2010 Year in Summary - AKA- The Christmas Letter - aka -The Valentine's Letter

Dear family and friends,

Since we obviously missed the Christmas letter deadline, we would now like to wish you a happy Valentine’s Day! And in the spirit of love, we would love to share with you some of the things we each have enjoyed about this year.

We spent the beginning of this year in Utah where David’s parents’ generously housed us and fed us for several weeks while we searched for new housing and waited for David’s post doctoral fellowship to begin at Stanford. We finally made the move to California at the end of January. Here’s a summary of the highlights for each of us.

David has enjoyed beginning new research in the lab. We live about six miles from the school and David bikes there and back most days of the week. This year he had the wonderful opportunity of attending a conference in Germany. It was his first trip to Europe and he loved it. The rest of us missed him, but were so happy when he returned with lots of amazing chocolate! In other news, David also seems to be getting clumsier as he approaches the ripe old age of 30! This year he fell off his bike and bruised a rib, stubbed and broke a toe on a door, sliced his finger open at work and had it stitched back together, and broke his collar bone when he fell off his bike again and had to have it surgically plated and pinned together. He’s still recuperating from the last escapade. My only consolation is that Stanford hospital is across the street from his lab, and that in a couple of years he’ll hopefully be done working with toxic chemicals and will let his students have all the fun. Nevertheless, we’re praying daily for his safety!

Tanya – I have adapted fairly well to California. The first couple of months were calm and relaxing as we had few commitments and little to do but unpack boxes and entertain three kids. It was nice. But then it became boring so we got busy again with preschool groups and lessons and trips to the zoo. I keep myself busy nowadays by volunteering at Callie’s school and by acting as a room parent. I also babysit a few times a week and do the usual take care of a family of five kind of things. I recently was called to lead the nursery at church where we have lots of toddlers/preschoolers and I love it! My favorite things about California are affordable and delicious produce, a mild climate, the wonderful people who have befriended us, and the fact that I don’t have to have a baby to persuade family members to visit us! We were happy to have both our parents stay with us this year. Friends are welcome to visit, too! I also have to add that I loved visiting our families in Utah and West Virginia this year.

Callie’s big news of the year is that she started kindergarten! Callie is loving kindergarten and thriving. She has made many friends and loves her teacher, Ms. Francis. She still loves running, climbing, and playing, but she’s added coloring, drawing, and writing to her array of interests. She also loves transformers, dinosaurs, and dragons.

Alyssa has enjoyed making new friends, participating in a parent led preschool, and taking ballet and swimming lessons. She was sad to see Callie start school without her, and cried the whole way home and then some on the first day of school. But now she has recovered and is her usual cheerful self. She loves to color and loves to pretend she is different characters – usually a type of dinosaur or one of many transformers.

Haven’s big accomplishment is growth! She has changed so much over the course of the year! She’s mostly talks in sentences (although she’s still missing a lot of consonants, so Mom has to serve as interpreter), she learned to use the potty, and started nursery at church. She really wants to be a big girl like her big sisters. She loves her baby doll and totes it around with her often.

We miss you all and we are grateful for your love and friendship!

Happy Valentine’s Day

Love,

The Michaelis Family

David goes to Germany!

David went to Germany this week and brought back lots of yummy chocolate! I think the chocolate compensates for the cost of the trip and my personal weariness from his absense. Hurray for chocolate!

Callie's First Day of School

We did it! She's at school right now! Callie popped up this morning at 6:30 and quickly woke up Alyssa too so we wouldn't be late! She got ready really fast and had to wait while Mom made lunch and got ready. David stayed home to help out and see Callie off to school too. We were out the door at 8:00 and had plenty of time to spare when we got to school. Callie was so excited. I didn't cry ( I was just excited for her), but poor Alyssa cried the whole way home. She wants to be able to go to kindergarten and she misses Callie. I had to hold her on my lap for a bit while she just cried and cried, and that nearly brought me to tears. But she's doing much better now and so am I.

