Hello 2026! Glimpse back at 2025

Hello 2026!

Overall, 2025 was a touch more turbulent than we would have liked, with work being a big reason why—but we ended the year still employed, so that’s something. Elise started the year by receiving an ADHD diagnosis, which definitely helped explain some of her challenges. Navigating next steps has been challenging at times, but we are committed to figuring out how best to support Elise so her strengths can shine while we find ways to manage what’s especially hard for her. I won’t even get into the political climate 2025 brought—just acknowledging that it was frustrating and full of way too many WTF moments.

We had plenty of moments of pride for our kids. Paul has become increasingly conscientious about his responsibilities, especially with schoolwork. He really hit his stride during cross-country season, setting PRs and having fun with his fast friends. Lily made a verbal commitment to play volleyball in college. She also found a close connection with a special someone who brings her a lot of joy—he’s a great guy. We’re proud of Elise for continuing with piano, improving her German, and getting a lot better at ping pong. She’s a fast learner, and it’s fun to watch how quickly things come to her when she’s truly into something. And the way she handled her fourth surgery to address her leg-length discrepancy showed that even though her anxiety can rear its head, she is also incredibly brave.

December 2025 highlights included Oma and Opa celebrating 60 years of marriage (with Lolo surprising them), Paul and Elise turning 14 and reaching Lily in height, playing and cuddling with our new kitten Moose a lot (and Moxie too, when she allows it), Lily spending part of the holidays in Sunriver without us and having a blast, Nate turning 49 and enjoying a little getaway to the Gorge to help usher in a new age, and of course, fondue with Oma and Opa on New Year’s Eve.

It’s pretty amazing how full our December was, considering sickness hit us hard in tag-team style. Poor Elise was extremely sick starting Christmas morning, and Paul’s illness lingered throughout winter break. Still, all that downtime meant our holiday season overflowed with cat cuddles, cat-play entertainment, Gang Beasts, and ping pong. Lots of movies and shows were watched too—Elise and Nate got into Stranger Things, and Paul still loves the quick laughs 30 Rock brings.

By this time next year, Lily will be in the middle of her senior year and close to turning 18. Elise and Paul may very well have their driver’s permits. Nate and I will be tired—but also incredibly proud of our kids and of 20 years of marriage.

Here are just a few highlights from the last month in no particular order

Decorating the Christmas Tree together

Paul playing the Chocolate Game at his 14th Birthday sleepover.  Warms my heart that they requested to keep playing this family game tradition.  Lots of soccer fans in this group of friends (matching jerseys)

Siblings on P & E's 14th Birthday - catching up quickly to Lily in height.

Dinner at Portland City Grill for Oma and Opa's 60th wedding anniversary.  Lolo surprised them!

Elise's 14th Birthday party sleepover. She also requested to play the Chocolate Game.  Go figure.

Get together with good ol' friends before the Holidays kicked into higher gear.

We are so proud of Elise and how well she performed both her piano pieces but also her German Psalm reading.  Proud Oma and Opa too.

Decorating Christmas cookies together

Obligatory Christmas sibling pic

Christmas Eve meal - Moxie was ready for it.

Christmas morning.  Paul woke up feeling unwell but then perked up later in the day. Elise threw up shortly after this picture and was down for the count for several days. Ugh.

Cuddle time with Moose

Treehouse at Skamania to help celebrate Nate's Birthday for a 1-night getaway with Paul and Elise.

Taking down the Christmas tree and decor on New Years Eve

Family tradition of going through our jar of 2025 memories.  

Watching the ball drop East Coast time on full stomachs of cheese fondue

Fall 2025

Before a Christmas tree takes its place in our home today, I wanted to reflect on some of the moments the last couple of months served up.  

With Lily starting to drive more and more, Nate back at work 4 days/week, and Nate and Paul REALLY making it clear how much they love Toyota 4Runners, we bought their dream car.  It's fun to drive but the most fun was seeing just how happy Paul and Nate were and still are about getting to drive it.  Elise, Lily, and I like it a lot too but on a different level.

