It's Finally February

Hey Michael—

You sent such a great letter this week! I can tell you are working so hard and learning a lot. I hope everything went smoothly for Tony’s baptism. It sounds like you’ve got some good opportunities to teach new friends. Hopefully things settle down so you can go bak to in-person church and teaching. The snow storm looked absolutely amazing. I’m guessing that must have been exciting for your companion from Arizona. I think if you hadn’t been serving a mission, you would have been the one being pulled through the street on skis! Your hot pot meal sounded really good, though I think I would have taken a pass on the octopus! In my mind I was picturing small chunks of octopus meat. But your picture looked like you were eating an entire tiny octopus! Wow! You are adventurous. I’m always so surprised to hear when you are invited into people’s homes and they feed you amazing meals. How generous. 

Well we haven’t had a very eventful week. Here’s what’s up:

1. Your dad has been working hard putting together travel itineraries for our Spring Break trip to New York and our Rawson family trip to San Diego.  We are really excited about both trips.

2. Ben Halladay flew out to El Salvador last week. 3:30 am airport drop-off!

3. Ty and Max bought a pallet of salt pellets and went door-to-door selling this week.

4.  We taught the kids to play Cities and Knights, and now Ethan is dying to play again. Not sure we will ever be able to talk Blake into playing again.

5. I called and talked to my Grandpa Bramhall this week. He seems to be doing really well. He said he has some skin cancer on his ear with the cochlear implant. So he is going to have to have surgery to remove the cancer, and he’s worried about them removing too much of the ear and having that interfere with his implant. Janet was at the house with him when I called. Grandpa spent the Christmas holiday in Idaho with Janet. She is going to have surgery on her hip in about a month, and then it sound like Grandpa is going to move up to Idaho with Janet. I’m really glad they are able to keep each other company and take care of each other right now. Grandpa is very concerned about my aunt Karen who has been diagnosed with multiple myeloma. They are still running tests to figure out the best course of treatment for her. But she is starting to feel some fatigue and it’s important for her to avoid getting covid.

6. My guess is your Dad won’t tell you this, but he found out he was the most profitable attorney at the firm last year—by far. He’s very good at what he does, and is very valuable to his firm.  

7. I’ve got some terrible news for you. Maddy and Matthew have divorced. It was all very sudden, and I can’t explain it. They were scheduled at the end of January to sign papers to purchase their house in Bountiful, and that morning Matthew left the house and wouldn’t return Maddy’s messages. He left a note saying that he couldn’t go through with the purchase of the house. A few days later he was filing for divorce. Maddy is devastated. She said they never fought about anything, and had no idea that Matthew was unhappy with the relationship. He was unwilling to try to talk through it or do any counseling. It’s crazy. That’s all I can say about it. This is doubly hard for Maddy because her entire social circle revolves around Matthew’s family and his band, so she feels very alone. The lease on her apartment is up at the end of the month, so I think she may try to get an apartment with her friend Bronte. Please keep her in your prayers.

8. The kiddos had a good week. Blake had basketball yesterday. His back is hurting a bit—probably from weight lifting. He’s reading a ton, and LOVING piano ;) Ethan had some good ball games, but jammed his finger. Jett is playing goalie for his indoor soccer team, and wanted me to tell you that one of his teammates is moving. He really wants to take karate. Jett has made friends with a boy named Andrew from school and is spreading a lot of time with him. Tate is loving preschool and playgroup. He has such an intense personality. He pretty much only eats milk. Like, he hates actual food. He is so fun though. Says the funniest things, and has a really strong vocabulary. 

9. Dad and I are in discussions about changing up storage solutions in the garage. Extremely exciting stuff. 

10. We are watching the winter Olympics tonight. Ty is geeking out over the ski jump competition. 

I taught my Sunday School class again today. Another disaster. It actually went way better than last time, but the kids were still so out of control. I’m going to have to get creative. Maybe duct tape?  Lol. Seriously, it’s bad. The lesson today was about Noah’s ark and we learned all kinds of fun trivia about the story. One thing I had never really thought about with this story was that the Lord destroyed the wicked—it was necessary to cleanse the earth after total corruption. But this is also a story of mercy—preserving the righteous and giving the earth a rebirth. The Lord preserved Noah because Noah “hearkened” to the Lord. This goes along with what you wrote about last week—being born of God and turning our will over to the Lord. It’s not something that is easy to do. And the symbol of a rainbow after the storm is such a great metaphor. We all will go through storms in our lives. But the storms don’t last forever. And the Lord gives us light and beauty to remind us of his love and promises. 

I hope you had a great week. We love and miss you and look forward to your letter and calls.

Love, Mom