Dear Elder,
Hi, how are you? Thanks for your last letter. I’m sorry your hand got hurt. Any broken bones? I hope it wasn’t too painful!
Here is the pumpkin pie recipe:
Aunt Renee’s Pumpkin Pie
Preheat oven to 425 degrees F.
1 cup sugar
1 cup brown sugar
1 heaping teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon ginger
¼ teaspoon nutmeg
¼ teaspoon allspice
(If you can find pumpkin pie spice, you can put 3 ½ teaspoons of it and a teaspoon of cinnamon in place of all the spices above)
4 eggs
1-24 oz can pumpkin
1 can evaporated milk (this is canned milk, NOT sweetened condensed milk)
1 cup milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
Beat the eggs well. Mix the beaten eggs and all the other ingredients together in a big bowl. Pour mixture into unbaked pie shells and bake 15 minutes. Turn oven down to 350 degrees and cook 1 more hour. Let cool. Serve with whipped cream.
If you need a pie crust recipe, let me know. If you need to know how to make whipped cream, let me know. If you can’t find canned pumpkin and need to know how to make a pie with fresh pumpkin, let me know!
Thank you for telling me about the people you are teaching. It sounds like the single mom and her kids that you are teaching are a really great family.
I love what you said about a light under a bushel. I never thought about it that way. None of our feelings or beliefs will show if we don’t let them shine. In fact, if we don’t let it shine, the light from those feelings and beliefs is in danger of going out. I agree with you that that concept is especially important when it comes to love.
How did you meet the three women whose families you are teaching? I have been praying for them and their families. I hope you can get the members involved so that, if these families get baptized, they will have the support they need to stay faithful.
It is Sunday morning and I just finished making yucky breakfast, ha ha. It didn’t turn out the way I wanted it to. Katrina is banging on the bathroom door and telling Thomas that she needs to take a shower, Dad is calling to Thomas to let Katrina take a shower first, because it takes her longer to get ready for church, Miriam is on her cell phone, and the Hymns are playing. Its nice to have a noisy busy Sunday morning. It’s quiet around here waaaay too often these days. Dad is giving the lesson in priesthood meeting today, and he is preparing it right now. He and I got flu immunizations Thursday, and he is not feeling well because of it. He said that priesthood meeting will probably be the only part of church he will attend today. Poor Dad, he finally gets a free weekend, and he isn’t feeling well enough to enjoy it.
Despite feeling unwell, Dad took the fam to the ski resort and the big city yesterday. It was mostly a trip to help Miriam find an evening gown, but it was also a wonderful way to spend lots of time talking together as we drove. You know, Dad’s not wanting a DVD in the car is really genius if you think about it. Driving is a wonderful way to have uninterrupted family discussions. We talked about Grandma Sally and the lessons we learned and blessings we got from having her live with us, the importance of family home evening, and Dad and I shared lots of memories from our childhood. This stuff all came about in normal conversation and it was all very good.
Miriam was looking for an evening gown because she’s going to the Marine’s ball in November. She seems to only be looking for modest evening dresses, and I am very proud of her for that. They sell a lot of prom formals around here, but not very many schmauncy evening dresses, so we will probably find one online. Miriam passed the insurance test that she took this week. She now could be an agent if she wants, but she says it is very hard to be and agent. I don’t know if she means it is hard to be an insurance agent or become one, but she says she will probably become an accountant. She is majoring in accounting anyway. I hope that she survives all the math, ha ha.
Katrina passed her behind the wheel training in driver’s ed and has driven three times on the freeway. She has half her driving hours in. She has been practicing lots for Aida as well. Miriam and I bought her a coat at Costco yesterday, and she likes it. I think it will go well with the cute clothes she’s been wearing to school.
While we were at Costco, Miriam and I saw Jonathan. He stopped to talk to us for a minute, which was nice. He went on a date to Corn Belly’s last night. His date was a girl who works at Costco and she is very cute. He’s gone out with her before. Miriam says she is planning to go on a mission. Jon doesn’t like to talk to us about it much, though so we don’t mention it to him, but we are happy to see him reaching out and socializing with good people.
