Hello,
I liked 2012. It treated us just fine. 2012 was full of kids, travel and spending
two months painting the outside of our house green (possibly a little too green
but I’m not going to repaint it!)
Travel:
Costa Rica: I was my husband's plus one for his “work” trip to
Costa Rica and was able to check deep sea fishing and doing a zip line off my
bucket list.
France and Spain: We took Brianne, Jacob, and Elizabeth to Europe for two weeks because my fantastic nephew David flew out to watch
William! I thought about taking Will but
decided that he would hate flying, waiting in lines, going to museums, walking
and eating non-preferred foods; and forcing him to go would result in multiple
sets of bloody arms. So, David took Will
to the beach, New York, 6 Flags while we were gone.
Surprisingly someone figured out we
were tourists in Paris and picked my husband’s pocket but thanks to a man we caught him and he went to jail, and we got to ride in a speedy police car with sirens
blaring through red lights. This was
actually Elizabeth’s favorite thing about Europe. Our favorite city was Taragona Spain which
had fantastic Roman ruins.
Unfortunately, we might have scared my children for life when we took
them to a beach because I forgot the whole “clothing optional” part of European
beaches and I got some wide-eyed distressed looks from my children and I spent
a lot of time apologizing and telling them to look in a different direction.
Jacob’s view of Europe can best be
summed up by his comment that he would have rather paid someone to paint our
house and not have gone. However, we
discovered that he likes escargot.
Husband: 2012 cut his travel budget by 20% which I
thought was completely acceptable. He is
no longer a Scout Master and thus will spend 11 fewer nights sleeping on the
ground. Since he is old I think he’s ok
with that. He loves fishing and plans to
do a lot more in 2013.
Me: Quit the Special Ed board in June because I got a big calling at church (I can only assume that everyone else they
asked said “no.”) I still volunteer at
the Y teaching two pre-school enrichment classes. I spend as much time as possible reading and
watching Love it or List it. I foolishly
thought painting our house would not be a big deal because my dad had us paint
our house twice while I lived at home.
Brianne: Turned 16!!!!
Now she can drive to school which makes her mother ecstatic! She is taking violin and has improved a lot
in the last two years. She is doing well
in school and joined the Key Club (maybe?) and the Human Rights club. She doesn’t have as much time to read this
year which makes her very sad.
Jacob: Is now in high
school. He is taking piano lessons,
hopefully will progress in scouts and wants to be a video game designer. He ran cross country this fall and will
probably do outdoor track in the spring.
He is working on improving his grades but strangely seems to prefer to
doing other things to studying.
William: Is big, blond and
adorable! He likes school, reading,
writing stories, playing on his iPad and watching TV, previews and looking at
the scene sections pictures on movies.
We signed up for cable and I think whoever designed the DVR thought
“how can I drive the parents of autistic kids crazy?” “Oh, I know … I’ll design something that they
can rewind over and over again. Because,
come on, doesn’t everyone need to hear the opening song to a TV show again and
again and again!” Designer of the DVR –
actually the answer is no. Will has also recently decided
that church needs a little more applause and has started giving standing
ovations when people pray or sing solos in Sacrament Meeting. And
about half the time he sings his own lyrics during hymns.
Elizabeth: Is super cute (I am possibly biased). She is in the 5th grade. She is doing really well learning the flute
and has played twice at church! This is
fantastic because she gets nervous so her flute teacher and I bribe her. She likes basketball, riding her bike,
playing games, Legos, going anywhere and helping her dad fix things. She is a great sport and is doing a lot better
this year doing her reading and homework.
(Now if she would only start sooner than 8:30pm life would be better.)
Kitty: Continuing her career as mass murderer. (We have only seen 10 squirrels in our yard in two years and we don’t have mice in our shed anymore.) However, the children adore Bri’s cat because
she waits for their buses in the afternoon and walks them to the bus in the
morning. We recently installed a cat
door in the garage so she can kill animals more conveniently.
We hope that 2013 treats you well!
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