Terry, better known to us as T.J., was born in 1984.

He is now 16 years old, and a really great kid. He has been in the Boy Scouts since he was in the second grade. He has always enjoyed it, and now he likes it even more because he goes camping for weekends in the fall, winter and spring, and in the summer for a full week. He spent 2 and a half weeks in France when he was 14. That was a once in a lifetime opportunity we could not pass up. We hosted a french student that April for 2 weeks, and T.J. was invited to stay with that boy's family through the exchange program. In all, we have hosted 3 french students and each boy was so polite and well-mannered.

Below is T.J., and Henri in France

I suppose T.J.'s biggest passion right now is his car. Well, he actually has 2 cars. He has a 1981 Camaro he bought when he was 15 and was working on. (That's it over there on the boarder LOL) Now it sits in the back yard. Steve and I gave him a 1983 Camaro for Christmas this year. It also needs work. He takes Auto Tech at Tech school in the afternoons. He just loves to tinker with the cars... but I think he likes driving better LOL

His next greatest passion is the firehouse. He is a junior firefighter. He really seems to have taken an interest in this. I think it started out as a "cool place" to hang out, but now he has taken classes, and every week he has training. We live close enough to the firehouse that he just runs when the whistle goes off. He is always wanting to modify his car for the firehouse. He has a blue light on top, he has done something to the headlights so they blink back and forth... I drew the line at adding a siren! LOL

Another passion for T.J. is hunting with his dad. The year he turned 14 was the first year I allowed him to do this. Being raised so close to a very large city, hunting was pretty foreign to me and I had a hard time understanding why he wanted to do this so badly. I was afraid he would be upset about killing animals, and I was afraid for his safety. This would be something I had no control over (even though his father was with him, it was still hard for me). He is old enough to make this decision for himself and it is something he and his father do together. The bond they are building with eachother will last a lifetime (I hope) and it warms my heart to see that part of their relationship.

I was looking around the internet for web page graphics I could use for this page, but I couldn't find any camaro ones and I couldn't find any firetruck ones (ones that weren't too babyish anyway) so I had to make my own. What do ya think? LOL