Ramblings on a Wednesday Afternoon

*We put Olivia in a big kid bed. I know its crazy, she's growing up so fast. The best part is, she completly loves it and has had the easiest time transitioning into it, which means that we are still getting sleep, and she is still taking naps. Yay!

*I haven't had a voice in two days, and Olivia has been more obedient than ever. Do I really just need to whisper to get her to listen?

*Although I am not a mom that wakes up to cook my hubby and kiddo a warm meal, breakfast is no simple meal at our house.

We each have our own milk, and our own cereal. Kind of like Goldie Locks and the Three Bears.

Jaron goes for the whole, (and why wouldn't he?), I go for the organic non-fat, because its the only skim milk that tastes great and doesn't leave a sick after-taste in my mouth, and the dairy-allergic-Olivia goes for the Rice dream.

As far as cereals go Jaron and I never eat the same cereal. He goes for blue berry muffin tops mixed with honey granola (which he thinks is the greatest thing ever), I personally don't care for the combination or the sugary flavor of the muffin tops that early in the morning, so I go for a good wheat chex with a little flax seed on top.

So this is our routine every morning.

Just in case you were wondering. :)

*I only have 8 weeks left! Wahoo! Yesterday I was researching names online, because I realized this baby boy is indeed coming, and it really wouldn't be very nice at all if he didn't have a name. Everybody deserves a name. Anyway I found some wonderful options. My favorite was Anoop. Which means incomparable, and the best. I figure we can't go wrong with that. So feel free to start calling our child Anoop "the little poop" Brown. :)

Our Christmas Story

First there was Christmas Eve at the Gustin's house (some friends of Scott and Annette Bowen) . . . and after a gloriously delicious ham dinner, Olivia got to be a little lambie in the nativity scene.

Then Santa Clause came to bring gifts to all the children that had been nice.

Apparently Jaron and I had been really good too, because even we got presents from Santa (thanks again Scott and Annette, we love the pajamas!).
(I really tried to get a picture of Liv next to Santa, but she was sort of hiding behind the couch while he was visiting).

Then there was Christmas morning.
Olivia slept in our bed, and Jaron and I were so excited to open presents that we almost couldn't wait until she woke up. Finally around 9:30 we decided to wake the little sleepy head. Who has ever heard of parents waking their kids up in excitement for Christmas?? Isn't it supposed to be the other way around??
"Wakey wakey little Liv. . . its Christmas!"

And then there was presents. Lots of fun presents, especially for Liv.
Thank you to all our Grandparents for such a wonderful Christmas!


Then, there was lounging, snuggling, resting, and watching Charlie Brown's Christmas. . .

While the movie was on I messed around with my Christmas present from Jaron, a new portrait lens. . .
And then to top off our Christmas holiday we mozied (sp?) on up to our favorite little cottage in North Bend to join Scott, Annette, and Jeremy for the rest of Christmas.
North Bend was so dreamy and snowy. Annette said it perfectly when she was looking out her big windows and watching the fresh, white, snow fall on the pond in her back yard. "She said it's like were on the inside of a little snow globe, but were not, this is real". I wish I had more pictures of our fun outing up there. I will have to get some more from Annette. As always Scott and Annette were so hospitable and fun to be around. We had so much fun eating yummy meals, playing games, and watching movies. We even built some snow men out on the frozen lake, which I didn't take a picture of, but we created two snow men swimming away from a shark. It was pretty cool. Jaron brought up some cross country skis and even skied around a bit.
Mostly we just relaxed and hung out together as a family which was so nice.


Overall it was such a great Christmas. As much as we missed our family and loved ones, our first Christmas alone was actually one that I will never forget, and may even be my most favorite Christmas yet.

Merry Christmas friends! And a Happy New Year!

I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas. . .

Just like the one's we used to know. . .

I think Utah snow must have known that we were missing it this Christmas season, because it went and decided to travel all the way up to the northwest just to make us feel at home.

Last night my sister called me and said "Jess did you know that the snow storm in Seattle is the biggest one that they have had in ten years?!"

I figured it must be pretty big seems how a lot of businesses have been closed and church has now been canceled for two weeks.

Jaron got on the computer to google it and see if it really was the biggest snow storm in ten years, and come to find out, it is actually the biggest snow storm that Seattle has had since 1990 when downtown Seattle got 12 inches of snow.

Aside from the excitement I get out of my current read (Breaking Dawn)(which by the way I did finish David Copperfield, and yes it was well worth it), it has been pretty mellow around here for me and Liv. So, today we decided to go for a walk and take some pictures to document this special weather occasion in Seattle history.

Here is a picture of our parking lot:

This is the road into our parking lot:

Yea, they don't believe in shoveling snow around here, which sure does make for some fun donuts, and believe you me we have been taking advantage.

Jaron even found a way to make his cruiser keep on cruisin right on over that snow.

