Disneyland Thanksgiving

 We have got Thanksgiving mastered. Instead of spending the day making a huge turkey dinner only to turn around and clean up a huge turkey mess while feeling like you ate the whole turkey yourself we get to spend the day with Mikey Mouse at the most magical place on earth. Although I do miss getting together at Grandma Homey's house for dinner I love our family tradition and don't even mind the crowds. This year was especially good because we got to spend it with most of my family. It was so nice having Jori feeling good enough to join us on most of the rides. Even though moving that large of a group (18 people) through the huge thanksgiving crowd is not easy we had A LOT to be thankful for.

 Asher especially loved Disney Land this year. He called it Mikey Mouse's club house. He was such a happy guy the whole trip.

"Goof"

As always Rex & Jett had a blast. I think they especially liked hanging out with their cousins and Ryan and I hardly ever rode a ride with either of them. I guess we can't compete with the Goughs.

 Here are more of our favorite pics of our Thanksgiving.....

 More pics....

 The Beach

The water was way to cold to play in but that did not stop the kids from going all the way in (or Tip). I think we enjoy the beach just as much as Disney Land. We love finding a good spot with lots of Tide Pools that we can explore. My Dad always finds the best creatures, including a really ugly sea slug that he removed (from Idaho:)) and got a nice long lecture about not misplacing the animals from were they want to be from a "volunteer". She was a special person with a very important job. 

 Hollywood

Before the rest of the family got to CA we got to go explore Hollywood with Gramma & Papa. It was something we had always wanted to do and now we can say we did it. The boys thought we lost our minds wanting to look at stars on a side walk instead of going straight to dland but once they found Michael Jackson's star they were sold.

The fam in front of the Chinese Theater

Jett & Jamie Foxx

Good Times were had by all! Until next time.....

Rex

It is hard to believe that I could have an eight year old.....so I choose not to believe it. I am pretty sure only old people can have old kids, that could not be me. Rex is pretty sure he is 8 and he feels so old. He really enjoys the three weeks he has of being a number older than Jett. He rubs it in whenever possible. This year he got to have a birthday party with friends. He saw a commercial about a place called Jambo and has been trying to convince us it would be the perfect spot for a party. Other than being a tad bit ghetto he was right. The boys had a blast they ran from ride to ride and didn't slow down all night. Because it was a bit ghetto it was not busy and the boys got free reign of the place.
Here are some of our favorite pics.......

We sure love you Rex! We think you are pretty cool & we are so glad that you are our 8 year old!!

Some fun facts about Rex's year...

Rex's favorite thing to do is play the wii or the computer

He decided he doesn't believe in the tooth fairy.

He honestly believes he knows more than his Mom. 

He started cub scouts this month.

He still thinks girls are yucky.

He gets baptized on the 28th of January.

He loves to read.
He LOVES hot food. (he can eat hotter food than his Mom)
He still loves writing books.
 

It is so fun watching your kids grow and getting to know the person they are becoming.  I am proud of our Rex, he is such a good boy. He knows what it takes to be a good person and he is determined to make sure he is choosing the right. We love you Rexy Poo!

Halloween 2011

This year Halloween was quite the event. We partied until I couldn't stand to put costumes on my kids even one more time. When all was said and done we had dressed up 4 times. By the time Halloween night came around the boys were just barely dressed up because their Mom was all Halloweened OUT. Luckily I had taken so many pictures at all other events that it didn't even matter (it is all about the pictures still....right?).
We do LOVE Halloween though. Especially in the valley were it was 75 degrees when the sun went down. Our neighbor hood is the best trick-or-treating spot, it is mostly retired couples who like to party. So they open up their garages and have open bars and chilli. They give out fantastic candy & love to watch the little ones. The boys got a Haul this year (especially Rex who is a bit of a candy hoarder) and had a blast!

Here are some pics to prove it.....

Ninja

Young Jedi

Indiana Jones

These handsome boys make their Mama happy!

 The boys costumes this year were all homemade. Asher's costume was a hand-me-down from the boys, our favorite NE friend Taneil made it for them. Jett wanted to be Indiana Jones, not because he loves the movies or has even seen the movies but because of his new infatuation of whips. Rex wanted to be a Ninja and thought he looked great even though he was just wearing all black (I agree). Gotta love a cheap solution to Halloween.

