As usual, it has been a couple of months since my last blog. Since we are wrapping up the year 2009 I thought I would blog a Christmas letter of sorts to sum up our year. This is the 3rd year in a row I have not sent a mass mailing of Christmas cards and if anyone gets one, it will be late! Christmas seems to come faster every year and I get more behind with cards and gifts. Someday I hope to get back on top of this! :)
Disclaimer: Continue reading at your own risk. You may learn some things you didn't want to know. It's also incredibly LONG (like a book) so grab your coffee if you do wish to continue.
So 2009 is coming to an end. This year was quite a roller coaster ride for us. We rang in the new year with one of my worst fears. I finally learned the true meaning of the phrase "nit-picking". My fear of these things was a HUGE reason I did not want Austin attending school and lo and behold New Year's Eve, Austin comes to me scratching his head like a maniac! After inspections of the entire family, we found he had given "them" to his brother too. This miserable challenge took 3 weeks to get rid of! Problem solved. Just in time to welcome my mother for a visit with the expectant arrival of baby #3. A high point in the year! Or should I say the highest. In February we welcomed our baby girl who has been such a delightful addition to our family. Having a girl is such a different experience. They are so different from boys! In March, Teagan comes to me scratching and covered in red spots. My first reaction...chicken pox. But no, it wasn't. My next worst fear had come true. Another phrase I now know the full meaning of. Any guesses?
"Goodnight, sleep tight, don't let the _____ _____ bite." Are you kidding me, I thought? How can this be happening? I now know much more than I ever cared to know about those terrible bugs! Like where else they live (picture frames and wall corners) or that they can live an entire year without feeding. Yuk! And for anyone out there thinking I must never clean my house this has nothing to do with it or those other icky bugs mentioned earlier. And I do keep a very clean house! This problem resulted in having the house fumigated and every article of clothing in the house bagged and washed in hot water! All while in zombie mode with a newborn in the house. Between regular laundry, the extra from a newborn and all the rest it took nearly a month to get everything washed. Ok, what next...
In April, we took Austin out of school for may reasons really. Ultimately differences with the school and the need for more flexibilty brought us to the decision. We then started preparations to homeschool Austin for the rest of our time in England.
The month of May brought on another challenge when some unforseeable moment in my normal routine would render me lying in pain, barely able to to sit up. Taking care of 3 kids was a nearly impossible task considering I spent most of my time lying in bed or crawling on the floor. Thank goodness we had an awesome nanny to help me out! After 4 months of physical therapy and an MRI we found I have a bulging disc pressing on the sciatic nerve causing pain down my right leg. My options were surgery or see how it goes. Thankfully the physical therapy and excercise on my own has brought me eons from the pain that was there. I've even heard it can heal on it's own.
June through October brought warm beautiful England weather and vacation! We flew to Orlando for a conference/family reunion. My family drove to meet us while we were there and we had a great time visiting, going to Disney and the beaches! We also spent some time traveling to nearby England sites and castles and then a European trip to Italy and Greece!
September marked two years since arriving in Oxford and started our countdown for our return to the U.S. I started teaching Austin kindergarten at home. It's going generally well although it hasn't yet sunk in for Austin that we "do school" every day and he still puts up a fight periodically. I'm also not sure I have the patience for this but I'm trying. It's tough trying to teach one while there are 2 others hanging on you for attention. Devin and I started teaching the 3 yr old cubbies at AWANA at our local base and have been blessed to get to know some more people there. Austin and Teagan are enjoying spending the time with other kids and memorizing Bible verses. The boys are growing and learning new things every day. Austin is growing into a big boy and liking things like transformers, secret agents, sword/gun fighting and skateboards. He's an uncontrollable ball of energy at times and I often lack the creativity to channel it into something productive. We want to get him involved in sports but he's not interested in any of them so we're still looking. Teagan is ever more obsessed with Thomas the Tank. His growing love/idolatry could be getting out of control but how do you explain this to a 3 year old? I'm sure he'll grow out of it, right? We've told many times that he is a cartoon and book character and not real. Still he continues to memorize every line in every movie and book. He can name nearly all of the hundreds of characters. He's evenmoved on to memorizing the commercial adds. We're thinking he should be there new spokesperson.
Bailey amazes me every day with how quickly she is progressing. She's bigger than either of her brothers were at 10 months. She has already got crawling down and pulling up to furniture. She'll definitely be walking before her first birthday. She's very intuitive already and is helpful when getting dressed and knows where to put her arms and feet, she has learned to clap, say mama, dada and uh-oh. She's light years ahead of where her brothers were at 10 months! It just goes to show how different raising girls are. She loves her brothers but is already learning to take charge and be bossy. She even likes to attack them if they are on the floor by climbing on them and pulling their hair.
Devin is doing well with his PhD program. Some days he comes home feeling great about it all and others he's overwhelmed and can't see light at the end of the tunnel. This summer their lab location moved to a different building which resulted in disassembling and reassembling his wind tunnel. This of course put a hitch in his testing but it's finally up and running again. Provided all goes well, he'll be ready to write his thesis in April and submit in September.
Me, I struggle at times to keep everything in some sense of order. Often times my "momnesia" takes over and I'm a bit spacey I hate to say. Thus the lack of Christmas card sending among MANY other things! I keep thinking where is the light at the end of this tunnel? When will I get a good night's sleep and my fuzzy head clear? Probably not for another 18 years. Oh well, I just try to remember that this will pass and all too quickly so I better enjoy what is now. Fuzzy head and all.
So as 2010 approaches...wow it's so weird to say that. We have much to look forward to with hopefully a visit to Colorado and New Mexico to see family and friends. We have our last summer in England with more travel and of course our return (permanently)to the U.S. (As I write, Devin is going through the list of possible job assignments). We are incredibly excited to go back. We've enjoyed our time here and all the opportunities living here has provided us but we are ready to go home. So since I've dragged this blog out WAY longer than a blog should ever be, I'll end it here. The "O'Dowd clan in England" has had a very blessed year, up or down, God has brought us through, brought us here and His loves for us never changes. We wish everyone a blessed Christmas season and pray you would know the unfailing and unchanging love of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Merry Christmas!
Love,
Devin, Andrea, Austin, Teagan and Bailey.
