Merry Christmas 2005 and Happy New Year 2006! It has been a good year for us and we are very thankful for family, friends, a full life and many blessings. We pray that all is well with you and your family. It also looks as if we are getting a new member of the family soon. Sadie, a rather nondescript, black, possible spaniel mix, 8-month old puppy should be coming to live with us tomorrow. We are looking forward to the company and hopefully not too much more excitement.
We’ve been keeping as busy as ever. In fact so busy, we’re late again with the cards. While we still haven’t completely finished fixing up “Tall Oaks” our country house, we have moved in. In June we decided that we were getting close to finishing, so we put a “for sale by owner” sign on the house on Garden Place anticipating several months before a closing. Instead in less than three weeks, we had closed and moved. 9651 E Hwy 72 is our new street address, but the city and zip as well as the telephone number remain the same as before. Even though we still don’t have a proper kitchen and we are living in the guest bedroom, at least we no longer have two houses to maintain. However, the unexpected success in selling one house created new problems and more work. We found out that with all the boxes and junk, we no longer had room for a workshop. So, we’ve put up a new 24’x24’ workshop on the southeast corner of the property. It’s great and we now have some room to work as well as an inside place to park the van. But we’ve not been able to complete much work inside the house since spring. It didn’t help that we took a few trips and smelled a few roses.
The biggest trip was a 60th-birthday celebration trip to Peru with twin sister Joyce and brother-in-law Kenn. In fact, it was more like two vacations in two countries. We first flew via Lima to Iquitos and then cruised up the Amazon for a week. The river, wildlife, birds, fish, villages and all were awesome and unforgettable. However, while it was all new experience and quite an adventure, the accommodations on the Arka, our rusty “cruise” boat, were just a bit lacking. Civilization was a very long way away. The second half of the trip was completely different. We flew back to Lima then to Cuzco in the Andes. The highlight of this week was the visit to Machu Picchu, the old Inca city rediscovered in 1911. These were the most wonderful ruins in a truly spectacular mountain setting. Between the landscape and the history, I think this site surpassed anything else we’ve ever seen, including Egypt. The life-style luxuries we experienced during our week in the mountains made up for those we missed in the Amazon.
We made our annual trip to England in late September. This year the weather was pretty good, everyone we wanted to see was healthy, and we stayed a couple of days longer than usual. Sylvia’s mother remains pretty much the same and is always in good spirits. The kids, Paul and Angela, are both doing well and we got some quality time together. Brother Frank is now a published author, quitting his “day job” to work on the second book. Harrogate and Cheltenham, the two places we lived, hadn’t changed much. We also got to northern Wisconsin for the annual family (siblings) reunion and timed a “mini” class of 1963 reunion in Mantorville, Minnesota. Among the quicker trips were Florida, Omaha twice, and Minneapolis a second time.
We’re still helping out a couple of days a week at the local Habitat for Humanity “resale” store; however, Sylvia is now the boss as the paid “Saturday Re-Store Manager” and I am just her volunteer assistant. I also assist in the AARP Volunteer Tax Preparation program starting in February until mid-April. This is a pretty good program and it’s not just for seniors. Although we are no longer actively looking for antiques, we are still selling some redundant things we brought back from England at a local antique mall, called True Treasures.
So that’s the news from the Argetsinger’s for now. If you are ever driving US highway 71/I-540 between Bella Vista and Rogers in the NW corner of Arkansas, stop in. We’d love to see you.
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year
Sylvia and Jerry
9651 East Highway 72, Bentonville, AR 72712
Telephone 479-271-8572
E-mail: jerry@argets.com or sylvia@argets.com
Web site: http://www.argets.com/