Guess Who's Having a Birthday!

My baby sister turned the big THREE OH today. Here are 30 reasons why I absolutely love being her sister:

1. She has the best sense of humor and is extremely funny. She always makes me laugh, coming up with things I just don't expect.
2. She is BRILLIANT! I wish I was as smart as Jessica! She can still recite the Canterbury Tales in old English (something she memorized MANY years ago). Her head is full of interesting trivia, but she also has deeper understandings of very difficult subjects. I love learning from her.
3. She never ceases to amaze me. For instance, last year she graduated in Near Eastern Studies. She learned the spoken and written language of Arabic, the culture and geography of the Middle Eastern countries (historical to present), how to decipher Egyptian hieroglyphics, etc. That is an achievement in and of itself, but Jessica recently lost most of her hearing and she went through this program anyway! She had an entourage of people helping her along the way (note takers, interpreters, and a student aid to help with learning how the Arabic sounds feel). I am not sure if I could have done the same!
4. She learns languages extremely quickly. She learned American Sign Language in less than a year, then started teaching ASL 101 and 102 at our local community college for a couple of years.
   
5. She is very artistic. Jessica draws, paints, sculpts, writes, etc. Jessica recently made me the most beautiful and precious thing: a 5 Generation Chart! She wrote all my ancestors names in calligraphy. I had it framed and have it hanging in a prominent location in my house.
6. She loves to read. She once told me she read almost all the novels in the local library. She is always devouring a good book. She even enjoys the books I don't like to read...the ones where you have to use a dictionary to understand.
   
7. Going on with the last one: She enjoys learning new words. Don't play her at word games, because she will win!
8. She is very talented. She has many talents and loves to learn new things. A couple years ago she picked up the hobby of knitting. She has knitted many beautiful things, including hats and scarves. I am a proud owner of one of her scarves. She actually started and finished it on our 32 hour drive from SV to Seattle, WA for our Alaskan Cruise. She recently told me she finished a hat she knitted for my mom with using BBQ skewers (she forgot her knitting needles at her apartment in Tucson). She can also knit, watch TV, and read closed captioning at the same time. Very multi-talented!
9. She is an AWESOME cook and baker! Everything she makes is amazing. She loves to try new recipes and experiment with old ones. She makes the most delicious fudge you will ever try (but this is a Christmas treat, so we can only enjoy her fudge once a year).
10. She is a fun travel companion! We had a blast together on our Alaskan cruise in July of 2006.
11. She is very thoughtful. Jessica recently stayed at my house while she was in town for Thanksgiving. She cleaned my kitchen and washed my dishes more than I did! She even cooked me breakfast a couple of times.
12. She is very generous! She would feed the missionaries or the sick in her branch with a very yummy meal, then eat Ramen for the rest of the week before she got paid again to go grocery shopping.
    
13. She is eager to help! She gives of her time and talents to anyone who needs assistance! She is currently helping my aunt transcribe the journals of our grandma, which is an extremely large project because my grandma wrote extensive journals.
14. She is very caring! She is always concerned for her family...if we are sick, if we are in need of help, if we have problems at work, if we have other health issues, etc. She would drop everything and come help us if we need her too.
15. She attends the temple as often as she can. She usually tries to go once a month with her deaf branch for the ASL session.
16. She has a strong spirit and knows the gospel extremely well. I am amazed at her insight and understanding.
17. She is willing to go to Costco, Trader Joes, Ulta, or other stores that are in Tucson and not in Sierra Vista if we need her to. She once bought $200 worth of paper products for the SV Stake Young Women presidency to help us restock our closet. Jessica filled her cart to the brim, stuffed her car, and stored all the goods under her dining room table until someone could go get them from her.
    
18. She is very supportive of her friends and family. We can always count on her to be our cheerleader!
19. She always has our back!
20. She is the perfect sister.
21. She has great tastes in movies and and often recommends really cool (or cute) foreign films, such as Lagaan (India), Shaolin Soccer (China), Train Man (Japan), The Tunnel (Germany), etc.
    
22. She can always find really cool and unique things at stores. I enjoy looking at all her decorations at her apartment. And she always gives cool gifts for birthdays and Christmas.
23. She has a great sense of style. She always looks really classy. She's had to teach me a thing or two...like how to tie a pashmina around my neck.
24. She can do ANYTHING! If she puts her mind to it, she can develop any talent, do any job, and learn any skill. Like I said before, she is BRILLIANT!
25. She doesn't let her challenges in life overcome her. She has the courage to charge ahead even though she is faced with unbelievably hard trials in life.
26. She is patient (most of the time :) with our family as we struggle to learn Sign Language. She has learned that language SO WELL now and she continues to help us learn new words or remember the ones we forgot.
27. She has many angels watching over her, and she herself is an angel on earth watching over her friends and family.
28. She loves to travel and if she could she would travel the world meeting new people, learning about their cultures, tasting their food and learning how to cook it, enjoying the sights, and learning the history of the different countries.
29. She is extremely trustworthy! If she says she'll do something, she will do it, and will do it better than you expect.
30. She is very loyal. She will not go back on a promise and she expects others to do the same.

You can see why we love having Jessica in our family. She adds so much and we would not be the same without her.

I LOVE YOU, JESSICA!!

Happy Birthday!

Enjoy some random pictures of Jessica through the ages:

Jesse as Mary in our Family Christmas Pageant


Our family standing in four states at once: Four Corners, USA

At Nauvoo

Graduating from Brownies

"So this is snow?" - Arizona winter of 1989

Jesse loved to take naps in our mom's newly laundered clothes

Even at age 7, Jesse loved earrings. She still does.

Dressing up for Halloween

While trying to dunk our dad in the tank, Jesse ran so fast up to the lever,
she slipped and fell right through the tarp wall. She did manage to dunk him as she gracefully fell, though. :o)

Posing by my HS graduation present. Jesse loved that pink hat.
She got it as a gift from a friend. We always thought it looked like a toilet bowl cover. :o)

Jesse was in drama in HS. She was in many plays and did a lot of stage
management behind the scenes. This was posing in our driveway before one of her plays.

We took a quick trip to California one year to go with our aunts,
uncles, and cousins to The Price Is Right. What a blast!

On top of Snow Bowl in Flagstaff, AZ. Isn't my sister simply beautiful!!