Hi Everyone --

Craig arrived safely! That may seem like a mundane item, but it is quite a journey to India! When he hadn't arrived at our house by 3:30 a.m., I started prowling around worrying. I checked my cell phone (which he didn't have a number or phone to call me on), and I checked our e-mail (which wasn't working at the time), but I just couldn't quit worrying. Feroz finally got here with him about 4:20 a.m. That is a long drive from Mumbai airport to Pune! Craig is still working on the jet lag, but he isn't too concerned -- maybe college life is more like India time anyway -- sleep in the day and stay up all night.

We had a great breakthrough this week. We got our sewers cleaned out! They have been "chalked up" now for weeks and it has really been stinky around here and in the house. We called the HR guy at John Deere to start working on it. It only took 2 weeks, lots of talk and negotiation and more talk and negotiation. Finally some guys showed up who would do it for 2000 rupees (about $50). John Deere said not more than 900 rupees. I was just thankful someone was there and willing to do it. I wasn't going to let this opportunity for clean sewers pass me by! After much talk -- more than 2 hours -- they finally started. They were done within a half an hour. I could only shake my head -- 2 weeks of waiting, hours of discussion, all for a 1/2 hour of work! Now we should start on the waterproofing project which is much bigger!

We had a chance to go shopping again and found a Christmas tree sari. I have seen more women wearing the Christmas tree skirt of my dreams than I thought possible. We did finally find one though. The man asked if I wanted to try it on. I told him it wasn't for me. Michelle thought it would be a great joke to get a picture of me wearing a Christmas tree skirt! It really looks nice and adds a lot to the poor little tree! It was only 250 rupees (about $5.50) for 9 yards of glittery fabric.

Hannah's last day of school was Thursday. We decided to make Christmas cookies. We made chocolate chip (since the Indians don't know better anyway), roll-out sugar cookies with green frosting and red and green sprinkles (I don't have any cookie cutters, so I made balls and smashed them with a glass and they are all round), Rice Krispie treats with Christmas sprinkles on them, butter toffee, snowball cookies, and Reese's dipped balls. We will make up plates of cookies for all the people that work for us and the neighbors, etc. We sent plates home today with those who came to church.

We had church here at our house in Pune. We had 8 -- 6 were us! I suppose when Michelle, Ryan and Craig leave there will be less. Also most of the Indians are leaving Pune too. They all seem to like Bangalore a lot!


We are ready for Christmas! We are planning on having party food for Christmas Eve and a nice Christmas dinner on Tuesday. We will have it about 2 p.m. so we can talk to everyone in the evening (your morning). We are having another John Deere family that is staying here for the holidays, so that should be nice.

We hope everyone is doing well and not too stressed out by the big days ahead!
Love, Lucinda