Christmas 2006

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from all of us. This page is a photographic annotation of the email (or regular post) that you may have received. [If you want to see a bigger (and sometimes also wider) version of the pictures, just click on them.]

As usual, our kids traveled further and stayed away from home longer than we did. Katherine started it out with a spring break trip down to Mississippi to help with Katrina recovery. She's third from the right in the picture at left, in the center of everything as it were. This one was taken after driving all night on the way down. The one at right shows some of the devastation they saw. She was in Peru when the hurricane hit, and I tried to explain the magnitude of the disaster by long distance but it was a little hard to do. The trip was an eye-opener and she was happy to be of some help.

Katherine spent most of the summer in Mexico, working on a research project involving interviewing people from all levels of society in the city of Merida about their housing conditions and the formal and informal economic networks of the city. She was able to get some research experience working with professors from geography and anthropology departments and utilizing her Spanish skills.

It wasn't all work, though. They did get to some archaeological sites such as Chichen Itza, which included the Mayan pyramid shown at right, and to some natural wonders as well, such as the cenote (sinkhole connecting to underground rivers) at left. Katherine is graduating next year, and is considering a number of job possibilities (Her degree is in Human Rights Studies with minors in Spanish and Linguistics.)

Matt had a good freshman year at Fitchburg State College, but decided to transfer to Stony Brook University on Long Island and study physics this year. He's enjoying Stony Brook and although he's much further away we can stay in touch via email and cell phone.

Laura went south in the winter to visit her dad in Florida and her sister Sally in Georgia as she often does. This time she went with her other sister Beth from Bridgewater, MA. At right the three of them are in Georgia on a picturesque riverwalk. Left to right are Laura, Sally, and Beth.

We went to the Cape in July with the extended family, as usual. Tim's parents were with us, enjoying the beach at left. We didn't take a lot of pictures of everyone this year, but at right are Laura and her two sisters-in-law, Anna and Amy, representing the rest of the family units and demonstrating how tough a life it is there at the beachfront cottages!

Laura and Tim took another summer vacation for a week to New Hampshire, staying with some good friends. We did some hiking around the woods, as shown in the picture at lower left, as well as played some tennis and generally took it easy.

Laura was looking for contract work at the start of the year, and then went back to work at the medical instrumentation company where she worked during part of 2005. At the end of the summer, she changed to be a regular employee of a startup located right in the center of Bedford. She's testing technology for mobile devices for Zeetoo. It's a fantastic location, a lot more security, and a lot less vacation! Laura is still teaching the pre-K and K Sunday school and singing in the choir.

Laura had an accident in November in which she was walking in a steep asphalt parking lot and slipped on a twig, breaking bones in her hand and face. She had surgery to put some pins in the hand and to relieve the swelling in her face. [If you want to see how those looked in the X-ray, click on the tiny X-ray image.] Tim had to pick up a few of her usual jobs, so it was a busy fall for both of us.

Tim is still working at Lincoln Lab, singing in the church choir, and helping Laura with Sunday School. He split a few cords of wood and did a little snowboarding early in the year. [This winter it's been rather tropical so snowboarding has not been feasible yet.] Rather than showing any log pictures, take a look at our new stove which burns them. It's easier to deal with and looks better to boot.

Tim, Laura, Katherine, and Matt