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~ 2022 ~

~ 2021 ~

~ 2020 ~

PLEASE! NOT ANOTHER GRINCH YEAR LIKE 2020!!!

...and so it was that Nana Dahl of the past 57 years Christmas letters looked forward to January 2020 with all the excitement and anticipation she could muster but in a few weeks those hopes began to dissolve! A debilitating virus was coming to our shores! And that was the only beginning of the debacle!

The three wonderful trips planned for the spring and summer ( a Trans- Atlantic cruise with the Jacksons, another Alaskan trip with Michael's graduating classmates, and an European Grand River Cruise) looked doubtful ...and then faded into oblivion. Nana lamented not seeing places they always wanted to visit, mostly the Azores, Bruges Belgium, and a tour of Ann Frank's hiding house. The latter was especially disappointing since we'd been to Amsterdam numerous times and always put that off, or didn't get tickets in time.

President Trump reported it all as a mere flu that would magically disappear and all would be good.....another fantasy from him as he ignored real science and our trusted virologist Dr. Fauci. January turned into February etc.

We relegated our family to be distanced and masked but mostly it was just the two of us most of the year. We were thinking we'd get pretty tired of only each other's company and faces, but as it turned out, we like each other a whole lot and it wasn't as debilitating as we feared. However as months went on we tired of the stay-at-home suggestions and missing other scenery we decided to take jaunts from March until August to our favorite of all locations....Lake Madrone. The travel plans changed to driving to the cabin each Thursday...raking and cleaning for two days, reading, resting, and playing cards and Rummikub for the next two and coming back home on Monday after the garbage man had hauled away the fruit of our labors.

That seemed to be what we needed as we changed all travel plans to the same time in 2021. Since not much else was going on in June, Michael took the chance to get a brand new knee. He was amazing and in less than three weeks was out pacing me and without a cane!

Then the unthinkable happened, our beloved cabin of 31 years burned to the ground; all the raking and clearing was for naught! The neighboring town of Berry Creek was made a moon scape by the Bear Fire (later named North Complex), at our lake it took some cabins and left some cabins....with no apparent viable reason. So, except for Cedar Path the place where our first cabin was bought as newlyweds, much of Lake Madrone remained its amazing and beautiful oasis, just no cabin. Thankfully we had insurance, but the re-building will not be fast!

The devastation from fires up and down California, Hurricanes, and flooding elsewhere in our country, a divided nation politically, a virus that is killing faster than war, an economy in the toilet with so many people hurting from lost jobs, schools and businesses shuttered, Catholic mass on the basketball court, increasing homelessness, it fortified the idea that the year 2020 was somehow, brought straight from hell! It became Nana's favorite curse word. (" I'm so 2020ing tired of this!" And of course her favorite, " What the 2020!?!"). Our travel plans changed from the bedroom to the kitchen to the living room to the kitchen to the garage to the kitchen....do you see a pattern here? That caused me to gain back some of what I had managed to lose during the summer! More "2020"!

Thanksgiving, however, was saved as our family pot-lucked our usual feast with only our cabin family of 13 instead of the thirty we usually have. We ate outside at separate family tables and the rest of time social distanced, masked on the patio and back yard. Erick brought a huge blow up screen in the back yard and showed, " A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving" ( a tradition that the grandkids started as toddlers on our beds many years ago!). The neighbors brought over two butane heaters plus the one Erick had brought from his house, we bundled up with coats and blankets had a rollicking game of trivia on the big screen. It felt so good; it gave us hope...along with the election ...that better times would eventually make it our way.

Christmas will be like no other. With all of California in the purple tier, safety will have to prevail so that hopefully we will all be together with some normalcy by Easter. Hopefully masks won't be political and Un-American, rather a preventative...you know like seat belts, helmets, prophylactics and the pill!

