Collins Family 1st Annual Year End Letter

Another year has passed us by, a busy one. To keep everyone up to date on what has happened this passed year, I decided to write a letter to send out in our Christmas cards this year.
Where do I start? This time last year, Harold was graduating from Old Dominion University and was commissioned as a Naval Officer. That was a hectic month with his senior project and getting ready for graduation and all, but we survived.
On to January, not much to mention I don’t think, I was busy with babysitting, and normal life stuff.
February, Harold left for Pensacola, Florida, to start in his pre flight school classes. The kids and I stayed behind to let Christian finish up the School year in Virginia Beach.
I remember I had minor surgery in March, along with a bad ear infection and a bad case of the flu. Not a good month from what I remember. L
Harold turned 30 in April and our sweet dog Sadie passed away, we had her for about 3 ½ yrs, she was 13 yrs old.
In May, Harold came home on 30 days leave; we did a lot of fixing the house up to get it ready to sell. We put our house of 6 years on the market and it sold in two days!!!
In June Christian earned his black belt in Tae Kwon Do at the American Tae Kwon Do Association (ATA). We are so proud of him. The house closed in mid-June; we moved out the same day and headed for Milton Florida. Our house wasn’t going to be ready for three ½ more weeks, so we took a trip to see some family in Colorado. Didn’t seem like we had enough time to visit though.
In early July we moved into our new house, we love it.
On to August, Christian started the 3rd Grade and he likes his new school, Bagdad Elementary. We also got two new dogs, Merry and Pippin, two Chihuahua mixes.


On to September, one word…Hurricanes! September 16, Ivan came on shore as a strong category 3, only 1mph away from being a category 4 storm. Ivan had everything (tornadoes, flooding, and high winds) the damage was widespread. The kids here in Milton missed 19 days of school due to damage and power outages. We had minor damage. September was also our 10-year wedding anniversary…not to be overshadowed by all the hurricanes…J. We were going to go to Disney World for our anniversary, but hurricane Jeanne stopped that.
In October, Elijah turned four. November…election year! We had a great thanksgiving, had friends and family over for yummy fried turkey.
December, Christian just turned 9 years old, time sure flies, our big boy is growing up. This month is good so far. I know we will have a blessed and Happy Christmas and New Year also.
Thanks for reading this far. Please feel free to give us a call or write us. God Bless you. Have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New year.

The Collins’
Harold, Michelle, Christian and Elijah