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Blue Valley Riding Christmas Spirit Story
Two Little Girls And A Carousel

December 22, 2002

Bob,

It's nearly Christmas, and I thought I'd share something wonderful that has happened in our neighborhood. Please feel free to add it to your neighborhood website if you wish.

Last Thursday night, about 2 in the morning, Theresa heard a 'rumbling truck' out in front of our home. She looked out, noticed a big truck with running lights on top of the cab in front of our house. She didn't think anything was wrong, it just seemed kind of odd, so she went back to bed as she heard it pull away.

Friday morning she was leaving for work and came back in crying. "Someone has vandalized the carousel! And I think I heard them last night!" I went outside to see for myself, and our Christmas Carousel was leaning to one side with one of the characters (elf with bag of presents) missing.

We had built this ourselves about 6 years ago, and it has been part of our decorations in front of our home ever since. It has survived rain, snow, ice, and the tremendous winds that we sometimes get without damage over these past years.

Unfortunately, someone decided to end that run of 6 years one week before Christmas 2002.

This morning, Saturday, my son and I sadly took the carousel down. As we were taking it down, several neighbors I knew, as well as some I didn't know, stopped by to say how sorry they were that this had happened. Many said that their kids looked forward to this going up each year. Help was offered to repair it.

Then the best part. We were done putting everything away, and were relaxing in the living room. Our doorbell rang, and I answered. Our neighbor, Jamie Hunter was there with his two young daughters.

I opened the door, and one of them sadly said "We're sorry your Merry-Go-Round got broke". They gave me some Christmas cookies, and a beautiful hand written note with some wonderful pictures on it.

I was so touched, I was speechless. In this small, wonderful gesture, the meaning of neighborhood and Christmas seemed to melt together. I choked when I whispered "Thank you". That brief moment made all of the anger and sadness for the loss of this years display disappear.

My thanks go out to Jamie and his two lovely children for changing this sad event into such a wonderful Christmas story.

Finally, the damage to the carousel is minor and very repairable. In fact, I spent the afternoon looking for the appropriate character to replace the missing elf.

I hope for the honor of having the Hunter children here to turn on the power for our Christmas 2003 Carousel!

Happy Holidays!
The Swallow Family

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