There will be no twelve feet high tree to decorate for a week in the family room, but Nana will put a few boxes of Christmas decor out and the small tree in the window of the living room in an attempt to be festive. Papa is dead set to have some lights up in the yard, albeit on a smaller scale, and Nana is thinking up an easy but weird alternative to the big tree in the family room.

Even though this year has been one we'd just as soon 2020ing forget, there are the blessings of our wonderful family which you will hopefully see in photos. All the grandkids are maintaining stellar grades albeit at home on their computers. It is hard to believe that Katie will graduate from Chico State in June, Alysyn will be a senior at Yuba City High, Lucas has outgrown us all and will be a junior at PV high in Chico and our youngest Olivia will graduate and enter PV in September! Where has the time gone? There have certainly been some challenges in our country nonetheless although we have seen many amazing countries there is not one we love more than this one.

Bless you one and all; " we'll get by with a little help from our friends!"

Still together, still here, still love to hear from you!

Grove and Michael Dahl

1784 Grace Road a

Gridley, CA. 95948

_________________________________________________________________________

Nana Dahl Christmas Reprisal (12/31/20)

Expecting a “Grinch Christmas, brought to us by an infamous 2020” I was pleasantly surprised that Christmas wasn’t nearly as Grinchy as I’d worried. Thinking we wouldn’t see our kids and their families, I was feeling pretty put upon!

BUT.........

Aaron and family came by just before our dinner Christmas Eve to wish us masked-Christmas-love and deliver gifts. It was so great to see them. I think Lucas is almost as tall as his dad...honestly he gets taller every time I see them.
We took him to the hall to mark date and height and compared with past family members......especially his dad. Cristina showed me a copy on her phone of Olivia’s eighth grade picture, BEAUTIFUL! I wish I’d had it for the Christmas letter. Lucas took his too but Cristina says the proof hadn’t come on her phone yet. I have all their photos in a frame in the kitchen one behind the other so when I add this year’s I can lay them out and see how they have changed.

That night instead of 30 in the garage we had only four inside. Jim and Kathy joined us (brother and sister). I was able to go much fancier with shrimp cocktails, lobster dinner and of course Jim brought great wine. Kathy brought Pumpkin Pie Cake with whipped cream for dessert. We didn’t have the ten sides and ten desserts of the past Christmas Eves but we were still stuffed.

The next morning Michael got me at “Christmas Gift“, a game tradition since my grandparent’s day. (Although Michael and the boys soon took that game to steroid levels). We have done some incredible tricks to be the first to say “Christmas Gift”to each family member! I started the day 0-1 but when Erick’s family came on Christmas morning to get us....I improve my score a bit. We had masked-hugs and present openings again before they left for Chico.
It was great to see all four of them. Katie is always at college and Alysyn is being zoom schooled; she still managed two awards in Spanish and math and the usual A’s. That is something ALL our grandchildren do!

Jim cooked an incredible beef fillet dinner that night for the four of us. The homemade leek and kielbasa soup and a wonderful potato bake with cheese sauce were the perfect sides. Dessert was a fresh fruit tart. The fillets were so delicious but so large that everyone kept their left-overs for the next day.

The 27th was our 53rd Wedding Anniversary and the two of us decided to drive down to see the Christmas lights in Yuba City. Since Christmas was over we found that many saved on electricity and turned their lights off. Kind of disappointing but we came home with Chinese take out so it wasn’t a bust.

The next day was Kathy’s birthday and Jim outdid himself again with balsamic tomatoes, a butter lettuce salad, salmon patties and finally Risi Bisi ( a rice and peas Northern Italy dish that is killer!). We played games and pigged out on partially frozen milkshakes from “The Burgie”! Hooray for “Milkshake Monday”!

So this Christmas, though we missed having all the Federico’s and Fishers, we had a delicious substitute. We can’t wait to get the Covid vaccine in hopes for a more regular Christmas next year......maybe at the new cabin if we can get it built in time. Joe is the project manager and everything looks really great and exciting.