Brown Halloween Party 2011

This years party theme was "Dead Hollywood". We were all to come as dead celebrities & all the food went along with the theme.

Some of the desserts were Anna Nicole's pink coffins, Heath Ledger's chocolate od cookies, Patrick Swaze's Ghosts, Mata Hara's Kisses, & Rock Hudson's rocks.

 Here are some of the famous faces...

Cleopatra & Bob Ross

 The night was a bit much for me, thank heavens for Michael's "juice".

The boy's school parade

This will be their last year to be in the parade apparently next year they grow up:(

Pumpkin carving

Every year we carve pumpkins as a family. Ryan is in charge of helping the boys and I am in charge of pictures and clean up. The last two years however Ryan was so into carving his pumpkin that I end up helping the boys. His pumpkins are pretty fabulous I have to say. The boys did most of their own carving this year. I was pretty impressed.  And in the tradition of Halloween Jett ate some of the pumpkin guts (Rex even tried them out this year). 

Rex eating the pumpkin guts

good stuff!

Rex is not as fond of them

 

Jett                        Rex                    Ryan

Day 2 of CGL...India

Bright colors, lots of sparkles & the BEST food in the world....who wouldn't want to go to India on their world cruise?!

When we got to India we were greeted by some lovely individuals who told us all about India and some of their festivities. We learned to Bolly wood dance (So you think you can dance has got NOTHING on us), made sparkly elephant decorations, ate some fantastic curry dishes, & celebrated Raksha Bandhan (a celebration of brothers & sisters).

 Our favorite friends from Eagar came over to learn the Bollywood dance so they could all perform it for their families on the night of our party.

for Raksha Bandhan the kids all made their brothers or sisters a card and gave them a bracelet

I think that if Grandma Luvlee could she would decorate her home like she did for India every day (that or Mexico). It was such a fun day full of happy colors. One of our highlights was watching pieces of the movie "Jodha Akbar". It is our favorite Bollywood movie. Jett is still singing the songs from it.(Only he doesn't know the words-it is quite lovely).  Watch the video here if you want it stuck in your head to, trust me you won't regret it:)

Dev boren koru

 

the Brown's shindig

One of my favorite times of year...the Brown family reunion. This year was nothing short of fabulous as we camped on Nanette and Wade's ranch near Pine. It was great weather, great food (gourmet hot dogs, chipotle style burritos & butter with a side of French toast), and great company. Here is what our weekend looked like....

 Jett worked hard all weekend on becoming a cowboy. Thanks to "uncle" Dallas he learned to lasso and to crack a whip. The rest of the time was spent perfecting these things. As you can tell it was pretty serious work. He probably would have spent all his time shooting his BB gun that he talked his Dad into letting him bring, but it was confiscated with in the first 10 minutes for shooting towards camp.

Asher's days consisted mostly of playing in the dirt! He was in heaven because he could get so dirty & no one cleaned his face every few minutes.The rest of his days were spent eating candy & cookies, throwing dirt on himself & any one who stood still next to him. Believe it or not he was NOT the dirtiest kid at camp-not even CLOSE!

We were lucky we got any pictures of Rex. We were lucky if we saw him 3 times a day, breakfast, lunch & dinner. He was up in the mountains the rest of the time. He was building forts and looking for treasures. I would literally go hours with out seeing the kid. We figured he would come down when he got hungry and that is what he did. He always had at least two other kids with him (his posse). He was loving life.

  the Pinata

and the dirtiest kid award goes to......

It is to close to call. But if I had to make a decision I would give it to SHEA!Congratulation Shea.

The thing I enjoyed most about camp had to be the sitting around and relaxing part. I can always use more of that in my life.

 

A great time was had by all. Until next year....

Happy Adoption Day!

As always I love celebrating adoption day, it gives me a chance to really look at some of my favorite blessings (Rex & Jett) and be grateful that they are a part of our family. It gives me a chance to think of their unselfish birth mothers and remember the sacrifice that she made in order for my family to be together. I LOVE adoption, I LOVE my sweet boys, and I am grateful to start the process again so we can hopefully make our family a family of 6 (and add another girl to the equation).

7 years after we adopted Rex & Jett (Mikhail & Timur)

Their silly shot!

 The boys helped build the cake. We had to use our imaginations and pretend that the pink was red and the baby blue was really Russian flag blue. I think it turned out great.