Merry Christmas
The word of the year for 2008 has been “anticipation.” In the
fall of 2007, we applied and were accepted into the Peace Corps.
We knew nothing more until March, when we were told to expect a
placement in Eastern Europe. We waited longer, until August,
when we received our official invitation to Ukraine beginning in
March 2009. And, now, we're eagerly (and nervously) anticipating
this next big adventure!
In the meantime, we're trying to get our fill of life in
Carrboro,
NC, and the USA. We still really like our little community
of Carrboro. Emma loves wandering around the weekly Farmer's
Market, and we've been trying to eat lots of good, fresh, local
food. Alex started our volunteering with the Obama campaign in
July, and we both met lots of great people doing that. Every weekend we
were in town between July and election day, we knocked on doors,
registered new voters, and talked with people about the election.
We were very proud to have helped “turn North Carolina blue” in
November!
Alex was promoted to a management position at iContact in March. He enjoys working at such a growing company (Alex was the 15th employee in 2005 – they now have 150!), but misses some of the web development work he was doing before. Alex has been playing hockey at least once a week, on the Pylons rec team. He's a great skater, and with the exception of a dislocated pinky finger, he's holding up alright.
Emma continues to teach sexual violence prevention programs in
area schools, working at
Family Violence and Rape Crisis
Services of Chatham County and volunteering with the
Orange
County Rape Crisis Center. She enjoys working with a variety
of classes, speaking with Kindergartners through High School
students. Emma's biggest event of the year was a trip to
Mali, West Africa,
with the Griffises to visit sister Anna. After a
week and a half of exhaustive traveling (
Timbuktu,
camel rides,
Dogon Country,
boat trips,
Djenne),
they spent a week in Anna's
village of
Kourouma.
It was a tough trip at times, but very
interesting to see how people live in such a different part of
the world.
Other travels included a week of
skiing
with the
Griffises in
March at Alta, Utah, a weekend for Emma in New York with
college friends,
Thanksgiving
with the McHardys and Kunzas in
Missouri, and a number of
weekends
spent in Ashe County, NC.
After Christmas at the Creek and New Years in Hannibal, we're
looking forward to a calm January before our lives are turned
upside down! If all goes as planned, we'll leave our jobs
mid-February and spend 5 or 6 weeks traveling the country and
visiting family and friends. We're scheduled to depart for
Ukraine the last week of March – fingers crossed!
We hope your Holidays are filled with family, friends, and some time to relax. Here's to a peaceful, happy, and exciting 2009!
Love,
Alex & Emma
Now take a look at our year in pictures!