Close Family Christmas Letter & Family Photos 2015

December 2015

Dear Friends & Flamily,

This is Francine. I’m three-and-a-half. My mama asked me to write the annual Close Flamily Holiday Letter this year. I DID just learn to write my own name. She told me to talk about highlights from 2015. I like to tell people about that time I saw a dead pig in Ireland. It was verrrrry stinky. I flew on an airplane for a long long time with my parents, my Mimi and Papa, Uncle Brian and Aunt Jen, and Grandma Lambie – four generations! My mama and daddy wish I would instead tell people about using my passport for the first time. Or all the Irish cousins I met. Or visiting the northernmost point in Ireland. Or walking across that rickety old bridge to a fishing island.

I’m in the Preschool Class at daycare now. I go two whole days and one half-day each week. On my first day I wore a fancy dress. I’m learning to write all the letters and I get to play outside almost every day. I like to choose my own clothes, draw and paint, play with dolls and music, and ride my scoot bike. On Wednesdays I have Beebee Days. We play at the park and eat yummy treats at the coffee shop and go on fun PDX adventures. I reeeeeally like babies and pretending to be pregnick. I don’t nap anymore. I’ve already had my first cavity, so now I take fluoride medicine every night. I finally weigh more than 30 lbs and am taller than 3 feet.

My daddy teaches Big Kids. In June he talked in front of A LOT of people. He was voted some kind of favorite or “distinguished” teacher and spoke at the Big Kid high school graduation. When he was done, I tried to run up on the stage to give him a hug and a kiss but froze when I realized how many people were watching me. He started teaching a new class this year, for Big Kids who don’t speak English. And he volunteer coaches a Unified soccer team. Daddy got a new-old truck this summer and likes to spend a lot of time fixing it. He also brews beer and I help; I like to watch for the bubbles. He didn’t have to teach the Big Kids this summer, so we played a lot – he built a deck in the back with Mimi and Papa and he took me camping.

My mama works some days. She helps people with brain injuries. I pretend my babies have brain injuries and go see the doctor for shots to make them all better. She is a speef pafolojis and works in a hospital. I like to draw pictures for her to take to work and give to the people she helps. Sometimes she doesn’t come home right after work because she is helping Big Kids with their studying. She says she wants to be a writer. But the only thing I ever see her write are lists. Or funny things I say. “Write it down, Mama!” I tell her when she laughs at me. And she keeps a silly little blog, mostly writing about, you guessed it, me. Mama says she’s afraid to fly, but it seems like she goes somewhere on airplanes a lot. Sometimes she goes with just her girlfriends, and sometimes I go too, like to see Mimi and Papa in Tahoe and go skiing for the first time, or when we took a girlcation to visit Uncle B and Zahavah on Block Island. I’m SO excited I’ll have a baby sister-cousin before next summer! 

This year we also drove lots of fun places, like to Sunriver, a few camping trips, and to stay with friends in Bend or at a cabin on a pretty lake. This summer with my Beebee I used my passport a second time. We took a long drive and went on a ferry to Victoria, B.C. We rode in a taxi boat and saw a miniature goat stampede. Mama and Daddy daydream about us taking a big US road trip next summer. I don’t love riding in the car for a long time, but I do love to go new places and talk to new people. Mama and Daddy say I’m sweet and charming and think I’m just the funniest, with the cutest big tummy and tiny buns they’ve ever seen. I think I’m funny too. My very favorite is doing Ring Around the Rosy or having flamily dance parties in the living room. We mostly have a blast together, the three of us, even though sometimes we are all prone to tantrums.

They just told me to stop talking about myself, and to tell everyone that I hope they are healthy and happy and get to laugh a lot, too. Happy Holidays and a Happy 2016!

Love, Francie

P.S. Mama made me include just a few of the silly things I have said this year:

• “I’m Doctor Francine. Let me make you feel better (hug!).”
• “I need to put on lipstick and make a few phone calls and then we can go to the museum.”
• “Our fingers and toes are PHALANGES!”
• “We are Oregon girls. We climb up to the clouds and squeeze out the rain.”
• “Hey, you know what? Pigs are made of BACON.”
• “Before I nap, you and Mama should try and make a baby.”
• “Hey guys, wanna see my table dance?”
• “Daddy, I’m scared. Actually, I just want attention.”
• “Is the sun farther than the moon? I love you to the sun and back.”
• “I just don’t like your face with glasses on.”
• “Do you think owls are eating dinner right now? Because they are okturtle.”
• “These glasses help me see better than motorcycles. I have six eyes. Not in my brain, but outside my brain. I don’t want baby books. I want 4-year-old books.”
• “I don’t have to go potty. I’m just rubbing my crouch.”
• “Mama, I LOVE ginger beer.”
• “Does Grandma Nancy not have arms and legs? … Look! I drawed her. Doesn’t she look pretty?”
• “Mama, does that sparkly pajama shirt make you feel like a motherf@*#er?”
• “My belly says I’m all done pooping.”
• “I want to take your selfie.”

Alternative holiday cards:

Family photo session w/Patti O'Mara: