The Falank Family Christmas Letter, 2013 Edition: The Blog Version (with pictures!)

Dear Family, friends, co-workers, acquaintances, Facebookers, Twitterers, all the Whos in Whoville, the Hobbits in Hobbiton (this also extends to Fili, Kili, Oin, Gloin, Dwalin, Balin, Bifur, Bofur, Bombur, Dori, Nori, Ori, and of course, Thorin), as well as any and all followers and those who've stumbled their way by.

Welcome.

This is my/our first attempt at an annual Christmas letter. Before I get going, first, two things: This will only be "annual" if I/we remember to do this again next year, and second, I'm saying "I" and "we" (we being Rebecca and I) respectively in regards to publishing this letter because this was my idea and Becca's helping me. So if you enjoy it (and I/we hope that you do) then we did a great job. If you don't like it, blame the author. I can only try to promise to try and do better next year, and actually put out a physical version to be mailed to friends and family. If I remember to do this.

Nothing goes back to the beginning of 2013 like resolutions. For the last three years I've kept the same resolution: to get published. I'm overwhelmed to share that this year I've been fortunate enough to have accomplished that feat not once but three times. In April and October I had two short works ("The Morning After" and "Answering the Call") put into print in issues 10 and 12 of RiverLit magazine. And it's what's been the biggest news of my writing "career" thus far, in May I was contacted by Jessica Kristie of Winter Goose Publishing, expressing interest in publishing my first novel, Seeing, which is due out in the spring.

Signing my contract!

Yes, I realize technically my first book being published is more a 2014 thing, but I'm sure you can overlook that detail. More about it in next year's letter (setting reminder now).

After a workload that even I cannot comprehend, this year marked a wonderful accomplishment for Becca. As she put it herself:

"600 hours, 50 pages of daily log, a bunch of annotated bibliography entries, 4 STAR activities, 3 evaluations, 2 school board meeting reports, 1 leadership project, an updated resume, and 8 months later .... I am officially ready for my meeting with my internship supervisor.

"Tomorrow, it all comes to an end, but as with all things,

"A new beginning comes from some other beginning's end!"

This list doesn't account for absolutely everything she had done during her Education Administration Certificate program (there were countless small and big tasks asked of her to perform that just don't fit into specific categories) but nevertheless she completed her last few courses (ending with a 3.95 GPA!) and once she takes her final tests in March, will be certified to be a school administrator. I couldn't be more proud of her :) No matter what was put in front of her, she didn't flinch. Not once.

A shared goal Becca and I had this year was to get in better shape. Cliche? Yeah, sure. But it kept us focused. Over the summer we trained for a Color Run (a 5K where participants are doused with colors at random checkpoints) by participating in a free program called C25K (Couch-2-5K). In all honesty, you learn quickly just how out of shape you are when you begin this program. On top of that, I worried I would struggle with my asthma. Neither of us were expecting to do too well given that through the program, the running intervals begin to increase. We had a tough time of it at first, being winded just running for 90 seconds, but by the time we completed the program in August, we could sustain running (without stopping, without the use of an inhaler) for over 20 minutes.

In October, on a chilly, foggy Saturday morning, we drove to Scranton for the Color Run.

Mission Accomplished!

And we're gonna do it again when the Color Run comes to Binghamton in April 2014.

2013 wasn't all work and goals. We also took a few vacations. Over spring break we spent a couple of days in Washington D.C.

The available speeches to read were Nixon's resignation and Clinton's "I did not have sexual relations with that woman"...

In August we also visited a little place you may have heard of called Aruba!

It was really hard to hold this pose waiting for the picture to be taken.

One of the really cool "firsts" for the both of us happened in early August when we were given the opportunity to go up in a hot air balloon during Binghamton's annual Spiedie Fest.

I had a death grip on my phone whenever I attempted to take a picture.

Overall, as I am sure it was for many of you, 2013 was a very exciting year for us and we look very much forward to the New Year and all the surprises and good news it brings.

I do feel like I missed something else that happened in 2013...

...

Oh, yeah, we both turned 30.

...

Nothing more to be said on that.