Happy Birthday Holly

Hollybus turned 12 today. Whenever my girls have a birthday I get a little sentimental. I start thinking back to when they were born and the following years and how much they have grown. Today was no different. Holly has grown up so much and has matured into a smart, sweet natured girl with a fun but very dry sense of humor. Holly keeps the Brown family laughing! Like I mentioned in the earlier post, Holly pretty much spent her whole birthday at a swim meet. She was so focused throughout the day that she said later that she had forgotten it was her birthday, that is until the end of the meet when her team mates dumped the team cooler of ice water on her head. What love! After getting home and recovering a bit from the long tiring day we had some of her buddies over for cake and ice cream and presents. She got some money from G & G Brown and "the boys" next door. A couple NEX gift cards and the prized gift of all was seasons 1 and 2 of Lost. Holly's addiction. She was thrilled. Holly plans to use her cash to shop in Bali. Not every 12 year old gets to say that! We are so proud of our unique gift from God that we call Holly. Happy 12th birthday Bus! We love you! Of course all the birthday pics can be seen on Picasa. Enjoy

The Guam Typhoons

Today (Holly's Birthday) we spent at a swim meet. There's a little joke among swim parents that goes: if I only had one day left to live I would choose to spend it at a swim meet because they last FOREVER! The girls swam with their team today in the Guam Swim Federation's Short Course Championship Meet. The Typhoons competed against five other teams here on the island. I am so proud to report that all the Typhoon swimmers swam very well, the competition was tough but our kiddos rocked the pool. Gracie and Holly took time off of every one of their swims. Caitlin and Abbie placed third in their age groups and received bronze medals at the end of the meet. The photo above is of all the medal winners from the team. You can also see the HUGE album of all the pictures taken at the meet. Most of the kids you will not recognize but there are quite a few of the Fabulous Brown Swim Sisters. All in all it was a very long but enjoyable day here on Guam. Go Typhoons!!!!

The Countdown Continues

Only two days nine hours and forty-five minutes until opening day! Baseball season is quickly approaching. Are you biting your nails? Well don't. It's a bad habit, try a little chocolate instead-it's very calming. Don't panic, you have another day or so to get to the store and shop for your game watching snacks.

Welcome Home Sailor

Several nights ago we waited up till 1:00 AM to go to the airport to greet Lee's RP who was coming home from an almost year long deployment to the Horn of Africa. Along with the hospital CO, XO and Master Chief and a number of other sailors and family we waited and waited, only to discover we had the wrong date. Ok so we had a dry run and I took a lot of fun pictures. Fast forward to two days later same time, same place. RP came in as expected and was greeted like a hero. You could see the relief on his face at being home. For him Guam is REALLY home since he was very young. So his Mom, Dad, Sister and fiance' were able to be there to greet him too. Unfortunately, just before he arrived I discovered the camera was out of batteries!! Rats!!!! Of course there is nowhere in the little Guam airport to buy batteries, especially at 1:00 in the morning. So all the pics of the event are of the "dry run" two days prior. They can be seen on our Picasa Web albums page. Our girls are pretty happy to have RP home, they have such fun picking on him and I think he gets a kick out of teasing them too. Welcome Home RP!

Lee wants you to know...

that as of the time of this typing, Baseball season will begin in 5 days, 7 hours and 10 minutes.

New Furniture

This is our new Step Tansu above. Friadycat thinks we bought it just for him. It has become his favorite lizard hunting post. The steps are perfect for a cat of his abundant size, no jumping required. We got this and a curio and a Teak wood TV stand at a Furniture Auction/Asian Bazaar a few weeks ago. I think all of these pieces were made in Java which is in Indonesia. All the furniture and Frady's lizard hunt can be seen on our Picasa Web Album. Link to the right. Double click on the album you wish to see.

The Lizard Hunter

One of Fraidycat's favorite pastimes is hunting lizards and geckos. Every now and then an unlucky little creature wanders into the house where Fraidy is ready and waiting to pounce. Most of the time they just taunt him from the other side of the glass. Can you imagine the fun he will have in Virginia where there are birds and squirrels to taunt him as well? What a life change that will be for this born and raised Guam boonie cat.

