You give birth to them - and then they leave.

That's what it feels like anyway.  You know what they say about time flying.... 

Drew is getting married - yep, leaving the nest.  He's engaged to cute, tiny, Rachel Shirey, a girl from right here in North Texas.  The big day will be March 28, 2009 in the Dallas Texas Temple.  We are excited for them!  

They asked me to take some photos of them, and though I'm not really a photographer, though I aspire to be and am working on it (thanks for the ideas Angela), we all headed to Arbor Hills Nature Preserve in Plano for a photo shoot.  In the spring and summer it's a really pretty place. Not so much in January.  We made the best of it and had a great time!  

They look pretty cute together, don't they?

Wonder why they are smiling so much?

Of course Drew is still Drew.  Here is his Pee Wee Herman face! 

We had some pretty good laughs, too!

What do you think?  Is he marriage material?  Think long and hard, Rachel.

He's still my little boy...

In the end, we got some great shots.

And then headed home!

I've got to get this off my list....

I'm feeling too much anxiety over not posting anything about our wonderful Christmas Eve and Christmas Day festivities.  The perfectionist Karen wants to do a really cool montage of photos to add to the post.... time intensive.  The Karen dying to come out wants to just move on with the events of the day.  Soooo, the Karen's have come to a bit of a compromise and "we" will just post, in the ordinary fashion, a few of "our" favorite photos of Christmas past.

Enjoy.

We (especially Molly) love to have our good friend, Chris spend Christmas Eve with us.  

Ashley and Sam

Fun with Fondue!!  We've had Fondue on Christmas Eve for as long as I can remember.  We added chocolate fondue for dessert several years ago.

We wear out the old people!

Santa makes an early delivery on Christmas Eve!

This is what he brings!

(The PJs, not the gangsta kids)

The wait on Christmas morning.  Dad, are you ready??

Jon's favorite gift, the Kindle.  Karen is so smart.

Santa heard the plea of both Molly and Will!  

Lucy is the black, white and zebra print queen this year!

Christmas dinner was casual, yet delicious this year.  Notice various members of the family still in their PJs!!

Karen's favorite gift was having Parker home for Christmas!

And here are a few shots of some of our favorite post-Christmas activities!

Our traditional bowling game was super fun at the black light bowling alley!

Molly was awesome with the handy-dandy ramp!  No bumpers, though!

Parker had fun, too!

Lucy wins the prize for the coolest shoes.  Orange flames with green glow laces!

Seeing the Christmas lights is another fun tradition.  This year we went to Highland Park and to Frisco Square where the lights are synchronized to music.  And our street was pretty, too!

We had lots of fun and made great memories together shopping, wrapping, party throwing and party going, singing, playing, bathing babies, catching up with friends through visits and cards and most of all, sharing in the joy of celebrating the birth of our Savior, Jesus Christ.  

Family Portrait Session

A few days before Christmas, while everyone was home, we ventured outside for a family portrait.  Since Texas isn't the most beautiful spot on the planet in December, we had a difficult time deciding on a location.  We ended up in Downtown McKinney, which has a darling little square full of boutiques and antique stores.  I've only seen a few of the shots so far, but will go next week for a look at all of them.  The photographer (Marquette) who took our great shots last year couldn't take us during the time we were all together, so she referred us to her friend Angela Majerus! Angela was great to squeeze us in at Christmas time and spend 2 hours with us.  We had so much fun laughing and playing around.  She posted a preview on her blog. (click on the word blog to see it) There are some cute shots.  I especially LOVE the ones of my wonderful parents. They look amazing and are in such great health.  I'm so glad they came along! Take a look, if you'd like.  I can't wait to see them all.

