2010 November: Robertson

I can now breathe, so I figure that I should get this thing written before the month is over and the new year is upon me. SO, November…I am trying to think what happened way back then…when the world was still innocent and fresh. I think I spent the majority of the beginning of the month nagging slacking students. That lasted up until Thanksgiving break. During the break, We decided that we would spend the time remodeling our home to some extent. So, Morgan found a business that was liquidating some laminate flooring. We bought enough to redo the floor in our back room and the kitchen. We installed it during our spare moments. It really looks rather nice. We are almost finished with it now. We only have to put the trim back on the walls and do some paint touch up. Anyway, since this year is my parent’s 30^th wedding anniversary, they wanted to do something nice and go on a vacation, but their anniversary lands on the day after Eljay gets home from his mission (the 18^th). My mom didn’t think it would be a good idea to leave a newly returned Eljay home alone in a big house with only the little sister Lindsay for company, so my parents decided that they would take their anniversary vacation over Thanksgiving break which meant that said little sister, Lindsay, came and stayed with us. Morgan and I prepared a meal that was way too big for all of us, so I invited over some of my students and my TA (who is conveniently engaged to one of my students) for dinner. At least we had a decent number to gather around and eat all of the food that we prepared. After the dinner, Kyla and Daria took my students to the living room and proceeded to school them all in a game of Wii Mario Kart. I figure that is how I can humble students in the future – have them be beaten by three year old girls. Awesome. After the break, I was back to nagging students, but this time I figured out some scare tactics. I think it shook enough of them up to get them working. That was about our November. December will look crazy (and has been crazy) but that will be next months entry – that will come in more or less on time.

God Bless,

Derik, Morgan and the Robertsons

2010 November: Hope

Well Hello All F4 peeps,
Well the time has gone by fast I have been at my job for almost 6 months now and it is still crazy but I am getting use to it. Michelle is still working over the internet talking orders like you see on TV. Scott and Kyle got their Tonsils out in the first of Nov and they are both doing great they were up running around the next day as if nothing happened. So now they are eating more and have more energy. So for Thanksgiving we were going to Rexburg but the weather made us not go up there so we had dinner with my brother and his family. Then a very sad day happened on friday when Boise State Broncos lost to Nevada. There first lost in a long time. Michelle turned 28 so she is getting old LOL. Other than that we are doing about the same well hope everyone is doing great hope to hear for you all and hope everything is going well for you all

Jason and Family

2010 November: Bates

November has been an excellent month.

Fintan has strengthened his arms and can now hold himself up, so crawling is emminent. Orianna can now talk amazingly well (which she loves to d all the time). We got Christmas lights up. I got my Projector & screen mounted out in the office/garage, and dug through about half of the huge pile of dirt that has been in our driveway for 2 years.

ZebraStrut has been progressing nicely. We got our 5th member, and are now going to get the business license and figure out all that bureaucratic nonsense.
ExpoStrut (the first product we are doing under our ZebraStrut umbrella) is going well. The website is about 75% done, the iPad app is about 50% done, and the card reader portion is about 25% done. Our original schedule was to be finished by Sept 2011, so we are well ahead, even though at the moment we really only have 2 of the 5 people working (until Jan that is).

We went to Idaho the week before Thanksgiving and I built a wall in my parent's basement (well, I replaced a wall I'd previously built from junk in their basement with a reall 2x4/scheetrock/insulation wall). It went well, but I did crack a rib in the process. The worst part was that my dad said "you probably shouldn't do that. I cracked a rib that way once." To which I responded "Yeah, but you're old," approximately 10 seconds before I cracked my rib. Very embarrasing.
The other lousy thing was that our car died in Malad on our way up to Idaho. We'd paid it off just a few months prior, so that was very dissapointing. But, we are now the proud owners of a minivan. We can blend perfectly into any street in Utah. So, if you have any stealth operations you need to do here, you can borrow my van.

We stayed in utah for Thanksgiving. My boss helped me fry a turkey, and I am convinced it is the only way to do turkey now. It took about 30 min from start to finish, and you end up with a delicious fried turkey. Baking takes WAY to long, now that I know you can fry.
Wishing you all a happy holiday filled with fried foods,
The Bates Family

2010 November: North

We’ve had a good month here out East. A big story in the news lately has been the bad weather in the Utah/Idaho area; I guess you guys have had some pretty severe snow and cold over the last few weeks. I want you to know that I’m thinking of you. The day before Thanksgiving Becky, Sophie, and I went for a walk. It was around 2pm and it was so nice out that I left my jacket in the car. I thought of you all as I walked.

We had a nice Thanksgiving this year. We were invited over by one of my classmates to eat with him and his family and another med student. It was a small gathering of friends and we enjoyed each others’ company.

On Tuesday before Thanksgiving I went and bought new tires for our car; cost: $700. It shouldn’t have taken more than an hour or so to change the tires and do an alignment, but the shop was slammed with people trying to prep for their Thanksgiving travels so I spent 4 hours in the waiting room! I was hoping to get some homework done, but instead I just sat around switching between Fox news and CNN. I took all day Wednesday to finish my homework, which made for a long day, but I haven’t had to think about school for the last few days which has been nice.

On black Friday we went looking for new cell phones, and possibly a new cell plan. I was not surprised to learn that any switch in plans would cost us more than we are paying now. We signed a contract at 2007 rates and everything is more expensive now. We decided to keep our current plan for awhile longer or until they kick us off because they are losing money on us. I was surprised to learn that none of the simple ‘text and talk’ phones they make these days are as nice as ours. Our phones are dinosaurs in the phone industry, 2 ½ years old. I thought that we’d find lots of new and exciting models for us to choose from, and, if we were looking for a smart phone we would have. I guess phone companies have decided that there’s no money in a simple cell phone, so they aren’t working on any new ones. So we decided to keep our old plan and our old cell phones. After that we went shopping for a couch. Up until now we’ve been using Becky’s old bed as a couch. A few weeks ago we agreed that it was time to buy a real couch. So on Friday we did. New couch: $500. All in all it was an expensive week.

One more thing: Becky and I read 3 books together this year, plus another one that we started but didn’t finish. They total up to more than 1400 pages! I just thought you (especially Derik) should know that.

We hope that you each got to take time to count your blessings. We live in a marvelous, wonderful time!

Stewart, Becky, and Sophie