Christmas in Washington

Snow!!! tons and tons of snow! there has been a series of storms from Canada and it has snowed over a foot at my house in Monroe. the roads have been terrible because of the lack of preparation Washington has. it doesn't snow that much here and so they aren't prepared for it. i work outside and it has been in the low teens here just before Christmas, it has not pleasant. it was nice having a white Christmas though. on Christmas eve i shaved most of my hair off and it was at its longest i think it had ever been. its kinda cold now... then we went to church and had a nice service. after that we came back and had a ton of appetisers and opened presents. all of the Ottow kids put their names in a hat and draw for a secret Santa so i had presents from her sister in law and i got a hiking book and hand + foot warmers and a sweet pirana shirt. and from Elle's parents i got a fishing Washington book and some hair product :) i picked Lee, one of Elle's older brothers, i got him a sweet doormat, The Soup Bible and a coffee table book. we drank and played charades till the wee hours of the morning. on Christmas day most of us were sleepy and were moving really slow. we had a nice big Christmas dinner with a quite large bone in ham and it was delicious!! after that we watched What About Bob. its the ottows family movie like the mad mad world is ours. if you want to have a sneak peak at what the family i am living with is like just watch that movie. in all it was a fun Christmas. --Nial

It was awesome to have Nial up here for our first Christmas. He is lucky to experience one of the only White Christmas's ever to happen in recent memory! He also got to make his grand Charades debut! We play it every year and The Girl Team tried our hardest to make it especially embarrassing for our newcomer. :)

Christmas Day was pretty relaxed, cooking, movies, etc. Nial and I furiously attempted to finish a puzzle with a lot of grassy/flowery and sky pictures... ergo- we're not quite finished yet. We snapped almost 300 pictures over the two days but my computer is being crazy so hopefully we'll get some good ones up here! My niece Mia and nephew Jackson were adorable as usual, but they are finally at the point where they'll play together by themselves- its quite a milestone! :) They also had a ton of fun walking slowly on the treadmill with Grandpa (my dad) until he wasn't looking and Jackson turned it on all by himself! He bit his tongue and scraped his chin but he was back 10 minutes later trying to walk on it. --Elle

AHHH! COOKIES!

Living in close proximity to my oldest brother Jordan means he calls "a Rosie" on me every once in awhile. When I was younger and we all lived in the same house my brothers would call "Rosie!" whenever they wanted something of me; a glass of water, a snack, the phone, whatever. My middle name is Rose and it only gets used in this capacity. SO, a few weeks ago I heard the familiar tone being exuded from Jordans lips in the form of "Christmas Cookies for my co-workers." Oh, goodness. Planning ensued.

Plans, recipes, shopping trips, return shopping trips done, Steph (sis-in-law) and I attempted to begin. Of course her daughter Mia (see pic)
decided to hit her terrible two's all on that day. Screaming kid factored into the equation, 4 batches of cookies and one batch of Scoteroos were then my responsiblity alone. Steph attempted several times to rejoin the process only to forget she was melting chocolate on the stovetop...!


We only got through 2 batches and the Scotcheroos yesterday and I fear she won't get to the other two today...


Scotcheroos are an amazing remodeling of the classic rice crispy treats. Disolve 1 cup sugar in 1 cup corn syrup in a saucepan. Add 1 cup peanut butter. Remove from heat and slowly add rice crispies. Pour into 13x9 pan. Melt butterscotch and chocolate chips on stovetop. Spread lavishly over the crispy mix. Let set and enjoy!

I'd never heard of them but Steph claims they are a hit in Iowa (where she is from). Delectable.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Nial and I returned from our mini-vacation on Tuesday real late. It was awesome to catch up with some friends, visit the Cluff Homestead and attend Simple Faith on Sunday. It was short but sweet. We had the chance to meet Weston's new girl-- super cute! And see the new boat which is huge and definitely something I will make the trip to go cruise on! It was too short to do everything (sorry we didn't make it to see you Tiana!) but what we had we were definitely grateful for.