One Last Bit of Excitement for 2008

I really wanted to end 2008 with a bang, but I think I went too far!  Actually, though it wasn't as much a bang as it was a "THUNK"!!  I was preparing an awesome dinner (Rachael Ray's South by Southwest Sliders and oven fries) for my really great family and slicing some sweet onions to caramelize, when the amazingly sharp knife slipped off the onion and right into my index finger. YIKES!  Sudden bursts of pain and blood surged simultaneously and I was done.  I'm a total wimp and can't do blood.  After the color returned to my face and I wiped the clammy sweat from my forehead (thanks for your help Mom and Dad) our super-duper-Doctor-friend-neighbor made a New Years Eve house call (thanks, Karl) and fixed me up.  He told me I didn't need stitches and was lucky I hadn't severed the important nerve - it has a more technical name, but my head was down on the kitchen table when he said the name of it and I don't remember.  So, no multi hour wait in the ER.  No needles.  Woo hoo!  Even though I can't bend it, probably can't work on my knitting project for a few days, can't type very well and can't get it wet, I'm lucky it's my left hand, and my sweet husband and great parents have stepped in and finished making dinner and will take over what I can't do.                                                                                 

Photos. . .

Awesome bandaging job.

Jon made me a splint from a popsicle stick - which we amazingly had sitting on the kitchen counter from Molly making cookies on a stick a couple days ago!!

The patient is resting quietly.

More Small Town Perks

Like we've said before, we are really enjoying living in a small town.  On Christmas Eve, we opened our community newspaper, The Prosper Press to find this.....

That's our house.  Prosper has a Christmas Lights Contest every year.  The story was it was too hard to choose just one winner, so they included photos of all their favorites. There were three houses from our street!  The sad part about ours is they didn't even get the beautiful and HUGE lit wreath on our driveway gate in the photo!  It's the BEST part! Maybe I'll go out and take a picture tonight and get the wreath.

Thanks, Prosper Press!  

It Was A Merry Month!

2008 has been a wonderfully eventful year.  It's fitting that we wrapped it up with a wonderful Christmas season.  Here are some highlights.

Karen's Mom and Dad arrived mid month and are staying a whole month.  They are blessed to be in such good health and we enjoy having them in our home.   Dad turned 80 this year and Mom isn't too far behind.  Don't they look great?

We hosted our annual Chili and Chowder party in our new home!  We loved having old friends from Plano and our new Prosper friends all together.  The food was de-lish and the company was even better!

Our great neighbor Mike Koster and the Morleys, new church friends.

Prosper church friends the Platts and the Fergusons.

Long time Plano friends Rhoberta Blankmeyer, George and Heather Nail and Cindy Bell

Ashley had fun visiting with college roomate Kristin Willardson and her sister Jenny.

On Christmas Eve, we headed for the mall for our traditional kids photo with Santa.  We've done this since Ashley's first Christmas.  There are a few more people in the photo and for the first time, a second generation is included.  Parker was remarkably cooperative!  We actually had a harder time getting everyone else to pay attention and smile.  

The photo Karen took looks pretty good, too!

Will and Molly looking picture perfect!

The professional image - pretty good looking family, I think.  Nice socks, Santa!

Everyone had a great time!

After the photo, we all (except for Drew who had to go back to work) headed to the Original Pancake House for a yummy breakfast - Breakfast AFTER Santa.

Molly's Swedish Pancakes were as big as she is!!

Ashley and Sam

Grandpa Jon and Ashley

Beautiful Lucy and Adorable Molly

Perfectly adorable Parker!

We had a fun visit with an old friend from Karen's YW Prez days.  Charlie Thiot served on Stake Youth Committee, along with Ashley.  He's married now and has a really cute (and itty bitty) daughter, Keelie.  I managed to only take pictures of the babies. 

The standoff.

We also were able to celebrate in other ways of which we didn't get photos - school parties, a choir concert, an ornament painting party, seeing Christmas lights in Highland Park, playing games and visiting with each other.  We've had a wonderful time with family and friends and appreciate so much all who add so much to our lives.  

Up next - Christmas Eve and Christmas Day....

Meet Miss Sally Brown!

Lucy recently auditioned for the Prosper High School production of "You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown".  With only six parts in the whole show, there was some serious competition.  But guess what?  She got a lead!  Very impressive for a Freshman.

So, may I introduce, Miss Sally Brown.

Way to go, Lucy!