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| Zachary's Letter I am 6 this year. I am in Kindergarten. I like my friends best in school. I like to go on trips. We went to Disney World and Universal Studios this year. My favorite rides were the roller coasters. We went to Big Cedar Lodge. I liked the mini golf, swimming and tubing with my friend Stevan the best. We went to Horn Creek family camp. I have tons of things I liked about this place. Some are rock wall climbing, Western night - I like this because I get Root Beer in a bottle, the water slide and hanging out with my cousins and family. I started piano lessons this year. I am learning to read. I took tennis lessons all summer long. I am getting pretty good. I started basketball this year. I like to play with my friends, ride my bike, scooter and skateboard. We get to spend the summer swimming at my grandparent's pool. I like to go rock climbing at the YMCA. I like to do the hard runs. I am better than my mom. We talked mom and dad into getting a dog. Her name is Katie. I like to play ball and pet her. Zachary |
| Hayden's Letter Hi this is Hayden, I own this part of the letter. My 3rd grade year was a lot of fun I had Mrs.Griffin at Maize Elemantary School. My 4th grade year is still in progress I am getting good grades. I love reading. One of my favorite trips was going skiing last year. I went down some hard blue slopes with mogles and a lot of tree bashing and even some blacks. Some other great trips was going to Universal Studios, Disney World Sea World and Kennedy Space Center. At Universal I had an awsome first time there I loved the ride named Poppeye. I got drenched and I forgot to put my shoes in the dry shoe compartment instead they got drenched right along with me. Sea world was a blast the seals were very funny. We fed some very very greedy seal lions. Kennedy Space Center was a very fun educational trip. We took a close up tour and unfortunately the shuttle Clumbia had just crashed so we didnt get to see everything we were suposed to. I also saw an actual Saturn 5 rocket. Disney World was fun too. I went to Space Moutain and water ride that was a tour sort of ride and there were boats that you rode around on and I got to drive a boat. My Interests are building with legos and playing Need 4 Speed Hot Pursuit 2 this is a gamecube game. I like riding my bike and talking to my friends on Instant Messengager known as IM. My favorite sports are tennis and soccer. The thing I am looking forward to is my electric guitar that I hope to play in jazz band with. I am thankful for my family and all the things we have. Hayden |
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Well, 2003 was no different from many years at the Woods house. We traveled quite a bit this year, as usual, and had great fun. Our Trips In early January, Sherri and I dashed off to Las Vegas with our good friends Bryan and Darcie Green to see the sights. We saw the "O" Show (highly recommended) and had a great time on our first trip to 'Vegas. What a crazy town. In February, I attended a Computer Security Seminar in Orlando and dragged the family (kicking and screaming!) to Florida with me. After my 2-day event ended we toured NASA and went to Disney World. While I was in the Seminar (learning tips and tricks of computer hacking) the kids and Sherri went to Sea World and Universal Studios. It was an unplanned vacation that made for a fantastic February in Florida. In early June, we vacationed with our good friends the Ellingtons at Big Cedar Lodge on Table Rock Lake in Missouri and had a wonderful time boating, tubing, fishing, swimming and otherwise relaxing. We dashed off to Colorado in late July for our now annual trip to Horn Creek Camp, stopping by Frisco, Colorado for a bit of biking by Dillon Lake. We met my folks there (the timing worked perfectly) as Dad was making his way on his bicycle from the Oregon coast back to Kansas. I got to ride Hoosier Pass with him as a special father/son treat. Dad has now completed both a complete Mexico/tip of Texas to Canada ride and an Atlantic to Pacific Ocean ride (He rode from both coasts inward rather than one complete ride across. Each half took basically one month.). He is an amazing rider. Mom is also amazing as she sags for him and provides wonderful logistic support. Marathons In early August I got the wild idea that I was running so much on a daily basis that I should probably look into running a marathon. It turns out the running I was doing was somewhat similar to the early/mid weeks of some official marathon training schedules and I set my sights on running the Wichita Marathon in October. I completed the Wichita Marathon in 4:20, was happy I finished but somewhat disappointed with my time. I then got the next crazy idea that while I was in shape I should try to better my time. On December 14, I completed the Dallas White Rock Marathon in a somewhat more acceptable 3:57 so now I feel like I can wait a few months before the next one. I'm sure my body appreciates the breather. I had purchased a new pair of shoes in early August and when I retired them in mid-November I had put just over 400 miles on them. They still looked new on top but the soles were worn through in several places. No wonder my feet had started to hurt! The Kids Hayden is now in the 4th grade and, as in past years, is doing very well in school. This past spring he played soccer and then devoted much of the summer and fall to tennis. He takes lessons several times a week and plays in a kid league. Hayden attended Camp Mennoscah in June, was a bit homesick, but had a great time otherwise. This winter he is playing indoor soccer and loving it. Hayden has now been taking piano for about 2 1/2 years and really enjoys it. Zachary is a Kindergartener this year. He loves school, is working on math and reading skills and is an absolute sponge for knowledge. He challenges himself by attempting (and sometimes completing!) the sections of Hayden's math that Hayden finds very easy. It is amazing what math he can actually do as a 5/6 year old. Zach also played tennis this year, taking lessons several times a week and is involved in basketball this winter. He has started taking piano lessons already and is doing very well. Sherri Sherri has really trimmed down the work schedule these last 6 months and will continue to slowly minimize work and maximize time with the kids in school. She has been helping nearly every day in Haydens classroom doing whatever his teacher needs in the way of tutoring, listening to reading groups and interacting. As always she has outdone herself this year planning the most awesome vacations and short trips and keeping the house running with amazing ease and efficiency. She certainly reduces my stress level greatly as she handles so much that I never have to think about. R.B. I'm just having a great time with the family, running a ton, trying to keep in shape to keep the weight off and loving life right now. My job goes well. I will have been with Metal-Fab for 6 years in mid-January and the position keeps me learning new technologies, integrating them into the business and handling the usual management duties. I barely get enough time to play with the kids, go on bike rides or other activities but I can't imagine where I would find more time. Life, as many of you know, just gets very busy at this age (almost 40!) and there is always the desire to squeeze more things in. As always we hope life is being good to you and the Lord continues to bless you as he has for us. Keep us in your prayers and we will do the same for you. Thanks for visiting our web site and on-line Christmas Letter this year. As always, it is fun to put together, though there is never enough time to keep the site updated throughout the year like we always think we will. By the way, I listened to many of your comments this past year about the use of Flash vs. other methods of deploying the annual letter. Most of the complaints I heard were related to timing, speed and the inability to actually look at the photos on your own time schedule. That has all been changed this year. I decided to power the letter with a database this year, allowing you to flip through captioned pictures at your own speed but putting more smarts behind the site. It is less creative and cute than past years but more functional and actually required about equal time to implement. I may try to add more creative features next year now that the foundation has been laid, we'll see. Survey I've included a small survey in the Guest Book signing to help me understand the internet setups you all have a bit better so please don't skip the Guest Book this year. At the very least, do the survey and put in your name and e-mail address. We love the comments, what ever they are, and signing lets us know you got our e-mail saying it was finally ready (otherwise, we stress about whether to somehow contact you in other ways). R.B., Sherri, Hayden and Zachary P.S. If if you noticed our letter missing apostrophes and other punctuation I apologize. I wrote the letter in Microsoft Word and exported it out. The export dropped a whole bunch of punctuation for some reason and it has been a royal pain to reread the letter over and over to find them all. |
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