On My Own

I'm back on my own blog.
janijean.blogspot.com
If you are not already invited to read my blog, send me an email and I'll add you.
janbrown21@gmail.com

Time for an update

Holy cow - it's been a long time! Where do I even being? What do I even remember?

Christmas was an enjoyable time. It's still hard learning how to share families and family traditions. I remember that we got lots of good stuff. =) Jammies, movie gift cards, clothes, etc. It's the most wonderful time of the year! I never got sick of listening to Christmas songs on the radio!

For New Years Eve we went to Magic Mountain. It was the last day to use our season passes. It was very exhausting because we haven't stayed up that late in a long time! Cooper, Jer's youngest brother, came with us. We stayed the night (morning?) in a hotel and drove home New Years Day.

At the end of January I had surgery to remove 5 areas of endometriosis and some uterine polyps. The surgery went well and I took a week off from teaching. It took a while to heal but I feel great. I'm still waiting to see all of the affects though. Thank goodness I have such great benefits because I paid absolutely nothing!

Nothing happened on Valentine's Day other than me getting sick. Boo.

Jeremy is still working for Decipher. I'm still loving my job teaching deaf and hard-of-hearing 2- and 3- year olds. I'm even considering getting another credential. It's getting scary in Fresno Unified this time of year with all of the budget cuts.

Other than the normal daily routines after 2 years and 2 months of marriage, we're still learning how to meet each others' expectations, show our love, compromise, and pick our battles!

Thank you to all of our friends and family who are helping, supporting, loving, and praying for us during the not-so-great times. We don't know what the future holds, but we plan on being happy in the end.

Date Night

Friday night Jeremy and I decided to really have a date night. I mean REALLY.
After a nice dinner (of course we used a coupon), we headed to Maxx Putt Fun Zone (we used yet another coupon). It's located right by our house and we've always wondered about it. The mini-golf is glow-in-the-dark and themed "Around the world in 18 holes." Each hole was a different famous landmark. We got glowing wristbands, putters, and balls all of the same color (I picked green, Jeremy was orange). It was dark, but we tried to take pictures of our fun adventure.

These are where the landmarks' facts are shown.

Egypt

Big Ben!

At the last hole, The Golden Gate Bridge, where Jeremy got a hole-in-one!

In Antarctica.

I'm proud to say I only lost by 2. The mini-golf was fun and educational. What an awesome date night!

'Tis the Season

I can't believe how fast the end of the year is approaching! After my birthday, Halloween and Thanksgiving came and went so quickly.

There's not much to tell about Halloween. We went to the ward party (dressed as nerds) then went home and ran out of candy (our neighborhood is popular apparently). I guess we ate too much of our own candy!

Thanksgiving morning we went to the movie A Christmas Carol in 3D. Although it was a very dark movie (not recommended for kids!), the 3D was absolutely awesome! It really made the movie! I can't wait to go and see more movies in 3D.

For Thanksgiving lunch, we met with the Short side of the family at the Amerjan's. We ate lots of yummy traditional food. My favorite was the mashed potatoes and Lindsey's home-made bread!

After a nice nap, we went to the Brown Thanksgiving festivities at Black Angus. My grandpa wanted to treat us to a nice meal where no one had to stress about cooking. It sure was yummy!

Jeremy and I had the opportunity to go to the Nutcracker on Thanksgiving weekend. Fresno Unified employees got a special ticket price so I jumped on that opportunity. Luckily I have a wonderful husband who is willing to try new things, like going to the ballet!

Here is a picture of us after the show:
Last Friday, Jeremy's company (Decipher) had their Christmas party at Erna's Elderberry House. I believe it is the only 5 Diamond restaurant in the valley. Everyone met at Decipher to load charter buses and we traveled to Oakhurst. We started out with questionable appetizers (Jeremy tried everything of course) and had an interesting 3-course meal. Everything was new to me, but it was all very good. Quite the once-in-a-lifetime-experience!

Here is a picture of us at our table:
We got home very late, so our Saturday was spent lounging around. I can't imagine what kind of Saturday morning was had by the people drinking at the party!

