We hope this Christmas Season is filled with many blessings for you and yours.
Click the pictures to hear what our kids have to say.
We have been so blessed this year. When Karen's car showed signs of loosing it's transmission, we took the long-dreaded plunge into the world of automobile shopping. Having less than stellar luck with the used vehicles we purchased, a decision was made to buy new. Karen did not like the idea of a "soccer mom" mini van but I thought it may be our only economical choice. One of the first places we stopped had a Chrysler Pacifica "dealer demo" model with 5000 miles on it. After looking at that, we found nothing else appealing. We would have spent about $19,000 on any car we looked at and for $2000 more we could have the car of our dreams. The Pacifica has been a fantastic vehicle for us and the kids. It's wonderful to be able to rearrange the seating configuration just by folding them up or down.
Karen continues to work as Director of Religious Education (k-6th grade) at our church. She is hired as part time staff but puts in close to 40 hours a week during the school year. Our monetary donations to the church may not be as high as they should be, but the extra time Karen puts in more than compensates for it.
My Mom, "Grandma Mary" comes down every Wednesday to take care of the kids while Karen puts in a full day (12 hours usually) preparing for the Evening Faith Formation classes. Having Grandma here is absolutely wonderful. She gets a little extra spending money, we get superb day-care, and the kids get to play with Grandma every week.
I am (as always) still teaching art classes at Litchfield High School. Every year has its ups and downs but this year has been filled with ups. The students have been fantastic and I've thoroughly enjoyed my job. I made up a website for my art classes and post our assignments in the Current section every week. Check it out if you're wondering what I do all day.
As long as I have your attention, I'd be remiss if I don't mention a couple other exciting things here. First, I wrote a grant to help promote my ArtsConnectEd class and actually got the grant. Let me explain... The ArtsConnectEd class is a highschool art history class that utilizes internet technology in groundbreaking ways. I could go on and on, but you can click here to visit the site and view the entire curriculum if you're interested. The "Target Community Giving Grant" will fund expenses related to promoting the class throughout the area and throughout the state.
Another exciting event in our lives will be the opening of our new church this spring. I post "construction progress" pictures on the Church of St. Philip website so if you'd like to see how that project is progressing, click here.
And finally, the most important news of the year... We are expecting our 4th child around the first week of March, 2005. We are all so excited to see our new little baby. Drew is hoping for another sister. We'll just have to wait and see if he gets his wish. As for me, I'm very happy we bought a car that can seat 6 adults!
We wish all of you the best in this new year and hope to see you soon!
