fall 2016 recap

put on your safety belts and hold on tight, we're going for a ride!
here are the highlights of fall 2016

august:

1) these kids started school on the 15th, the day after we got home from florida

kindergarten, 4th grade, 3rd grade

charlie was so ready for full day kindergarten. i think its probably because his birthday is late, so hes one of the older kids. he has wanted to go to school since he was 3 and used to cry when id drop jack and ellie off. he is loving kindergarten and has become quite the reader!

2) i went with this beauty, anna leah, to a coldplay concert in tulsa. absolutely incredible!!! the venue was fantastic, the company was even better, and the band made me weak in the knees! we sang and danced our hearts out.

3) the weekend of the 27th we went to dallas and visited the smith's who drove up from austin!

we ate yummy food and visited a great aquarium

4) then the night of the 28th our family went to the coldplay concert! thats right, the whole family!

a lady behind us took these and then came and got our number to text them to us. sweet owen loved the concert! he had in ear plugs the whole time, but danced and clapped and pointed and rocked to the music.

we have lots of great videos with the kids all dancing and singing along with their favorite songs, but the videos are too long and i don't want to edit them. these little clips will have to suffice for the blog. for the record, jacks favorite song is viva la vida, ellie's is yellow, charlie's is magic, and owen's is adventure of a lifetime.

5) also worth noting, this month also brought the scalding pig, which is pretty much the hottest taco known to man and we were foolish enough to try it. our taste buds and intestines will never be the same.

september:

1) fall means football around here and jack played for coach johnny and the steelers again. he played both offense and defense this year and loved every minute of it

2) a date with my girl to the watch the women's conference.

before going to the church, we decided to skip dinner and get dessert. a lot of dessert.

then we went to walmart and tried on creepy halloween masks and bought a couple items to prank the boys with later :)

3) september also brought the move of our dear friends the smiths from arkansas to idaho. boo!

we soaked up as much time as we could with them doing things like pedicures and cookie baking.

we were able to babysit remi the night before the byu-utah game. the smiths are utes through and through, so naturally we put remi in one of our byu shirts under her jammies so they'd have a big surprise the morning of the game :)

jenna got really sick the day that the smiths were heading out of town. she ended up being admitted at the hospital with meningitis. all of their belongings were already on the way to idaho, so the other girls stayed with us for two days and two nights while jenna was treated and recovered. i know it was hard, but we really loved having an extra couple days before saying goodbye.

4) owen fell on a jar and cut his hand in 4 places. ouch!

one of the cuts maybe could have used stitches, but i wasn't sure.... it healed up though.... eventually...

october:

1) crazy hair and sunglasses day at school

 2) the kindergarten circus.
charlie played the part of the balloon man and his classmate dylan played the monkey. in their act, the monkey chases the balloon man and when the balloon man stops to tie his shoe, the monkey pops the balloons. 

it was adorable!

3) a trip to eureka springs for an early birthday gift for jack. he wanted to go ziplining with dad and the rest of us tagged along.

the other three kids and i went to a drive through zoo. it was actually pretty fun! the animals had no fear and came right up to the cars, obviously having been fed by people even though its against the rules, hoping for some handouts. before we went to the drive through we visited their petting zoo, much to owens delight! he is our animal lover.

4) a football game that ended jack's season early, due to a "complex dislocation of the finger". before the injury, owen enjoyed some popcorn :)

he's number 20 on defense and at some point after this tackle, his hand was stepped on in the jumble of players. when he stood up i could tell something was wrong because he was holding his hand. chris thought he'd just shake it off, but i (very annoyingly I'm sure) kept saying, "hes hurt chris, hes hurt! i know hes hurt! its bad i can tell! hes hurt!". he tried to line up for the next play but quickly ran off and i said, "i bet his wrist is broken danggit!" we saw his coach take a quick look and send him straight the medical station. so relieved to find out it was only a dislocation.

waiting in the er with the whole family for a couple hours was a bear!

jack was tough when they reset the bone, but chris could tell it wasn't put back completely. the er doc looked at the X-rays and said it was fine, but chris still didn't think it was and that the gap between bones in the X-ray was too big. that night was rough and jack didn't get much sleep. the next couple days weren't much better and his finger looked like this:

we took him in to see an orthopedic surgeon, who said jack was being a baby and it would just take time to heal. chris still wasn't convinced so he showed the X-rays to the hand specialist (who happens to be the son of the orthopedic surgeon) who instantly said it wasn't set right.

jack missed quite a bit of school this week! 

he missed a day (the 19th) because he had to go in for surgery. grateful for his teacher mrs howald, who asked all of the kids in jack's class to pray for him or think special thoughts for him while he was in surgery. they even made him some cute cards.

jack was treated like a king at Sparks because everyone loves chris so much.

the doctor was able to do a closed reduction, which basically means he jerked his finger around while jack was asleep and put it back in place without having to open up jack's hand. he said there was only a 20% chance that would work. so glad it did.

he had a hard splint and bandage for the next 2 weeks. it stunk not be able to play anymore, but he still went to the games to support his team.

5) jack turned 10!

he got a rogers jersey from grandma grandpa rikki and andrew!

and he got a drone!

