The highlight of our year was the arrival of Eric Justin Frantz on August 22nd. The pregnancy, labor, and birth went extremely well. We were very well prepared. We exercised throughout the pregnancy (walking, swimming, and muscle toning exercises), read extensively, ate healthy vegetarian meals, and took both Bradley and Lamaze childbirth classes. (Thanks to sister-in-laws Cheri and Nancy for recommending Bradley). We had a purebirth (no medical interventions of any kind, either drugs or machinery) and Missy experienced a physically intense but painless labor and delivery. She even reached down and caught Eric as he was born!
Eric has been winning hearts since his first day. "He's so alert!", "He's so pretty!"., "He's beautiful!", "What a happy baby!". The pediatrician who saw Eric on his birthday said, "He's not only beautiful, he's perfect!". We feel the same way.
Missy has taken a year leave of absence from IBM to provide a nurturing environment for Eric. She's had few problems with the lifestyle change. The most difficult thing is we miss spending time together riding to and from work and at lunch. Before starting her leave, Missy received a $1500 award from IBM for outstanding work she did in resolving difficult business, personnel, and political issues. Her manager already wishes her leave were over.
Curt also received a $1500 award from IBM and two weeks of paid leave (Eric's first two weeks) for work he had done in building teamwork in his area. In November he was promoted to advisory programmer and given a raise. In addition to his team building efforts, Curt has been publicizing the case against competition. He developed a presentation and audiotape based on the book, No Contest: The Case Against Competition by Alfie Kohn and has met requests for copies of the tape throughout IBM (in 50 cities, 22 states, 8 countries). He also created a corporate-wide electronic forum for discussion of this topic.
We didn't do as much travelling this year as in years past. Part of that was due to IBM belt-tightening (Curt's only business trips this year were to Los Angeles and Rochester, Minnesota for 4 days each) but most of our reduced travel was due to being cautious while pregnant and not wanting to be apart as a family. (Curt turned down an opportunity to work for a week in December on the French Riviera as part of an IBM project on which he's working. He didn't want to be separated from Missy and Eric.) Early in the pregnancy (in March) we did travel to Orlando, Florida to assist Gary and Maggie Frantz in providing computer scorekeeping for the American Cup gymnastics meet (and to do a little sightseeing). In April we made a trip to Michigan and Ohio to visit family and friends. In November, we took our first trip as a threesome. We spent four days in Virginia seeing museums, caverns, Civil War battlefields, Monticello, and the University of Virginia. But most importantly, during that trip Eric got to meet his Amie Carolyn Bloemker. We also took an early December vacation in Charleston, South Carolina and a late December vacation in Pennsylvania.
Family and friends made long trips to visit us during the past year and for that we are thankful. Carolyn visited twice for a week (in early January and July), Curt's brothers Rich and Bob visited in May, Missy's mom Joyce Leslie came in September in part to welcome her newest grandson to the world, and Curt's parents, Bill and Nancy, came as well and were also smitten by Eric.
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