Christmastime Catch-Up

Merry Christmas everyone! A lot has happened, and I have lots of pictures, so I suppose I'll get right to it. Well, November 24th was officially my last working day. I am now employed as a stay at home mom and house organizer. We've got a lot to do to fix and organize this place before the baby comes in April seeing as how we found out that it'd cost us over 15k to sell this place. So, we're not moving...we're attempting to somehow make more room....not an easy task. The day after my last day we found out the gender of the baby. Here are a few pictures.

And that's right! We're thrilled to announce that it's a boy. We can't wait until he makes his adorable appearance in April, and I've already started to buy some cute boy clothes....I forgot how small they can be! My favorite picture is his cute little foot.:)

Thanksgiving we spent with my parents. I only managed to catch two pictures, and both are of the same thing. Misha decided she wanted Opa to help her eat some pudding, and being spoiled as she is, he obliged. I find it hilarious that he opens his mouth to get her to open hers. Isn't it funny the things we do without thinking about it? We had a blast with them, and look forward to spending a few days this next week with them-even if Jerry does have to work Christmas and the weekend.:(

Our first snow finally came around in the first week of December. I caught a few picture of Misha playing in the snow for the first time. She also helped Jerry brush my car off.

Our first HUGE snow came yesterday.:) We got over a foot in less than 12 hours or so. It made me feel like I'd moved to Utah in the middle of the night! It was REAL snow! (I.E.: Powdery!) And lots of it! It brought back a lot of memories for Jerry and I when we first lived at Sundance after we were married. Multiple memories of driving in knee deep snow...and shoveling a wrap around deck...and doing it all the time...and it made us miss having a four wheel drive vehicle. Misha also decided to find the shovel on the front porch and once again help daddy out.

(I actually caught a drip!)

I just love the look of untouched snow. Isn't it beautiful!?!

And so, that seems to be about it. Things are going well. We have had a wonderful year and are incredibly grateful for the chance I have to be at home with the kids (multiple?!?! That sounds SO weird). Jerry has worked very hard this year, and as of tomorrow or Tuesday will have finished his first college class in about 7 or 8 years. I’m so proud of him! Misha continues to amaze us and grows bigger and smarter every day. It has been a truly bountiful year. We love and miss all of our friends and family who live out of state and hope you know that you are often in our thoughts and prayers. May our Heavenly Father bless all of you at this joyous time of year when we celebrate the birth of His son and our Savior, Jesus Christ. We have a strong testimony of Him and of the gospel. We know that it is through living the way He would have us to is the only way to true happiness. Merry Christmas to all, and remember that wise men STILL seek Him.

Testing testing one two three!  I figured out how to use different fonts!!

Halloween and other happenings

So, for the few of you that read this blog, yes, we're still alive and kicking. It's been a busy time and things are happening, but we're still here. So, I'll give you the updates and make you wait in anticipation for the pictures.:)

As of November 24th, I will no longer work at the National Institutes of Health. We have so much to do in getting ready to move (we just need to sell our house, and then are planning on renting in the area) that I have no time to get it done on my days off! So, in order to make for a less stress life, I'll be stopping work to get things in order here at home before this baby comes. I honestly can't wait to tackle my closets...I've been wanting to get at them for quite some time.

We will find out the baby's gender (provided shim cooperates) on November the 25th.

Thanksgiving with the folks on November 26th! What a great week!!!

The morning sickness is still prevalent, but only on the mornings where I have to wake up for work...something about getting up before 6 in the morning-believe me, I've tried everything there is to think of to not get ill, and it's simply the time I wake up. Another perk to not working anymore (besides not having to commute over an hour anymore!!!) is that I always get up after the timing that would make me sick.

Jer begins his paramedic class in just a couple of short weeks...afterward he'll go from having 5 college credits to his name, to over 40! I'm so proud of him, and he's on his way to a degree (at very least an associate's) faster than we realize. Though the class won't give him an increase in salary, he'll be that much closer to finishing school so he can find a job he loves AND that pays well.:)

And now...on to pictures.


My mom got Misha a Dora backpack not too long ago, here she is receiving it! She absolutely loves it, and was wearing it all through the episodes she was watching yesterday.

We of course took a trip to the pumpkin patch to pick our pumpkins this year. Here are her and Jer picking out a little one for Misha.

My little Dorothy (with Toto of course!)

(Sorry it's blurry!!)


The First House

(She actually tried to give them candy out of her basket...isn't she just the sweetest?!?)

Right before getting scared by a fake spider on the porch...it was the only thing that scared her the whole night!

The Loot

I've been experimenting with my new camera-as you can tell from the fuzzy pictures above...sometimes I wish I had an automatically focusing lens...but Misha is a blast to shoot when she's just being herself. She's playing with Jer's wedding ring here...

