In 2002, our biggest personal investments provided us with our most joyous experiences. In their third year of Taekwondo, Missy and Eric both earned their first degree black belts. Curt, who started Taekwondo one year later, is hoping to earn his black belt next year. We "worked" even longer and harder at our happiest accomplishment of the year. After years of trying and failing, we are pregnant! (Technically, "pregnancy" is in Missy's disappearing lap but Eric and Curt have taken on added responsibilities as Missy tires easily through her early pregnancy so they also feel heavy with child.) Muffin is scheduled to make a first worldly appearance in late June.

Eric is quite the martial artist. In addition to earning a black belt in Taekwondo, he was recognized as "White Tiger Taekwondo Student of the Month" in July. We believe he is the first two time winner of this prestigious award. During the year he participated in two tournaments, dozens of demonstrations, and was named Leadership Team Student of the Month for March. Eric also earned his first three promotions in Hapkido. White Tiger co-founder Master Rondy believes Eric will be even better in Hapkido than he is in Taekwondo. Eric's unstructured homeschooling is progressing well. In this year's standardized test he scored in the 99 percentile in all graded areas. Eric learns best through physical activity. During the year he learned how to water ski, play table tennis, gallop on a horse, and build and operate radio-controlled vehicles from kits. He doesn't participate in league sports but he continues to improve his skills in tennis, golf, bowling, baseball, football, soccer, rollerblading, biking, and snowboarding. He's been taking lessons in horseback riding, speaking Spanish, and acting (he had key roles in two plays performed by homeschooling groups).

Missy is in her fifth year as a La Leche League District Advisor supporting North Carolina League Leaders and ninth year as a League Leader supporting NC moms. She is excited about being able to mother a newborn as she counsels new moms on parenting and breastfeeding. Missy is already missing the physical activity she has temporarily traded for pregnancy. In addition to being highly skilled in Taekwondo (Leadership Team Student of the Month in May), Missy plays indoor and outdoor soccer--at least she will again come next summer. Missy coordinates and manages our family affairs and assumes primary responsibility for Eric's homeschooling, though she still finds time to learn new crafts and participate in an active book club. We had a scare in August when Missy had an allergic reaction after gardening. For ten days her face was swollen to the point of being unrecognizable (check out her photos on our website).

During the year, Curt also won Taekwondo awards (Best tester for Red Stripe in March and Red Belt Student of the Month in May). Though he doesn't have great flexibility, in class Curt's energy level is unsurpassed. In achieving his bodan belt, Curt broke a 2¼" thick concrete slab with a palm smash. Work at IBM takes much of Curt's time and his current job is less enjoyable than most of his previous ones. Fortunately, he is working on the best money making product (the T-Series ThinkPad; a notebook computer) in a money losing division (Personal Computing Division). As layoffs tend to be based on canceled projects, his job seems secure and at this point in time, that's good enough. To stay in his position, Curt is required to become a certified project manager even though his job does not involve doing project management work. He plans to take the certification test next year. In an under appreciated coup, Curt was able to remove more than $1 million from his division's expenses by transferring high cost test systems to friends in other divisions. After years of effort (.00000951 years or roughly five minutes of web surfing), Curt became an ordained minister of the Universal Life Church. He plans to preside over the wedding of friends next spring. Some of the most fun Curt had during the year was in co-producing, with Eric, a couple of films using our new digital camcorder.

This year we participated in a big vacation, though we didn't take one of our own. Danish relatives whom Missy and her mom visited last year, vacationed this past summer for three weeks in the United States. During their marvelous vacation in the U.S., Hans Bechgaard, his wife Susanne and their sons Jonas (20), Jakob (19), and Jeppe (14) visited dozens of relatives spanning thousands of miles and several states. We were able to host them in North Carolina and visit with them and Missy's family of origin in Michigan. Missy and Eric made two other trips to Michigan and Ohio to visit family and we all traveled to Michigan over Thanksgiving. As two of Missy's brothers now live in North Carolina, we were able to see them and their families more often than in years past. We will be traveling to Pennsylvania in December to see Curt's family of origin. We expect this to be an especially exciting trip since we didn't make our usual trip to PA over the summer, we will celebrate our pregnancy with our extended family, and Curt's parents Bill and Nancy will be one month away from their 50th wedding anniversary.
 
 

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