Merry Christmas 2018

Merry Christmas!

We hope this finds you well and you have had a good year. It has been an interesting year for us. Our big trip this year was to Walt Disney World. We were at the parks for five days and also enjoyed Disney Springs. Our highlights were eating in the ball room at the Be Our Guest restaurant and riding Flight of Passage three times in one day without much waiting. We were without a kitchen sink for over a month as a result of our dishwasher leaking and ruining our cabinets and floor. It has now all been fixed, looks great, and was mostly covered by insurance. We were also entertained for a number of months by the installation of an expanded gas pipeline directly behind our house. It was fun watching the work being done just outside our windows, but the price was that we lost a lot of nice trees. We were fortunate enough to get three tickets to see “Hamilton” in Durham which actually exceeded our high expectations.  

Miriam is a high school senior who is also taking college classes at Durham Tech. She is in her second season as a co-captain of her robotics team, The Hitchhikers. They had a very good season earlier this year by winning two district events to qualify for both the state and world championships. Miriam continues to enjoy dance and Venturing. She has also been busy applying to colleges and scholarships.

Bethany is in her third year at North Carolina State University majoring in Industrial and Systems Engineering. She has enjoyed numerous sporting events there and brought some of the rest of us along with her for a few of the games. This summer Bethany had an internship at Newport News Shipbuilding in Virginia. We visited her for an extended weekend while going to Jamestown, Williamsburg, Busch Gardens, Yorktown, and the Mariners Museum.

Carl is in his fourth year at North Carolina State University majoring in both Computer Science and Communication. He participated again this year in a REU (Research Experiences for Undergraduates) at Notre Dame this summer. We visited him there while also going to the National Museum of the United States Air Force in Dayton, Ohio on the way there and Chicago on the way back. Carl also participated in a wilderness program in the Sierra Mountains in California and attended conferences in Montreal and Chicago.

Christian continues to enjoy his job as a firmware engineer at Lenovo. In his free time, he enjoys playing video games. Christian has also worked on creating a motion control camera rig that will help him more easily create brick (Lego) films. He has also been a great help to The Hitchhikers as one of their mentors.

Leslie-Jean is finishing up her last year of homeschooling. She has enjoyed her weekly Bible study. Leslie-Jean has worked hard this year improving her running and completed a seven mile race.

Dan continues to enjoy his performance engineering job at Lenovo. He has worked hard getting back into competitive running shape completing a 30K race. Dan also had some medical difficulties this year. He had cataract surgery in both eyes and can now see without glasses. Dan also suffered with blood clots in his lungs which is now being treated with medication and no restrictions. Dan’s parents continue to live nearby in an assisted living facility. Dan’s Dad suffered a couple of falls this year requiring surgery and rehabilitation. He is now doing quite well.

This has been a year with lots of medical expenses mostly due to Dan’s health issues. This is the first time we have exceeded the family annual deductible even getting close to the maximum out-of-pocket limit. It was nice to have our medical expenses substantially lowered by insurance leaving us with only small co-pays. Fortunately, God’s eternal plan for us is so much better than health insurance. God did it all for us and required nothing from us other than accepting His free gift: no cost for insurance, no deductibles, no co-pays. Jesus paid it all for us. Romans 6:23 says, “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Jesus paid the price of our sin by dying for it upon a cross. This was possible because Jesus had previously left his heavenly throne to be born as a baby in Bethlehem. This is what we celebrate at Christmas – the birth of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Luke 2:11 says, “for today in the city of David there has been born for you a Savior, who is Christ the Lord.” Let us rejoice in Christ’s birth this Christmas season!

We wish you a very, merry Christmas and happy New Year.