January 6, 2013

Dear Mama,

Hi! Hope you had a great celebration as you invited the New Year 
into your life. So far mine has been rather quiet and I am grateful. 

Monday, as you know was New Year's Eve. Beck invited the kids to have a 
sleepover at her house. The boys went and, from their reports, had a 
great time. The girls waited for Brenna to get off of work, and then 
they headed to Amarillo for a young adult activity. They said that it 
wasn't exactly what they had expected, but they still had a nice time. 
Jay and I had the house to ourselves, and it was so quiet in the house. 
I hadn't realized how I had forgotten what that was like. We just 
enjoyed spending time with each other. We went to bed at 10pm. We 
figured New York was celebrating by then, and that was good enough for us.

Tuesday, New Year's Day. And Matt's 21st birthday! I realized 
that I still needed to bake him a birthday cake. He had requested a 
chocolate cake with chocolate chips and vanilla icing with chocolate 
chips. Ask, and ye shall receive, and that is exactly what he got. He 
had a lot of fun opening his presents and eating his cake, and we 
invited him to stay for dinner. We were having Chicken Mozzarella! 
Everyone's favorite and a usual birthday request. We also spent that 
day picking up all of the Christmas decorations. We had fun being 
together as a family.

Wednesday, I went to the gym, and came home and then read the rest 
of the day. It was time for me to have a sort of vacation. I still 
cooked dinner, but I made the kids figure out their own lunches. It has 
been chilly enough lately that we actually have to scrape the car 
windows. Nothing bad, just some heavy frost. Jay had to go back to 
work on Tuesday, but the kids were still on their winter break.

Thursday was an almost repeat of Wednesday, with the exception that 
I did the laundry--in my own house, with my own machine! Wow, it was 
really nice not having to lug heavy baskets of laundry. Did some more 
reading amidst laundry and dishes and cooking.

Friday I hit the gym, and I really worked out hard. I got home and 
was so tired that I sat most of the day. I felt sore, but mostly in my 
joints. I took some ibuprofen and that helped, but I have decided that 
I am not going to work out that hard anymore. My old body is 
rebelling. I will still go to the gym and workout, but not to that 
extent. We made pizza that night and watched a cartoon version of The 
Justice League. I finally got to watch Josh's favorite, "The Martian 
Manhunter" in action for the first time. I was impressed with his super 
powers. If I were going to be a super hero and could pick my own super 
powers, I would copy his. Pretty amazing dude!

Saturday was our day to get ready for Sunday. Cleaned the house 
and made some of your vegetable soup for lunch and worked on Sunday 
school lessons. Doctrine and Covenants this year. The boys all played 
Nancy Drew computer games most of the day.

Today, of course, is Sunday. It was a Fast and Testimony meeting. 
So, the kids were all fasting, but Jay and I had temple recommend 
interviews with a member of the Stake Presidency. We didn't get home 
until 1:30pm and the kids had not touched lunch and waited as patiently 
as possible for us. We did get a phone call from one of them while at 
the church asking how much longer we would be because they were 
starving. But they all waited. For our Family Home Evening, we watched 
a new DVD called "The Letter Writer". Oh my gosh, it is such a tear 
jerker! It was so good. At least, we all thought so. In the middle of 
it, Jay's Dad and Karren called to wish Matt a belated Happy Birthday. 
They have plans to do a lot of traveling this year. I am a bit envious 
because I was hoping to do some traveling with Jay for our 25th wedding 
anniversary, but it's not going to happen. I am resolved to paying my 
credit card off and not use it at all until it is clear, and then 
hopefully, if I have to use it, be able to pay it off every month the 
way I do with our other cards. It will be hard because every time I 
have wanted to do this, something huge breaks down and needs fixed or 
replaced and I end up using it. I will find another way to handle it if 
this happens. I have asked the Lord for help in this.

Anyway, the boys start school tomorrow, and it is getting close to 
bedtime. They need to go to bed early because I have allowed them to 
stay up late every night of their vacation. Well, except for Saturday 
nights when they had church the next morning, but I am sure they were 
still awake in their rooms until all hours.
I love ya Mama, and I hope you are doing well. I am thinking of 
you more often these days if that is at all possible. I send you my 
best wishes and all my love, your 4th, Lisa