Uncle Kason and Aunt Sara

Being an uncle or an aunt is a pretty cool gig because you don't really have to do any work, but you get a lot of fringe benefits. Sara and I had the good fortune of gaining said title twice in 2007. The first was my sister Alisa and her husband Chad's little baby, Emery. He came in February during the Olympics and I had no idea that it would feel so cool to hold my nephew. It helped a lot that he was a very cute little baby. There was a big shin dig over at my folks' house in April, with the sun all shiny and the food all tasty. When their family came to visit us last year (those pictures are forth coming) Emery and I had a ball playing on, around, above and below the airport escalators. He's two years old now, and I still don't know where all that time went.

We were once again rendered Uncle and Aunt when little Annie Brown came our way in September. She's the daughter of Sara's sister Jennifer and her husband Nathen. Annie is so named because her parents' first date was to see the play Annie. We were going to follow the same naming convention with Zoe, but the name Shrek didn't really seem to suit her. Perhaps we should have gone with Donkey. Only a few days after we had gotten to know little Annie, we were on our way out to Wisconsin. We set a picture of her on the dashboard as we made our way through the plains of South Dakota and Minnesota. We really miss Annie, but the web cam helps a lot. We get to hear her say "Hi hi hi" and she is very good at mooing at us.

I really feel like having these two little sweeties come when they did was an assurance to us from on high that kids aren't anywhere near as scary, sticky and smelly as we once thought. Or at least, when they are you love them enough to see through the sticky and see your own flesh and blood who love and trust you fully. And then, you just don't want to ever mess with that trust. But those are all word for some future blog, there's plenty of baby a brewin'. Thanks Alisa and Chad and Jennifer and Nathen for letting us share some of those special times with your babies!!