And here's winking at you kid...

Yes, she can wink with just one eye...isn't my kid talented!

Hope everyone's good-we'll be letting you know the gender in just a couple of weeks, so stay tuned Slackers!

A thing to view

Please see my guest post this week on On How to be Lovely. It's done by my great friend Lindsey and a couple of her college roommates who also seem to rock. And always check back. It makes you feel good about yourself.

Yes

I'm pregnant.


And nauseated.


'Nough said.

Good bye Scout, Hello Jet!

So, as many of you have found out, Jerry and I recently utilized the Cash for Clunkers program and purchased ourselves a BRAND NEW CAR!!! We thought for sure that it would be years (more like 15) before we were able to do that, but after saving, saving, saving, and saving some more, we paid off a brand new vehicle on the spot. And so, after being with me for 6 faithful years, I sadly had to say goodbye to my trusty 4Runner, Scout.

As much as I would have LOVED to buy another 4 wheel drive vehicle, paying off a brand new car is better than going into debt on something that can wait a few years (see mom and dad-aren't you PROUD?!?!;)).

And so, I'd like to introduce everyone to our brand new Honda Civic LX, 4 cylinder, manual transmission vehicle...ladies and gentlemen, Jet.

I don't care, Jerry, if you don't believe in naming cars. I do, and I drive it the most, so there. I believe in the long run, if you name your car, you'll treat it a little better, and it'll be good to you. So there you have it folks...the newest member of our family.

In other related news-seeing as how we purchased Jet the day before my birthday-we went to my parents just after purchase to celebrate my b-day and my dad's that was going to happen when he was out of the town. (Mine's the 15th-his the 18th.) We had a great time. On Saturday I decided that I'd rather chill out at home with a great barbequed meal than go someplace fancy. So, we grilled some steak and veggies and had a fabuloso dinner. Jerry whipped up a delicious fun-fetti cake. My dad decided to help decorate....

Clearly the logical choice after failing out of cake decorating was to go to law school...it was his only option left.....and yes, I turned 26-represented at the top by two and six candles...

I appreciate the effort and love that went into this though! I love you Jer and dad!

Hershey!

So we had a great time on our trip to Hershey Park on the first weekend of August. We didn't get a ton of pics, but here are a few-mostly of the kid.

Here she is on her very first solo amusement park ride. She had a ball-it was the little kiddie ride that's hot air balloons. She went on it about three time before our trip was over.

She also seems to be quite the little daredevil. She made Jerry go on this ride with her, which goes surprisingly fast! It also had a joy stick at the front of the space ship that controls it going up and down-Jer wanted it down, she was all about going up!

I'm quite lucky I got this shot.

Of course she went on the swings. They're her favorite!

She also insisted on going on the carosel several times. It was fun though.

For the first time ever, we got our caricature drawn. Misha was not a happy camper at the time, so the fact that he was able to capture her so completely from the one or two times that she smiled was quite good! He also kept saying while he was drawing me that it looked like I was a presidential candidate. I said yeah, my campaign would be "Grow up, go to school, and get a good job with health insurance benefits. Sorry, the welfare system is closed." He he. All in all it was a really fun trip.

Happy Birthday!

To me! Okay, so it was Saturday, but who cares?!?




Yes! That's right! Jerry got me a Nikon D5000 for my birthday!!!! My camera actually came with Tamron lenses, not Nikon ones, but the reviews have been fairly similar, and I think will be great for what I'm planning on doing with it for my little side hobby. I LOVE it. I'm still a bit intimidated by it, but I took a picture this morning that if you asked me turned out pretty darn good.



Look at how beautiful my little girl is! It kills me. This isn't quite as sharp as it appears on the camera, or when downloaded to my computer, but it still gives you somewhat of an idea....

Hope everyone's good out there-we went to Hershey Park a couple of weeks ago, I'll be posting pictures soon.

Gotta love being a parent

Don't you just all remember the things you do for your kids??? Here's an example....



Yes, that would be 84 cents worth of stamps that she found and are now her "stickers". The things we do for our kids...I didn't have the heart to take them away from her...and now she is so proud of having the world's most expensive stickers.

The Beach

So, I know it's a little later than originally intended, but better late than never! Our trip to Nags Head, NC (aka: the Outer Banks) over the fourth of July weekend (my favorite holiday!) was a fun trip. Though it does seem that Misha has hit her terrible twos on this trip (a tantrum every 5 minutes!), we had fun nonetheless and I hope my mom didn't have too big of a headache (no, the two 8-10 mile back ups do not figure into that) by the time we hit home.

