Happy New Years!

Here we are as a family and the girls with Hannah Montana dolls (a favorite!) and with Princess dolls and magnetic dress up things. How fun!

Here are the hosts of our wonderful Christmas-time treats! We have a wonderful time each year at their house.












Here are the girls with Grandpa after he opened the gift from them. They got him polished rock book ends. They are really pretty - at least we thought so! I took the girls to the mall after school one day and they were so cute looking for gifts for their grandparents. They used their very own money too.

Just Christmas Pictures

Grandma had all the gifts wrapped and waiting in the basement. So, Christmas Eve, after we had eaten, everyone (mostly!) took trips down to bring them up to put under the tree. The most excited of all were the girls!

We got PHOTOS!

These pictures are from the school Christmas Concert. Aren't the girls pretty? They love to dress up in their pretty clothes. They sang 3 or 4 songs. It was a nice concert.

Shelby - the ham!

The kids program was supposed to be last sunday night, but church was canceled due to the weather.  So, instead of sunday school, we watched the program.  Shelby and Colesy had a duet.  They sang the second verse of Away in the Manger. It was cute, including Shelby elbowing Colesy to let her know she needed to pay better attention.  Anyhow, there were about 8 kids who had speaking parts. Each kid would say a line and it would go down the line, with each kid stepping to the microphone to say the line.  Well, Shelby is by far the shortest one needing to use the mic.  The director was pretty good about leaving the mic where it would work for Shelby to speak into.  On one of her lines however, the mic had been moved up fairly high, how ever the kids were able to work with it. When Shelby stepped up, so took a deep breath to say her line, then looked UP at the mic.  when she realized there was no way she could speak into it, she blew out her breath and rolled her eyes, and her face said "this will not work!"  The whole church broke out in hilarious laughter.  It was so funny!  Debbie and I were crying!  

Connie got it on her video camera, so I'm hoping to be able to get it on here and post it so you all can see.  

We'll see if iI can make it work..... 

From Colesy! :o)

Colesy worked really hard on a card for Shelby. It was too cute, and I've tried and tried to post it here for you to see, but since I can't,  I'll just type it to you  -  even though you wont get the cute handwriting and stuff. 

"From Colesy

To Shelby

I love you

I wish you a broodafle crismis 

I love you"

and she drew a picture of her giving Shelby a present.  too cute!  

Merry Christmas!

Our Christmas was a great day!  We started officially on Sunday.  We had our kids program in the morning (Shelby was the star of the show - More to come on that, hopefully).  We went to Grandma Mowreys for lunch and gift exchange there with the Mowrey clan.  Then we had our candlelight service Sunday night.  It was  a nice time, and Colesy didn't burn anyone or thing with her real fire!  (small praise!)  Monday we got up and let the girls open their stockings.  They had fun, and it was just enough of a taste of things to come.  While Matt ran to town to get some needed items, I took the girls to the boys house (Micah, Jared and Ethan) so they could exchange their gifts.  They had a great time.  The girls got Polly Pocket things and they got the boys a driving game that you hook up to the TV.  Looks like great fun!  When we came home, we had just enough time to take a nap before going to Grandmas for dinner. We had ham and too much other food.  :o)  

Christmas morning we got up and opened our presents here at home and then chilled for a couple hours. Then we went to Grams for the rest of the day.  Suzie was not able to get there til about 2:30. We went for lunch and then hung out til she go there and then we opened presents for the rest of the day.  REALLY!   There were 12 of us and we all open them one at a time. We had to take a break and eat dinner (Prime Rib!)  then finished gifts and then we finally got home about 9, leaving early since Matt had to get up at 4 this morning. 

What a festive time we had!  We forgot to take our camera to grams, but we got a couple from the morning at our house.  

Of course, Blogspot seems to have a problem with my uploading my photos, so I guess you'll have to just use your imagination!  Grrr.  

Shelby

Shelby's allergy doctor decided to do some more allergy testing in her. So last Wednesday, she got 60 more pricks in her back. on a scale of 1-5, she scored a 4 on six items. Grapefruit, apricots, mushrooms, nutmeg, Bass (the fish), and egg yolks. so, we get to cut them out of the diet for 6 weeks and see if that makes a difference for her. At her last evaluation 3 weeks ago, they changed her weekly shot to bi-weekly, so that is good. Her last one went really good. So, we're off on the next adventure.... no egg yolks is the hardest one to cut out. We're trying.

Daisy update - again

Well, the people who took Daisy (the second set) sent an email that said it seems like she has been a part of the family for forever. I'm glad. And we're done!

Happy Thanksgiving!

