family & friends:
MERRY
CHRISTMAS!
As I draft this letter
it’s approaching 80°
in Austin. Some things just don’t seem right. So what do we do? We flip on the
Christmas lights and start a fire. We decorate Christmas cookies and walk them
to our neighbor’s house (in our flip flops). We sing Let it Snow and giggle. We enjoy the influx of Christmas cards (and
marvel at those of you wearing scarves), enjoying the faces and updates. Here
are ours…
Maggie (4) Correction: four and
the all-important half. Maggie is
almost always happy and almost never in a hurry. She finally gave up her daily
nap in her tent. She also officially conquered potty training through hard
work, bribery and the help of a paid professional (I only wish I was joking). She
only fell asleep on the potty once. And while she takes her time with most
things, she talks a big talk about going to school with “Owie” and “Recka” tomorrow. Sweet, neglected, third kid
that she is, she has pretty much taught herself the alphabet and if she’s angry
will yell “M-A-G-G-I-E spells Maggie” as if it’s the world’s best comeback for
unwanted discipline or disappointment. She also likes to remind us that “M is
for Maggie, and M is for Minion!” If only I could adequately describe how
appropriate this is. Maggie was a minion for Halloween – but really she is a
minion everyday. You’ve never heard a better belly laugh. And she and Rebecca’s
sister-language is minion: papoy, papoy!
She loves: going to school four mornings a week, swimming lessons, telling us
the time (always thirty o’clock), My
Little Pony, puzzles, listening to audiobooks, encouraging us to get out the
door by yelling Let’s go Vaqueros
(while she is still half-dressed), taking “little snoozes” with whichever
parent looks sleepiest, picking at scabs and twisting her hair into precious
mini dreadlocks. She also gives THE best kisses and hugs – always in sets of
three – let her count! She is cuddly, spunky, loud, nurturing, and still
usually pretty sticky.
Rebecca (6) is in kindergarten. On
the first day of school she came home disappointed and upset with her teacher
(whom she now adores) because she didn’t
teach us to read TODAY. By the
second day of school she insisted on walking herself in all by herself (though
I made Owen trail her). By the third day she came home telling us about “phonological
awareness” – whatever that is. She seems to have grown up more than a year’s
worth in the last twelve months. She mastered riding her bike without training
wheels in under two minutes, which was not surprising. She has lost two teeth
and because she has a flair for the dramatic she requested they be pulled, one
via the old doorknob trick. Her party planning business has been very busy, as
has her toilet-paper-roll art studio. She has turned our “trash” into
everything from party décor and piñatas to a fairytale castle. Entrepreneur
that she is, she also opened a hair+nail+body paint+temporary tattoo salon out
of our entryway table. But her most successful new endeavor is her bakery. She
has a growing local reputation for her “mystery treats,” devising original
recipes as she goes – part art, part science experiment. You never know quite
what you’ll get from our rogue baker but it’ll almost always be a chocolate and
sprinkle covered adventure for your palette. And since she knows the restaurant
business is hard, she’ll have her interest in medicine to fall back on. She
loves flipping through Kyle’s anatomy books and thinks field dressing the deer
is the best part of going hunting. She is creative, curious, brave, generous, independent
and rules the girls’ shared bedroom as the official Queen of the Top Bunk.
Owen (8) is in 2nd grade and in full
elementary school swing – with enough experience under his belt that he can say
in his deepest voice “That’s what they do in first grade, but in second…” He
really loves to learn – grammar rules and math facts are his jam. We started
letting him stay up a little later on school nights so he could read his
favorite animal encyclopedia. He really enjoys all the special projects at school:
devising a very homemade porcupine costume for Texas Animal Day, dressing as
Nate the Grate (complete with pancake in his pocket) for a book report, and
sending his Flat Stanley to friends all the way in north Africa. He saved up
some allowance and bought a wristwatch with a stopwatch, which has greatly
impacted our family. Want to know how long it takes to drive to school? Want to
know how long it takes to bike-ride our favorite loop in the neighborhood? Want
to know how long Maggie has been singing her favorite tune using only the words
brother and John on repeat? Owen will tell you. He’ll also set an alarm to ask
every day at 4pm whether he needs to water the flowerbeds for a little extra
cash. He doesn’t often spend his money, but he sure does like earning it. He also
loves lazer tag, camping, a CD of songs he liked from the radio that he plays
on repeat, and having “sleepovers” in his sisters’ room where Maggie fights for
the floor pallet gladly giving up her bed for him. He is a natural leader –
heading up a secret spy network called Guardians of the House with his sibs and
some neighbhood friends. They’re on the hunt for a local graffiti artist named
Dr. B which makes for lots of fun in the car. He is sticking with piano and
soccer and has really improved a lot in a year, but if he could choose any
activity it would be playing a strategy board game with his dad. He is pretty
Type A, but also goofy and sweet. Still an old man and a fun kid rolled into
one.
As a family, we took our first big
road trip this past summer and spent a glorious week in Colorado with another
family. We did it all - rock climbing, horseback riding, rafting, outings to
Wilderness (YoungLife) Ranch and the Great Sand Dunes National Park. Did I mention
we drove there and back and survived? We stopped in Stratford, TX (bestest tiny
town in the Panhandle) for a quick family visit and parade (not in our honor,
but the kids would have thought so). We are still doing family bike rides but
now have added indoor rock-climbing and jigsaw puzzling to our repertoire of
fun. We also did our fair-share of hosting people and gatherings. We had two
graduate students from Iraq for a weekend in the summer. And on the opposite
end of the spectrum threw an 80s party for Ali’s birthday complete with giant
hair (Ali) and a real mustache (Kyle). But the biggest parties of the year were
two family weddings that we were blessed to a part of (and grateful to survive
since the kids walked the isle).
Kyle & I used our 10-year
anniversary as an excuse to get away to France (oui oui!) for 10 days sans
kiddos. Tough to pick a highlight but the top contenders would be: staying in a
for-real castle in the countryside, touring the Normandy beaches (and never feeling
prouder to be an American), and watching Kyle in Parisian-mode. Please picture “French”-speaking,
scarf-wearing, baguette-in-satchel toting, escargot-eating Kyle. You’re
welcome. To balance things out Kyle took a very manly backpacking trip with a
college buddy to the Wind River Range in western Wyoming (say that 10 times
fast). And just to prove that we’re not completely incapable of spontaneity we
accepted an invite with just a couple of week’s notice to go with two other
couples to the beach without kids. Watch out world.
With the kids
essentially on autopilot (isn’t that what diaper and nap free feels like?) Kyle
and I have both taken on some new responsibilities. He is now the Chief of
Anesthesia at one of the smaller hospitals in town. And I am leading the
women’s ministry at our campus of our church overseeing classes and events. It
would be the perfect “job” if only there was a walkie-talkie involved.
One
last story: Maggie asked a few weeks ago why Christmas was happening again since we just had it yesterday. Owen chimed in with a quick
tutorial on the rotation/revolution of the earth and the Gregorian calendar. And
Rebecca launched into her Linus-like recitation of Luke 2:4-14. The beauty is
that their answers are both true. God in his infinite mercy and wisdom knows
how fickle and forgetful we are, how transient our desires, how weak our faith.
He gives us new mercies every day and a yearly reminder in this season of the
great and perfect gift of His Son. He gives us Advent to prepare us for
Christmas. He gave us Jesus in the manger and had already prepared the cross.
So it doesn’t matter that it’s 80°
in ATX because Christmas isn’t about us (though snow would be a joy!) – it’s
about the birth of our Savior – and we need the reminder year after year.
rejoicing,
kyle
& alison
owen
* rebecca * maggie
