A Day Off

The kids had a Friday off of school so we set off for adventure. First stop, the Capitol Building. We gave ourselves a tour and even sat and listened to The House and Senate for a while. I was quite impressed with how quiet the kids were. I was prepared to retreat quickly if needed, but the kids were very respectful.

I had a great time watching them explore everything. They were very interested in the white granite, but I think they learned more about parking meters than anything else. Andrew had so many questions about why you put in money, what happens if you don't, and loved to comment on the status of everyone else's meters. It was so funny.

Then we picked Greg up from the airport (yea!) and headed to the skating rink.

The kids have been begging to go skating for ages, but I refuse to take them on account of my tailbone. So this was a great chance since we were all in Boise. Natali's roller blading paid off and she took off with confidence.

Kate's skates only touched the ice from the stroller - shocker!

Andrew borrowed the ice walker and did fine, as long as he held on tight.

Mack took off with his usual "can do" attitude and managed pretty well.

I pushed Emily around in the stroller a bit. She really coveted Kate's skates, until I put them on her and she immediately wanted them off. So the little girls and I mostly just watched the show. Everyone had a great time.

A Bit of This and That

Hese are a bunch of pictures from the last few months.Emily loved these sunglasses for a few days.

Yummy frosting!
Emily loves snow. It was one of her first words. When she sees it, she beelines for her snow boots. It didn't actually snow much this year but of course one day it did Emily had been crying all day with (I would find out later) a sinus infection and bronchitis. Sick or not, when she saw the snow all was forgotten and out we went. She walked around it in and let me push her in the stroller so she could look at it. It was the happiest she had been in days. However, when Kate and I were ready for lunch, Emily would not come in. I was pretty miserable with my own cold and was not staying in the snow any longer. She screamed in the garage for 15 minutes, refusing to come inside. She eventually stopped screaming when I put her in the stroller. And there she stayed outfitted with all the snow gear. She wouldn't get out or let us take off the gear and so she napped there. It must have been warm.

Best Books of 2011

I have finally done it - In 2011 I read more non-fiction than fiction. I have been on the verge for a long time. The more kids I have the less fiction I read. Otherwise, I ignore my kids and my home for three days to finish it and when it's all over I wonder if it was worth it. Non-fiction on the other hand, I can pick up and put down a little easier. I can use more self-control and still feel like I am broadening my mind (which is sadly quite unused). So here are my top five, in no particular order.

The Great Bridge by David McCullough: The fascinating story about the building of the Brooklyn Bridge. I love how McCullough intertwines the lives of the different historical figures in such a way that gives the story a personal human feel while you are still blown away by the technical side of how it was all accomplished.

Tiger: A Story of Vengeance and Survival: This is a story about a man-eating tiger in Russia. Yea, that intro didn't interest me much either, but I watched Greg get sucked into this book and had to find out why. It is such an eye opening look at the animal world, the effects of the Communism and its collapse on rural Russia, and the fear of being hunted.

A Tree Grows In Brooklyn: I remember reading this in High School and being so struck buy the impact books had on the main character. I loved the new insights I gained this time as an adult. I understood a lot more about her mother and their relationship. A classic worth rereading.

The Help: This one has been given enough airtime - I'm sure you have all read it and/or seen the movie. I loved the rich characters, the humor, and the details that made it such an easy book to fall into.

Infidel: The autobiography of Ayaan Hirsi Ali was amazing. I am having a hard time putting into words what I enjoyed about this book. I learned so much about parts of the world I have never been, about Islam, about how much have to be grateful for, about the many injustices in the world, and how you can overcome anything.

Annual Christmas Letter

Most of you have already read this - but someday my kids will read this and laugh at their father who enjoys his yearly letter maybe a bit too much.


