It was winter January 22, 1996 when I received the message that my younger sister Claudia had just given birth to her first daughter Hannah.  The first of my siblings to bring a child into this world. I was quite overwhelmed being an uncle for the very first time.

I was getting prepared to leave for Switzerland to visit family and friends. When on the plane, Swissair heading to Zürich.  Sitting in my seat I repeated, “It’s the night before Christmas Eve and the Ferguson family had just finished dinner prepared by grandma Ferguson”.  Through out a 12 hour flight I ran out of paper, leaving me to write on airsick bags, sides of newspapers, magazines and even napkins I pulled from my neighbor sitting to the right of me. Hours went by as the plane flew through the air, making our way closer and closer to our destination.  I couldn’t put the pen down for the story kept going and going.  By the time we landed in Zürich.

The story was on it’s way to becoming something very special. Once I arrived at my destination by my mom in St. Gallen.  I told her of what I have written while I was traveling from LA.  She thought it was very cute and asked if there was anything she could do?  I asked her if she would like to join in on this project with me?  She accepted and did all the illustrations.

Now my mother for many years has made wonderful greeting cards and all different types of cards, for all kinds of occasions.

Her background was in children’s wear in the embroidery industry of Bischoff Textiles AG. She had just asked me to write down what the characters were like and she would come up with the illustrations then posted them to me via the international post office.  Sometimes it would take weeks to receive changes but I was confident she knew what I was thinking and most of everything came exactly the way I envisioned.  She was right on target capturing a new and fresh look for this project, which would ultimately become my first children’s book to self publish.

Now the story didn’t end there.  It took me three round-trip flights. Once to Europe, once to New York and once to Boston. Then I was able to complete this story.
Now one day while working as a limousine driver on location at Raleigh Studios in Hollywood California.  I was working on some beats on my PMA-5 “ personal musicians assistant “, by Roland Music Corp.  On this day it became an Audio CD book.

For many years after I always thought that the story would be unique, live on the stage for all to see.  Then several years back I got the idea to make it into a musical.  Now the story has grown and will be able to be seen in the nearest future entitled; Night Before Christmas Eve.