5 February 2017

 Dear everybody,

   Thank you, Aimee and Dixie, for your emails; I enjoyed them so much! Steve, I'd like to see a picture of the tanned porcupine hide; and what did you do with the quills? Also, what is the SEL flight department that you're hoping to get an internship with? Anne, I'm excited about you volunteering at the hospital; please tell me all about it! Ellen, babysitting, that is wonderful; I'll bet all the kids just love you! Naomi, I'd like to hear how the geography bee turned out and how you're doing in swimming lessons. Noah, how did the spelling bee turn out and how is basketball going? Spencer, I'll bet you had fun on your bowling date with your mom. Aimee, glad to hear that your shin splints are getting better! James, I tried cross country skiing once...I'll stick with snow shoes! I'm glad you enjoy it!

   Dixie and Zach, it's fun to hear about your new house; I look forward to seeing it someday! And it's neat that the neighbor kids are enjoying your 4-wheeler! Mel, I'm glad you like your new school. And Cal, I'd like to see that bouncy egg thing sometime! Stella being so insistent on still being the baby...reminds me of when Sam was about that age. When the next one comes along it changes everything!

   I've enjoyed phone conversations with Heidi and Aimee this week. It's so nice to visit on the phone when we can.

   The two things I've attached...one is something I found in the LDS Living magazine about the hymn, Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing. I love that hymn even more because you kids sang it at a family reunion several years ago. Does anyone have that picture? I thought I did, but can't seem to find it.

   The other thing is about 40 pages I copied from a book on word origins that I gave to my cousin, Annette. I had found it at a used book store, but it's in good shape and seems to be a first addition. I think she'll really like it. But I copied those pages to keep for reference and thought some of you might like to have them too. Many of them would be helpful in learning medical terminology or other subjects. ( PDF of Word Origins)

   I've been listening to General Conference from Oct 2014 and not far into it the choir sings "If I Listen With My Heart." I remember when they sang it I wasn't familiar with it and couldn't understand all the words. I made a copy of the lyrics last week and have put them on the wall by my computer at work, that way I can learn them. Now as I listen to that disc again, I can sing along. It's one of my new favorites! Simple words with a powerful message.

   Dad is on his way to the Boise area for meetings all week. I think he'll be seeing the Weaver's and the Hessing's at the beginning and end of his trip. I've been going to Ward Conferences for the past few weeks; just two more weeks to go.

   Love to each one of you. I think of you often and keep you in my prayers always...and miss you!  Mom/Johanna/Nana

Hi Everybody! This is Naomi. First about the Geography Bee, I won which meant I had to take a state qualification test. I won't know if I made it to the next level until March, 1. And about swimming lessons, after the first lesson my teacher said I was ready to advance but she didn't move me up since that class was all ready crowded. So now I do double every thing the other people have to do.

Naomi

Hi All!

Dixie, your email and pictures were super fun!  And Mom, thank you!  I'll attach the picture of the five of us singing Come Thou Fount.  It's probably not the highest quality.  I think Lynsey took the original picture, she would probably have a higher quality picture.

Well, you got Naomi's exciting news!  She did a great job!  Noah did very well also.  He tied for third place in the spelling bee!  The word "dimension" took him out.  I'll attach a picture of him.  It's kind of a fuzzy picture, but if you can see the boy with the light green hoodie standing in the middle, that's him. 

I'm also going to attach a little video clip of Stephen and Spencer performing their newest trick.  Hopefully the file isn't too big!  And a picture of the two of them playing Chutes and Ladders.  They played three games in a row the other day!  Spencer was in heaven.

My shin splints were not gone on Thursday, so I got to start the actual treatments and they are working!!!  The treatment is just massaging different muscles in my legs while they are moving, like massaging my calf muscles while I wiggle my toes and again while I wag my foot back and forth.  It only takes about 10 minutes to get through all the different muscles, then I walk around for 2 minutes, then do all that one more time and that is one treatment.  I've done that twice, with four more times to go.  I hardly ever feel my shin splints any more and I have been running!  I went just over 2 miles on Thursday right after my first treatment, then Annie and I went 8 miles yesterday.  No problems!!  I am so excited!!!

Our weather is warming up a bit.  We've had rain off and on since last night and will have more for the next few days.  Today we saw grass on our way to church!  The kids were pretty excited about that.  Mom and Dad, and Sam and Nat, I know you have a while longer before you see grass.  I hope your winter isn't too long! 

I convinced Annie to watch You've Got Mail with me last night and she loved it!  She usually doesn't want to watch anything I suggest, so I was pretty excited that she watched it and enjoyed it.  Yay! 

I think that's everything for now.  Love you all and can't wait to see you!

Aimee