So, Thanksgiving found us in a different situation than normal. Matt's parents flew down to Memphis to spend the weekend with Tim and Carol. That left the 4 of us all alone for the first time in our married lives! Yikes~ what to do... Well, we decided to make the best of it and enjoy a relaxing day. Then Tuesday night brought a welcome surprise. Nathan called to see if him and Jill could "drop by". Of course! So, They arrived Thursday morning and left Friday morning. I was very bad and took NO pictures. Sorry! We had a really nice day and it was exactly what I had wonted. Relaxing wonderful day with family. Turned out just very NICE. Friday, we had the Mowrey Thanksgiving at Daine's (back to usual) although, we were the only Brownlees in attendance. Which was again unusual, but turned out good. I guess that is all.
P.S. (Jenn - It is a little alarming to me how GOOD you looked in your 80's get up!)

Daisy updated...

Daisy went to live with Annie and her boxer Tyson 2 weeks ago. She told me she would give me a call when I got back from Oregon and let me know how it was going. Well, I got back from my trip, and the same day, there was a message from Annie saying that Diasy is a great dog, but Tyson does not like her. so, I brought her home after work today.
I had put an ad online in the free classifieds and I had several responses in the first hour. So, this evening, after having her how for a few hours (3) she went home with a new family. The new family has 26 acres for her to run on, and they have a creek as well. She will live in Brookville, so that is close. They have kids and another dog, who they brought so we could meet. There were 2 dogs running around the house getting to know each other! I think Daisy will be very happy there. The mom is a stay home mom and will be able to give Daisy more time than we did. Hopefully that is the end of the saga. Shelby is sad, but she'll recover shortly. It would have been better if Daisy hadnt come home for a bit, but cant take that back now.

Bye Bye Doodle-Bug - Maybe. . .?

We finally decided that Daisy is not the dog for our family. I know a girl who LOVES boxers, and always told me she would take Daisy if we wanted to get rid of her. So, I called Annie and she came and picked her up on Thursday evening. She already has a boxer, Tyson, so this is a trial basis. I got a call Friday that things were off to a rocky start, so we'll see, but hopefully she has a new home! We are going over tonight to take some more of her things, and her pen. Maybe that will help some too! I hope! :o)

Hold Still Crazy Daisy!!!

We were trying to take pictures of the girls with Daisy, but it was very hard to get her to sit still - as those of you who have met her can imagine!

Rusty

"Nobody can fully understand the meaning of love unless he's owned a dog. A dog can show you more honest affection with a flick of his tail than a man can gather through a lifetime of handshakes."

I sure do miss my little bug!

More Beartown pictures

Beartown Rocks!

We recently discovered Beartown Rocks! We knew we had to take Nathan and Jill when they were here this weekend. The rocks are fun to climb on, and the girls love to go! We spent Sunday afternoon here. The leaves are changing, and so pretty, and the rocks are just spectacular! Enjoy the photos . . .

Valeries new puppy, Dutch

Val was home for the weekend, and brought her new puppy, Dutch to visit us. He's so cute and TINY! He's an 8 week old Chihuahua. It was cute this weekend, because Suzie was home too, and she has a new puppy (Chihuahua, too) but Evie is older/bigger than Dutch. But they are both way smaller than the old man Harley. He looked like a giant in comparison. It was cute to see the 3 dogs together though. I didn't get pictures of Evie this time, so sorry, but she is a cutie pie! The girls loved little Dutch. Even if he is a mama's boy! :o)

The girls got to get in a limo, and trolley and a firetruck. They had a blast! And to top off a hot fun day, the ice cream truck was giving out ice cream sandwiches. We took Macy, my friend, and one of the girls favorite baby sitters. We sat in the shade of a tree to eat the cold treat before going back to climb in more trucks. They had dump trucks and cement trucks and electric trucks and all sorts of stuff. Ambulance and semi trucks. Way more things than I ever imagined would be there. And it was very fun!

And for Papa Lewis.....

MoreTouch a Truck

Colesy's good friend Erin was at the Touch a Truck, so they were together some. That is her with the long hair. Shelby sorta looks like a dork in the bottom picture, but isn't that truck amazing? It was so cool inside too!

Touch a Truck

The was an event at the mall this weekend. It was really a neat idea. They brought in a zillion different trucks opened them all up and let the kids climb ALL through them. Here are the girls on a steam roller, Shelby wearing a SWAT hat from the police and Colesy "driving" the police car.

Colesy lost her other front bottom tooth the other night. It got really wiggly when she was eating an apple, so Shelby grabbed it and pulled it out. Dontcha love that face?!