Letters to my brother

I just finished reading all the letters my kids wrote to Andrew and the others in his OCS class. The kids could address them to Andrew specifically, to Sir, to Ma'am, or to the "Future Officers" as many students liked to write. I only had to take one letter out of there (the kid kept saying how everything must be so awful and they should hurt their DIs and he likes grenades), and most of them were super cute and encouraging. Some of the best parts:

--A boy wrote a list of his hobbies. The last one was "fold paper," and we're definitely not talking origami here. I'm picturing all the notes and paper planes I've made him trash lately.

--A girl said she wants to own her own restaurant someday, and if the recipient of the letter visits her restaurant, she might give them free brownies.

--A girl said she has "like about" seven brothers and sisters, but not by her mom because her dad "gets around." This happens to be the same girl whose brother had the ingrown hair (see earlier post--Good to know.)

--A boy said that he knows I'm Andrew's sister and that when Andrew gets home he needs to teach me some lessons.

--One of my boys asked me lots of details about Andrew so he could figure out things to write about. The one he chose? "Your sister told me that when you was little you liked trucks."

--A few girls addressed their letters to "brave lady" and used other very sweet, very encouraging salutations, thanking them for representing the women of America so well.

--A boy said that he knows he and Andrew will "make good friends" and he hopes Andrew will write him back (as did lots of kids). He gave his phone number as well, "if u want 2 talk 2 me."

--A few boys wrote about how important God is to them and that they will be praying for the candidates.

--One of my boys was having a bad day, so I asked him to draw me a picture to include in there. His picture was of a small submarine surrounded by huge bubble letters spelling out, "I Hope You Graduate."

--I told my kids they've been in OCS (I really just said "boot camp") for two or three weeks, yet many informed the candidates that the Saints won the Super Bowl and that Obama is now our president.

I'll be sending these along with another fun card early this week, hopefully Monday. I'll have to run by the Post Office to do it since it's a big package. I'm excited. :)