So, here's our room. Okay, so by the time I took this it looked like a mess, but it really wasn't that bad!

I thought it was nice to be able to buy groceries and only eat one meal out. Though, groceries were expensive down there considering the only decent grocery store is Harris Teeter.

Jer brought along the hammock he got for Father's day so that we could relax....

While looking at this view....

No, it is not zoomed! It was an awesome view and so relaxing to swing in that and listen to the waves. The beach was not crowded (unlike Ocean City), and was nice and quiet. Only the last full day did we get one or two weirdos or smokers near us.

The pool was small, but clean. Misha still isn't too keen on water, and certainly doesn't want her head or face anywhere near it.

But, here's a rare moment when we're ALL smiling, and in the water.

We bought Misha a bucket in anticipation of her wanting to be more on the beach than in the water, and so we of course built a sand castle.

Nothing too fancy, I know, but honestly, it's the most elaborate one I've ever built, even if it was completely with artificial aids than my own "artistic" ability (of which I have none...)

Have I ever told you how much I love watching Jer and Misha together? They're just the best of buddies, and I love how much they love one another.

Aren't they simply too adorable for words?!?!

Friday afternoon and evening mom and I headed to the outlets! (We were only a mere block away!) And who doesn't love the beach AND shopping?! Mom scored and got herself about four bags on a Wilson's Leather clearance sale, and I bought myself a leather jacket. Alas, no pictures of us spending away all our hard earned money, but I promise, it happened.:)

Saturday was another day for lounging and waiting for my favorite part of this holiday. We went down to the beach to watch the fire works! Alas, this was as close as we could get...

Okay, so I realized that these seem really close, but those were just some small ones the people on the beach were setting off...the "real" ones were way past this.

But, we did bring along some sparklers of our own...here's Misha being fully thrilled for the prep....

But, as you can (barely) see in this photo (most likely the only one my mom won't kill me for posting), my mom is the one with the sparkler, not my kid....

And she really doesn't like the sound of fireworks (they scare her a wee bit), and so, common sensically, here she is covering her eyes in our family photo.:)

But Jer and I looked great in this one!

Though the fireworks were disappointing (they always are after going to DC's for so many years...), we had a great time....and I won't even mention those two 10 mile back ups we hit on our way back to mom and dad's, one of which was still going on at 10:00 at night when we were heading to WV!

Hope everyone had a happy and safe fourth with fantastic fireworks!

I had fun with ours anyway!

Happenings of Late

Yes, I still belong to the blogging world...you were worried, weren't you? So, a lot's been going on the last couple of months, so we'll just hit some of the major points.

In April, Jer and I took a quick few days trip to Williamsburg. It was a lot of fun to get away for a few days without Misha. We love her, but the break was nice.:) We had lunch outside one of the days (it was DELICIOUS).




And the blacksmith we saw later was pretty cool too.



Misha turned two in May! She's getting so big, and much more loquacios. I love it! I can't wait to have real conversations with her.

She got a lion pillow from us, that we only have video of, and I don't feel like posting a full out video. But she got a baby doll stroller from her other, better mom.:)



She finally got some cake (okay, she did have some here, but we don't have any pictures of it either, and it was little last minute...) in UT with my family (and some again with Jer's as well, but again, no pictures...I'm all of the sudden not feeling like I'm doing my job as a mom....)




We had a great time in UT for a couple of weeks (other than my bout with the swine flu the first four days we were there...) Here were two of Misha's favorite activities.




She's watching Dora by the way....and that's my grandpa who spent a majority of the time we were there, in bed not feeling well either. Surprisingly he never complained about Misha sitting in there with him watching Dora....

And now for the second-here she is with her all time favorite thing to do while we were there, and that's having my grandma push her in that swing. She couldn't get enough of it, and didn't really like it if anyone else was pushing her.:) I LOVE that she loves my grandma so much.



We went to a wedding-my best buddy Jeff finally tied the knot. Though, again-with the no pictures, the ceremony was beautiful, the bride ABSOLUTELY GORGEOUS, and of course, the groom handsome as ever. Congrats Jeff and Shasta!

The last full weekend of our trip was spent entirely with Jer's family. We had a blast staying with his sister KJ and her husband Rich, and their kids Jacqueline, Madeline, Charley, and Ryan. The girls were so cute with Misha, and we had such a good time hanging out with them. Here are all the Brown cousins together. Thankfully we got to see Angie, Marcus, and their kids, Ethan, Aubrey, Jason, and Jacob from Wyoming.

So, from left to right back row then front row we have Madeline, Ethan (with Aubrey standing in front of him), Ryan, Charley, Jacqueline (holding MaKayla), then Misha, Sophie, Jacob and Jason (though possibly not in that order, but I can't tell them apart...it doesn't help they're in the same outfits all the time, Ang!), and finally MaKenzie. WE MISS YOU ALL!!!

