Merry Christmas from the Lotts

 

Lotts of fun in 2013

 

It’s crazy that another year has come and gone. And yet I have a ton more gray hair, which Adam likes to point out to me, and the wrinkles to prove it.

Alex will be 18 in about two months. It’s crazy to think that he will be on a mission sometime next summer. We are very proud of him for becoming an Eagle Scout. For his project he was over the Hooper City Easter egg hunt. When I first heard what his project was I thought it was a joke. Boy was I wrong. Our family, along with other scouts, spent the month of March preparing for this event. Together about 10,000 eggs were filled, 100 Easter baskets filled with goodies, 1000 cookies bagged and 1000 bags of cotton candy made. When Alex added up all the time spent by everyone, it totaled close to 250 man hours. The crazy thing was that all the goodies and eggs were all picked up by all of the excited kids in less than five minutes. Alex dressed as the Easter Bunny and sounded the horn that started the hunt off. It was a fun event and there was a great turn out. His Eagle ceremony was held in October. We had a live eagle as part of the program. Thank you to all those who helped him in any way. We are so proud of all of his hard work. He was also so excited to finally finish his project so he could get his driver’s license. The proud day came in June. He wished he had listened to us sooner so he could have been driving all last year as well. Alex finally started growing. We weren’t sure it was going to ever happen, but it finally did. He is now 5’ 10½” and we are all thrilled he won’t be the size of a girl anymore. He is even getting a little facial hair to go along with his height. I still joke with him that I have more on my upper lip than he does. The truth is that if you get up real close you can actually see a faint little mustache, and he’s proud of it. Alex really loves Duck Dynasty. Actually obsessed would be a better term. He wears camo all the time and says, “Way to go Jack.” He has even informed us that he wants to name his first child Jack. He is into hunting and trapping poor little furry animals. At different times of the day I can hear him practicing on his elk call in his room. Thank goodness one hasn’t shown up yet. We are thankful for Alex and love him very much.

Jaime is loving being in Jr High. She turned 12 in June. The poor girl was sick with the flu and threw up the entire day. I have some great pictures of her looking pretty miserable. She is loving being in choir at school and also takes piano. She has recently taken up reading. It only took her till the 7th grade to figure out that the right books are actually fun to read. Now if I can just get her to read and play the piano at appropriate times and not when she’s supposed to be in bed or going somewhere. We were very proud of her for getting a 4.0 her first quarter in school. Yeah. It’s wonderful to not have to remind her to do her homework. A few days ago Mike asked Alex and I a math question. Sadly neither of us could answer it. The next day I asked Jaime and within about 3 seconds she answered it correctly. Wow, she put us both to shame. I recently bleached a few small pieces of her hair and then dyed them orange with Kool Aid. It turned out very cute. It’s crazy that my once feisty little three year old is now growing up into a beautiful young lady- who can still be feisty at times. She loves being able to go to young women’s. I was released from young womens about a month after she turned 12 but it was fun to be in there with her for a little while. I even attended camp for a day with her and that was special. She is the 2nd counselor in the Beehive class and is very diligent working on her personal progress. She knows she has to have it completed in order to get her license and she has informed me she isn’t going to put it off to the last minute. Jaime loves to do crafts and can draw very well. She is babysitting now and is growing up right before my eyes. I am so glad to have her for my daughter.

Adam is still as cute as can be. His 2nd grade teacher adores him. I go and volunteer once a week in his class and really enjoy that. He is a very good reader and a super speller. He gets both these skills from his dad, who used to win spelling bee contests. Adam has a sweet tenderness about him. I love to hear him pray. He says such special things and puts his heart into it. We recently donated some of our extra clothes and toys to a homeless shelter. Adam took $6 of his own money and put it in an envelope to give. On the envelope he wrote, “I hope you can get a house and a car.” Tears came to my eyes to see such compassion and love. It was a special experience for my little boys to give to those in need. After attending the rodeo this summer, he and Ethan got all suited up in their cowboy clothes and went out to practice their mutton busting skills on our little goats. I actually have seen this and it’s pretty funny to see them try and ride them. I was happy they weren’t actually putting all of their weight on them and squishing them. Both he and Ethan want to ride the sheep next year at the rodeo. We shall see??? Adam loves soccer and is actually really good. I am not sure where he got this skill as neither Mike nor I play. We were glad we decided to only pay him 50 cents a goal this year or we would be broke. And he is ok with us not paying him next year. Luckily I have earned most of the money back that I have paid him because I have started charging him for all the socks he ruins because he won’t wear shoes. Too bad he doesn’t seem to care too much about losing his money. I can’t believe my little Adam will be old enough to be baptized in April. He has a special place in my heart and I secretly hope he never grows up.

