May 6, 2012

 Dear Children,

It is sunny here in Portland today and supposed to hole this weather for a few days.  Maybe I will get out in the garden!  Yesterday, Dad and I went on a bike ride and it felt like winter still.  I couldn’t believe it; we were riding in winter air on Cinco de Mayo!  Right afterwards we worked in the kitchen at the temple and afterwards both of us were so sore.  Dishing up food and handing people their dishes across a steamer counter for four hours hurts your back but it was kind of fun.

This weekend we travel to Utah for Rebekah’s baptism Saturday afternoon.  We are flying on Saturday morning, the baptism is at 2:00 and then we will spend the evening at the Brady’s.  They have invited people over for dinner afterwards.  On Sunday, Adrianne and Blake have invited us for Mother’s Day dinner.  They are barbequing Taco Bill and Gumbo, their tow males ducks.  We may get to help Adrianne in her garden on Monday.  She was going to take the day off on Monday to play with us. 

Sad news for the Seversons: White Duck died last week. They are not sure what happened but she was one of their two laying ducks and she was doing fine up until her death.  They got two new ducks Tuesday night from a lady in Payson. They are Muscovy ducks.  Adrianne says that they are extremely ugly, but almost soundless. They have also laid a couple giant eggs already. Did you see the graphic photos of Blake’s hand surgery?  I am curious what it will look like this weekend since the pins are ones that have to be removed.

Our next plans to travel will be to Albany this Wednesday.  Kyre invited us to bring Grandma Maldonado that evening for an early Mother’s Day dinner.  Isn’t that nice?  Grandma is still feeling tired from her trip to Mexico with Aunt Denise.  The two places they stayed looked so beautiful and SUNNY.  Every warm place these days looks very inviting.  After Mexico, Grandma went to Antioch to celebrate Asteria’s first birthday with Wiley and Michelle.

Dad accompanied me this week to a very interesting event, Food Services of America vendor show to look for Girl’s Camp ideas.  Oh my, I was sick and THIRSTY afterwards having little samples of prepared foods isle after isle!  It was quite interesting and I may have gleaned a few ideas.  I need to squeeze a trip up into Washington at the end of this month to look at the camp kitchen.  Did I tell you that I am the Girl’s Camp Cook this year and they changed camp sites to three hours away in Washington?  Just the transportation of all the supplies is mind boggling right now.

After May, we are headed to Las Vegas for the SendOutCards convention and to see the boys.  That will be lots of fun.  Dad wants to bike Red Rocks one of the days in preparation for the Las Vegas Century on September 22.  We are going a couple of days early since Nate got Wicked tickets for Thursday night!

Last weekend Aaron and Morty were here so we were able to celebrate Aaron’s birthday on his exact day on Friday.  The boys arrived on a very late flight the night before.  Katie was leaving for her cruise and would be gone on her birthday the following Monday so we did a late night quick birthday celebration for her the night before Aaron’s birthday.  She requested Tillamook chocolate peanut butter Oreo dessert; interesting. We stayed up late that night playing games since it was her only chance to be with the boys. It seems that our April and March birthdays can easily get bounced around.

We went to a new breakfast spot called Biscuits for Aaron’s birthday and then had, what else, sour cream burritos for his birthday dinner.  Grandma came also so we played more games. On Saturday he and Dad wanted to ride bikes into Sherwood.  He and Aaron are getting ready for 100 mile bikes rides this summer and fall.  Aaron had an old missionary companion that had moved here so they rode to his house and then Dad rode on to Newburg where he met Morty and I at Sunhee’s first softball tournament of the season.  Aaron stayed to visit with his friend and then got a ride into Newburg since he was quite sore already.

It was fun for all of us to be supporting Sunhee.  She is dedicated to whatever she is doing.  She is one of the team’s catchers so she has to work very hard all game.  Dad biked home and we all met at Grandma’s home for more dinner and more games.

I had broken my tooth late Thursday night so everyone enjoyed making fun of my lisp over the weekend.  Unfortunately, I had to speak in church and my sharp broken tooth was shredding the side of my tongue.  I didn’t realize how painful it would be when I was telling Dr. Griffiths that he didn’t need to come to his office on Friday to smooth the rough edge.  At the beginning of the weekend Dad’s advice was not to start my talk explaining why I sounded funny but by Saturday night, he was saying I should explain myself.  I decided not to say anything but speak more slowly.  About a third of the way through my talk I all of a sudden realized that I was avoiding the lisp altogether!  I was so thankful; my prayers had been answered.

