Holiday Travel

Even though the NW was hit with the crazy artic blast this Christmas, we were still able to make it to my parents' house in Nevada for the holidays...but just barely. Our flight was scheduled to leave from the Portland airport at 8am Saturday morning the 20th. As we watched the weather Friday night everything was looking good. The storm wasn't supposed to hit until later Saturday afternoon...phew! So, we arrived at the airport bright and early Saturday morning and were delighted to find that our flight was on time. We made our way through the security lines to our gate with no problems and expected to board our plane within the hour. We were wrong- Apparently the last of the working de-icers had just broken down. They announced over the loud speaker that all flights were delayed indefinitely while they waited for their maintenance crews to fix the machines. An hour later they announced that they were trying to borrow a de-icer from another airline. Another hour later, still no de-icer. Again, an hour passes and now the snow is really coming down outside. We can see all the planes sitting at each gate, empty, waiting to be boarded, waiting to be de-iced. Still, no de-icer. It's now almost noon and they decide to line up all of the passengers on our flight to prepare for boarding. We're all standing in line, watching and waiting for the stinkin de-icers to arrive when we hear, "All flights in and out of the Portland airport have been cancelled....except for the following flights -" I held my breath as they listed 4 flight numbers - ours was the last to be called. We continued to stand in line and wait for boarding, and all the while, I'm thinking that they were going to change their minds and cancel our flight as well. Even though I knew there was nothing I could do about any of it, I was stressed. And when I get stressed, I get emotional. Finally, after about hours of waiting, we boarded the plane. As soon as I got to my seat and settled myself in for the ride I started crying. I'm such a nut case. Brett started laughing and I love him for that. He's always so level headed and never ceases to give me a reality check. Really, was this whole thing that big of a deal? Not in the least! I just over-think, over-worry, and over-react. Brett's helping me with all of that, but I have a feeling it might take a while. All this to say, we were the last flight out of the Portland airport that Saturday and even though we arrived in Nevada about 5 hours later than planned, we made it home to spend our Christmas with family. For all of that, I am very very grateful!

I will post some pictures of our Christmas with family in the next couple days. We had a great time and as always, it makes me wish we lived closer to all of our wonderful family! For now, here are some more pictures of the snow we had before leaving.

We hope you all had a Merry Christmas!

Tis the Season

I love the holiday season. Although it's been busy, and I admit a little stressful, I can't help but love everything about the holidays. Mainly it's the fact that we get to spend time with family, but I also love all the decorations and lights around town, the Christmas music, the scarfs and hats, and the snow when we get it....which we did! We had the first snow of the winter season and I absolutely love it. I wish I had a nice camera that would take really cool pictures, but I did my best...

Oh and I had to add a picture of our Christmas tree...or as I like to call it, our Christmas shrub. Seriously, how can a baby be bigger than a Christmas tree? :)

Hope you all enjoy this Christmas season and remember what's most important!

Thanksgiving Weekend

We weren't ready to come back! We very much enjoyed our Thanksgiving weekend at Brett's parents' house - and everyone (minus our brother-in-law, Larry) was home. Every day was spent playing at least 1 or 2 games of Phase 10 and Cribbage, and we threw Taboo and Twister in there a couple times as well. All were successful in bringing on a lot of laughs. Our nephew, Carson, proved to be the main entertainment for the weekend. He is getting so big and will be a year old in January. He crawls super fast, is just about to be walking, and giggles and babbles most of the time. He's such a good baby and we wished they lived closer than Arkansas. The good news is...they are having another one! Another baby-boy-Billing will be joining the family come April.

One thing I'm so thankful for is the fact that we both have such amazing families! Whether it's on the Timmerman side or the Swenson side we can't get enough of the people we're closest to. Christmas with the Swenson's is just around the corner and we can't wait for that either!

Thanksgiving Countdown

I am very much looking forward to Thanksgiving. Not only am I ready to have a few days off work, but I'm excited to spend time with family and eat some great food. Brett and I are heading down to Medford on Tuesday where we will get to spend several days with family we rarely see... including these 2 faces - so fun!

Moon Soft

Out of toilet paper?

One of my responsibilities as the townhouse manager at the college is to supply toilet paper to the residents when they've run out. This means that once a month or so, I get 2 very large boxes of tp delivered to my front door. I then gather as many plastic bags from around our house as I can find and place 10 rolls in each bag for easy hand out when students come knocking. So yes, I have over 100 rolls of toilet paper in my closet right now...

