Christmas letter '07

A very warm welcome to all of you who are checking in here because you received our Christmas card. Perhaps you've visited us before, back when we were in China to adopt Grace, but you didn't know that I had continued to slog, I mean blog, through the last year as well. Although it's been somewhat sporadic, I have made an effort to record a few events here and there and am now taking a stab at distilling our lives from 2007 down into one post. If you're super ambitious, you can scroll back through the past posts and feel confident in your Hojnacki trivia knowledge. Or you can just read this letter and hope that there is no pop quiz. Either way we'd love to hear back from you in the comment section at the bottom. It's always fun to see who is checking up on us.

Last Christmas was pretty quiet since Grace was still recovering from her cleft palate surgery. She had been on a strict liquid diet for three weeks and was able to have her first taste of stage-one baby food on Christmas day, which was definitely her favorite present. Once she recovered from that procedure we were able to start with speech therapy which is ongoing and is finally beginning to show some results. Grace turned three on Dec. 1st, and is just now beginning to use words on a regular basis to communicate. She did learn quite a few signs along the way and was using those before she was talking. Now that the words have taken over, the signs have fallen by the wayside, but they were extremely helpful in keeping everyone's frustration levels in check as she learned.

Aside from her speech struggles, Grace has adapted unbelievably well to her new life with us here. She is a very resilient, happy, independent girl. Imitating her big sisters is her favorite pass-time and she is extremely determined to do everything by herself. She puts on all of her own clothes (often backwards, but usually matching) and sometimes I can hear her in her room grunting and almost crying as she puts everything on, but once she gets it (which she always does) she comes running out to show us and is so proud. The Hojnacki household is also very happy to be diaper free for the first time in seven years.

Sophie and Lily are both in school; Sophie all day in first grade, and Lily half-days for "Young 5's." Sophie loves school and is lucky to have had the same great teacher for Kindergarten and First Grade. She leads a pretty charmed life as her two best friends (twins) moved in down the street this summer and are in her class at school. Lily is getting ready for Kindergarten in her pre-K class, but still much prefers her unstructured, imaginary play time. Although we no longer have a dog, there is a water bowl on the floor of our kitchen for "Cindy," the cat which Lily pretends to be on a regular basis.

All three of the girls are typical sisters in that they careen wildly from idyllic, loving, giggling playtime to all-out warfare complete with screaming and crying all in the blink of an eye. It's sort of like the old adage about the weather; if you don't like the kids' behavior, just wait a while, 'cause it'll change.

Dave has faced the distinct challenge of surviving a corporate takeover/bank merger this year. LaSalle Bank, which was formerly owned by the Dutch Bank, ABN Amro, was sold as a pawn in ABN's takeover battle to Bank of America. So Dave now works for "B of A" (as you must call it, if you're in the know) and has been one of the lucky ones to have kept their jobs this Christmas season. While it hasn't been an easy transition and will continue to present challenges while everyone figures out an entirely new operating system, we both are extremely thankful that that is the only thing we have to worry about.

I have taken on a new role this year as a basketball coach in our school district. I coached the eighth grade girls team in the Fall and am currently coaching the girl's JV team at the high school. It's made for a busy schedule for the family, but we have found a wonderful babysitter who is holding down the fort in my absence. I've really enjoyed getting out a bit and having something to wrap my brain around other than "what are we gonna do today?" and "What's for dinner?" Sophie and Lily get to come to a lot of the games and practices and adore the "big girls" on the teams. The 8th graders were a very good group with lots of talent and even better attitudes. We ended the season at 10-2 and I can't wait for them to get up to the high school next year and start contributing to the program right away. The JV squad has been in a state of flux since our leading scorer was moved up to Varsity and our starting center injured her back. But several other players, including two Freshmen who have moved up, have stepped in and we just got our first win in the new configuration tonight. We are currently 3-4.

As a family we took our first big camping trip this summer, renting a pop-up camper and driving out East to the Maine coastline. Our former exchange student, Barbara, from Germany, joined us for a good part of the summer, including our trip and will therefore probably put off having children for quite some time. We were happy to have her along.