My talk assignment was from Elaine Green since the Relief Society presidency was assigned to speak and two members of the presidency couldn’t or wouldn’t speak.  My topic was Love Work, Avoid Idleness and Help Other in Need.  I found a great article from President Thomas S Monson called “Hands” from 1991.  Isn’t it great how the words of our leaders never go out of style!  His talk pulled together those three subjects perfectly as it talked of the miracle of the creation of our hands; how an infants hand instinctively grips a parent’s finger tightly and a child’s hand opens up in perfect trust to be led by a parent to learn love, service and trust.  I used the Primary song below and talked about the idea of us praying for a blessing on our hands to understand the goodness and service that they can accomplish as we gain the Christ like attributes of loving work, avoiding idleness and helping others in need, which before this I had never noticed the power of that phrase. 

I have two little hands, folded snugly and tight.

They are tiny and weak, yet they know what is right.

During all the long hours till daylight is through,

There is plenty indeed for my two hands to do.

Kind Father, I thank thee for two little hands,

And ask thee to bless them till each understands

That children can only be happy all day,

When two little hands have learned how to obey.

In considering the teenage hand, President Monson said those years are perfect for learning to labor and laboring to learn. And then the adult hand reminds us of the lessons taught to us by devoted parents.  Lastly, I talked of our Savior’s hands and putting our hand in His hand to allow ourselves to be guided safely home and then told the story I had heard, but couldn’t find anywhere, about a statue of Christ in Europe that had been destroyed in the war.  Upon trying unsuccessfully to replace the hands that were destroyed, a plaque was posted at the feet of the stature instead: Our hands are His Hands. 

Thankfully, that one talk by President Monson was the foundation for those three subjects.  If you wish to read the complete talk, it was the First Presidency Message in the 1991 March Liahona.

Last week Dad traveled to a special sports award dinner at OSP with Scott hosted by the inmates’ sports club.  Scott could buy a ticket for one guest.  It was a catered meal from a local restaurant so it was quite a treat for Scott to eat that kind of food.  When he saw Scott enjoying it so much, Dad shared much of his food.  Dad enjoyed being with Scott in a more relaxed environment and especially loved the comments made from other inmates about Scott’s good qualities and his amazing thirst for knowledge.

I look forward to this coming week and seeing many of you.  Lots of love, Mom

April 22, 2012

Dear Family,

We are enjoying a beautiful weekend here.  The sun has popped out a couple of times this spring, giving us HOPE for better weather to come.  Truly, I hear about Aubrey and Adrianne planting their gardens, even having some blossoms on their plantings, and the thought has NEVER crossed my mind.  Well, I can’t say never, because I have glanced at our garden area longingly.  Dad says that we have three artichoke buds starting.  Growing an artichoke was Adriane’s idea last year and I just tried it.  Since nothing happened with that plant I thought I had done it wrong but maybe, it takes a year before you get the fruit.  We will see!  Working in the garden is very therapeutic.  I think it is because creating is such an important part of our being.

Some quick news items about Adrianne and Blake:  Blake broke his hand playing basketball at the church with friends.  He has received second opinions on what to do to make it heal correctly and is scheduled for surgery this Tuesday.  Because of the bones that were injured, he needs to have pins put in for six weeks and then they are removed; ouch!  He could use some cheerful calls or notes.  He is doing his programming work one handed.

On happier news for the Severson family: Their ducks are laying!  They go out in the little home they built for ducks and retrieve an egg each morning from their layers.  One of the ducks seemed concerned at first that her eggs were leaving the nest so Adrianne put a plastic Easter egg in there and the duck seemed content.  That kind of makes my Mother heart sad to think of the whole egg laying and “mother ducks wondering where their eggs are going” process; I had never really given that a second thought when eating an egg!  They had to sell two of their nosiest ducks to make a neighbor happy.  Gumbo and Taco Bill, their latest two ducks that they purchased, are due for slaughter and barbecue.  They are planning on doing that on Mother’s Day, May 13 this year.  That is nice of them to wait to do the barbeque when we are able to be there. Oddly, eating a pet duck just doesn’t have the same sadness that the whole “eggs being taken from mothers” carries!

On Mother’s Day weekend, we are in Utah for Rebekah’s baptism.  They have changed her baptismal date to Saturday, May 12 at 2:00.  If you have the May 5^th date on your calendar, be sure to change that.  We will be in Utah from Saturday morning until Monday evening that weekend.  We look forward to being there for the baptism and, as you can imagine, Rebekah is of course, excited to be baptized!!!