So this is a reprisal to my grim Christmas letter. I hope your Christmas was just as wonderful. May next year be as safe and delicious but with more family time!

Love❤️💕

Grove......... and Michel too

This is Ken... and my apologies for the lateness of this letter. Nana had this first portion of the letter to me on 12/3/20, and it normally takes only a few hours to put it up here on their site. But... GoDaddy, the server for this website had problems and though we could view the site, and post to the site, none of the changes and additions would show up on the site. It took our diligent and wonderful guru nephew Ed to work through GoDaddy's kinks and get it open for us to post... today... January 24th. So, here is her letter, for your future reference, and her images are below.

Because Nana and Papa missed out on their trip to Yuba City to enjoy the Christmas Lights, let me help to make amends by sharing some near our home. We can see these from our home, and they run all night long. They are so cheerful, and the neighborhood is so delighted that they continue to shine... even tonight, January 24th.

~ 2019 ~

Merry Christmas 2019

Happy New Year 2020

...and so it was that Nana Dahl of past Christmas letters was sabotaged in two-thousand-nineteen by the latest Thanksgiving ever! (Whose demented idea was that?). No sooner were the surplus Thanksgiving left-overs packed up in "to-go boxes" and the families out the door, did Nana start taking down all the fall decor, ready for Papa to truck in the Christmas bins. Of course Papa balked at the thought of hefting Christmas bins...(OK.......maybe thirty is a little obsessive but Nana has never been a "moderation-in-all-things-kinda-gal!”)

Verily did all the stress and scrambling to get some stuff down and some stuff up, did Nana have another most unpleasant bout with back spasms. It was reminiscent of the wild time she had on the plane all the way from Japan! At least Papa could take her to the local hospital and in a matter of an hour (albeit a pretty obscene hour), two strong pills, and two powerful shots, old Nana was back with the living and to her normal PG-rated conversations! Down for the count meant minimizing the decorations, a heck of a way to start a blessed holiday. Sons and grandkids promised to come help which gave Nana some time to get out the Christmas letter in time to send it to Ken for the blog!

And with that in mind did Nana reflect on their month of October in Israel and Palestine. Yea was the experience so memorable .....especially being baptized with Papa in the River Jordan . This was a first for Nana but since Papa couldn't really remember his first baptism as a baby, he chose to join her. There were three others in the group that joined them and it proved to be an emotional high point of the Israeli trip.

A visit to Bethlehem in Palestine and being at the exact birthplace of Jesus was also pretty amazing as was our visit with the Bedouins, but for different reasons. (check out that one on the trip journal.) Yea did Nana and Papa pledge not to take such a long time away from home again, but have already two such trips in Europe planned for spring! (Oh no! Is that why they call us "travel whores"?

The devastation from the loss of Paradise has brought a new "temporary village" to Gridley....300 FEMA trailers. It has Papa working at the Distribution Center every week while Nana is at the St. Vincent de Paul Food Closet. There have been so many horror stories from people who come to those two places. We feel so sorry that they have to endure this.

............And now about the grandkids:

KATIE is a junior at Chico State. She changed her major from Business/Accounting to PolySci/Environmental Science and is really loving it!. She has maintained A's and has enough units to qualify as a senior! We are hoping her generation can help clean the mess we have made to this planet and give hope that mankind can somehow pull together. Big job! Previous generations surely messed it up! Color her green!

ALYSYN is also an A student sophomore in Yuba City High and is still addicted to volleyball...her lack of height she makes up with hustle and skill, making her a great setter or libero. But right now she is obsessed with getting her driver's license! Color her behind the wheel. Northern California beware!

LUCAS has outgrown Papa, Nana, and his Mom and is hoping to out-grow his dad someday. He probably will when he grows in to those size 10 shoes! He is a freshman at Pleasant Valley High in Chico and like his cousins is an A student. He enjoys adventures with his dad like finding crystals and hiking and teasing his little sister. Color him at the piano.

