August 13, 2009

Dear Family,

It is hard to believe that the end-of-the-summer trip to Las Vegas that I planned many months ago is this week! Dad and I leave this Friday and then planned to return on Tuesday night. He will still come back home since he is in the middle of a job. Plans changed last week for me when Carol Stanger begged me to go to Education Week with her at the last minute. After a bunch of rearranging, I will drive up with Adrianne when she drives her car to Utah (Tuesday morning) and then stay at Grandma and Grandpa Bitter’s along with Carol. Adrianne leaves from Utah to have a visit in Portland on Wednesday. I told her since I don’t get back now until Saturday morning, she would need to do all her horse visiting while I was still in Utah. Katie also leaves Utah for Los Angeles on Wednesday. It sounds like the last minute rush of vacations before school starts.

I have enjoyed this summer; it has reminded me of the kind of summers I had growing up in California. And with all this heat, my garden has really been amazing. Dad and I have enjoyed several meals with corn on the cob from the garden. The green beans need some attention before I leave town as do the beets (but they may not get it). Friday is coming so fast and I have promised to help with Lorraine Floyd’s wedding flowers. She is having finger jello at her reception; doesn’t that sound just like her? I just made all of that tonight. Suzie Ludlow also is getting married this weekend; Dad and I will miss that. At Suzie’s shower the other night I told Becky that I have been out of town for the last two Ludlow weddings so if she wanted to guarantee us being at her wedding, she might have to marry one of my boys! The only thing I am doing for Suzie is having her fiancé’s family stay at our home while we are gone. That is a little weird but it works.

With all the sunshine and heat, it was quite a shocker to sit at an outdoor concert Tuesday night in Carolwood Park with our umbrella. It rained lightly most of the day on Tuesday and again Wednesday. I can’t complain about the rain; it helps me water Ramona’s yard. They believe that they have a buyer. I hope it closes soon! Chris Jones announced his engagement; he is getting married October 6 I believe in the Timpanogas Temple. I liked the girl; he introduced Dad and me to her when his parents spoke in sacrament meeting before they left. They will get to come back for two weeks for the wedding. Chris is not having anything in Beaverton.

Heidi and Bill had a great family reunion with the Sabey family in Island Park, Idaho (that is his mom’s side of the family). It is the reunion that they have talked about before that has those big Rook tournaments; that sounds so fun (Our tournament would have to be Hand and Foot; that would be a fun looking trophy)! Unfortunately though, they were rear ended their first night up there. No one was badly injured but they had a real scare. Their car is in the shop of course to repair the damage.

My week was filled with children; grandchildren and Primary children. Dad and I were released on Sunday from the Singles Ward assignment and both called into the Primary. Dad will teach the Valiant 9 class (a class that needs a strong presence) and I will be the first counselor. I am excited to be back in Primary. On our way home from Albany on Saturday evening, we stopped at the Temple’s distribution center and I picked up the Children’s Sacrament Meeting Presentation and Sharing Time Outline and Dad picked up his own mini Children’s Songbook to learn the songs. I woke up Sunday morning so excited to start studying the scripture and Church resources to teach in Primary. When in Primary before, I remember the feeling in July when the new outline would come out each year. I love the detailed direction of gospel study that it gives me. I volunteered to be the first one to take a month of teaching sharing time (in September). I hope I can get back in the swing of things!

Dad and I had a full week of fun with Meeja and Sunhee here. They love playing outside and riding bikes. Meeja’s accident last Saturday didn’t decrease her determination in the least to learn more bike riding skills. They both love to hop on a playground every chance they get. When we found out that the neighbor girls go to the elementary school for lunch each day we decided that would be a fun outing. The day we went to the zoo, we started at Vose. We peaked around the school too find where I dropped off the children sometimes for kindergarten. The second time we went to Greenway School and then stayed and played on the playground until I pried the girls away. I think Meeja would make a fun little gymnast.

Meeja was the one who really wanted to go to the zoo. She wanted to see the bird show again but, being that it was Wednesday, they were setting up equipment for the zoo concert on the lawn so they didn’t have the show. We still had fun and one of Meeja’s highlights was getting to ride a school bus from the overflow parking lot since the zoo was so full of children.

Eileen Daniel’s father passed away so I attended his funeral one morning so the girls spent the day with Grandma Maldonado. They liked that since she treated them to both Taco Bell and McDonald’s! That night we took the girls to Bridgeport to hear the concert there. And guess what, Dad and I sat on a bench by the playground so the girls could play within earshot of the band. Meeja liked the bubble machine from the concert.

I invited the Jensen girls one day to come and play. I thought they would enjoy jumping on the tramp with the sprinklers like the girls had been doing most days. But, this time, the girls mostly stayed in and, since the Jensen girls love playing make believe, Meeja and Sunhee joined in. It was nice to see them play differently. They had a blast and the Jensen girls seemed to find all my dolls around the house. They found old jewelry and all had fun prancing around it that. They had a blast just being little girls.

