4th of July

It was a wonderful 4th of July yesterday!!

We had a ward activity in the morning and Jeremiah was able to ride his trike around the church parking lot behind a police car for the kids' parade. He had such a blast and it was fun to be with our ward friends. So many of them have served or are currently serving in many military positions. I am so grateful for those who serve us and continue to make this country a place of refuge.
In the evening we celebrated by going downtown DC to watch the fireworks and enjoy the atmosphere. It was 97 degrees and extremely humid but, being on the National Mall for the 4th is well worth the discomfort.
Jeremiah couldn't get enough of the music and people. He ran around and round looking at everyone and giggling. 

While we were dancing at the concert I looked around at all of the many diverse faces surrounding me. As I watched, I also listened to their voices with accents from all over the world singing in unison to the music. The words were:

"We got to give a little love 
have a little hope
make this country better 
try a little more, harder than before
lets do what we can do together
Oh oh
we can really make it better
oh oh
only if we try"

WOW! :)  It was so touching to be among such a large plethora of people who had gathered together to celebrate a country that has given us all so much. Isn't that so cool!? And Isn't it so true? We can make this world better by just trying,  having faith, hope and love. I believe that we can make a difference and that our founding father's set up our government the way that they did so that we 
would and could make a difference.

After the concert was nearly over we walked back to our camping chairs to watch the fireworks together. Jeremiah loved the fireworks and kept saying, "boom boom, wow wow." It was really cute and such a fun experience for him.

I don't know that I've ever seen such an amazing firework show anywhere else in my life. It was a treat to sit with my family under bursting flames of light and just enjoy the night. I take for granted the freedoms and luxuries that I have just because I live in the United States of America. There are so many around the world who can't sit down or even sleep at night without worrying about how they are going to survive the day. 
We have so much to be thankful for.

I hope you all had a wonderful 4th of July and got to spend time with your loved ones.

Happy Days

This past Thursday my husband surprised me with a cute little box and a note for my birthday. Excitedly I opened the box only to find a whole bunch of mud! YES! Just what I wanted :S Actually, it turns out that this was his way of telling me that I was going to run in The Dirty Dash (a 10k race in Midway Utah). I had been wanting to run the race and kept asking about it but it was too expensive to register so late in the game. So, it was a great surprise and a wonderful present!

Today we ran The Dirty Dash.  I couldn't believe how much I enjoyed getting so dirty. What a great memory.

And, to top the day off, I went to the General Relief Society Meeting. I enjoyed all of the talks but the one that really spoke to me was the talk given by Elder Uchtdorf. I adore him! Not only is he the most handsome apostle (in my opinion) but also extremely sweet and funny. I genuinely feel his love for me and for the members of the church. He hit on 5 points that stem from his thoughts on the Forget Me Not flower.

1. Forget Not to be Patient with Yourself

I think it's so important that we don't get down on ourselves for not being perfect. A problem that many of the women of the church have. Why is it that we believe we have to be the perfect mom, wife, cook, pianist, painter, etc? And, what is perfection? Is our vision of what perfection is warped?

2. Forget Not the Difference Between a Good Sacrifice and a Foolish Sacrifice.

Sometimes we focus too much on trying to go the extra mile but the sacrifice we make in order to do so might not be wise.

3. Forget Not to be Happy Now!

We should enjoy the blessings we currently have and life in happiness along our quest for perfection.

4. Forget Not the "Why" of the Gospel.

We often focus on the "What" (what do I have to do now?) and "How" (how the heck am I going to find time to do this?) but, as we remember the "Why" it makes the "What" and "How" so much easier to see and do.

5. Forget Not that the Lord Loves You

:) We are beloved daughters of our Heavenly Father and He LOVES us! We are loved by the most magnificent being in the entire universe.

Wow! It's so wonderful that we have modern day apostles and a prophet who leads our church and speaks on behalf of God. We can hear exactly what Heavenly Father wants us to know.

I am also posting a few pictures of Jeremiah because I know you all enjoy seeing pictures of him more than hearing about our lives. :) I took these over the past 2 days. 

Oh...to sleep like a baby! I swear Jeremiah can sleep  in ANY position.

We all have BYU jerseys so that we can sport them when we watch the games. The picture on the left is Jeremiah in football line position. We thought this was funny.

