I should have set a New Year’s resolution to not get behind on my family news but I didn’t set any New Year goals at all yet! That’s terrible; Dad and I need to have a Family Home Evening about goals since I know, “A goal not written down is just a wish.” Remember the times we had you write your goals down and put them into an envelope to be opened the following year? I remembered one of you saying when you opened it a year later, “Those aren’t my goals; that is not my writing” since your penmanship had changed so drastically in one year!
We had a fun holiday break. I would say that we played games more this holiday than ever before. It seems if we weren’t doing something else, someone would say, "Let’s play a game” and we would. Everyone received a Monopoly Card game in their stocking and everyone enjoyed learning that game. It is way more fun than Monopoly and of cours3e, MUCH shorter! You can be winning in one moment and be wiped out the next. We first played the game at the Daniels one evening in the fall and I liked it so much I bought several when they were on sale on Black Friday!
Of the travelers, Morty came first. I t
hink he does that so he has his pick of rooms! He slept in his favorite bed until the day before Blake and Adrianne arrived so we could change the sheets on a day other than Christmas since the Bladrianne came Christmas night. Aaron and Nate came on the morning of Christmas Eve so we promptly headed to the Mitchell’s home directly from the airport to take them their treat and make our annual home visit that we saved until more of the family was here to enjoy. Blake and Adrianne came in on the last flight Christmas night so they could spend Christmas with Blake’s family in Utah (all of his siblings live in Utah now). It was Shawn and Aubrey’s year in California and Heidi and Bill’s family went to Disneyland. Yes, their gift to the family was a surprise trip to Disneyland!
I always like our Christmas Eve dinner to be early in the evening so we can have our Christmas Eve program, open our traditional one gift and then have an earlier bedtime so Santa can come. Well, right before dinner someone suggested to watch a movie and we thought, “What the heck?” and we did. That was kind of different but fun. Dinner was delayed so much that I think Katie got there before we were completely done (she had to work late Christmas Eve so we didn’t expect her to be able to join us).
My favorite part of the holidays was on Christmas Eve when everyone had a part in the program and Nate chose to play a Christmas song on the violin. Well, I think he was quite surprised by how many songs he could remember. He played several and it was SO enjoyable to watch him. Another significant piece of the program was Katie’s choice to read an email that Heidi had just sent to everyone announcing 
that they are expecting a baby on July 31! Everyone was so happy to get that news. They told us that they want to be surprised if it is a boy or girl so they are not going to let the doctor tell them this time.
We had a relaxed Christmas morning, went to church and then had our traditional prime rib dinner. We left some of our presents under the tree until Adrianne and Blake arrived. Santa had left them some presents and we watched them open their gifts and received their gifts to family members at that time.
Having prime rib during the holidays allows us to have hash while Nate is home. We h
ad an early hash dinner on Monday since some of the family was going to the Blazer game that night. We all went to the Blazer game on Tuesday night since Morty bought cheap tickets for us to go see Jimmer play. That was a fun adventure.
While Nate was home, he gave me some good advice and ideas for a Facebook page for my SendOutCards business and then Aaron took over helping me finalize it and got a blog for the business started for me. Plus, Aaron helped me clean up some of the email problems I have. I would love it if all of you would go “like” my Facebook page, Cards by Lori Bitter and then you will be aware of when I post something o
n my blog. My blog will be sharing ideas about sending greeting cards and how I use my SendOutCards service. I appreciate that my children help me stretch and learn some new technology. I have felt on overload a couple of times with what I am trying to learn. Aaron finished all the fixing of my email problems just the day before he had to leave, so there has been some possible “user errors” without him being here to tutor me. He had to walk me through disabling the sync of my lap top and computer saying that our computer just didn’t seem to have that capacity with the old technology in it. Old? It doesn’t seem old to me! At least my email is working again. My computer since doesn’t like my camera so the process of getting photos into my computer is very SLOW, going through my laptop firs and then emailing small batches over; yuck! I spent many, many hours finally getting all my photos into the computer for the last couple of months. Now I need to get them to the Costco website so the rest of you may enjoy them. I need some TV watching time to put prints into my albums to catch them up also. Yikes!
It was so wonderful that Aaron, Adrianne and Blake were able to stay long after Christmas. The after Christmas days always feel more relaxed. We played lots of
games, finally got to the Rheinlander for dinner and even had cioppino: lots of holiday traditions. The best part about cioppino this year was that Adrianne made her yummy French bread to go with it! Plus, while the newlyweds were here, they ordered their anniversary cake form Beaverton Bakery and let us all have some (saving two slices to freeze for their anniversary). A yummy memory! On New Years Eve everyone but Aaron had left (and he went with friends to a dance) so we had some friends over to play games.
