MERRY CHRISTMAS!

December 2008


Dear Friends and Family,

Merry Christmas! We thought we would just a share some of our favorite things that happened this past year.

Beth started preschool. She goes twice a week and she loves to learn, be with her teacher, and especially the playground! JJ continued his exciting forays into the educational system. Each night Mom and Dad try to drag out of him any details of his day, generally without much success - but he always remembers what kind of milk he had for lunch! For Halloween, JJ got to be his favorite super-hero - which is Spiderman, no matter how many times Dad tells him Superman is better - while Beth chose Princess Aurora (Sleeping Beauty).

Last month, for a special treat, we stayed at a condo in Heber and took the kids on the Heber Valley Railroad - even though it only went about 15 miles an hour, you would have thought our kids were in heaven.

DeDe has had a really busy year, adding various new responsibilities in the fast-growing community of Digital Scrapbooking - in addition to hosting a number of regular online scrapbooking activities known as "crops", she also launched a new blog, attended the Scrap Girls Digital Scrap Link retreat at Fort Douglas, and illustrated a children's book titled, Princess Secrets (available for purchase at her blog, http://designzbydede.blogspot.com). Her distinctive visual style has really built a following, and we're all so pleased at her continued success.

Our favorite family sport, Football, has been a series of ups-and-downs this year. Joey and DeDe got to go to a Utah Utes football game in-person (thanks to DeDe's brother Cody and his wife for all the babysitting!), and the Utes had a perfect 12-0 record, becoming the first ever team to "bust" the BCS rankings twice. Meanwhile, the Indianapolis Colts got off to rough start, and are now faced with having to "win-win-win" in order to retain their hopes of a post-season berth as an AFC Wildcard team. On the plus side, last time they were doing this well on Defense, they won a Superbowl - perpetual hope is what makes us fans, right!?

In work-related news, Joey finally finished the project Novell hired him for almost 5 years ago, after having it repeatedly pushed to the "back burner". The release resulted in - among other things - a trip to Dublin to present the new web-based tool to the European team. He tried many new (and strange) foods, was introduced to many bizarre rituals and cultures, and was nearly arrested for having the wrong kind of bus ticket! Well, at least it was a short trip - he should be back before any of you even get this letter, wiser and world-weary.


Well, that's all from the Smith's for 2008 - we hope everyone there is safe and well, and wish you all a happy and healthy 2009!

Love,

Joey, DeDe, JJ, & Beth Smith


I want to thank each and every one of you for reading my blog and for being such great support to me! I love to hear when you enjoy my products and I love all of you for making designing such a joy for me!

I wish you all a VERY VERY VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS and a joyful HOLIDAY SEASON! I hope each one of you feels the REASON FOR THE SEASON and the true magic and spirit of Christmas! I hope you have lots of family time and that your season is the best ever!

Love you all! Merry Christmas!