We spent a fun-filled weekend with Shawn and Aubrey and the boys.  We went last weekend while Aubrey had a large assignment with the annual auction for Gregory’s preschool.  We played with the boys so Aubrey could get things done and helped her with some of the decorating.  We had fun with batting practice, played kickball, played UNO and a funny chicken-egg game and enjoyed a hike in the hills with everyone.  The boys were excited for the hike that ends at a pond.  They went hunting for newts and frogs.  The warm air on the hike in the hills made the surrounding eucalyptus trees fragrance more vibrant.  The smell of eucalyptus is a great childhood memory from the canyon by our Patricia Court home.

We took Flat Stanley with us so he went bike riding with Gregory.  Gregory said that Flat Stanley must be saying, “Wow, this is like a roller coaster ride!” so we put that thought bubble on the postcard with the photo of Flat Stanley using our SendOutCards account. After I loaded the photos, Gregory and Bryson wanted to see them on my computer.  Flat Stanley had gone to work with Dad last week and “helped” do some jack hammer work.  When we sent that post card to Adam’s school I wondered what 12 year olds would even recognized what a jack hammer was.  Well, on my computer screen there was a tiny thumbprint of Flat Stanley on the jack hammer and Gregory immediately saw that and asked, “Is that Flat Stanley on a jack hammer?”  My jaw must have dropped to the floor as I was amazed a five year old even knew what one looked like!

We extended our trip to stay all of Monday instead of going home in the morning s that we could see Gregory and Bryson swim.  We went to the YMCA by their place.  It has a great pool and inviting hot tub!  The most fun part of swimming to me was watching Shawn and Aubrey play in the water.  They know how to work hard and play hard.  It is a joy to see our married children laughing together amid the sometimes overwhelming responsibilities that they have.  I hated to go home.  We cut it close getting to our flight since we waited until the last minute to leave.  We were very lucky that our luggage made it.  When you are standby, there is no luggage guarantee nor luggage delivery.

That same night Morty was sitting in court side seats with Jeremy Luman at a Blazer versus Suns game in Phoenix.  He was on the TV for a bit.  Seems like Morty has that knack!  Hey, Dad and I might be on TV.  I forgot to tell you last newsletter that we got tickets to the Wheel of Fortune Portland taping.  The shows that we watched will be aired next Thursday and Friday, May 3rd and 4^th.  They scanned the audience a few times.  We may show up on the Friday showing since they moved us in between shows.  It was pretty fun and we have Wheel of Fortune light up button souvenirs to prove we were there!  I hope the world doesn’t judge Oregon by one of the VERY inadequate contestants.  I don’t remember which night he was on but it will be obvious.  I mainly was interested in the ticket lottery when my chiropractor said she had been chosen to try out to be a contestant.  That would have been so much fun to see her on it.  They said she wasn’t loud enough.

I ran into Sonja Morton the other evening.  She said that she was Heidi and Scott’s teacher at Cooper Mountain School.  I told her that I wouldn’t know her from that long ago and as I looked closely at her, I realized that she was Shane Morton’s mom.  She said that he lives in the area and is working for some non-profit in Portland after his mortgage business quit doing so well!!!

Relief Society was interesting this week especially since it was a general conference talk, A Time to Prepare, by Elder Ardern who is Jessica Chandler’s father-in-law form New Zealand!  He suggested that we be as quick to kneel as we are quick to text saying, “ I know our greatest happiness comes as we tune in to the Lord (see Alma 37:37) and to those things which bring a lasting reward, rather than mindlessly tuning in to countless hours of status updates, Internet farming, and catapulting angry birds at concrete walls. I urge each of us to take those things which rob us of precious time and determine to be their master, rather than allowing them through their addictive nature to be the master of us.”  He also said that there is no substitute for real friends who can give us hugs and look after our best interest as opposed to cyber friends.

Speaking of real friends and real hugs, an article in the April Ensign, Taking Time to Talk and Listen, brought me to tears as I realized the real expression of feelings that our family neglected to develop in younger years.  Oh, how I wish I could turn back the clock on some things!  As the article spoke of personal communication and stated, “The adversary would love to bind our tongues-anything to prevent us from expressing verbally the feelings of our hearts face to face.  He delights in distance and distraction; he delights in noise; he delights in impersonal communication-anything that would prevent us from the warmth of a voice and the personal feelings that come from conversing eye to eye.”  Oh how I wish we all could communicate our feelings better!

