Briar Wade Shank

Aunt Liz and Briar, who wasn't exactly thrilled.

It seems that all babies make "bird faces."

Mamaw, Briar, Leah, my Dad, and Brandon.

Briar and Uncle Brandon! Soon they'll be wrestling!

Briar sitting with Mamaw.

Briar and his mommy- who is my sister, Leah.

Roadside America, Shartlesville, Pennsylvania

Lindsey and Nan

Paul and Lindsey like "The great and beautiful indoor minianture village." Ashley, however, was not impressed :)

About 45 minutes south of my Grandmother's house is Roadside America. My mom used to take us (Leah, Andrew, and myself) when we were kids to visit. Funny, nothing has changed since I last visited, which was about 15 years ago!

Four Generations

My mom, Marie, myself, Lindsey, and my Grandmother.

Lindsey's first school lunch.

Lindsey, Brandon, and his girlfriend.
Lindsey and Uncle B!

Not a big fan of strawberry milk.

Brandon wanted us to eat lunch with him at his elementary school, which happens to be the same one I attended! Below are the pictures from Lindsey's first lunch at a public school cafeteria.

Leah's Baby Shower

The cake.

Kassie Collins, myself, Lindsey, and Leah (with the baby.)


My mamaw is a great- grandmother! Actually, her mother is alive and is a great- great grandmother.

Liz and Leah

There were actually a lot of men at the shower.

Womenfolk.

Trip to Virginia January, 2009

Lindsey's new favorite pasttime is playing with playdough. She's tried a bite or two or three :)

My mamaw (my paternal grandmother) can't play on the floor, but Lindsey and Brandon loved playing at the table!

Lindsey and my dad wrestling at Leah's house. Why do dads and granddads always want to wrestle right before bed time? In this case it was nap time, but they had fun :)

My dad can make wonderful creations with the stuff. Lindsey liked the "enchiladas."

"Horsing" around!

"Flying."

Merry Christmas 2008

Shame on me. I think I'm the only mom in these United States of America who did not take any pictures of her children on Christmas! I'm sorry. Here's my lame excuse, my camera eats up batteries and I actually ran out of batteries on Christmas Day. My camera died and therefore no pictures were taken. I went to Sams today and bought a 50 count pack of AA batteries! Maybe I'll just buy a new camera.

I hope everyone enjoyed themselves. Lindsey and I will be traveling to Virginia for Leah's baby shower in January. I promise I'll post pictures after the trip!

Happy New Year, 2009!

Nan and Ray

Lindsey and Ashley's Nan and Papa Ray were able to visit us this past weekend! Lindsey helped mom and I make Paula Dean's Ooey Gooey Pumpkin Cake, which is a wonderful dessert for parties! Lindsey had fun doing the "Christmas dance" with Nan and enjoyed wearing Ray's Virginia Tech hat!

Trimming the tree...

This was the first year that Lindsey really enjoyed decorating the family Christmas tree. As you can tell from the photos, she took the job seriously.

Ashley and Summer are having fun as well!

Some have asked why Lindsey looks so "rough" sometimes. Well, I'll tell you why! She hates having her hair brushed and if we get it styled- usually a ponytail or pigtails- in the morning, after nap it's all over the place. Notice the upside down visor? It was from Emmi's birthday party in Denver! I must say, she is a lot like me, in that, she doesn't really care about her hair too much.

Thanksgiving in Roanoke

We were very thankful to be able to travel by CAR this Thanksgiving. Say what you want about long car rides, but I love being able to pack what I want (without having to pay for it), and I love not having to rent a car! We have a DVD player in my van so Lindsey and Ashley get to watch cartoons on the long car trips.

These are pictures of Lindsey playing with my dad. In the first picture she is signing "more" rather forcefully. She had a lot of fun!

Lindsey was a Mouse!

I was really reluctant this year to take Lindsey trick-or-treating, but Paul insisted. We shopped on Halloween and found this costume marked down! I was thrilled to only spend $11 on a costume that she'll probably be able to wear next year too!

Halloween 2008

Ashley and her friend Emily were bugs for Halloween this year. Cute!

Ashley's hair...

Ashley got her hair cut yesterday. She also had the stylist put in red streaks in her hair which turned out a lot better than what I had expected. Ashley likes it and I like it so I hope all of you people like it!

Our new home!

This is a picture of our new home here in Ohio. We love it so far! As you can see, we're already having problems with a really big mouse :)