Zwahlen Family Newsletter

In case we missed sending our Christmas/Year-End letter your way, here's our 2009 update! And don't worry, you didn't miss getting snail mail since we barely emailed it today. Enjoy!

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Salutations from Wise, Virginia! Or as the locals say “You doin' alright?” Wise is a small rural town in southwest Virginia for those of you who did not know (which is all of you).

We arrived just in time to enjoy the beautiful fall colors and rustic southern backwoods charm. In spite of our many mispronunciations and Roy’s aptitude for verbally embarrassing himself, we have yet to insult anyone here, which reflects a lot about our new neighbors. Roy’s first experience with his neighbors involved getting a U-Haul stuck in his neighbor’s driveway trying to turn around. He knew he would enjoy his new home when he hit his neighbors gutter with the truck and they apologized.

Abby has had quite a year growing as fast as she can and experiencing everything her world has to offer. She spent her summer going to Busch Gardens and Disneyland with the excuse of spending time with her relatives. She also swam in her first ocean (the Pacific) and loved the “big bubbles.” Abby loves the music and dancing she experiences at church, the library, and at home. We especially enjoy when Abby sings herself to sleep. She understands the holidays more this year and cannot wait to open the presents under the Christmas tree.

Michelle is pregnant with our boy and is due February 13. He is an active child and Michelle is not as sure she can keep up with two busy children. We decided to use both grandfathers’ given names and are naming him Samuel David Zwahlen. We wanted our son to remember that if his grandfathers can make it through life anyone can.

Michelle enjoyed playing host to family and friends in Washington D.C. this year and is now trying to convince everyone for another trip to Coal Country. Abby and Michelle ditched Roy in the spring and went to Utah to visit family and friends. Michelle is thriving in our new abode and has taken on serving the youth in our church. She has never worked with teenagers but she loves those girls.

Roy spent the spring interning at the Department of Commerce Office of Intellectual Property Rights. He loved working there even though no one is really sure what he did. Roy graduated from George Mason School of Law in May and started his first job as a Magistrate in Wise County. He spends his time providing bail hearings, making sure the police have probable cause, and drowning in paperwork. Roy never thought he would practice criminal law but he enjoys the work. Outside of work, Roy is learning the ins and outs of maintaining a home, including fighting off the woodland rodents.

We hope you have a Merry Christmas and that this letter finds you and yours well. Please keep in touch.

They Say It's Your Birthday (Celebration #1)

Abby is turning 2 tomorrow. We've been talking about her birthday for several months now and she has only wanted three things for her birthday. Luckily for her, we were able to fulfill all three birthday wishes for the 2-day-early celebration (but we had to take advantage of the Zwahlen clan being in town). All she wanted was an Elmo cake, blue balloons, and Zach. I just wish we had caught her face on camera when Roy walked in with her three blue balloons. They barely left her hands all day.

We had Abby and Zach each paint a wooden boat and bus. They were masterpieces!

Grandma and Baba Z gave Abby two more boxes to go with her Fisher Price Play-My-Way table. And of course the wrapping was almost as fun as the doctor and baby play sets.

Thanks to James, Miriam, and their cool parental unit, Abby has her own train set. It has already traveled to the OB and the Thomas train has taken a nap with Abby. That was a winning present!

Tinkerbell purse? Candy? Wow, how can anything get cooler than that?!? Thanks, Zach, Ethan, and their parents!

Happy 2nd birthday, my Abigail Claire! We love you so much and can't wait to spend the whole day tomorrow celebrating with you! Our lives are so much better because you are here.

Christmas!

Christmas Eve:

Grandma Z, Zach, and Abby telling the story of the nativity.

Uncle Steve-o, Zach, Abby, and Roy reading "The Night Before Christmas".

The cousins all excited for Christmas.

Christmas Day:

Yeah for Santa!

All dressed up in her Christmas dress from Mor Mor and Far Far.

Plus her tennis balls from Uncle Steven--great toy. And pink!

Day After Christmas:

Abby and Zach spent probably 10 minutes on the tire swing.

Cute kids!
Making the gingerbread train with Grandma Z.

The Good Amid the Bad

First, and most importantly, we survived! And we learned a whole lot!

