Christmas Card 2011

Welcome to the 2011 installment of the Traveling Roths' Microsoft Word Christmas Letter. If you received a card from us, or if you saw a post on Facebook pointing you here, thanks for clicking through, and taking the time to see what we've been up to this year, and what all those pictures in the collage are all about.


Winter

Too late for last year's card were the Christmas musical performances by Tristan and Zoe.  The award-wining Glenwood Elementary Show Choir performed their holiday show at several locations, all with incredible professionalism for their ages.

Tristan had a solo with the North Carolina Boy's Choir at their annual Christmas concert at Duke Chapel.

Jennifer was the maid of honor at her best friend Tiffany's wedding in Atlanta.

The rest of the winter was pretty quiet.  Dave spent another week in England for work.  Here he is at Ice Bar, London.

And Zoe turned 11.

Spring

With spring comes Spring Break.  Jennifer and the kids traveled to Albuquerque, New Mexico to see Uncle Jared, Aunt Julia, and Cousin Zane for a week.

Zoe continued running 5K races

and in June, concluded her elementary school career by graduating from fifth grade.

Summer

This is where things get crazy, as they do every summer.

All of us went down to Georgia for a long weekend.  We got to stay with Tiffany and Ceasar and their new baby Canon, and also with Dave and Michelle Wenegar for a few days.  We visited some of our old favorite places, saw where the kids were born, and even went to a drive-in movie with a bunch of Jennifer's old school friends.

Jennifer and the kids went to Virginia so see Jennifer's cousin Jeanine and Sean and their daughter, Eliza and son Finn.  From there it was on to Pennsylvania, where Tristan went with his Opa down to Maryland to join the rest of the NC Boys Choir to start their summer national tour, while Jennifer and Zoe continued on to New Jersey and New York.  Tristan, Zoe, and Jennifer all got to spend a little time in NYC - Tristan with the choir, and Jennifer and Zoe with Jennifer's friend Kathi.  They were all able to catch Tristan's final show with the boys choir in New Jersey.

At the end of the tour we all met up with the rest of the Roths at Uncle Andy and Aunt Shelley's house in Maryland.  Joining us there was Uncle Tom, Aunt Jenni, Cousins Kayley, Krista, Alex, and Ella, as well as Opa.  We had a great few days in Maryland, playing some volleyball, visiting the Udvar-Hazy museum, seeing some fireworks, and eating a lot of crabs.

After being home for a couple days (to do laundry and pack, basically), it was off to California.  First stop: San Diego to see Uncle Jordan and Sofia (and In-N-Out Burger).  We met up with Uncle Jared, Aunt Julia, and Cousin Zane at the San Diego Zoo.  After a long day of animals, we drove up to La Jolla Cove so the kids could finally swim in the Pacific.

We finished our too-brief stay in San Diego at Ocean Beach Pier Cafe for a great breakfast and some pictures.

From there the four of us made the long an picturesque journey to Yosemite National Park.  We spent the next few days camping in a cottage outside the park, and seeing as much of the interior of the GINORMOUS park as we could.  Of the many pictures we took, there's the requisite shot of the Traveling Roths with Half Dome

And Jennifer celebrated her 40th Birthday!

We continued on to South Lake Tahoe to Uncle Jonas and Aunt Nellie's house.  We spent the next week in that area, doing as much as we possibly could.  Lots of hiking and swimming and eating California Burgers and a side trip to Reno for a day.  We could've easily stayed for the rest of the summer, but we had to get back East.

We took another quick trip back down to Georgia for Dave Wenegar's "Match Game"-themed 40th birthday party, where Dave (Roth) was a Gene Rayburn-inspired host, and Jennifer was a French foreign exchange student contestant. . . . all in fabulous 70's style.

August came, and we headed up to Huron, Ohio with a bunch of our Southside Mebanite friends for a long weekend on Lake Erie at the Brouwer Cottage.  We did plenty of eating, drinking, merry-making, and got to spend a full day at Cedar Point.  And somehow in the process failed do get a decent family photo.

Summer ended, Tristan started 7th Grade, Zoe 6th Grade both at McDougle Middle School.  In early October, we spent a weekend in Asheville, ran into a few of our Southside friends, and went to the top of a very frosty Mount Mitchell. Dave spent yet another week in England later in the month, and we celebrated Tristan's 13th birthday at the North Carolina State Fair in October.

In November we took a long weekend trip up to Northeast Pennsyltucky to see Jonas, Nellie and brand new cousin Aida, who was born in South Lake Tahoe a few weeks after we left.  Joining us there were Jared, Julia, and Zane, as well as several of the local Saias.  Once again, the trip was too short.

We spent a weekend in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina where Zoe ran in the USA Track & Field Junior Olympics Cross Country Championship (Region 3).  They also tried raw oysters for the first time.

And that's our year.  We'll be up in Pennsylvania after Christmas, so for those of you we haven't seen yet in 2011, hopefully we will before the year's end.  

Merry Christmas, and thank you to everybody for being part of our lives.  Keep up with us here, on Facebook and Twitter.  Happy New 2012

The Traveling Roths

Dave, Jennifer, Tristan, and Zoe

Mebane, North Carolina, USA