Christmas Update 2024

It has most certainly been a very busy year for our crew, full of blessings, challenges, long days, answered prayers, new friends, and God’s leading to unexpected places!

For the purpose of this post, we decided to keep things simple and share 24 points of remembrance from 2024, in chronological order.

#1 – Steve had his gall bladder removed, alleviating some years of stomach trouble.

(I know, not the loveliest way to open this update, but as stated, we are striving to keep things in chronological order here.)

#2 – Jennifer, Olivia, and Annalise flew out to South Carolina to visit our older kids, be present for Katelyn’s wedding shower, and do some wedding dress shopping. (Extra points for any who can guess a future event in this list of 24 🙂)

#3 – The Hall Family Christian Homeschool concluded 19 years of homeschooling.

#4 – We celebrated the marriage of our daughter Katelyn to Jared Miller on June 1st.

#5 – We celebrated 25 years of marriage on June 5th.

#6 – In July we completed five years of employment at Aardsma Research and Publishing.

#7 – Our family had our fullest season of traveling out singing and speaking at various services and events through our Truth in Time ministry.

#8 – We celebrated two years of podcasting, and are now into our third season of The BC Messenger podcast.

#9 – We celebrated the 50th wedding anniversary of Jennifer’s parents, Gerald and Helen Aardsma.

#10 – Olivia and Annalise won 2nd place in the Cissna Park Old Settler’s Reunion talent show playing guitar and singing “Take Me Home, Country Roads.”

#11 – Steve became the pastor of our home church, Christian Bible Church of Cissna Park, Illinois.

#12 – All of our older kids were able to come home at some point throughout the summer. Joshua spent most of the summer at home, in between his studies at Bob Jones University, where he is completing his master’s degree.

#13 – As the new school year began, Toby, Olivia, Annalise and Micah all became students at St. John’s School, a very big change for our family.

#14 – After some months of battling a roof leak, we had to have a major roof restructure/repair done in September.

#15 – Toby grew our largest harvest of pumpkins to date and made a good business venture out of it.

#16 – Toby finished out his time with the local football youth league, and enjoyed winning their first (very exciting) playoff game. As a ninth grader next year, he will begin playing for the local high school.

#17 – All the kids have gotten good grades in school. Micah received straight A’s in the 2nd quarter.

#18 – Olivia played basketball for the Saint John’s Eagles, and now both Olivia and Annalise are playing on the SJ volleyball team.

#19 – Jennifer was able to vote in a presidential election for the first time! (She received her U.S. citizenship last year.)

#20 – Sam got his driver’s license in November. (It paired up quite well with the white pickup truck he purchased some months before.)

#21 – Sam, as a sophomore, unexpectedly became the starting quarterback on the local high school’s varsity football team following injuries to both the starting QB and the second string QB.

#22 – Our family travelled to Virginia for Thanksgiving for our annual Hall family gathering.

#23 – Micah has learned many amazing magic tricks this year. Even as I type this he is saying, “Dad, pick a card, any card…” 🪄

#24 – And…. in December, our first grandchild was born into the world. Once again, WE HAD OUR FIRST GRANDCHILD!! Ethan and Erin were blessed with a sweet baby girl named Autumn Ariadne Hall, on December 2. (As you can see, she’s a doll baby…)