Happy New Year !

The Ferron Clan is wishing you all a Happy New Year. We hope your Holidays have been merry and bright! 2009 is here and looking good!

2008 brought a few changes to our lives. We remained true to our annual trip to our beloved Ireland. Nothing like a few weeks to revert to the roles of ancestors-but golf and eat like the aging baby boomers we actually are.

But changes were on the horizon. Retirement was short as advertised last year. J is "rewired" with his own company, "Ferron & Associates." His largest client is Crain Communications. They are a large publications company which publishes "Automotive News." and 35 other newsletters and magazines. Now, instead of being quoted, his task is to take the company global in a major way.

We bought a condo/golf villa in Jupiter, Florida. By that we became members of The Ritz Carlton Club, which allows us a lot of flexibility to use the other 13 Ritz Carlton Clubs everywhere. We have visited Kevin and his family in San Francisco and we skied, dog sledded and snow shoed at Bachelor Gulch, Colorado for a week before Christmas. Our base is in Jupiter, Florida, and we go there to relax and golf in January and hopefully in March and April (the hardest months in Michigan).

Our kids and grandkids are the greatest and their families are growing up faster than their parents seemed too. Brady, Meg and Cullen headed "Up North" to their condo to ski, snowshoe and sled, etc. after being here for Christmas. The slopes of Michigan might not be as big as Colorado but Cullen is a big time fan! Kevin and Jenilee flew here bringing a chatty Kiley with them just after Christmas. We are truly blessed to have such wonderful kids who are living exciting lives of their own (but happy to include us).

In 2009 we are planning a few more trips to Florida; to San Francisco, and even to Washington DC for a Reese Air Force Pilot Training Reunion. The Academy Reunion for the class of 1968 this past fall was great fun with over 250 of J's surviving 400 or so classmates in attendance. We know we will love seeing the group of former pilots and their wives from Pilot training too.

We hope you enjoy the pictures of the Ferron Clan. We also hope you and yours are in the warmth of a family's love this coming year. Tough times like these cause us to pause and re-evaluate our lives. Michigan has been getting used to tough times for a few years now and we see 2009 as the year for all of us to make our world collectively better. No one is certain of our exact direction, but we know we will make things better together and with God's love.

May God Bless you and hold you in the palm of his hand.

Click on thumbnails below for larger picture.