Before everyone left, Aaron, Adrianne and Blake were able to travel to Salem to see Scott. They had a nice visit. It meant a lot to Scott to be updated personally in their lives. Scott remembers every detail that his siblings tell him. While he was so busy raising his large family and trying to help Kyre so much, he had very little time to think or be with his brothers and sisters. Family is everything to him and since he no longer has the connection with Kyre and his children, he is completely interested in his younger siblings.
After everyone left, we put 
a bit of Christmas away and headed for Salt Lake for some training meetings from SendOutCards. It was a fantastic weekend. I am SO excited for the coming year as I work towards my next promotion. My goal is to be Senior Manager by March 7; I will be a Senior Manger by March 7!!! I love this company and of course, I am crazy about the product. We stayed in downtown Salt Lake and on the last day of training, it snowed and blanketed the tree lined streets. It was beautiful! Grandma Maldonado went to the training with us and she did a great job of staying up with us with her walking sticks (and Dad’s to-the-door chauffeur service) but after the weekend was over, he body was exhausted.
As wonderful as the SendOutCards weekend was, my favorite part of the weekend was being able to visit family afterwards. We stayed at Grandma Bitter’s home for two nights and on Sunday we went to Uncle Dave’s ward since it was his first Sunday conducting as the new bishop of the ward, Adrianne and Blake’s for lunch and for Grandma Maldonado to see their new home for the first time. It was our first peek at their new car and first introduction to the Severson’s ducks. They have built quite a set up. It was also fun to see how they use Thrive in their cooking.
Blake and Adrianne went with us to Heidi and Bill’s home for dinner. I was looking forward to going to the Brady’s home to hear the girls tell us all about their Disneyland trip. They had a cute picture from
the Princess lunch they attended and amazing stories of the hours they spent in the parks. We had another incredible meal and the girls realized they had four grandparents there in their home for the first time so we took a picture and then traveled back to Orem to sleep.
This weekend was Gregory’s 5th birthday on Saturday. He was so cute and animated (duh!) when we called to talk with him. As he described all the things that they had done that day, he said, “This is the best day ever” and then told us he was headed to Chuck E. Cheese to win some “cool prizes”!
We traveled down to see Alina on her 14th birthday on Sunday in some snowy weather. We were lucky to only hit a couple of bad spots but as we traveled home, when we came to our own corner at Brockman and Davies, the roads turned icy and slippery. She liked the giant cookie and the amazing candle with fireworks. Weather-wise it was good that 
we planned to leave early in the evening so Alina had the evening left for plans with friends.
We had more storm warnings than storms in the last week; I am sure that the school children have been bitterly disappointed. I look forward to the snow mainly because life goes slower during the storms. The threat of snow was always more fun when there were children here hoping for canceled school. Now, Katie must drive to work irregardless of dangerous roads at 4:30 in the morning; real life!
After stake conference last Sunday, we had a wonderful visit with Scott. He has lots of plans to keep his mind and body busy. He has started another trek of crossing the States with his running and exercise but this time, he is visiting family history sites along the way, doing what research he can and asking that you all provide stories of ancestors in areas of the United States. He looks very good and probably is more fit than he has been since his high school soccer years. He still enjoys his work helping other inmates with their legal work and keeps plugging away at any hope for post conviction relief on his case even though his attorney continues to give his disappointing news. He is in the best spot he could be in the prison system and we are very thankful for that every day. He has many benefits other inmates do not.
Well, Morty comes tonight and stays through Wednesday morning. On Thursday, I go to my annual beach trip with my old Young Women Board friends. I come home earlier form that trip to go to Jaden Mitchell’s open house (he got married in Utah last weekend) and then go back to Otter Crest the next day with Dad for a few days at Ramona’s place. The day we come home, Aunt Cara comes for a week and I might get a beach stay during her visit also!
I hope you all had a chance to read the best article in the Ensign this month from President Monson called “Living the Abundant Life”. There were so many great thoughts about attitude, courage and believing in yourself. He teaches in a way that is so easy to understand and remember. It would make a great Family Home Evening discussion, besides all your home teachers are supposed to give a lesson to you from it! I love so many things about it but my favorite phrase is, “Courage is required to make an initial thrust toward one’s coveted goal., but even greater courage is called for when one stumbles and must make a second effort to achieve.” What was your favorite part? I included the link here so each of you could read this short article and send us an email telling us your favorite part of the article. Everyone that sends us back an email about the article by January 29th will be entered into a drawing for a gift certificate! How's that? Are you game? The married couples get two chances if they reply separately. Please don't reply to this post as it is on an email that I do not check; send to the regular bitterfam@gmail address. Thanks!
Have a great week ahead! We look forward to hearing from you! Much love, Mom