Catching up

The holidays were wonderful! We are so grateful to have been able to spend them with our wonderful families.  Chris and I were able to spend a lot of time with my family up until and including Christmas Eve and Christmas morning. We were able to go see Grandma, Grandpa, and Seth before they left to see Sam off on his mission. It was so nice to participate and be a part of the Brown family Christmas traditions this year.
In the afternoon, Christmas Day, after everyone had opened presents and rested a bit, Chris and I  drove to the airport to get on a plane to Virginia! (HOORAY!!!) Flying on Christmas wasn't my first choice but, now that I've done it I can personally say it was AMAZING! The tickets were half the price that they usually are and the airport was completely empty, which made getting through security a breeze even when the security level is raised to "orange"(High risk of terrorist attacks).
Being in Virginia with the Clarks was a delight. We are extremely happy that Abby and Joshua stayed an extra day so that we could see them. I had never met Joshua but have heard great things about him. Now that I've met him, I can say that he is absolutely adorable and that it's obvious that he makes Abby happy.  (And he totally rocks at guitar hero!) ;)
For New Years, we all went out to Pennsylvania where we had some fun adventures. We spent one day driving around most of Pennsylvania's highways until we found Hershey Park. Chris was a bit flustered with all of the driving, as was Dad, who we were following. However, I think the rest of us enjoyed the ride with each other; we laughed a lot, had fun singing with the radio and telling stories. Despite the cold cold weather and crazy drive, Hershey Park was fabulous. We met up with the Hockers (such a cute bunch) and had a blast wandering the chocolate dream world of fun.  There really is something there for everyone. I don't even like chocolate very much, but i found out that Hershey makes a lot more than just chocolate. They make Twizzlers!!!!!!! :D So happy!
Pennsylvania was full of a lot more than chocolate however. We spent pretty much the rest of our stay in a quaint little home just outside of Gettysberg. We played games, talked, laughed, stayed up way later than we should have, slept in way later than we should have, and ate a lot of food. :)  It was a perfect recipe for a fantastic vacation.
Gettysberg is a marvelous place, definitely worthy of our time. We were able to see the famous sights of places on the battlefield and stop by the Gettysberg museum.  The museum was a treasury of the memories and facts about the war.  I believe it brought a sense of love, sacrifice, and gratitude for not only the men who fought, but for their families on both the confederate and yankee sides.
After returning to Virginia we just "hung out" with the family and enjoyed being part of the clark "everyday life". Because Mama' clark loves Chris so much she let Chris teach an early morning seminary class.  He was definitely born and raised to be a great teacher and leader. It's a joy to watch him thrive and see the way that he smiles while he teaches.
We arrived back in Utah on the 6th of January. Just in time for us to figure out how to get Chris into the classes he needed. Heavenly Father is sure watching over us.
I am now currently trying to find a job and have tried to spend my free time cooking so that I don't bother Chris while he's trying to study.
Things are going well for us and we are so happy and so grateful to be where we are in life.
We love you all!

Happy Halloween

We had an exciting and fun Halloween this year. We spent Friday evening with Jenny and Kofee and watched the "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" (Totally creepy!) just for daddy Clark.   :)  We ended up sleeping at Grandma's house and woke up early to the sound of children screaming and running around the house. Apparently they were excited for Grandma's Halloween bash!!! I don't blame them...it was quite the party. Everyone knows that Grandma's house is the place to be for fun, food, family, and lots of exciting conversation! (that last bit was just for you Jenny). It was my first year participating in the traditional Christensen Halloween Parade. With Grandma leading the way, the heard of loud monsters, ice cream cones, doggies, witches, cowboys and girls, and even Super-tie men sang as they marched around the block.   SO FUN!!!

After the fun events with the Christensen Clan started settling down and the kids all went home to trick-or-treat. Jenny, Chris, and I ventured to a well known Halloween store in the area. We were trying to find a great "Asian" wig for Jenny's Captain planateir costume. However, Chris and I got sidetracked ,while Jenny was debating between a few wigs.  Can you guess where I went off to?...that's right... I was looking at all the cute baby costumes! So adorable, I know it's wrong, but sometimes I just want a baby so that I can play dress up with him/her. (I guess this is probably good evidence that I might not be ready for babies yet.) And Chris...well, he was looking at the "cool" masks and hair spray colors. And, as you can see from the picture, we ended up coming home with BYU colored hairspray!

Halloween night, Chris and I used the Lagoon tickets that Aunt Michelle gave us. Every year at the amusement park they have a "frightmares" theme during Halloween. The park was full of haunted music, employees dressed to scare, and even some haunted houses. I'm not the biggest fan of haunted things so, Chris, being the good husband that he is, road on all the fun roller coasters with me. It was just fun to be out together! 

All in all our Halloween was FANTASTIC! We love you all and hope that your day of spooks was a great as ours.