Happy New Year!

We are at home tonight celebrating a quiet start to 2009. With everything that has happened in our family over the past few weeks, quiet is the perfect way to start the new year. Ben is asleep and Brant and I are getting ready to watch a movie before we watch the ball drop.

We were talking about New Year's Resolutions on our way home from shopping today. Brant and I agreed that we don't like resolutions and that it seems that resolutions to begin a new year are only set ups to fail. Our conversation turned instead to our hopes for ourselves and our family for 2009, big and small.

- Health and safety of Ben (and all of our family)
- A 5 year anniversary vacation for Brant and I
- Taking on a home improvement project
- A cure for diabetes
- Creating a play area in our basement for Ben
- Continued success and challenges in our jobs
- Keeping my dad's memory alive and dealing with everything involved in the process with wisdom and grace
- Calm and peacefulness - no surprises, no tragedies, no illnesses - just life as it should be

All the best to you in 2009.

Christmas 2008

Here is a little peek into Ben's first Christmas!

Merry Christmas!

As we all prepare to celebrate, we'd like to give you an overview of the biggest events and changes in our family during 2008.

• On March 6, we welcomed our first child, Benjamin Alan, into our family. He is a healthy, active, and happy little boy and brings so much joy into our lives.

• We took Ben to the lake in Minnesota in July. We had a good time, but quickly realized that vacation with a baby is a very different kind of vacation!

• Brant changed jobs in September. He is working remotely from our home for Bader Rutter and Associates out of Brookfield, Wisconsin. This is the same company he worked for when we lived in the Milwaukee area, so it made for an easy transition.
  


• I still teach fourth grade at East Elementary in Ankeny. I love my job and the school where I work, and now love the crazy balance between work and motherhood.
  
  
• And, on a somber note, the latest change in our family was the sudden death of my father on December 12th. He will be sorely missed by all of us, but there is a small sense of peace in our hearts knowing he is with my mother again.

We wish everyone a healthy, happy 2009 and a very Merry Christmas!

We're Online!

After very little discussion, we decided to go online with a family web site. It was actually born out of a conversation about the pros and cons of Christmas letters. We felt the more appropriate way to share information about our family was in short, ongoing snipits... hence the blog.

Rachel and I haven't decided who will author our posts, so you may hear from both of us. Or we may Indian wrestle for rights.

Regardless, feel free to check back often to see what we're up to. Unfortunately, we're not able to talk with everyone as much as we'd like, so this might help fill that void. Rest assured, we'll still call when we can.

Enjoy!