The Bowen's 2012 Christmas Card

Happy holidays! We just wanted to update everyone we love, and anybody else who cyber stalks us, on how our year went. We meant to finish this earlier and send it out, but Bart has been stricken with Mono and is rendered useless until further notice.

                The year started out great. Megan was in her second semester at the University of Utah and Bart was halfway through his first year of teaching, contemplating his life choices. He soon realized teaching is about 15% inspiring young minds and 85% punishing the little &%$@ who disrupt the class. We regularly argue who is to blame for the bad behavior of these kids. Bart says it’s the parents while Megan says it’s the children.

Our upstairs neighbors and their small yapping dog finally moved out…followed quickly by an even larger more annoying dog. Our apartment adventures have been memorable to say the least. We live in a place invested with dog owners who have no time for their dogs, and so these dogs bark and cry all day long. We regularly dream about giving a bacon sponge to the dog downstairs, but have had self-control so far. This has further encouraged us to start thinking about buying a house, which will hopefully be in next year’s Christmas letter.

We decided to take a vacation in the early spring to California. On our way we discovered a little town where the people are literally outnumbered by livestock 7:1. At this point we were lost on our journey. Bart was willing to stop for directions but there was not a soul to be found and let’s be honest, cows aren’t that friendly.

Angel’s Camp, CA was a great place to vacation….if you’re collecting social security and have a subscription to AARP. We stayed for 4 days. Our trip later took us to San Francisco but we only stayed one day because come on, what would a young couple like us have to do in the “Paris of the West?” After biking from the pier across the Golden Gate bridge and back (which only took us 2 hours), we decided not to stop for lunch to save us money on the rental fees…but Bart was quickly reminded  how Megan gets when she’s hungry, and looking back he would have gladly paid the extra fees. After fighting a herd of retirees for a table at the local chowder shop, we decided to head back to our hotel for a nap (because remember, we’re 80 years old).  We were pleasantly surprised by the location and classiness until we got to our “room” which was really just a bed squeezed into a 5x5 closet and yes, that included the bathroom. We decided to tour the city at night, which left us incredibly lost for a few hours…but we got to see the side of San Fran that few tourists ever get to see.

The summer was an exciting time for us this year. Bart was a coach for Kearns High School Football which meant Megan became very familiar with the bleachers and Bart was socially absent for most of the season. Megan also got her first grown up job as a morning producer for ABC4. We are both feeling very blessed that we have jobs we love. The rest of the summer was spent running. Bart started training for a half marathon and Megan started watching Bart train for a half marathon. He completed it under his goal time and lost 30 pounds in the training process.  

     

We really do live in a great location. We love the area. It’s close to work and more importantly, close to the mall! In an unrelated note we will be pushing back the purchase of a house.

Since Megan is now working full time she’s napping a lot more, but the naps kind of suck since she really hates the couch. Bart however still enjoys taking naps as often as possible.

Many things happened in the political world and Bart was so happy to announce that this was “our first election in love”. A very exciting time in the Bowen household! In other social news….Megan thinks it’s stupid that women are wearing pants to church to send a message. Bart was all for supporting it except his disability prevented him from realizing his “purple” tie was blue.

Megan is still a student and finds joy in going to class (HA!) She finally learned how to spell available and resturaunt….resturant…restarount? Moving on…        

    

                During this season of giving Bart wants an iPad for Christmas and Megan wants new couches. But hey, we don’t always get what we want right? Just two days into Bart’s Christmas break he finds out he has mono and should be resting for the next 3 weeks. Bart is keeping busy by taking pictures of his nasty infected tonsils and sending them to random family members. On the plus side we have plenty of pudding, applesauce and soup in the house.

                All jokes aside, Merry Christmas everyone! We have missed our friends who have moved away, and enjoy living so close to our families. We are truly blessed and during this time of year we are grateful for our happy and fulfilling lives. We wish all of you the best and a Happy New Year!