Happy (Belated) New Year!

Happy (belated) 2008 from the Nankivel Family!

2007 has been a busy year at the Nankivel household. Draven Alexander Nankivel was born on February 22, 2007. Mazaryk loves being a big brother, and Draven thinks Mazaryk is the coolest thing since sliced bread. It has been a challenging adjustment switching from 1 to 2 children, but I think we’ve managed it well.

Just recently, we receiving some more exciting news, we are pregnant! The due date is August 8^th, and we are formulating plans already for how to cope with being outnumbered by our children!

Our family has made great strides in many ways this year. We’ve been doing a budget together each month inspired by Dave Ramsey, and it is amazing what we’ve accomplished since we started actively managing our finances. As of March, we had increased our net worth by about $20,000 since January 2006. We will have increased that to $38,000 by the end of 2007. The majority of that has been paying off debt, which will be about $23,000 we have paid off total. By March of 2008, we will be completely out of consumer debt. It feels great to have money to pay cash for things now, and not pay interest to the banks and credit card companies anymore.

Draven has been such a joy to have in our lives. He is a very happy baby, always smiling and laughing. He is very inquisitive and likes to get into things. He is starting to talk now, or at least will repeat words at times. He eats anything and everything, and a lot of it. He looks up to his big brother, and is always at his heels. Draven’s first birthday will be coming up soon on February 22^nd. I can’t believe he’s a year old already!

Mazaryk got his hearing aids in the beginning of the year, and it is amazing how much he has progressed since then with his speech and listening. He was attending the South Dakota School for the Deaf up until Thanksgiving, when he started home school with Tamara. She does a great job, and I’m glad she is able to put her degree in Elementary Education to use and stay home with the boys. Mazaryk is a sponge for knowledge, and loves to read. He also has more energy than most nuclear power plants, which we need to let him run off every day. If scientists could harness the metabolic processes of a 3-year old child, we could have cars that get 30 miles to the banana.

Tamara has been busy as usual. Of course the children have been keeping her busy, and she has been working special events at the YMCA in town. She has also been doing a lot of cake decorating, something she is really good at and enjoys. Recently she was selected to be the Wilton Cake Decorating Instructor at Hobby Lobby here in Sioux Falls! She’ll start teaching classes in February, and we are all very excited for her. Tamara and the boys will be taking a trip to California in January to visit her relatives. Josh is going to stay behind for work and school, and will miss them terribly!!!

Josh has had a busy year with work, school, and family. In September, he left Citibank as an MIS Analyst for a position as the Project Coordinator with SAIC, a contractor to the USGS and NASA for the LDCM project, a satellite mission scheduled to launch in July 2011. As of this writing he has 1 term left at school until graduation, and he can’t wait to be finished! It has been difficult working full time and going to school full time, and not being able to spend as much time with family as he wants to. Josh was also interviewed in March on The PM Podcast, which is the top rated project management show, and was featured in a debate in the July 2007 issue of PM Network, the magazine put out by the Project Management Institute. He also did some articles for the International Community of Project Managers, and the University of California Santa Cruz.

On April 1, Josh had the privilege to be the best man in his best friend’s wedding. He was very proud to be there for Chad and April on their special day. They make a great couple, and we’re very pleased to see them happy as they deserve to be.

Some other significant events in our family included the addition of little Jonah to Aaron and Heather’s family. He’s a little sweetie. Eland joined Becky and Thor’s family, and he is also a little cutie. Draven is going to have a lot of playmates! Zach went off to join the Navy in December, and Josh hopes to drive out to Illinois with Mom and Dad to see his graduation. We’re very proud of Zach and all his accomplishments.

Have a great 2008 everyone!