30 June 2011

dia



has anyone been watching the voice?? spencer and i watched every espisode! we couldn't get enough. we loved the top 3 girls! bev reminded me of melissa etheridge, spencer and i LOVED vicci (she was spencer's choice) and i was rooting for dia all the way (pictured right, xenia left my second favorite). what was your favorite performance?


mine? dia and blake singing tom petty's "i wont back down", spencer vicci's "dog days are over"


much love,


us in sitka

28 June 2011

look familiar

we found the totem that is in the header of our blog!



we got that picture in the header before we moved to sitka.



spencer and i played a good game of frisbee here in totem park
we loved the totems and all the intriguing designs

we're still a little scared to walk through the national forrest

we might just run into a bear.




we love it here in sitka. the scenery is to die for. spencer likes to get out and see more of the lusciousness of sitka while hiking and being active. i'm not really into hiking here, although i have been with spencer this week. here in sitka they don't zig zag up the mountain, they just build stairs that walk you straight up the mountain!! it's funny how scared we are of meeting a big brown bear, we are all big eyed and creeping up the mountain while the local sitkans here just blaze right past us. i'm not really into getting eating by a bear after all. the last hike we went on we packed arizona teas and two snickers. then while we were resting on a bridge i pulled out my snickers and starting snacking away. i looked over to spencer who was starring at me with some very concerned eyes i asked "what's wrong?" he just shook his head and told me that he hoped the bears didn't smell the snickers i was savoring. then we got scared, turned around and headed home!






more from the sitka swalberg's later.






xo,



olivia






p.s. we buy lunch from these two 11 year old adorable boys jake and jack who run a reindeer dog stand (hot dogs made from deer meat) by our store. today we were cleaning our apartment when the two little rascals just walked right in our house! so i put them to work! they are the cutest boys, we just love them. spencer wrestled them up for an hour while i did the laundry... boys just always have more fun.

27 June 2011

18.june.11

austin and vanessa

austin with his mom and dad
vanessa with the parents

austin and his mama

just married

the beautiful bride



the gang sans spencer :( i am so happy to get the little brother i never had. i love my little big brother! austin, you are in for plenty of wedgies, noogies, pantsings... prepare youself!

25 June 2011

austin

i was very fortunate this past weekend to fly in and see these two get married, it was truly a beautiful day. today austin gets baptized my eyes fill with tears of pride and happiness as i write these words. austin has a heart of gold. he is the best listener, isn't listening a lost art these days? well he's got the art. once he over heard emily and jon saying that they needed baby wipes for baby ashy and without a second thought he went and got them about 5 giant packages of baby wipes. not only does he listen but he is genuinely kind and generous. austin would give you the shirt off his back and more if he could. austin looks you in the eyes when you talk to him. austin is very comforting, his big eyes and gentle smile are enough to melt anyone's sadness away. austin loves the movie tangled, doesn't that phrase speak a million words? i love how motivated austin is and such a hard worker. austin can not fail because he works too hard. i am sad to miss this big day, but i have 100% confidence in not only austin but vanessa as well.


"remember the worth of souls is great in the sight of God. and if it so be that you should labor all your days in crying repentance unto this people, and bring, save it be one soul unto me, how great shall be your joy with him in the kingdom of my Father! and now, if your joy will be great with one soul that you have brought unto me in the kingdom of my Father, how great will be your joy if you should bring many souls unto me!" d&c 18:10, 15-16


the proud big sissy,

olivia

24 June 2011

Eyefone

mine and spencer's phone contract expired with t-mobile. so we walked over to the at&t store across the street (the only cell phone store in sitka) and walked away with shiny new iphones! we are in love. the funny thing is spencer was the one wanting the free phone and i talked him into getting an iphone the next thing i know he is on it 157 times more than me! he is over in the corner watching skateboarding videos laughing and having the time of his life while i'm downloading mobile banking apps, hahaha! that's always how it goes right? men just have more fun.




