Happy New year to all. We’re excited to see what 2026 has in store for us. We had an eventful December with the kids’ various Christmas performances and parties. Sadly, we also had the sickness that Natalie picked up at the end of November pass through the rest of family. We had a fun visit to Mimi and Papa’s house for Christmas week. We all has a great time lounging in the hot tub, watching David in the theater, celebrating Christmas, and going to the Desert Museum. As we enter a new year, it’s always fun to reflect on the past year.
Cordelia played the clarinet at the middle school Christmas band concert. The 6th grade girls class went caroling at a retirement home and Cordelia played the piano. She also played the first two soccer games for the season. She’s been playing right mid-field or defender. She participated in the ice-skating rink Christmas show on the Synchro team. Unfortunately, she slipped and fell, but it was still a great performance. At the beginning of the year Cordelia was having a relaxing 5th grade year at Legacy. Now in 6th grade, she’s learning all sorts of new things and being challenged to manage her classes and homework at Horizon Prep. At the beginning of the year, she was skating three to four times a week and planning on taking the first test. During the summer her motivations changed. Now she’s only skating on the synchro team and has picked up other sports. She played her first volleyball league and now is playing soccer. She’s enjoyed the new sports, although it’s hard to let go of her old friendships at ice skating. Cordelia is still trying to navigate the social dynamics of a new school and middle school. This year she has grown in maturity and started earning some money as a mother’s helper. We are very proud of the caring, thoughtful, and responsible young lady she is becoming.
Anthony is doing great with his school work. He completed a report of the California mission San Rafael and made a Styrofoam model of the mission. Sadly, he got sick during the middle of the month and was unable to participate in the Grammar school Christmas show. For soccer he’s doing practice two times a week and played in one game. At the beginning of the year Anthony was just starting his first Super Leage with soccer. Over the year he has improved a lot in skill and confidence. With school Anthony had to adjust to the difference between Montessori learning and a traditional learning environment. In piano Anthony is starting to get a natural love for playing. He’s now in level 3 books and will occasionally play some of his favorite songs just because he feels like it. Anthony continues to show a higher mental and social maturity than the average 4th grade boy. He is a very thoughtful son and brother.
Lydia had a good month at school. She participated in the Grammar Christmas show. Unfortunately, she was the last to catch the sickness and missed her class Christmas party. But she was healthy enough to get back to school for the last three days of the school year. At the beginning of the year Lydia was in first grade and just getting a feel for elementary school. Now she’s excelling in second grade and has made new friends at her new school. In swimming, she started the year at level 8 and was just learning how to do butterfly stroke. Now she’s at level 11 and is refining all the strokes and working on flip turns. Lydia also seems to have turned a corner in her piano and is starting to play with more fluidness and confidence.
Natalie had a fun month of December once she recovered from her 4-day fever. Her class had a Christmas party and book exchange. Natalie got a very special Christmas gift from Mimi and Papa; her very own talking Violet dog. Natalie at the beginning of year was just working on her sounds and understanding what base numbers meant. Now at the end of the year she is reading short simple stories and is doing basic math. She also transitioned from Legacy to the pre-school at Horizon and has made some nice new friends. Natalie has continued playing soccer and now she’s in the 4-5 yr old micro class learning how to do scrimmages. In swimming, she went from level 5 to level 8 over the year. She can do a good free-style and backstroke. She also has the basics of breaststroke but need to get more strength to maintain it for more than 4-5 strokes.
Alicia has had a busy and challenging year at work. With her co-worker switching groups she took over as the primary lead project engineer for her product line. She’s continuing to do her best to keep everything progressing and people have noticed and appreciated her efforts. At home it’s been a change going from the on-route school drop-off to the farther out of the away school. Also, the new school has increased the support required to help the kids with their homework. But overall, it’s been a positive year with lots of good changes, in spite of the challenges. The positive part of the longer drive is that Alicia has been able to listen to some Bible podcasts. Alicia completed her 6th year as director for Sparks at AWANA and continued into her 7th year. It’s been great doing it as a team with Tim and several of the adult volunteers have been serving for several years too, which is really great for building strong working relationships together.
Tim continued to make some progress on the trailer. He was able to get all the roof panels replaced and the cracks patched. It’s rewarding to see the progress. We didn’t end up taking a trip during December, but hopefully we will be able to take the trailer out this coming summer. At work Tim tried to take some time off to work on the trailer and use up his vacation time but his project it trying to meet some tight deadlines so he’s supporting as needed. His part is waiting for others to complete their tasks but it’s been a stressful time for the whole team. He’s been the lead engineer on two different programs both of which want all of his time, so it has been challenging navigating competing work demands.
On the home front, we’ve continued to make more improvements to the house this year. We renovated the pantry at the beginning of the year. We had a major remodel of the kids’ bathroom and one of the bedrooms. At the end of the year, we pulled out the upstairs hallway cabinets and flooring. We’ll continue to finish the upstairs hallway into the new year. We’re working to get out house in sale-ready condition; if we don’t end up selling then we’ll still have the advantages of an updated house. We remain grateful for where we’ve been planted.
In 2026, we are looking forward to continuing to see our kids grow and mature. Tim’s got a 3-week work trip planned in February and Alicia plans to bring Cordelia and Anthony out to visit for their winter break and do some historical sightseeing. We’ve got a few other things planned (including hopefully taking the refurbished trailer out camping) but we’ve learned that God’s timing usually trumps our plans, so we’ll see how the year goes 😊.