Family and Friends,

If the letter is dramatically different next year, it is because Lisa and I are arguing over the contents as I seek her feedback the night before sending this out. She claims I don’t want her feedback, but why else would I have asked for it? She keeps getting caught up on the difference between facts, memories, and the artistic license required to make this mildly entertaining. And then she wants me to say positive things about our kids. It’s not my style, and for at least this year, this remains MY letter. Challenging Lisa on such important matters after 11 years of marriage is how a father of 5 lives on the edge. Actually a father of five always lives on the edge. (Editor’s note: there were some actual improvements made to the letter after Lisa’s review.) On to the year…

I crossed one cat species off my list and two countries. While in Chile for work I took a few days to visit Patagonia at the southern tip of the continent in hopes of seeing a puma. It was an adventure worthy of more than paragraph a in the Christmas letter, so if you ever head that way I have a few pointers on how to avoid $35/gallon gasoline, where to spotlight for pumas in Torres del Paine N.P., what guanacos and rheas are, and a highly recommended Spanish only speaking guide. (No, I don’t speak Spanish) While I was gone Andrew prayed, "Help dad see pumas on his drive home so he can take pictures of it, or in the morning when there is enough light, or when it is dark but with lots of flashlights." That’s how we spell love at the Easton home.

In between tours of ancient ruins in Mexico and Guatemala with Lisa’s family we watched BYU in the NCAA basketball tournament over the internet or with the Spanish speaking commentators on TV. Jimmer proved to be an international phenomenon. Mack and Andrew made homemade Jimmer BYU jerseys out of white t-shirts.

I spent 4 months successfully on the “get in and out of shape plan” and completed my second ½ marathon in the middle of the plan.

We took a late summer trip to Washington State to look for whales and to visit the mountains, rain forests, and beaches of Olympic National Park. After 3 hours on the boat straining to see through the pea soup like conditions we had seen nary a whale, but the boat captain and many of the passengers knew Andrew and Natali by name as they roamed the decks looking for signs of wildlife and striking up conversations with strangers. Suddenly we found ourselves in the midst of a pod of killer whales that frolicked around and beneath our boat for nearly an hour—what a memory!

In an effort to avoid the effects of global warming I scheduled two trips to Yellowstone National Park this year and managed to catch the last snow of spring season and the first snow of autumn. Our stalwart kids didn’t let the weather slow them down as our family of 7 completed a 3 mile hike in 39 degree weather. We proved that kids are scarier than cars by not seeing a single mammal during our hike but we did see grizzlies, wolves, coyotes, and about everything else from the road.

Natali (9)—received a perfect attendance award at school—I feel like a failure as a parent. She may have gone to school sick a few times to make sure she received the free bike prize for not missing a day. The kids must have too many days off of school if she can win the award and we still put so many miles on the car. She narrowly missed the perfect daughter award.
Mack (8)—was baptized in October and spent the remaining 364 days playing football, basketball, or soccer. He stopped playing long enough to attend a BYU football game and read the collected works of Roald Dahl. I think his life is good and so does he.

Andrew (6)—driving home one night with just Andrew in the car we had a deep conversation about the foreign species in his 1st grade class. Andrew confessed that at recess they always play “Girls chase the Boys”, and though one of his friends likes to get caught Andrew vehemently declared, “But none of them ever touched me!” Andrew conceded to attend school this year, but only until he learns how to read his animal books. He sleeps on the floor in his room nearly every night—except for the night he and I slept at the zoo next to the Lion enclosure.

Kate (4)—has found her 2nd home at dance class and is ready to perform at the mere suggestion. She still likes to snuggle and find an open lap for story time. She is not quite as into hiking (let’s be honest, walking on uneven surfaces can be difficult) and the outdoors as the boys are, but somehow I still love her just as much.

Emily (1)—has been taught by her siblings the appropriate sound for all 4 primary animals. (Editor’s note: there is no such thing as 4 primary animals, but she can growl, meow, moo, and woof woof). Her official vocabulary consists of 53% “no”, 45% “nuh-uh” and an assortment of other words that occasionally imply approval or acceptance. Look for her in the 2012 Toddler Olympics as a food thrower. Other than that she’s absolutely adorable and hasn’t lost her red hair yet.

Editor’s note on obligatory praise of children: our kids really are wonderful, talented, well-behaved, good-looking, and even love each other and their parents, but you probably could have guessed that.

Book of the year—The Tiger: A True Story of Vengeance and Survival. Even Lisa enjoyed reading about a man-eating Siberian Tiger.

Author’s note: my apologies to the readers and editor for going beyond 1 page for the first time in Easton Christmas Letter history. The truth is I look forward to the chance to write fiction once a year way more than I should. I find myself reflective at this year end. What have I done with my time and talents? It is easy to be busy, but it is much harder to be good. To paraphrase Thomas Monson, may we all keep Christmas this year rather than just spending it.

