Templin Christmas 2011

Daughters, spouses and grandkids first:

Colleen and Karl, both computer gee…er…engineers, continue to enjoy Austin, Texas with their two daughters: Karl as a senior hardware/software designer/programmer and Colleen with a thriving marketing consulting business of her own. Emily, now 13, is the female clone of her dad and is a joy to watch growing into a beautiful young lady. GT everything plus Japanese, law and national class synchronized swimming keep her (and her driver-mom) very busy. Trinity, who started life as a one pound, 13-inch miracle baby, is now five, in kindergarten and enjoying the wonders of daily discovery (and super bug girl). She seems quite stuck on her grandparents, which doesn’t bother any of us.


Meighan and Frank (FJ) are still glued to Chicago. FJ remains successful as a wholesale broker despite a finicky market in this crazy economy, and Meig was just announced as an equity partner in her law firm and is this year’s president of the matrimonial lawyers association. Lily continues to prove herself a force to be reckoned with in French, ballet, Irish dancing, swimming, baseball and drama (we suspect she actually teaches the class), with a bit of first grade readin, writin and rithmetic thrown in for good measure. We keep telling Meig and FJ, “what goes around comes around,” as Lily is the combination of both of them incarnate.


Clare and Brian decided to give the burbs a try this summer and moved from the city just days after delivery of their second boy-child. So Brian is now commuting to Chicago each day as a structural engineer while Clare very literally holds down the home front and dreams about the “easy” days as an event planner. We recently volunteered to sit on the boys while Clare and Brian enjoyed a much-deserved overnight break at a friend’s wedding. Afterwards, we told Clare that heretofore we had great sympathy and empathy for her plight, but now that has become utter respect and admiration. Cole is an all boy, sensory seeking two year old; Cute as a bug and very, very busy! Tate is five months and about the sweetest kid ever – and that’s not just because he’s one of ours.

Judy and Bud are well, but learning the true meaning of becoming senior citizens. Just prior to a family gathering at Disney World, Bud had the common old man’s form of the big C removed by robot (oh, brave new world) and was up and running 5Ks within two weeks. Then after about ten years of living with pain, Judy decided to have her body rearranged a bit. She’s now well on the way to full recovery; enough to allow a road trip to Chicago over Thanksgiving during which we not only enjoyed Clare’s first large family dinner, but were also privileged to attend the baptism of the latest clan member, and subsequent reception where we kissed and hugged Smith family in-laws, cousins, nieces, nephews and young-uns in what Judy affectionately refers to as the “Irish baby toss.” Our next big sojourn will be a month-long cruise of the eastern Mediterranean this coming May with great friends from Shaw/Desert Storm. We’re also looking forward to having two-thirds of the family down to the Texas lake house over Christmas.



Here’s wishing you and yours the merriest of Christmases and the happiest of new years.

Bud & Judy