We have never written a holiday letter, but the blog makes this task a bit easier.  Christmas sort of feels like Thanksgiving because we find ourselves at the end of another year feeling grateful for our health, family and friends.

The Astalos family highlight has to be mom and dad’s (Ron and Kimiko) 50th wedding anniversary.  It’s officially on Dec. 28 but all the kids decided to make it to Port Huron, Michigan to celebrate the week before Thanksgiving.  We realized it had been 17 years since all seven of us had been together.  It was a great reunion.

Keana is in 6th grade and enjoys art, theatre and music.  She’ll audition for her 12th production in January (the school musical) and  is currently in her second year of piano lessons.

Cayman is an active 2nd grader.  He is proud to tell you he reads at a 4th grade level.  He started guitar lessons but spends far more time on Guitar Hero than the expensive electric guitar we bought him.  He plays all sports, and dad coached his basketball and flag football teams this year which Cayman thoroughly enjoyed.  Cayman took first place in his very first triathlon this summer…a chip off the ol’ block.

Cayman is “riding the bull” in the front of the boat, Keana has her eyes shut tight on the far right side of the boat, Sheryl is getting blasted with whitewater next to Cayman, Lynn is digging in behind Sheryl, and our Japanese exchange student Miwa is enjoying the ride in the back of the boat.

Following a weekend rafting trip down the South Fork of the American River, we spent two weeks in Maui in August at our family condo in Napili Village.  It’s nothing fancy, but we’ve been going there for 11 years now and we all love it in Maui…how can you not?

Sheryl has enjoyed 11 years of being a full-time mom and has a part-time interior design business with her mother.  In February, they completed the design of a 10-room hotel in Santa Cruz, CA called Bella Notte, The Inn at East Cliff.  It was a fun challenge.  She also enjoys volunteering at school and will be heading up set design for the school musical for the third time.

Lynn has been at Cisco for six years, managing global communications for their professional services business.  He also owns a boutique marketing agency and does marketing consulting on the side.  He finds a twisted pleasure in competing in Olympic and half ironman triathlons, ultra marathons, and any event that includes the swim, bike or run.  You can read more about it at www.iswimbikerun.wordpress.com including his big event for 2009–a 125-mile run over 6 days across the Rocky Mountains.

Merry Christmas to everyone!  Wishing you all a healthy and prosperous 2009!

Love,

Lynn, Sheryl, Keana and Cayman

Hey, Family,

Mike and I wish you all a happy Christmas and a prosperous new year.  You can always see the latest goings on with us by checking out carltonartfactory.blogspot.com

Greetings from Colorado!

I can’t believe I’m writing this letter again so soon. It seems like it was just a month or so ago that I wrote last year’s letter. I guess that means we’ve been busy all year (or at least I have been busy!)

<!–[if !vml]–><!–[endif]–>This year we discovered geocaching. While we had heard about it before, we hadn’t done it. Talk about fun! For those that don’t know what geo-caching is, it’s a high tech treasure hunt. People hide containers with trinkets & a log book in them. Then all they give you is the GPS coordinates to find it. So you have to use your GPS receiver and maps to figure out how to get there – sign the log and exchange a trinket. The boys think it’s GREAT to find a treasure (and Robert and I enjoy the hiking to get to it). It has taken us on lots of fun hikes that we probably wouldn’t have known about otherwise.

Our big trip this summer was to the Black Hills of South Dakota (cool caves & Mt. Rushmore) and Grand Teton’s National Park (where we met up with Coleen’s sister & family and Coleen’s Mom). We camped in our trailers and enjoyed hiking (and geocaching), campfires, ice cream, beer and margaritas (no healthy eating happening here!)

The main effort for Coleen this year was the new elementary schools in our town (replacing 3 old with 2 new). She’s been on the committee working the effort for a year and a half. This fall it was time to get a $12M bond passed by voters (in the midst of a shaky economy). So she was constantly at a meeting, preparing for a meeting, giving presentations, walking door-to-door and doing anything else that was needed to campaign for the bond. It passed by a narrow 300 vote margin – so her hard work definitely did make a difference.

Robert is still at Adams State College teaching physics and math. The BIG news is that he’s officially been recommended for tenure. There are still a few rubber stamp approvals that have to happen before it’s official, but that should bring no surprises. In addition, the physics professor who runs the observatory and teaches astronomy is retiring. So Robert is looking forward to expanding his teaching into that area as well. This last year he got to teach a whole bunch of cool advanced level classes, so he’s been quite happy. When he’s not teaching he’s flying – his flight simulator that is. He now has 5 computers running 5 wrap-around screens, with rudder pedals, throttle quadrant, yoke, and a radio stack. So it’s almost like the real thing (but not as dangerous!)

Justin started 2^nd grade this year. His class is a mixed age 2^nd/3^rd grade class which he enjoys as he has the 3^rd graders to keep up with. Over the year he played basketball, volleyball, baseball and is back to basketball again. However, his passion is tetherball! It’s the only thing he plays on the playground at school and every day when I would pick him up from school he’d ask to go play. So we put up a pole in our yard and he bought his own ball so he has one to play at home now. Occasionally Coleen can beat him. But in general he wins. He needs some more height to beat Robert (but that day will come). Yet he’s still one of the tallest in his grade level.

Ryan entered all day kindergarten and he loves it. He’s reading at the 2-3^rd grade level (keeping up with his brother) and loves all the songs they sing at school. He just had his Christmas program and he’s quite the performer. At one point when they were singing “I Ain’t Getting Nothing for Christmas” I looked up and saw he was crying – until I realized he was acting! (Watch out Aunt Stephanie!) He also loves gymnastics & is constantly upside down. When there is no gymnastics he’ll settle for Taekwondo.

We hope you all have a very Happy Holidays and a fantastic 2009!

Coleen, Robert, Justin & Ryan