Dearest Loved Ones

2010 Schroeder Christmas Letter

Dearest Loved Ones,

Merry Christmas!!!! Things are busier than ever on the Schroeder home front, living life, traveling when we can--sometimes for fun, sometimes for work--publishing, Juice Plus’n, and lovin’ on our three-year-old Andrew! He is the most awesome thing in our life! A.J. continues to be advanced in so many areas and just keeps us rolling with his funny antics and astounded at his thought process.

In June, Pat’s parents rented a beach house at Hilton Head and invited our family and Pat’s brothers & our nephew to join them—what a wonderful family time we all had for a week! In September we hiked around in the magnificent, breathtaking Sequoia, Kings Canyon, and Yosemite National Parks. In Yosemite, we stayed overnight in a tent cabin and had to lock all our food and toiletries in a metal cabinet from bears, and still had raccoons checking us out, haha. That was quite an experience for me since I’m not much of a camper, but A.J. LOVED it—it was just hard for him to be quiet for the sake of our neighboring tent mates. In October Maria was fortunate to have a Juice Plus+ Conference in Orlando this year so we made it into a 2-week family trip and took A.J. to Disney World, Disney’s Hollywood Studios, Sea World, Animal Kingdom, visited some friends in Tampa & caught a hockey game, then spent a few days at Fort Donaldson with friends in Tennessee. We were so blessed and fortunate to do so many fun things and see so much beauty this year! We have hundreds of photos to share, and if you are on FaceBook with us, you can see many of them there!

We published one new book this year: “Like Leaves In A Storm: The Sacrifice of Iverson’s Brigade at Gettysburg” by Jason Amico. We continue to do Civil War soldier research at the National Archives and work on several other future titles.

We loved getting an early first snow this year. Snows are wonderful for making us take a break, enjoy being home and time out to PLAY! Andrew LOVES snow and throwing snow balls, sledding, and building a snowman. We love how he gets us out there to play in it like we are kids again too. That’s so important you know, taking time to play. . . keeps an important balance in life.

We are sending great big hugs, lots of love, and wishes for you to enjoy this Christmastime and have many special and wonderful moments in the oncoming new year! We reminiscence every day and are very fond of all our memories with you--the people that make our world a very special, loving place. Hoping to make more sweet memories with you in the new year.

With much love, sunshine & snowflakes,

Maria, Patrick & Andrew

434-525-4431

434-238-3936 (M-cell)

434-238-3933 (P-cell)