Dear Friends & Family,

Happiest of holidays to you and yours! Every year I say we will get our cards out ahead of Christmas and I have not been successful for some time (or maybe ever). A couple of years ago they did not even make it out of their box. This year I thought making the update portion online would speed the process up. Spoiler alert: it did not!

In my defense, I do have a large list that I need to send to! I am not always the best at keeping in touch with friends and those I care about throughout the year, so this is my one chance a year to remind you that I am still kicking and that I am thinking of you!

I commissioned the caricature on the post card from an artist named Cody on Etsy. I wanted to highlight a few of our favorite holiday movies – Jim as John McClane, me as Kevin McCallister, and Ike as Buddy the Elf. (Jim and I are passionately on Team Die Hard is a Christmas movie.)

Highs of 2022

Spending Christmas 2021 in Minnesota with Jim’s sister Erin and The Lewises. We rang in the new year in Minneapolis “babysitting” our amazing niece and nephew. They are little kids no more, sadly, as Maddox turned 15 and Kennedy turned 13 this year.
Playing trivia with our brilliant team named “Risky Quizness”. We pretty much win first place every time we play. We hope to pick it up again once things calm down in 2023!
Celebrating our 13^th anniversary with Jim making heart-shaped chicken parmesan.
Continuing the tradition of celebrating Galentine’s Day!
Celebrating my sister Jessica’s 40^th birthday in Newport Beach, CA and wearing matching shirts as a family at Disneyland.
Watching the Seahawks and the Sounders from the Starbucks suites.
Repeatedly visiting the sea lions that made a temporary home in Ballard.
Seeing friends that visited us while they were in Seattle: Julie, Ben & Curt, The Waddells, Brian, and Devin!
Continuing our chain restaurant tour with our friend Alisha and getting the greatest picture ever with the Easter Bunny.
Seeing a variety of shows: Letterkenny Live, Trixie and Katya Live, Sarah Potenza & Katie Kadan, Paul McCartney, New Kids on the Block, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Hamilton, RuPaul’s Drag Race, Jingle All the Gay, and Potted Potter.
Soaking in the Sol Duc Hot Springs in the Olympic National Park with Darla.
Traveling to Wisconsin (Jim) for the Annual Guy Trip and home to Clinton to visit Grandma Pat and Erin.
Traveling to San Diego (Andrea) with The PF Chang’s Ladies for an awesome girls trip where I got another tattoo.
Visiting Ocala, FL (Andrea) for training for work. I will never go back to Florida in August.
Celebrating Jim’s 43^rd birthday at the newly opened Renton Topgolf.
Traveling back to Minnesota for the wedding our lovely friends, Jennie and Jeff.
Flying to Reno for a work trip and extended weekend that got us one more state capital to cross of on our list!
Driving to PDX to watch Iowa State play in the Phil Knight Invitational (Jim)
Spending Christmas in the sunshine of Las Vegas with Erin and introducing her to the great entertainer, Big Elvis

The most exciting change in 2022 for us were new jobs in August!

After seven years at Starbucks, I started working at Chewy! As an Executive Assistant, I support the VP of Logistics and the VP of Real Estate, Facilities & Procurement. While I miss my friends at Sbux daily, I am learning so much at Chewy. And it is pretty great to be able to bring Ike with me whenever I go to the office.
After six years of managing teams of engineers at Amazon, Jim decided to return to working as a software engineer himself and began working at Xcential Legislative Technologies in August of this year. His primary focus is on writing software that is used extensively by the US House of Representatives.

Lows of 2022

There were some frustrating moments in 2022 too. I finally caught covid and struggled with several bouts of respiratory infections over the year thanks to my allergies and asthma. I am seeing a pulmonary specialist in January and hopeful that there will fewer instances to complain about these old lungs in 2023.

And unfortunately, there were some sad moments as well. We are still mourning the loss of Jim’s mom Bernie from November 2021 and experiencing the year of first without her amazing presence. We also lost Jim’s Grandma Pat in August and his Uncle Dick in November.

However, all in all, we were incredibly blessed and grateful for all the wonderful memories in 2022! Whatever you celebrate, however you celebrate, we hope it’s been restful and has refilled your cup. We wish you an amazing 2023!