Update by Chris...

Every month, Chris' family puts together a family letter. This would be impossible in my family, but on his mom's side, it is just "Nana" (Chris' grandma), Chris' mom, Chris and his three siblings and his mom's brother's family and their five kids. So...12 families in three generations. Anyway, Chris never posts, but he is well written and it is always entertaining to read his perspective (at least I think so). Here's his entry for January (December re-cap, even though he didn't mention Christmas!)...

Well, it is still raining up here and getting dark at 5:00. That limits the things you can do outside of the house. I have been taking the girls swimming a lot. Ruby is a stellar swimmer. She can swim the full length of the pool now by herself and her teacher told me she is the best "back floater" in class. She can also do something resembling a back stroke pretty well (also resembles a dying fish). She also has the earsplitting ability to scream at a window breaking octave on her way down the waterslide. You can actually see the sound coming out of the bottom of the slide as it shoots out like a bazooka. I told her once to scream on her way down and now she does it every time. Sometimes she recites the ABC's as she goes down to see how far she can get before she comes out the bottom. Either way it is hilarious to see people plugging their ears that are 50-60 yards away from the source. She heard me tell some boys how to go down faster and decided to try it on her own by lifting her body up on her heels and shoulder blades. She comes shooting out the bottom and almost clears the ropes that section off that part of the pool. She had the sweetest swimsuit wedgie I have ever seen after the first time.

Ruby asked me last night at bedtime if the next time we saw a dead animal we could stick around and wait for Heavenly Father to come pick it up and take it to Heaven so she could talk with him. She wanted to do this in the woods where nobody could get in her way.

Alice is talking more and more and can now turn the lights off by herself - not quite tall enough to turn them back on yet though. She chooses of course to do this quite often. When she is not cutting the lights she is tormenting the new kitten we got. She likes to follow it with little pieces of food stolen from the dish and try to feed it. It has been a real treat to find the cat food all over the house. Another favorite trick is to screech "Hi Kitty! Hi Kitty! Hi Kitty!" in a voice resembling a Whistling Pete. The cat comes out less and less when Alice is around. It found a home under the washer and dryer pedestal that Dad and I built that is "Alice free".

Ruby and I are coming down to Colorado later this month because she really wants to see her Nana. She has broken into tears enough times about not being able to see her Nana that we finally broke down and decided to bring her down. I am sure there won't be any crying when it is time to leave and come back.