Our Fun Adventure

The girls swim coach invited us and several other families to go along on a little adventure that turned out to be great fun. We left the beach swimming (I kayaked) out about 1/2 mile around the cliff line to an enormous cave right on the ocean. The cave has a rope swing hanging just inside it. Everyone was able to climb up the rocks and then swing out into the ocean for a big drop! It was a neat experience. I was the conservative one staying on board what I officially named "the safety kayak" to take pictures and keep an overall eye on the proceedings. Of course if anything had gone wrong I would have been the last one they turned to. Along with us was a Navy Seal, a Navy Rescue Swimmer and a Nurse. I think I was really there to carry the gear, keep important items like car keys dry and of course take pictures. You can see the pics of the whole trip with captions on our Picasa Web album linked on the right. For some reason the pictures uploaded to Picasa in backwards order, so start at the end. Oh and I took the pictures with a generic brand cheap disposable camera, so quality is not that great.
The girls reported seeing some very large fish, many anemones and quite a bit of wreckage including a huge old anchor chain from a ship. Rich, the Navy Seal with us would free dive down and bring bits and pieces back up for the kiddos to examine. They would then have big fun watching it fall back down to the ocean floor. From where we were at the mouth of the cave we averaged the depth to be about 20 to 30 feet. Doing stuff like this makes being on Guam such an adventure! Enjoy the pictures

QIL= Quotes I Like

These two quotes come from my favorite series of books called the Mitford Years by Jan Karon. I wish I could write like her. I know she works at it and that is something I do not do. One can wish right? While I'm at it, I wish I were 20 pounds thinner!
On with the quotes.
" There is a God shaped vacuum in the heart of every person, and it can never be filled by any created thing. It can only be filled by God..." ~ Blaise Pascal

Do all the good you can, in all the places you can, at all the times you can, to all the people you can, as long as you ever can." ~ John Wesley

Is anyone out there?

Hey is anyone reading this blog? I'm not getting many comments :(

Vacation

We are so excited we just had to share. The girls and I have just made reservations to go to Bali (In Indonesia) at the end of April. There is so much to do and see there in tropical paradise! We have friends that have gone and have come back just raving about what a wonderful time they had. Gracie is mostly excited about the Monkey Forest! One friend who just came back reported waking up one morning to a monkey perched on her balcony. When Gracie heard that was a possibility she went bananas! We look forward to also taking a bike tour, a day long Balinese cooking class, going to the zoo where you can hold the BIG birds, touring the wood carving and basket weaving factories, spa treatments and of course SHOPPING. Naturally we will take lots of pictures and post them when we return. Sadly, daddy will not be going on this trip with us, but someone has to hold down the fort right?

The Kid House

Back in my day they would call moms like me the kool-aid mom. You know the one who has the house where the kids end up spending most of their play time. Today that is definitely our house. There is often an extra kid or two or three hanging around here. Most of them have sign in names for games on our computers! The group of gals pictured to the left we call "Gracie's Posse". This is a sweet bunch of cuties that will play the day away every chance they have.
This aspect of living in base housing is one that our family enjoys the most. When you move in to a military community there are bound to be friends aplenty right next door. Many of these friends are families we have linked up with hard and fast. The kind of folks who quickly become like family, even if it is only for 2 years. The ones you spend holidays with and help through the tough times because your real family is half a world away. Needless to say that it is hard to say goodbye but you get used to it because you have to. We do our best to stay in touch and look forward to being stationed together again someday. Even when we go separate directions it is fun to know that you have friends all over the world.
We are quickly approaching that point in our tour here on Guam when we will have to say goodbye. It's sad and exciting all at once. We look forward to keeping alot of friends from Guam who have moved or will be moving with us to Virginia. We are also excited about reuniting with old friends who are there from other duty stations. It's all becoming real now that we are setting packout dates and looking online for housing and a church family. Look out Virginia here we come ready to set up "The Kid House" in one of your unsuspecting neighborhoods.
To see the rest of the Gracie's posse pictures click on the link for our online album on the upper right side of this page. Then you will double click on top of the album and it should open for you.

Teenagers

Yep we have our own resident teenager pictured above doing one of her favorite activities. Ali in NC happens to be the teen on the other end of that line. Hi Ali!!! I remember spending hours on the phone when I was her age, but I still cannot understand what two people can find to talk about for hours on end. Whatever it is though, she sure does enjoy it. Caitlin has been working especially hard lately to raise the funds needed to go on the Brio Missions trip to Peru. I'm proud to report that all the money has been raised and her trip is paid in full. PTL! She even has enough money to buy her round trip airfare ticket from Virginia to Miami. This thankfully spares mom and dad from having to move house from the other side of the world and then drive to Miami and back in a matter of weeks.
Focus on the Family did a 30 minute broadcast with Dr. Dobson and Brio Missions on the upcoming trip to Peru a few weeks ago. Even on Guam we had the chance to hear the broadcast. It was so awesome to hear testimony of what the Lord has done in years past on this trip. There were stories of 100's of salvations and even a few miracles. Needless to say that after hearing these testimonies, Caitlin was very inspired and excited to get this chance to be a part of that this year. She says a BIG THANK YOU to everyone who has supported her either with money or prayers-they are both essential.