From an activities perspective, Elise continues to row with Rose City Rowing Club on the Willamette without much complaint and is super active with her Girl Scout troop.  She also really likes taking German lessons and asks me a lot about going to Germany.  I need to make that happen.  Paul had a lot of fun competing with his mountain biking team, running x-country, and continuing his tennis training.  He continues to be a super fun teammate and really enjoyed the improvements he saw this season while competing. 

Lily continues to really love volleyball and it shows with just how dedicated she is to improve.  It's fun to watch her hit the s*it out of the ball and only get smarter on the court.  She puts in the time to get stronger and smarter and her dream to play college volleyball continues to take shape. She made the team she wanted for club season too so her volleyball journey is about to kick into higher gear.  

  

I had a really good start to October visiting family in Chicago. I was spoiled with summer-like weather the whole trip.  Visiting my brother's grave, his new memorial bench overlooking Lake Michigan, hanging with family, and going to a UofM tailgating party with the friends and family that really knew my brother was what I came for. My sister and I laughed and cried so much together on that trip.  

One of Lolo's happy places is going to Cubs games and she took me to the final wildcard playoff game.  I get it!  Super fun atmosphere.  

A family picture on Eric's memorial bench recently installed near their Lake House in Fennville, Michigan at Pier Cove Park.  

I was most distraught at Eric's grave.  I was a bit blindsided by the intensity of emotion I'd feel being there.  It didn't bring a level of comfort like the bench did.  The finality of it, like the biggest punctuation period at the end of a sentence of the last line in a great novel can bring.  I didn't like the feeling one bit and I made the mistake of fighting it instead of leaning into it.

We had fun together exploring Holland Michigan too.  What a fun little town.

Family picture with Opa doing the signature Eric signal.  

A picture of my brother Eric exploring the beach near his bench.  My sister reminded me of this picture and I'm glad I found it.  

Elise underwent her 4th surgery this Fall in relation to her macrodactyly condition.  For the first time, it wasn't an operation on her special foot.  Instead, it was addressing her leg length difference.  The doctor said to Elise that she was putting Elise's growth plates to sleep in the tibia and femur of her longer leg.  This will hopefully give the other leg time to catch up during Elise's expected final growth spurt...and yes hopefully stop at the right time and not overshoot it.  This was a preventative surgery to have a lower chance of future pain related to mobility.  Elise made it clear in "Eric" fashion how she felt about it but overall she did great.  

Birthdays and Thanksgiving is what keeps us the fun kind of busy in November every year.  My Dad turned 88 and my mom turned 84!  I know it's kinda weird to say as a daughter but I'm simply super proud of them and what they do and endure on a daily basis.  It's great to have them back in Portland.    I'm inching closer to 50 too and felt the love.  Sharing a meal with friends of over 25 years was a highlight.

Thanksgiving with my parents and neighbors brought some fun laughs thanks to Elise and the secret dares everyone had.  I had to speak in an accent throughout the meal and Opa had to bring up the penny in conversation every chance he could are some examples.

Opa/Paul - soccer time

From a work perspective, the company I work for, Ampere Computing, was acquired by SoftBank, a Japanese conglomerate, and the deal officially closed this past week.  The CEO has an AI vision that we are now a part of.  I like to think the work we do designing technology for AI solutions will help solve humanity's issues and help empower humanity rather than replace it. From a personal perspective, it was nice to see my 5 years at the company get a bit of a reward and be part of a start-up that reached this point.

Nate's work has been more rocky, as his manager who he's known for 25 years was let go and he now has two new layers of management above him which are unknown quantities.  At least the company is now on more solid footing than it was a year ago.  Hopefully the seeds for a big turnaround have been planted.

