December 15, 1963 The Coldest Wind, The Christmas Tree, The Snow on the Ground and The Next Summer's Vacation

Dear Mother & Daddy,

"It is almost midnight but I was afraid I wouldn't get this written if I waited till morning.  We have been to a potluck supper and just got home.  This has been a full day and I didn't even get to Ann's lesson with her.

I had to go down to the church and help set up the dining room for our big family Christmas party tomorrow night.  I have to fix food for that and really don't know yet what I'll fix or when I'll fix it unless I skip church.  All of us are invited to a tea in the afternoon and the church supper is at 5:30.

Yesterday I got a permanent and spent the rest of the day addressing cards.  Last night we went to a program at school.  It was so cold and the wind just went through us as we walked across campus.  I think this is the coldest wind in the country.

We finally got the Christmas tree up and the children have it decorated.  The cat thinks it belongs to her. She lies down under it and watches the lights.

There is snow on the ground but we are planning our next summer's vacation.  We have signed up to go to Europe with a University group. President Bone's family is going so Bob will have pals in the group and Polly's folks are making arrangements for her to go so Ann will have a friend, too.  The rest will be adults, we think. There will be about 30 in the group.  We'll be gone from the end of June to the end of July.  It will probably be the last big trip we can take before Bob starts to college because he'll want to go to summer school a year from next summer. He is more excited than any of us, I think, and is doing a term paper on one of the Greek islands we'll visit.  We'll be in London, Rome, Greece and Paris besides a lot of other places.  We'll just have to tell you more about it when we see you.

We're still planning to come on the 22nd and probably will stop in St. Louis.  So it may be late afternoon before we get there.

I must go to bed but we'll see you soon."

                                             Lots of love,

                                                 Bonnie

Clipping with the letter

NOTE:  The poem at the top of the post was written by Grace Shea (1894-1982), our school nurse, a writer, and close friend of our mother.

Thank you, readers, for reading another year of letters!