We got to sit outside in the sunshine for part of our visit with Scott on his birthday Saturday afternoon. Plus, his old cellmate brought him over a chocolate milk and pastry from the vending machines in the visitors’ room which was very kind.  Scott said that his block had promised him a burrito birthday party afterwards.  They have figured out a way to create a slow cook oven effect by filing a lined garbage can with hottest water and submerging plastic wrapped foods in the heat.  The ingredients to the burritos sounded rather unappealing but, you know Scott, he loves trying unusual foods; but really, ramen in a burrito???

I hope that you are experiencing some warmer days and fresh smells of spring as we have the past couple of days. 

I love you, Mom

April 9, 2012

Dear Children,

Happy Belated Easter!

Since the last family newsletter, Dad and I have been to Utah to see Rebekah in her school musical, ­­­The Music Man. Her real performance dates were while Scott and Kyre’s family planned to be here over Spring Break so we traveled to Utah to see her in a dress rehearsal (thank you to Katie’s benefits). It was so fun to see Rebekah on stage enjoying herself; the whole play was quite impressive. The students are all very talented and the set and costumes reminded me of Beaverton High Drama performances. I still find myself, almost a month later, hearing the Music Man songs in my head.

While in Utah we were able to visit with Bill’s family, his twin, Jen and her family had come to see the Brady family. While Dad, Bill and Ammer went to some property to shoot guns, Heidi, Jen and I had most of the children and went to tour the Salt Lake Temple area. We went through the Conference Center, the visitor’s center and the temple grounds.

Dad and I lucked out again to be in town for another Smurthwaite reception; their other daughter got married. Their reception was held fairly close to Heidi’ place so that was convenient on our way down to Grandma Bitter’s home for the night.

We went to church at Adrianne and Blake’s ward so I could go to her nursery class. They have it organized very well and on that day, the children were all delightful. The big advantage to being in Adrianne’s class is great snacks. She brings Thrive snacks so they get a well rounded lunch type snack besides the goldfish crackers provided by the Primary.

Sunday afternoon we had a big birthday celebration at Heidi and Bill’s home. We celebrated many of our March birthdays: Dad, Bill, Jen, Adrianne and Rebekah with a delicious chicken dinner and homemade banana cake. Anytime, they invite Adrianne to dinner, their only request is that she brings the rolls. I have seen her make them twice and she just whips them out like they are nothing. They are SO yummy.

We returned home on Tuesday morning in a bit of a panic as the security line was backed up in Salt Lake like I have never seen before. We had to make our plane since I was having a meeting and presentation for SendOutCards at our home that evening. After waiting about 45 minutes in line and seeing how far we still were away from getting to the gates, Dad asked a security person to let us go in the first class lane and that was the only way that we made it.

We had a simple birthday celebration with dinner and a few cupcakes on Dad’s actual birthday since we knew we would be celebrating it in larger fashion once the grand children got here. Grandma Maldonado came over to help with the celebration.

The next day we picked up Sunhee and Meeja for Spring Break and the party and game playing began!!! They also helped me get ready for the rest of the family to arrive and make Dad’s cherry-chocolaty birthday cake with lots of layers of cherry chip cake, chocolate cream and ganache. They brought their chore charts so we had fun thinking of things they could do for extra points. They even helped us plant primroses in between the games, jumping on the tramp and playing games.

The speed of activity and noise level rose on Monday when Kyre, Alina, Adam and Klaire arrived on the train in Portland. What fun that they take Amtrak up here for their vacation! That was the morning that I recorded a KUIK radio program with some of the leaders of the Hillsboro Chamber. They said that they will be sending me a copy of that recording. We listened on Monday night and it wasn’t too bad! Relief but I am ready to do it again with fewer butterflies in my stomach one of these days when the opportunity comes up again.

Our Family Home Evening was run by Meeja and Sunhee. Sunhee prepared a great lesson about the First Vision to pass off a Faith in God goal and they kept everyone on task throughout the week to do scripture reading so we could finish the Book of Mormon while they were still visiting here this time. That same night we celebrated Klaire and Dad’s birthdays.

Lots of games, food and fun filled the rest of our Spring Break. Adam did some scout work with Dad and only part of the family wanted to go to the zoo so Dad took them. A few of us got a 24 hour bug during the week so that slowed some thing down but still, we crammed a lot into the week. Alina left a VERY happy girl that she finally beat me at ping pong. I am going to have to practice!