I was worried that nine days would be too long for the girls to be here so Dad asked Sunhee if she would rather be here for the short weekends that we normally have them. Sunhee thought for a minute and then said, “I think a month would be long enough!”

The girls saw all the dresses for South Africa that I had sorted in piles from the Girls’ Camp Humanitarian project. I had bought extra materials to make my grand daughters dresses so I asked them if they wanted me to make one. It wasn’t until the last day that they remembered about the dresses and asked me to make some. They picked out their fabrics and helped with some of the steps. Sunhee wanted to try sewing with the machine so she put in her entire hem. She was so pleased to show Kyre on Saturday afternoon when we saw her. We made a dress for Klaire so I got a picture of all them at Kyre’s house. Adam surprised us; he was there when we arrived so we got to play one last game of Uno with him before leaving.

On the way back home we stopped and visited with Scott. It is always great to see him just after having the children so he has a chance to hear about all the little details. He laughs a lot at all their personalities. He is doing well and he is making some progress (in the VERY slow process) of the chance to visit with his children someday. He is very determined and has been endowed with the Bitter patience gene. After my brush with the prison guards I decided that my personality could not survive there. He is very wise.

I finally was able to pack up all the dresses and deliver them to someone who is heading to South Africa. I hope that they get there. We sent them with one of our attic suitcases that we didn’t need to see again! The mission president’s wife has promised to send pictures of the girls with their dresses. The Young Women will love that. Speaking of the Young Women, I forgot to tell you that Robin Whitaker is the new RS president in our ward with Kathleen Westhora and Jaime Jorgensen as counselors. Jo Black is the new Primary president with me and Brittany Westhora as counselors. It is a big ward shake up and since all our Junior Primary classes are without teachers, the Primary intends to shake up Young Women. It is a domino affect!

Well, I am off to help with the wedding and then I pack for Las Vegas and Education Week. I just laugh at the things I had planned to do in my first summer with no children home; NOTHING on that list got done!!! I got the creative bug last year for Christmas so I had so many gifts planned to make . . . Ha! I love you. Enjoy these last weeks of summer! Love, Mom

August 3, 2009

Dear Children,

This week has just flown by with lots of activities. As I drove out of Beaverton on Monday with the thermometer climbing through three digits I realized that it was a PERFECT day to leave town. What a dramatic difference; the coast was gorgeous. It was crystal clear most of the time we were there with temperatures in the 70s and 80s. We also had an excellent room location. I remember not liking the Depot Bay place since you can’t walk to the beach but I can’t wait to go back. While there, I realized that it is a perfect place to take out bikes since Depot Bay is so close. I love watching the fishing boats coming in and filleting their catch so I could easily ride to the beach early in the morning if I had my bike.

Our room was on the cove side so I was kind of disappointed to hear that until we got there. We had a spectacular view of both the cove and the ocean. We saw whales most days and sometimes whales can be spotted in the cove (not this time though). We were on the ground floor so we could walk out of our room onto the grass. We ate our breakfast on the sunny grass one morning. We chose to swim in the pool that overlooked the ocean; it was great. When we weren’t swimming, we were playing games or visiting Depot Bay. We visited the whale watching station and learned more about whales. Grandma and I also went to a class about whales at our place given by a marine biologist. It was quite interesting. On the night of Grandma’s birthday we had dinner at Tidal Raves. It is always a great meal there and the view was spectacular.

The day after we returned from the beach, Aunt Denise left and I prepared for a visit from Adam, Meeja and Sunhee starting Friday. I was able to visit with Scott on my way down to pick up the girls in Albany. We had a very nice visit but I made the mistake (something that I have obviously done wrong hundreds of times without knowing it was wrong!) of carrying a paper out of the visiting room. I always take notes as to the things Scott requests me to do (otherwise I would forget some of the things). I write names with a letter in a circle just like I used to do on the family calendar: it is fast and helps me know the letter is a name and not part of a word. Scott also drew a diagram of the prison on the back of my paper to give me a visual of where he works showing the reason why it takes so long for him to come to the visiting room since he passes through several rooms and guard stations and he is held up when there is a movement through one of the rooms. As I walked out of the visiting room, I reached into my coin bag for the key to my locker and put the paper in the bag. One of the heretofore borderline nice guards asked me what I was putting in the bag and had it been signed off by the sergeant. I didn’t know it needed to; there is no rule posted about that. She grabbed it and asked me what it was. She was so angry as if I was trying to sneak something out of the prison. She didn’t believe me at all of course since, in our Oregon justice system, they have forgotten that simple foundation of being innocent until proven guilty (and we are quite often treated like criminals when we visit all the while the system professes to realize the importance of visitation). I told her she could keep it if I could reread my notes to remember what Scott asked me to do for him. She mumbled something about her being able to confiscate my belongings. She called me over to the main desk when I was getting my car key out of the locker and told me that this “sort of thing” is what could “land me in handcuffs and in a patrol car on my way to the courthouse” and "my son shipped off to a different location.". It was hard to wrap my brain around the intimation tactics being hurled my way. Then the officer at the desk told me he had been “professionally trained in code” and that my paper was full of “code” from my son. Again, he didn’t bat an eye when the truth was made known that Scott didn’t write a word of it and all it was a “to do list”. I should have engaged him in the whole history of trying to cram ten family member’s schedules on one little refrigerator calendar and that is where I “professionally” learned code I guess! It is all such a ridiculous nightmare to step into the prison system of our free country. And all the time I am thinking, “Don’t you dare cause me to be late picking up the girls and cause problems with the unreasonable Lane family!” I felt like I was in a sandwich from hell with both sides pushing me into a Neverland of utter madness. Hmm, maybe that is how Scott feels every moment in there. After they got their fix of bullying they let me go while saying “no worries”. So I turned to them on my way out and said, “No worries; you have got to be kidding me!”

