I recognize that not every family that does the Christmas Letter uses the opportunity to shamelessly plug every minute detail of their year. Not everyone believes that the world will be impressed by the fact that their child's elementary school is named after an American war hero. I kid you not. For those people, I say thank you for sharing with me how you are doing and what you have been up to. And I also ask that you recognize that I am not talking about you. If you aren't telling me that I should be thoroughly impressed with your 8 year old's high score on Super Mario Bros., we are good. In the spirit of the Christmas Letter, I have composed my own version. I hope to some day be able send it out. You have been warned.
Merry Christmas to everyone!
Wow, hard to believe that another year has already passed. Seems like just
yesterday we were celebrating the accomplishments of last year, and now we have
a whole new year of wonderful memories! We did some traveling, some visiting
with family, and enjoyed watching the kids grow and thrive.
Susie just turned 16…Help! We have a teenage driver! Just kidding. Susie is doing great and
has shown herself to be an expert driver already. In fact, her Driver’s Ed
teacher allowed her to help teach the class. With her photographic memory, she
had the book memorized in a few hours and of course, got a perfect score on the
written test. I have suggested, and her school agrees, that taking the SAT’s
would not only be pointless, as she will most certainly get a perfect score,
but could also be discouraging to all the other students who would know their
scores wouldn’t be able to compare to hers. As a result, we will be driving her
to Boston in July to meet with some researchers at Harvard so we can find a way
to better measure her aptitude in “real life” terms that college admissions
personnel will be able to quantify and understand. Since she is finishing up
all of her high school credits this next semester, the quicker we can get this
issue resolved, the quicker she can go ahead and be admitted to the college of
her choice. She still hasn’t decided between Harvard or MIT, since each has offered her a full academic scholarship. It’ll be tough to see my “baby” leave the
nest, but it’ll be such a joy to watch her soar!
Patrick just turned 13…Help!
Another teenager! Ha ha. Seriously, he is a wonderful kid and we are so lucky
to have him as our son. Since he finished his Eagle Scout last year, he has
had to find new hobbies to fill his time. He took the opportunity
to pursue several new past times, and most recently began playing the guitar. He is
surprisingly good! We recorded him playing a few songs and sent them off to
some music producers. Who would have guessed he’d be asked to play guitar on
Kenny Chesney’s next album and to tour with him next summer?!?! Certainly not us! We’ll
have to find a way to squeeze that in between the church mission to Nicaragua
in April, and his internship with the New York Times which is supposed to start
at the beginning of June. Kenny has said he is willing to schedule the
recording around Patrick’s prior commitments because Patrick is “that good,
he’s worth the wait”. Fortunately, the Gifted Academic Program (GAP) that
Patrick attends is well aware of his talents and is willing to work with us in
planning for his academic needs while on tour. Phew! This will allow him to
continue in his study of Russian as well as Global Economics without skipping a
beat.
David turned 9 in May and is
ALL boy!...Help! My nerves are shot! As much as his high activity level
stresses me out to no end, it is well worth it when we get to sit in the stands
and watch him play ball. He has been playing baseball for 5 years now and this
spring, the high school pitching coach started working with him to keep him on
track with his pitching "career". His mastery of the fundamentals at this young age has helped his team win a
small tournament called the Little League World Series, where David was the starting
(and only) pitcher in the winning game. A college baseball scholarship is
pretty much wrapped up. But we don’t want him to feel too much pressure, and
burn out on one activity so we encouraged him to participate in several
different ones, to diversify so to speak. So this winter he joined a local ski
team. So far so good, as he has won every race he has participated in (by a
good 30 seconds each time, too!), so we are optimistic as to how the rest of
the ski season is going to pan out. Crossed fingers! And of course, he will continue with his golfing at the Country Club in the summer. There are still a few more course records he hasn't won, so he has some work still to do with that.
Steve continues to work as
CEO, CFO, President, and Head of the Board of Trustees for the bank. Not too
many more rungs to climb on this ladder! Ha ha Just kidding. In his spare
time, he continues his community service as Mayor since he was just re-elected
this year for his 7th term! Yay! Who knows, there may be a move to
Washington D.C. some time in our future! Wink, wink…
I have been fortunate to be able
to stay at home with the children and work as a Domestic Goddess. With the help
of our housekeeper Freda, our cook Marvin, the nannies A, B, and C (we can
never keep their names straight, so this is a system that we have all agreed
works well for us), as well as the butler George, I must say I have been
able to keep things running ship-shape and keep up with the many scheduling
needs of this busy family. Unfortunately, our driver Pete has been laid up for the last several weeks with a
slipped disc so we have all had to make due and come together to help everyone get where they need to go. And our lawyer has assured us that his injury
is most assuredly NOT work related, so now we can focus on getting Pete better,
rather than get distracted by a nasty lawsuit. I do continue my charity work
with the local Animal Shelter, Homeless Shelter, Abused Women’s Shelter, Teen
Runaway Shelter, Emergency Evacuation Shelter, Parks and Recreation Shelter,
American Red Cross Shelter, and the Country Club. There is no feeling quite
like what you get from “giving back”.
In the midst of all of the
individual activities, we managed to get in some quality family time and travel
together. Our annual trip to Bali was again, spectacular. But this year there
were no snake bites or sun burns so that made it all the more special! We
followed that up with some short vacations to Hawaii, Italy, Morocco, Brazil,
Fiji, New Zealand, and Moscow. We feel its so important to expose the kids to
other cultures to keep them grounded and sensitive to those who come from
different backgrounds. We were hoping to get to India this year as well, but our
busy schedules forced us to put it off for one more year. Hopefully Kenny
Chesney’s tour won’t keep us from India next year too!
Hope everyone is well and
wishing everyone all the happiness and joy we have been lucky to experience
this year. Best wishes for everyone!
Love, The Balthazar’s
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