it's official we have 907 phone numbers, xtratufs...

we're sitkans



cheers,

spencer and olivia

21 June 2011

the weddin




i surprised vanessa and austin (along with the WHOLE family, sans kimmie) and flew in for the big weddin! i flew out of sitka on wednesday night and did the "milk run" where you take about every flight you can in alaska then out of anchorage i flew 5 hours to SLC. eloria picked me up from the airport bless her soul, i love her, and took me to alli's house. i loved everyone's different reactions when they saw me. alli thought i was her reflection (haha) my dad and alexis thought the big surprise was maddie going to be a big sister when my mom asked them what surprise they thought maddie had. vanessa was speechless, so was austin.



oh their wedding! what a glorious day! i was in charge of army sargenting the wedding line. i cued them in on beat and it went awesome after a couple of run throughs the night before. alexis, eloria, emily and i decorated the honeymooners suite and it was SOOO gorgeous, nicely tucked up in the mountains of park city. the wedding day was a breeze, vanessa looked so gorgeous and didn't even need the little make up sesh we had together, austin looked straight GQ, such a handsome couple. austin's grandma said the prayer and it was perfect. they walked down the isle to "marry me" by train and the theme song to "tangled" it was the perfect wedding mood music. i even cried. the ceremony was beautiful and simple.



eloria and nick came up and off went the clothes and we threw our swim suits on and partied in the pool. we had the greatest time. a swim party reception with your closest friends is the way to go. man we had so much fun, squirting each other in the ears with water noodles, sliding across the pool on the blow up aligator, and just celebrating the new couple. and not to mention the food was to die for.



my dad didn't have a heart attack this go around he just managed to drop the trailer hitch on his ankle by the achillies tendon and cut it out like an ice cream scoop. eloria and i rushed him to the hospital and there he got internal and external stitches to mend his poor ankle, it was pretty gnarly with his achillies tendon all exposed. but a nice pei wei dinner can always lift lowry's spirits, so we did just that.



i went to the chalk festival at the gateway with the gang. i put a head massager on maddie while she was standing in front of a pole and she crouched away from me and hit her head so hard on the pole, she never cries but it was sure sad. we ended the night with a little seranading by nickolav, he played his guitar and sang for us and i think even cody thought his deep country voice was pretty nice! those two, elora and nick are quite the couple.



although my stay was short and exciting i was ready to come home to my beautiful husband. it was the first time in my life where going somewhere other than my mom's house felt like going home. we loved each other all night long (ow ow) and worked like dogs all day today. we had our biggest day in sales today and it felt pretty dang good. life is sweet. there is so much to be grateful for. i am happy.





so true. xo, olive p.s. i thought spence would do some "surprise" posts on the blog but i guess he's just not that into it.

17 June 2011

if spencer blogged he would have blogged about...

our hike to heart lake



looks like 9th grade cheerleading gave me some pretty good posing skills. danielle with her baby camryn on her back, spencer and i hiked up to heart lake. it was like a movie, the scenery was to die for. this is the place to go swimming in sitka, wouldn't that be a magical dip?

the accident

this photo of olivia was taken moments before the accident. my life will never be the same, now that i am a burn victim. i burned the crap out of my hands removing the lid off that steaming pot. at 1130 at night i had to run to the grocery store for some burn gel and sleeping aids, without which i may have not slept for days because of the excruciating pain. the pot stickers were still good though. and i miss that adorable lady cooking (olivia added that part).

love spencer.

16 June 2011

he went to russels





my first carharts and xtratufs. spencer told me i better get myself a pair of xtratufs so i can show them off in utah. he is the greatest, i can't stop smiling.

