Letter from the Knapens

I received the year end letter from JW's mother - Anne Marie. Would like to share with you.

There are a whole bunch of nice garphics. I will try to load them later.


Dear all,

2006... A year filled with “for the first times”... For the first time towards, for the first time without, for the first time with, for the first time from, for the first time through, for the first time for, for the first time against, for the first time on top, for the first time under... Nothing but firsts...
Our girls went to Middle School (sixth grade) for the first time and Alexander to first grade...
All three of our earthy children got their first taste of tennis (and they loved it!); Alexander finally got permission to attend his first real drum lesson (how exciting!); Helena and Elisabeth performed in their first piano recital with their wonderful teacher, Melissa Lin.
For the very first time in years, we were able to visit our family and friends in Belgium and for the first time, we traveled with new friends (Dr. Wong, Vicky, Wijan, and Nancy) – and that was fun! We enjoyed a first family trip without the physical presence of JW...
We are still working hard towards the big day of the groundbreaking of JW House; we’re so grateful and happy that we were able to reach and break through the one million dollar barrier and still, we feel thankful and thrilled to so see our piggybank getting fatter...
Jan-Willem became our first Knapen-child to graduate from high school and the first Belgian citizen ever to receive the most precious space and a beautiful tree on Bellarmine’s campus.
For the first time in our lives, we learned what real true Love means --- and pain --- and ups --- and-no-way-around downs since from now on, we would never be able again to physically touch, hug, or kiss Jan-Willem – or to simply scratch his back, his arms, or his legs...
And in between all these firsts, we learned to see, hear, feel, taste, and smell Happiness and to cherish it. Happiness... In every sunflower, in every seed... and in every heavenly dancing butterfly... We learned to share tears of sincere thankfulness and pain and to bear them together; we learned to discover the beauty of Life. We learned more than ever before to live Life like JW did and we managed in a spontaneous way to keep our dear brother and son involved in our daily concerns and rhythm...
I can honestly say that life kept on laughing in our hearts and souls and that we were able to seize each new morning. Sometimes, we felt desperate and in tears but we always managed to end up smiling. Despite everything. We want to thank you for your support at any moment! We want to thank each other and most certainly, we want to thank the Lord! --- We definitely want to thank our angel JW, for taking care of us, day and night, and for reminding us how one can also do it, how one can make things work better...
We love you all; we love each other; we love the gift of Life and Memories!
Last but not least: we profoundly want to thank you for every effort you contribute towards the realization of JW’s dream! Together, we can do it; we will Never Ever Give Up!!!

We wish you Love and Peace in your hearts and on Earth!
Merry Christmas! Have a wonderful year 2007!

Geert and Anne Marie,
Helena and Elisabeth,
Alexander and Jan-Willem who lives in us forever now

On January 7th at 6pm,
we will remember and celebrate
the beauty and the gift of JW’s life
and his wonderful Dream, the JW House…
Church of the Jesuits
Waversebaan 220, 3001 Heverlee, BelgiumEverybody is welcome!

Advisory Board Meeting 12/13/06

I walked in the meeting without a specific agenda. When I walked out of the meeting, I felt we had a good meeting.

Mary Ann, Sue, Bev from Kasier were there. Barbara, Anne Marie, Vicky and myself were there from the JW House.

Mary Ann and Sue started by giving us lead to different people or organization that may have an interest to help build the JW House.

We discussed the preliminary bid that came in from the builder. Barbara reported that with the upcoming meetings with the builder, more serious discussion on the cost of building will come.

We begin a discussion on the future of the JW House. Now most likely we will have the house. What follows would be programing and future on going funding of the JW House.

We have a preliminary budget but how can we ensure a continue stream of money in support of the continue running of the house?

We agree to continue this discussion in our next meeting.

First Frost at the JW Friendship garden

Some one donated a tree for the garden. Its is domant now. Now the frost has come. I do not know how long the flowers can last.

3rd Annual JW House Music and Family Festival

We had a wonderful event. More pictures are posted at: http://fcaw.smugmug.com/gallery/2259511

Lets start from the beginning. We started out by recruiting our committee. We ened up with Debbie, April, Ann, Ann Marie, Vicky and myself. We met at least once a month about six months before the event. Later it was more like every two weeks.
Kaiser was kind enough to allow us to use the Conference room for our event. We then begin to recruit performers.
KJ, Alum Rock Christian Church Worship team with Arden as our contact, the Candy Cane Gang, Santa Clara Kaiser Choir, Alison and Megan, Helena and Elisabeth and St. Martin of Tours Music Group all decided to help.
Vicky had the great idea for the Candy Cane Gang draw pictures for the Twelve Days of Christmas. You can see them in my photo album.
April heads up the festival part. She design games which are simple but with much fund. One of the projects kids did was to use hand prints to make out a christmas tree.
She also was responsible for decoration and work with the volunteers. She did not have much sleep when she tried to finish with decoration just before the event.
Ann was responsible for gift drawing and she spents hours designing and making a fishing game booth.
On the day of the event we were there early, trying to decorate and get organized.
Kaiser volunteer brought in a lot of cookies. They came through every time for us.
Guest begin to arrive. Marc - our volunteer MC began with his jokes and kept the event going.
KJ was awesome. He was followed by beautiful music made by the Alum Rock Church.
Of course I love the Candy Cane Gang's performance. The Kaiser Choir was responsible to set up the whole sound stage. Thanks Don. Alison and Megan were great flute players. Helena and Elisabeth sang the beautiful - the gift goes on. St. Martin of Tours Music Group sang a few traditional christmas song as Santa appeared miraculously.
Anne Marie brought out the new JW House update. That was the high light of the day.
One glich was that we could not find the coffee that we had prepared. Luckily, Pediatrics departemt came to the rescue. We had coffee for those who wanted it.
Our festival follows where kids can play different games. There are Holiday Tattos, Merry Christmouse, JW Hugs & Kisses, Angel in My Pcoket, Pretzel Wreath, Candy Cane Lane, Photos with Santa, Video Tennis Anyone?, Trim-a-Tree Hand in Hand. Many voluteer help to put this on, thanks to every one.
We ended with a gift drawing. Kids were allow to help draw out winning tickets. That was fun.
We ended about 5 pm. After every one was gone, the committee came together again. Clean up time took a little over one and a half hour.
We then retired home. The event was set to get every one together and enjoy what JW enjoy most. We accomplished that. Thank you April, Ann, Vicky, Geert, Anne Marie and all the kids.

Other pictures can be found at: http://fcaw.smugmug.com/gallery/2205110