The past three weeks have been a study in contrasts between having a full house and being very quiet. The full house came on Thanksgiving, when we hosted the Rabbits, family and friends for a big celebration. Lairds children, Ceilee and Jo, were here all that week. Former members Cedar, Jess and Skyler spent a couple of days with us and former member French was here on Thanksgiving. The Rabbits also brought along their visitors James, Dana and her little boy Egon for the dinner. Egon and Skyler are the same age and they made quite a pair.

We had a magnificent dinner featuring our home-raised tom turkey and all the fixings, lots of other good things from our farm and great food brought by various members of Dancing Rabbit. We probably came close to setting the Scotland County record for different varieties of pies served.

The following day, Laird, Ceilee, Jo, Cedar, Jess and Skyler went to Dancing Rabbit for an intensive session of playing board games. Skyler and Egon took advantage of the opportunity and had a full day of playing together while the adults were busy with the games.

Ceilee has been here at Sandhill and at a friend's place in the area for deer hunting during the season just finished. He got four really nice deer and he, Laird and Jo processed all of them in the days before Thanksgiving. Two of them are for us and two he is keeping for himself. His effort is much appreciated and we have really enjoyed the venison he provided both last year and this year. Deer have been cropping our soybeans pretty regularly, so it has been nice to get some benefit from all their munching.

Stan went north to Manitoba on the day after Thanksgiving for his annual visit to see his family. He had a good time and got in some ice skating before he returned. I forgot to mention in the last column that Gigi and Renay went to New York on the train November 18 to spend time with family in Albany and New York City. The two of them then flew to Winnepeg to join Stan for the last part of their vacation. All three them got home this past Friday after visiting friends in Minneapolis on the way back.

Susie went up to the Chicago area before Thanksgiving to spend the holiday with her family. She got a ride with recent visitor Megan who stopped by again on her way there. Susie arrived back at Sandhill on December 3 and brought her friend Amy with her for a weekend visit.

Another one of our interns, Ingrid, also rode to Chicago with Megan and Susie to catch a train for a trip to see family in Delaware before going back to California. We have just heard from her that she got a job with an urban agriculture project in the Bay Area and is working on their newsletter and radio show.

Laird took Jo to the train in Quincy on November 27 to return to school in New Hampshire. Ceilee went home to Columbia on the 26th and gave our intern Megen a ride there. She then went on to St. Louis to visit our friend Matthew before going for a month to Kentucky where she will be staying at the farm our former intern Stephanie now lives on. After that, she will be heading west to Port Angeles, Washington to live.

Laird left on the evening of the 29th for a trip to Colorado. He did a facilitation training workshop at Nyland Cohousing Community in Boulder and then went down to the southern part of the state to meet with some people there. He came home on the train December 8.

That left just Michael and I at home until Susie returned on the 3rd. That is the quiet part I was talking about. We had a very nice mellow week and kept the home fires burning(literally!). Apparently, our cats thought that aliens had abducted everyone else and followed the two of us around as a group. It was funny to come out of the back door at the White House and see them all waiting there expectantly for us.

Michael and I were at the Christmas Fair in Memphis on December 4. We always enjoy doing this one since it gives us a chance to see local folks and support Beta Sigma Phi's fundraising efforts. This was our last fair of the season.

We want to tell our friend Duane Courtright that we are thinking of him and wishing him a good recovery. We certainly appreciated his gifts of yummy vegetables this past summer. Glad to hear also that Irene Mayfield is doing better after her fall.