This is our Christmas letter...

It was more fun before I copied it here, because some on the words were colorful and fun, but I guess that can't copy over.   Merry Christmas!  Hope you enjoy this wonderful season.



Dear Family and Friends,




Tis the Season to procrastinate and now there are only 4 days left until Christmas. If I don’t get this letter written today, I’ll have to use a sharpie to cross out our “Season’s Greetings” and write “Happy New Year”. Wait, does “Season’s Greetings” include the New Year in it? Maybe I’m okay, then!



We’ve had an eventful year. The main thing was moving. Last May we thought we were at the end of our efforts to sell our house. We took it off the market, our realtor accidently put it back on, and that day(!!) we got a call to show it to the people that eventually bought it. Lucky for us, the house of our dreams was on the market and we could afford it (mostly?). We figured in extra money for heating and water bills, but not that we would have 40 extra mouths to feed. We are in a great neighborhood with lots of other kids who are constantly coming over to our house where our children generously offer them food! We also have a cow farm behind us, so we spent the first few months feeding them as well. Then we got our first bills and decided to kick the cows out of our grocery bill. We actually love that the kids come to our house and feel so happy to be here.



I am sad to report that Brandon is still in his MBA program. The end is in sight, though! Next June or July we will be only 6 months away from repaying his loans. It has been a long road with him either at school or doing homework. But he has been doing great in school and is bound to get his dream job after all of this effort. He sure does deserve it. He is still with the State Auditor’s office and it is as unfulfilling as it sounds for him.



Riley is in the 4th grade this year. He just recently got to be one of the town’s folk in his schools production of Tom Sawyer. He had a lot of fun with it until they told him he had to wear makeup for it. Luckily, his cheeks are naturally rosy, so no one noticed much. He really has enjoyed his dad being his coach for baseball and basketball this year.



Anna is really enjoying 2nd grade. She has made some new friends. We are close enough to where we used to live that she still gets to attend her Tap dance class. She is so cute when she’s dancing. This year she has discovered Taylor Swift and knows all of the words to her songs.



Evan is growing up so fast. He’ll start Kindergarten next year! He is enjoying preschool this year and spends the rest of his time killing all of the bad guys that are constantly invading our home. They must be invisible, because I never see them. But he is always shooting something.



I’ve been keeping busy with trying to keep this house clean. I’ve also been working with the Cub Scouts that Riley attends. That has been quite an adventure. The kids keep me busy with all of their activities and homework. I am starting to think about what I will do next year when Evan starts Kindergarten. I’m thinking Bonbons & Lifetime Movies! Maybe I’ll take a class or two. We’ll see.



Well, this is probably going to be late, but I’m going to try to get this out today. Hopefully, this will get there in time to wish you a Merry Christmas, but even if it misses the 25th, we hope you enjoy this wonderful Season and that the Spirit of Christmas will fill you long into the New Year.



With love,

The Kirkwoods

Brandon, Pam, Riley, Anna and Evan

Getting better...

That is my goal.  To get better at keeping up with life.  After moving in here, life started getting ahead of me and I've been fighting to keep up.  New school, new callings, new friends.  Mixing those with all of the old stuff and old friends has been difficult.  But we are starting to settle and adjust and have been loving it here. 

The kids have made friends in the neighborhood.  Brandon is so excited that Riley has two friends that come over all of the time to play football and baseball.  Riley is at the end of a really great soccer season.  He got a perfect score on the math section of the 3rd grade standardized test. We were so proud about that.  He actually asked his teacher to give him extra work during math time, because he was finishing too quickly and having to read during math time. Anna has been loving the new school and making some nice new friends. We live close enough that she still gets to do tap dancing.  Evan gets to attend the same preschool as last year and he loves it!  He is doing soccer for the first time and thinks that it's so fun. He still loves having his own room and has been coloring pictures that he tapes up on his walls. So cute.

