Toomey Times 
Volume 14 April 2001 (Should be December 2000)
Toomey Times
Volume 14 April 2001 (Should be December 2000)
Happy New
Year and Happy Easter! The year 2000 was a year of change. We changed homes,
neighborhoods, employers (sort of), and added a family member.
Harold, on the
other hand, pretty much stayed the same. In Lindon, he worked with the eleven
year old Boy Scouts and helped neighbors with their computers and Palm Pilots.
In American Fork, Harold works with the twelve year old scouts and helps
neighbors with their computers and Palm Pilots.
Symantec,
the maker of NORTON AntiVirus,
acquired Axent Technologies where Harold was employed. Now, Harold works as
a Product Manager for Symantec, the largest information security company in
the world.
Holly keeps busy
raising Heather and her three big brothers. In Lindon Holly taught the nine
year olds in church, and assisted with the Relief Society Visiting Teaching
routes. When she wasn't at the elementary school helping with math and the
home reading program, she could be found painting, painting, and PAINTING
the Lindon house (to get it ready to be sold) and house hunting. She became
quite the house-hunting guru, recognizing every Northern
Utah County house on the market by description, location, length on the
market, and the asking price. ARGH!!
Since moving to American Fork,
Holly has shifted gears by unpacking, chasing Heather in a fun new environment,
keeping mud OUTSIDE, adjusting to a new elementary school schedule, and being
the Webelos Den Leader in Cub Scouts.
Heather (16 mos.)
has the Toomey appetite! She loves potatoes, particularly French Fries, peas,
scrambled eggs, French toast, Swedish pancakes, and Sparkling Spumante
(expensive taste). Heather loves her brothers, music, toilets, toilet bowl
brushes and plungers, and BATHS. Upon moving to American Fork she took up
stinker-bug crawling, probably to avoid knee-to-tile floor contact in the
dining room, become quite adept at climbing stairs. In December she began walking.
Heather is not afraid to express
her opinion. She'll look her opponent straight in the eyes and roar with
disapproval. She can also be very comforting, kissing Mommy and giving her
assuring pats on the shoulder. Heather's vocabulary is increasing daily.
Currently, her favorite words are: “Dad, Mom, David, Jonathan, Andrew, Grandma,
Yes, No, Ouch, Hot, Shoes, Juice, and Mmmm Good.” But Heather is not the only one expanding her vocabulary.
Andrew (5) likes
to use such words as "camouflaged"
and "response."
He has been a great example to the rest of the family on Fast and Testimony
Sundays, because he loves to bear his testimony. He also loves Macaroni and
Cheese, Petit
fours, chocolate, chocolate, and chocolate. Andrew began Kindergarten at the end of August,
and while home without his brothers he is a tremendous help with Heather.
Andrew loved riding the bus to school with David and Jonathan in Lindon. He
now has to adjust to walking 0.8 miles home from school with his brothers.
Jonathan (9) loves Cub Scouts. He earned his Bobcat
badge only one week after his eighth birthday and his Wolf
badge shortly afterwards. He now has several arrow
points and belt loops. It is very evident that Jonathan loves Heather,
because he is often found playing with her. He played baseball this year and
loved it! He aced computers and health last semester and also enjoys Science.
Jonathan is adjusting well to a different school, but he misses his friends
in Lindon. Three of his Lindon friends threw him a going away party before
he moved and took him to a movie. This was a major highlight of the year for
him.
We learned something new this year,
when Jonathan accidentally grabbed his African
Fat Tailed Gecko by the tail. It came off! The boys rushed to Holly, screaming
all the way, dropping the end of the bloody tail onto the kitchen counter!
While the tail end flopped around and Gecko ran around on the counter leaving
a bloody trail, Holly tried not to faint while hunting through the phone book
for a veterinarian. The prognosis? Geckos have a defense mechanism to protect
them from predators in the wild. If their tail is grabbed, it comes off, and
the Gecko grows another one. Whew, what a relief!
In October Jonathan had eye surgery
on both eyes for Lazy
Eye. He was very brave, all went well, and he recovered well.
David (12) received
straight A's on his last report card in the fifth grade and a state citation
for being in the top scoring ten percent nationally in science and reading.
Now in the sixth grade he has earned his First
Class rank and the Orienteering
merit badge in Boy Scouts, and has become a Game Boy ace. He is very analytically
minded, is very resourceful, has great problem solving abilities, and is a
tremendous help to his parents. He
has grown very tall.
Marcia,
Harold’s mother, moved in with us this year.
She is a great joy and helper to our family. With three girls and four boys, there is finally more balance in
the Toomey household.
We played very hard this year,
traveling whenever possible.
Portland,
Oregon
In
January, Holly and Heather flew to Oregon for the wedding of long time family
friend and former college roommate, Cathy Morgan.
San
Diego, California
In February, our family traveled
to San Diego, California, for the sealing
of Holly's good friend, Robyn Hyde, to her husband Jared. Robyn's children
were also sealed to Jared at that time. It was a wonderful experience to witness.
We are so glad they have each other.
We stayed at the home of Harold's
brother, Paul, though Paul's crew was out of town. We visited Harold's brother,
Jerry, and his family. We enjoyed that tremendously. We revisited Sea
World, the beach, and explored
Legoland for the
first time … twice.
St. Louis and Hannibal, MO, and Nauvoo, IL
We visited Harold's brother, Robert,
and his family in St. Louis this summer. Harold and Andrew got to go canoeing.
Some of the sights we visited were: Cahokia
Mounds, St. Louis Children's
Museum (the Shoe Factory), the St. Louis
Science Museum, Magic House,
and Six
Flags amusement park. We enjoyed the time with them and the site seeing.
On July
4th we attended a St.
Louis Cardinals baseball game. One highlight of the game was Keith McDonald's
homerun, on his first time up to bat in a professional game. Yeah, Keith,
batting a 1,000!! To commemorate the moment, Holly made Heather a teddy bear,
named Keith McDonald, at Build-A-Bear,
a cool store where the customer can make her own customized teddy bear. http://www.buildabear.com
Venturing out further from the city,
we went to Hannibal, Missouri, home of
Mark Twain, where we explored the cave where Tom Sawyer and Becky Thatcher
got lost and took a riverboat ride on the Mississippi River.
Robert and Jana and their boys joined us in Nauvoo and gave us a tour
of Robert's old missionary stomping grounds. We also saw the building sight
of the Nauvoo temple.
Cave
Creek, Arizona
In the sizzling
heat of August, we braved the Arizona desert. Cave
Creek was home base for a week, where the boys enjoyed swimming almost
daily. We saw beautiful scenery and revisited Slide
Rock State Park just north of Sedona.
We enjoyed Raw Hide, an old western
amusement park, where the boys rode donkeys, fed pigs, climbed rock cliffs,
bungee catapulted, had a squirt gun fight, and more!
We took a jeep tour with Enrico,
the Italian Cowboy, and our view of the desert changed forever. He taught us
how to survive in the desert, which cactus to get water from, what to eat, how
to eat, what to avoid, and how to tell directions. Now the boys see the desert
and literaly salivate.
As of last Thanksgiving,
our new address is:
Harold
& Holly Toomey
1376 North 1100 East
American
Fork, UT 84003
Home: (801) 492-1526
Email:
harold@toomey.org
(Pers.) jonathan@toomey.org
htoomey@symantec.com (Bus.) andrew@toomey.org
holly@toomey.org heather@toomey.org
david@toomey.org marcia@toomey.org
The Lord has been good to us. May
He bless each and every one of you throughout the year. Keep in touch.
With love from,
Harold, Holly,
David, Jonathan, Andrew and Heather-
To download the original "Toomey Times" Christmas Newsletter, click on the
Word icon below:
Original Word 2000 Document