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Merry Christmas from the Neergaard & van der Werff Families

LOIS and DICK:

	Cincinnati Opera, which usually plays a safe repertoire of the likes of Verdi and Puccini, had the effrontery to put on a Wagner opera this season! My initial dread however proved to have been founded in ignorance. There were hours and hours of soaring major chords alright, but no large stentorian women with blond braids and horned helmets. Instead the opera, Meistersinger, turned out to be a light-hearted romance and, while indeed l o n g, was hugely enjoyable. Waddya know!
Lois and I remain in good health, thanks be. Again this year we escape from Ohio’s winter by retreating to Hilton Head for four months, less four weeks in December in Cincinnati for an at-home family Christmas. How very pleasant that sojourn in the south is! As we go back year after year, we’ve developed friendships with fellow snowbirders that we value deeply . Big family events of the year were, chronologically, Richard’s appointment as General Manager of Reckitt-Benckiser’s German subsidiary, our family excursion “Out West”, choreographed by Sue (how nice!...all I had to do was be there), Jan Willem’s business expansion and his (almost) disarming affair with a chain-saw, Arthur’s acquisition of a dog (at last!), and Cathy’s new job. About all of which here’s what the principals have to say:

SUE and JAN WILLEM and Willem and Nick (per Jan Willem):

From Elephant Hill [editor: four-wheeling through a rugged pass over rocks and washes into the Utah high-desert wilderness] to the Woerdense Verlaat [editor: home - a lovely pastoral village in Holland] Chainsaw Massacre [see below], this was an eventful year. For the last couple of months Sue has been the family chauffer, driving the boys back and forth to school twice a day. But she has also been driving me, since I had a small accident with a chainsaw which put my right arm out of commission for a couple of months [editor: a tree had blown over onto JW’s Porsche. In the course of clearing it, the wrong limb was (partly) cut off].

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In what little time she has left over, Sue is kept very busy volunteering at school. Through her contacts in the international community around us, new cooking ideas are brought home from which we all benefit. Sue’s Indian dishes are just excellent. Willem and Nick do well at school. As 8th and 7th graders respectively, they do so well that they hardly ever have homework ....really! [editor: a-hem!] Much more importantly, sailing this year has also been very good. Besides Lasers and catamarans, Willem has discovered that some
of the instructors at sailing school are very interesting, particularly those of the female persuasion. And a couple of weeks ago Nick scored his first goal for VV Sportief, the local youth soccer club [editor: YAY!].
Business has been great in 2010. GBT [editor: “Global Blade Technology” is a wind-turbine company of which JW is founder and CEO: see: www.gbtholding.com], had a very good first year. With a current headcount of 20, the company established sales in China, Korea, Europe and the US. We started a plant in Holland and have just landed an order in the US that will enable a molds and tooling plant to be constructed in the US, most likely in Ohio. The outlook for next year is great also and we expect to grow to 80 people. A true highlight of the year was our summer vacation in the Wild West. During a weeklong trip we visited many adventurous sites, with grampa, Uncle Peter, and “Stevegar” as our traveling companions. More about the trip can be found by clicking here.

ARTHUR:

	This year started out as just another year. I worked, did stuff, had a birthday carried out projects for my company [editor: P&G R&D in Cincinnati], saw some people, went some places, and some stuff happened, blah, blah, blah …. BUT THEN I GOT A DOGGIE!	[editor: guess which ]
	Her name is Pumpkin (at least that’s what I call her, because she won’t tell me her real name). She was a rescued stray that I was dog-sitting for a weekend, then one thing led to another, and she decided to stay.
She still has a lot of puppy in her, and judging by the size of her feet, has some growing to do. [editor: that report is way understated! Arthur’s always been a dog guy, but felt he oughtn’t to have one since he’s away all day (but he has let himself be serially seduced by stray cats, now numbering five). Then in November he spotted Pumpkin, a feral pup, vulnerable to the coming winter. He trapped her and gave her over for adoption. Alas she immediately ran away from her foster home. Arthur then spent two full days scouring the countryside searching for her. And he found her! Clearly Fate had decreed that she remain with him. For the full drama, CLICK HERE ].
So now we’re working to integrate a dog into our lives. We’ve stopped getting car sick, and throwing up into the center console. House training is going well … most of the time. Right now, the dog and Grampa are in trouble with Grandma, because one of them pee’ed on Grandma’s bed, and neither is admitting to it. Pumpkin and the cats are pretending to ignore each other. …..It’s gonna be a busy year.

RICHARD and ISHRAQ and Samer and Lila (per Richard):

	Another year, another move... The family moved from Istanbul to Frankfurt over the summer and the kids now attend the Frankfurt International School, which their aunt Sue and uncle Arthur attended 40 years ago. History coming full circle. The school and house are great so the family is happy and just trying to get used to the German lifestyle which seems to revolve around the proper sorting of garbage.
Samer is now mastering being a DJ and all the electronics that go with it, turning our garage into the school's party center. Lila as always, excels at the piano and art.

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I continue to ensure dishes and laundry are clean in Germany [editor: as General Manager of the Reckitt Benckiser German subsidiary], escaping regularly on my Harley on the perfect roads of the German countryside.

Ishy has developed a taste for nature as we live at the edge of a forest, and has taken up the German habit of "walking" with friends from the neighborhood. She very much enjoys indulging her passions for history and art, which are combined in a class she attends in Frankfurt with a group of patrons of art.

PETER and CATHY (per Cathy):

	2010 proved to be a relatively calm year. We continued to settle into our new home and tackle several planned (and unplanned) home improvement projects. On a positive note, this allowed Peter to expand his collection of power tools. It also gave the boys a chance to exercise their Y chromosomes before calling in professionals to clean up their messes. Steven (ten) continues to do very well in school and has been invited to participate in an advanced kids program at Carnegie Mellon University. When he’s not busy with extracurricular activities, his favorite pastime is bonding with his little brother, Alex. Alex (two) has transformed from a baby into a toddler. His favorite activity, when he is not helping mom with laundry or flipping pancakes, is playing with his big brother "T-10" -- they are inseparable.
As for Peter and me, we’re both still with IBM [editor: in Pittsburgh], and I've moved to another position with lots of new responsibilities [editor: Peter designs then gives courses in IBM's high-end business software; Cathy organizes and manages IBM conventions world-wide].

With our most cordial best wishes for a joyous Christmas, and a prosperous new year,

Dick and Lois