14 June 2011

i wanna be xtratuf


i want a pair of xtratufs so bad i can taste it





like today when it started pouring i really coulda used em




sitka has a style and xtratufs are in






oh i just love them
almost as much as former dr, aspiring actor tobias funke. liz you are right the combination of tobias and gob with a little squirt of george michael can really cure a homesick heart. it's gotta be the teamocil. it's 949 and still light outside so spence and i are goin for a little walk. xo. liv

11 June 2011

mustard, charcoal, a splash of robin's egg blue tea pots, dr suess flowers & sweets














aren't they so lovely? i had almost forgotten how beautiful the 18.nov.10 was. these are my forever treasures. xoxo

garage selling

danielle took me garage selling today. it's pretty big in sitka.

we went to about 7 different houses, these were my two glorious finds.
& for two bucks spencer was pretty stoked.



the humidity here makes my hair curl like this after i round brush it dry. it's pretty sweet, my hair is getting so super long. i usually throw it up in a big bun on top of my noggin but it always feels so nice to brush it out once in awhile.

vanessa gets married one week from today, i'm so sad we're going to miss it. i know it's going to be so beautiful her bridals should be in a magazine and the engagements are so handsome (i was so jealous) her and austin are making one great team. i am so proud of those two. i'm so sad that i didn't get our nail polish that changes from silver to red before we sold out to send so all the girls could wear it. that would have been sweet. life is so good right now.


i love my family. i miss them dearly, what am i gonna do with out spencer for 6 weeks in sept? probably buy the next two seasons of arrested development.


much love,

livtown


09 June 2011

out on the water with charlie

we had to make a tough decision tonight between watching the NBA finals & going out to sea.


at sea we went, with live updates from kimmie of course
plus, i think this kid is the cutest thing in sitka. charlie is the man.









p.s. GO MAVS!!

07 June 2011

the video that finally uploaded

i hope it is worth the wait.




arent the crying eagles just a spectale? love, spencer

thanks man

i threw up about 7 times last night while spencer stood by the toilet eating his dinner and laughing and cheering me on like "woah" and "oh my!" yeah, you read that right he ate his dinner in the bathroom watching me throw up, when i looked up with my blood shot eyes and gasped "how can you be eating that and looking at this?" he simply replied "oh, i don't get grossed out over things like that" i offically dubbed spencer cleaner of our children's throw up, best day ever.

love,
olivia and the guy who likes throw up

p.s. don't worry i just ate too many cry baby bubble gums and ramen noodles in one day.

the nuisance bears at the end of the road

in sitka there is a little sanctuary called "fortress of the bear" they acquire "nuisance" bears from sitka and other parts of alaska and they teach them some manners. for starters eating out of the garbage is not very good etiquette & stealing fisherman's caught fish is not very nice.
they have found these bears downtown sitka, at sea mart, in backyards eating everything.

even though they are nuisance bears they are so so cute, i've always had a thing for the under dogs & the rebels.

this guy "baloo" dug this hole for about 10 minutes then just shimmied right in a took a nap.

this big guy is 4.5 years old, when the fortress caught him he only weighed about 10 lbs. now he weighs in at a whopping 850lbs and stands 8.5 feet tall and not full grown yet.

he was a little camera shy and his buddy only poked his head out of a little room he was in for about 2.3 seconds. we got to the fortress right at about nap time so they were all a little sleepy.

there was a mini horse that was well fed and it's belly almost dragged along the ground.

new baby goats, only one week old. i think they look like weiner dogs, i just can't take them seriously.

"toby" who is a girl bear (so i will call her truvy, way more girly) showed off all her sweet tricked for us. she climbed up this stump and waved at us. truvy totaly stole my heart.

when she got to the top she started smelling around in the air, it was so awesome. i wanted to curl up in her fur coat. in sitka there are 120 brown bears per 100 square miles, scary huh.



spencer caught just the end of her wave, so it looks like she is taking a bow. we loved her.
that's it folks. the end of sawmill creek & the end of the 14 mile road system in sitka. it was such a beautiful day. lightly misting through the cool crisp air, little islands off in the gigantic deep blue, mossy oak surrounding our world, we've found a little piece of the shire here in sitka a little piece to store away in our hearts to keep forever and always.


xo. liv