Molly Grace Shearrer

I am so excited that my very first niece, Molly, arrived at 4:25 pm on January 3, 2012! We have all been patiently waiting her arrival, most of all, Amy, Clifton, and big brother Layton. I still can't believe she weighed 9 lbs 6 oz and was 22 in long. I was so blessed to get to go on Wednesday and see her while they were still in the hospital.

I couldn't believe how much she looked like Layton yet had some similar features to Amy as a baby. I enjoyed getting to cuddle and love on her while Clifton did some work on his computer and Amy enjoyed getting her neck and back massage (one of the lovely perks of North Central Baptist Hospital in San Antonio) :) I was able to have lunch with Amanda, Layton, and Tricia before heading back one last time to say bye to everyone at the hospital and make my way back to College Station. I am so glad I got to see her when she was still so new and I can't wait to go see her again and for Daniel and the kids to get to meet her next weekend!!

Christmas 2011 at Home

Saturday, on Christmas Eve, we enjoyed an awesome lunch in Pleasanton and then headed back to College Station. My parents, grandparents, and my brother came in that night to enjoy Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, and the day after. We went to Christmas Eve service at our church and it was beautiful. I especially love to attend services on Christmas because there is so much joy in the air it seems like just celebrating Jesus's birth and the season. We didn't plan dinner too well that night and the only thing open was Dominos so we enjoyed some pizza after the services were over.

The next day I had a big lunch planned of brisket, potato salad, Daniel's famous beans, and for dessert some of Jim's leftover Milky Way Pie (YUM). We had a really lazy morning just enjoying the kids opening their gifts and playing with all their new toys. We enjoyed watching a movie that afternoon while the kids were napping and then we had some visitors later that evening to end out a really fun day.

The next day as much as I wasn't ready to, everyone helped take down my Christmas decorations , and my mom and I did a little after Christmas shopping. We were able to find some great deals on organization stuff for the playroom (which I am SO glad I cleaned out before Christmas because it is overflowing once more with all the new gifts) and some other fun goodies for ourselves. I'm so glad that we were able to enjoy this time with ALL of our family and I hope that we can continue to do it this way every year!

Christmas 2011 in Pleasanton

We headed down to Pleasanton to celebrate Christmas with everyone the Thursday before Christmas Eve. Daniel had a meeting on that Friday so it worked out for us to go down on Thursday so we could spend an extra day there. We decided a long time ago that once we had children and they were old enough to understand, that we wanted to celebrate Christmas morning at home as a family. We really enjoyed our couple of days there and as jam packed as they were we wouldn't have had it any other way.

It is so rare for a family of this size to really truly get along and enjoy each other's company as much as we all do. It is also rare that we are all able to get together at one time. It was so nice just hanging out and doing nothing but catching up and reminiscing about old times. I hope that we always enjoy getting together and I really hope that our children all grow up to do the same. It's a little crazy to think that Christmas next year, we will be adding 2 more kiddos to the bunch!

Cooper's First Movie

A few weeks ago, the movie Arthur Christmas came out and all my girlfriends were taking their older children to see it. I have never tried to take Cooper to a movie before but I decided it was about time. We all pitched in for a babysitter for the younger ones and headed out to the theater. I had really pumped Cooper up about the movie and how it was kind of a little date for he and mommy and he seemed really excited about it. We got our drink, fruit snacks, and popcorn and settled in.

This excitement all lasted about 20 minutes....at most. After the fruit snacks were gone, he told me the popcorn was "disgusting", and he refused a drink of my soda, we had to leave :( I was really hoping that he would love the movies as much as I do but sadly I think he's going to be more like his daddy. There's still hope for Kyleigh........

Kids Decorating and Santa's Wonderland

As you all probably all ready noticing, we had a very VERY busy December. I normally put my tree up the day after Thanksgiving and this year it just didn't seem to work out. I had the tree out around that time but it was definitely not decorated until a few weeks later. I have to say that part of me enjoyed just having the beautiful lit tree out even with no decorations. I love Christmas and sometimes it's the simple things that really make the holiday special.

