January 2, 1991 Orem, Utah
Dearest John; Roy, Patrice, Emily & Timothy; Bob, Claire, Michael, Laura, Brett & Katie; Rick, Jean, Ricky, Barbara Jean, Mary Ann & Sarah; and Ron, Ann, Susanna, Jessie, Russell, LeeAnna & Jimmy:
HAPPY NEW YEAR!!! The holidays are over and it seems kinda' good to have the house back to fairly normal - our Christmas decorations and outside lights are all down in the basement waiting to be packed away - I keep putting it off but will get at it later today. We have had a wonderful relaxing holiday season and we hope each one of you has too. We feel kinda' like we have gone back into the ice age - the sun feels so good coming through the windows but the outside temperatures haven't even been to freezing during the day and much below freezing at night. There has been SO much water damage throughout the city with pipes breaking - we heard the Fine Arts building at BYU had some pipes break with water going into some organs and the estimated damage was $300,000.00 Our neighbors down the street have to replace their entire kitchen and the Smiths next door had
a lot of damage too - so I guess we are lucky!!! Daddy is fixing our ceiling now and then he plans to take up some of the floor in the upstairs bathrooms and see if he can get to those pipes to insulate them better - we have had the toilets running for over a week now!!!
Roy & Patrice - you have had some terrible weather too. We have wanted to call but have felt so good that you are in the area you're in where you can walk to everything you need except to Roy's work - we hope you haven't had any trouble. We have thought so much about Suzie being with you - she had seen such beautiful weather in October and then to have it be so bad during Christmas must have been a shock. All the time we lived there we only had ice storms like that twice - is that some kind of consolation???
Happy Birthday to little LeeAnna last Saturday. I can't believe she is 7 years old - she spent quite
a bit of time with us when Jimmy was born and I guess I will always think of her as that age - she was just a "ray of sunshine" then and she still is. She had a roller skating party and she called us after and told us how their WHOLE family went but her Daddy had to hold Jimmy up while he skated.
We have talked to Bob and they're doing fine. This is the "season" for all kinds of respiratory problems so we know Bob is busy. I know Claire, Jean & Ann are all happy to have some of their children back in school - especially Jeannie since three of theirs have been off during the entire month of December. I don't know how I would have liked the "year round" school system but I believe most of the Utah schools will be that way before long. Do you all have your Christmas decorations taken down? We had
a lot of lights outside as usual and we appreciated John helping us take those down.
John is doing fine - he got his final exam tests back and WOW he really did well!!! We are proud of him because he has spent
a lot of time studying. Gayla's sister called and told him "Hi" for Gayla - she could call her family for Christmas but of course she couldn't call John. She is still in California in a Spanish speaking area and loves her mission. John went "tubing" up in American Fork canyon yesterday by that "Tibble Creek" lake where we have gone fishing and he said they had a wonderful time.
Daddy caught a terrible head cold about the day after Christmas. When we told Bob about it he said, "Blame it on the kids"!!! He is MUCH better now but he really hasn't felt very well so we have just stayed indoors and that has been fun. Ramona & Winston came over on my birthday and visited for quite awhile and we loved that - Ramona brought a big plate of her homemade candy and it was just heavenly. I couldn't help but envy them though - they had had forty of their family for Christmas day - I would LOVE that!!! As soon as it warms up
a bit will you all come down and have dinner with us - I know it will be crowded but we have a much larger house than Ramona & Winston do. One of Daddy's Aunts died and the funeral is today in Manti and most of the family was going but Daddy decided against it - Lester's wife - 92 years.
Dianne & Garry Power came over yesterday afternoon and we had such a good visit. Dianne looks wonderful and she is feeling much better - loves living in Las Vegas but can you imagine how hard it is on Garry? Dianne says he does
a lot of traveling and they would like to sell their home in Trumbull but real estate has gone down
a lot and they would lose too much money (like about $150,000.00). They're hoping to get a transfer so UPS will buy it. Dianne and the girls are living in an apartment in Las Vegas and they said it was very nice. She has had all the fillings in her mouth replaced with glass & plastic ones because she was allergic to them - even had a root canal done over.
Daddy & I went to Clinton & Aris Holmes' annual New Year breakfast and it was just wonderful - they serve a special pancake with sliced frozen peaches (from Brigham City) and whipped cream and then ham, orange juice, milk etc. Our friends, Ellen Mae & Mel and Roberta & Merlin were there also and we just visited and laughed and laughed about OLD times.
I did a DUMB thing. I taught my lesson in Relief Society on Sunday morning and decided it would be nice to take our poinsettia plant to brighten up the church. It is more like a bush than a plant and just gorgeous - well, when we got it home it went black and the leaves all curled up - it had frozen in taking it from the car to the church. Ann & Art Willardsen have been sending us poinsettias for Christmas for at least 30 years
I'm going to go buy another one and never tell them but I won't do that again. I'll close with a joke we received on a Christmas card - they couldn't have a live nativity scene in Washington D. C. this year because they couldn't find three wise men or a virgin - sent to us by such a sweet demure friend in Billings.
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