Christmas 2010

What a year! We have seen how God has been with us through the great times and the very sad times.

After staying very busy with learning a lot about low income housing and community development, Al took a role as executive director with a non-profit that helps entrepreneurs start up a business. (Economic Growth Business Incubator http://www.egbi.org/). It's a small non-profit with a lot of potential. He is also on the board of directors for some non-profits in town that are targeting the underserved areas of the community and schools. He stays very busy.

We have helped again this year with putting on dinners at the schools here in the neighborhood in order to get parents to come to the school for special events. We wanted to get the school moms involved so we planned a tamale making party that took the entire day. The ladies were excited to help out. Judy now knows some more of the moms of the kids and also knows how much lard goes into tamales. Wow! We have had the 2nd annual dinner at our home for National Night Out and were so pleased with this year’s turn out. We have such a mix of people on our street and it was great seeing everyone having a good time.

Judy has also been doing crafts with a variety of groups. She did a few classes in the government assisted living complex in East Austin , also a few with the teen moms at the high school and with the kids in the neighborhood as a way to keep the kids busy while the parents have a meeting. The biggest thing was preparing for Hope Fest which has taken place the last 5 years at Reagan high school in the neighborhood. The woman who had headed up the crafts area was not able to do it this year so Judy took that on for about 200-300 kids. Judy thought everyone was having fun until one little girl actually fell asleep while doing the craft. She now has a better idea of what to do and what not to do next year. She also helps out at the nearby elementary school library.

Our community group has “adopted” a high school class, AVID (Advancement Via Individual Determination) which helps those kids who may not be thinking about college, get more prepared for college. We have put on our 2nd annual dinner for them and then do crafts and games. We also took them to the movies. They are great kids.

We have also expanded our involvement with helping with low income housing by building some small homes in the neighborhood for people who would probably have a hard time finding housing. They should be finished the start of the New Year.

We continue to be involved at church. Judy does her Bible storytelling and Al helps with the offering.

If you have time and interest you can look up all the sites below to see pictures of the grandkids and read about what they are up to. Britt and Greg are still in NC, but Greg is now the director for a Christian camp in north Raleigh called New Life Camp.

Justin and Sally are in Austin. Justin heads up the “For the City Network” (http://www.forthecity.org/) which has come about through our church. It hosts a center that houses other non-profits in town that target the needy, orphans/foster kids and their families.

Mark and Alli are in Dallas as she continues with her medical training at Southwestern and Mark is working at a graphic design company called “Element X Creative.” We have travelled to North Carolina a few times (one because Britt had her tonsils out) and they have come here. The picture was taken at Camp John Marc’s 20th anniversary; all but Sally had worked there.

We got to go to Tucson to see Al’s family and then up to Phoenix for a wedding of the son of Judy’s good friend, Kelly and so got to spend time with her wonderful college friends. It was great to see you guys!

The sad news of the year was the death of Judy's Dad, who would have been 90 this year. He had been in poor health. She got to see him before he died. A few months later her Uncle Marshall died. He was one of the nicest men you'd ever know and the two of them were quite a pair of great men. We wish you all could have known them. Also, our friend, Cliff Tyrance, (Justin’s AAU basketball coach) died suddenly of a heart attack. For a few years we spent a lot of time together as an extended family and Cliff was a wonderful role model for those young boys. We’d like to send our love, sympathy and prayers out to his family and friends.

For news on the kids and their families:

http://gregandbrittany.blogspot.com/, greg@newlifecamp.com , http://marknlopez.com/, http://elementxcreative.com/, http://marknlopez.blogspot.com/, http://alliandmark.blogspot.com/, http://salandj.blogspot.com/, http://austinstone.org/, (this is our church’s web site and has links to some wonderful sermons especially the one titled, “History of Redemption.” It was made into an illustrated book.).

Thanks for taking time to read this. We hope you have a meaningful Christmas as Luke 2:11 states "For unto you is born this day in the city of David a savior, which is Christ the Lord." Happy New Year.

We love you. Al and Judy