OLIVIA is a seventh grader at Bidwell High in Chico. She matches the academic prowess of her brother and cousins but prefers to concentrate on music, art, and photography. Everything she entered in the Butte County fair was amazing. The photo of her cat, Blue Star, won Best of Show as did Papa's photo of Whitby Abby in Scotland. Color her blue like all her ribbons.

And with that did Nana turn off the hot pad on her back, kiss her hubby of fifty-two years, and wrap up the #52nd Christmas letter saying:

May this find you all in good health and happily enjoying this blessed holiday. May peace and love win out to make our country and our planet be in saner hands.

Love❤,

Nana and Papa at the Dahlhouse

What’s happening in your corner of the world? We’d love to hear from you.

Gandmdahl@hotmail.com \\\\

~ 2018 ~

Merry Christmas from the Dahlhouse!

And so it was that with two thanksgivings under her belt (both literally and figuratively) Nana began to contemplate the Christmas letter. Yea was there the usual bloat with the family of twenty-six at the Dahlhouse and then a second in Kingsburg with the Gibson Clan the next day. Both were so “fulfilling”…again in more ways than one!

This Thanksgiving was especially poignant after dealing with the worse fire disaster in California’s history very close to home. The first responders did their magic, having met with the third evacuation in two years….two fires and a broken Oroville Dam spillway. Stories and sights of heroism and destruction every night on the television have been “emblazoned” on our minds and logos of Nike on shirts have been replaced by “Campfire 2018”, “Butte Strong” and “Sheriff Honea is My Homie”! Our town is now been filled with evacuees and homeless at the Butte County Fair and has found Papa and Nana Dahl manning food closets and helping with dinners, lunches and breakfasts for the many misplaced by this horrific fire. Friends and family have lost their homes and though now contained, it has charred within one mile of our beloved Lake Madrone cabin.

Two-thousand eighteen may have had a fire-y end, but the rest has been filled with more adventures than ever for this Dahlhouse Duo. In spring we hop-scotched around Japan with our “tour guide extraordinaire” and Nana’s LHS classmate Carol Garcia Dias. It was followed with a class trip with Alysyn and Erick to Washington D. C. and Gettysburg in June, to England, Scotland and Wales in August and to Italy in September and October. All of the adventures brought golden memories and more classic photos than a Christmas letter can hold.

These adventures started with a remake of the honeymoon at Disneyland fifty years ago. It was followed by memories of snow in Kamakura, cherry blossoms in Tokyo, Alysyn among the monuments, an ancestors’ castle at Caernarfon, being with our beloved exchange student/son, Carlo, and his family in parts of Northern Italy and Chamonix, France, and meandering with friends from Sorrento and Pompei to Lucca and Vinci. A highlight will always be Papa becoming Eduardo’s “American Godfather” at the confirmation celebration and hanging out with his family to celebrate by a castle in Sylvia’s little town of Montasegale.

A monumental year by any standards found grandchildren with schedules and adventures as well.

Katie… a sophomore at Chico State,

Alysyn… a freshman at Yuba City High

Lucas … an eighth grader at Bidwell Junior High in Chico

Olivia… a sixth grader at Bidwell Junior High with her brother.

All are amazing 'A' students, talented athletes, artists, and musicians and so beloved by their Nana and Papa. Life as grandparents is sweet!

And with that did Nana Dahl pack up the Christmas letter for Ken, Papa’s classmate and our dear “Blog-master”, for another year. http://dahls.gridley59.com/

May you all enjoy a safe and glorious 2019 and get back to us at gandmdahl@hotmail.com with your news.

Peace on Earth!

Michael and Grove Dahl….1784 Grace Road, Gridley, CA 95948

~ 2017 ~

And so it was that two- thousand-seventeen Christmas snuck up on Nana Dahl with no thoughts of the Christmas letter until long after the Thanksgiving bloat.

