Here is Christmas at the Kerns house. I am writing this one week before Christmas and you are reading it a couple days after, so keeping the proper verb tense is challenging. Here we go. I began planning for this big family Christmas way back in the fall of 2012. With my daughters and daughter-in-law pregnant with grandchildren #10, #11 and #12, there could be 24 bottoms and mini-bottoms seated at the family dinner table for our celebratory feast honoring the birth of our Lord. Thus, I began building a large addition to our home; a project which began with a logging outing in early July. Expanding to five bedrooms and bathrooms, a barracks style loft in which to bunk grandchildren, plus adding a dining room large enough to seat us all at a single table, was an optimistic goal; completing it by Christmas made it criminally insane. Windows, exterior doors, roof underlayment, Tyvek house wrap and a little bit of insulation made our new mess hall functional seven days before Christmas; “functional” being the key word. The remaining expansion was still fairly rough. However, because my three children spent most of their formative years in wet sleeping bags on the mountains warming themselves by drinking coffee boiled over a campfire, their misery index is adjusted so low they will not complain. Fortunately, all three chose spouses of similar fortitude.

My middle daughter, Chelsie, her husband, Marc, and their three wee ones arrived from Florida the week before Christmas. Marc has one more year with the Navy’s Blue Angels and then they hope to return home to Montana. We hope as well, because developing a close relationship with our three Warner grandchildren is challenging when they are 2000 miles from Big Sky Country. It is tragic Montana sits on vast natural resources which could be developed and open enormous economic opportunities for young, growing families, yet we have allowed the Progressives to lock it all up under the guise they are protecting the environment.

My oldest daughter, Meagan, and her seven mini-Kimmels arrived four days before Christmas. However, my son-in-law, Tim, showed up a full week early just to help finish construction. His effort and enthusiasm was a blessing. This was a huge, challenging project and thinking back, my garage thermometer showed 103 degrees when I was peeling ridgepoles in July and 30 below zero the December day we lag-screwed them in place. The old saying, “failure is not an option,” is not entirely true. During exhausting moments of building, the trophy wife and I discussed failure as being a dang good option; perhaps our only option. Christmas is celebrated on December 25th by choice; a date picked to coincide with a pagan winter festival. The exact birthday of our Messiah is not precisely known, so the Kerns family could correctly celebrate Christmas in March thereby getting our construction task back on schedule. Facing the choice of altering the calendar or redefining “mission accomplished,” and making due with bare walls and exposed insulation, we chose the latter.

My youngest, Tyler, his wife Jill and their two little ones, rolled up the driveway the Sunday before Christmas. They have helped me most every weekend this fall, which is the great thing about them living just 100 miles away in Sheridan, Wyoming. Because the Cowboy State does actually develop their natural resources, Tyler and family were able to put roots down reasonably close to home. Wyoming and North Dakota offer tremendous economic opportunity; Montana offers $8 per hour housekeeping jobs in the Flathead catering to the ruling class who vacation in our Treasure State. Sadly, a majority of Montana voters find this arrangement acceptable if we expand social programs such as Medicaid, to keep housekeepers dependent on government. There is nothing charitable about committing anyone to a life of dependency.

Faith, family and freedom were my focus yesterday, today and will remain my focus tomorrow. America is the tool God has used to bestow good and relieve suffering throughout the world and it is our obligation to restore her to greatness. May you all have a Merry Christmas and may God continue to bless our great republic.