Our big news this year was the birth of a daughter Caroline Louise on June 27th. Carrie’s older brother and sister continue to be excited about their younger sister. Jeri enjoys carrying her sister around, and Zac enjoys singing to her. They both like to play with her and tell her stories. Carrie, of course, loves her older siblings and stares at them with adoring eyes. Like her older brother, Carrie has been able to spend the first months of her life with Brian and Mariah at work. One of the perks of the professorial lifestyle, is the flexible schedule which allowed them to schedule their classes in an alternating fashion, so that one was always available to be with Carrie. Carrie spent many hours strapped to her Dad’s chest (in the Baby Bjorn carrier) asleep as he runs errands or prepares for class while she waits to eat when mom finishes teaching.
Many people have commented that Carrie is a very happy baby; of course, it is easy to be happy when you are carried everywhere. She is very alert and enjoys meeting new people (which happens quite often at work). Anyone who stops to chat with her will get a smile, and she is often willing to let outsiders hold her – but only for a few minutes. Like the rest of the family, Carrie loves reading and books; she will sit and listen while you read to her (although she will try to taste the book if you let her). She likes to be bounced and jiggled; she is a bit more of a daredevil than her older sister was.
Zac has started Kindergarten this year. He is the youngest child in his class (birthday is two days before the cut-off) and we plan for him to repeat Kindergarten next year, but he is certainly enjoying himself at school. He is starting learn how to read and is proud of the words that he knows. If you read a story to him, you will need to allow for him to read all the “and”s, “it”s and “the”s you may encounter along the way. As his vocabulary grows it gets harder and harder to read to him. Zac (and Jeri) started singing in the children’s choir at church. He is an enthusiastic singer, although is often guilty of holding the lyrics upside down while he hogs the microphone. Zac started tumbling this year with Jeri. When Jeri placed fourth out of nine participants, Zac placed third out of three participants. Jeri tried to explain the unfairness of the situation, but we made sure Zac was able to enjoy his moment of glory.
Jeri has done quite well in all her pursuits. After she earned first place in tumbling in the sub-beginner category, she was required (by her parents) to move up to the beginner category. She continues to excel in school, reading at a level which puts others to shame. Jeri has developed a fashion sense from some mysterious portion of the gene pool. She is able to put together fashionable outfits from the yard sale refugees that her mother finds. Occasionally Mom gets a, “nice outfit, Mom” comment from her as well. Jeri is friendly and confident, making friends with ease (again, much to the befuddlement of her parents).
Mariah has been working hard as the director of the Scholars Program at Wartburg. She has been able to grow the program and streamline the process for recruiting incoming students without strangling them as they grow towards graduation. Her first student graduated from the program this month (in 3 ½ years). She has traveled to conferences in New Orleans, Denver and Dickinson, SD and will be taking more of her Scholars to London and Paris in March. Additionally this Summer Mariah and Brian took a weekend trip to California for her 20 year high school reunion. Mariah is very glad to not be pregnant any more and happy that nursing is going well the third time around.
Brian had an eventful year. He finally managed to get tenure. This was not a big surprise, but was certainly a relief. This was followed by receiving the Student selected Teaching award. With the award came to honor/obligation to give a number of speeches, most of which he was able pull off without embarrassing himself. The only real difficulty was at the Winter Graduation when he was scheduled to give the address, but his speech was left out of the master program. He had a few frantic moments looking for his speech after which he had to deliver the speech from memory. Fortunately his reputation for being “quirky” and the fact that his planned remarks were about “the importance of failing”, caused some of the audience members to think that it was all part of an act. It should be mentioned that the last time Brian spoke at a graduation ceremony was when his 8th grade graduation when he also failed to have his reading available, and it did not end nearly as gracefully.
Last Christmas found most of us (Mom, Jeri, and Zac) traveling home from California, grateful that Grandpa Don’s heart surgery was successful, but a bit disappointed that we had missed that connecting flight back to Iowa. During Spring Break this year, we decided to take a family vacation out to California. We flew out and (remember Mariah is 6 months pregnant) visited family members, went to Disneyland, the San Juan Capistrano Mission, the Los Angeles Zoo, and then took the train home. It was a two day train ride that we all enjoyed. Jeri and Zac had great fun exploring the train from front to back, and, as usual, Jeri made a new best friend.
This Summer, after Carrie was born, we had the usual parade of visitors. Grandma Judy was in the hospital for the birth, managing to finish knitting her blanket at just about the same time Mariah finished pushing. Jeri and Zac’s cousin Sarah came out to Iowa for two week to help with the new baby. Mostly she played with Jeri and Zac and let Carrie be doted on by her Mom and Dad, but she was incredibly helpful, even without changing a single diaper. Grandma and Grandpa Birgen found time between horseshoe tournaments to visit as well. Finally, Mariah’s Aunt Barbara drove south with her new trailer, cursing her navigation system which doesn’t know whether or not a road is paved, and got to see all the improvements to the house.
We wish all our friends and family a safe, healthy and relaxing Christmas season. We are thankful for our many blessings, and we continue to pray that our children may grow up in a world without war.