Yea, fires and floods caused two evacuations for the Dahl Duo this year and have put Nana in “escape mode”. Watching the hurricane and fire problems across America has kept her feeling lucky and thankful that both places are still standing; the only problem is all the picture books and favorite things are piled upstairs waiting for any surprises from the Oroville Dam. Prayers and heeling thoughts go out to the unfortunate that are still reeling from the past fires and storm.

This was the year that all the Dahl Clan (16 in the picture below) celebrated an early Dahl 50^th Wedding Anniversary at Bucerias Mexico. The venue and the staff and of course all the treasured family that gathered there made it an anniversary to remember. The real one on December 27^th will be more-low key for sure. Plans for a “re-make”of the Honeymoon at Disneyland is planned for the second week in January. Folks are teasing that it will be far from the original, but Papa is saying don’t rule him out!

Papa has managed to keep busy volunteering for Lions and Catholic Church, hunting pheasants, and finding fun travel locations for us to visit. He manages to zip us to the cabin twice or three times a month just so he can blow all the pine needles off the roof and down the driveway. They are planning to buy him a backpack blower for home so that will keep him busy keeping all our leaves off the neighbors’ yards. Man and machine!!!

This fall the Duo went with their traveling friends to visit Spain and Portugal. They had done a similar trip in 2004 but found it to be different in many ways…both being dang good! They visited Madeira this time and had great fun on the two mile basket ride down the hill. As they skirted around cars and through intersections it was fun and thrilling. The gondola ride up the hill was not so rewarding….it would take a lot of “Ponchas” to do that part again!

This year our Art Docent Trio has tried to pass off that experience to the young and energetic moms at school. It seems to be working well, but Nana may have to zip over for a lesson or two to see the kids and get a charge on the old hug battery. The retirees still try to connect once a month or more for visits and so Donna can finish Nana’s sentences.

With a seventy-fifth birthday looming in the year to come, Nana is trying to get all the travel she can muster before the back, knees, and mostly memory go south. So far plans are for Japan with Carol Dias, Washington D.C. with Erick and Alysyn, England, Scotland and Wales with The Fishers and Italy again (this time the Amalfi Coast and Tuscany) with travel friends.

Christmas at the Dahlhouse is always Nana’s favorite with not a single present purchased and Black Friday long gone, Nana is beginning to panic. Will this be the lame Gift-Card-Christmas?

And with a peek at the family pictures, Nana reflected on the wonderful grandchildren. How did they grow up so fast??!!

See Katie.

She is living in the coed-dorm at Chico State

on a floor with all the rest of the Business

Administration freshmen.

At high school she ”majored” on taking lots of A.P

classes so entered college with 30 college units.

Her folks told her this time to have a social life and

she is taking them at their word!

Still she manages stellar grades, and Mom and Alysyn

miss her big time.

See Alysyn.

She is an eighth grader at Franklin.

She still manages her 4.0 average and tolerates

having one of her teachers still being “DAD”.

She is our volleyball star and will play club again

this time with older team members.

Her sense of humor and drama-filled personality

keeps us all in stitches.

You go girl!

See Lucas.

He is our fabulous seventh grader at Bidwell Junior High.

He is full of energy and maintains all A’s while

still enjoying so many extra-curricular activities.

His piano concerts, especially the one at the senior

apartment complex were great.

Like his sister, he enjoys nature and hikes

and many stays at the cabin to hunt for treasures or

going camping with Dad, and taking fun trips to the

coast or S.F. with Mom and Olivia.

See Olivia.

She is a fifth grader at Shasta School in Chico and

is enjoying being the “senior” there before her

“graduation” to Junior High next fall.

She is a great student, an accomplished artist, and

voracious reader.’

Although she can draw anything, lately she’s into

elaborate dragons

She still thinks being a kitty would be a lot more

fun than being a granddaughter.

