Merry Xmas
from the McManus Family
Here we are on the traditional Christmas Eve sunset kayak tour of Lake Union
The New and Expanded McManus Family!
Its been a busy year - We've added 1500 square feet to our house and two more children!
It seemed that two of Kelly's friends, from a single parent home, had become displaced - in search of a local residence - from which to finish school. Haley and Rachael are their names. And since there always seemed to be extra children in our house anyway - we figured two more would hardly be noticed. They're great kids - both are doing well in school, Haley went on a student exchange program to Japan this year and speaks Japanese quite well - at least as far as we can tell! - Rachael is quite an athlete - she took up running this summer on a Thursday - ran in her first race on Sunday - and placed third in her age group out of 18 runners.
Oh - and the house - We had this burning desire to fix an error in the placement of our home on our lot. It seemed that the home must have been built by a blind contractor. He located the house such that it had no view. We needed to move the house about 16 feet north to get a view of Tiger Mountain and the Cascade Mountains to the east. Well since moving the house was not really practical - we just built 16 feet more house!
Well the work is almost done - its only been 6 months...We still have interior doors and trim to do, and quite a bit of painting. But hopefully all that will be done by spring.
On other fronts - Young Richard continues to grow - an official teenager - he has added a foot to his height and his feet are larger than Dad's. He's taken up lacrosse and plays for a local middle school club team. And as you can see from the photo - he grows stronger every day.
We had our young friend from Belarus back again this year. Sasha enjoyed her stay a bit more than last year. Things were more familiar to her - and she wasn't quite as home sick.
Kelly is the neighborhood babysitter-at-large
Mike had a birthday in the middle of the construction - The dining room also served as the pantry at the time!
And Dad continues to fly...
and Mom continues to hold the wild bunch together!