Ethan is as crazy and silly as ever. If he’s not losing a dead snake in a neighbor’s house (we actually found it the next day in our mailbox), he's doing a number of other things that make me shake my head and snicker. Lately he breaks out in song at random times. I have recorded him singing a bunch of cute songs he has learned at preschool. Last month when I cut his hair he told me to,”Cut it like President Monson’s.” I am not exactly sure what that meant but it made me laugh. He now raises his hand anytime he wants to tell us something. He waits for us to point to him so he can talk. He has even shown us the correct way for us to point to him. He has also informed me that his new name is “Stink Brain,” He recently learned how to call my cell phone. The first few days he kept calling me all day long. It was hard to get anything done because I kept having to answer the phone for an excited 5 year old. Half the time he was about five feet away from me when he would call. Sometimes he would go upstairs and hide in the closet to call me. Finally I got smart and gave him Mike’s number. Ha Ha. Ethan then asked for Alex’s number but Alex was smart and wouldn’t give it to him. Once, Ethan told me he was going to call Robin. Long story short, I guess he dialed the wrong number a few times and talked to someone named Robin. I had to have a little talk with him about that. All I need is for the cops to call me with a complaint from a perfect stranger. Ethan loves to be outside. He loves to play with our dogs. But his most favorite thing right now is football. A few months ago he would carry around football cards and discuss which teams he liked with perfect random strangers. It was actually cute that many of them would actually talk with him about this or that team. He has learned a lot about the game from playing Xbox. We were at a Utah State football game last month and he called the first play of the game even before the announcer did. Sadly, I couldn’t have done that. He and Adam love to wear their little Texas Longhorn jerseys and play football. Thank goodness we have a big empty toy room upstairs for them to be wild and crazy. They even play imaginary football in my living room. It’s funny to watch them throw an imaginary ball and to hear Ethan commentate, “That was an impressive play Adam.” They play their own pretend super bowls all the time and poor little Ethan has yet to win. Today I actually saw him setting up our nativity set and running football plays with them. Needless to say, Heavenly Father knew we needed our little Ethan. He makes me laugh. He makes me smile and I love to hold him and snuggle, even though he recently informed me not to give him kisses anymore and he wipes them off when I forget.

I have stayed busy this year keeping up with Ethan to say the least. I enjoyed planting a garden this year. I now know why Hooper is famous for tomatoes. I planted enough tomatoes to keep a small country fed. We don’t even like tomatoes and I wasn’t in the mood to can and so I gave most of them away. That was an adventure to say the least. I went repelling for the first time this fall. For some reason it was on my bucket list. I almost couldn’t physically go through it, but with tears in my eyes went down a 140 foot cliff. I am glad I did, but now think I need to evaluate my list and make a new one that’s not so scary. As a family we drove out to Nauvoo. Amazingly enough we all survived almost 45 hours in the car of driving. It ended up being a wonderful trip and I am so thankful we went. The kids had a blast and we saw some really amazing church history places. Jaime and Alex were able to do baptisms for the dead in the Nauvoo Temple. It was a special thing to watch Mike baptize them. The spirit was very strong. As I mentioned earlier I am no longer working with the young women. I am over the Bear cub scouts. My partner is my mother-in-law Jeri and we have a lot of fun with the boys. Oh yeah, we finished a little apartment in our basement and Jeri has been living with us since February. It has been wonderful to have her close by. We always tell her to have a safe trip as she walks down the stairs from our house to her’s. The kids love going down to visit her and usually when I have lost Ethan he is found at Grandma’s eating her snacks and watching a movie. What a blessing it is to have her with us.

Mike went repelling for the first time this fall as well. He loved it and went down multiple times. I guess he couldn’t have very well chickened out considering I did it before he did. He was called to the Stake High Council this spring. What a blessing it has been for our family. I really enjoy going and hear him speak. The poor guy has to speak at least once a month. I have had the privilege (Ha Ha, I was scared to death) to speak with him twice and had better quit teasing him or he will ask me again. He usually has multiple meetings to attend every Sunday. A few weeks ago he actually attended three different sacraments in one day. I told him that was because he had been very bad that week and needed to take the sacrament three times. I admit I am glad it isn’t me that has to get up early on Sundays for meetings. I guess I am the one who needs to repent as I roll over and fall back asleep as he leaves in the morning. Mike could use a little more sleep himself. Last night he was saying our family prayer and he started it off, “And it came to pass…”. We all broke out laughing. It took about five minutes for us, ok me, to finally get it under control for him to actually pray. And yes, we didn’t even make it through the prayer without giggling. I am sure Heavenly Father was up there rolling his eyes. It was super funny and we needed a good laugh. Mike was a great sport as none of us would stop teasing him the rest of the night. I did tell him that he was lucky he hadn’t done it at one of his High Council meetings or he would never have lived it down.

I guess I should stop rambling and just wish everyone a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, but I am not going to. I couldn’t end without mentioning my Ryan and expressing my love towards him. I couldn’t possibly write about my kids and not include him. He would be 15 right now. He’d be loving High School and counting down the days till he was 16 and could drive. I don’t doubt he would be close to have his Eagle now. I am sure he would still love to see how much bigger he was getting compared to me. And I am sure it would still drive me nuts for him to do this almost daily. I’d like to think he would be close to 6 foot by now. He would look tuff on the outside, but would be a teddy bear on the inside. I know he would still have his perfect curly hat hair and long curly eye lashes that the girls would adore. He would still say he hated them, but secretly love all the attention they drew. He would love his new room downstairs all decked out in orange with Texas Longhorn things. He would love to go hunting and trapping with Alex. He would still love to wrestle with Adam and Ethan. He would love to tease Jaime and then I would ground him. But alas, this wasn’t what was supposed to happen. Our dear Ryan was needed somewhere else. His purpose is great and just couldn’t wait. He’s happy looking down on us. He knows what he is doing is so very important. We know this as well. We miss him so much but know that we will be together again. We know that this life is just the beginning. We know that we might not understand all the whys right now, but someday we will. This keeps us going. This gives us hope. This eases the pain. This makes it worth it. For I know without a doubt that I will be with my son again someday and I will be able to give him a hug and it will be real and not only in my dreams.

At this time of the year I am so thankful for my Savior. Because he lived and died and suffered for me, I can someday live with my family forever. That is the greatest gift there is and it is given to us all. In the scriptures he tells us, “Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me… and ye shall find rest unto your souls”. (Matthew 11:28-29) May we never forget the priceless gift we were all given long long ago when a little babe was born in Bethlehem.

We love you all so much and hope you are filled with the pure love of our Savior this Christmas Season and forever.

Love,

The Lott family