And with that did Nana wind up her 55th Christmas letter. Now that her friend, Ken, puts it on the web, she doesn’t even have to address all those envelopes. Hooray for friends and technology!

Have a blessed Christmas and Prosperous New Year. Notice that Nana kept all politics out of this letter. No need to end this year in a rant!

Peace and Love ,

Nana and Papa Dahl

What’s up at your house? We’d love to know at gandmdahl@hotmail.com.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

~ 2016 ~

… and so it was that two-thousand sixteen made it’s big appearance in January as usual, then everything “sorta” went downhill from there.

Politics, elections, and world affairs gave the folks in the Dahlhouse BIG headaches, and are bringing prayer to the forefront this year. The Giants blew it which grumped up Papa Dahl, but Nana, who usually doesn’t’ give a “Cracker-Jack-Care” about baseball rooted to put down the “Goat-Curse” to the Cubbies and it worked!

The Trip in October on the Elbe in Germany was another big plus. It was enjoyed by fellow friends and travelers and rains came in time so we could actually cruise along the Elbe…too shallow for cruising the six previous weeks. The captain and crew were as thrilled as we were to finally sail out of Wittenberg.

Thanksgiving with twenty-five family…who thought two only-children could accumulate so many…was over the top. (Three days later we are still digesting!) We missed a few of the family, but will have them for Christmas Eve, the more the merrier!

Nana Dahl’s 55^th Class Reunion was super this year. We had over a hundred with classes from three years before and three years after us. Old people can party too, you know!! This was definitely one party where you couldn’t lie about your age.

With everyone healthy and happy in the Dahlhouse family, it’s impossible to paint two-thousand sixteen too bleak and dark. We surely hope American’s won’t retreat to bigotry and bullying in the years to come but find some peace and humanity in two-thousand seventeen. We could surely use it!

And with no cleverness or humor Nana Dahl ended this fifty-fifth Christmas letter with her favorite subjects….THE GRANDKIDS!

KATIE...our YC High Senior continues to wow us with her beauty, her brains, and her athletic prowess. We can’t believe that she starts college in the fall. With her 4.0 and beyond grade-point and her long list of AP classes under her belt, she is still choosing her college alma mater. She is forgoing club volleyball but loved her time with the YC Varsity this fall.

ALYSYN….our seventh grader at Franklin Elementary with Dad has so many drama performances, and academic awards and keeps us all laughing with that personality of hers. She is planning for her third year of club volleyball so we’ll be traveling to watch her a lot until the end of May. She has not a shy bone in her body and she still is our A#1 cuddle-bunny.

LUCAS….is at Bidwell since Chico Elementary Schools were too crowded and bumped all sixth graders to Jr. High. He seems to enjoy leaving his sister on her own at Shasta and is enjoying friends, academics, keyboard…the music kind… and Minecraft on a daily basis. He still enjoys fishing and hiking adventures with his dad and sis after school.

OLIVIA… a fourth grader at Shasta continues to excel and has become as addicted to books as Minecraft and Pokemon and that’s HUGE! She is loving music and gymnastics as well. She amazes us with her drawings; give her a pencil and paper and she’ll blow your hair back. Get her talking about the little creatures she carries around in her pocket and she’s on a roll.

…and with that did Nana Dahl snuggle up with her hubby of forty

nine years and focus on the good things about America, Christmas,

Friends, and her wonderful family. May all of you find health, joy

and peace in 2017.

Peace and LOVE,

The Dahls (gandmdahl@hotmail.com or

http://Dahls.gridley59.com

___________________________________________________________________________________

~ 2015 ~

Let It Snow Deco Mesh Snowman by GlitzynDitzyDecoMesh on Etsy, $27.95:

Snow, PLEASE!
From The "Dahlhouse " to Your House in 2015

Christmas letter for 2015

And so it was that two thousand fifteen came as previous years with beautiful weather 24-7 from winter to fall, but with no rain, (good for picnics and sunbathing, but boy did it increase drought conditions across the state). Now we’re promised an “El Nino” that should dump lots of rain across the state. This brings joy that we may end our drought, but fear that it will all come at once as it has in other parts of the country.