Update: It's now been two weeks and Callie is doing great. Alyssa started her Joy School (parent swap) preschool and is happy to have her own thing to be doing. We still miss Callie, but she seems to be doing well. She has the very good fortune (blessing, really) of having a very good friend in her class. She is very eager to please and to do well. In fact, I was telling her a bedtime story of how Optimus Prime was holding transformer school and Bumblebee and Ratchet painted another transformer the wrong color. In mid-story Callie plugged her ears and looked very stressed, and I had to come up with a quick remedy so they wouldn't get in trouble! Not a very good bedtime story I guess. Anyway, the point is she is doing great.

Summer Summary

Summer is officially over for us tomorrow because Callie starts school tomorrow!!! Aaagh! She's excited as can be, and I'm just hoping we can get out of the door on time and that I don't cry. I hope it goes well!

And since summer has finally come to a close and I have never blogged yet, I thought now would be the perfect time to review.

We moved to California at the end of January and have really enjoyed our time here. When we arrived I quickly began quizzing other mothers about their favorite things to do around the area. We soon discovered many parks that we enjoy frequenting, and in the spring we bought a pass to Happy Hollow Park and Zoo. The girls love going there, but I admit I wish it were just a zoo. The park area has many fun children's rides that are free with your pass, so the girls always opt to ride the rides. I rather miss seeing the animals even though the zoo portion is rather small for a zoo. Also, due to my stubborn frugality we always park far away and bike/walk in because I don't want to pay parking fees. :)

In April or May the girls were invited to join a preschool group, where parents create and teach a lesson and rotate turns teaching. So Callie and Alyssa made lots of new friends, and I got to brush up on creating preschool lessons again. It's been wonderful to have something regular for the girls to do, and to be able to grocery shop with just Haven when I wasn't teaching. They continued their preschool group through the summer and just had their last class last week.

In May, Callie and Alyssa also took a 6-week ballet course. On the first day of class, Alyssa gave me a good laugh - as they went around the circle announcing their names, when they came to Alyssa, the teacher asked, "And what's your name?" Alyssa with frank seriousness answered, "I'm Ruquayah." Her teacher was a little surprised, but luckily I was there to reveal her true identity. I was surprised at what the learned in 6 weeks and we have a cute little video of their dance from the end of the class that I'll try to attach (I did get it attached - Callie's on the right, Alyssa's on the left in the black and pink).

Callie and Alyssa each took swim lessons this summer and loved their classes, but I soon learned why the midday classes fill up so quickly. I signed the girls up for early morning and evening classes and much of the time the temperatures were in the 60's. The lifeguards standing guard were usually wearing sweatshirts! But my brave little girls toughed it out.

We've also discovered that the beaches here are also freezing. When we've gone the to beach the temperatures are usually 10 -15 degrees lower and the wind chill makes it even worse. So now we pack sweatshirts and not swimsuits. But we have headed slightly northward or barely southward and I think we just need to go further south. Maybe next summer will be warmer?

In July, for Independence Day, David took a day off work!!!! Hurray! And we made a vacation of it. We went to Muir Woods just north of San Francisco and had a great time looking at the many huge redwood trees and just enjoying Mother Nature and being together. It was a wonderful day.

And at the end of July we went to Utah (hurray!) for the Hales family reunion and also to celebrate great-great-grandma Hales' 98th birthday. I can't believe she made it out for the reunion too! She's a trooper. It was wonderful to be with family and to relax and swim at the Crystal Hot springs. We were also surprised and pleased to see that David's Aunt Judy from his mother's side of the family joined the reunion too. We brought a tape recorder with us and David spent some time interviewing his grandparents and great grandmother about their family histories. And Aunt Shirley also provided lots of wonderful family history activities and information. I thought it was a well done reunion, and we sure love spending time with David's family. My only regret was that the trip was much too short. I wish we could have stayed two weeks rather than 3 days. We also made a quick trip to Orem to have dinner with my siblings which I really enjoyed. I wish I could spend more time with them, too, as I love and admire them all so much.

