The Two+ Year Update

Hi friends and family! As most of you know, we’ve had a couple of kids get married the past two years, but we thought maybe we’d finally drop a line to fill in some of the other blanks of what’s going on with the Schindler family.

Jessica and Nathan (Larson) both graduated from BYU in Dec 2006, which was just about one month before their wedding in the Washington DC Temple. Since that time, Jessica started working as a labor and delivery nurse, primarily at Orem Community hospital, which just happens to be the hospital she was born in—just another one of life’s fun little ironies. Nathan has been working as a Tech at Utah Valley hospital and will start dental school this summer.

Kristie and Wesley (Hurst), married in Dec 2005 at the Bountiful Utah Temple, are also still living in Provo while Wes finishes his Business degree at BYU while adding a few other classes in anticipation of applying to dental school later this year. After getting married, Kristie decided to follow her dream and enrolled in Paul Mitchell Hair Design School, from which she graduated in June 2007. Since that time, she’s been working at an Aveda salon in Orem, UT. They’re pretty excited (as are we) to be expecting their first baby—and our first grandchild—in April 2008. Oh, and it’s a boy. :o)

Sydney graduated from High School last year and couldn’t wait to get out to BYU in the Fall, where she’s decided to major in Photography and minor in Illustration. It’s been fun for the three sisters to be together in Provo since Fall 2007. Sydney’s enjoyed getting to know (harass?) her new brother-in-laws, who also keep an eye on her and make sure she doesn’t date any slackers. They also don’t seem to mind mooching off her Dining Plus card whenever they get a chance. :o) When she’s home for the summer, she works full-time providing respite care for her brother David as well as another physically handicapped young woman from our area.

David turns 18 this April. Even if we didn’t know that from his birth certificate, we could guess his age pretty close by the amount of food he consumes on a daily basis. David is a pretty happy kid. He’s grown a bit taller than his mom, not quite as tall as his dad, has the energy (and strength) of a teenager, and gets into everything like a toddler. At times, that makes for a dreadful combination, but it’s always an adventure. We’re grateful for the progress he’s made in the past two years, particularly with potty training, and his general cooperation and understanding have grown to the point that we can go a lot more places and do many more things together with him. Having David around has also made our transition into the “empty nest” phase of our lives much easier.

Sabine finished her stint as ward Relief Society president after only 18 months. It wasn’t the constant turn-over in the ward, nor was it the juggling of church responsibilities with being wedding coordinator for both Jessica and Kristie that finally did her in. It was simply time to be released when they called Ralph to be the Bishop. Now she just continues to stay busy helping others, teaching piano, teaching music at the Fredericksburg Preschool (going on her 10th year), working as a consultant for Heritage Makers (www.heritagemakers.com/246719), taking care of David, and serving as the Scout Committee chair as well as Ward Historian.

Ralph finally retired from the US Air Force in Jan 2006 and co-founded System High Corporation (www.systemhigh.com), which is doing well going into its third year of operation. Serving as Bishop while trying to help build a growing company has been challenging, but with great counselors and other strong leaders in the ward serving in key positions, it’s worked out just fine.

We’re so grateful for the many blessings we’ve been given. Most of all we’re grateful for our testimony of Jesus Christ and the perspective that gives us on everything else in our lives. We’re also grateful for friends and family who have kept in touch over the years (even when we’ve been slackers at times) and are always happy to hear from you. We’ve resolved to do better in the future, and with the ease of blogging, we decided that might be the best way to keep you abreast all through the year of what’s new in our family. We’ll still occasionally send out a letter, but if you’re ever interested, pop on over to http://ralphandsabine.blogspot.com for the latest and greatest (if you’re reading this online, you obviously have already found our blog!).

Looking forward to many exciting and great things in the coming year and can’t wait to hear from all of you again!

Yet Another Form of Communication

So we're blogging now. Jessica convinced us that it was a good idea. The more 'sophisticated' way to communicate (when compared to facebook, etc.). We'll see how well we can keep this up. Stay tuned :)