December Family of the Month

We received an unexpected surprise from the daycare yesterday. We apparently have been selected as the December family of the month. They like to select and spotlight one family every month, to let everyone get to know them better and to show how much they appreciate them. I’m not sure of the criteria that goes into the selection process, but we were pretty surprised and honored to be selected after only three months.

As part of the process, they asked us to supply a picture and write up a bio on our family to be shared on the bulletin board and posted on Facebook. My wife asked me to write it and then gave the order that it needs to be fun, creative, and unique. Apparently, she’s decided this is a contest and we need to out-family the previous families of the month. So what follows is the bio that we submitted.

It's quite an honor to be chosen for this prestigious award. First, we'd like to thank the Academy for choosing us out of all of the worthy families out there. Second, we'd like to thank all of our fans for voting for us. We wouldn't be where we are today without your continued love and support. And lastly, we'd like to thank a laundry change machine that refused to give change, which led to our chance meeting. Without which, we might not be where we are today…here accepting this award for December Family of the Month.

So, they asked us to write up a bio. But how do you condense three life stories down into a few sentences and yet still get across who we are as people? Well, I have two words for you, "Challenge Accepted." We are the Knotts family. We have ruled a small plot of currently-brown grass in Lantana for almost five years now. The lovely queen of this small kingdom is Anastasia, as exotic in person as she is in name. Hailing from the far-off land of Greece, she came to this country for school and stayed for love. Every day, her eyes are opened by God to the wonders of the human body through her research in the Department of Pediatrics at UT Southwestern. Anyone who says, “We’re not curing cancer here, people!” is not talking about her, because that’s exactly what she’s doing. The yet-to-grow-up king of this story is Derek. He’s a native Texan through and through, and hopelessly in love with his queen. He’s definitely not curing cancer, but he’s right where God wants him to be, leading a team of consultants as he traverses the not-so-glamorous world of ERP systems. And last, but certainly not least, that brings us to our little prince, Troy. Who at nine-months old has already learned that being a prince means all of the fun with none of the responsibility! And that if mommy says, “No,” daddy will surely say, “Yes.”

But to truly know us, we must dig deeper. We’ve been married to each other three times (yes, there’s a story to this). We're suckers for a good British detective show. Yes, all three of us, although Troy is partial to “Death in Paradise,” at least the first seven minutes, which is all he can stay awake for. We love reading fantasy books. We love to travel. One of us loves to write, one loves Korean romance movies, and one loves to bounce up and down, screaming for no reason at all (I'll let you decide which is which). The parental units adamantly agree that there is no better sound in the world than our son's laughter. And we take every opportunity to make him laugh, whether that's playing "hide the daddy," "kiss the stomach," or "splish-splash in the bath." Troy is the best thing we never knew we were missing. He's changed our lives in such a way that we can't remember what it was like before him. And that's why we're so glad to have found this family of beautiful people to help us look after him. People that love him almost as much as we do. All you have to do is meet him once to see why he’s the sweet, charming, little boy that we’re completely in love with.