart Chapel

It would be odd to be there without being a part of the inside - but I think it harder to stay away.

Anyone else?

6 Months Later

OK Friends...this was only 6 months ago. God continues to work in our lives in oh, so many ways. And, certainly, the only constant is change.

Any prayers you might raise for my candidating weekend will be felt and appreciated. I'll be at Elk Grove Community Church -- just about 20 minutes south of Cheryl's and hope to start there on Dec. 1.

I'll let you know how things turn out shortly afterward. Blessings to you all!

Hangin' with Francis

Last weekend I was invited (along with three other Bossey students) to represent the World Council of Churches at an "Interreligious Youth Gathering on Peace" in Assisi, Italy, sponsored by the Roman Catholic Church. The event was in commemoration of a peace-focused gathering of religious leaders invited to Assisi by Pope John Paul II in 1986. There were about 100 young adults between the ages of 20 and 35 ("youth" is broadly understood in Europe) who attended, and although there was not much substance to the meeting, we had a good time. Some photos, for your viewing pleasure:

First stop, Rome. Above, I'm standing in front of St. Peter's Cathedral with my friend Eva from Slovakia, who is studying at Bossey with me. Below, the all important Italian gelato - even though it was cold outside.



Below is me standing outside the gorgeous Basilica of St Francis in Assisi, where Francis is both commemorated and buried. I highly recommend a pilgrimage to Assisi if you ever get the chance - it's preserved almost as it was in the middle ages, with winding cobblestone streets carved into the side of a hill.

Moving

Dear Friends,
I have just about cleared my office of all "stephanie" stuff -- no pictures, no pottery, no books! It feels very strange, to say the very least. Lots of teasing about cold weather and encouragement to soak up all the warm November sun that we're experiencing just now.

Today I rolled up my big "cloud of witnesses" bulletin board to take with me; it has most of your smiling faces and others' from graduations that I have celebrated in my 6 years here.

Jim and I will close on our brand new house next week and the movers will be here on Monday to pack us up and move us out(although we won't actually go to Michigan until the end of the semester). If you're interested, I can send you an email with our contact information and timeline. We'll actually be hanging out in one of the sabbatical apts in Hunter while all our worldly possessions travel ahead of us to Michigan. Our realtor knows someone who will make sure the stuff gets placed in the appropriate rooms; when we arrive (around Dec. 20/21, Lord willing & the snow don't fall) we'll begin the fun of finding ourselves in a new house, a new state, a whole new life! YIKES!

Lots of mixed feelings -- mostly good, mostly exciting -- some trepdiation and no little amount of sleepless nights figuring out where the piano will go and if our new family room will hold the old sofa and chair. What kind of fridge and washer dryer to get? Long coat? Boots? Ice scraper and shovel?!! How's Sammy (our self-righteous cat) going to deal with this? He'll have to be a totally indoor kitty now and fortunately for us, he has no real say in the matter although he has taken to yowling as only Siamese self-righteous kitties can do...

Anyway...these are the thoughts for now. I think about you often, hold you close in my heart and miss you soooooooo much!

78 degrees on November 6th

Forcasters are calling for flooding in all the usual places in Portland by the end of the day today. Here in Santa Rosa we experiencing yet another warm afternoon - sunlight filling up all the rooms, front and back doors open to catch a breeze. I'm in shorts and a t-shirt and I'm restless. All this sunlight is just not right. How does anyone get any work done around here?













Well, November it is and 78 degrees as well - so here are some updates on the garden:

First - a picture from mid-summer. I had just put in some beans in the middle - notice the little teepee frame thing. I thought it was going to be a wonderful structure...













Well... it turns out that whoever it was that dreamed up a beanstock large enough for Jack and the giant didn't stretch their imagination much. That massive green thing in the middle are the beans that ate the garden.





















and one more thing: I went up to watch Audrey (my youngest daughter) be a drum major and conduct a marching band field show at her high school homecoming.

Send news!

Anitra

snow

Hello Friends - So here we are not even to November yet and it snowed today. Lars and I are in for something a little different than the California rain. Things are going great in Wilbur. Today was the 5th Sunday of the month so it was Tub Band Sunday - man did we have a fun time! Everyone was up front singing or playing guitar and there is a washtub bass and even a washboard to play. What a zoo I work in. Above you will see a picture of the snow out my office window at home. Also you can see my pastor appreciation gift - our own wheelbarrow! Lars and I have been busy in the yard! Anyway, we are loving country folk and life out here. We have been blessed with many gifts on our doorstep from fresh potatoes to carrots right out of the ground and walnuts off the tree. We are looking forward to Halloween and are hoping for Trick or Treaters. Miss you and sunny California for those who are there. - Heather

Worth 4000 words

As promised, here are some pictures of life in Switzerland.

This is one end of the building where I live; my window is the bottom corner on the right.



The entrance to our chapel is through this little tower, once owned by an Abbey and dating back to the 13th or 14th century.



Here is our group of students standing in front of Calvin and other Reformers in Geneva (Calvin is second from the left).



And this is the inside of the Church of Scotland, where I attend. If you look closely, behind the communion table you can see extra wooden legs - the legs of a chair on which Calvin once sat.

At home in Wilbur

Hello Friends -

Lars and I are finally getting settled here in Wilbur. With the help of the church we have bought a small house. Most of our furniture arrived last week. We were heartbroken at what was lost and what was broken. I did not choose a moving company well and the whole thing was a disaster. But we are thankful for everything that did make it. Lars and I have been busy painting and unpacking boxes and the house is finally looking like our own. It feels like it has been years since we had our own place.

Things at the church are going well. The ordination service on the 24th was wonderful and very moving. I looked at Bitty when I was giving the benediction and she was crying which made me cry and I totally messed it up. Oh well. The church provided a lovely dinner afterwards. They had decorated the tables and men in red vests served. It was great. With people there from my lives in Kennewick, Moscow, and San Anselmo it was quite the event for me.

My first Sunday was a communion service. Everything went well (no spilling of juice) until I said "will the servers please come forward" and no one stood up! There was a bit of miscommunication. But you know me, I shrugged it off and made some joke and before long I had some servers at the front.

This is my third weekend of worship and tomorrow is my first funeral. I am really jumping right in. Tragic death of a young mother in town and they were not church goers. At this point I feel good about my prep but we will see how things go tomorrow.

I am loving small town life, the cool air, and the fall colors. Lars is still looking for a place but I am confident God has something for him here.

Miss you all . . . love and blessings . . . Pastor Heather : )