Settling In

Wow. So, its been a LONG time since we updated! We didn't send out Christmas/New Year cards or letters, and a lot has happened in our lives lately...I think its about time to update this thing!

So, We moved again! This time we moved out of Ben's parent's basement into our own space! We were looking to buy a home, but the market here, during this time of year is just pretty much dead. We also were just sick of the whole process. After looking at dozens of homes, making 4 different offers on different homes, and coming up short, we decided to just rent for a while. I think all the road blocks were meant to be, because now we live in the most perfect rental house! Isn't it funny how the Lord answers our prayers in ways not expected? It is way nicer and bigger than any of the homes we were considering buying, and it is in the area we wanted/felt like we needed to be in also (Salmon Creek/Mt. Vista area). We moved in at the beginning of December and we're just now starting to feel "settled in", slowly, but surely.

Anyways, we are so happy to be on our own, not in an apartment complex, not in someone's basement, but our own space. Our house is actually a townhouse, but the only attached wall is the garage wall attaches to the next door neighbor's garage wall, not even noticeable!

As we've been 'settling in', I started teaching again at the beginning of the year! I am teaching private piano and guitar and my private student time slots are already full! I am excited to also start teaching Let's Play Music, and Sound Beginnings in the fall.

Ben has been enjoying his PR job and his bus commute to Portland, where he has time to read, ponder, or watch the crazies on the bus. He's also taken on a few other side PR ventures in his spare time. He's been staying active by joining an indoor soccer team with Aaron and Hoku. Its been fun to see the Brewers totally kick butt on the field! We also have a babysitting arrangement with Aaron and Hoku every other weekend so that we can go out on dates. Its been SO nice to get out together on dates, and also fun to spend time with Aaron and Hoku and their girls before they leave us in a couple months. :(

I'll play a little catch-up, since I've missed posting about some major holidays and some major cuteness going on!

OCTOBER
--Halloween activities and fall fun!

 

NOVEMBER
--Maura's Birthday, Thanksgiving, Jesse's Wedding in LA, Alice finally starts walking (17.5 months old)!

 

 

DECEMBER

--Move into new house, Christmas

We went with Ben's parents to get their Christmas tree at an AWESOME tree farm in Washougal. The girls were very good helpers.

 Merrilee was the 'Angel' in the Brewer family Christmas program

 

JANUARY

--Ben's birthday, Maura starts teaching studio business

 

Snow on New Year's Eve!



We love Portland!

 

 

FEBRUARY

--Merrilee turns 3, feeling settled in.

 

Merrilee's 3rd Birthday was really fun. We had both sets of grandparents over and Aaron and Hoku with their girls. Merrilee loved having everyone there! She was so excited about all of her presents too! So excited, in fact, that while opening one of them, she had a pee pee accident! Yes, we are still in the throws of potty training with her. Its been a long, hard battle, but things are getting a lot better now on that front.

 

 

 

MARCH

--Alice and Merrilee both get big girl beds (they were sleeping in a pack and play and a crib mattress on the floor). They both love playing the piano and singing all the time. Here's a funny video of their rendition of "Happy Birthday to Everyone".

 



We do miss some things from Utah, but we have felt so incredibly blessed these last few months since we've moved back to the Northwest! We are grateful everyday to be close to family, friends, and the luscious green NW scenery! Hopefully we can get back to keeping this blog updated more often from now on (no promises, though)!

We moved! Finally an updated post.

Well, it has been a whirlwind these last couple months! I finally decided it was time to update this thing! We decided to leave Orem only 2 weeks after we decided we would be moving in mid-August. Those 2 weeks were crammed with packing, procrastinating, more packing, tieing up loose ends on all sorts of things, packing and cleaning. We made some visits and said some goodbyes. We didn't get to visit/say goodbye to everyone we wanted to, but oh well...these days, is there ever really a goodbye with how connected we can stay with technology? One of the hardest goodbyes was Grandma and Grandpa Brewer. They became our best pals and our favorite people to visit while we were in Utah! We already miss them dearly.

We packed up everything into our Budget truck with the help of the Elder's Quorum from church (Thank You!). It was really strange seeing our little basement apartment all bare, and realizing how much STUFF we had accumulated! When we moved in, we had been married just over a year and didn't have very much. By the time we left, our family had doubled and so did our stuff! We had some really great memories there, but now its time to make some new memories in a new place!



