Merry Christmas!
God is good! We hope this Advent season finds you rejoicing in the goodness of the Lord and resting faithfully in the grace and peace of King Jesus. One of the joys of this season is receiving the pictures and cards that are arriving almost daily and catching up on the lives of those we love. As we reflect on the many good things we have received from the Lord this year, we too felt it good to share some with you. We hope to see each of you soon and share the joy of your fellowship, but until then, here’s a little update on life in the Hayes household.
Doug and Amy will celebrate their 10th wedding anniversary in 2009. We have enjoyed a feast of love, fellowship and blessing these past ten years and look forward to celebrating together God’s goodness in working His mysterious will to bring us together. We love living in Portland and are enjoying our home on Strawberry Lane, close to church and family. We enjoying working in our yard together and continuing to transform it into a more garden-like setting. One of our favorite Portland “dates” is visiting the many McMenamins inns and restaurants and this past February we enjoyed a weekend at the McMenamins in Bend with Doug’s sister LeAnn and her husband Mitch. Our family also joined the Wilson family at the coast this summer for a wonderful week vacationing together.
Doug is still faithfully serving as elder at RCC and has just finished his first year as a Strategic Account Manager for a software company called GTS. God has richly blessed him in his work and in his first full year at GTS he has become their top salesman. Doug has had not only success but an enjoyable work environment at GTS and we are grateful God brought him to this situation. Doug has also, in the last couple of years, rediscovered fishing and awakened a fervent love for the John Day River and small-mouth bass! He and his fishing buddy, Chris Wilson, head out every chance they get all summer to catch 60-100 bass in a 10 hour day of fishing bliss. Usually, Amy or one or more of the kids join the fun. You can find pictures of these expeditions on Doug’s other new hobby, his blog at http://biblio-wonk.com/.
As for me (Amy), I continue to keep busy with teaching, cooking, gardening, decorating and all the other joys of keeping home that I love so much. With mostly having only Grace and Adam at home these days, I find myself with more time on my hands. So, to keep busy and productive, I have started a small elementary class at home called Zera Hall. I currently teach three siblings from a RCC family and am working on adding a couple of more students in the coming year. A few of the ladies from church and I are using a unique educational program which focuses the school year on the church calendar and the life of Christ. This has led me into year-round schooling which I am really enjoying, especially as it gives me extra time off during this busy holiday season! I also joined a book club at church and started another of my own for young ladies. The highlight of 2008 for me was surprising Grace for her 16th birthday and taking her to New York City for 5 days. The two of us had a marvelous time and fell in love with the big city. Seeing New York is one of those things on my life-to-do-list and it was a perfect trip. Traveling could definitely become a happy hobby for me!
One of the bigger events in the Hayes family this year was helping David (23) and Kathy remodel and move into their first house! They bought their charming 100 year old Victorian farmhouse in Oregon City in March and moved in at the beginning of April. They’ve already transformed it into a beautiful home perfectly suited to their sense of style and good taste. David still works for Classic Pianos, and is making a success of himself there rebuilding and selling pianos. Kathy works as a receptionist for Ameriprise Financial when she’s not fixing up the house and hosting their many parties and BBQ’s for RCC young people. They’ve both been such a blessing to us this year by so fully involving themselves in the family and acting as faithful, loving friends and examples to David’s siblings. In November they treated Grace and Adam to an exciting 5 day trip to Disneyland during which the four of them created many happy and often hilarious memories. Every Tuesday night Grace and Adam have “D. K. Tuesdays” over at the new house doing all kinds of fun things. Each Thursday for several years now we’ve had Family Dinner Night and David and Kathy are always there and ready to hear about everyone’s week and bring a word of encouragement or a laugh to lighten us. We are so grateful that in His goodness God has given us faithful friends and encouragers in our grown son and his wife.
