Merry Christmas!

 

The scoop

2012

A dose of stability is what our family needed this year and 2012 delivered just that. No household moves. No major career changes. Life has been steady, but steady -- you’ll note from the following update -- is a relative term.

Liliana (7) is a second-grader now and has plunged head-long into a partial Spanish-immersion program at our neighborhood elementary school. She weathered the rigors of being a new girl in her class with grace and determination, though we know it wasn’t easy for her. She continues her ballet and tap dance classes and has joined the children’s choir at our church. Over the summer she became a rabid swimmer and budding diver – skills she hopes to hone with some advanced swim lessons after Christmas break. Liliana is an adventurous and thoughtful girl, who loves learning new things, playing with her brothers and spending time with close girlfriends.

Calvin (5) has grown up perhaps most visibly of our brood in the past year. He’s shaking off his little-kid qualities and is exploring all facets of boyhood. He has an appetite for tree-climbing, bicycle tricks and trail exploration in our neighborhood park. He doesn’t sit still long, but when he does, it’s for classic Super Nintendo video games (Nick is thrilled!) or sitting down with a good book, sounding out the words himself. He played on his first ever soccer team in the fall, where he learned about teamwork, hustle and sportsmanship and I learned to temper my boisterous cheering from the sidelines. Calvin also started kindergarten, where he is thriving and, most importantly, making a few of his own friends. We’re glad he and his big sister share this foray into public school together.

Henry, our Winter Solstice baby, is about to turn 3, which marks an incredibly rapid passage of time. He is a spitfire and a delight to us, as he blesses us with full, busy days and, at last, full nights of sleep as well. Henry certainly is no longer a toddler and has grown into some of the activities his older siblings embraced in their preschool years. He and I have plentiful one-on-one time together for reading, playing, shopping, cooking and keeping house. He adores his weekly nature-center and music classes. He loves the focus my full attention affords him, but he knows the real fun begins when his siblings and papa come home at the end of each day.

Nick continues to fly military executives around the globe in the Gulfstream 550 out of Joint Base Andrews. His role as operations officer along with coordinating a rotating detachment in Afghanistan made for a hectic summer and fall, but he does an incredible job balancing work with family life. His morale is also helped by the occasional trip to Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Kuala Lumpur, Prague, Paris, and Mumbai just to name a few exotic locales. He also has enjoyed schooling Liliana on swimming techniques and Calvin on the finer points of Donkey Kong – harnessing some of his best-honed skills from childhood. Nick also happens to be the sun and the moon in Henry’s universe.

Despite the independence our little ones are gaining, I never seem to be able to rest on my laurels as a mom, which keeps this job interesting and rewarding. You may recall that I homeschooled the children last year, which was a tremendous success, but it also came with a heavy and at times taxing load of responsibilities for me. We chose to take this year off for both my own sanity and because Liliana and Calvin wanted to try traditional school. I am keeping my hand in teaching as lead teacher for our church’s kindergarten Sunday school class, which I absolutely adore. That responsibility combined with my nonstop mothering duties makes the days fly.

We visited family in California and Washington State in March and traveled to New York last May for Nick’s sister’s graduation from NYU law school. The kids and I took a road trip to North Carolina to visit dear friends in July, and I managed a solo trip to Seattle in August. We still enjoy the history and vibrancy of greater D.C., but miss our proximity to the bulk of our family out west. Praise God for e-mail and airplanes!

Thank you for catching up with us! We wish you all a very merry Christmas and a healthy new year!

Love, Danielle, Nicholas, Liliana, Calvin and Henry