Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!
We want to update you a bit on what has been happening with our family this year. Some of this info (if not all) will be things some of you have heard before, but there are others that will be reading this that have never been to our blog before!
I will highlight a few events in the life of our family in no particular order.
~ Sarah and Zach traveled quite a bit in the spring with TeenPact Leadership Schools. Zach traveled to 5 different states and Sarah did about the same.
~ Joshua got his first full time job since getting his bachelors degree at the end of 2010. He starts work at Farmers Insurance at the end of January, 2012.
~ Zach decided to run this year. He had run a 5K in the past and this spring he decided to run the 1/2 marathon here in town in May. He placed 3rd in his age category! Then with in a week or so he decided to try a marathon. So he trained all summer and mid October he ran the Kansas City Marathon and he placed 1st in his age category!
~ Kevin was diagnosed with Multiple Myeloma in July. You can read much more about that if you look around on our blog. He will be updating the blog on a regular basis starting in the next few days. So come back and keep up to date on his progress.
~ Becca is in the 7th grade, continues to play the piano and has started taking Bag Pipe lessons. 3 weeks out of the month she does her lesson over Skype. The other lesson we drive about an hour for a "live" lesson. Playing bagpipes has been a desire of hers for about 7 years now!
~ Sarah was accepted to be an intern for TeenPact this year. She has already traveled this fall for that, but will be very busy in the spring. She will be gone about 13-14 weeks between January and May!
~ Zach is in his senior year and is looking forward to being done with high school. He has started getting some college credits and has about 30 so far!
~ Josh went on a mission trip to Guatemala for a month this fall. He stayed with a family in Guatemala City that are missionaries with Global Soccer Ministries. He went down planning on spending a lot of time with children playing/ reffing soccer. He did get to do that some, but he ended up learning a lot about shovels! There had been a landslide just prior to his arrival that blocked the road into the soccer fields! You never know what God's plans are going to be!!!!
~ Sarah started working at "Queen's Pantry" in July or August. She came home one night in October and told us that the owner was going to close the business. She then suggested (not seriously) that we buy the business. Long story short ~ we bought it on November 5th (Guy Fawkes Day) and opened for business on the 11th of November, just one week later. In that time we also moved the business to a new location. :) Fun, exciting, scary, overwhelming are a few words to describe these last 2 months. But we finally feel like we are getting a handle on how to run it. If you want to look at our web site it is:
www.qptea.com
~ We have had a really good year. Hard times, yes. But we have certainly seen God's hand working in our lives. We have been blessed to be prayed for on a regular basis by people all over the world. I can't thank those of you enough that have been praying for us. The Peace that Passes Understanding has been a mainstay in our lives and we believe that is a result of those people praying for us!!!
I pray that the Lord showers you with blessings in this coming year!
Numbers 6:24-26 The LORD bless you and keep you; the LORD make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you; the LORD lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace.
Kevin, Kathy, Josh, Sarah, Zach & Becca
