Missing you all

Kristen, what a nice post. You are a wonderful lady and we all wish we were your neighbor so we could take part in your life. I am sitting at the computer getting ahead for next weeks nursery lesson "I can be kind to animals." The nice thing about nursery is that as long as you have plenty of pictures, your lesson will go well. I had to do a lesson on forgiveness a few weeks back and that definitely was the most tricky I have done. Teaching little 1 1/2 years old who can't barely talk is hard but the three year olds are so fun.

Since it is conference weekend I have been missing BYU and Utah. Hyrum figured out how to play KBYU on the internet though so now at least we can watch it at home like we used to. For any of you in the area, I am hoping to come out at the end of this month to Utah, maybe the 22nd through the 26th so an early Monday morning run would be fun.

Kristen, your cooking classes sound like a lot of fun. That is a hobby that I wish I would develop. I have been taking a Spanish class though and it is so fun. Hyrum is taking a night class at MIT on Tuesdays and Thursdays so I started this class on Thursday nights. It is really fun. I am picking it up pretty quickly because of my Portuguese background. The nice thing about it is that my work is paying for it since I have so many Spanish speaking patients that don't speak any English. My patients are pretty good about listening to my poor Spanish so I get a lot of chances to practice and there are several staff members who help me out too.

If you are interested in more books about the middle east my two favorites are Blood Brothers that gives you a little perspective on the Palestinian side of the Israel issue. I am also just finishing up the book "Leap of Faith" by Queen Noor of Jordan. If you don't know her story, she was born in the US and later married the King of Jordan. Her life is really interesting and it really provides a lot of history as well to the area.

Well, please keep in touch everybody. I miss you all like crazy. Come to Boston and visit. Leaf peeping is about to start and the fall in New England is really the time to come and see. Plus, maybe you could commemorate Joseph Smith's 200th birthday by coming to his birth place, Sharon Vermont, a measly 3 hour drive from Boston.

Love to you all,
Nicole