Naditz Family Christmas Letter

Welcome!

We gather that since you are here, you have received the Christmas card we sent (a bit late). We're glad you found your way through cyberspace to our 2007 Christmas letter!

It has been many years since we talked to many of you (our last letter was in 2003) so here is our most important news of late.

We are still in the same house we bought in 2003--the housing market decline means we'll be in this house for a while yet. Since buying the house, we've adopted two dogs to accompany our cat--who is now 19 years old! We adopted Sophie in 2004. Sophie (pictured with Alan and our cat, ET) is a lab-Sharpei mix and is a very gentle and adorable dog. She is now seven years old. Then, two weeks ago, we adopted Sienna, a hyper, three-year-old doberman-chocolate lab mix. We've been fortunate to find that she is house-broken and crate trained, which helps make up for the fact that she seems to think that she is a puppy and we are all her toys!

In 2006, we took off for Disney World. Alan had been there as a child, but for Caelan and I, this was our first trip to Disney World. We loved it! There was so much to see and do. Caelan had his first enjoyable upside-down ride experience on an Aerosmith-themed roller coaster called the Rockin Roller Coaster. There were interesting animals at the wild animal park, gazillions of new sights (and great food to try) at Epcot, and, most importantly, a lot of time spent together.

In January of this year, we had the very unexpected opportunity to take a cruise to Cozumel, Mexico. My cousin was getting married and both the bride's and groom's families were invited to join them on the cruise. None of the three of us had ever been on a cruise before and it was so much more fun than we had expected! One of the coolest aspects of the cruise was being able to cruise with so many people that we knew. That definitely made it easier and more fun. There was more to do on the ship than we expected and our port of call in Cozumel gave us the opportunity to enjoy a white sandy beach and turquoise water (complete with underwater Mayan ruins and tiny jellyfish) in January!

We love to travel, but budgets are limited, so in the past few years, we've mostly enjoyed short get-aways that allowed us to bring the dog (this was before we had two dogs). We had a wonderful camping trip at a KOA on the Mendocino Coast this past summer--definitely the way to go, especially if you can't afford the incredibly expensive hotels in that region. We get away to Lake Tahoe and to Monterey whenever our schedules will allow.

We also love to attend county and state fairs. In 2006, our love of the state fair reached new heights--we entered a contest to write lyrics to the state fair theme (and sing our composition at the fair) and we won! We actually got to go to a recording studio and record our jingle and then we heard it on the radio! That was unusually cool. Caelan loved being in the recording studio and when we had wrapped up our recording of the jingle, Caelan asked, "Is there anything else for me to record?"

Caelan just turned 11 this month. He now attends Winston Churchill Middle School, where he is enrolled in the International Baccalaureate program. He won the 6th grade spelling bee this year, much to his surprise and ours since it wasn't even announced. Although the program is far more demanding than it was at his previous elementary school, Alan and I are really seeing Caelan blossom as he works to meet the expectations of his teachers. Although he may not stay in the International Baccalaureate program all the way through high school, this was definitely a good choice for middle school. We wanted him to continue to be challenged and to develop his good study habits and quality work ethic before he reached high school.

Caelan loves video games and still hopes to be a video game designer. He has been asking us to buy him books so he can teach himself computer programming language! We haven't done that yet, but we see the day coming. In the meantime, he likes using movie making software to create short films and commercials and uses these to complete his class projects whenever he is allowed to do so. He also spends a lot of time writing his own stories or plots for future video games. There's a lot of his dad in him. His other interests include animals and the electric guitar. Because of his love of animals, he has chosen to collect newspapers for the SPCA as a community service project. The guitar is a new area for him--his grandfather just gave Caelan his first lesson a week ago and he has been practicing regularly (and rather well) since then. This year he also decided to grow...his hair. As of this writing he's three weeks shy of going one year without a haircut. And contrary to the picture here to the right, Caelan has quite a bit of hair on his head (note the first shot, above)...yes, he DOES have curly hair, and yes, he DOES look like he's auditioning to become a Caucasian member of the Jackson 5. Or perhaps Justin Guarini's replacement, for all of you Year 1 American Idol fans. But it's all worth it -- he doesn't know it yet, but his lack of haircuts helped pay for a rather big Christmas present...

Alan is still writing and editing for numerous trade and consumer publications--all freelance. What's nice about this arrangement is that he is almost always home and his schedule has a bit of flexibility to it. While that helps with the day-to-day running of the house, it also allows him time to pursue fiction writing--something he hasn't done in years. Earlier this year, he entered a Writers' Digest short story competition and actually received honorable mention. Considering that some writers enter every year and don't get recognized at all, that was exciting to us. Hopefully, he'll find time to continue refining his storytelling and developing the horror stories he loves so much. In the meantime, he contents himself with adding more movies to the ever-increasing horror film collection. He has quite a fondness for classic (and less-than-classic) old horror films.

I have been keeping myself busy in my many roles in education. In 2003-04, I was fortunate to be honored in many different venues for my work in education--by the Foreign Language Association of Greater Sacramento, the California Language Teachers' Association, the California League of High Schools, Region 3 and twice by students. It was a very exciting--and humbling--year. In the fall of 2004, I began a three-year leave from the classroom to be a full-time mentor to beginning teachers in my district. I learned so much from this outstanding opportunity to observe numerous teachers at all subject areas and grade levels. While I was out of the classroom, I received my M.Ed and my administrative credential--just in case! In August of this year, my term as a mentor ended and I returned to the classroom, resuming my role as a French teacher. To prepare myself for my return, I applied for and received a scholarship to study in Grenoble, France in July. That was an amazing experience and definitely helped me recoup the French I had not spoken for three years. And the trip gave me my first chance to visit the French Alps! No, I didn't climb them--I took pictures of others who climbed them.

Since going back to the classroom, it has been wonderful to put everything I have learned to use in working with my students. My teaching is definitely more exciting and thorough than it was when I left the classroom three years ago. Of course, to go along with that, my work is a lot more hectic--I'm far more heavily involved in local, state, and national language teaching organizations that I was when I left the classroom. It has been...interesting to juggle those many roles. Fortunately, being so active seems to really keep my skills up in the classroom, and that's the most important.

In short, we're busy, happy, and healthy. We wish you the same and more for the coming year!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Alan, Caelan and Nicole (and ET, Sophie and Sienna)