We enjoyed decorating the tree this year with a little help from our little people. I have to say that this is a big deal for me to relinquish my tree over to others because it's something I take a lot of time doing and I like for it to be just perfect. I know that it sounds a little crazy and sort of neurotic but it's just me...what can I say? I really enjoyed getting to watch the kids get excited about getting the ornaments out and putting them on the tree and we had a relatively easy time keeping them from completely demolishing the work after it was finished. The best part I think was seeing them covered in glitter after it was all done.....I probably could've chosen something a little less messy to work with don't you think?

The Thursday night before the week of Christmas we took the kids through Santa's Wonderland here in College Station. It's a huge display with over 1 million lights that you can drive through. It's something I really wanted to do last year but we just never got around to doing it during one of their off-peak nights. Those are the only times you can drive your own car through. We caught it this year just 2 days before the peak nights started and we had a great time even if the kids don't quite get the whole magic of lights at Christmastime. I know one day they will remember it and I hope that we can keep the tradition going each year.

Molly's Baby Shower

I helped host 2 baby showers back to back the first 2 weekends of December. The first was for my friend, Brooke, who's having a sweet baby boy in February. I can't believe she only has a few more weeks to go! Can't wait to meet Baby Easton! The second weekend I helped host a baby shower for Amy and my new niece Molly. I am so very excited for Kyleigh that she will now have a friend to play with and grow up with. I have loved watching Layton and Cooper grow up together so much because they are so close in age. They are like best friends and I only hope that Molly and Kyleigh will grow up to be best friends too!

Amy has always done so much for all of us when it comes to showers and pretty much anything so the very least we could do was try and go all out for her. And I think we accomplished it pretty well! My poor friend Juli who offered to have the shower at her house came down with strep throat the night before the shower so we had to improvise a bit and ended up having the shower at Amy and Clifton's house! I don't think Amy minded too much since she was able to show off the nursery and she didn't have to transport the gifts from one house to another. I am also so glad that we were able to wait and have the shower after Amanda came home from Africa! I think Amy really enjoyed the shower and I hope Molly is now enjoying all her new pretty things!

Family Pictures 2011

Back in October, we took family pictures. It was our first time to get pictures as a whole complete family since Kyleigh was born. Ashley Canfield, that took Amanda and Jerrod's engagement, bridal, and some wedding photos, came over from Austin to do the session. I was so thankful to her for driving all that way and especially just after moving from Houston to Leander with her family of 7!! She did an amazing job and I wish that I could post all of them on the blog but lets face it, it would bore everyone and there's not enough room to go crazy. Enjoy!

Thanksgiving 2011

This year for Thanksgiving, we traveled to Winnsboro to spend time with my family. I can't remember if I mentioned this in prior posts but my dad was involved in a freak accident where he got hit in his right temple with a golf ball. It was a really scary time for all of us but I am so thankful to God that he is doing fine now. It happened back in October and I didn't see him until Thanksgiving. It was kind of surreal because when I finally saw him I felt as though he looked like "my dad" and not like he had been in any kind of accident. I know in talking to my mom over the weeks that he looked pretty rough for awhile so it was probably better that I saw him when I did rather than when he looked so awful.

We really enjoyed our time seeing everyone and even though the Aggies lost to Texas (it's still painful saying that) I'm hoping that next year will find our Aggies in a much better position all the way around with some new talent and a new coach. Sadly, I took no pictures and haven't gotten any from my mom so maybe I'll post some pictures later.....

Kyleigh is 18 months!

Kyleigh turned 18 months back in November. To even say that she has reached the 18 month milestone is hard enough, but then you think about that being only 1/2 year more to age 2. She is my little inquisitive girl. She is still into absolutely everything and she's still eating us out of house and home. I am so thankful that she is still eating such a variety of foods because by this time Cooper had long ago gotten rid of veggies and fruit of any kind. Thankfully he is picking those back up now a bit.

She weighs about 26 lbs now which puts her in the 70% for weight and she's our little tall girl at 33 1/2 in which puts her in the 90% for height. She says so many words these days I can't keep up. She talks so much more than Cooper did because she has someone to mimic at all times. Her newest saying has been to tell us what she wants and then say "okay"....instead of saying "please". She's always keeping us laughing and it really the most joyful little girl. I do have to mention that we are beginning to see the "terrible twos" rear their ugly head. She is starting to throw some little fits but nothing too serious....yet. I really hope we can try to get through these terrible twos relatively unscathed but I won't get my hopes up too high because we've all ready been down this road before......