This was the year that Papa Dahl was able to scratch a bunch from his “bucket list”: Jumping out of a perfectly good airplane, walking the beaches of Normandy, winning the most blue ribbons at the Butte County Fair with his photographs, touring Paris with Katie, and meeting in Venice and other parts of Northern Italy to explore with our “exchange” son, Carlo and his wonderful family. Nana forgoes foolishness like skydiving and bungie-jumping, but she’s always ready for travel plans. Now we’re thinking Germany, Poland, Japan, Africa etc.

The summer trips this year were squeezed in from May to September without much of a break. Europe, Lake Madrone’s 4^th of July, wedding in Portland, Oregon, trips to Ft. Bragg and Mendocino, stays in Tahoe, etc. With only enough time between them to do laundry, being HOME was getting to be a drag! October brought enough fun days at home to lessen the negative. Before Thanksgiving, though, we’re off to Hilton Head with The Jacksons to tour and visit dear friends we met on our Greece trip. Yep! Retirement is sweet. We still volunteer a lot, but it’s OUR choice and we can always escape for a week or even a month if we want.

Of course being with the grandkids and families has been a treat as always. Most time has been at the cabin or shuttling between Aaron’s in Chico and Erick’s in Yuba City. The kids continue to be awesome with volleyball, music, theatre, and school. They seem to manage it all with all the stresses of the twenty-first century (bundles of homework, Core, intense-sports-schedules, traffic, social networking, etc.) Boy, am I glad I grew up at a different, more kid-friendly time!

Katie maintains a 4.4+ grade point while playing on their champion volleyball team at school and club ball all spring. She has her drivers’ license and grandparents all went together on a used car for her birthday!

Alysyn nails her volleyball serve and blows us away with her big parts in the musicals at the theatre in Yuba City. She sees Katie’s getting a car as a precedent and has told Papa she’ll want his mini. Well she has five years to learn how to shift.

Lucas has been a great actor and singer in the Chico productions. He hopes to be Tin Man in the next production with 80+ lines but...

Olivia just wants to be in it with NO LINES. She’s hoping for a role as Toto, but her first choice would be “The Tornado”! The Chico duo enjoys good grades like their two cousins but opt for fishing, mining for gold, collecting crystals, and exploring for arrowheads with their dad most weekends.

We send a huge thanks to friend and former high school classmate of Michael’s (Ken Smith) for making a blog for our trips and Christmas letters. Inching toward seventy-three, the chore of printing, addressing and sending all of the letters to friends would put me in the Looney House. Seniors and Social Media don’t seem to gel together well at our house, so having this blog is the bomb!

We hope two-thousand fifteen was as kind to you and yours and that the year to come is even better. May health, happiness, and most of all love, follow you. We’d love a visit with you, but if that can’t work, how about a note to tell us what you’ve been up to this year. (gandmdahl@hotmail.com)

Like the kindergarten song goes:

“Love new friends, but keep the old. One is silver and the other is gold!”

Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, Sweet Life!

The Dahls (Grove and Michael)

~ ~ + ~ ~

Christmas letter for 2014

This is my first techo-greeting and I'm sure it will be lacking in many areas. It is easier to send however so I included addresses from FOCUS, Classes of 61 and 59. If this is your first time to get this and you'd rather not, just delete it to "Junk" and your problems will be over.

You might notice how the Thanksgiving Family keeps growing (although a few were sick and couldn't make it.) It is still pretty impressive for a couple of only children.

Best wishes from the Dahlhouse to Yours

And so it was that Nana Dahl of the last 52 Christmas letters did opt out for a more techno-friendly Christmas letter for 2014, a sign that even old folks can jump into the twenty-first century. Hoping that their success will help forgo printing, stamping, addressing, and mailing, Nana and Papa figured it would be a stress-free and simple approach to tuning into family and friends and sending holiday cheer. Evidently optimism soars at 70+.

