Greetings to you and yours this holiday season! As another year has raced by and is coming to a close, we hope that 2015 has treated you well. As always, our calendar was pretty full but we have been having fun and were able to visit with many friends throughout the year.

In January, we traveled to Massanutten to visit with most of the Mayhew clan. A week of family fun, shared meals, and lots of laughs ensued. Greg got to ski after a long hiatus and Anna found out she can’t ski at all (watching Greg on skis was well worth it though).

Also in January, Anna’s mom landed in the hospital with a heart attack. Fortunately she rebounded quickly with little-to-no issues, which means that she’s back to being a handful!

Over the summer, we attended our first Pennsic – think medieval camping event, with music, song, campfires and some of the most amazing summer weather. We went after years of cajoling from many friends, and enjoyed the break from the ‘present day’.

This year’s big home improvement job entailed replacing our aging deck. Those of you who have been to the house know what a big deck we have – it runs along most of the house. In addition to replacing the entire deck, we decided to add a screened-in porch that will allow us to get more use out of the deck. Other, and much more modest, projects included a few plumbing repairs and new outdoor lights for the front of the house.

Anna’s pottery studio continues to grow little by little with this year’s shows mainly in Virginia, with the five-week run of the Virginia Renaissance Faire being the mainstay of the spring. This fall, a small local gallery started carrying some of her pottery, and she held her first open house event. Of course, we spent a lot of time at the Maryland Renaissance Faire at Tessem Stoneware peddling pots for our friend as well as few of Anna’s.

Gregory is still getting to work mostly from home and on nice days he’s able to move to his ‘outdoor office’ with his laptop. Often during the spring and fall, we were able to take walks during our shared lunch break which is a wonderful treat, not to mention good exercise.

Our furry children, Brodie and Duchess, are doing well and get along fabulously. While Brodie suffers from ‘wrong-side-of-the-door’ syndrome, Duchess seems to be afflicted with a tummy that can never be rubbed enough.