Dear Family,
What’s happened after I came back from Japan? It has just been busy, but there are no excuses for not writing a family letter. I need to get back into the routine of writing about our life. I actually like writing, but it requires a lot of time to write in English since English is not my first language. David is doing a science fair project with Lillian, so he asked me to write the family letter this month.
David is still traveling to Canada and Denver to show his face to the people he works with, but not enjoying the traveling or the work he is doing. He would rather stay home and spend time with family he loves. I am so glad that he is providing for our family and seems like good news that the company asked him to work full time even if he is based at home. So at least, we don’t have to worry about paying our bills and enjoy a vacation occasionally. He just finished the scout Pinewood Derby project with Thomas. He also took the twins and Lillian skiing one day. Now, he is helping Lillian on her science project. I am so glad that he can help with those big projects that I cannot help much.
I, Megumi, am busy coordinating kids’ schedule and activities, driving kids everywhere, and volunteering at school. I start taking tennis lessons and enjoy myself a little bit. I am still Activity Days leader and enjoy planning the activities. I’m also getting tired of getting after my children to practice piano and violin. Supporting Lilly’s music studio is taking my energy also. I run out of energy to keep my house organized and so our house is little messier than I expect. I’d like to clean our garage, storage room, and individual rooms. I want to decorate Thomas’, Marianne’s, and Hannah’s room, and the basement someday. Life is busy, but nothing I can complain about. We are healthy and kids are doing well. My life is so blessed! David and I celebrated our 18th wedding anniversary in Chicago. David didn’t tell me where we were going, so I didn’t know where I was going until the first flight going to Minneapolis. He finally told me that we are going to Chicago in the airplane. He arranged to meet Yukiko and Kevin’s family (you may remember them from our sealing in the Chicago temple). We did sealings for Yukiko’s ancestors at the Chicago temple where we were sealed 17 years ago. It was so good to see the Meldrum family. We haven’t seen each other for 10 years. Lots of thanks to John and Carole for attending to our children while we were gone. My children had a great time with Uncle John and Aunt Carole! It was much easier for us to leave and not worry a thing about our children.
Lillian is the busiest 12-year old ever! We have to maintain her sleep for her growth, but seems like she can take more sleeping time. She just participated in a Youth Symphony Orchestra concert at the U of U. It was originally planned for Sunday evening and David didn’t want to go. But a snow storm came and they rescheduled it on Monday evening instead. Lillian was able to perform the concert. They played an Italian symphony and Romeo and Juliet. I thought it was well done. However, Lillian and we decided to not join the orchestra next year since it takes every Saturday and too much family commitment. She is also getting ready for herself and her students to participate in the Piano Festival in February and March. She is also getting ready for her violin master class, recital and Federation. She enjoys every minute of school and refuses to miss any classes. Also she enjoys hanging out with friends every Friday night. But, now she made her dad upset by doing a last minute science project, so she is not able to get together with friends until she outlines NEXT YEAR’s science fair project. She is planning on taking a 6 week organ course from UVU. She keeps herself busy taking 3 honors classes, catalyst math, teaching piano & violin, , Young Women’s activities, and joining the mentor and acting clubs at school. She wants to do some kind of sports but has no time for it right now. But she always runs to the bus stop in the morning to catch the bus! No time for make-up or doing pretty hair in the morning like other middle school girls do.
Marianne is always happy except is having difficult time perfecting her violin play. She doesn’t love violin as much as piano. She is now really into crochet. Her school has before/after school programs for a few months. Marianne always wanted learn how to crochet, so I signed her up. She wants a day with Grandma just learning to crochet all day long. She is also getting ready for the piano festival and singing a duet with one of Lilly’s student. I changed her violin teacher to the same as Lillian’s, locally here in Heber and hopefully it is a good move for her. Marianne is also getting ready for Federation, etc. and Lilly is accompanying her on the piano. It is hard to practice with her big sister sometimes. She also is doing basketball for 8 weeks and loves it. Good exercise, good appetite, good sleep and good laugh. She is a healthy, happy 8-year old.
Thomas’ highlight and lowlight this month was the Pinewood Derby. He designed, sanded, and carefully painted the car. Dad put on the wheels with nails that had been sanded by our friend Kevin (Yukiko’s husband) and expressed mailed to us. He was worried that Thomas would be emotionally damaged if the race went poorly. Great to have a good friend like that! Thomas’ car was surprisingly fast and got 2nd place in his den group. Thomas was upset and in tears since he didn’t get 1st place. He wanted a trophy! I didn’t know that it was such a big deal with scout boys. Anyway, it was new experience for us and we will be glad to do this for two more years. He doesn’t like Spanish, but he is doing well at school. He has sense of humor and told the teacher “No Espanol porfavor” at the SEP conference and made the teacher laugh. He enjoys being a part of scouts. He doesn’t enjoy new thing so much, but I signed up Thomas with an afterschool basketball and homework club. Mostly he loves watching movies and playing games with his Kindle Fire he got from Santa. I rather have the Kindle used for reading, but we cannot figure out how to handle the electronics with kids yet. PC, smart phone, Ipod, Kindle, tablet, Wii etc. It is too much exposure to the internet and how can we protect our kids? Maybe Santa shouldn’t give them those toys.
Hannah is always worried about robbers and murder. I don’t’ know where she gets those ideas, but every night she makes sure I locked the doors, even the basement. She has finally started going to kindergarten happily every day and doesn’t refuse to go with the carpool anymore. She joined choir practice with twins in the morning and enjoys singing in Spanish/English. She sometimes gets up and dresses herself to make the 7:20am early ride for choir practice. She has perfect “r” sounds in Spanish which I cannot pronounce and loves learning Spanish. I cannot wait for her to go to full day school. Hopefully I won’t miss her too much next year. She started tennis lessons with the neighbor girls (Sophie and Chesney) who have birthdays 1 week apart. They are cute 6 year-old girls with cute tennis outfits, but also sassy girls. Most of Hannah’s friends have strong personalities and attitudes. It must be their age, so tennis lessons are perfect to give the parent a break. Hannah is playing violin for Marianne’s piano festival and Lillian is teaching her well.
I am sorry that I miss Abby’s wedding shower and Willow’s baby shower. However, our prayer is with you and we are SO excited. We also pray for our missionaries working hard.
Love,
David, Megumi, Lillian, Marianne, Thomas and Hannah
No comments:
Post a Comment