I only talked to Cassandra once this week. It was like on Tuesday or something and Lily was feeling out of sorts. She didn’t want to talk to me, but I could hear her talking to her mommy. She is cute even when she is feeling grouchy! I called Cassandra yesterday, but she didn’t answer. Emerson is in the middle of something at work called “turn around.” He has to work every day this month for, like, 12 hours a day or something which must be very grueling. He comes home to sleep and then leaves for work again in the morning. Sometimes Cassandra and Lily get to meet him for lunch, otherwise Lily doesn’t really get to see him. Last time I talked to Cassandra, she seemed in fairly good spirits, but I’m sure it’s not easy. I pray for them lots. I wonder if Emerson will miss trick or treating with Cassandra and Lily on Halloween. They were thinking of dressing her as Princess Peach, and it would be sad if he missed it. Happily, though, he may get some comp days, or in other words, time off to make up for all the time at work. I hope that he does, and if he does, I hope they decide to come visit us at Christmas! That would be a nice silver lining.
Thomas got to play in Thursday’s game, which is amazing because it was a very close game, and they put him in at the end and we were behind. Thomas made a good play and kept the other team from scoring another touch down. A coach even commented on it to him. Garred had a birthday the other day, and Thomas gave him a Treasure Planet video game that he and Garred used to love to play when they were little. Tanner and Derek loved it, too, but it got ruined, so Thomas was very excited to buy another copy of it for him, and Garred was very happy to get it. Even Garred’s parents were happy. Shauna called us to tell us how thoughtful she thought that was of Thomas to buy the game for Garred. Saturday morning Thomas went to Garred’s and they played Treasure Planet for 3 hours. Thomas said it was even more fun than he thought it would be. He was pretty disgusted when he had to leave Garred’s to go shopping with us. Thomas also went to a birthday party for his friend, John, this week, and he went to the Varsity game with his friends on Friday.
Dad has been trying to regroup and retrench at work. Things have been hard for him, but I know he’ll get them figured out. He’s an amazing teacher, Matt. He and I went out on Friday. He wasn’t feeling too sick at that point, and we watched a movie called Gravity which we really enjoyed. Cassandra and Emerson had both recommended it to us, and we were glad that they did. We also went out to eat. Then we went to the mall and Dad bought a big glass vessel to display his broken arrowheads in. They’re worthless, but he thought they’d look cool in a big jar in his office. He was pretty excited when I told him he could display it on the dresser in our bedroom if I could help him pick out the jar. We found one we both liked, and it was on clearance so the price was right. Now it’s sitting on the dresser waiting for broken arrowheads. I reminded him that he has to keep the rest of the dresser completely clear of stuff. I want to hang a mirror up behind the jar.
I had a nice week at home and at work. I enjoyed being with different kids at different times taking them where they needed to go and getting them to do homework and chores. Some days, like Thursday, were really crazy, but it was all good. On Tuesday, Dad brought me two dozen roses, and the girls one dozen each. It was so sweet of him! I was away visiting Shana at the assisted living home when he brought them, but they were there when Shana and I got to the house. We thought they were so pretty that we went and bought some ourselves. I bought a dozen, and Shana bought two dozen. I gave mine to 4 different neighbors, and Shana planned to give hers to 4 different family members. Later, I had lots of fun to go giving flowers to different ladies in the neighborhood and visiting with them. We have some awesome neighbors, Matt! The Rasmussens send me home with a bag of apples, too. I plan to make some cider.
Well, church is in an hour, and my computer’s almost out of batteries. I hope that you are doing well, Matt and that you are feeling well and that you are feeling close to the Spirit. I pray for you many times a day, and I know that you are in Heavenly Father’s watchful care. Please tell your companion “Hi” for us. I pray for
him, too.
Love,
Mom
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