Dear xxxxx,









Christmas Time, 1997





This Fall saw the celebration of the first birthdays of our first 
grandchildren - Willem, in Holland, and Samer, in Israel.   

As goes without saying, these two new people have injected lots of 
new effervescence into Neergaard family life.  Lois and I, for instance, 
have seen the insouciance which empty-nesters such as we drift cheerily 
into, cheerily give way to an enthusiasm for this next generation, an 
enthusiasm nourished by the stream of electrifying news bulletins 
(".....he said 'bird'!";   ".....first steps today!") that keep arriving from 
those recently filled, if distant, nests.





Aside from indulging our newly available source 
of entertainment  -  poking through toy stores (which I 
can now do without even a trace of sheepishness in my grin)  -  
Lois and I continue much as before, doing our things on the tennis 
court and in the garden, interspersed with odd bits of travel.  When time 
permits (hey!  we're supposed to be retired!), I push along my search for 
genealogical nuggets, and Lois designs and makes really quite lovely quilts.  

 We did manage to get away to France for a month in June, first to Paris, followed by a
ten-day meander through 
 the Loire valley to Burgundy.  We met up with the kids there for a week's float on a boat down the very pretty 
 Nivernais canal - a gorgeously languid interlude, at least when it wasn't being punctuated by the need to 
 crank lock gates, a not infrequent event (there were over 100!).   But the exercise was handsomely rewarded by 
 its effectiveness in working up of a good appetite;  and one does eat well in
the Burgundian countryside.  

There followed three days in - how  else to say it? - magical Provence, with Sue and Jan Willem, in the house they'd
 taken near Avignon;   and finally, a week or so visiting several friends who've retired to the Riviera.
 
  
A few days after returning to the States, we 
were most pleasantly helped to re-root by being 
steeped in the dreamy Americana of rural 
Michigan as guests of the LaNouettes.  It 
was sailing and tennis and more eating 
well during our stay with Louise and 
Bill in their gracious new home, 
perched atop a knoll touching two 
shores, of Lakes White and Michigan.  


Next February, a Safari in Tanzania with the Treadaways!








Sue, living in Holland, has enjoyed being a full-
time mom so much that she and Jan Willem have 
decided she should become one again.   And no 
wonder.  Their Willem combines an endearingly 
cheerful disposition with an intensity of focus  
that's positively startling.  (And that's a totally  
objective grandparental view!).   She's due end 
of April.

The three of them visited us for several weeks  
during September.   It was a wall-to-wall 
pleasure.





Arthur continues to keep a moving target.  He's transferred from Product  Development 
to Engineering, but is still engaged in the design, with vendors, of packaging machinery 
for P&G, last year for installation in Latin America, now for  China.  Somehow, poor 
chap, he gets to do this work at such hardship locations  as Brussels, Geneva and Osaka.  
He did manage to be in Cincinnati in September  to throw his Riverfest party again this 
year, offering his balconies to a large,  eclectic and boisterous group of ooh-ers and ah-
ers at the spectacular  fireworks-choreographed-to-music.  He'll be back in town for the 
 holidays too, but only just, flying out Christmas night for a dive  trip off the coast of 
Burma.







Richard manages the Israeli subsidiary of his company, Benckiser,
which has just gone public.   His participation in the IPO has
caused a wide grin to settle on his face.  Richard and Ishraq's
home in Tel Aviv is by the beach, where the Mideast's political
turmoil easily evaporates in the ambiance of sea and sun.   So
whenever Richard calls, the talk is not much about business and 
never of politics, but of their son, Samer.  Each report asserts 
that Samer has become "even cuter", most recently progressing 
to a stage of "beyond cute".   And indeed Baby Samer is as
serene as Baby Willem is intense, but fully shares Willem's
beaming good nature (another unbiased grandparental
observation).   Richard, Ishraq and Samer will shortly be
joining us for a week's holiday in California (to enjoy El Niņo?),
and will then return with us to Cincinnati, bless them, for Christmas.





 Peter and his lovely friend Lisa have set next July as the time they'll become officially 
one, and wedding plans are moving toward stage- center.   Not that both of them aren't 
already fully occupied already,  with being supernumeraries for the opera, tending the 
sharks at the  zoo (in the tank, under water), going on diving trips, and, 
incidentally, coming up to speed on new jobs which each of them started a few 
 months ago.  Peter has joined Transarc, a network-software company,  as trainer of the 
information-management personnel in Transarch's clients.   Lisa is auditor of financial 
derivatives operations within PNC Bank.   She's been told it's OK if she doesn't 
understand them - no one  else does either, even the back-room birds who cooked  them 
up (as the periodic headlines of various fiscal  catastrophes attest).   We're very much 
looking  forward to having them with us for several days  of Christmas week.





 Warmest good wishes for the season and for the coming year, from all of us, to you and 
 yours,

				The Neergaards