General Conference weekend was wonderful. I was kind of tired so we didn’t do the whole conference morning breakfast, nor the big dinner that afternoon. One of my favorite phrases came from Jeffrey R. Holland, “It is not possible to travel beyond the reach of God’s love.”

Our Easter weekend was fairly quiet. In this picture you can see that it looks like we colored eggs in that bowl. We didn’t. Those eggs are the Chung’s chicken’s eggs that they brought us this week! We didn’t have any grandchildren here but I still made those cute deviled eggs that look like chicks. Plus, something really fun; Adam sent us a Flat Stanley. Have you heard of the books by Jeff Brown called Flat Stanley? Stanley is flattened by a bulletin board falling on him so he decides to enjoy traveling around the world by mailing himself to his friends. Adam created a Flat Stanley and mailed him to us. We are to take pictures, send postcards or letters with Flat Stanley pictured somewhere, tell a little about the place, send them to his school so they can map out where Adam’s Flat Stanley travels and then mail Flat Stanley to someone else. We weren’t going anywhere exotic so I organized an Easter Egg hunt. It was actually lots of fun to pose Flat Stanley finding eggs all over the yard. Flat Stanley is quite a climber! He even snooped out the egg with the dollar bill in Dad’s pocket! I just loaded the photos into my SendOutCards account and had a blast creating a three panel card of his adventure. If any of you get the Flat Stanley, be sure to take some photos, mail them to Adam’s school and then mail Flat Stanley on to a new adventure.

We look forward to a trip to Martinez this weekend. We had hoped to travel to Oakland for an A’s game but they are not in town this weekend. Instead we get to be in charge of Bryson and Gregory while Shawn and Aubrey are involved with annual fundraiser for the school, the auction. That sounds like more fun to me. We will leave here on Thursday and come back on Monday. Shawn completed the Oakland Marathon this year. We will have to learn more about that as we visit this weekend. We received a copy of an award that was given to Scott recently, Runner of the Year!

I love being in my ward when DeLys Ostlund is teaching Sunday School; she is one of the greatest teachers. We reviewed Jacob this week and the allegory of the Olive Trees. Instead of concentrating on the nouns, we discussed the verbs in those scriptures: prune, dig, even dung. Yes, dung. As she talked about the need to be dumped with dung for our own good, she read these words from Harold W Wood, “I saw a wheat field that appeared to be greener and taller than the others. Thinking about it for a while, I concluded that occasionally some loving farmer drives over the field with his tractor and pumps manure all over it. I thought, ‘My, it’s just like life. Here we are minding our business, growing our little hearts out. We’re really quite green, somewhat productive, and very sincere. When out of the blue, life deals us a dirty one, and we’re up to our eyebrows in manure.’

We, of course, conclude that life as we know it has just ended and will never be the same again. But one day, when the smell and the shock are gone, we find ourselves greener and more productive than we have ever been. Unfortunately, no matter how often we go through these growing experiences, we are never able to appreciate the sound of the tractor or the smell of the manure.” (The Smell of Manure, quote by Harold W. Wood).

I hope that you had a great Easter weekend and another wonderful week lies ahead. I love you, Mom