Yea had the last month been filled with travel journals to Eastern Europe with good friends (for a peek check out www.gridley59.com/Dahls/ ). Retirement for the duo still rocks with both as busy as ever. (Think every day a Saturday, but a REALLY filled-up one!)

Papa is still dedicated to Lions, Knights of Columbus, Class of 59 Reunions, BBS Pheasant Club, and GRANDKIDS, saving time for travel, volleyball games, and oh yes…NANA! Nana, on the other hand is still chairing the literacy committee in FOCUS and teaching art with her two buddies. She enjoys her GRANDKIDS, and her drugs of choice: Pinterest, travel, Ancestry.com, and oh yes…PAPA! December marks the 47th wedding anniversary...but who's counting?

Erick’s salmon dinner (3 kinds that were spectacular) in our spiffed up garage was the perfect meal and place for our fall birthday celebrations. When we returned from our trip, we discovered that Aaron had transformed our garage with a beautiful epoxy floor. The cars are still in shock, but it makes the Thanksgiving dinner this year for 31 a little more upscale and we can leave the carpets rolled up upstairs until Christmas.

With the holidays approaching did Nana begin Christmas letter #53 saying:

This is Katie, our sophomore at Yuba City High. She is our student cum laude, and our volleyball-labara magnifique. With sport camps and mega hours of homework, we see her whenever we can to charge our hug batteries. She is managing a very difficult school schedule that keeps Nana's head reeling. She is pretty on the outside and inside and we love having her around us. She is excelling at her second year of French, though I think math is probably her forte. We look forward to meeting up with her on her trip to Paris in June.

This is our sixth-grader Alysyn. She is still our drama queen, juggling volleyball games and musical productions with flair only she can manage. With art projects and cuddle time at the cabin, and with several gymnastic moves thrown in with good measure, life is sweet! She takes drama to new heights and keeps people around her laughing. She loves to read, dance, volley, and act, but her summers are spent mostly in the pool. We're not sure what world she lives in, but whatever, it's a pretty amazing one.

This is Lucas our fourth-grade wonder boy! Student extraordinaire, he can read anything, currently finishing the Lemony Snicket series. Like his cousin, Alysyn, he shows his musical drama prowess at many Chico productions. He and his sister reflect the artistic qualities of their father; keeping them in art supplies guarantees multiple blue ribbons at the Butte County Fair. Musical as well, he loves to sing, is in his second year on the keyboard and delights the "grandfolks" with his private concerts. We can't wait to see him as a hippie in the next production.

This is our second-grade granddaughter Olivia. She loves school, her teachers, her friends, and her room-full of stuffed animals…mostly kitties. She reads at eighth-grade level and strews art and books all over her bed. With her brother she collects crystals, frogs and their young, art projects, the before-mentioned animals, two live cats and a hamster. She thinks all critters are adorable: slugs, mice, newts, “Godzilla” and “Mothra”. She is still climbing walls and door jams and peers down at me from the ceiling in the hall to make my heart race just as her father always did.

And before hitting the button to send it to the clouds, did the Dahls include best wishes for a glorious Christmas holiday and a fabulous 2015. No politics. No ecology statements. No anti-war pleas. And apparently no humor. JUST LOVE!

Grove and Michael

Let us know what’s up in your corner of the world…in a Christmas letter or a note to gandmdahl@hotmail.com

This wasn’t nearly as easy as I thought! I made it six different times using Hallmark Card Studio and although the graphics were cute in each, nobody could read the letter. So with a picture of a child’s adorable art and Word, this is what you get! No clever clip art and no music! Maybe I’ll have better luck with the photo pages. I hope you will be able to open them. If all else fails, Ken has offered to put my Christmas letter on the blog each year.... www.gridley59.com/Dahls/

Grove