Turkey Day! Nial spent the morning taking pictures of a washed out road in Index and the Skykomish River that he loves to fish. I spent the majority of the day in the kitchen with my Mom. Turkey, stuffing, yams, potatoes, corn, rolls, cranberry applesause, one Dutch Apple pie and one pumpkin pie. The pies are my favorite to bake... I think because I feel empowered with a rolling pin :)
As tradition dictates: before dinner Dad read scripture and we had a prayer, after dinner we each read 10 things we were thankful for and that always brings tears from the weak-eyed. We played some board games and visited til the little ones got cranky and sleepy.
It was alot of fun... 11 of us in all, 2 of whom are little tykes.

I hope all had a lovely Thanksgiving Day!!! Unfortunatly, Nial and I both have sinus infections and a terrible cough... any cures?!

Trip South Approches!!

Nial just informed me yesterday that he actually has all next week off (therefore, with weekends 10 days off!). SO, we've been trying to get back down to Ashland to visit since Halloween-- now we can! As the plan stands to date, we are leaving Saturday and returning home on Tuesday. We're both so excited to see everyone. Dallas knew right away somehow and was texting me asking if I was coming :)

We're attending a Thanksgiving Pancake Dinner on Sunday at my old house-- should be interesting as we're supposed to dress up. For pancakes that seems weird?!



Tiana are you guys going to be in town by any chance???

A Trip in the Rain...

Friday, Nial and I took a small road trip across the Cascades to Cle Elum and the Yakima River. We met up with 6 other friends and friends of friends to camp for a night and fish (well, they fished I took pics.) We got there and it began to rain. It rained all night. It was COLD! I hardly slept a wink... The guys fished on Saturday, another girl sewed and I clicked away! We made fun of the boys in their silly waiters...

We had two dogs between the 7 of us, they were both puppies and extremely energetic and cute! I snapped a ton of Lark because she made Nial and I her adoptive parents on the trip. See how adorable???!!

We made it back in time to have a horribly sleepy and honestly boring night of watching Mia while her parents went out. The drive to Cle Elum and back was interesting on several levels because of the storms we've been having and the local flooding. The fall colors and scenery of the Yakima valley were gorgeous.

Mia and Jackson

My neice and nephew are the cutest things that ever happened. I watch Mia on wednesdays and she is a doll; always trying to get into trouble -- paint her nails, draw on the walls, play with scissors, take off her pants, get into Nial's room, or play with mom's makeup. Thursdays I watch Jackson, he is definitely a boy. Trucks running into each other, crashing blocks, running, rolling, motorcycles, wrestling and hard nap time.

I love them to death!

Tomorrow, Nial and I are going on a mini-fishing trip with friends from his work. Should be fun! Except that its raining. And cold. And I don't fish. And I can't really hike. But seriously, I'm planning on having fun! Because camping is great and I like his/our friends and fires and I can enjoy the outdoors, though I'm still not really sure what I'm going to do :) oh well.

My First Blog

Wow! I've never had a blog before, well that I actually took seriously. So we'll see how long I can actually keep this up! Currently, I am watching early election news, applying for school, recoverying from knee surgery. I am living in Snohomish, Washington in the great country of the United States. I am a registered republican and an avid volleyball athlete. My family means a lot to me and I see everyone at least once a week. I babysit my neice and nephew at least once a week and work at a restuarant on the Snohomish River real close to were I live.
I have been with Nial Cluff for nine months (tomorrow :)) and we are very very happy together. He moved up here when I moved back after being in Ashland for a year. He lives with my oldest brother, Jordan and his wife and baby Mia! They live in Monroe, where I grew up and its luckily only about a 6 minute drive. He is working for Snohomish County as a part of an AmeriCorps program. He is technically a "Forest Service Specialist" or something like that... His crew takes care of salmon habitats and native species and helps during times of emergency, like the floods that happen every year. He likes it and is definitely his supervisor's favorite worker.
Wahoo that was more than I even meant to write for this first blog... bon chance!