Today

-I did not go to work

- I slept in :)

- I went to coffee with Sarah and Lynds

- I played with Sterling

-And after weeks of contemplating...I went short!

I had to throw this picture in as well...

Sarah, I hope it's not weird that I post pictures of your baby...but he's just too darn cute that I can't resist!

Mom and Dad

My parents came to visit us this weekend and we had such a good time. My dad's birthday was on Friday so it was great to be able to celebrate with him. We spent the morning at the bowling alley and then the girls and guys split up for the rest of the afternoon. The guys went golfing and the girls went shopping...no surprises there :). We then came home to Brett grilling up some huge steaks and finished the day off with some apple pie and ice cream - YUM! Saturday was another fun day filled with much of the same. More shopping, more eating, and more playing. If you haven't heard me say it before, our family loves playing games! We played a new game called Pictionay Man, which is pretty funny, and then we played my family's favorite card game, Crazy Rum. On top of that, my dad got a Wii for his birthday so we of course had to hook that baby up as well. Even though I'm super competitive and can sometimes be a poor loser, it was pretty entertaining watching my mom and dad play and it made me smile knowing I have such fun parents!

I am so blessed to have such a wonderful dad and mom who love God, love each other and love their kids with everything they have! What great examples they are to Brett and I. Thanks you two - love you both!

COSTCO for life!

I drive over 400 miles per week with my commute -I know....LAME! I fill my tank up at least once a week and as I'm sure you've all noticed, gas is expensive! Even though we are Costco members, the gas line is always so long and because patience isn't one of my strengths, I choose to go with the quicker, but more expensive option. I normally choose the closest Chevron. Today, however, I decided to brave the Costco lines. Even though it took me about 25 minutes to get through the line, it was so totally worth it. I spent just over $25 to fill my tank. $2.22 per gallon, people! I can't remember the last time gas was that cheap. I am so excited about this that I will be dealing with my impatient ways to ensure lower gas prices for life!

More P4P

Here are a couple more pictures from the Pilates for Pink event last weekend. I have such fun instructors!

Pilates for Pink

Over the past few weeks I've been busy preparing for ClubSport's annual Pilates for Pink charity class in honor of Breast Cancer Awareness Month. This afternoon, it went off without a hitch. We had over 100 people registered for the event and raised just over $1600 in donations! I was very thankful for all my Pilates instructors who helped make this event so successful! Here is just one picture from the afternoon but I hope to post more later -

My wonderful Pilates team -

Lulu, Shoshana, Marsha, Thea, Peggy, Elizabeth, me, Randi and Jill!

Look at how cute our nephew is!

When I Can't Sleep

It doesn't happen often, but when I can't sleep...

I organize (or re-organize for that matter). Most of the stuff in my house is already organized to the umpteenth degree - I think some people call it OCD :). Regardless, I reorganize - my closet, my dresser drawers, my kitchen cabinets, my magazines, my craft supplies, my junk drawer (which isn't that supposed to be unorganized?), my email folders, and most recently, my picture files on my computer. As I was going through all of these files, I came across some pretty funny pictures. Pictures that brought back many memories as well as a few good laughs. I thought I would share some of these with all you past soccer girls out there so you can have a laugh or two yourselves. I didn't put captions, but I'm pretty sure the pictures speak for themselves. Enjoy! :)

Classic!

Family Weekend

I'm really not that great at keeping up with this whole blog thing. I guess I just really don't like to post when I don't have a picture to go along with it. Should I get over that? I'm going to try...

The past several weeks have been pretty busy. We've had guests in our home the last two weekends, weddings to go to, late nights at work, piled up laundry, and the list goes on...Looking at my calendar it doesn't seem as though that will lighten up anytime soon. It's good though - keeps life exciting and there is never a dull moment. Speaking of "never a dull moment" all my brothers and sisters were in town a couple weekends ago. The 6 of us (Sam, Heidi and her husband Brady, me and Brett, and Sara) haven't been together all at once for quite some time so it was really nice to have them all here. For those of you who know our family, we can't spend time together without a bit of "friendly" competition. Our weekend activities included bowling, disc golf, Mario Cart, cribbage and A LOT of Connect Four. My parents were pretty bummed that they couldn't be here with us, so they sent a funny card (check out http://www.hoopsandyoyo.com/) along with $40 worth of Little Caesar's pizza gift cards. I don't know if they realized you can get $5 pizzas from Little Caesar's...but of course, we thought it would be funny to spend all $40 and see how much we could put down. We ended up getting 5 large pizzas, 2 orders of crazy bread and hot wings, and 2 liters of soda. We invited the Officer's over to help us in our endeavor and I think we finished all but 1 pizza off! I get a stomach ache just thinking about it. ;) Family is great and it makes me wish we all lived closer so times like that could happen more often.

the sisters (unfortunately, the losing team)

So I tell Brett to smile, and of course...this is what I get.

