A year in review

Since we are new to the blogging scene, I thought it would be nice to review our year as a family through pictures.


January 2007 - The Creek: The creek, which provides such a beautiful setting most of the time, frozen solid for the winter. But once it thaws and begins to crack....well, see the April entry.



March 2007 - Teen years here we come: My son turned 12 this year. In less than 3 months he will be 13.....ughhhhh!
No, but really, he is a great kid and will probably be a prolific writer very soon! Check out his blog - dachampster's corner - to read his latest work.


April 2007 - The Creek part 2: at least once a year the creek (which is actually a tidal river) floods our yard and sometimes our house. This year was no exception.



May 2007 - Graduation: I received my doctorate degree from the University of Pennsylvania in May. My in-laws got me that really cool cake!






June 2007 - Lehigh University: I took a leap of faith and left k-12 education for the Ivy towers of the university. So far I love it. I taught my first class in Children's Literature (even though my doctorate is in math education!) with only 8 students. The College of Education is housed in the old Bethlehem Steel headquarters, complete with dreary steel gray walls on top of a mountain. I decided to add some color to the place in my office.




July 2007 - We went to Punta Cana this year. What a beautiful place!





August 2007 - Outer Banks, NC: we love to spend time in Outer Banks, we try to get there every year. This year we spent a week there hang gliding, crabbing, and just relaxing before starting a new school year.








October 2007 - Cari's Crusaders: When my closest friend, Cari, was diagnosed with breast cancer in August, I didn't know what I could do to help her. I decided to get together a team of her friends and family and run a breast cancer race in her honor. I was a beautiful day for a great cause! Cari, next year you will do this with us!!







November 2007 - My mom, grandmom, aunt and cousin at a family event. I love hanging out with my family.



December 2007 - Christmas Morning

Christmas 2007

Okay, these past few days have been pretty crazy with house cleaning, last minute shopping, cooking for Christmas. Now that it is over, and before I get back to work preparing for next semester, here are a few reflections:

1. Holiday one stop shopping - we spent a few hectic hours on Sunday and Monday trying to find those last minute gifts. We scurried from store to mall to outlet, getting more and more frustrated by the minute (though we brought it on ourselves, waiting so long). Finally, we decided to stop at our regular grocery store and pick up gift cards. Lo and behold, what did we find? everything on our list that we couldn't find elsewhere! Usually I complain about the high prices at the grocery store because of all the added services they provide, but this time it saved our sanity!


2. Be careful what you buy your children - Having an only child makes Christmas easy and difficult. Easy because you don't need to worry about evening out all the gifts, or getting one child more things than another and having to explain that. However, it is difficult because you wind up getting things that you necessarily wouldn't get if you had more children to worry about. My husband is notorious for getting our son things he really didn't ask for, but thought were so cool (and usually VERY expensive) that he could pass them up. Then many of these cool gifts wind up not being used or creating other problems (like have 4 game systems and then wondering why your child keeps gaining weight!!!!!). This year I joined my husband in that fatal mistake. When visiting my friend Cari in Minnesota, we took our kids to the Mall of America. We went ot the LEGO store and my son saw some really cool toys - like a giant Death Star from Star Wars and a replica of the Eiffel tower. Well, he decided he really wanted to tackle that Eiffel tower, so he put it on his Christmas list. Now, my son being older and wiser, knows not to put frivolous things on his list because he knows he has a better chance of getting what he wants. His list was very short. So of course I went ahead and got the Eiffel tower. Well, when the box came I didn't really know what it was because it was so big and weighed about 20 pounds. I opened and realized that it has almost 3500 pieces, most of which are plain gray! Since I know my son will not put this together alone, I can only pray for strength and patience to get through it.

Christmas Concert and Celebration

On Friday night, our church had its Christmas concert and celebration. It is just singing and dance and playing instruments to praise the Lord! This is the first year we have done it on a Friday night; we usually have it on a Sunday which makes services run to almost 4pm, with dinner and everything. I am the director/choreographer of our dance ministry and we practice diligently every Thursday night. Even though our main goal is to prepare dances that will allow others to see the glory of God through us, there is an added bonus: the camaraderie of my fellow dancers. We support each other, pray for each other, laugh with and at times at each other (especially when trying to learn a new dance!) We have 10 member ranging in age from 7 to 54. I am so blessed to have been called to be a part of this group - and we looked fabulous Friday Night!

Dancing to "The Night When Christ was Born" by Kirk Franklin



Worshipping with flags to "Hark the Herald Angels Sing" by the Broadway Inspirational Voices



A trio - me, Ayanna who is 14, and Adella who is 7, praising God through "Purpose" by Spensha Baker

Dachampster's Corner

Hello! This is Champ's Corner, where I will do cool stuff here, like stories, game walkthroughs, and maybe some comics! You may know me as Randy Jr. on the other posts.
Anyway, I am going to start a walkthrough on GBA games. I will start with the game Pokémon Emerald. Walkthrough coming soon! Any requests for walkthroughs are accepted, but don't think it's an automatic yes.
Above this message is an old comic that I did years ago. Dont worry, I am a lot better than I was then!

See more at dachampsterscorner.blogspot.com

About us

Okay. This post is to catch everyone up on what is happening in our family:

Randy Sr. - Working hard as usual. He is still a paramedic and a flight paramedic. His latest hobby/parttime job is buying and renting houses in the city to help those who can't find decent affordable housing. Any deals out there, send them our way! Youth basketball season is upon us and Big Randy is coaching Champ's (that's Randy Jr for those who don't know) team again. We are praying for a better outcome than last year, as their team lost the championship in overtime with a stolen pass! Ughhh! Keep their team in mind in March!!!


Randy Jr. - Working hard in school as usual, too! He is now in seventh grade (oh my goodness!) at Calvary Christian Academy. He was on the high honor roll last marking period, and we are praying for the same next time. He plays trumpet in the jazz and concert band, and they sound pretty good too! The school has been perfect for him - small size, pre-k to 12th grade, all sports and extra curriuluar activities abound. He continues to love to write - be on the look out in this blog for his stories!


Lanette - This has been a year of change for me. I left my position as math coach in Cherry Hill and took a position as professor at Lehigh University. My job there is to teach classes in teaching and learning, supervise student interns, and many more things than I imagined! It has been exciting; working with brand new, out of the box teachers. I sometimes feel overwhelmed by the freedom I have, making my own work schedule, trying to come up with things to research and new classes to create. But I love it!! I am still working with some teachers in Cherry Hill on a math project and will be presenting our work in Las Vegas March 4 - 6. Anyone can come and join us!! Oh, and I am a sort-of wedding planner for my cousin Gayle, who is getting married in Jamaica next year. I don't think I am good at this planning thing, but I am going to give it my best shot. She has a wedding website, which I will post at a later date. I am on break right now until Jan 10th, so I am trying to catch up on my reading and things. This is defnitely a good time for sending me emails!

Nana DeCohen and Fullback - Nana is doing great. She went on a cruise to Alaska this summer and loved every minute of the trip. She is talking about finally retiring this coming summer and wants to keep traveling. We already will be going to Jamaica next summer, and who knows where else Nana will turn up!

Fullback is still Fullback, eating, sleeping, and sloppering all over my hardwood floors.



Fullback wishes everyone a Merry Christmas!

Welcome to Waddell's World

Hi all! We are creating this blog to help all our family and friends keep up with the goings on of our family. I hope you enjoy our posts!