So, a little rattled, I hurried to Kyre’s home where it was the plan for all of us to meet there. They enjoyed playing with Klaire so much that we decided to stay for several hours so the girls could swim in her little turtle pool and Adam and Sunhee played with water balloons. It changed my plans for the evening but they all loved the extra time at Kyre’s place.

Saturday was our annual neighbor hood party with a pot luck, bouncy house and triathlon for the children. Before it got too hot everyone helped picked blueberries and green beans then proceeded to jump on the tramp with the sprinkler under it until the very last minute before the party started. Adam, Sunhee and Meeja played well with all the neighbor children (half of them are in our ward amazingly). The Jorgensen’s put a pool on their front lawn and that is where everyone spent most of their time. Sunhee and Adam entered the triathlon but Sunhee had to use the bike we have for Meeja since the bike we have for her had an irreparable flat tire. We would have stayed longer just relaxing at the Jorgensen’s but Meeja crashed her bike right on that hill by their house. It actually is a miracle she hasn’t done more damage to her body before this. She is determined to perfect her biking skills no matter how many falls she has. This time, though, her fall involved the sidewalk meeting her upper lip so she needed lots of clean up and some down time (although she did not take much down time). She was hoping to get back under the sprinkler when Adam and Sunhee put it on the slide later on but I decided her lip needed time away from the waterslide!

Adam wanted to complete some of his Webelos requirements so we cooked our dinner in Dad’s firebowl. We sat around cooking biscuits and roasting marshmallows just as if we were camping. Dad and Adam set up a tent and slept in it even though it was still VERY warm late at night. Sunhee reminded me that besides Meeja, she also got hurt on Saturday. She slid down the slide onto a bee and it stung her foot! The entire stinger was in tact in her foot; it looked like a thorn. Adam joined the pain cycle when he came down the slide too fast and hurt himself!

Sunday was a game playing day. Sunhee left her Clue Game last time that we bought for her birthday so we had some fun with that also. With the grandchildren here, we had a good excuse to go to the home ward which is so nice since it is now just minutes away. We learned all the new classrooms and they all had someone they knew in their classes. Grandma Maldonado came over for our shrimp pasta dinner; it was also a great excuse to use my homemade berry pie that I was saving in the freezer. We played games right up until the minute that Adam left to go home.

President Harris was at our ward and he spoke at the end of the meeting. He left us with a quote by Joseph Smith that was something like this: “Everyone is plagued with weaknesses. It is the progress that makes us perfect, not the achievements.”

Adrianne reported that she had a great weekend being able to see some old school friends at her roommate, Rachel’s, wedding in the Bay Area and especially being able to play with Shawn and Aubrey. I think this is the first chance for her to see Bryson. Aubrey invited her to come along on two Nike runs that will help Aubrey qualify for a half marathon in the fall. She received extra points since she showed up with Adrianne’s Nike shoes. On one of the runs they jogged nine miles from the Golden Gate bridge, along the Embarcadero to the Bay Bridge and back! Without Adrianne in Las Vegas this weekend making her homemade goodies, Aaron got a craving for cinnamon pull aparts. He called me after midnight, on his way home from work, for the recipe!

Katie tells me that Nate was in the news, the front page of the Deseret News Sports Page! Here is a link so you can see it: http://www.deseretnews.com/sports/byu-cougars/ I wonder it that was the Seattle game that I went to with him last fall?

I hope you are enjoying this great summer weather also. My garden has never grown so much with all this hot weather; it feels like the kind of summer I had growing up in California. I am going to get my bathing suit on and go jump in the sprinkler with Sunhee and Meeja. I love you, Mom