Before we get started, I would just like to wish our friends and relatives a really wonderful Christmas and a bumper 2005. May it be a year of peace, prosperity and fulfillment. Thanks for all your wonderful gifts - much appreciated.

This is what happened on Christmas day....

George woke up at 7.30, hurled his dummy across the room, yanked the Beatrix Potter characters off the mobile above his bed then, devoid of further accessible entertainment, cried for assistance. Little did he know that Santa had been making regular visits to the house over the previous few days and had left him a whole stack of toys, which now adorn every room of this large house.

Wallowing in a sea of glittering parcels, all there for the ripping, George duly let rip, occasionally showing his appreciation with a loud chortle or an incomprehensible sentence delivered with gusto. He loved the plastic doggy with puppy, which plays songs and barks when you push a button on his back and drag him along. He was much amused by the dump truck driver who toddles off on his own when you press his head. The educational wooden beads on bendy wires device attracted passing attention. Pop up books with exciting animals were a hit. But best of all were the discarded chocolate wrappers - further evidence of mummy and daddy's decision to let it all hang out this Christmas season. George is planning to send thank you letters to his kind relatives and godmother for their generous donations to his wellbeing. Talking of which...

Mummy has a horrible laryngitis, hacking cough illness which makes her talk a little like Donald Duck, if she tries to talk at all. She smiles a lot and indulgently pretends to chew George's chocolate wrapper when prompted by son. Daddy is on good form but fears he is also coming down with the virus. Boring.

George made a special Christmas delivery to the neighbours today, carrying their gifts on the back of his new tractor and cart from aunty Lori and uncle Edi. Mummy and Daddy made him wear his pudding hat and pretended he was one of the dwarves working for Santa in Greenland. Dominique and Gaby seemed to fall for it and even invited George and daddy in for a drink.

Baby is eleven months old and is walking a lot now. He looks a bit like Frankenstein's monster, holding his arms out in front of him and wobbling precariously, but each foray across the room is greeted by loud applause from adoring parents, which seems to spur him on to greater adventures.

George, Graham and Julie are really enjoying baby's first Christmas - and the first for all of us in our new home. May the good times keep rolling on.

Charles Darwin, British Naturalist (1809 -1882)

I have called this principle, by which each slight variation, if useful, is preserved, by the term Natural Selection.
—Charles Darwin from "The Origin of Species"

Charles Robert Darwin was born on February 12, 1809 in Shrewsbury, England. He was the fifth child and second son of Robert Waring Darwin and Susannah Wedgwood. Darwin was the British naturalist who became famous for his theories of evolution and natural selection. Like several scientists before him, Darwin believed all the life on earth evolved (developed gradually) over millions of years from a few common ancestors.

From 1831 to 1836 Darwin served as naturalist aboard the H.M.S. Beagle on a British science expedition around the world. In South America Darwin found fossils of extinct animals that were similar to modern species. On the Galapagos Islands in the Pacific Ocean he noticed many variations among plants and animals of the same general type as those in South America. The expedition visited places around the world, and Darwin studied plants and animals everywhere he went, collecting specimens for further study.

Upon his return to London Darwin conducted thorough research of his notes and specimens. Out of this study grew several related theories: one, evolution did occur; two, evolutionary change was gradual, requiring thousands to millions of years; three, the primary mechanism for evolution was a process called natural selection; and four, the millions of species alive today arose from a single original life form through a branching process called "specialization."

Darwin's theory of evolutionary selection holds that variation within species occurs randomly and that the survival or extinction of each organism is determined by that organism's ability to adapt to its environment. He set these theories forth in his book called, "On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life" (1859) or "The Origin of Species" for short. After publication of Origin of Species, Darwin continued to write on botany, geology, and zoology until his death in 1882. He is buried in Westminster Abbey.

Darwin's work had a tremendous impact on religious thought. Many people strongly opposed the idea of evolution because it conflicted with their religious convictions. Darwin avoided talking about the theological and sociological aspects of his work, but other writers used his theories to support their own theories about society. Darwin was a reserved, thorough, hard working scholar who concerned himself with the feelings and emotions not only of his family, but friends and peers as well.

It has been supposed that Darwin renounced evolution on his deathbed. Shortly after his death, temperance campaigner and evangelist Lady Elizabeth Hope claimed she visited Darwin at his deathbed, and witnessed the renunciation. Her story was printed in a Boston newspaper and subsequently spread. Lady Hope's story was refuted by Darwin's daughter Henrietta who stated, "I was present at his deathbed ... He never recanted any of his scientific views, either then or earlier."