A New Year

Well, Happy New Year everyone. The break is now over. Sad day. And I have to go back to work/school tomorrow. It's a little bit sad that this was my last real Christmas break. I don't like that the "grown-up" world doesn't give you a real break. And so, to celebrate that break, I'll post a few pictures. Sadly, I didn't really take that many. But here's just a little taste of what it was like...

Steven is growing right up. I almost made him laugh. It was pretty darn cute. Apparently his neck is pretty ticklish. :)

Poor Hayley didn't feel very good. However, she wasn't about to put up with any nonsense from the cousins. Hannah, don't cross that line....

I guess it's a good thing that all of the kids like books so much. Here is Grandpa Rowley reading Karen, Jace, and Colton a story. Who knew that the Big Bad Wolf was so intense!

And, we have a couple of traditions at the Rowley household that I thought it could be fun to have some pictures of. My mom is very good at dipping chocolates and we have done it almost every year since before I can remember. So, here are some of our finished products this year.

And, of course, our New Year's Eve tradition (that just happens to occur most nights between Christmas and New Year's). Lots of yummy foods -crackers and cheese balls, chips and dip, fruit, etc. etc. etc. We eat that food and play lots of games and just have a good time all around.

So there's just a little sample of the Rowley Family Christmas break.

This makes 19....

Well all, say welcome to the newest addition to the Rowley family. Abigail Kristina Rowley (they're going to call her Abby) was born this morning at 1:03 am. She's cute as all get out. 7 lbs. 1 oz and 21 1/4 inches long. And of course, lots of dark hair!

This is her with her two big sisters, Karen and Hannah.

A little more winter fun....

Well, who can't help but love winter/Christmas time. Okay, at least I can't. Last week it snowed again and it was beautiful! So, I made some friends of mine come on a walk. We went to "downtown" Provo where they have some Christmas lights up.

And while there by the tabernacle, some kids were making a snowman. Since it was totally huge, we decided we probably better help out. The finished product.... (seriously over 7 ft. tall)
And then on Sunday, we decided to have a Christmas Turkey dinner because my roommate Hilary got some turkeys from work. We had to eat them. This is me and her breaking the wishbone. (Don't worry, I totally won both times! :)
And because I've always wondered about those cartoons where they tear off the whole big drumstick, I had to have at it when I saw it sitting there. :)
Good times!

Winter Wonderland

This morning, I woke up, and everything was covered with snow! Yeah!!!! Our first real snow of the year. So, of course, I had to go out and play in it a bit. :)

And some of the ducks on campus might have forgotten to fly south for the winter....

Champions!!!!

Go Cougars!!!!!!!

What a day and what a game. It was quite the defensive battle throughout. Then when Utah scored with 1:43 left in the game to take the lead, we started to get a little nervous. 1st down...2nd down...3rd down... 4th down and 18 to go and the ball inside BYU's 10-yard line. I must admit, I started to lose faith. But then Max Hall completed a 49-yard pass to Austin Collie. They moved it forward, and Harvey Unga ran it in for the touchdown. In less than a minute, BYU moves ahead again and hangs on for the win!!!!!

Friends: Kevin, Emma, Holly, and Me

Yeah!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We won!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (I no longer have a voice.) And, of course, getting ready for the big game. This is me and little Steven in our BYU shirts.

I'm it!!!!!

Well, I have just been tagged by my sister-in-law. And I was previously tagged by a friend. What's funny is that everyone's "tag" seems to be different. So, in order to satisfy both, I decided to take components of each one. I hope everyone is happy with it. :)

6 Facts or habits about me (from Jenny's tag):
- I love socks! I love collecting them. I love matching them with different outfits. I love holiday socks, seasonal socks, colors, stripes, patterns, etc. For example, these argyle socks are fantastic!

- Wicked (the Musical) – I might just be slightly obsessed. But honestly, it’s amazing. I have seen it 3 times, and would go back in a heartbeat.

- One of my favorite jobs in the world is being Aunt Sheri! Note different pictures on my blog for reference. :)

- I hate saying “oh, let’s do that someday.” I’m all about doing it. You only live once!!!!

- Things I love to do: reading, playing the piano, singing, tennis, basketball, etc. etc. etc.

- I’ve had an interesting array of injuries to my body. Among others, In 7th grade, I burned my eye with a curling iron and then 3 months later got hit in the eye with a soccer ball, causing a hyphema, or hemorrhaging in the eye. In high school, I tore out the tendons and ligaments in my right ankle. Last year, I had two different knee surgeries. There are others on the list, but through it all, I have never broken a bone. And just to let you know, I considered putting a picture of a hyphema on here. But it was pretty disgusting. So, if you're curious, go google image it. :)

And now, for the tag from Brittany. I'm sorry that I didn't fill out all the sections. And there are a couple that I just can't think of what else to fill in. What can I say, my brain is nigh unto no longer functioning.

