My letter to you for Aug. 4-10, 2013

Here is my letter to you from Aug. 10, 2013, just in case you do not receive it:

Dear Kieran,

How are you doing today? I am doing fine, though I miss you like crazy!

I want to begin by letting you know that I was as disappointed as you were about not getting together Friday afternoon. I’d also like you to know that I wanted to get together and did not cancel our visit. I actually was driving to the center when I received the call that our visit had been cancelled. I have asked the center to set up a makeup visit, but whether or not we are able to do that is entirely up to the person who cancelled this visit. I love you very much and never would cancel or be late for one of our visits except in the direst of emergencies. If I were allowed to, I would see and talk to you every day.

In addition, I want you to know that your emails to me continue not to be sent. As of this writing, 31 days have passed since your last email was sent to me. That is very unfortunate, as I am now not aware of what you are doing even though I would like to know so we can talk about those things (and perhaps I even can participate in them in some way). I have never missed sending my weekly letter to you in the nearly 11 months since I have been allowed to write to you, and I never will miss a letter except in the direst of emergencies.

Hopefully we will get to see one another again very soon for our make-up visit, and hopefully I will begin receiving your emails during the next day or so. We are next scheduled to meet on Friday, Aug. 23, but there is no reason that we cannot have a makeup visit before then. I always will change my schedule to be there for you and to see you.

You must be getting very excited about a couple of big events that are coming up!

First, the Minnesota State Fair starts in just 12 days, on Aug. 22. It is a lot like the Los Angeles County Fair we used to go to in California, but I’d say the Minnesota State Fair is a wee bit better. When I was a little boy your age, I remember seeing the fair on television. One of the cool carnival rides the TV always showed was a big yellow slide, like what we used to go down on gunny sacks at Legoland and at the Poppy Festival in Lancaster. Hopefully the slide will be there again this year, and you’ll get to go down it!

The other big event is that you’re about to start first grade! I don’t remember much about my first day in first grade except that my friend Ron and I had to go through different doors into the school than we did during kindergarten. The kindergarten room was in a different section of the school than the first through sixth grade classrooms! My first grade teacher’s name was Mrs. Rhiel. Do you yet know the name of your first grade teacher? What day do you start school? Do you know which of your friends will be coming back to school with you this year?

I hope that you’ve been having a great summer and have gotten to go to lots of places in the Twin Cities. There are many fun things for kids to do in Minneapolis-St. Paul, from carnivals to museums and from sports to bookstores. I miss and love you very much and look forward to seeing you at our makeup visit!

Love,

Rob

 

My email for week of July 14-20, 2013

Here is my letter to you for July 20, 2013, in case you do not receive it.

Hi Kieran,

How are you doing? I am doing fine, though I miss you very much! I did not receive your email this week – could resend it to me, please?

How has summer school been going? What kind of things are you studying? Have you finished learning about the presidents and which ones are on money? There are a lot of presidents to learn about, aren’t there?! In a previous email, I told you about my favorite president, Abraham Lincoln. Do you have a president that you like or admire more than the others?

What kind of stuff have you been doing for fun this summer? When I was a little boy your age, I lived on a farm near Elmwood, Wisconsin, and spent my summers playing outside. We had a big pile of sand that I could run my trucks and construction toys through all day long! I also liked to check out all of the animals on our farm, which were kept in different buildings. We had cows in the barn, two pigs in their own little shed, chickens in the chicken shack, and cats in our hay mow. Sometimes I also visited my best friend, Ronald, who lived next door. We thought it was amusing that both of our names started with the letters “Ro”!

Do you have plans to go to the State Fair later this summer? It doesn’t start for another month or so. It always is a lot of fun – there are carnival rides, farm animals, interesting displays, and lots of great fair food like cotton candy and corn dogs. I have not been to the State Fair in many years, and I hope you get to go since you live so close to it. The fair is held in St. Paul, and it’s much bigger than the Los Angeles County Fair that we used to go to in Pomona…you may not remember that fair, though, as the last time we went you were just three years old. Here are some pictures of it. 

Another great event in Minnesota held each summer is the Renaissance Festival. That is when people dress up like they live in the Middle Ages in England. People back then had castles, and there were knights! The festival also has lots of fun shows you can go to and neat costumes and toys you can buy. We went to a few Renaissance festivals when we lived in California; at one of them, you got a Robin Hood cap. At another one in San Diego, you dressed up in a knight costume! I hope you can go to the Renaissance Festival in Minnesota!

How is your baseball throwing and catching coming along? If you like, I will pick up a softball for us to toss to one another when we get together. The visitor center has a playground area outside that we can go to and safely throw the ball without worry about breaking windows. Just let me know!

We now get to see each other every other week, and we next get together on Friday, July 26 – that’s in just six days! I can hardly wait to see you again! I’ll bring the tote full of new stuff for us to do and with some of our old favorite standbys in it as well. Let me know in your next letter if there’s anything special toys or books that you would like me to bring.

Well, that is all for now. I love and miss you very much! I’ll see you on Friday!

Love,

Dad

My dinosaur memories with you

I received your email on Monday, and you mentioned going to the science musuem in St. Paul to see the dinosaur skeletons. I bet that was a lot of fun!

I have lots of "dinosaur" memoires with you.

When you were a preschooler, we had a whole bunch of plastic dinosaur toys. We'd play with them on plastic mats that showed jungle and volcano scenes.

We also went to see life-sized models of dinosaurs when we could. There were some at the Museum of Natural History in Los Angeles, at the Los Angeles County Fair, and at a roadside attraction called Charlie Brown's Farms in Little Rock, Calif.

You also had a great book called "Ten Little Dinosaurs." The cover had a dino with googly eyes on it, so when you shook the bok, his eyeballs spun!