March 11, 2012

Dear Children,
I had the treat of visiting Long Beach, Washington twice in one week right after we took Sunhee home. Long Beach is about 2 ½ hours away, across the bridge from Astoria. So, it is a bit longer travel time but it is a cute little beach town. The WorldMark there is a newer one and quite nicely situated right on the beach. Did you know that you can drive on the beaches in Washington? Weird. Anyway, on this beach there are really great biking trails and then a cape and lighthouse close by for hiking. We should plan a family trip there someday. PLUS, the town has the best bakery!!!
I went up with Grandma Maldonado on Monday and Tuesday. We got lots of game playing and warmed ourselves in the hot tub as it was pretty cold and wet. It was hailing one of the days while I was out for a walk. Actually, I was walking to the bakery to get a Devil Dog, for which the bakery is famous. A Devil Dog it a tube shaped chocolate bar filled with a heavy cream like a custard cream. YUM! Walking to the bakery to get pastries helps you feel better about eating them! We had to take the long way home since a storm had come in and there would most likely be snow on the coast mountain pass. We traveled down the Gorge and then crossed over on Cornelius Pass. I haven’t been that way in a long time. It was a long, wet drive and I wondered why I was returning in two days if Dad and I could fly anywhere, like say maybe . . .WARM Palm Springs, to celebrate our anniversary!
I did a “week’s” worth of work (good thing I can do it anywhere; well, that’s a bad thing also sometimes) including medical appointments in the two days at home. I am trying to decide how to go forward with my back and hip injury since I seem to be at a stalemate and I am looking at summer outdoor adventures coming up with fewer abilities than last summer. I plan to change doctors for a fresh perspective; I hope that will help.
Thursday afternoon, Dad and I headed back to Long Beach. Because of the drive time, it isn’t our first choice of coast stays but was the only place available (without camping out on the website to catch a last minute cancellation). The trip was very relaxing and we had a great ocean view room. This time we hit a dry afternoon and took our bikes out. Dad took a longer bike ride to explore some extra areas, which I hope I can do next trip to Long Beach. I am just getting used to being back on my bike. I have special bars that allow me to sit straight for most of my ride. We also walked the entire town and into the next town on one of the days. We stopped at each restaurant to take a look at their menu so we could find the best place to go to celebrate our anniversary!
Dad got an idea from Adrianne and Blake when they were here at Christmas. They ordered their anniversary cake (small version of one of the layers of their wedding cake), shared it with us and took two slices home for their anniversary. So, he secretly ordered a Beaverton Bakery banana cake, our favorite, and quite possibly one of the flavors of the cakes at our wedding. That was a fun treat. That covered our dessert for the entire weekend except one Devil Dog (since we had to make a Cottage Bakery visit while in Long Beach!).
On Saturday night we went back to a restaurant that we went to years ago when Uncle Scott and Aunt Carla came to Oregon for Thanksgiving. We went to Long Beach them and Grandma. I don’t remember it being so good but it was and we will have to visit it again! It is called the 42nd Café. It is gourmet home cooking.
We tried to go to the Long Beach ward for church on Sunday morning but arrived to an empty parking lot. They had stake conference in another town. So, we went back and sat on our deck overlooking the ocean, ate a Devil Dog and had our own Sunday School lesson as we studied the Isaiah chapters together in the Book of Mormon. It was kind of nice! I loved what I learned from those chapters, which is repeated over and over again, “for all this, his anger is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still.” For all the mistakes we can make, the Lord is loving and ready and anxious to forgive us if we just ask and commit to improve!
At Aunt Karla’s suggestion, I checked out flight availability to Utah for Sarah Bitter’s baby shower on Saturday. It worked and so I went! Crazy! At the last minute I saw that there were seats left on Friday evening so I went down and was able to stay at the Brady’s. It was nice to chat with Bill on the way home from the airport and hear all the great things that he is directing to happen at Eli Kirk. I am so happy that they found him. The Brady’s are getting ready to have Bill’s sister and her family stay this coming week. So, I slept in a bed that they set up in Ainsley’s room. Heidi looks great and sounds like she is feeling much better. She always looks so cute when she is pregnant even though she suffers with some difficult side effects.
It was fun to be around the excitement of the girls. They have such cute and amazingly different personalities. I went to help Heidi with Bountiful Baskets at 6:30 Saturday morning. That is a ton of work! But, it is always fun to be somewhere where you hear everyone say how great the Brady family is as soon as they find out who I am. Jenna had a school friend’s birthday party so Heidi and I took Ainsley and Rebekah with us to the shower so they could play in the built in play house at Dave and Karla’s home (Aunt Karla’s invitation). Everyone had a great time and we met up with Adrianne there.
Of course the shower was beautiful and it was good to see Sarah. With them living in Texas, it will probably be few and far between to see Jon and Sarah. Karla and Kari had planned a fun game in which we all won candy, which we sorely needed! Dave was right in the mix doing much preparation and clean up, just like Dad would have been! Even though there are many years between them, they have many similarities, even which little heh . . . heh chuckle sounds the same.
Afterwards, so Heidi could concentrate on her Saturday afternoon toy room project, Adrianne and I took the girls to play at her playground and see the ducks. The girls enjoyed feeding Adrianne and Blake’s ducks some spinach and egg shells. Ainsley was enthralled with the baby ducks in the house, Taco Bill and Gumbo, (named purposely to remind them that they are future food) but not as crazy about the noisier ducks in the yard. She loved feeding them but stayed a distance away. The girls love the playground at the Severson’s home! It was an amazing day in Utah; the sun was shining and it was actually WARM!
Our time was too short but I had to catch my Saturday evening flight. I was hoping to be able to sit in my Relief Society for once. I have a new calling, Compassionate Service leader, and I need to get to know the sisters a bit better. In the coming months, I know I will be doing lots of calling to help a family in the ward who just had triplets almost three months premature. But, at the last minute I was in Sunbeams today. Oh well, best laid plans.
Anyway, when Adrianne took us back to the Brady’s and then me to the airport she talked of wanting to go family camping in June in Utah. Let us know what you think and when the best times would be. Dad and I will be in Las Vegas from at least June 6 to June 10 and I no longer have Girls Camp the last week in June since it was changed recently to July.
When I got home, I realized that I should be gone more often. Dad seems to get lots more done when I am away. He washed our sheets, mowed the lawn right before the rains started again, drove to visit Scott and then came right back to feed the missionaries! And I thought I did a lot in those 24 hours!
Scott is preparing for his last days before a marathon run for which he has been training. He didn’t think he was going to be able to do it since he had some injuries to his big toes. I think it is because of the poor shoes that he wears. Can you believe all the fancy equipment that people get to run marathons outside his walls and what he does with what he has? Well, he finally has agreed that he needs to buy real running shoes. Of course, they only sell them one choice of Nike shoes and they charge the prisoners a premium price so a good birthday present coming up for Scott would be a donation to his funds since he sends his library job money to Kyre. A donation to his commissary fund has to be done through the state of Oregon in a special way if you are interested. Wouldn’t it be nice if a company like Nike could donate shoes to local prisoners who are training for marathons or athletic events to encourage and reward them for trying to improve themselves!
This afternoon I took Anna Callais to see her triplets in the NICU. They will probably be there for another 8 weeks. I expected the girls to be much smaller since I knew they were all about 2 ½ pounds each. They are of course all connected to many tubes and monitors but are all gaining weight. It is a miracle what the medical world can do.
I am thankful for my health and the health of all my family. Have a wonderful week ahead. We are headed back to Utah either Friday evening or Saturday morning. We are going to see Rebekah’s Music Man dress rehearsal since her play is while Kyre and the children will be here PLUS we have four family birthdays to celebrate in Utah; now it is five since Jen, Bill’s twin, will be there also. And that is not counting Bryson and Klaire who also have a birthday in the next two weeks. Our March Madness!!!!
Love you all. Mom

February 26, 2012

Dear Children,

This newsletter started with three trips to the coast in one week and ends preparing to leave for two trips to the coast this next week. Grandma Maldonado and I are going up for a quick trip to Long Beach Monday and Tuesday. Then I will return to Long Beach with Dad on Thursday to celebrate our anniversary. Most often we have gone skiing at Timberline for our anniversary but that wasn’t even a choice for us this year.

At the end of January I went to the beach three times in one week. I always look forward to my annual weekend at the beach with my girlfriends with whom I served in a Young Women’s Board several years back. Our president, Angie Bleazard, moved to California so we try to make arrangements so that she can also be there. Last year she came up for Adrianne’s wedding and Jamie Jorgenson was very sick with her pregnancy so we didn’t have the entire group. Angie said she couldn’t come this year but then her husband surprised her with a plane ticket for Christmas. She kept it a secret from the rest of the group so it was fun to see the surprise on their faces when she walked into the condo as we were in the middle of a game.

We lucked out on the weather most of the days so it made for enjoyable walks on the beach until the last morning when the rain was sideways. Otherwise, we enjoyed a ton of game playing, talking and eating.

From that trip I came back to Beaverton for a couple of hours for Jaden Mitchell’s open house. He married a girl from Utah so they had an open house in Beaverton. It is always great to be in the Mitchell’s home. They had a sandwich bar with homemade breads that John had made and of course, they had lots of his chocolate desserts for which he is known. We saw lots of old friends there which was great but they all look so, well, OLD!

I drove Carol Stanger’s car back to the beach so that I could stay the last night with the girls and then we met Dad on Sunday in Lincoln City (her family was meeting her there also). Ramona Jones had offered Dad and I a week at Otter Crest so we took advantage of piggy backing it at the end of my YW weekend. Business is picking up for Dad so we didn’t really have a whole week to spend on the coast. Plus, Aunt Carla was coming to visit Grandma and we wanted to be back for that.