Nate and I were spoiled with an overnight at Silcox Hut on Mount Hood celebrating one of our favorite friends turning 50.  Silcox Hut is part of Timberline Lodge, about a 30 minute hike up closer to the peak.  You can see that ski season is definitely not underway with how little snow there is.  Stunning views.  

End of Summer and First Month Back at School 2025

We are about a month into school and in between taking kids where they need to go and working, it's been really nice to enjoy the warm and sunny days Portland has been serving up for a while now.  Sitting on the porch for a little respite or the quick walk to Trader Joes for the umpteenth time in a week actually are some of the lovely moments to help break up the day-to-day.

Summer break 2025 ended with some notable highlights for our memory book.  We celebrated our 10th annual Irving Street Block Party and we went big with a dunk tank this year.  Building connection in our little Irving community is really important to us, it's as simple as that.   Paul competed in his first triathlon and Lily did her first season of beach volleyball.  They both would say they'd do it again.  Nate went to Michigan not once but twice to see his family and took a different kid each time.  Paul got the special treat (he was the only one interested) to get to watch a Michigan football game in the Big House.  

Lily definitely had quite a summer with passing her driver's test, being officially done with Invisalign after 2 years, and hiking and exploring all over Washington and Oregon with her boyfriend.  

My sister flew out to surprise the kids at the start of school.  This time she successfully surprised each of them separately.  You'd think they'd catch on by now with how often she comes but nope, the fun reveals continue.

8th grade for the twins and Lily's junior year are almost a month in now.  Lily is very busy with school volleyball season.  She is really proud to be captain this year and spends a lot of time giving her best to the team on and off the court.  Paul is busy competing on his mountain biking team taking up most weekends racing around the state.  He is also enjoying x-country season with friends.  Elise is back to rowing, piano, German, and Girls Scouts.  We just scheduled her next surgery for 11/13 to address her leg length discrepancy with the hopes that it'll be a preventative aid in minimizing lower back pain and hip pain when she's older.  She is interested in doing the surgery and we are supportive.  This means she'll have 2 more surgeries on top of the 3 foot surgeries she's already had.  That's a lot of surgeries for a 13 year old.  

In terms of growth, Lily still grew an inch the first part of this year as a 16 year old and seems to be topping off at 5'10".  Paul is 5'8'' and growing quite quickly.  His voice hasn't changed yet and I'm trying to record his voice a bit more these days because that deeper voice is coming soon.  Elise is 5'7'' and her x-ray in preparation for surgery showed very open growth plates which means she will probably still grow 3-4 inches.  I remember thinking back in the day that if I have girls, I hope they aren't as tall as me because I had a hard time.  I got my wish: I just didn't calculate on having a daughter obsessed with being the best attacker there is on the volleyball court.  She'd love my height.  Funny how things work out.  Paul is my only hope for surpassing me.  We shall see.

Here are a few more moments from the last couple of months.  The world outside of our family continues to feel uneasy, tense, and divided. It sucks.  I miss hearing eloquent, thoughtful, empathetic, and unifying words from our leaders during times of crisis.

10th Annual Irving Street Block Party

Our block party co-hosts Ken and Cari specializing in grilling and pool setup. They make it all extra fun.

Paul's triathlon at Hagg Lake.  Thanks to the Ushers for hosting the Xterra race.

                    Paul getting ready for a bike race.  There are a lot of youth in this league (hundreds), more than I anticipated.

Lily at Seaside for a beach volleyball tournament

Elise at Girl Scouts Wow Camp - Counselor in Training week.

                                                           Visiting Nate's parents in Michigan.

Big House with Grandpa

                                Lolo practicing her surprise for Elise.  Paul joined in on the fun.

1st day of 8th grade and 11th grade. Paul, Elise, Lily

Lily just passed her driver's test so had to celebrate.  She doesn't have her actual license yet but soon.

School photos.  Paul cracks me up because his looks exactly the same as last year - same shirt too.

Enjoying sitting in the Timbers Army for a game

                                                    This just makes a Momma's heart smile