In spring Jon (20) was promoted in his job at Evan’s Glass and was transferred to the Seattle office. He moved to Auburn in April and is now living there with his mom. It’s been a big change to have one of the kids farther away than a 5-minute car trip! We know in our minds that the Lord’s work may take our children many places and this is just another part of having a family that is growing up and spreading out, but it doesn’t mean our hearts are glad to see them go. Since moving, he has changed companies but still works doing outside sales. After barely beginning to adjust our hearts and minds to this big move, we were surprised again with the news that over the summer Jon met a young woman and in October they were engaged! His fiancée is a very sweet young lady named Michelle Clark who lives in Auburn and attends church with Jon. We are getting to know her more and more and had a wonderful weekend visiting with the two of them and their puppy, Peanut, when we had our annual Hayes Christmas Tree outing. They are growing together in the Lord and look forward to a wedding sometime in the next year. We have learned this year that God’s goodness is at work in our children, even when we have to let them move beyond our day-to-day influence.
Since Ben (20) lost his roomy when Jon moved north, we invited him to move back home to save money and be with the family. So, we’ve gone from a household of six to four to five over the past couple of years! Adjusting to being a family of four when the twins first got their own apartment was particularly hard on Grace and Adam so they were glad to have a big brother back. We really don’t see much of him, though, as he is busy working successfully doing outside sales for Evans Glass. He made it on one of the John Day fishing trips this summer and we had a fun time fellowshipping with him on the river and enjoying the beauties of God’s good creation. Ben is always a hoot to have around and we spent many fun evenings listening to his story-telling around our backyard fire-pit last summer.
2008 was a big year for Grace as she turned 16 and hit the road! She got her license shortly after her big 16th birthday party and surprise trip and has proven a reliable driver and handy errand girl. She’s keeps pretty busy these days between her junior year school-work and her job as a courtesy clerk at Fred Meyer’s. She is well loved at her work for her cheerfulness and willingness to work hard and is a joy to have at home for the same reasons. We have rejoiced to see her grow in strength of character, depth of knowledge of God and faith in Christ this year. She has a quick mind and brings intelligent, piercing questions to the table as she grows in her personal knowledge of what she believes and why. What a joy it is to see young people take their spiritual walk beyond what you are teaching to seek out better understanding for themselves! A highlight of her fall school work was spending two weeks with our friends the Arnolds studying education and teaching with Lorna. During this time she was able to renew her friendship with Tori and Rosie Arnold and they became quite close. We hope along with her that they continue this in future visits!
School has been the highlight of Adam’s (13) year as well. He officially “graduated” from home-schooling this year as we enrolled him in Veritas School in Newberg. He loves school, gets straight A’s and is having many fun and challenging new experiences in the 8th grade class. This spring he’s looking forward to joining his class in a trip to Washington, D.C. for a week. In preparation for Veritas, Adam spent 3 weeks of his summer cramming 5 years of Latin into his brain. He’s seems to have taken right to it, though, and is thoroughly enjoying explaining to the rest of us dummies the Latin roots of our daily speech. J The long drive to Newberg everyday has been helped by carpool and by Doug being able to get off work at just the right time to pick Adam up each day. Doug has very much enjoyed seeing Adam grow not only in knowledge, but in maturity through this new experience and they have had many good conversations about the Word, wisdom and godliness along with school, knowledge and friends on the trips home. God has been so good as to bless us with the ability to give Adam this privilege and we are pleased with his grateful spirit and good use he is making of it.
God has continually revealed His goodness to us in both the hard providences of life in a fallen world and the abundant blessings of living in Christ’s kingdom. Psalm 107 comes to mind, “Oh, that men would give thanks to the LORD for His goodness, and for His wonderful works to the children of men! For He satisfies the longing soul, and fills the hungry soul with goodness.” We pray that each of you, our beloved friends and family, find your souls filled with the goodness of the Lord this Christmas time!
Sincerely,
Doug, Amy, David, Kathy, Jon, Ben, Grace & Adam Hayes
Tags: Christmas, Christmas Letter, Christmas Tree, Family Picture
