Dear Kids,
      Yay, it’s snowing! The ground has been pretty bare for the last week or so. The resorts have been doing OK, but they could use more snow. Especially since I want to go snowboarding tomorrow. Paul and I are probably going to Wolf Mountain, the place by Wolf Creek Condominiums (you remember those from the family reunions!) where an all-day pass is only $22, and they give a senior citizen discount if you’re over 55. (Me). It’s not a fancy place (old barn for a lodge) but you can have a lot of fun there. Next week, Nora and I are going to drive to Pocatello and snowboard with Vanessa at Pebble Creek. (Vanessa’s going to find somebody to tend the 6 kids.)(Probably more than one person.) That’s going to be fun, too. I love winter now. I used to hate it. I’d sit on the heater and read books, waiting for spring. Or pound in the basement. It’s all different now.
     Paul has been keeping busy with temp jobs, which he does in between working sudoku puzzles. And watching bowl games. So far this week he’s watched the Rose Bowl, the Fiesta Bowl, the Orange Bowl, and the Sugar Bowl. He explained to me how they spread them out now, so they’re not all played on New Year’s Day. Very Smart. People like Paul are hooked. But today Paul’s at work, at MyGrant Windows, where they deal in car windshields. (It probably used to be called “Migrant Windows,” back when they used to hire illegals.) Anyway, Paul spends his time sweeping floors and tearing apart wood pallets with a sawzall.
     To celebrate New Year’s Day, Dad and Paul and I drove to American Fork to get some cabin firewood from Bevan’s neighbor. The guy had bits and pieces and some pretty nice logs, which we loaded in the truck. Then we drove to Heber and visited John and Heather and their kids. Then we drove to the cabin and unloaded the wood, and just lazed around for the rest of the day. One of my New Year’s resolutions is to not work so hard at the cabin this year. I’m off to a good start.
     Yesterday I visited Grandma and Grandpa in Orem. I hadn’t been for a month or so, except for our Christmas Eve visit, so it was fun to get back into the swing of things. I had brought the movie “Just Like Heaven” (edited by me, since Cleanflicks is out of business) and they thought it was great. John Heder, aka Napoleon Dynamite, is really funny as a psychic. Same type of character. Grandma and I got back to work on our family history project, too–scanning pictures of ancestors for the next edition of our ancestor books. Hopefully we’ll have at least one of them done by Christmas.
     I was changing the sheets on Paul’s bed (down in the cave) when I noticed one of the springs had popped out. Just like in the cartoons–boiinngg!! I said to Paul, “Didn’t it hurt?” He said after his mission, he could sleep on anything. I tore the mattress apart, so we could put it out with the bulk trash, and now Paul’s sleeping in the guest room. He says he has to watch the bed-making video now, so he’ll know how to put the bed back together when he leaves for school.
     Gotta go! Life is good! Love, Mom