New Thanksgivmas Eve!!!

Posted from sunny beautiful AZ where we are spending a FABULOUS week vacation (and loving it):

The weekend after Thanksgiving we went out to Pittsburgh for a Rockville girl roommate get together at April and Cord's awesome big old house. April initiated the gathering for New Thanksgivmas eve, a new holiday started by us :) Aside from Harrison being sick and Cory and Harrison having to take off before the main event (8 course dinner and gift exchange) it was so fun to have almost all of us (and Erin's sister Taci) together again with our families. Harrison loved playing with Vincenzo and Alesa and chasing the "baby kitties" around the house. Thank you April for making this happen, can't wait til next year where I will be more prepared to ensure my child is NOT sick

I snapped a few pictures....I really need to see the one with the boys in their cheap-o chrsitmas ties (holding up cory's since he was absent)! April??
Shalise and Frank getting ready for dinner. You'll notice beautiful table decorations and like THREE drinks at each place setting. It was pretty amazing.

Yumm...Ham, mashed potatoes, sweet potato souffle, and pumpkin cheesecake

My claim to fame for the night was definitely assistance with salad assembly.

Our cute hosts!

Taci was SO excited she drew my number in the white elephant exchange....I of course had forgotten and threw something together that I found in the car (who knew that a big gulp cup filled with candy could be so hilarious..)

Although the weekend was half-super stressful, it was still a great time--can't remember when I've laughed so hard. Love you guys!!!

Thanksgiving

We just got off of two really fun (as far as road trips with a small child go) holiday weekend trips. First, we went to visit our friends Todd and Emily and Jonas and Carmen in the Detroit area for Thanksgiving. Todd and Cory are BFFs from their days at the BYU-I/Rick's College and we haven't seen them for far too long and it was great to catch up! It was COLD, but we had a great time eating an AMAZING dinner (with 4 pies plus awesome pecan bars and pumpkin woopie pies made by yours truly...yeah...for four adults and three kids under three.. :) YUM), watching the kiddos play awesome together, visiting the Ford Motor Company museum and "village" (not many people braved the cold to go into the old shops and buildings...good way to beat the crowd!!), and going out on a DATE to eat yummy italian food and see Harry Potter. Oh yeah, and we went to a diner and ate chili dogs. YAY FOOD!!! HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!! (I could say a bunch about gratitude here and what not but it's almost 11 and I have to get up at 5...so please just keep and mind that the Brown family is very blessed and grateful this year!!!)

Slim pickings in the weekend pics, but I think I covered the most important stuff:

A huge train set made out of legos!!
Blurry photo of Harrison and Jonas in the tub--the BEST part of every day! Nothing better than two little boys in the tub dumping water on each other and cracking up!!

OH WAIT!! There is something better!!! jumping up in down in your sister's bed after mommy told you not to!!!

(as a postscript to this post, Emily, you can see why I need your pictures, right??)

(also...let's save the new holiday and last week's trip for another day...before I start writing incoherent sentences that I'll regret in the morning)

AIRPLANE!!!!

This is Harrison's favorite new word. Especially after we went to the Air and Space Museum in VA on Saturday. It's an extension of the A and S at the Smithsonian and was SO COOL!! Seriously a huge hanger full of planes---and way less crowded and stressful than going downtown..even if Harrison basically wanted to climb over the railing and go try out every plane :)

More fun in the city!

I was nervous about how Harrison would do in a museum but we had such a blast yesterday at the Museum of Natural History! He LOVED the fish/ocean life exhibits the best. The weather was absolutely perfect and we had a great time hanging out. We went to lunch at the same Potbelly's (a favorite for sure) that we went to a year ago when we were out here visiting...and can't believe we actually LIVE here now!!

This is how we let him see stuff up close at first, we let him run around in the less busy exhibits :) Dinasour bones!!!

HUGE WOOLY MAMMOTH!!!

They had a "Discovery Room" for kids to look and touch stuff--it was very cool. Harrison loved this crocodile's mouth (and collecting magnifying glasses) the best.
Can you believe this huge coral reef is all crocheted? It's almost as big as the blanket I made for my dad a few years back :)
Daddy and Harrison pose outside--the weather was PERFECT. Just cool enough to wear a sweater but sunny and awesome.
After lunch Harrison had a blast running around the fountains at the Navy Memorial. And of course we tried to get some pictures together
SIT STILL CHILD!!!!

Thank you i phone 4!!!

We got cory a new phone and it takes way better pics than my phone, or even my camera-YAY!! Such a relief for those of us that love pictures but can't seem to get it together to bring a camera...ever..... Here are some of what we've been up to

For Halloween we decorated pumpkins with the Millers and also went to their trunk or treat because there was no way we could get to ours given the traffic situation around here (6 pm on friday...YEAH RIGHT). We also borrowed some costumes and were thing 1 and thing 2--Harrison was an adorable giraffe (although I'm a little annoyed his 2T-3T costume was almost too small when he JUST started wearing 2T clothes...WHAT UP TARGET???

In this picture Harrison is saying--"This sour patch thing tastes funny!!!"
I promise next year I'll be more creative with the costumes...but seriously running around in huge footie pajamas was KIND OF AWESOME

Yesterday we drove down to Mt Vernon for a couple of hours-I've been a few times but Cory had never been. It is only $10 more to get year passes so we totally took advantage. It is beautiful up there and there are lots of places for a toddler to run around after he barely makes it through the house tour :)

climbing a fence to look at the cows
Hello

Kind of I LOVE this picture--he's contemplating the meaning of life, and hay, of course...
of course you have to sit on the green chairs outside the house
With daddy
George's view--I'm a little (LOT) jealous
family shot. Sorry, I refuse to do my hair on saturdays :)

Harrison found a stick!! YAY STICKS!!!

