So, we haven't been very good at maintaining our blog this year but we can hope to do better next year. We are doing well. Gary just finished his first semester of kindergarten (do they call it a semester?) and had a great time. He was awarded the "Terrific Tiger" award last month for not getting his card pulled (for being bad) for an entire month. He is enjoying learning how to read and has lots of good friends at school. Bram is still sad to not be attending school with his best friend but he sure enjoys all the one 
on one time with his mother. Together, they love to play with their Transformers and are really hoping for an Optimus Prime for Christmas. Apparently it's their favorite thing but so are the many other things they see on TV and at the store so who really knows. They enjoyed having their Grandma Cornia visit in November while Larry was in China doing cleft lip and palate surgeries and walking on the Great Wall. They also enjoyed having their Grandma and Granddad Hartzell come visit recently for the first 
time in 2 years after being in Japan for most of that time on their church mission. They also had a great time recently having their cousin Beatrix and Callum visit with Holly's brother Reed and his wife Shelley for Thanksgiving. Gary had an especially great time doing EVERYTHING with "B" - they were quite the duo!
Holly is just glad to finally have Larry back home for a little while after a few months of lots of traveling and meetings. She continues
to work on lots of different sewing projects for the house and friends. She is so creative and gifted!! (at least according to her adoring husband). Her latest project however has been trying to get Larry into shape (what's
the big deal that he now weighs 10 pounds more than he ever has???) by doing workout routines that involve running up and down our steep hill mixed in with some weights, pushups, situps,
etc. She has even gone as far as to encourage our home teacher to
invite Larry on moutain bike rides instead of coming by for hometeaching. She'll get him into shape one way or another!
Larry is now a chief resident in ENT and is enjoying all the surgeries and experiences he is having. He will be starting a 2 year fellowship at the conclusion of his residency in July to focus on pediatric ENT which will include cleft lip and palate surgery as well as advanced ear surgery and airway reconstruction among other things. The best part is that this will be done at Arkansas
CHildren's Hospital which means
no moving in June!
The house continues to consume a disproportionate amount of Larry and Holly's time. This year,
all 3 bathrooms have been remodeled in one way or another, about half of the ceilings had the
popcorn scraped off and of course painting. We hope this year won't be quite as crazy!
So, that's our family update. We hope all you, our friends and family, have had a great year and that the coming year will be wonderful. Most of all, we hope that Christ's spirit and perfect light
will brighten this holiday season for you all.
Love, The Hartzells