Brandon is taking a really hard class right now, but after this he only has a few more classes and one big research paper before he's done!  He is coaching Evan's soccer team and has a lot of fun with that.  I enjoyed a really fun birthday last month with a house full of friends.  I've been trying to figure out how to keep this house clean. I've never been really good at that, but I love this house so much, I'm trying. I can't believe that we are heading into the holiday season. I love it.  Life is going so fast, but we are enjoying it! And I'll try keeping up with this blog.

Family Home Evening

We had a really fun FHE tonight and I thought I would share.  We made playdough at the beginning of family home evening and each child got assigned one thing to add to the pot.  One put in a cup of flour, one added the bowl with 1/4 cup salt and 2 teaspoons of cream of tarter.  One added one cup of water that contained 1 tablespoon of oil and Koolaid to it's color. We made two colors, so Brandon and I each had a pot to stir, over medium heat for about 3-5 minutes until it turned into a lumpy ball. As we were stirring, we took the opportunity to talk about how this playdough was like Heavenly Father's church.  The kids tried to guess why they were alike.  Evan thought it was because it smelled good!  So I explained that we each had a specific part in making the playdough so that it works.  We couldn't all have the water or it would just be wet.  We couldn't all have the flour or it would just be dry.  We had exactly the right stuff and put it together in just the right way.  Then we took the playdough off of the stove to let it cool, pretty quickly, and then showed them how it was all together, but still pretty lumpy.  We had to knead it and work it in order for it to be smooth.  I explained to them how this is like the church, because Heavenly Father has given us all talents to help make His church work smoothly.  Some of us are creative, some of us are friendly, some of us are natural leader, some of us are doers. Just having those talents is not enough, though.  We must mix them with the talents that others have and use them.  We set the playdough aside and went into the living room for Riley's portion of the evening.  He had come up with the idea of talking about talents.  Here is his talk:

"WE NEED THEE EVERY HOUR


Did you know we wouldn’t be very talented if we didn’t believe in God? Well we wouldn’t. All of our talent comes from Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. Heavenly Father has given talents to each of his children.

Here is a story I read that talks about this:

Wendy watched her sister Shelley draw a beautiful picture of the mountains behind their home. Wendy was discouraged because she couldn’t draw as well as Shelley did. Shelley played the piano too and was smart in school. Wendy thought about all the things that Shelley could do well. She wondered why she couldn’t do those things well also. One day Wendy’s teacher asked her to give a talk in Primary. She worked hard on it and gave a good talk. The bishop heard Wendy’s talk and told her how much he enjoyed her talk. He told Wendy that she was very talented.

A warm feeling came over Wendy. The bishop’s words helped Wendy discover something important about herself. Wendy soon discovered that she had other talents too. She made friends easily, and other children always wanted to be with her. She loved to read and write. When she went to church, she was reverent and listened to her teacher. Wendy had never thought that these were talents because they were not like Shelley’s talents. Now Wendy realized that she did have talents, but her talents were different from her sister’s.

I bare my testimony that Heavenly Father has given us all our talents. And I say these things in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen."

After Riley gave his talk, we went around and told what we thought our talents were .  Then we each told what we thought someone else was talented at.  We talked about how we could use these talents to serve Heavenly Father and how we needed Him all of the time to help strengthen our testimonies about our talents and to help us use them.  We ended our FHE by singing 'We need Thee every hour'. After the prayer, they got to play with the dough that was ready for them.
 
I have to say, this was one of the most fun FHE's we've done in the past few months.  Hearing all the kids tell me one thing that they think I'm talented at was neat.  Hearing them compliment each other and talk about how they could do things to help at church just made me feel good inside. It feels kind of formal, but I want to bare my testimony that Heavenly Father has given us all special talents.  They are for His work and His purposes, not just ours, and we need to pray to find out where our talents can best be used. It's not always were we imagine them to be needed, but we need to be open to the path that He has us on, because it will only lead to blessings.  I say these things in the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.