You know you have a good babysitter when....

Having WONDERFUL care for Harrison has made transitioning to full time work so much easier than it could have been. For the first day of Cory's job Harrison played with Alesa at Erin's house and every day since he's been with Rebekah, Kaitlyn, and Alex at Heidi's. Although the commuting situation is less than ideal (and definitely makes me appreciate the time we have together at night, on the weekends, even for like half an hour in the morning)--knowing that he is taken care of and having LOTS of fun doing some FANTASTIC stuff makes me happy. Plus--I get pics like this sent to me during the day--HOW COULD THAT NOT PUT A SMILE ON YOUR FACE???
Alesa and Harrison showing their babies how to take a nap
And jumping on the couch/looking out the window
Rebekah and Harrison making halloween cookies
Time to try out some dough!!!!
Since spending so much time with Rebekah, Harrison has gotten VERY good at giving hugs. Not sure if it is because they are forced to hug each other after they have a little fight or because they just love each other so much :) Yesterday we had our friends Noelle and Jon over and Harrison decided barely 1 year old Sabrina needed a hug too---OOPS---Sometimes his affection is a bit much, but I'll take it.

This Saturday we took a break from the Halloween festivities and went to Tyson's Corner, a swanky mall just down the road. I know. What a lame thing to do on a beautiful fall day in DC, right? (particularly when we could have gone to the "rally to restore sanity," right? don't get me started...) Harrison was in heaven though because he got to ride the train and play in the play area. When you're one it is SO the little things.

BOATS!!!

A couple of weekends ago we had the pleasure of hosting grandma and grandpa Kline from AZ --we went to the Annapolis boat show and looked at lots of swanky expensive boats--Harrison LOVED climbing all around and enjoying the scenery. Plus the weather was AMAZING. It was so fun to see family even though we'd really only been separated for a week or two :) More people need to come visit!!! WE MISS YOU!!! VISIT US!!!
Try to get harrison to sit still on a boat...YEAH RIGHT :)
FAMILY SHOT!!!
Sitting in the cool little chair
Yeah, when we're rich, we're SO getting one of these babies

And some video just for fun. Just look at Harrison's face at the end. How could you not just LOVE THIS KID AND WANT TO EAT HIM UP???

How much time do I get before I have to update the blog??

Just wondering how long the "I just moved" excuse will last. It's been long enough. We are happily all now in Viriginia (me, cory, harrison, the cat. OUR STUFF. YAY.). I've had a great two weeks at work (just training so far, and four more weeks of that comin, but I think I'm going to really like my job, the people are really nice, and those government benefits are AMAZING). Today we took advantage of a FEDERAL HOLIDAY :) and went to a pumpkin patch in Poolesville, Maryland. We met up with Heidi and Joseph and her kiddos and Alissa and her kiddos. The weather was in the 70s and the drive up was beautiful!! Here are a few pics off my phone (sorry, haven't sorted throught the rubble to find my real camera..yet..)
They have wheelbarrows in the parking lot for you to put all your stuff in. Luckily Harrison was only .25 a pound :) We also got about 13 pounds of apples that we (mostly cory, he's taller) picked, 2 pumpkins, a butternut squash, and 2 gallons of apple cider. YUMMY.
OOOH!! A WHEEL!!! By the way, you'll notice there aren't many pics of Harrisons face. Yeah...have you met my son???

PUMPKINS!! We actually took the hayride to the patch and picked ours, but these were cool too.
"baba" (chicken..in Harrison talk because of the sounds chickens make)
climbing up on the fence to get a closer look at a goat
I handed him an apple I picked and he didn't hesitate to jump right in and start eating it....oops....
Rebekah and Emmeline enjoying the front seat of Alissa's stroller
HAYRIDE!!! half of alissa, hazel, heidi, kaitlyn, joseph, half of emmeline...
Alex and Rebekah on the hayride--Heidi also got some pics of Harrison and Rebekah holding hands. SO CUTE. THEY are So getting married someday, right Heidi ;)

Well, thanks for indulging my distraction. Back to trying to figure out how to fit 3/4 of a walk in closet into half of a closet that is basically a wardrobe and not really a closet at all....

I HATE GOODBYES!!!

Good Bye dinner with the family yesterday and goodbye lunch with my girls today. SAD. But I guess it's better to HAVE friends and family to leave behind, right? We're so blessed to have so many great people in our lives. WE'LL MISS YOU!!!!!!

(T-minus 3 days until I leave--AAAH...still no place to live, although we do have one pretty good option I'm wavering a bit on...)


Sorry--I don't have pics of the dinner last night (but they are up on facebook)--here are some from today--it's nuts that Lisa, Jen, and I all have BABIES now :)


Lisa and Liam
Owen--such a sweetie!!!
HARRISON BUG!!! Huge compared to the other two!!! But he was so excited to see the babies!!!

I got to hold Owen for a minute--
so sweet!!!
I got a flip video for my birthday and it is Harrison's favorite thing to play with when we're out places. (speaking of which, I have a lot of basically pointless video to post--better get on that...)