Christmas greetings inside Friday
December 23, 2016 OFFICIAL NEWSPAPER OF HARDIN COUNTY
E L D O R A, I O W A
641-939-5051
Santa and the Mrs turn up all around and everywhere
High for the Day
Medicap thought it detected a zero reading but the official high in the recent Sunday freezup was a minus 1 according to the weather service. The low Sunday morning had been a bone crunching minus 19. Snow was just barely an inch but winds magnified its impact.
Newsbriefs Early deadline for Jan. 3 edition of the Eldora Newspapers
Due to the Christmas and New Year’s holidays, the Eldora Newspapers will have early deadline for their Tuesday, Jan. 3 editions. Deadline will be by 5 p.m. Wednesday, Dec. 28. The Eldora Newspaper office will be closed Monday, Dec. 26 and Monday, Jan. 2 in observance of the holidays.
Free movie at the Eldora Library Dec. 27
There will be a free kids’ movie at the Eldora Library on Tuesday, Dec. 27 from 1 to 2:40 p.m. The movie is rated PG. Check the library website or Facebook for the title.
Crafts at the Eldora Library Dec. 28
The Steamboat Rock Library is excited to inform you that author Jean (Vande Voort) De Vries will be there (511 West Market Street) on Thursday, Dec. 29 from 1 to 3 p.m. Her recently published book, Bestow on Us your Grace, is her first. She will tell a little about the publishing process and give an inside look at her novel. Lunch will be served. Everyone is welcome at this come and go event.
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by Rick Patrie News Editor ELDORA – Santa’s been busy. Not only has he had to go round the world, he has had to spend a lot of time just here in Eldora. Santa and Mrs. who look an awful lot like Eldora’s Tom and Linda Pierson (just coincidentally) had a very busy schedule this year. The retired farm couple, Santa and Mrs., were at the Steamboat Rock breakfasts twice, at the big holiday show and Christmas pageant once, at the courthouse in Eldora in the rotunda, at the Eldora Library just last week, and they were set to go to the New Providence Soda Fount on Tuesday this week. Santa and Mrs. have a Eldora summer home between Steamboat Rock and Eldora, and when they overnight in Eldora, it’s at a residence on 15th Street. The one thing you learn being Santa, he says, is to watch the parents closely. Don’t get caught up in trying to make every child smile, not if you do it at the price of promising something that moms and dad are pleading you deny.
Kids can take disappointment while on Santa’s lap, but they are no good at all come Christmas morning when something scheduled does not show up. Sometimes they ask a lot Like last year, one little girl wanted Santa to promise that every child in the world would get a gift. “I said we try to do our best.” Then a child asked for something even Santa on his best day can’t delivery. The world won’t let him. Peace on earth. Kids do ask for exotic electronics, and Santa admits that once in a while he and Mrs. have to investigate just exactly what the latest gizmos might look like. Santa says he has been at this six years…. he has put on a little weight, and he has always had a beard, which has now turned snow white – so he is in perfect dress for the job. Finally, we think we heard Santa say something about maybe having been part of the graduating class of Eldora 1967? But naw….that couldn’t have been.
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“Considering the weather we had a pretty decent turnout,” said Eldora Librarian Dan Gehring, who counted somewhere in the neighborhood of 50 people. Tom and Linda Pierson were conspicuously present there and in the courthouse too. Friends of the Library provided cookies. Everybody had a good time.
An assist for families of those afflicted
Organizers envision new mental health support by Rick Patrie News Editor HARDIN COUNTY – Some enthusiasts for better mental health services in this area are inaugurating a new project addressing not so much the sufferer’s from mental illness, but care givers and family members who are trying to help their loved ones. Recognizing a need to support families of individuals with mental illness, a new support group is forming in Hardin County. Hardin County Families Supporting
Families will begin meeting January 10 from 6 to 7:30 p.m. at First United Methodist Church, Iowa Falls. The group will then meet the second Tuesday of each month. A light meal will be provided. The purpose of the group is to provide support, education and advocacy for families and caregivers of persons with mental illness. The group also intends to eventually provide public educational events. For more information call 515689-4262 or contact Hardin County Community Services at 641-939-
8168. Organizers have been pulling the new project together for a couple of months and Cynthia Brown of Iowa Falls has been a key figure in the effort. The initiative comes amid a changing backdrop for mental health services in Iowa. The state and county’s involvement have in the last couple of years adjusted to more and more regionalization of public programs. Hardin County Mental Health Services director Lynn Adams says the new system
sometimes offers opportunities for expanded programs, but there are a lot of misgivings as the changes remove some of the ‘local’ from the service efforts. Meanwhile, Iowa Falls already has one active program under way in that community, where Monday, Wednesday and Friday, the community Friendship Club invites all persons actually suffering from mental illness to come in for some socializing and support. Adams says there are about 40 participants on a semi regular
basis. It is a long-standing project for mental illness sufferers and the meeting spot is just north of the HyVee store in the commercial center on the south side of town. He says the 40 regular attendance numbers at the Friendship Club maybe point to the potential for the Families Supporting Families project, too. The Friendship Club routinely draws in membership from the Eldora and Hubbard communities too, he says.
The story of Christmas
Contributed by Ryan Harvey who heads Mid-America Publishing the parent company of the Eldora Newspapers From time to time as Christmas approaches, I love to pull out one of my sons’ board books and read it to them. The book, written by Joseph Slate entitled “Who is Coming To Our House,” gives a glimpse of what happened in the barn over 2,000 years ago. “Who is coming to our house?” “Someone, someone,” says Mouse. Who is that someone? As Christmas approaches just a few short days ahead I’ll recite Matthew 1:18-2:12 of the New Interna-
tional Version. This is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about: His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be with child through the Holy Spirit. Because Joseph her husband was a righteous man and did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly. But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in
her is from the Holy Spirit. She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.” All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: “The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel”--which means, “God with us.” When Joseph woke up, he did what the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took Mary home as his wife. But he had no union with her until she gave birth to a son. And he gave him the name Jesus.
After Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, during the time of King Herod, Magi from the east came to Jerusalem and asked, “Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star in the east and have come to worship him.” When King Herod heard this he was disturbed, and all Jerusalem with him. When he had called together all the people’s chief priests and teachers of the law, he asked them where the Christ was to be born. “In Bethlehem in Judea,” they replied, “for this is what the prophet has written: “’But you,
Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; for out of you will come a ruler who will be the shepherd of my people Israel.’” Then Herod called the Magi secretly and found out from them the exact time the star had appeared. He sent them to Bethlehem and said, “Go and make a careful search for the child. As soon as you find him, report to me, so that I too may go and worship him.” After they had heard the king, they went on their way, and the star they
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