Hey Alec...What's Up?

Alec is finishing up 7th grade and his adventures at public school. Next year he will be homeschooled, which seems to be working into everyone's plans quite nicely. We are very excited about the flexibility that homeschooling will offer our family. Alec says that he is very pleased with the idea of homeschooling because his teachers take time out of teaching the class to discipline the other students who are causing trouble. Alec is totally stoked about moving into a nice home! He will be closer to some of his friends and will be exploring his dream of 2nd floor escape routes! He celebrated his 13th birthday this past March with two parties--one paintballing and the other at Magic Mountain with his friends. Of course each day needed its own cake, as did his actual birthday, and the celebration with his Grandma Herrick. For those playing the home game, you counted them, yes, four cakes!!! By the way, check out Alec's blog at http://www.boyerscorner.blogspot.com.

The Life of Lara

Lara obviously has a lot of time on her hands since she just took her last final. This semester she took Chemistry and Sociology (Deviant Behavior) and finished up with a B and an A. She plans to take the summer off and return in the fall to finish up Calculus. In addition to being out of school, she is also out of a job. She kept cutting back her hours more and more until there weren't any hours on the schedule. She will work on an "on call" basis, but for all intents and purposes, is unemployed. Again, is that a tear? Not to worry, she has been keeping busy. This past year she has been teaching Alec's Confirmation class and ultimately got involved with the Youth Board (along with Michael). Together they have been planning activities for the 6th-8th graders one Saturday a month that involve service projects for an orphanage in Romania. In addition, Lara has been invited to join 13 high school youth and three other chaperones to San Antonio, TX this July for a youth gathering! It has been amazing getting to know the kids and the new youth director, Elizabeth. If you'd like to see more of what they've been up to, check out this link: http://www.oursaviourlutheransimi.org. So you can see that Lara is pretty busy--and she has quite a bit planned for this fall, too...

Michael's World

Michael will be leaving SWAT as of June 1st. Wait, is that a tear we see in Lara's eye? However, he is switching over to the Crisis Negotiation Team, which will allow him to keep his cool car! This will lighten up his extremely heavy training schedule so that he can start his new school program in the fall. Yes, it's back to the classroom for Michael, two nights a week. His goal is a Psychology Doctorate, which he will be pursuing at Alliant International, fully funded by the Bureau. Thanks, taxpayers! Since he will be leaving SWAT, he is able to finally to get Laser Vision Correction! So, all things going as planned, he will be beginning the process this week, with surgery scheduled for June 1st! Yay!

New Location

The Baas Family et al will be relocating to an adorable townhouse in Simi Valley at the end of June. The thoughtfully designed two master bedroom home has two stories and is just perfect for today's family on the go. Escrow will close around the 27th and moving will happen shortly thereafter! We are so excited!

Welcome to the Premiere Edition!

I know, I know, it's not Christmas! So why am I writing a newsletter? Because there is so much going on right now, I figured the only way to catch everyone up would be to write it all down! And this is the 21st century, right? So why not a blog?! Well, after I got Michael's blessing to put private info online, here we are--let's see if I can update it with any regularity! I'd say that I will welcome opinions, advice and comments, but I don't handle criticism well, so kindly keep mean things to yourselves--I'll take compliments, though! Love to you all!

Lara, Editor in Chief