Pirate Treasure

Eli's grandpa Brough is so nice and set up a treasure hunt. Eli knew what the treasure was before he started but any excuse to act like a pirate is ok with Eli. The treasure was some polished rocks. Eli and his grandpa like to collect rocks on every trip and then Grandpa tumbles them and gets them pretty err...I mean cool! Don't tell Eli I said pretty. Now Eli will have a treasure box to contain the hoards of rocks that are going to be coming into the house. *sigh*

Here is Eli with his Grandma and Grandpa Brough. He didn't recently have a stroke, he's doing some sort of pirate face.

Grandma

This is my grandma. Beautiful, right? And amazing. Grandma was someone that you could look up to and follow her example. She went back to school at the age of 40 and got a Bachelors and Masters degree. She taught school for 17 years. (To my dismay. I was jealous of the children in her class. I don't like competition for affection.) She was a master seamstress. More importantly she was loving and kind to everyone.

We love her so much and are going to miss her a lot but we are glad that she is going to be able to be together with her sweetheart. I was able to have a few sweet moments with her the last few months, especially the last few days, and I will treasure them ALWAYS.

I'm glad that I was able to care for her a little bit the last few months.

Chatting

Eli has taken to chatting online. I have always believed that children need as much free access to the Internet as possible at the age of six. OK that's not really true. If I chat Eli likes to sneak in and take over. The first time was with my brother and Eli did it without any prompting from me. Today he chatted with Stewart for a few minutes but I did tip him off that Stewart was online.

9:59 AM me: hi mi name is eli

10:00 AM Stewart: hi eli!

my name is daddy

10:01 AM me: hi i mistu

Stewart: I miss you too

I love you so much

10:04 AM me: no i love you so much

10:05 AM Stewart: are you going to school today?

10:07 AM me: ok I'm back


Eli is pretty much awesome...in my humble opinion. ;)


Next up: get Eli his own email account.

Let's try this again.

I was reading my blog from 2 years ago and it made me think I should keep blogging because in 2 more years I might wonder what I was doing 2 years ago. Get it? In Twenty-ten I looked to see what was going on in Two thousand and eight. But in 2012 I might wonder what is happening in 2010.

And yes I think it should be called twenty-ten because I like it better but I'll admit that I still sometimes call it two-thousand and 10.

This year has not been that great so far. I know! sad!

~I miss Stewart BAD!

~My grandma is very ill.

~My little boy misses his daddy.

~I stay in the house all day.

~I'm jealous of people who get what they want.

Did I mention I miss Stewart. This pic is from when he was on leave. We pretty much had the BEST time ever...but it has made Eli and miss Stewart too much. It was worth it though.

I think it's funny how I thought that I was really tough and deployment wouldn't be THAT hard for me. funny-ha ha...ha?

Here are some good things though.

~I got a bike trainer.

~We are debt free.

~I'm planning on buying some cute earrings.

Well that's a good start. I'm going to try to blog more even if I really have nothing to say. So sorry about that in advance but it might do me good.

Christmas Letter Post

Christmas letter 2009

Dear Friends, Family, and people who I perennially annoy with my exaggerations and bold faced lies…

It’s time for the Brough Family Christmas letter. I’ll skip the lengthy preamble and start with the updates.

Eli is 6 years old, and quite the ladies man now that his front teeth have grown back in. He has cut quite a swathe though the female population in his kindergarten class and is an unrepentant playboy. His current interests also include Lego’s, viva piñata on the xbox, and of course his longtime goals of world domination.

Becca has spent the last year putting up with my crap (or maybe more appropriately the lack thereof, since I haven’t been around for most of the year). With Eli in school for 3 hours a day, and me on the other side of the world, Becca doesn’t have to get us dressed, tie our shoes, or make us snacks all day long. She works out, edits home movies, cooks wonderful creations, and she makes me wish I were at home with her instead of playing Army on the other side of the world.

Here is the recap of the year:

After spending the holidays in Utah, we went back to Kentucky for a month while I attended the Army Reconnaissance Course, which culminated with the worst ice storm the region had seen in decades.

Graduating the course ended our six-month stint at Ft. Knox. We then started preparing ourselves for a deployment to Afghanistan. This of course consisted of a lot of denial while we attempted to simultaneously live life to the fullest and ignore the dates on the calendar and eventually the ticking of the clock.

This deployment has taught us that no matter how much we drive each other nuts, we prefer to drive each other nuts from a distance close enough to give each other hugs.

Regardless, I’ve still been able to accomplish some of my personal goals:

· Promotion to 1^st Lieutenant (I can’t believe it’s not butter!)

· Lead men in combat and bring them back safely

· See my family for leave

· Find Osama Bin Laden crap…

We still have a bit of a haul in front of us, but we are freshly energized after I was able to come home for leave over Thanksgiving. For those of you who are with your loved ones this Christmas, be thankful and let them know that you appreciate them.

Love

The Broughs

Updates

I got my new bike. I love it because it's pink and SO much lighter than my other bike...which was really Stewart's bike. After I bought it I almost threw it over my head when I was loading it on the car rack. It's SO light. I went with a hybrid bike because the road bikes intimidated me and my back hurts after biking so I am really only good for a 2 hr ride at the most. It's easier to sit up straighter with these kind of handlebars. The day after I bought my bike it snowed! I was so sad and had to wait about a week and a 1/2 to get my first ride.
Our Halloween was not the best. Eli got a tummy ache after the 6th house. I was worried that he was getting the swine flu but he was better the next day. Danny and Emi came to visit and Danny really freaked Eli out.

Here are some of our other October pictures. We had a fun month.

Eli

Naughty: Staying up late to play Lego's, draw, or play the Leapster under the covers.
Nice: confessing these things the next day.
Naughty: Sleeping in so long because you didn't go to bed until midnight.
Nice: Leaving a note for your mom outside her door.
This note says "Dear Mom, I know you miss Daddy, you deserve a great big hug."

He was already asleep when I found the note. It made me SO happy. I smiled and went in and kissed my sleeping little boy. I feel so blessed to have such a sweet little boy! He is very perceptive and kind and loving. I talk about Stewart with Eli but I really don't cry or anything. Yesterday I was very worried about Stewart and he was on my mind a lot. This letter was very sweet to get at the end of a day like that.