Letters to my Children

Hey Michael, It sounds like you have fun day planned exploring MIT and Harvard. Boston is such a neat city to be able to explore. How lucky you are! Hopefully you are having a good time learning how to use your new camera. Looks like it's still very cold. Hopefully your boots and coat and gloves are keeping you warm. Glad to hear things are going well with Alex.  I wish I could say we had exciting things happening at home, but we are just stuck in a never-ending winter, and nothing more exciting than doctor’s visits and organization projects. Sigh. 1. Tate saw one of his cousins using the toilet standing up, and now I can’t get him to sit anymore. So of course there is pee all over the toilet and floor. I came home the other day and pulled into the driveway and found him peeing on the front flower beds. I honked at him and gave him a good scare! 2. Did I tell you Tate got a haircut? I finally gave up on the long hair and let Dad cut it short again. People keep telling me he looks l...

Hey Michael,  It was fun to chat with you a bit over messenger this week. I hope you had a great time at the Boston Science museum. I bet that was a fun p-day activity. We look forward to your emails and phone calls home. I encourage you to make the time to keep up on your letters. You will be grateful to be able to look back on your letters and remember the details of your mission experience. And your grandparents and friends enjoy hearing from you as well. I hope everything is going well with the people you are teaching. Have you had any interest in your English classes yet? We have had a few days of really nice weather, and it looks like you will be having a few nice days as well. Hopefully as the weather warms up it will be easier to stop and talk to people out and about. I bet Boston will be just lovely in the spring. How is everything going with your companion? I hope you are getting along well and enjoying your time together. I think it can be very difficult to spend so much...

Hey Kiddo— How was your week? Hope you had a fantastic week and lots of success.  What’s happening here? 1. Ok. Funny story I forgot to tell you about a few weeks ago.  So I was cleaning out my car and noticed someone had stuffed garbage in the panel on the back of my driver’s seat. I just pulled a TON of wrappers and trash out of it. And then.  I pulled out your graduation tassels. And a card addressed to you. And your missing watch. It was as if someone took all of the trash from your car and stuffed it into my car. Hmm. Wonder how that could have happened? Dad told me not to send you the watch because you’ll probably just lose it again. Speaking of lost items. . . my toilet bowl scrubber and base are missing. My toilet bowl scrubber. What the heck? Nobody will admit to taking it. I also found my missing earbud. Unfortunately I found it broken to pieces after being run over by the car. Lame. Blake lost his earbuds at a house where he was babysitting on Friday. His earbu...

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 w...

Hey there— I went out of town for the weekend and got home too late to write to you on Sunday, so my letter is a bit late. It was great to talk to you on Monday and to read your letter. It sounds like you are doing really well. I'm so proud of you and the hard work you are doing. I’m so happy that you seem to be thriving and making a difference in other people’s lives.  I love looking through your pictures and seeing the different areas of the city and people you interact with. I hope everything goes well with the people you are teaching this week. What’s happening around here? 1. Parent/Teacher conferences for the little kids. Jett was the first in his class to pass off multiplication tables. He is so far advanced that his scores are nearly off the chart that they track scores on. He’s got some work to do in reading, but he reads whatever he can get his hands on, so I’m not too worried about it. Ethan got straight 3s on his report card, so they are both doing really well. 2. Ethan...

Hey Michael, Hope you are doing well! I miss your detailed emails and calls home. Hope to hear from you soon! News from home: !.  We had another slow January week.  Even slower than usual because the kids were home from school this week. The jr high and high school moved to remote learning because of high covid case counts. I decided to keep the younger kids home as well, but will probably send them back this week. The kids got new schedules for second semester. Ty needed another PE credit, so he’s taking Yoga (from the good teacher apparently). He also got into a ceramics class. Decided to drop his math class. Hopefully ACT prep will give him the math practice he needs. He will have one home release period so he can go up skiing after lunch, but will not have the entire day of home release. Blake will be taking another art class and is taking current events for the third time! I think he secretly likes talking to me about the news, but just won’t admit it! 2. Ty got some new ...

Dear Michael, it was great to talk to you on Monday. I hope you are feeling better by now. Your grandma texted me to find out if you were ok because she hasn’t seen a letter for awhile! I think today’s letter is going to be short and sweet because I can’t think of much to tell you. January can be sort of slow and uneventful, for which I am grateful. 1. Blake had a meeting with his school counselor to talk about his grades and academic track. He’s doing very well and we are pleased. Meetings like that are sort of parent payoff moments. He’s also working hard at the gym a few times a week, playing rec basketball, and logging a lot of hours on the playstation. He’s decided to grow his hair out, so we will see how that goes. 2. Ty pulled and all-nighter on Thursday studying for a test and trying to get all of his end of term assignments in.  He’s trying to juggle a lot with school and work and skiing. He’s trying to talk me into shifting half of his classes online so he can have full s...