 

Ben's Dad came down to Utah and drove the truck up to WA while Ben and I drove with the girls in our ONLY car. We sold Ben's commuter car before we left, so now we are down to a one car family. (Thank you Dad B! It was so nice of him to do that for us!) So far it has worked out really well! :)   In fact, Ben's parents are so extremely generous that they are letting us live with them until we can get into a house! We are hoping to be able to buy a house in the next few months.

 

Cost of living and housing/rent are so much higher here than in Utah! It is crazy that it is cheaper for us to buy a house than it would be to rent a decent place! We've been going through the process of getting pre-approved, taking homebuyer's education courses (really helpful!), and looking for homes! We actually put an offer in on a house a couple weeks ago, but got outbid by a cash investor! Grr! Those cash investors are smart investors, but sure are frustrating when families like us are trying to buy homes! It is way more of a seller's market up here in the NW than it was in Utah. Oh well, something will open up for us soon, I'm sure! (We are trying to put a bid on a foreclosure house as I type this!)

 

Ben is loving his new job and is glad he made the decision to go with this job rather than the Utah job he was offered around the same time. Since we are down to one car, he's been taking the commuter bus from Vancouver down into Portland. Its been working out nicely for him because he doesn't have to stress over driving in traffic, and he gets some time on the bus to read or do whatever.

 

The girls have been keeping me busy and it has been nice to be close to both sets of parents and spend time with family. I'm antsy to get into our own place so I can start "home-making". These 'crafty and cozy' seasons are just killing me thinking about all the cute stuff I could be doing/decorating if I had my own space to do it!  Once we get settled into a place, I also look forward to setting up my music studio again and getting some private students and some students for Let's Play Music classes. In the mean time, I've started singing with the clark college chorale to keep singing and music a part of my life.

 

Ben and I have callings in the ward, even though we are temporary. I am a primary worker teaching the 6-7 year olds. My class is 7 boys and 1 sweet little girl. Its been fun. Ben is the 14-15 year old sunday school teacher. It has been interesting trying to trade off and juggle Alice around during church while we are trying to do our callings. She turns 18 months mid-November, and will (age wise) be old enough to go to nursery, but she is still not walking, so we are working hard to get her walking before nursery age! (She's making some great progress on the walking though! She'll probably be running around in circles in the next week or two!)

 

Here are some fun pictures of the girls since we've moved...they are best friends! So cute. There are a bunch more that we want to share, but they are on Ben's phone, so those pics will just have to wait until we update again. Enjoy! :)

 

A Summer Catch-up Post

Its been a while since we last posted, so most of this post will be pictures to chronicle some more summer fun...

Water Fun- Shops at Riverwoods splash pad

Merrilee was terrified of the water for most the time. She would only touch the littlest squirt of water and only if she was with Alice or one of us. Alice loved the whole thing! :)

4th of July

My parents and siblings all came to town for the 4th of July week. Unfortunately, I didn't get many pictures of family or all the awesome fun stuff we did, but I did get pictures of just our little family enjoying the balloon festival on the morning of the 4th! The girls were entranced! It was really fun. We also went to the Provo freedom festival later in the day. Merrilee loved doing all of the kid crafts, and Alice loved sleeping through it.

 Mike and Song also came into town that week and we spent some time with them! This is the only picture I have to document that visit. Cute cousins!

 

CONCERTS!

Towards the end of July, Ben and I celebrated Pioneer Day with 2 different concerts. On Friday, July 20, we went to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir Pioneer Day Concert "The Joy of Song" with Katherine Jenkins. It was lovely. (Thanks Mom and Dad!)

Then, on actual Pioneer Day (July 24th), we went to a Rodney Atkins concert at the Scera Shell across the street from our house! It was SO FUN! We love country music! :)

It was raining right before the concert started, and we saw a double rainbow right over the stage!

Don't worry, it stopped raining before the concert started! 

The Concert was amazing and right during the encore song, tons of fireworks were going off all around the city! It made for a perfect ending to a great night! :)

NORTHWEST TRIP

3 days after the concert, we left for a trip to the Northwest! It was fun visiting with family and friends! 

We went to the zoo, went on walks, visited with friends and family, and just loved being back home in the Northwest! One thing we were sad we didn't get to do while we were there was go to the coast. But guess what?! We will be able to go whenever we want now! That's right folks...we are moving back to the Northwest!

