Hello Dear Friends,
I hope everyone is doing well and made the best of what needed to be during this Christmas season.  Thank goodness this won't last forever.

I wanted to let you know that Lin and I drove to Vida, Oregon, along the McKenzie Highway on that beautiful day we had on Monday to deliver the quilt that Alice had pieced and Virginia had machine-quilted and for which Mary had made a label that I sewed on for Nate & Melissa, my cousin's son and his partner.  They were really delighted with it!  They said one of the hardest parts of their place burning to the ground in the Holiday Farm Fire in September has been losing all of their mementos so they said this will be something great to start creating new mementos for them.  Melissa said that her grandmother had made a quilt for her when she was a little girl and that, of course, was destroyed so this quilt would be special.

Nate is a science teacher at McKenzie High School so took us there to see his classroom and lab, empty now since March.  Just outside his classroom was a greenhouse which burned to the ground where their Garden Club met in addition to other things.  I've attached a photo taken from inside Nate's classroom showing the burned greenhouse just outside it.  It is amazing that the school didn't burn but I imagine the firefighters battled hard to save it.  It is being used as a temporary post office for one of the nearby towns which lost theirs and there is also a 'free thrift store' there for fire victims to come and get things they need that people have donated for their use.  They said it was amazing how generous people can be when something like this happens.  Nate's & Melissa's big hassle has been fighting with their insurance company, a non-major one designated specifically for teachers, which has fought them every step of the way.

Nate & Melissa had bought a new house just before the fire that needs a lot of work before they can move in.  They were there working on it on Monday since Nate has school vacation so we met them there.  Another photo shows just how close the fire came in the grass to that house.  The burned stump is about 15' from the house on the other side where a shed also burned down.  It was a miracle that their house didn't burn.  He said he had been by the house a few days before the fire and watered the shrubs around the house really good since they hadn't been watered all summer.  That probably helped.

We must have seen more than a hundred houses and businesses that had burned to the ground with only the chimneys standing.  It was really sad to see all that destruction.

Thanks to all of you for your efforts in making quilts and comforters for those in need.  It is a wonderful service that you are providing.

Linda Rush