The Faulkner Freeman Family

Yes, this would be easier on a social network, but here we are...

We could have a paved a road with all the milestones this year brought. 

2022 ended with a proposal, and as we began planning what a wedding might look like, we quickly realized that a big celebration with family and friends was likely incompatible with Christie's very demanding school schedule. However, waiting two more years for her to finish her degree felt way too long. So we split the distance and on the afternoon of May 16 (her birthday!), we headed into NYC for a simple but beautiful ceremony. New York allows you only three guests, which was the perfect number! Oliver was Christie's ring bearer, Waylon was Henry's ring bearer, and Elliott was our witness.  Afterwards, we celebrated with a family dinner in Little Italy. The boys seemed as excited by the champagne in the limo as they were by the nuptials.

Rest assured that a grandiose celebration with all the people we love is still part of our plan. As soon as we figure out when that is, you'll be the first to know 😉

The celebrations didn't stop there! Waylon not only graduated high school but was also formally made an Eagle Scout.  He's currently knocking out his general requirements at Hudson County Community College while deciding where he wants to go next. 

2023 is the year that Oliver went from being interested in boxing to being passionate about it. A weekly activity has quickly become a 4-5 day a week commitment. He's inspired to whole family to become more active, and we're grateful to him for that. 

Elliott continues to thrive at Temple University and made the leap from dorm life to his first real apartment. 

He still makes it back to Jersey City on occasion, which inevitably includes a game night.

We do our best to keep up with Fran, who somehow still runs rings around us. Like her grandsons, she'll never decline a game (warning: while she's a formidable at Corn Hole, she is absolutely ruthless at Exploding Kittens).

Despite busy work and school schedules, we still managed to fit in a couple of getaways this year. 

The first stop was Texas where we celebrated our engagement with Henry's side of the family.

From there we headed into even warmer weather with a vacation in Tulum, Mexico, where the family not only celebrated Waylon's graduation, but also became. open-water certified scuba divers!

As has become our tradition, we celebrated Waylon's birthday by attending New York Comic Con. We called this year's cosplay ensemble "The Fantastic Four-mal"

Woven in through all of this were lots of wonderful moments big and small. 

Not all of 2023's big moments were happy ones. 

This year we lost both Mike Faulkner, Henry's father, and Betty Grant, Christie's aunt. We were fortunate to have spent time with each of them recently, and we miss them both very much.

We wish you a 2024 filled with peace, love, and new adventures. 

It’s been a pretty incredible year with some wonderful milestones. 

We began our second year in our new old house, and while we’re all still adjusting, there’s a significant uptick in random board game nights, jigsaw puzzle solving, and deciding on a whim to making a truly staggering amount of boxed mac & cheese. 

This year saw Elliott graduate from St Peter’s Prep and start this fall at Temple University in Philadelphia. In typical Ellliott fashion, he made multiple spreadsheets of colleges across the country–their acceptance rates, strongest majors, scholarship opportunities–-as well as maps for visitations. It’s no surprise that after all of that, he is thriving at Temple and loving the college experience. 

Waylon finished his junior year of highschool and also completed the rank of Eagle Scout! This is the culmination of over 10 years in scouts, and we couldn’t be more proud. Waylon also worked as a lifeguard at a Boy Scout camp this summer–our first experience with him having a job that kept him away six days a week. Now he’s enjoying his senior year and trying to decide what’s next (with decidedly fewer spreadsheets).

Oliver is flourishish at High Tech High School where he’s focused on Media/Digital Arts. He’s been using the skills he’s developed to help Christie create digital marketing for her studio!

Oliver continues to be effortlessly good at pretty much everything he tries (basketball, drums, flag football, crushing us all in Parcheesi), and we’re delighted that he’s getting an engaging education.

In the spring a miracle occurred: despite all three of our boys being in three different high schools, all of their spring breaks lined up! On top of that, Christie’s lined up as well!

Knowing that this was the last year where we’d have all the boys at home, we decided to capitalize on this and travel abroad together. We spent ten days going from London to Paris to Lyon to Barcelona. 

Highlights: an FA Cup game in Wembley Stadium, riding e-scooters around Paris, a beautiful beach day in Barcelona, and one incredible meal after another. 

It was a wonderful vacation and we came away (mostly) impressed at how well we all traveled together (note for future: don’t all get hangry at the same time).

Christie’s year was particularly full! After over a decade, she decided to close Hamilton Health and Fitness to better focus on Project Pilates and her graduate studies in acupuncture and Chinese Herbal Medicine. She also felt that this was a great time to breathe new life into the pilates studio–which celebrated 16 years in Jersey City! This summer she moved the studio to a new, larger location in the heart of downtown. Her plan worked (no, surprise) and the studio is busier than ever with old and new clientele.  Her school work continues to be both grueling and totally invigorating. She is loving learning so many new things and also very, very sleepy.

Henry celebrated 10 years of working with Google this year. And also ended a four-year term as warden of his church’s vestry. While we had always assumed that Waylon making Eagle Scout would mean that Henry would be less involved in scouting, however he seems to be easily baited into participation with the promise of long hikes or uncomfortable sleeping conditions. 

While Elliott was preparing for his freshman year, Henry, Christie, Oliver, and Waylon traveled to Texas and got to meet baby Dawson as well as help Henry’s mom, Sue, get settled into her new apartment. This was the first time that Oliver got to meet Henry and Waylon’s extended family (and his first trip to Dallas!). Bonus: Jordan finally had people to play video games with. It was a truly wonderful trip that involved a lot (like a lot, a lot) of Mexican food.

Likewise, we all continue to enjoy and appreciate having Fran so near by. It makes for easy impromptu dinners and fun weekend getaways. Most recently, Henry and Christie took Fran for a weekend in Philly. Highlights: getting to see Elliott on campus, a Willie Nelson concert (super fun!), and singing/dancing/drinking bus tour of the city. 

Having successfully lived and traveled together, we decided to put our relationship to the test this fall and do a kitchen renovation. We all agree that it was the most wonderful thing that we never want to do again. 

Waylon’s birthday always coincides with New York ComicCon, which has historically involved Henry and Waylon crafting elaborate costumes based on obscure comics or Japanese animation. This year, Christie and Oliver joined in which brought the whole experience to a new level! Turns out that rolling in 4-deep in character from super popular anime (and 6-deep when we ran into our friends George and Megan, who cosplayed from the same anime!!) pretty much steals the show. We felt like celebrities! Pro-tip: if you’re going to have four people trying to work on costuming and make-up, you should do it during a kitchen renovation–it really doubles down on the whole chaos vibe). 

The year wrapped up by Henry making good on his promise to reschedule the 50th birthday party that Covid canceled in 2021. Everyone knew they were coming to a birthday party, a few knew that they were coming to an engagement party. When Christie declined Henry’s offer to go get a manicure before his party claiming “We don’t have time!” he knew she had no idea what was coming. Turns out the lack of a manicure did nothing to dampen the mood. We’re all pleased to report that she said yes. (no, there’s not a date yet–but keep an eye on this space).