Things I am passionate about (I can only think of 6)
- The Gospel of Jesus Christ
- My family
- BYU Football
- Social work (Which sometimes is too bad. It can be tough :)
- Traveling – I really do love it.
- Music

8 Things I want to do before I die
- Get married :)

- Have super cute kids.
- Go to Italy and float down the streets of Venice in a gondola while being serenaded.
- Graduate with my masters (I only have 6 months left. I’m hoping I make it through.)
- Serve a mission with my husband.
- Travel to many other parts of the world
- I really think writing children’s books with a therapeutic value would be extremely cool.
- Sing with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir

8 Books I have read recently
- The Book of Mormon
- I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
- The Alchemist
- The Child Mental Status Examination
- Clinical Practice of Cognitive Therapy with Children and Adolescents
- The Healing Power of Play
- Dear Mrs. LaRue (a children’s book)
- The Flower Man (another children’s book)

Things I often say (Once again, only coming up with 6...)
- “That’s true”
- “Blast!”
- “I’m done.”
- “Seriously”
- “GP” (Which means good point)
- “Let’s be honest”


8 Songs and Albums I could listen to over and over again
- Wicked
- Anything by Michael Buble. (I don’t know that you want me to list all his albums. And I probably love his Christmas songs as much as anything else!)
- Norah Jones “Come Away with Me” Album
- Bing Crosby’s “White Christmas”
- Nat King Cole’s “The Christmas Song”
- “A Wink and a Smile” by Harry Connick Jr.

- “Peace I Leave With You” by Rob Gardner

- "O Holy Night" by Josh Groban - Okay, okay. So I totally love Christmas music.

So, I apologize for things I may have missed. If there was something you really desperately wanted to know about me... just ask. :)

As for tagging people, I tag only whoever reads this and has not yet been tagged. (I think almost everyone I know has been. Although maybe not Megan....)

100 Days of Love

In my class today, one of our classmates announced that his brother-in-law had just passed away from metastatic melanoma. There were 100 days from the time that he was diagnosed to the day that he passed away. And he was only 32 years old. He brought up the question, what would you do if you had 100 days left? And Bryce, his brother-in-law did so much. So Nate has continued on with the mission that Bryce began and has extended to another 100 days of love. He has created a blog that talks about simple ways that we can work on increasing our love each day. It is found at http://100daysoflove.blogspot.com. Within that page are also links to many other great blogs. I’m hoping that we can spread the word and all take a step back and think about what we really want to accomplish. Changing the world begins with changing the individual. Sometimes we realize too late to do the little and important things in life.

Some Halloween Fun!

This weekend we had some little activities to celebrate Halloween. Friday night was our ward activity. Here's some pictures with me and other ward members. We had the party out in an old barn and got to go on a hay ride and everything. I don't know if you can tell or not, but I dressed up as "partly cloudy with a chance of rain". I had blue scrubs with cotton ball clouds on it. And then I carried a squirt bottle! It was pretty fun.

Then on Saturday we had some friends over and frosted cookies and watched Clue, which is sort of Halloween like. :) So here are a couple of pictures from that too.

Kaitlyn's Baptism

Yesterday, October 13, my niece Kaitlyn got baptized.
This is a picture of me with her.













This is Kaitlyn's family: my brother Kevin, his wife Jeanette, and Justin, Kaitlyn, and Jace.








And even though it has nothing to do with the baptism, this is me with my cute niece Hayley!

I finally got the pictures from my CA trip 2 months ago...

So, I went on a little random road trip to CA the end of August. My friend Robbie ended up taking most of the pictures, and I just barely got them. So, I thought I would share a few.

When we got to Las Vegas, we stopped to use the restrooms, and then my car wouldn't start again. So, pretty much every time we stopped the car, we had to get a jump to start my car again. Luckily, I only needed to get a new battery and it wasn't anything worse. Beware, if you need to have your car jump-started, hope that you're not in California. I can't tell you how many people told us that no, they wouldn't help us out.

Eating a little "Bubba-Gump Shrimp" at the Santa Monica Pier.

We stopped to see the La Brae Tar pits

And this is the 4 of us that went: me, Veronica, Evan, and Robbie and we're waiting to go into Wicked!!!! (I forgot how sunburned I was until I saw these pictures again.)