Merry Christmas! What an exciting time of the year this is as we celebrate the birth of our Savior! As always, the past year seemed to fly by and was filled with a number of exciting events.
On August 7, David McAlpine joined our family as he and Amy were wed at Carmel Church. What a privilege and blessing to welcome another member into our family.On Father's Day, we found out that our family will be growing again! Alec and Becky are excitedly expecting a child in February. Amy informed us that now we are officially old, but we can't wait for our first grandchild.
In 2009 we had three daughters and two sons-in-law in college. In June Lori received an Associate's Degree in Accounting from Colorado Tech University and will receive a Bachelor's Degree in December, 2010. Amy finishes this month at Central College with majors in Linguistics and East Asian Studies. David also completes his degree this month, with a major in Banking from Iowa State University. Alec is attending Northwest Iowa Communit
y College in Sheldon for Computer Science, and Becky is studying photography through the New York Photography Institute.In the spring we began to make plans for Rachel and I to travel with Brian for a year. I received a leave of absence from my ESL responsibilities at school, and we left home in August. So far our travels have taken us to Alaska, Spain, Turkey, Peru, Ecuador and Mexico. It's been an incredible experience to work with so many translation teams as they work to put God's Word into their own languages.
Because of our travels, I'm home-schooling
Rachel for her 7th grade year. We enjoy incorporating our travels into our studies, learning about Alaskan landscapes, Muslim beliefs, and Peruvian history. Since we're based in Chiapas, Mexico for 2 1/2 months, Rachel is able to experience where our family lived for five years before she was born.Although it will be strange not to be "home" for Christmas this year, we can still celebrate the Reason for the Season - Jesus's birth. May you be filled anew with awe and wonder of this miracle. Brian, Donna and Rachel
So many blessings, Donna! Thanks for the "year in review." And I love the pictures!
ReplyDeleteGlad to hear from you again. I've been also wondering how to get our Christmas picture to you - I'm sure you are on pins and needles waiting for it! The picture of the three girls is very cute; I bet it makes you miss them more. (Maddie's words - "Becky is just so CUTE pregnant!")Also the picture of Rachel is adorable even if looking at all those leaves does make me sneeze! Have a wonderful Christmas.
ReplyDeleteI finally got to your Christmas Letter. When traveling ourselves it is a little harder to keep on a schedule. What a wonderful year of experiences for you world travelers. Yes, I echo Kim's remarks about the pictures. And Becky is indeed cute pregnant. I hear you might be Sioux Center around the time of delivery. Wonderful! Glad you can be with friends on Christmas. It should be a good time renewing the friendship and catching up on families. Merry Christmas to you all,
ReplyDeleteMom
Seeing Rachel in the leaves makes me wish that we could see some of those in this part of the country, SNOW is the word for the last few days. It has been relentless. We came out of church this morning and MORE snow showers! No need to dream of a white Christmas-it definately was a reality. Lots of plans were changed for Christmas gatherings, but we are all so lucky to have warm homes to go to and food to eat. We are truly blessed! At least now we can communicate by phone or email-think to years past and they didn't have that luxury. Yes we are blessed. Hope this finds you all doing well. May you have a Blessed and Happy New Year.
ReplyDeleteKrista