The snow dumping started at 1 Friday afternoon. By 11 pm the same night, we had a little more than 18" in our yard. The only reason I know that is because we had some tree branches that broke and fell on our roof and Roy and I went out to assess the damage. Thankfully, there was nothing beyond a dented gutter. Considering we have more than a dozen trees surrounding our house, we consider ourselves extremely blessed that nothing more happened. The next morning as Roy was getting ready for work our power went out. It was out for 19 hours (not that we counted or anything). We were some of the first to have our power turned on and that is only because we live in the shopping and hotel district. Seeing as how our car was buried and the street was ice, Roy had to walk to work at 6:30 am. We live at the low part of our street so getting in and out of our house has been interesting the last few days. Roy has probably built up his muscles more than he has wanted to between shoveling and having to push the car out the driveway and up our street. It's a good thing baby Sam gets the hiccups every morning and I'm awake anyway so I am the engine rev-ver and he's the pusher. When Abby is in the car, she counts and cheers. Not for Roy, but for me. I've got a tough job. :)

Besides the fact that in our preparations to move here, we were told by everyone we asked that the most snow they got was 2-3 inches and it was gone the next day, and our disillusionment with the present amount of ice and snow now dominating our lives, I have to say I am so very impressed with the attitudes and compassion of the people here. I wanted to share a few examples because it's been amazing to see that even when people have nothing--no power, no heat, no water, nothing more than cereal to eat and a shovel--they give and give to make the lives of the people in their area a little more comfortable. It's been amazing to watch and hear of stories of how people have coped with what is now nearly a week without heat, water, electricity and an incredible amount of winter.

• Roy had two guys walk into the Magistrate Office saying that they had a truck and wanted to help anyone that needed help so they came to ask the police.
• We had several people get out of their cars to help us push our car down the street.
• Walmart was handing out free drinking water by the case.
• Roy's coworker who was scheduled to work graveyard shift worked 12 hours in a dark, cold office without being able to use the restroom out of a sense of duty.
• People with electricity or heat hosted those without in their homes.
• We had a handful of people from church call and drop by our house to make sure we were okay and to offer any assistance. By the way, they had lived through the same storm and many had power restored later than we did.
• Finally, we had 750 utility trucks from around 8 different states come to fix the electricity on what was probably their week off for the holidays.

And since we haven't said it enough yet, thanks to the parental units for the emergency preparedness kits we have received the last couple of Christmases (although Roy said he will disown any family member that gives him an emergency preparedness gift again).

The Enforcer

We have been working with Abby lately so that she understands what is going on at church. Near the beginning of the service, we have the Sacrament, where we have bread and water to remember Christ and His sacrifice. She even has a "Jesus book" that she likes to look at while she is waiting for that part of the service to be over. Today I reminded Abby that this was the Sacrament part and asked who we're supposed to think about for the next couple of minutes. Her response, at the greatest volume which her lungs can muster, was, "THINK ABOUT JESUS!"

The Christmas Spirit

I really enjoyed this video made by our church reminding us of the true spirit of Christmas.

The Christmas Spirit

Christmastime is Here

Winter and it's activities hit us this week and we are really excited. We pulled out our Christmas tree and decorations and spent Monday afternoon decorating and preparing for Christmas. We are hosting Christmas this year so we're excited to show off our house. We don't have everything up because our landlady doesn't want us to use nails and since double-sided tape isn't a cure-all for all things I want to hang, we are putting up the basics.

Abby was really excited to help decorate the tree. Last year was her first Christmas and she participated, but this year was so much more fun for her and us. It makes it even more fun for me because she gets so excited. She was hanging up ornaments way faster than either of us, but it turned out that all of her ornaments were gently placed on the same three branches. Our tree isn't perfectly decorated, but it has personality. And, more importantly, Abby is proud of "my Kiss-mas tree" so we're leaving the three heavy-laden branches just the way they are.

We were also able to make our first snowman, which is probably the biggest one either Roy or I have made. We really aren't great snowman artists, but Abby isn't complaining. Roy is sad about his pathetic attempt, but we've got all winter to figure it out!

And just in case anyone is counting down with us, I am now 30 weeks along so Sam will be making his appearance in about 10 weeks (wow!). Everything is looking good and, if it is humanly possible, he seems to be able to move as many times a day as his sister. We are going to be busy...and tired. We are so excited to meet him soon--all of us. Abby talks about him too now, which is thrilling to me. And, by the way, we won't be putting up the ultrasound pictures not because we aren't just as excited as we were with Abby, but because we got two pretty lame pictures printed out. One is of the circumference of his head and the other is a fuzzy profile shot. We do have a VHS so someday we might actually be able to watch it if we come across a VCR. :)