Dearest Family,
I am WAY late in writing my letter today!!!
My goal has been to have my Christmas cards in the mail by Monday,
December 6th and I spent most of this morning doing that - AND THEY'RE
STILL NOT READY! I send some to Thailand so I wanted them to get there
for Christmas instead of New Years like they did last year - they
celebrate New Years in Thailand and I didn't want them to get mixed up
about the two holidays. I wanted to have pictures of my two baby
great-granddaughters for my Christmas letter but I knew that wouldn't be
possible because they won't be together until Christmas - SO I had a
card made with my picture at the China Great Wall. I did a poor job
with my Christmas letter - I wrote and re-wrote it four times and then
had it copied and when I realized what was wrong with it, it was too
late to have it re-done. I didn't even mention the real meaning of
Christmas - OH ME!!! I enjoy receiving cards from friends SO much -
it's an important part of the holiday for me.
I hope Annie had a HAPPY BIRTHDAY on Friday
- I felt bad that I had forgotten to mention that in my weekly letter
last week. She sent a message telling me they were having the Christmas
dinner for members of Rons' Ward at BYU at the Wilkinson Center on
Wednesday night - I hope that meant that she wouldn't have to do alot of
cooking. They are SO generous and good to make sure each one of the
ward members is taken care of during the holidays. I remember last year
they brought one of the students to our Christmas party - or was that
for Thanksgiving? I can't remember!!! They were also going to meet the
parents of Jared - he is the young man who has been dating Jessie and I
HAVEN'T EVEN MET HIM!!!
Bob & Jeannie usually come over on Sunday
night but I don't believe they are coming tonight. I had a very
"scrambled" message on my answering machine when I came home from church
and I couldn't understand it - the only words I could understand were
"Have a Happy Day" and I believe it was Bob's voice. I am assuming he
can't make it tonight and that is surely understandable - this is such a
busy time of year. Jeannie called and invited me to go to their home
and watch the First Presidency's "Devotional" so I will go there later
and that will be fun. I haven't visited with them for a couple weeks.
John - THANK YOU SO MUCH for "backing up"
all the picture project pictures I had completed. He came over while I
was in Little Rock and worked on it. Bob - THANK YOU SO MUCH for coming
over to turn off the computer so it would be turned off right. John
called me and wanted me to turn it off but finally he said "Mom, see if
Bob can come over - he and I speak the same computer language". I would
absolutely commit "Harry Carri" or something if everything would be
deleted by accident - John has put SO much time and effort into it and
so have I and Ricky worked one entire Summer on it. John has fixed it
now so I can access the albums real easy and it's fun to spend time on
it. I don't know when the family will get copies but you will
SOMETIME!!!
I thought of some things we did in Little
Rock that I neglected to write about in my letter last week. I wanted
to go to the M. M. Cohn's store so Roy took me there. He & Patrice kept
telling me that it wasn't the best place to shop in Little Rock like it
used to be but I thought it was very nice. It has changed places in
that mall - it used to be in the center and now it is on the very East
end. They were having a good sale and I saw LOTS of things to buy but
then I remembered I would have to pack them and bring them home so I
didn't get them. The other stores in that mall were practically
deserted and that was sad. I remember when Claire was a buyer for
Cohn's in their hosiery department and I loved to shop there.
I also wanted to go to Park Plaza to shop
and Roy was worried I would get lost between there and Cohn's so he
stayed with me and took me across the street to Park Plaza. That is a
VERY nice place to shop - they have two Dillards' stores, one for women
at one end of the mall and one for men at the other end. They don't
have a grocery store there like they had when we lived there - I will
NEVER forget the day I was shopping at that grocery store and John
decided to leave the store while I was checking out. I turned around
and he was gone. We notified the police and a man on the street going
towards our home had found him on the road and had taken him into his
house and called the police. I had called Lynn in the meantime - he was
at the church because we were having a big conference that week with
church authorities staying at our home. Lynn brought Ann and they went
to this man's house to identify John - they all thought Ann was John's
Mother because he ran to her so quickly. John was about three years old
and I think about that experience everytime I hear about a child who is
missing.
I was SO impressed with an activity Roy &
Patrice have during their meal times in their home. Their church is
very active in the "Heifer Project" - they have special fund raising
activities to help countries get animals that will help them provide
food for their families. These countries are very poor and families
often go hungry because of the lack of help in raising crops, etc. Each
family in their church is encouraged to provide money for this activity
so Roy & Patrice have a plastic "Noah's Ark" that is like a bank. This
is passed around to each family member and they tell what they are
thankful for and they put some money in the ark - they had many quarters
for us to use. Their responses were individual and they didn't "copy"
each other. IT WAS FUN!!!
I also wanted to tell you about a
documentary we all watched one night. I believe the title was "Super
Size Me". It was about all the calories we consume when we eat mainly
at "McDonalds". I don't believe I will ever eat there again, at least
not their super size meals - IT WAS VERY EFFECTIVE!!!
I put my Christmas decorations up in my
living room last week - each year I decide to not do that but then I
"give in". I have a little Christmas tree in my family room upstairs
that shows through the window and I am using that instead of having the
Christmas lights on the roof like I have done before. Margaret doesn't
understand why I didn't want the roof lights - each year we pay Darrell
to do them and then some of them don't light and after Christmas half
are blown down from the roof and I decided to just do the things I can
take care of and besides that I like the Christmas tree in the family
room.
That's all the news - I think. I LOVE EACH
ONE OF YOU SO VERY, VERY MUCH. PLEASE BE SO VERY, VERY CAREFUL IN
EVERYTHING YOU DO. Grandma B XXXXXOOOOO