Christmas Letter 2009

December 7th, 2009

Dear family and friends,

We are spending Christmas in Kauai this year and are so excited! We leave in only 12 days and will be happy to escape this cold (it snowed last night in CA). The kids are excited to celebrate Christmas early before we leave and we are excited not to haul presents to Hawaii. We are calling it “faux” Christmas.

What’s happened this year? We survived the first year with Holden. The first year with any baby is always a big accomplishment! We loved spending time with Jason’s family in Utah for the New Year and the big family reunion at Bear Lake over the summer. It was wonderful to have everyone in one place. We enjoyed a few fun vacations to Bend, OR, Monterey and a camping trip.

I finally got motivated to get the baby weight off and started a weight loss competition and blog with my girlfriends. It worked and I have lost 23 pounds. YAY! In the middle of that I started running for the first time in my life and trained for a 10K. Even though a stress fracture kept me from running the race, I developed a real love for running and plan to run a half marathon in the spring. I have really enjoyed my girlfriends at church and all the fun things we do together – lots of girls nights out, a Tahoe Trip and a San Francisco trip as well.

Jason has been busy at work and has also been taking some pre-requisite classes for Physician Assistant School, which he applied to. We’ll know if he was accepted by the spring. Needless to say, working full time and taking a heavy class load has been hectic to say the least. He is ready to be done next week and relax in Kauai. He worked on some projects for the house this summer like the BBQ Island and the fire pit, which is still in progress. We got a lot of use out of the pool and hot tub this year. The kids love them and we love having them so convenient in our backyard.

Dawson (6) is in first grade now. He reads really well and is doing great in school, usually getting 100% on his spelling tests. He played soccer and t-ball this year. He is a great swimmer and loves to snorkel. We added another skier to the family this year when Dawson learned how to snow ski and water ski.

Taya (4) loves to read and is learning quickly. She got brave this year and learned how to swim and snorkel. She has a great imagination and likes to pretend she is a dog, cat or horse and loves for people to take her on walks with her leash. Taya is in ballet/tap and her teacher says she is very talented and focused.

Holden (17 months) is a busy body. He is walking all over the place and getting into everything! He has been busy cutting all his teeth and has almost all of them now. He has found his belly button and likes to show people theirs too. He is getting good at a few sign language signs, but mostly communicates through a series of grunts – too cute.

I love this time of year and have especially been enjoying this holiday season. I am so grateful for my family and for the true joy they bring to me. I am grateful for the Savior’s birth and for the opportunity we have during the Christmas season to reflect on all he has done for us.

We hope your families are well and that you have a very Merry Christmas this year and a wonderful 2010.

Love, The Packers

Jen, Jason, Dawson, Taya and Holden