The end of a great year!

So I think "The Christmas Letter" is a great way to sum up 2012:

December 2012 I’m sipping coffee and sneaking cookies and trying to sum up our year – firstly, apologies if you did not receive a card from us last year.  I lost my address book – if you sent us a card I tried to keep your envelope long enough to transcribe the return address… and now I need to find that list.

Fall 2012:  K started High School. Tiger started Middle School. Dragon is in 5^th grade, M-Lyons in 2^nd, Bitsy started Kindergarten and Little Hawk hated preschool but we switched him and now he attends Bright Beginnings 5 mornings a week and rides the bus and everything.  Tim coached Dragon’s soccer team and Tiger played for his dad as well as his usual team with legacy.  We added two dogs: Molly Hogan the pretty yellow lab in the picture, is staying with us until late spring when we expect she’ll join her dad, P. in Indianapolis.  Thalia is the bat eared German Shepherd puppy that flew out to us from Oregon, having flown from Germany to Oregon not long before that.  In addition to being an experienced traveler, she is a digger and often digs under Tim’s nice new backyard fence to go play in the swampy ravine adjacent to our property.  Yay.  And (drum roll please) M- Lyons just finished her first Nutcracker ballet.  The Virginia Regional Ballet produces a Nutcracker every year and this year M- Lyons joined the cast as a “gingersnap” also known as Mother Gigogne’s children.  Personally I was sure that all the late night rehearsals would lead to a meltdown, or that we’d get through all those Saturday practices and then she’d decide she didn’t want to actually perform, but she surprised me.  She totally loved it, and she rocked it.  Go M!

This summer we broke tradition with the Sharks Swim Team and instead drove across country.  I commandeered DataXstream’s Sprinter, loaded it up with kids, ski gear, and lots of snacks, and drove to Texas.  We visited my brother Tony and family for a few days and then drove to Salt Lake City where we picked up Tim.  With Tim we drove to Mt. Hood, Oregon and spent a week skiing with our ski team.  I’ve never been to Mount Hood and it is the coolest experience.  Beautiful country.  From there we drove back to Utah, put Tim on a plane, went out to Antelope Island in the middle of the Salt Lake.  And then proceeded to drive home.  We stopped in Nebraska to catch up with Tim’s college roommate & best man, Scott and family.  I have decided to do a cross country trip again soon with just K.  She and I both kept seeing wayside places that we would like to stop and see  “if we didn’t have a 5 year old and a 2 year old in the car.”   Lincoln Nebraska looks like a town I’d like to revisit.

Last Spring Tim was on assignment over spring break so we drove to Florida to hang out with him.  While he was at work we went to the Tampa Zoo, and the beach, and once drove out to see Mama Kay.  I highly recommend the Tampa Zoo.  For an astronomical fee you can buy romaine lettuce (can’t bring your own sorry) and feed it to the giraffes. Totally cool.  And the kids rode a camel.  Another day we went to Sea World and hands down the sea lion show is the best.  We added it up, Little Hawk’s been in the country less than 2 years and he’s been to 10 states, and driven through 22.

We are gearing up for a winter with the Wintergreen Ski Team.  Tim plans to help coach again this season, the oldest 4 with be on the team, Bitsy will ski with me and maybe we’ll teach Little Hawk too. Our love to everybody- The Yates Family