Another year behind us, and what a year it was. Concern over the ongoing wars all over the world tempered by the excitement of a new administration in the United States. Financial pain from the ongoing recession balanced by gratitude for a stable work situation. Through it all our family has been blessed with wonderful health and much good fortune. We pray for the same for people everywhere.

Consider making a contribution to one of the many good charitable organization working to make the world a better place. We like World Neighbors and Cross International Catholic Outreach.

Had a good year in school and sports. He finished 7th grade and began 8th grade at Hanes Middle School. In January, he took the SAT as part of the Duke Talent Identification Program, and scored higher on the math section than his dad did when he was applying to college. He obviously gets his math abilities from his mother, who was a math major in college. In the fall, his third year playing trumpet, he tried out for and made the All-County Band. Listen to "Aztec" from his middle school band concert.

In the spring, Paul retired from little league and committed himself to tournament tennis. He played 12 tournaments, won the main draw in 2 and the consolation draw in 2. He finished the year ranked in the top 100 in the boys 14 division in North Carolina and is a Yonex sponsored player. He is also a fine racket stringer and helps his dad a lot with his racket stringing business.

Graduated from elementary school and began middle school at Thomas Jefferson Middle School, but the biggest event of the year for Hannah was getting braces. She wanted to get braces so badly-- until she got them-- and then she realized they aren't all they're cracked up to be. For example, no popcorn or sticky candy.

Hannah is a pool rat in the summer, hanging around our neighborhood pool as often as possible, and also swimming and diving for the Polo Park Recreation Center teams.

Her creativity shines through in various projects she does at home, like making herself into a Big Mac (rollover at right). She loves taking photos with a digital camera her grandma and grandpa bought her for her birthday. Her favorite music artist is Taylor Swift and she especially loves the song "Love Story." For movies this year, "Kit Kittredge: An American Girl" and "High School Musical 3" were at the top of her "best of" list.

Successfully completed second grade at Jefferson Elementary School and began third grade in Mrs. Hopp's class. He also made his First Communion in the spring at Our Lady of Mercy Catholic Church.

Mark kept busy with alot of different sports this year. At Polo Park Recreation Center, he was on the swim team this year for the first time, competing in his first ever swim meet (rollover image at right), and also played basketball and soccer. He played coach pitch baseball in the spring and kid-pitch minors in the fall to get ready for next season. He also likes to knock the tennis ball around a bit. For example, in the picture at right he is playing mini-tennis with Top 25 touring pro Mardy Fish.

He continues to spend alot of time playing with our across the street neighbors, the Currans, who like professional wrestling as much as he does. His favorite WWE wrestler is Hornswoggle.

How is it that every year seems busier, harder, and more tiring than the year before? A good part of Megan's life involves keeping the kids alive, managing the household, and fighting the school system. Through her activism in the schools, Megan was asked to become Involved with a community organization called Forsyth Futures.

In the spirit of "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em," Megan has also kept herself busy as a teacher. She continues teaching Faith Formation (a.k.a. Sunday School) at Our Lady of Mercy Catholic Church (she's pictured at right with the former director of faith formation at OLM, Sister Kathleen). This fall she began teaching in the 4 year old classroom at Mt. Tabor United Methodist Church Preschool.

Based on her teaching experiences, Megan is developing a couple theories for better understanding of Asberger's Syndrome, which will be the subject of her doctoral dissertation if she can figure out how to work that into her schedule.

90% of the time you can find David positioned as you see him at right. Still, some big things happened while David was sitting at his desk this year. In the spring, he was granted tenure and promoted to Associate Professor at Wake Forest. In November, he was asked to take over as Chair of the Sociology Department beginning in January 2009. David also continues to serve as editor of Sociology of Religion: A Quarterly Review, and is overseeing the transition of the journal to its new publisher, Oxford Journals. So, he expects to be sitting at his desk 95% of the time in 2009.

Outside of work David continues to play some tennis, but more importantly, he started working as racket technician for the Wake Forest Men's Tennis team, including stringing rackets for ITA National Indoor doubles champions Cory Parr and Steve Forman (rollover picture). To support and expand this "hobby," David earned the Certified Stringer and Master Racquet Technician designations from the USRSA and started a company, Big Time! Tennis, which is "going live" in 2009.

Paul

Hannah

Megan

David