This here is the river trail that normally provides Olivia and I with our daily walking routine:

The weather prediction is that it will keep on snowing until Christmas, and I really never thought I would say this in Kent, Washington, but it looks like the dream of having a white christmas might come true afterall.

Its Snowing in Seattle!!

Winter 2006: Utah Lake
Temperature: 9 degrees
Snow fall: 13 inches and counting
Businesses and churches closed do to snow conditions: 0%

Winter 2008: Kent, Washington
Temperature: 30 degrees
Snow Fall: Barely a skiffle
Churches and Businesses canceled: 100%

OK, OK. So I kind of made up all of those numbers, but you get the idea. Last Sunday Jaron and I received a phone call that church was canceled due to the snow. Snow, we thought, wow there must have really been quite the snow storm last night while we were sleeping. Much to our surprise we looked out the window to view picture posted above.
For all of the memories I had growing up in Utah just praying that the snow would just once be enough to cancle school, I had to laugh. And I laughed pretty hard, for a long time looking at the little skiffle of snow outside our back window.

We had heard from friends that whenever it snows in Seattle it is really funny, because people will fully abandon their cars in the middle of a road and then other drivers get to have fun driving through the car-abandoned obstacle coarse.
We have yet to see this.
However, as shocked as we were at the cancellation of church on Sunday and as obsurd as it seemed, later that evening we went up the hill to do some home-teaching visits only to discover that the roads up yonder were like sheets of ice. People were sliding all over the place.

At one point we were behind a little car that was trying to get up the littlest hill and had simply lost momentum. Jaron got out to help push and simply ended up sliding backwards. It was like trying to push a car on an ice skating rink. After attempting a few times and simply sliding backwards, he apologized to the lady, turned back towards me and smoothly slid back down the hill to our car.

So, to the credit of all Seattleites, snow here freezes unlike anything I've ever seen. It's not quite like the sticky utah snow that piles and piles and at least provides some traction for your car wheels.

So, what did we do instead of go to church you might wonder?

We enjoyed this:

And some more of these:

As much as I love the rejuvination and the peace that comes from going to church every sunday, it was kind of nice to have a day at home with the fam, relaxing and spending a little time together.

Today it snowed again and my doctor's appointment that I really didn't want to go to was conveniently canceled due to the weather conditions.

So thank you snow. Snow away Seattle, snow away!

Olivia's Prayer

I was just writing this little journal entry in Olivia's journal and thought I would share:

Here is Olivia's Blessing on the food yesterday:

Olivia- "Dee Fa"

Me- "Were grateful for this day"

Olivia-"Day"

Me- "Were grateful for. . ."

Olivia- "Ketchup. . . (pause), food. . . (pause). . .chicken. . . (she was eating chicken nuggets, another pause). . .Jethuths (jesus). . .(pause). . .Dad. . .(pause). . . work. . . bike. . .packpack. . . Name, AMEN!"

Her little prayers melt my heart. Sweet little Liv really loves to pray. In fact, everytime she goes down for a nap or for the night, she can't be put down until we have said her prayers. For some reason she also thinks that it is necessary to pray every time we get done singing the song "I am a Child of God". She's such a great little example to us. I really enjoy her prayers now especially that after a little prompting she sort of takes the lead and I get to hear all of the little thoughts that have been roaming through her head.

Lately Jaron (i.e. Dad), work, his bike, and his "packpack" make it into every single one of Olivia's prayers. Every morning Olivia sees him put on his back back and jump on his bike and ride to work, and apparently it has really made an impression on her.

A few days ago when Jaron had just gotten back from riding his bike home in the dark, he showed Olivia his bike light. Sure enough in her prayer that night she said that she was grateful for "Dad", his "packpack", "work", and then she added at the very end his "light".

Go Ahead.

Do it.

Call me Betty Crocker.

Actually, I really doubt that these pretty gems of sugar cookies would have taken Betty Crocker four hours to make and frost, eh hem.

Here's some of my favorite latest photos of Liv:

You gotta love the post-pony-tail-nap-hair.

Thankgiving Fun in Prov

Well I'm afraid to say that this last trip to Utah was so much fun that we were too distracted to take a lot of pictures.

However we did manage to take a few.

Ah the late night talks, the games, the food, the company, the chaos, the newly purchased homes of siblings, girls day out, boys day out, shopping, shooting, go-cart driving, lounging, and almost finishing David Copperfield.

The food was delicious,

the Lights On Temple Square beautiful,

the nieces and nephews darling,

really darling.
The hot tub at Grandma Pope's was balmy,


the weather lovely,

the new four wheeler joyful,

and as always, the trout slimy.
It is so weird to think that the next time I see my family we will have a new little addition of our own. I'll throw in a prego picture for those of you who never get to see me!

There is definitely something in there!

Happy Holidays!

Stylish

As I was packing for our trip to Utah, Liv was noticing all of her clothes on the bed before I had put them in the suitcase, and she decided to pick out this outfit to wear. With a little help from me she was dressed to the hilt in no time. I think she's got pretty good style. What do you think?