Merry Christmas from Eric, Dennise and Maria!!!
Dec/25/2008 10:49 AM Filed in: Life Happens
We've been doing e-Christmas letters since before
they were cool. This year's version is below. Happy
holidays, everyone...EF
December 2008.
Greetings from the Folkerth/Garcia household. It's time for the annual electronic Christmas card/letter. A lot more people are doing this kind of thing this year, so we're not quite the freaks we used to be. Hope you enjoy it. As per usual, feel free to click on the links below to go to even more content (movies, music, etc..).
Maria is as tall as her mom now and they wear the same shoe size. She's eleven-years-old. Any day now, she'll pass her mom in height and we‚'ll be sure to send you the pictures at our next Christmas letter. Maria is still involved in competitive gymnastics. This Spring, she participated in the TAAF league State Championships and placed 5th on balance beam for her division. In the fall she participated in the USAG State Championships and placed 5th on beam and 5th on floor exercise for her division. At some point in the season, she was able to compete at the gym where Carly Patterson and Nastia Liukin trained. This, as you might imagine, was a big thrill.
At school, Maria was "commended" on two of three areas tested (on TAKS), and on the third scored just one point away from commended. She continues to love math, and she received a school award last six weeks for her work in that subject. She took a school field trip this year to Sky Ranch to do some hands on learning in science. Maria also has a new pet fish named Sky. Here's video of her in the Spring Talent Show. And here's a little from the just completed Christmas musical at school.
Eric and Dennise enjoyed a relatively quiet year on the professional front. We're pretty happy about that. The church has been doing well. The United Methodist General Conference was in Fort Worth this year, and the Northaven took an active role in witnessing to the conference about reconciling ministries. It was a difficult couple of weeks. But many other things at the church have actually been very good this year. Here is a video that was made for our Stewardship Campaign that gives a snapshot of the church right now, and here is a nice historical video.
Most of Eric's musical time was given to Connections Band. If you haven't visited their website, please do. The stunning news is that the band raised over $30,000 in this year alone for Nothing But Nets and UMCOR. That puts the band close to $50K raised in the past three years! Amazing. Please sign up to be on our mailing list, and come hear a show. There are lots of pics, soundclips and videos at the website.
Dennise spoke at the Advanced Family Law Course on ‚"How to present property cases at trial.‚" Dallas Observer named her in the "Best Of" issue. Their exact title was, "Best Judge when your cheap divorce gets expensive." We chuckled at that, but we'll take it. The write up about Dennise's work was very kind. It was a pleasant surprise, in that the Observer did not let on to anyone we know they were working on this category. Dennise was also selected to be co-Vice Chair to the DBA Bench Bar Conference in 2009.
Although this was certainly a big election year, it was truly nice to not be running in this one, after having to run in both 2004 and 2006. However, by this time next year, we'll be back in the thick of things once again. One final thing, did you know Dennise turned forty this year? Enjoy a four-decade retrospective here.
Maria wanted to go to New York for vacation, and while we were in that part of the country, we visited Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., and Boston. It was a great vacation, and you can see the movie here. We also took a little trip to San Antonio in August and managed to get some time at Sea World.
While we have many blessings we are happy about, but we also have endured some events that deeply sadden us. We've had a number of dear friends and mentors pass away this year. We won't mention them all here, but we will tell you that they had enourmous impact in our lives. From them, we were able to reflect on the chance we are each given in order to make a positive difference in the world. From them, we were able to learn ways in which we can live and make dying a part of our living. We learned an important lesson from one dear friend about dying gracefully. Yet another friend taught us to enjoy our time together as much as possible.
While the loss of these friends and mentors saddens us, we have faith in God. Faith sustains us and helps us with our grief. As the years pass, we know there will be others. This is a part of life. We are grateful for the lives of friends and mentors who have gone before us. We are grateful for you. Each of you touches our lives in some form or fashion. Thank you for being there.