Those were our big highlights this year. You may now consider yourself a semi-pro in Hojnacki trivia. If you'd like to extend the breadth of your knowledge, you may continue to browse the other entries from this year. We all wish you a happy and healthy 2008; may you survive this election year unscathed and unjaded and continue to appreciate all that is wonderful and wondrous in your life.

can my competition-mongering self be saved?

So I've got all these other blogs that I keep track of, mostly of other moms with some semblance of a relationship to my own situation, and I think that at times it is a very bad and dirty habit that I need to quit. There are several types; one is the rubbernecking, car-crash variety that I cannot drag myself away from because these people put each and every tiny element of their lives up there and, let's be honest, even if someone relatively smart did that, we could find things to be snide about and laugh at. But when it's a more mundane, white-bread suburban type who thinks they've got everything figured out and that we should all hear about it...I mean come on! Call the ambulance and alert the personal injury attorney 'cause that's just way too entertaining.

Also there is the flip side, which is the super-cool mother with the job I want, who writes like she's already been published in the New Yorker, who just so happens to have had her blog discovered and turned into a book, who just drops in little tidbits about her four-year-old beginning to read and all the super-cool, non-princess worshipping things she does, and I have to admit I'M JEALOUS!!! The mom has this uncanny ability to brag about her child without ever coming off as bragging so I must study her some more in order to effectively carry out the same slight of hand.

So all that being said, I am going to proced to shamelessly brag. Feel free to stop reading if you are not a close friend or Grandparent. If you are one of these, please leave a comment about our profoundly amazing children, as it just completes the whole self-gratification circle.

First the backstory: Sophie's big weakpoint so far in first grade has been her hand writing. Her teacher has been wonderful about first pumping us up with all of the talk about the deep content of her writing and her contributions to class discussions (first grade style!) The phrase she used, which I keep going back to, is that, "Sophie really gets it." Unfortunately her handwriting can be so illegible that nobody has any idea what she's getting. Her teacher (again, can't say this enough, love her) is careful not to emphasisze the handwriting so much that we squash her boundless enthusiasm for writing, and to some extent believes that she is so ambitious in her storytelling that she can't get everything out of her head and down on paper fast enough.

So with the thought that she could use some practice, we set her up with a lap board and some lined paper and asked her to write us some letters at night before she fell asleep. She chose to write poems. Each night she writes between four and five of them and each one takes her about ten minutes to write and illustrate. So now, without further ado, I present for your reading pleasure a poem by Sophie: (all spelling and punctuation in the original)

To Mom
From Sophie

a bowom by Sophie Hojnacki.

I was bon in Shcocol.
Lily was bon in Mishcan.
Grace was bon in cina.
You and Dad wr bon in indeino.
But naw we ol lef in the sam haws.
and that is ol that matrs.

In case you didn't quite get all of that, it goes like this:

a poem by Sophie Hojnacki

I was born in Chicago
Lily was born in Michigan
Grace was born in China.
You and Dad were born in Indiana.
But now we all live in the same house.
and that is all that matters.

Its companion poem from the same night is as follows:

to Mom

I am 7 ues old.
Lily is 4 1/2 ues old.
Grace is 3 ues old.
Dad is in the 20es
you are in the 30es.
We ol are dofrit acis,
But we ol liof togothr
and that is ol that matres

Translation:
I am 7 years old
Lily is 4 and a half years old.
Dad is in his 20's (hilarious!)
You are in your 30's.
We all are different ages,
but we all live together
and that is all that matters.

That is just a taste of the literary wonders that await us every night. As you can see, there is a distinct pattern and the subject matter is most always family related, but hey, they say to write about what you know. I'll leave you today with a few more deep thoughts by Sophie

To Mom
crismos sprcs

what a spris win I oping up my iac
to see ol of the prucis.
we sit togathr.
we plue games togathr
and that day is a spris for Grace

Christmas surprise

What a surprise when I open up my eyes
to see all of the presents.
we sit together.
we play games together
and that day is a surprise for Grace.

ocis are frooets. just like bnanas.
cade cas are a swet. just like cookes.
cracrs are populr. just like froot snacs.
foods are got for you.

oranges are fruits just like bananas
candy canes are a sweet just like cookies
crackers are popular just like fruit snacks
foods are good for you