We drove to Otter Crest in a driving rain storm and then the weather cleared up for the rest of our visit. It was very mild so we took our long walks in pretty good weather. We ran into a couple that we met last year on one of our walks and visited with them for awhile in their newly opened art gallery right at Devil’s Punch Bowl. They lived up the street from the little girl that we came upon last year that had been mauled by a bull dog but they didn’t have much information about her since her family had moved from the home right after the accident.

We had lots of relax time at Otter Crest with no cell coverage and very little internet since it went out while we were there. We did lots of planning, making goals for the coming year, swimming and walking. We had dinner one evening with Ramona and Ivan. They now own completely their one unit at the top of the complex so they live there when they are not traveling or staying at Corina’s when Ivan needs to be in Beaverton for work. He is becoming more and more retired. They are finishing up some business deals before turning in their papers for another mission.

We came home in time for me to do laundry, attend to a couple of appointments and pack for the beach again. This time it was with Grandma and Aunt Carla at the WorldMark in Long Beach, Washington. I like the Long Beach area; it has a quaint little town and good walking and biking trails.

In January we enjoyed a basketball visit from Morty. He arrived late Saturday evening so he joined us at church and we were able to have everyone home for Sunday dinner including Katie and Grandma. I don’t even try to make sense of Katie’s schedule (well I do but it is not often possible) as she did some crazy traveling herself during January: Salt Lake, New York and Phoenix, that I know of. She was home to go to the Blazer game on the Monday night with Morty. They played Jimmer’s team again.

Morty came for a second basketball weekend in February. He actually was here twice since he came up for a very last minute trip having obtained great Blazer tickets for free for one night. It was close to his birthday so we were able to do an early birthday celebration for him here. Then on his real birthday, Nate and Aaron took him to dinner. The second time he came up he went to a couple of games and then there was lots of sports to watch on TV. I told him that I have never seen so many sports games in one weekend. It isn’t until Morty is here when I realize that my TV tells me when someone is calling my phone!

I have enjoyed hearing news of work successes and promotions from several in the family. Adrianne applied for a promotion to work in the Marketing Department at Shelf Reliance as the online Marketing Director. She says PR must run in the family. She started a couple of weeks ago and is now on salary with even more responsibilities. That company has given her lots of experience so far. She said that she earned employee of the month in January and that earned her a special parking spot and a massage at work! She and Blake are at the Wolf Creek WorldMark in Ogden, Utah celebrating their first anniversary this weekend.

I haven’t heard it from Nate but Grandma Maldonado tells me that he also received a promotion, much of the job he was already doing for quite sometime. But now, I guess he got the raise and the title to go with it. She said it had something to do with managing more people in his department at Zappos. We will have to hear more from Nate but I hear that he is in New York right now!

I also received a promotion with SendOutCards. I am a new Senior Manager as of the day after Valentine’s Day. That increases my percentages and coaching bonuses which is pretty exciting. Aaron is helping fine tune my Facebook Business Page, Cards by Lori Bitter, so the welcome page looks better. I appreciate all your individual help either for liking my FaceBook page or reading my blog, CardsbyLoriBitter.blogspot.com. In my blog. I include tips that any card sender could use, not just those using the SendOutCards service (even though it does make card sending so much easier)

We had Sunhee here this weekend. It was very fun and relaxing. She mainly wanted to play games the entire time. We figured that we played around 40 games with her including an afternoon at Grandma Maldonado’s home while I went to a baby shower. She is a delight. She loves to play, loves to work and is just plain lovable. She started learning a new song on the piano, Nephi’s Courage, and worked on a few more goals in her Faith in God booklet. She loves being challenged by a goal. Can you believe that she turns 11 this year and she will be preparing for Young Womens. What an exciting time in her life. We planned to finish up some more while she and Meeja are here for Spring Break. Kyre, Alina, Adam and Klaire will stay part of that week with us also. After bringing Sunhee back to Albany today so we didn’t have to drive to Sweet Home, we had dinner and visited with Kyre and the children.

I don’t think I have written since I challenged you all to read that great Ensign article of President Monson’s on keeping a positive attitude, believing in ourselves and having courage. I appreciated hearing from all of you that read it and about what you enjoyed most from the message. Thank you for sharing your feelings; I loved that. Dad and I did a drawing for Family Home Evening while at Otter Crest and Aubrey won the gift card for sending her thoughts on the article. Thank you! That was fun!

I love you and hope you have a great week ahead. Love, Mom

January 21, 2012

Dear Children

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 think 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 had 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 on 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 5^th 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 14^th 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