It would be funny if....

it weren't actually happening. About a month and a half ago Lee had a mild case of shingles. The docs put him on Prednisone and it cleared up easily. Since that point though, he has been ill, because as we were told today the Prednisone wipes out your immune system for a while. First it was a bad cold which turned into bronchitis and then now into pneumonia. He also has had strep and laryngitis and still has not gotten his voice back. Pink eye was a small problem a week ago too. Today he went in to see his doc for a recheck , new chest x-rays and new blood tests. The good news is the pneumonia and bronchitis are clearing up but the bad news is that his blood work tests from last week revealed that he has mono! Yes, the dreaded "kissing disease". Since he is my sweetie and I have kissed him (because I did not think he was contagious) I had to undergo some blood tests today too. We do not know for sure if I have it too but we are pretty certain because my naps have been as frequent as Lee's. I am hoping that my exhaustion is simply from taking care of a sick household for over a month. I will know for sure tomorrow. The girls have all been sick too with Holly actually having an asthma episode. That was scary. Holly has never had asthma before so we are praying that this was a one time thing. All the girlies are feeling much better now, thankfully. So if you are so inclined, please pray for the health of the Brown family especially Lee. That's it for today, I'm off to take a nap!

Nothin' says love like ink

Yes I know most of you are probably gasping for air right now, so take a deep breath and read on. I have been wanting a tattoo for several years now, but no one would take me seriously when I would talk about it. Finally for Valentines Day Lee gave me a card that said I could either go pick out a piece of Plumeria jewelry that I have had my eye on at Micronesia Goldsmith or he would take me to get a tattoo. I guess you see which one I chose. (no redneck jokes please) I have now had my cross for one month. A couple days ago Caitlin asked if I regretted getting it and I could honestly say "no". First of all it was absolutely NOT a spur of the moment, mid-life crisis kind of decision. I spent a long time thinking it through and considering the consequences and choosing a design. Secondly I have discovered that it has almost NO affect on me or the way people perceive me which was something I was a tiny bit concerned about. In other words I have not turned into a rebel housewife contributing to the delinquency of my children. If anything it has made me consider my actions and my witness for Christ more carefully. After all I have permanently identified myself as a follower of Jesus by wearing his cross.
AND in answer to the question on everyone's mind: YES it hurt!! Therefore this will be the first, last and only tattoo on me.

Our online photo album

You should be able to click the links on the top right (Picasa2) to navigate to our online album. But like I mentioned earlier, I'm very new at this blogging business. So if the link does not work, I probably did something wrong. Instead you can visit www.picasaweb.google.com/snickerdoodledog to see the latest pictures. I will try to update these albums as aften as we take pictures.

CTTS=Cute Things They Say

The latest CTTS comes from Gracie. Yes, Gracie says cute stuff on a regular basis but this one was so cute. For Christmas we received the Casting Crowns CD called Lifesong. We have listened to it over and over and over again while in the car. Guam is christian music station deprived. A few days ago we were listening to one of the songs on this CD called Praise Him In the Storm. Gracie pipes up from the back of the suburban and says "Mommy you know when swimming gets really hard (she swims competitively) I sing this part of the song to myself in my head" I asked which part she is talking about and she quotes from Psalm 121 which is a very small part of the song. It says "I lift my eyes unto the hills. From where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, maker of heaven and earth." Ah so sweet! I had to keep myself from crying to explain to her that she was quoting scripture. She was very impressed with herself that she knew other verses besides the ones she learns for AWANAS.

My first blog post

OK, the Brown family has finally started a blog. I guess you could say we caved to the peer pressure. Blogging is "in" right? We hope to share the daily news and nonsense that happens when you are raising four daughters. Lets not forget the dog, cat, guinea pigs and fish that live in our little zoo also. So visit often.
We got another new camera recently because I dropped our old new one on the marble floor in the lobby of the Hilton hotel. Oops! We like the new new camera so much better anyway. I will try to put a picture or two here on the blog taken with the new toy. Don't hold your breath, I may not be able to figure it out. If you see pics then I succeeded. Here goes....