6) halloween!!!

we had a box turtle, a monkey, nacho libre, and a ghost this year.

it's been a while since I've sewn a costume. this year i made the ghost and the turtle costumes.

owen was a trick or treating pro! he refused to ride in the stroller and ran from house to house with the big kids for almost two hours.

november:

1) chris had the first week of november off work and he let me take four days of it. i went home to party with my folks and sisters rik, lari, and alli!

after missing the last 3 halloweens, i asked mom to leave up all the halloween stuff so i could enjoy it :)

pub subs were a must!

all the girls went to get pedicures on the morning of the 3rd. lari decided not to come because she wasn't feeling well and went to see the OB.

 it was a good thing she did, because this special boy needed to come that day! little samuel bo browne. can't believe i got to be there when he came! thanks sammy!!!

he ended up spending several days in the nicu because he was early, but he did so great and is growing like crazy

here he is a few weeks old, wearing a suit that owen wore coming home from the hospital. those two are going to be trouble together i can feel it!

i pretty much died when larissa sent these pictures out at the end of november!!!

ok, ok, i'll stop being a proud aunt and get back on track...

i asked my dad to teach me how to road bike while i was home. we went out every morning and i am in love with it! hopefully once owen is in school i can get a bike because i think its something i could really enjoy doing. thanks pops!

i keep thinking about our short rides and I'm so glad we got to spend that time together and that my pops is so patient and willing to teach me. hes always been so good at that.

oh, and he took me out on his other bike :) that is also an addicting feeling

i got to hang out with ash, ev, and soph, a bit while lari and bo were taking care of sam. we had a good time and it was nice spending that time with them since usually jack, charlie, and ellie steal all their attention.

 rik, mom and i got to spend so much time together. i needed that.

ellie texted me a dare to jump in the pool. she thought it would be cold, but she didn't know that i would do it at rik's pool, which is heated. ha!

IMG 0468 from Lisa Brower on Vimeo.

this little getaway came at a much, much, needed time and I'm so thankful to chris for allowing me to have a break from being a mom for a few days.

2) owen turned 2!

owen LOOOOOVES dogs. his gifts from rikki and grandma were a huge success! 

we have watched this video of owen about 5 gazillion times and we laugh SO HARD each and every time. it never gets old! he practiced blowing out fake candles for about a month before hand, so he was pretty dang excited!

IMG 0605 from Lisa Brower on Vimeo.

3) thanksgiving!

the smith's came all the way from austin to spend 5 days with us for the holiday!!! it was incredible! i wish i had been better at taking pictures, but we were having too much fun catching up and playing to bother with pics. i am now really regretting not getting any pictures of the adults or even of our thanksgiving spread. it was delicious!

these two, nora and owen, they're trouble makers. 

watch out world!

we had a couple dance parties, which is always so fun to watch little one's personalities open up!

we made these silly pumpkin pie headbands and some turkey leg headbands for the guys to wear on thanksgiving. we even wrangled the elders into wearing them so we could send a picture to their families :)

4) also in november, owen learned a new trick. thumbs up is his new favorite way to answer any question.

december:

1) basketball season! ellie girl has started basketball for the first time and we. are. loving. it. she may be small, but she is a defensive beast!

it hasn't been easy for her, but she has learned so much in the month that they have been playing. her team is definitely the underdogs. theres only one or two girls on her team that have played before, but that has actually been a really great thing for ellie because it has forced her to push any fears aside and get in there. i am one of those moms that yells, and yells loud, at and for her kids from the stands at sporting events and this has probably been my loudest sport yet... good thing ellie doesn't mind having a loud cheering section :) the second game i got pretty worked up at one point and chris walked over to me and said "you may need to stay home from the games if you can't handle the stress...". oops! super excited for the rest of the season, especially since they finally won their first game right before christmas break! wahoo, GO WARRIORS!

2) charlie got glasses

we had noticed that when he started reading out loud during our nightly scriptures that his left eye would go crossed sometimes. so when i asked the pediatrician about it, he recommended taking him in for an eye exam. 

i thought it was a lazy eye, but it turns out he's far sighted. his vision is actually perfect, its just that the muscles in his left eye have a hard time focusing at first. the dr is hoping that wearing these all day for 6 months will strengthen the muscles and he won't have to wear them after that. we'll see. until then, he'll be the cutest kindergartener around!

3) ellie was the patriot of the month!

it was pretty fun because her teacher, miss weaver was chosen as faculty member of the month as well!

4) charlie turned 6!

he wanted a chocolate pikachu cake, so thats what he got! he woke up to yellow balloons filling his room and pikachu everywhere. 

oh, and waffles for breakfast

charlie is our little prankster and is always trying to play jokes on everyone, so he really loved his jelly beans from rik and andrew!

MVI 3380 from Lisa Brower on Vimeo.

he wanted to stay in pajamas all day long and he wanted to have mcdonalds for dinner, because we never ever eat there... in his pj's. so thats what he did. and then we played pin the tail on pikachu, which was fun and frustrating all at the same time :) he said it was a really, really great day and i hope he felt special!

and that folks, is the longest post in the history of the brower hour.