Hello Family and Friends,
In February we ventured into the new world of blogging and have found the regular writing and posting of pictures to be a huge blessing. Blogging is not only a great way to stay connected to our family and allow them to watch our girls grow up, it helps me reflect on and review the events of our lives and my joys of motherhood. We appreciate all our readers and the comments you write, email and tell us about how you enjoy reading the blog. Since we gave you the abridged version of a Christmas letter, I thought I'd do a blog post recapping some of the highlights of our year. I'll link previous posts to the descriptions, just click on the colored letters to be brought back to that page (or skip that for a quicker read!) It's not quite the end of the year yet, but I'll post this early...it may take you the rest of the year to read it! :)
Obviously, the most significant change in our lives this year was the arrival of our second daughter, Delia Kristen. She came only a week late, but it felt like (and was written like) it was much longer. We were blessed with a quick and healthy labor and delivery and have loved becoming a family of 4 every day since her birth.
Delia brought not only joy into our lives, but also many visitors! Dave's parents were out for a few weeks, my sister, Heather and her husband Dan were out for a while and my friend/cousin Anna even came for a long weekend. While I was still pregnant, we loved having both my college roommates visit with their little ones.
And we did much traveling ourselves. We took trips down south to see good friends and college roommates again. One of the best parts of our year was a trip back to the Midwest to spend time with Dan and Heather and Thanksgiving with Dave's whole family. This was the first time many of them got to meet Delia.
Our jobs kept both Dave and I busy this year, also-- too busy for me, in fact. In the spring I decided to switch jobs-- from part-time teacher to full-time mom. This has been a good decision and I love every part of my new job almost every day. Dave's ministry at church has held many of the same responsibilities: fundraisers, leading youth group, retreats, lock-ins, meetings, Evangelism/Activities events, teaching, preaching, committee leading, etc. His job really consumes all our lives, but in a good way. Once again, we received overwhelming encouragement and generosity from the members of our congregation, from meals, visits and gifts when Delia was born, to hand-me-down toys to 100+ pounds of beef to huge loads of firewood.
If we are not careful, we could let our whole lives be filled with church service and activities. Dave's job is never truly done and he could just work forever. We've also loved spending time together, just our immediate family this year. We took an awesome vacation to the coast over spring break. We've been intentional about doing lots of day trips to get away and enjoy each other and creation. Our family activities included things like hiking, apple picking, food festivals, pumpkin farms, mini golf and ball games. These fun times have bonded and recharged us.
We've had some amazing opportunities to celebrate, also. Ella turned two and our marriage turned 8. Our holidays (Valentine's Day, Easter, Mother's Day, Fourth of July, Halloween...) were packed thoughtful gestures, friends, family and festive ways to party.
So, as you can read it's been an incredible year. Once again God has been so good. These are just the events of our 2007, I could write another whole letter on the love I have for my family and the little every day wonders: Ella's unique understanding of things and sense of humor or the way Delia can't just smile at you, she has to wiggle her whole body in happy shudders or the way my husband sees when I need a break and jumps in with some wonderfully creative way to make me happy.
"Go...to your family and tell them how much the Lord has done for you." If you are new to our blog, check back regularly for updates on our adventures. If you've been a loyal visitor, read on. We hope to continue to inspire you with stories, pictures and descriptions of how much the Lord has done for us!
Love, Dave, Jen, Ella and Delia
In February we ventured into the new world of blogging and have found the regular writing and posting of pictures to be a huge blessing. Blogging is not only a great way to stay connected to our family and allow them to watch our girls grow up, it helps me reflect on and review the events of our lives and my joys of motherhood. We appreciate all our readers and the comments you write, email and tell us about how you enjoy reading the blog. Since we gave you the abridged version of a Christmas letter, I thought I'd do a blog post recapping some of the highlights of our year. I'll link previous posts to the descriptions, just click on the colored letters to be brought back to that page (or skip that for a quicker read!) It's not quite the end of the year yet, but I'll post this early...it may take you the rest of the year to read it! :)
Obviously, the most significant change in our lives this year was the arrival of our second daughter, Delia Kristen. She came only a week late, but it felt like (and was written like) it was much longer. We were blessed with a quick and healthy labor and delivery and have loved becoming a family of 4 every day since her birth.
Delia brought not only joy into our lives, but also many visitors! Dave's parents were out for a few weeks, my sister, Heather and her husband Dan were out for a while and my friend/cousin Anna even came for a long weekend. While I was still pregnant, we loved having both my college roommates visit with their little ones.
And we did much traveling ourselves. We took trips down south to see good friends and college roommates again. One of the best parts of our year was a trip back to the Midwest to spend time with Dan and Heather and Thanksgiving with Dave's whole family. This was the first time many of them got to meet Delia.
Our jobs kept both Dave and I busy this year, also-- too busy for me, in fact. In the spring I decided to switch jobs-- from part-time teacher to full-time mom. This has been a good decision and I love every part of my new job almost every day. Dave's ministry at church has held many of the same responsibilities: fundraisers, leading youth group, retreats, lock-ins, meetings, Evangelism/Activities events, teaching, preaching, committee leading, etc. His job really consumes all our lives, but in a good way. Once again, we received overwhelming encouragement and generosity from the members of our congregation, from meals, visits and gifts when Delia was born, to hand-me-down toys to 100+ pounds of beef to huge loads of firewood.
If we are not careful, we could let our whole lives be filled with church service and activities. Dave's job is never truly done and he could just work forever. We've also loved spending time together, just our immediate family this year. We took an awesome vacation to the coast over spring break. We've been intentional about doing lots of day trips to get away and enjoy each other and creation. Our family activities included things like hiking, apple picking, food festivals, pumpkin farms, mini golf and ball games. These fun times have bonded and recharged us.
We've had some amazing opportunities to celebrate, also. Ella turned two and our marriage turned 8. Our holidays (Valentine's Day, Easter, Mother's Day, Fourth of July, Halloween...) were packed thoughtful gestures, friends, family and festive ways to party.
So, as you can read it's been an incredible year. Once again God has been so good. These are just the events of our 2007, I could write another whole letter on the love I have for my family and the little every day wonders: Ella's unique understanding of things and sense of humor or the way Delia can't just smile at you, she has to wiggle her whole body in happy shudders or the way my husband sees when I need a break and jumps in with some wonderfully creative way to make me happy.
"Go...to your family and tell them how much the Lord has done for you." If you are new to our blog, check back regularly for updates on our adventures. If you've been a loyal visitor, read on. We hope to continue to inspire you with stories, pictures and descriptions of how much the Lord has done for us!
Love, Dave, Jen, Ella and Delia
2 comments:
Hi VM family,
You're inspiring us! We are pretty far behind and don't have our Christmas pic out yet, but we had decided we wanted to do our short letter just like yours with a blog post referring to posts throughout the year...and here's yours! Yahoo! Now we can copy! Sorry I haven't been in touch-I've been behind on life, but it will definitely calm down after Thursday. We miss you all and hope to get together as families soon.
Love,
Jonathan's mom
Hi Jen,
I'm working on my own "Year in Review" for our blog, but you're on the ball. Great minds think alike. I enjoyed walking through your year again. I especially enjoyed some of the earlier blogs before I was checking or blogging myself. The Anniversary one is really cool.
Many blessings to all of you this season!
Dorina for the fam
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