Now we're back and right back into the full swing of work and everything else. It was a wonderful trip, and we miss everyone there with an indescribable intensity.

We hope everyone out there is doing well! We are looking forward to spending the fourth of July with my mom on the beach in Nags Head, NC! We leave Wednesday, so I'll try to post some pictures the week after. We're so stoked!

Yes or No **Now updated!**

1. You can ONLY answer Yes or No.

2. You are NOT ALLOWED to explain ANYTHING unless someone messages or comments you and asks. --and believe me, the temptation to explain some of these will be overwhelming nothing is exactly as it seems.

3. Tag some friends.


Kissed any one of your Facebook friends? Yes

Been arrested? No

Kissed someone you didn't like? Yes

Slept in until 5 PM? Yes

Fallen asleep at work/school? Yes

Held a snake? Yes

Ran a red light? Yes

Been suspended from school? No

Experienced love at first sight? No

Totaled your car in an accident? No

Been fired from a job? No

Fired somebody? No

Sang karaoke? No

Pointed a gun at someone? No

Done something you told yourself you wouldn't? Yes

Laughed until something you were drinking came out your nose? Yes

Caught a snowflake on your tongue? Yes

Kissed in the rain? Yes

Had a close brush with death (your own)? Yes

Seen someone die? YES

Played spin-the-bottle? No

Sang in the shower? Yes

Smoked a cigar? No

Sat on a rooftop? Yes

Smuggled something into another country? No

Been pushed into a pool with all your clothes? No

Broken a bone? Yes

Skipped school? Yes

Eaten a bug? No

Sleepwalked? No

Walked a moonlit beach? Yes

Rode a motorcycle? Yes

Dumped someone? Yes

Forgotten your anniversary? No

Lied to avoid a ticket? No

Ridden on a helicopter? No

Shaved your head? No

Played a prank on someone? Yes

Hit a home run? No

Felt like killing someone? Yes

Cross-dressed? No

Been falling-down drunk? No

Made your girlfriend/boyfriend cry? No (Though please correct me if I'm wrong....)

Eaten snake? No

Marched/Protested? No

Had Mexican jumping beans for pets? No

Puked on amusement ride? No

Seriously & intentionally boycotted something? No

Been in a band? No

Knitted? No

Been on TV? Yes

Shot a gun? Yes

Skinny-dipped? No

Caused someone to have stitches? No

Eaten a whole habenero pepper? No

Ridden a surfboard? No

Had surgery? Yes

Streaked? No

Taken by ambulance to hospital? Yes

Passed out when not drinking? No

Peed on a bush? No

Donated Blood? No

Grabbed electric fence? No

Eaten alligator meat? No

Eaten cheesecake? No

Eaten your kids' Halloween candy? No

Killed an animal when not hunting? No

Peed your pants in public? No

Snuck into a movie without paying? No

Written graffiti? No

Still love someone you shouldn't? Yes

Think about the future? Yes

Been in handcuffs? Yes

Believe in love? Yes

Sleep on a certain side of the bed? Yes



By the way-thank you to the 8 of you who read my blog. It means a lot.

Anyone?

Is anyone out there?!?! Does anyone care I haven't posted in over a month?? This was originally intended as a way for family to see pics of the kid and us, but I'm pretty sure the only family member who checks this thing is one who I see fairly often and only lives two hours away! (Thanks mom!) So, in order not to feel guilty, I'm thinkin' I may close up shop....

Just for some clarification

So, there seems to be this growing trend at work that my "mentor" (and good friend!) Nicole and I look like sisters. Well, I was lucky enough to be able to spend last weekend with my sister and brother-in-law when they flew in for a quick trip to organize getting some of my brother-in-law's things out to Utah. And so, for clarification purposes, here's a picture of my beautiful sister and myself. (One of these days I'll probably have to post a picture of Nicole and I for comparison's sake...)
I had a blast with them, and I always deeply cherish the laughs that come so easily when my family is all together.

Movie!

And a picture. So, I think that most of you don't really care to hear my opinions. Most of you never comment on those blogs that don't involve a picture of my daughter, so I suppose I get the hint. I'm not Lindsey Patten-people don't care what I say. So, here's a picture of the kid, and a short clip of her saying some of her new words. Hope you enjoy!

I just love dressing my daughter for the summer! It was 75 degrees out last weekend! Just 4 short days after a foot of snow fell! Yeah for the warm, perfect, dry, pollen free days that come as a surprise at the beginning of March!



My favorite is her saying "'llo?"