August provided a bit of fun for us also. Our 7th wedding anniversary was on Sunday, August 8th, and to celebrate we took the kids to see Toy Story 3 in the movie theater. The movie also served as a reward for the girls earning a certain number of points for good behavior. We were aghast at the cost of tickets, but begrudgingly paid the money and soon forgot about it as we enjoyed the movie so much. Haven got a bit wiggly towards the end, but overall the girls did really well and really enjoyed it too.

Alyssa's birthday was on August 17th and she turned 4 years old. Alyssa anxiously looks forward to her birthday for a month or two before it happens, so it's a lot of fun when the big day finally arrives. We celebrated by inviting 8 friends over for a royal celebration (Alyssa is very enthusiastic about princesses and dresses this year - last year it was Diego, animal rescuer). So David and I stayed up too late making swords, shields, and hats. We decorated bags, had a royal ball, found the princess's pea, hunted for dragon eggs, played dragon bowling, saved the King, slew a dragon, had a royal feast, and watched Cinderella in the royal theater when we were all finished. It was a lot of work and a lot of fun. I also made a castle cake which I thought was pretty cool :)

Finally, I want to share a few favorite things. 1. The dishwasher - I know we shouldn't be attached to worldly things, but I LOVE IT!! I am pretty slow at washing dishes by hand so it saves me so much time! 2. Backyard space. We have a little backyard space in which we put a medium sized trampoline and play structure. The kids have so much fun back there. 3. Affordable produce. We love fruits and veggies and can find really good prices here. It's wonderful. 4. My family. I'm so glad we're together and love each other so much. 5. Heavenly Father - He's with us wherever we go and guides and protects us along the way. 5. Patti, Dave, and the boys moving to CA!! Hurray! 6. Wonderful neighbors with kids :) 7. Wonderful family no matter the distance. 8. The beautiful natural world. 9. Watching David laugh hysterically while reading the Calvin an Hobbes book I got him for Father's Day.

Callie's favorite things - her stuffed animals, the new friends she's made, her primary teachers and class, climbing nonstop, pretending to camp or pretending with dragons, swinging in the hammock, learning to add, petting dogs, pet caterpillars that turned into butterflies, the humming bird nest in the tree that overhangs our yard, collecting snails, spotting fancy cars (she knows them all! - porches, jaguars, mustangs, corvettes, zap cars, smart cars, coopers, VWs, toyotas, hondas, acuras, mazdas, BMWs, saturns, and probably more :)

Alyssa's favorite things - dresses (must be pretty!), coloring, reading stories, her nightgown (wants to wear it all day!), her swimsuit (takes turns with the nightgown), playing with her new friends, her primary teachers and class, playing all sorts of pretend games with Callie, playing with her toy ponies, petting dogs, and going to the park and zoo. She makes me laugh with all the different ways she can fall asleep and I love the way she talks.

Haven - Haven loves attention (it's hard to get much when you've got older sisters to compete with) therefore she will go to great lengths to get it :), she also loves baby dolls and stuffed animals, pretending her doggies are asleep, having mom go to nursery with her, singing lots of different songs, joining in the preschool fun when mom teaches, climbing (she made it to the top of our 6 foot fence by pushing a few things together, yikes!), petting dogs, and learning to talk (she's quite the jabberer), and potting training (she's getting there).

David's favorite things - having his own funding, joining a great lab at Stanford, swimming with the girls, family trips to the beach, riding his bike to work, Saturday afternoons, teaching Sunday School.

And that about sums it up...

We're finally here!

Hello!
I've finally been persuaded to join the blogging world! So here is more for you to read and see so you don't have to talk to me on the phone so much :) I finally realized that blogging is probably a handy way to keep a family journal and scrapbook at the same time. And I type faster than I write so it's handy that way too. It will also help me to check your blogs and see how you're doing. Thanks to those who finally persuaded me to join in!
Tanya