Hope you are having a blessed and peaceful holiday season.
Dennise, Eric and Maria.
December 2008.
Greetings from the Folkerth/Garcia household. It's time for the annual electronic Christmas card/letter. A lot more people are doing this kind of thing this year, so we're not quite the freaks we used to be. Hope you enjoy it. As per usual, feel free to click on the links below to go to even more content (movies, music, etc..).
Maria is as tall as her mom now and they wear the same shoe size. She's eleven-years-old. Any day now, she'll pass her mom in height and we‚'ll be sure to send you the pictures at our next Christmas letter. Maria is still involved in competitive gymnastics. This Spring, she participated in the TAAF league State Championships and placed 5th on balance beam for her division. In the fall she participated in the USAG State Championships and placed 5th on beam and 5th on floor exercise for her division. At some point in the season, she was able to compete at the gym where Carly Patterson and Nastia Liukin trained. This, as you might imagine, was a big thrill.
At school, Maria was "commended" on two of three areas tested (on TAKS), and on the third scored just one point away from commended. She continues to love math, and she received a school award last six weeks for her work in that subject. She took a school field trip this year to Sky Ranch to do some hands on learning in science. Maria also has a new pet fish named Sky. Here's video of her in the Spring Talent Show. And here's a little from the just completed Christmas musical at school.
Eric and Dennise enjoyed a relatively quiet year on the professional front. We're pretty happy about that. The church has been doing well. The United Methodist General Conference was in Fort Worth this year, and the Northaven took an active role in witnessing to the conference about reconciling ministries. It was a difficult couple of weeks. But many other things at the church have actually been very good this year. Here is a video that was made for our Stewardship Campaign that gives a snapshot of the church right now, and here is a nice historical video.
Most of Eric's musical time was given to Connections Band. If you haven't visited their website, please do. The stunning news is that the band raised over $30,000 in this year alone for Nothing But Nets and UMCOR. That puts the band close to $50K raised in the past three years! Amazing. Please sign up to be on our mailing list, and come hear a show. There are lots of pics, soundclips and videos at the website.
Dennise spoke at the Advanced Family Law Course on ‚"How to present property cases at trial.‚" Dallas Observer named her in the "Best Of" issue. Their exact title was, "Best Judge when your cheap divorce gets expensive." We chuckled at that, but we'll take it. The write up about Dennise's work was very kind. It was a pleasant surprise, in that the Observer did not let on to anyone we know they were working on this category. Dennise was also selected to be co-Vice Chair to the DBA Bench Bar Conference in 2009.
Although this was certainly a big election year, it was truly nice to not be running in this one, after having to run in both 2004 and 2006. However, by this time next year, we'll be back in the thick of things once again. One final thing, did you know Dennise turned forty this year? Enjoy a four-decade retrospective here.
Maria wanted to go to New York for vacation, and while we were in that part of the country, we visited Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., and Boston. It was a great vacation, and you can see the movie here. We also took a little trip to San Antonio in August and managed to get some time at Sea World.
While we have many blessings we are happy about, but we also have endured some events that deeply sadden us. We've had a number of dear friends and mentors pass away this year. We won't mention them all here, but we will tell you that they had enourmous impact in our lives. From them, we were able to reflect on the chance we are each given in order to make a positive difference in the world. From them, we were able to learn ways in which we can live and make dying a part of our living. We learned an important lesson from one dear friend about dying gracefully. Yet another friend taught us to enjoy our time together as much as possible.
While the loss of these friends and mentors saddens us, we have faith in God. Faith sustains us and helps us with our grief. As the years pass, we know there will be others. This is a part of life. We are grateful for the lives of friends and mentors who have gone before us. We are grateful for you. Each of you touches our lives in some form or fashion. Thank you for being there.
Hope you are having a blessed and peaceful holiday season.
Dennise, Eric and Maria.
| Comments |
|---|
|
|