February Update

The blog has definitely been neglected for a while!  I doubt anyone even reads it any more!! But, I do plan to use this as a journal for the girls and Ryan...so here goes our crazy February!

The girls and Daddy went to the Daddy Daughter Dance at church. They had fun there while Ryan and I hung out with Missy, Maddie and the twins.



Mommy's Valentines!  Ryan really does love the girls, even if it doesn't look like it!

The weather was SO nice on Valentine's Day, so I took pictures of all the kids out at Lolly's house.   

Precious Easton! 8 1/2 months old here

Biggest Sister Landrie with Ryan

Middle Sister Karsyn with Ryan
(had to make her pic black and white to hide the Cheeto mouth! haha!)

Easton and Ryan looking so sweet and innocent.  2 seconds later, Easton pounded on Ryan's head...just a preview of what's to come I'm sure! :)

2 months old and first smile caught on camera
2 month stats:
14 lbs., 24 inches

Christmas Part 2 - Visiting Santa

We went to visit a very special Santa when Ryan was 6 days old.  He is the grandfather of one of my parents' foster babies.  He has been the Santa at Willowbend Mall for several years, so we took the kids out there to meet him.  It was such a neat experience.  Mrs. Claus was waiting for us when we got there and kept checking on us in line.  The girls thought it was so neat that she knew them by name!  Both Santa and Mrs. Claus told us over and over how they had prayed for our family through the years and how special it was to meet us.  We can't wait to go back again next year!!


A few pictures at Lolly's before we went to the mall...the girls are such good BIG sisters!!

Talking with the Ice Princess before we met Santa

Mrs. Claus with the girls inside the Ice Castle.

My sweet babies with Santa

Christmas 2011 - Part 1

Christmas this year was unlike any other we've had.  We got the best present ever on December 15 when Ryan was born, so what could top that!!!

Sweet Ryan 3 days old - after his 1st bath

We still celebrated quite a bit though and had a great break.

Our first celebration was our 3rd Annual Tacky Christmas party with all of our aunts, uncles and cousins.  Every year it gets crazier and crazier!!  We all come up with the tackiest costumes, bring white elephant gifts and casseroles to share. 

The 3 newest babies asleep during our Tacky Christmas Party - Brooks, Ryan and Brody

The "Tacky" Kids

Top 3 Boys - Kyle, Justin & Sergio

Top 3 Girls - Kelly, Kyndra & Ellen

Coach with Ryan and Easton

Our Tacky Family Photo - Ryan is 3 days old

I'll have to post more later...I took over 300 pictures during our break!  Wow!

2 Week Check Up

Since my blog will end up being my "baby book" I wanted to update Ryan's stats from his appointment today.

Ryan had his 2 week check-up today at 19 days old.

He was 9 lbs. 11 oz (67%) and 22 inches (84%) - a BIG BOY!!  He gained over a pound since his last weight check at 4 days old. 

He's taking 3.5 oz of formula every 4 hours, except at bedtime when he wants an extra bottle after about 2 hours.  He wakes up once during the night around 2 or 3 and sleeps another 4 hours. 

Today was the first day that we were officially in a routine.  The girls went back to school today and we had a very smooth morning.  I just hope they all go that well! 

Here's a few pictures from this weekend through today.  I will eventually update with Christmas too!

My boys in their Polo for Uncle Kyle's wedding

Meme & Papa with Ryan, their 17th Great-grandchild

Family pic at the wedding

Relaxed little boy!

My sweet babies before school this morning

They each had to have a turn holding their brother

Halloween

My girls love to dress up!  It's always a chore to figure out what they'll be though. At school they usually have to be a storybook character, and then sometimes they change their mind for the real thing.  We had it all figured out.  Landrie would be Bindi Irwin (think zookeeper/vet) and Karsyn decided on Repunzel.   Easy enough until we get a note home from Landrie's teacher that the 2nd grade is supposed to dress up as people from Ancient Greece...really?  They sent home a pattern and everything! 

Our Greek Godess Landrie

Beautiful Rapunzel ~ Karsyn was the Super Kid for the week, so she was the line leader for her class.

For Halloween night, the girls changed costumes.  Landrie went with her original idea of being Bindi/a vet, and Karsyn decided to be one of Landrie's patients - a cat!  We went to Pop's and Lolly's house to eat dinner and be part of the parade in the neighborhood.  After the parade, we headed to church to meet up with our friends for lots of fun, games & candy.

The Vet and her Pet Kitty

The Vet, Super Girl, Pretty Kitty and Adorable Bumble Bees!

First Day of School

We just finished our 2nd week of school.  This year was especiallly great because Landrie and Karsyn are back at the same school and Karsyn started Kindergarten!!! 

Landrie ~  My Beautiful 2nd Grader! 

Karsyn ~ My Precious Kindergartener

Sweet, sweet sisters!  They choose to dress alike for the first day, but haven't ever since.  A little sad for Mommy.

Coach and his girls ~ starting his 11th year of teaching/coaching

Mommy and her pretty girls ~ Starting my 8th year of teaching

Beautiful girl ready to go in her class!  She had a great first day and first 2 weeks.  2nd grade is much more challenging than K and 1st, but she's doing so well!  She had 3 tests yesterday and I'm sure she aced them all!

Sweet K ready for her class!  She loves going to school and has adjusted so well.  She's made several new friends and already has a little boy with a crush on her!  He said she was beautiful and that he was in love with her! Haha!!! 

Life is good!  We've had 2 good weeks at school, 2 awesome football games and we are all adjusting to our routines well.  Things should be smooth sailing from here...until brother comes along in 15 weeks!  It will be an adjustment that we all can't wait to make! :)

The Reveal

Our family has a LOT of babies!  The oldest is almost 11 and there are 3 babies on the way.  By Christmas, there will be 17 great-grands!  Right now the count is 6 boys (3 on the way) to 10 girls plus our little peanut.  We had a 6 girl streak and currently a 3 boy streak.  There was a lot of pressure to keep the streak alive! Ha!  As the last few babies have been born, we've started the tradition of the BIG reveal.  My Shanty cousins both did cupcake reveals, and they turned out so cute! 

We had our gender sono on Friday, July 1.  I started researching ideas and came up with several:

• a pinata with pink or blue candy insde - lots of fun for the kids
• Hand out a Hershey's kiss to everyone - with nuts BOY, without GIRL
• blue or red/pink sparklers
• balloons in wrapped in a box

Since we were so close to the 4th of July, my mom bought blue and red sparklers.  We were going to hold off our reveal until after the fireworks on the 4th and light the right sparklers for everyone.  It would have been 11 o'clock if we waited until then, so we opted for a new plan.

We went with the balloon plan, and it turned out perfect!

Team Blue

Team Pink

The girls were finding out for the first time too!  They got to open the box to reveal the surprise for everyone.

It's A...

 BOY!!!!

Ryan Marshall will join the Krazy Kirk Krew on or around December 16, 2011!!