Dear Santa

Dear {fun-pretend} Santa,

I am writing this letter to let you know my opinion before you get a letter from my son, Roderic. He has been a pretty good boy this year. He has learned to play (a bit) with his little brother. He only occasionally gets so excited around his baby brother that he pats his head harder than I would like. When I ask him when he's going to learn to ride his bike without training wheels, he replies, "December 11." When I ask him when we're going to practice his violin, he replies, "Tomorrow." When I ask him to do his homework he says, "Later." He has started to read a verse or two from the Book of Mormon with us when we read as a family each night.

I believe Roderic is going to ask you for Legos, Legos and more Legos. Pirates, Star Wars, Toy Story, Atlantis, City any and all.

He loves to create and build and destroy and rebuild them. We have hundreds of pictures on our computer of his creations, so if they get ruined, he can recreate them. (I don't think he has yet asked to see a picture so he can recreate one, though.) He will happily play for hours with them, especially if it is bedtime and he's been sent to put on his pajamas. He goes to violin lessons each week so he can show his teacher how well he plays the violin builds with the Legos she has out for him during Sabrina's lesson.

They have become the bane of my existence. The stress of keeping all of the pieces so he can build the ships and vehicles and such weighs heavily upon me. I am even more stressed about them being left on the carpet for curious, crawling Leo to get his hands and mouth on. And then there is the whole sharing thing.

I can only hope that the letter you get from him is this:

Dear Santa,

All I want for Christmas is my two front teeth.

Sincerely,
Roderic

would you look at that gap!

I'll be prepping for more Legos, though. They're better than Magnetix, right?

Sincerely,
Malauna

Song Writer

Don't you cry Leo,
Don't you cry.
Mom will feed you laterrrrrrrrrrrrr.

(sung to a modified version of Rock-a-bye baby)

Hyrum is a musical child. He reminds me a lot of Sabrina at this age - although she always sang in primary and he only occasionally does. But boy does he sing and make up songs at home! Pitch, rhythm, phrasing to help calm a crying brother.

Missionary Zoo

Hyrum has been singing this primary song for the last week and a half. Finally, tonight, I coaxed him gently enough to get it on film.



If you're reading this in your email, you need to go to my blog malaunagibby.blogspot.com in order to see the video (it's worth it!)

I hope I'm going on a mission, to go to missionary zoo.
I hope I'm going on a mission, to go and go and go to missionary zoo.

Oh, how I love my Hyrum!