2007 Christmas Letter and Photo

For those of you whose in-boxes were full, we've devised another way to foist our year-end thoughts upon you... the 2007 Morrison Christmas Letter and Photo. (If you give something a grand title, it makes it that much more auspicious.)


There’s a lot of balancing involved in writing a good Christmas letter: how to avoid sounding boastful without being boring, how to avoid the presumption of assuming you want to know all about our lives without completely ignoring you… it goes on and on. Then, just as I’ve decided not to write, I get a delightful letter from a friend, and I’m encouraged to go ahead and let you know what’s up, despite all the ambiguous feelings I have about this sort of thing. Here goes:

Due to the birth of our sweet son Ethan, the year passed in a blur. I’m not really sure what else happened, but he was definitely a highlight. Ethan weighed in at 8lbs, 7oz, on January 25, sometime after 4 pm. After several weeks of insomnia and resultant psychosis, our lives settled into a nice routine, and we are so grateful to God for the joy of having a little one around. He rolled over early, crawled at about an average age, and said “Dada” for months before finally mouthing the word “Mama”. Music to my ears. His little hugs, smiles and laughs make up for all the spit up and dirty diapers he’s managed to produce over the past 11 months.

Everything else that happened this year seems to be a little overshadowed by the whole firstborn son thing. We’ll try to dredge the recesses of our memories, however:

Both Matt and Ethan were baptized on the same day in April. It brings a sweet ache to my heart even thinking about it now.

Matt graduated from UT Tyler in May with a BS in Computer Information Systems, and went to work for Vann Pumping Systems shortly thereafter. This allowed me to cut back from three to one to two days a week as a labor and delivery nurse. Ethan loves having Mommy at home, but when I’m at work he either stays with Dad, with Marmee, with Grandmommy, or with a family from church. Matt also continues to work as a houseparent one weekend a month at Breckenridge Village, where Ethan charms his special friends with his slobber and smiles.

I reached a big milestone this month by completing half of my 48-hour Master’s degree, an MS in Nursing that will allow me to sit for the Family Nurse Practitioner boards, and bring me a couple of steps closer to an eventual goal of becoming a certified nurse-midwife. Don’t ask how exactly. It’s complicated. I also continued to drill as a Navy Reserve Nurse Corps officer one weekend a month. I enjoy the training, and have memorized more acronyms than should be humanly possible. Not to mention, I finally got dog tags and get to wear camouflage and combat boots.

We so enjoy hearing from all of you throughout the year and especially now when everyone’s so motivated to send letters. What’s up with that anyway?

Matt just read our letter and registered his approval with, “It looks pretty good, actually.” So, I guess my job here is done. We’d like to close with one final thought as we focus on Christ’s birth:

“Thanks be to God for His unspeakable gift.”
With love and joy,
Matt, Elisa and Ethan Morrison