Mr. Domestic

These last few weeks of working full time, teaching piano lessons, and preparing my classroom for the first day of school have been INSANE! Even since I've quit the other jobs and school has started full time, I have still been putting in 15 hours worth of work per day and I am tired. Poor Andrew has been left to his own devices for quite awhile now because I have had no time for domestic chores. But I have to say that Andrew is the most supportive husband ever. For example, I came home from working at the school at about 7:30pm Saturday night and Andrew was rushing around making dinner (yummy Japanese food), putting a load of clothes in the washing machine, and folding the clean laundry fresh from the dryer. Then, I found he had been grocery shopping while I was gone and later after dinner was cleaned up, Andrew made a batch of brownies for dessert!! Once I start to get the hang of this 3rd grade teacher thing life should settle back down and I will be able to take care of my sweet husband again. But in the meantime, I want to say: THANKS ANDREW! I LOVE YOU!

Where the blacktop ends...

We've been wanting to go camping this summer for while now and we were very excited to go this last weekend! What a beautiful drive it was to get there! Past Newdale and Teton, we took a turn on a gravel road and were surrounded by farmland for as far as the eye could see. But then within a few miles we went from rolling wheat and potato fields to a thick green forest of firs, pines, and aspens seemingly out of nowhere!

We prefer to camp far away from people and civilization and after exploring the maze of winding dirt roads for a bit, we came across this sweet little spot. From the time that we pulled back into the trees and set up camp, we didn't see another person until we packed up and got back on the road. Now that's real camping! I have to say, that romping around the woods in Andrew's truck made us miss our friends Travis and Brittany. Such happy memories!

Andrew's manly self prepares the coals for our chicken dinner =P

Our campsite was nestled next to a meadow of the most incredible display of wildflowers I've ever seen.

When we went out exploring the next morning, we found fresh deer beds in the meadow where entire families spent the night in the long grasses.

Rachel wading in the creek. Though you can not tell in the picture, this spot by the water was swarming with butterflies of all colors.

A moose. We were CloSE! Surprisingly, she didn't seem too concerned that we were watching her. She studied us for a sec and then kept right on eating. We saw a good sized 4x4 buck too but it was concerned by our presence and took off before we could get pictures.

What a cool camping trip!!

Brown Family Reunion

We spent a few days in Utah with my mom's family. It was fun to hang with those that we hardly ever see because they live far away in D.C. or Saipan. My cousins are starting to have adorable babies of their own that are miniatures of themselves. So cute! If you don't know the family I realize this post won't mean much to you. I'm sorry for those of you who don't though cause the Brown family pretty much rocks.

Chillin' in the shade, digesting Aunt Joy's yummy cooking: Heather Tebbs, Lenita & John Keller, Uncle Aaron, and Andrew.

Heather and her "Toby baby". He has curly hair, dimples, and big blue eyes. Awww...

Andrew participated in some serious male bonding with my little cousins: playing football and soccer, teaching them how to wrestle, and as pictured, lounging on the couch flipping through the sports channels. Andrew was so fun to watch with the little guys. They got pretty tight.


Aunt Shauna, Aunt Chelta, Nana Donna, Uncle JJ, Aunt Rita, and little Summer and Kennedy

My cousin Lenita has the sweetest little Samuel...plus they announced she's expecting their 2nd at the beginning of next year!

Karsten: the coolest goober of a cousin.

One of Aaron and Chelta's girls: McKenna
Isn't she a pretty thing?

Rob and Joy's youngest: Janaya sportin some crazy flower power =)

My sister Rebecca. She's cool. Most of the time. =)

Aaron and Chelta's boy Braden
We like him. Talk about a sweetheart.

Washington

No, we didn't have a baby while in Washington...this is our Niece Adelle. She is such a precious girl.

Tenant Lake: completely covered in lily pads!

This is my "looking directly into the sun" face expression.

The Needle

This is where we watched the fireworks on the fourth...Rachel used her amazing picture taking skills to capture this!

What a hottie! Rachel's first time to Canada!

Larabee State Park...I loved coming here growing up! It was fun to take Rachel to see the Puget.

Ferndale...don't blink

Road Trip!

So, Andrew and I spent the last week in Washington. It was a LONG trip there and back and poor Andrew was getting a wee bit bored with all that driving. He started to make weird noises, sing, and even dance in order to entertain himself. He actually does this all the time...he's kind of a ham =).I was looking for something to do too so I decided to capture his crazy antics on camera without him knowing. This was tricky. I pretended to be going through the pictures we had taken on the trip so he wouldn't be suspicious. Then, after a few minutes, I slyly turned on the video camera and and got some hilarious footage of Andrew... just being Andrew.

Sorry the sound of the car is so loud. You'll have to turn the volume up to hear him. And sorry if it is kinda slow at the beginning, keep watching til the end...it gets pretty good. Andrew sure had a good laugh when I showed him this finished product! He had no idea! (if for some reason it doesn't want to work on our blog click on this link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=upsMYtB972E&feature=email )

Andrew is posting more details about the Washington Trip soon...

Andrew entertains himself

Simple Joys

One of our favorite parts about living in a house is the yard! We love to spend Saturday mornings working out on the lawn and cleaning up the place after this crazy winter. We have also planted our first garden! When we moved to this house, there was a big pile of dirt, compost, leaves, sand, trash, and branches in the corner of our yard. After cleaning all that up this spring, we took the nice rich dark soil that was left and used it to fill this super cool planter box that Andrew built. We are very proud of our little garden...

We are now the proud parents of our very own corn, bean, pumpkin, sunflower, and green onion seedlings! Like I said, we're so proud.

More garden news to come...