The Mischnick Family: December 2022

Time for the Mischnick updates from the 2022 calendar year!

Ethan finished his third grade year at Waubesa Intermediate School in June and slid into 4th grade with ease. His top school activities include socializing with friends and interacting with technology. His attention is also sometimes directed towards academic pursuits, when they pique his interests. At varying times throughout the year, he has become absorbed with books, math puzzles, art projects, and creative writing.

Outside of school, Ethan has a diverse scope of passions. This year he has enjoyed neighborhood friendships, piano lessons, mountain biking club, basketball camp, Nerf gun battles, tinkering with Matt, legos, complex paper airplanes, model rockets, creating his own board game, and beginning to learn Python coding language with Sara (as part of an online course in which they enrolled over the summer). Ethan also participated in the Dane County Fair in 2022, showing an original piano piece he composed, a small engine display, and a model rocket.

Kate is working her way through her final year at Indian Mound Middle School and is more than ready to embark on the adventures of high school next fall. Unlike a number of middle school students, Kate enjoys learning much of the academics her school has to offer. The learning highlights of 2022 (based on the extra work she chooses to do and the dinner conversations she initiates) include 7th grade Social Studies, 8th grade science, Foods, Art class, and a couple of online writing courses she was eligible to take.

In addition to participating in cross country as an 8th grader this fall, Kate joined the track team in the spring, choosing to run the 400 and 800 meter races, and the 4 x 400 meter relay. We have enjoyed watching Kate set personal goals with her running and work diligently to meet those goals. Outside of sports, 7th grade included participation in Destination Imagination for Kate and a few of her classmates, culminating in a 3rd place state-level ranking in their division. Kate is continuing to take viola lessons, and spends plenty of her free time writing. Thankfully, much of this writing has a purpose at school this winter.

Kate showed a number of projects at the Dane County Fair this summer, including written pieces, artwork, and her first time showing live animals. Blue, the chicken, weathered the experience well, as did Kate.

Anna is remembered each day in our home, but more notably during the significant milestones of the calendar year. We find comfort in visiting Anna’s bench (more often in the summer with ice cream in hand or during a bike ride around the lake) and talking about the things that remind us of her.

Sara has continued to find value in her half-time position as the resource teacher for advanced learners at the local K-2 elementary school. She enjoys her students, her co-workers, her lessons, and how she can enrich the school environment in a variety of ways. A half-time position suits Sara well, with the other responsibilities she has chosen to undertake. In addition to leading the local 4-H club, she has also stepped in to help lead the confirmation program at church after the retirement of our church’s long-time Family Ministries Coordinator, until a suitable replacement can be found.

Sara still finds joy and fulfillment in growing plenty of tasty things to eat, although those pursuits do not have the same priority as they once did. This year’s produce bounty was dominated by apples, beans, and potatoes, with a lesser showing from the peaches, pears, and peapods, and a downright pitiful showing from the cucumbers and squashes. The sweet potatoes would have been in the first category, if it weren't for all of the varmints that nibbled the tubers before they could be harvested.

Matt celebrated his 3rd year anniversary of working at Trek in December. The COVID bike boom lasted well into 2022, but has started to subside in the later months of the year. This waning boom was reflected in Matt’s work-related travel, which included a number of trips (to California, Texas, Colorado, and California again) in the first half of the year and zero work-related travel since June. He enjoys the ability to identify, test, and diagnose different issues that arise in the field; he also loves being able to design parts that can be put into production and used in the field (which all happen on a much faster timeline than at either of his previous engineering jobs).

Outside of work, Matt is still a garage-tinker, an avid (though not competitive) mountain biker, movie watcher, and homebody who likes hanging out with his family. He finds ways to do a variety of projects with both Kate and Ethan, from partitioning off a section of the chicken pen with Kate to protect her “show chickens” for next year’s fair to working with Ethan to repair a variety of things that need maintenance around the house. Matt also trained and participated in the Trek 100 again this summer in memory of Anna. This was the first year since he began that the ride was in person!

Our family managed a handful of memorable trips this year, including: a Spring Break adventure to northern Virginia and Washington, D.C.; traveling up to Augusta in April and July to visit family; a weekend trip to South Dakota in May to witness the oldest nephew’s graduation from high school; a trip to Colorado to celebrate Sara’s parents’ 50th wedding anniversary; a few weekend camping trips in the summer; and a handful of day trips to surrounding locations throughout the year.

Life has a different pace to it for us than it has had in the past, but our focus remains the same.

Faith, Family, Love