The inside of our house is decorated for Christmas, so hopefully the outside will follow soon. Here is a picture of our Christmas tree:
We hope everyone has a great holiday season!

A Great Brithday Weekend

My 23rd birthday was one week ago. I decided to NOT get a substitute since I heard from other teachers that our principal specifically mentioned not taking birthdays off....I didn't want to get on her bad side my first year teaching....So instead I took Thursday morning off (I teach the PM class) and all day Friday (no students- only home visits).

After a decent work day Wednesday, my family took me out to a yummy Me-N-Ed's birthday dinner. The Shorts had a yummy Sunday birthday dinner a few days before. All in all, I felt very special! But it got even better.

Jeremy and I both got Friday off to make our way to the Bay area. We drove to the Oakland temple (after getting stuck in Atwater trying to find a Subway), and missed the 2:00 session. So we did initiatories instead. It was awesome! It was also my first "first" time. We bought some under things from the Distribution Center, too.

We then made our way across the ridiculously priced toll bridge to San Francisco. As we took in the awesome freeway-view of the city, we were excited about our next few days in a new place.

Our first hotel was near the airport...far from anything downtown. The good news was that the online booking site had a typo and we got the very clean and new hotel room for a whopping $5.50 (including tax). Yeah. And free breakfast. I know.

We were exhausted from all the driving so we napped and then walked down the road to Benihana, a Japanese teppanyaki restaurant. It was my first time experiencing such an event, and I was quite hesitant. Jeremy was great about my negative attitude and helped me order. It was...decent. And very expensive! Jeremy will have to find a friend to go with next time since I'm not much of a fan.

Saturday morning I had to drive 30 minutes to a seminar in Redwood City. It was an informative meeting regarding cochlear implants, free resources online, and a tour of the school where it was located. Afterward I drove back to our hotel to pick up Jeremy (he lounged around) and we headed to downtown.

Google maps can only be so reliable. We got lost in the city and couldn't find our hotel. We charged up our GPS (the tall buildings block the signal a lot) and eventually found the hotel, only to be informed that our room had issues. Turns out there was some sort of woodstock-like event happening and the hotel double booked. They sent us (with a map!) to a motel closer to the warf. AND the hotel paid for the motel! I know! What luck!

We walked to Nick's Crispy Tacos. Yum! Getting lost can be tiring so we relaxed a bit after filling up.

Saturday night we walked down towards Ghirardelli Square and Fisherman's Warf. We browsed the touristy shops and I bought a pearl ring. It was fun and interesting and a lot like other coastal towns. The walk back up to our hotel was tiring and we slept well.

Sunday morning we wanted to go to the Exploratorium but ended up just finishing the rest of the walk from the warf to Pier 39. We decided to drive this time and got lost, yet again, with all the weird one-way-streets. I guess city life just isn't for us, because after a great lunch at Boudin, we were so ready to leave.

Instead of heading back over the ridiculously priced toll bridge, we went south toward San Jose and went to none other than IKEA!!! It was huge and overwhelming but so exciting! We bought some cheap odds and ends, but my favorite purchases were an art easel for my classroom and a rolling laundry rack to hang and dry clothes! Oh, and the chocolate!

We made it home by 5pm and started laundry. It was a great weekend -- full of traffic, food, free hotels, and fun! It sure was hard having to get up for work Monday morning!

Thanks, Jeremy, for such a great birthday weekend! Even though we had stressful situations where we became frustrated with each other, I still knew that you loved and cared for me. You're my best friend and I love you!!!

Flower

For being the first post in many months this sure is boring, I know! This is a flower from my "Hardy Blue Passionflower" plant that I've been growing for about 6 months. It's a beautiful vine with such an interesting flower I thought I would share. Most of my vegetables in the garden have died and are gone but this guy is blooming away! Enjoy

Janice's new blog

I'm creating a new blog for myself. It will be a private blog so please email me or leave a comment with your email address so I can add you. Thanks.