This has been a year of change both for our family and our little world. On the family front both John and Alec graduated from their respective schools, John from High School and Alec from Middle School. John has gone on to join the US Marines, a choice that has both upsides and downsides, we are hoping that the upsides win the battle. He graduated from boot camp around US Thanksgiving this year and we are proud of him for his accomplishment. Alec has started grade 9 and is working to handle the transition to High School. He went off to summer camp this year for the first time and for the most part enjoyed it, though one week would have been better that two (for him, not Barb and I).

Barb had a great year of quilting as usual, making many beautiful quilts including a new one for me. She entered several in her guild’s quilt show and won several awards in different categories. She has been back to Toronto several times recently to see her mother who unfortunately is quite ill.

I did quite a bit of bike riding this year as I joined a local bike club and went on many of their organized rides. It was a great way to meet some people and see more of New Jersey. There is nothing like getting your ass handed to you by a 60+ guy going up a steep hill. Work is going well, I’m still with Goldman Sachs and am very busy.

On the home front, we did some renovations to our house, redoing the kitchen and two of the bathrooms. We are really pleased with the results except that finishing the final touches such as the backsplash has taken way way too long and is still not done. I’ll post some pictures when it is. Sadly our pet budgie Peter passed away this summer and we missed him so much that we went out and got a Lovebird called Pippi who is quite a different bird than Peter was, it’s almost like having a new child in the house and just as demanding.

As for the upcoming year, I expect it will be more of the same, Barb is slowly expanding the quilting enterprise to other areas of the house, so it is my job to try to keep it under control. It looks like we might get some actual snow this winter so Alec and I hope to do some skiing this year. I’m hoping to take him for a long weekend up in Vermont or some place where they have real hills. We also hope to make it back to Canada this summer as we have not been back on vacation for quite a while. We had intended to go this Christmas but circumstances beyond our control prevented it. We will also be going to Australia at some point this year as we were lucky enough to win a trip there courtesy of Whole Foods.

As always we would like to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a very Happy New Year!