‘Twas the poem before Christmas’

There’s something about Christmas and poetry that just go together! Perhaps it’s because some of our earliest memories have to do with that poem that starts out “T’was the night before Christmas and all through the house not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse...” Clement Moore’s famous Christmas poem is known and loved by people everywhere and its rhymes and rhythms help ring in the season every year. 
So it’s not surprising that for nearly 30 years, one of Hamilton County’s oldest residents has been penning a new Christmas poem to send out to her family and friends to share the joy of the season. At age 98, Agnes Andreasen, a native of Hordville who now lives in Grand Island, sat down a few days ago to pen her 28th Christmas letter, which is always in the form of a poem. She admits the annual tradition started out all those years ago as a way to save time and avoid writer’s cramp.  
“Instead of writing every card separately, I just make up a poem to send to everybody,” Andreasen explained. “I’ve been doing that since 1995, so it’s been a little while. But I guess the first one I made, I looked at it and I read it to my husband and I said ‘Should we use it?’ and he says, ‘Send it!’”
Taking a cue from Clement Moore, Andreasen began that first Christmas poem similarly:
“‘Twas just a few days before Christmas, and all ‘round our place, We’re busy in the workshop staying ahead in the race. This year it’s wishing wells, (Her late husband Bernie was building wishing wells as Christmas presents that year) and because of their size, it’s impossible to hide them and keep it a surprise. The outside of our house is an interesting sight, It includes a large star and many rays of light. Also on our place Christmas Eve is the date that our family comes home and we’ll celebrate. We’re enjoying good health in spite of some aches but square dancing is fun, and that’s what it takes. Bernie moves lots of trees and chips lots of stumps. It keeps him so busy. He’s never down in the dumps. Our kids are all well and hard work is the rule. The grandkids are all busy with their activities at school. We count all our blessings and discount the rest. Looking over the past year, we’ve truly been blessed. Life is just great; we can’t complain. I’m still his Swede-heart. And he’s my Great Dane.”
Andreason explained she is of Swedish ancestry and Bernie was Danish, so he once bought her a cup that said “Swede-heart” and in response she bought him one that said, “Love that I’m Danish.” 
She said she sometimes recycled lines from her poems from year to year, especially the closing stanza which utilizes a word that rhymes with her family name. 
“Well, a lot of times I would end it up like, ‘The best to you in this happy season, From the two of us, B. and A. Andreasen,’” she said, noting that “season” is one of the few words that rhymes with “Andreasen,” so she used it often.
Since penning that very first rhyming Christmas letter, every year since, Andreason has been creating a new Christmas poem based on things that have happened to her and her family in the previous 12 months, having it printed on fancy Christmas stationery and mailing it out to everyone on her Christmas card list. She has copies of all of them protected in plastic sleeves and clipped into a three-ring binder so she can get them out and re-read them and share them with visitors.

Highlighting the year
As seen in that first poem, Andreasen often tries to mention things that have happened that year in her poem, whether things that happened on the farm near Hordville or various adventures throughout the year.
“Like one year we took a little jaunt to the Black Hills,” she explained. “And one time we went to Washington D.C. Any little thing that we did, you know, during the year. Instead of telling them about it, just kind of make a couple of lines about it.”
Not only her personal annual activities, but those of her large extended family have also made it into her writing. Andreasen’s five children have given her six grandchildren and seven great grandchildren, who provide her with plenty of material to write about. 
When we spoke to Andreasen in late November she had done some thinking about her annual Christmas poem but had not yet written it, apparently needing the pressure of a deadline in order to get the creative juices flowing. 
However, already printed and bound and ready for distribution were copies of the eighth edition of a little book called “Out and About With Grandma,” which she gives as Christmas gifts to her family. She explains the reason is, “so I don’t have to go buy each one of them a Christmas present.” 
“I started out with really simple little deals,” she said, “because they were little, but as they get older then they can read more, you know. Sometimes a poem’s about the kids themselves and sometimes it’s just stuff. A lot of it is how we used to do things, like picking corn by hand and hanging washing out on the line and the old rural telephone and stuff like that.” 
But sometimes it’s things that happen to her grandchildren or greats that make it into her writing. 
“The one I get the biggest kick about from (granddaughter) Megan was when she was driving down the road and this pickup came up behind her wanting to pass her, which he did,” Andreasen related. “And then he cut in too soon, you know, and he was hauling a couple of porta-potties. And he cut in too soon and one of them fell off right on the pavement in front of her and she did some fancy driving getting around him. I got a kick out of writing about that!”
Andreasen also published an illustrated book for children when she was 90. The book called “Snips and Tales” which she says she “sold a lot of.” The book with drawings of animals by a professional illustrator has short snippets of statements about the pictured animals.
One page shows koalas with the accompanying text reading: “Koalas look like teddy bears. They walk around and play in pairs.” Another page shows killer whales and states: “In the ocean so big, with water so deep, lives Orca the whale, a big black heap.”
In addition to her writing, Andreasen is also a skilled crafter and enjoyed quilting for many years. In 2022 she won a ribbon at the State Fair for two folders of her poetry. 
Born in 1925, Andreasen was the sixth of 11 children in the Benson family and the first girl. She was also the first granddaughter to be born on her mother’s side of the family. She learned to love poetry as a school girl and at one point set out to memorize Longfellow’s lengthy “Midnight Ride of Paul Revere,” but never got it completely learned. She did, however,  memorize the great American poet’s “A Psalm of Life.” 
She married Bernie Andreasen in 1946 and when he passed away in 2018 they had been married 72 years. 
As mentioned earlier, Andreasen had yet to finish the 2023 edition of her Christmas poem at the time of our interview, however, we have reason to believe it may contain a line or two about being interviewed for this very article.