Me and my brother - can you tell who is who? :) He's been growing his hair out for awhile and I'm pretty sure it's as long as mine now.

In need of an update...in more ways than one!

It's been awhile since I posted, so I figured it was time for an update. Brett is doing much better after having mono and is back at work and doing well. After 7 + weeks we were both more than ready to have him back up and running (okay well, maybe he's not quite running yet, but we are making progress). Nothing super exciting has happened lately, but yesterday, I did a complete "spruce up" of our home. Sarah Officer helped me pick out some great stuff from Pier 1 and also helped me rearrange my whole living room. It came out looking 10x's better than I expected! Take a look...

the before - this fabric was on all of our living room furniture:

the great throw pillows Sarah helped pick out:

the complete look: this chair was also covered with that nasty fabric in the first picture, and look what I was able to make of it!

...and I thought I was going to have to buy new furniture to change the look of our home. You can accomplish so much with a slip cover and some great pillows. Thank you Sarah, for helping me get a fresh new look in our home!

Sterling's first babysitter :)

Tonight I was lucky enough to be Sterling Officer's first babysitter. Sarah and Justin are super busy this weekend with students moving in and freshman orientation, so I watched him for a few hours this evening while they were out and about. For those of you who know of my love for babies, I obviously didn't mind spending my evening hanging out with this adorable little guy. It seems sort of funny to be posting pictures of someone else's baby on my blog, but he's just so darn cute...I couldn't resist.

I also want to add that he is the best baby I've ever been around. He was happy the whole time, barely made a peep, slept when he was supposed to, ate when he was supposed to and smiled at me more than once! I'll watch him anytime you need, Sarah! :)

The school year is beginning...

For those of you who don't know, Brett and I still live on Corban's campus and I manage the on-campus townhouses. I'm going on my 7th year of living at Corban (what?? I've seriously been here that long??) Brett and I both have our off-campus jobs, which we love, but it's been a blessing to still be connected to this place, even in a small way. Sometimes we wonder what it's going to feel like when we finally move on.

Well, it's that time of year again. Students have started arriving on campus, as classes begin next Wednesday. Where did the summer go? It's nice to have people roaming around campus again, and even though it's not as quiet, it's bound to get more interesting. Not only is school starting back up for Corban, but Brett goes back to Lee Elementary next week for inservice and then his little kiddos come back the first week of September.

In light of all this back to school stuff, I thought I would post a picture of me and my siblings on one of our first days of school. Take a look and have a good laugh -

The Swenson Kids - 1992 maybe?

Sam(is that a pink jacket?), Heidi, Me and Sara

Lyndsey's Wedding

Yesterday Lyndsey Hawk became Lyndsey Brown. She was such a gorgeous bride and it was such a beautiful wedding. Everything went perfectly and I'm so happy for her and Andrew. I would have more pictures to show, but my camera kept giving me problems....GRRRR! Hopefully I'll be able to get some more from others who were there.

What have I been up to?

...taking care of my sick husband.

This poor guy...he's had mono for the past 2 and 1/2 weeks and isn't showing much sign of progress yet. Even though he is sicker than he's ever been, weak, miserable, and completely relying on me to help him do the every day tasks, I haven't heard him complain once. He is being so patient and strong and I'm so proud of him!

Who says the desert isn't pretty?

Yes, I know - there's no green and there are no trees, but sometimes you have to look for beauty in different places. I would take in a sunset like this anyday...even if it is in the middle of the desert.

Who knew?

I have always thought my hair was stick straight and wouldn't hold a curl to save my life. However, just recently, I was pleasantly suprised when instead of blow drying my hair right out of the shower, I let it air dry and found that it does in deed have some curl to it. I started experimenting with it and can actually get it to be curly and look somewhat natural. It's pretty silly really, but I was obviously excited enough about this to post on it. A little change is always fun...