While we were there, Ben had a 2nd job interview with a company in Portland. They liked him so much they asked him back for a 3rd interview while we were still there!After we got back from our trip they asked for a few more things from Ben and a couple days ago, they offered him the job, and we accepted! We are hoping to leave in about a week and a half.

This is all crazy and kind of unexpected, but we think this will be good for our little family. I will miss lots of things about Utah and lots of people in Utah. I will miss the opportunity to direct the Orem Children's Chorale. I was going to be their new director starting the first part of September, but obviously not anymore! I also was going to start up some Let's Play Music classes with school starting in a couple weeks. Hopefully we can get settled soon up in the Northwest so I can start these classes up there!

We are going to try to cram doing all the fun Utah stuff and hanging out with all our awesome Utah friends in the next week between packing and getting ready to go! The next update on here will probably be about our move!

Camping!

A couple weeks ago, Ben and I took the girls CAMPING! Ben got a new awesome 10-man tent for Father's Day, so we decided we'd go try it out with the girls. We have not been camping since Alice was born. We went camping a few times when Merrilee was 4-6months old, but not since. It was an..."interesting" camping trip, but we still had fun!

The girls having so much fun in the tent

We decided to stay close to home for this experimental trip. We went to Nunn's park right by Bridal Veil Falls in Provo Canyon (a 10 min. drive from our house). When we got there, we found a GREAT spot right next to the Provo River and a little bit secluded from other camping spots. It took us a while to set up camp and try to keep the girls contained and entertained while we set up. The girls LOVED being outdoors and getting dirty and the whole experience. Once the tent was up, Merrilee ran the length of the tent back and forth just squealing in delight. Alice followed suit by crawling close behind and giggling. While Ben set up the beds and tried to get a fire going, I took the girls to the campground playground. By the time I got back with the girls, Alice was getting grumpy, so we got the girls ready for bed. 

Right by our campsite

  The girls loved everything so much, they didn't even want to go to sleep in fear that they might miss out on something awesome! Well, Alice did go to sleep fairly well (considering the circumstances), but something woke her up a few hours later and she decided to stay awake and PARTY most of the night. Merrilee did not want to go to sleep. Ben had to sit in the camping chair by the fire and hold her and sing to her until she fell asleep (at around 10pm...2 hours after Alice went to bed).
Here's a little video of the campsite...

While I was trying to console Alice and while Merrilee was dead asleep, Ben had a close encounter with wildlife.

(From the perspective of Ben) So I was using the restroom (a tree behind the campsite) when I heard a really loud noise in the bushes right in front of me. I flashed my headlamp in the direction on the noise, and there was a pair of green eyes staring at me. To see a pair of green eyes with your pants down in the dark is a little unnerving. I walked quickly back to our picnic table to arm myself with a pink umbrella stroller and whipped around again to see the green eyes a little closer. I'll admit, I was a little frightened. After hiding in the tent for a while, I looked out once more and saw a chunky raccoon scavengering through our camp. I'm just glad it wasn't a cougar because there have been a few sightings this year (especially at BYU campus :)

The morning was a little more pleasant. Merrilee decided to wake us up at 5:30AM. She has NEVER gotten up so early...oh well.  Despite the lack of sleep for ALL of us, everyone was cheery and happy in the morning. I pre-made breakfast burritos before the trip and wrapped them in foil so we could heat them over the fire in the morning. YUM! is all I have to say.

We sat around the morning campfire and just enjoyed some family time together.

We really didn't want to pack everything up yet...it seemed like we JUST got everything settled, but we knew we were only prepared for one night and wanted the girls to get good naps at home, so we packed up camp. After we packed up, we took the girls on a little "hike" (walk) to Bridal Veil Falls. We just got a new (used) baby hiking backpack to carry Alice in. It worked pretty well, except that Alice was so tired and grumpy all the way there and back, so her cries were right in my ear.  JUST as we were approaching our car, she finally fell asleep!! Merrilee was very tired and emotional on this little walk also and made Ben carry her the whole way.

It was really fun (and needed) to get back in touch with nature and spend some quality family time together. Now that we've initiated the girls into camping, we hope we can get out a few more times this summer! Anyone want to come with us next time? ;)