Merry Christmas, Love the Easton Family (Greg, Lisa, Natali, Mack, Andrew, Kate, and Emily)

Family Pictures 2011

Our good friend took our pictures again this year. The kids had fun eating apples and exploring the swamp. The boys were knee deep in water before we even got started. Emily ate a bunch of skittles and Kate did her best "smiles" far too often. But all things considered it turned out pretty well.

Another one bites the dust...

I took Mack in for his annual eye exam. He has a amblyopia, fancy talk for a lazy eye, so we check on it now and then. When they put up the first row of letters for him to read I knew we were in trouble. He could only read the very largest letters accurately (the ones right under the huge E). My quiet little guy sits in the back row at school and of course never mentioned that he can't read anything his teacher puts on the board.

That officially puts us at 2 for 2 - kids getting glasses in the second grade. This is not a stat I am trilled about. I didn't get glasses till 4th grade and Greg only got glasses after Andrew was born. Technically, Greg doesn't even have to wear glasses. Mack's eyes are already twice as bad as Greg's. However, both of us carry the genes for bad eye sight. I was hoping some of our kids would get the good half of Greg's genes but alas...I guess I should just be grateful we live in a world where glasses are readily available so my little guy can see.

Halloween

This year I decided to try out a Halloween Dinner. We started by played a few Halloween games intended for the kids to earn candy corns that would be traded later to pay for dinner. The games were silly and meant to be fun - but the night almost ended there because of all the complaining, whining, and full out Frisbee kicking fits - however, everyone finally pulled it together and we got to our dinner.

With the help of the Internet we came up with a menu full creepy Halloween items. At first the kids were hesitant to order anything because they didn't know what it was (and they only had so many candy corns to spend). But eventually, they got into it and by the end they were begging to do it again next year. It was a lot of fun and semi-easy because Greg took the day off to spend time with his Mom and Randy. So I had a lot of help; I guess we'll see about next year. Here are just a few of the menu items.Bat Wings (Chicken wings)Deathly Dip (Hummus with veggies and tortillas cut out in Halloween shapes)Witches Brew (the apples are supposed to look like teeth and the grapes like eye balls)And for dessert - Edible Eyeballs these frozen pudding balls were quite a hit.
Then it was on to the Trick or Treating. This year Natali convinced all the kids to be characters from Peter Pan. So I made a bunch of simple costumes to accommodate them. I spend $10 or less on each costume so I was quite pleased with my self. Yet, as usual, I forgot about pictures. In fact, we only have pictures of the dinner because Greg was thinking. Thankfully, he did take costume pictures, but the kids were supper bundled and none of the pictures capture the costumes very well, but here they are.

Peter Pan - Only Andrew can get away with wearing 5T girls leggings and never think twice about it. He cut up the bottom of his shirt himself, which he thought was pretty cool.Tinker Bell - Well I had been planning for Emily to be Michael wearing pink PJs and carrying a teddy bear, but three days before Halloween a friend brought me this costume she had made years before. Emily loved it. She actually wanted it on, wings and all. It really surprised me. She made it around to 6 houses then filled her diaper and went home. She couldn't have been happier with her six pieces of candy and the dum dums she keep sneaking out of other treat buckets.Wendy - I kept expecting Kate to back out of this costume because it wasn't pick, frilly, fancy...you get the idea. Yet, she bought into Natali's enthusiasm and only slightly wavered when she found some pink butterfly wings I made years ago. Princess Tiger Lily - Natali had fun picking out the fabric and planing this costume. She decided to paint the top part and it turned out so great. She really did a good job. As we were chasing the boys around the neighborhood, Greg and I decided that Natali and Mack could double as Sacajawea and Lewis (or Clark). Whatever works. Lost Boy - Mack originally wanted to be Captain Hook , but I just wasn't up to that much of a commitment. So he came up with this lost boy costume. He almost decided to be John last minute, which would have been a fun costume, but luckily for my sake, he lost interest and stayed a lost boy. He did pick out all his fabric and cut up his pants and shirt - so he was happy. You can't see it in this picture, but he is wearing a hat with a tail on it (one he borrowed from Grandma so it may seam familiar to some of you) which definitely added to the possible frontiersman look.Now we have way more candy that anyone needs and my laundry/sewing room has counter space again. I wonder what Natali will cook up for everyone next year...