Dear Friends & Family,
Merry Christmas! We’re excited to share with you all that has been happening with us this past year. Our 2009 may best be summed up with just one word: CHANGE
In January, we were thrilled to be able to experience our country’s big change of inaugurating our new president and first African American to the Oval Office. Despite our political differences, we were both excited to be working in the media in Washington, DC that day to experience the historic moment firsthand. We not only saved pictures of us working, but Travis kept a copy of the Jan 20th Washington Post for our scrapbook and Mindy has great memories of sleeping on the floor of FOX News the night before to avoid the traffic!
This past spring, we experienced perhaps our biggest life ‘change’ when Travis was laid off from his Executive Producer position with Tribune Broadcasting. He was given just two weeks notice before his entire bureau was closed down. The next month, Mindy was also told the NBC affiliate in Baltimore would no longer be using her to report because they were eliminating all freelance positions to cut costs. We were both able to continue freelancing elsewhere (Mindy at FOX News and Travis at CBS News), but with so many of our friends & co-workers also losing their jobs our hopes of finding full-time job opportunities in media were quickly drying up.
That brings us to Easter, when Travis’ dad was experiencing his own life change and turning 70! We decided to make the trip to Dallas to celebrate but decided to fly thru OKC because flights just happened to be cheaper. Before we left, Travis saw a full-time job opening online at the CBS affiliate in OKC and decided to try to set up an interview (hoping to use it as a tax write off!) Long story short….he got offered the job. (He is now the Executive Producer of sports at the CBS affiliate in OKC!)
That brings us to another big change: Moving! Although we both LOVED living in Annapolis and near DC, we had prayed for months that the Lord would open and close doors. It was tough to leave, but we knew we couldn’t turn down a full-time job opportunity that was also conveniently close to family (Mindy’s parents & Aunt Di live in OK, Travis’ family is 3 hours away in Dallas).
This summer, we changed gears a bit and detoured from our road trip to Oklahoma to go to Hawaii! Mindy’s parents were spending the month in a timeshare on the island of Kona and invited us to join them. A week on the beach definitely cheered us up after a rough couple months of unemployment!
Meantime, Mindy’s sister Meg had her own life change…when her family changed from a family of 4 to 5! Corban Wallace was born June 18th and Mindy got to spend a week in Albuquerque for the birth of her new nephew.
Also in June, Mindy’s summer plans dramatically changed when FOX News suddenly called to see if she could fly to Los Angeles to cover the death of Michael Jackson. For nearly, two weeks Mindy reported for FOX affiliates across the country and did more than 260 live-shots (almost a year’s worth of reports!) from The Staples Center, Los Olivos and Michael Jackson’s Neverland Ranch.
July brought a great change---Mindy’s brother, Matt, changed his Facebook status from single to married! We love having Asthen Mizell as our new sister-in-law and we especially loved spending a week in Cancun, Mexico to see them get married!
By August, we made a fun transition…from living in a 1-bedroom apartment in Annapolis to buying our first home, a 3-bedroom house, in Edmond, OK. Our home has brought a lot of changes: we’ve been painting and this summer we hope to landscape! It did take us a few weeks to adjust to living in so much more space!
And In September, Mindy changed jobs when she was named the Web reporter/anchor at Travis’ same station. Our jobs have also brought some major changes to our schedule: Mindy works early mornings, Travis works weekends/nights…but we both feel very blessed to have switched from unemployed to employed.
We’ve also changed churches …from the Naval Academy Chapel in Annapolis to Crossings Community Church in Edmond with Mindy’s parents….and we have a great Bible study group we now meet with every Monday night.
And we changed our family dynamic…from a family of 2 to 3! Not with children….we got a puppy. Our new miniature schnauzer, Brinkley, is named after the old Huntley-Brinkley news program that featured David Brinkley anchoring from DC.
This December, we hope to change Travis from being a non-skier to a skier, and Mindy hopes to use 2010 to switch from being a retired runner to a half marathoner!
As you can tell, some changes we experienced were better than others, but as the Lord promised, “all things work together for the good of those who love Him.”
Happy New Year!
Love,
The Galeys
