The Shrewsbury's

Friends Thanksgiving

2011-11-26T21:40:00.001-08:00

In years past, our friends have gotten together for a Halloween party. This year though Halloween snuck up on us and we didn't get anything planned in time. Instead, we decided that we would put together a Friends Thanksgiving. Being that Sam and I are the only ones without kids, we decided that it would be easier to have the get together at our house and everyone would bring a Thanksgiving style dish. Tyler and Rachel brought the best turkey I have ever eaten, which is saying something because I don't really like turkey that is not deli meat...you know I like the processed stuff! :) It was a beautiful, juicy turkey.

To complete the meal, we had mac and cheese, green beans, broccoli and rice casserole, sweet potatoes, and rolls.

I forgot to take a picture of the dessert table, but for dessert we had pumpkin pie, chess pie, pecan pie, no bake oatmeal cookies, and chocolate chip cookies. It was all delicious!

Our group is growing quickly with all the kids getting added to the mix.

We found out tonight that friends of ours are expecting their second baby! :) A little boy to be exact! YAY!!

We have had a whirlwind of a Thanksgiving this year, but it has been great! We have one more to go tomorrow with the Claud family and then we will be in full Christmas mode!

Thankful

2011-11-20T18:28:00.000-08:00

It is that time of year again when people begin to reflect on the things that they are most thankful to have in their lives. As I read through several people's daily postings on Facebook, I began to think about the things that I am really thankful for. While I believe that people really are thankful to be in a size smaller pair of jeans, let's face it ladies..we all get excited when a smaller size fits, I think about what really matters. Yes, it is nice that this year I don't feel like I look like a can of biscuits getting ready to pop out of its little canister, but is that really what I am MOST thankful for?

I am thankful to have a husband, who loves me for being who I am. A husband who tells me every morning I am beautiful, even when I feel like I look my worst. A husband who can make me laugh when all I really want to do is cry. A husband who is blunt and real with me. A husband who motivates and encourages me to do the things I want to do.

I am thankful for old and new friends. Over the past year, Sam and I have found some new friendships. We have also grown closer with old friends.

I am thankful for new additions. This not only is applying to my new nephew, Boone, but also to the many additions that are coming by way of our friends. Our get togethers have taken on a new excitement that is for sure.

I am thankful for family. For parents that love and support us no matter what. For sisters who are there for us, who make us laugh, and sometimes make us mad. For nieces that can bring a smile to our face the moment they say "Hi Uncle Samuel! Hi Aunt Holly!" For two brother in laws that are loving and caring husbands and daddies!

This year though I am MOST thankful for a God who protects, loves, and heals in His plan. While we might not ever understand why it was not in God's plan to allow us to spend more holidays with Sam's dad, we are thankful for the healing that God provides overtime. I am thankful that we can celebrate and be thankful for the family that we have here on Earth, but still have faith that we will one day get to sit with one another again! I am thankful that God protected my uncle this week as he went through a quadruple by-pass surgery. I am thankful he was with doctors when he had a heart attack. I am thankful that the surgery went well. I am thankful that I get to spend more holidays with him, nagging at him over anything and everything I can. We have that special relationship that a niece and uncle can have. It started long, long ago, but I guess I'll have to play nice for a little while so he can get into shape.

This year, be thankful for the family that you have sitting around your table whether big or small. Be thankful that you are healthy. Be thankful you have a home and a job even if it is not your dream home or job. This year, be thankful for a God who has a plan for you in this upcoming year!

Happy Thanksgiving Everybody!

Zumba Madness

2011-10-22T16:27:00.000-07:00

I have never been that person who can stick to a workout plan. I have tried for years to keep to something. Each time I would start something, I would quickly stop it due to always finding something that can take its place. Almost a year ago now I started taking Zumba classes. Dancing has never been something that I am good at or felt comfortable doing. I was extremely nervous about doing it, but I had SO MUCH FUN that first night that I haven't stopped going. I actually plan around Zumba classes instead of replacing that time with something else. I hate when I have to miss it. I think y'all get the point.

Today they had a Zumbathon in Clarksville, so of course I had to do it. We had a team from our gym go and I must say..we were the best group there. Not only because I have a biased opinion, but we were also the largest group!

Amanda, Libby, and I went out last night to find a good outfit to wear. We were called the Pleasant View Angels because our instructors name is Angel. Pretty nifty huh? Anyways we decided what better way to represent our team than to wear angel wings. This was a great idea until two out of three of ours broke. :/ It all lasted long enough for us to get a picture and then they were gone. It was a tiring day, but we loved it! It was so much fun! We shook and danced our booties off!

Sam and Steve took off for the South Carolina vs North Carolina game this weekend. North Carolina lost, but they still have a great time from what I hear. We've all had a pretty busy weekend, but it was a blast!

Birthday Getaway

2011-10-10T18:04:00.000-07:00

Last year, Sam and I took a weekend away with Amanda and Steve to celebrate Steve's birthday and to get some away time. Well, this year we decided to have a repeat weekend getaway not only to celebrate Steve's birthday, but because we ALL needed to get some space from the world at home and hideaway in the mountains. I am sad that my Fall Day Break is over now, but it was an amazingly fun weekend!

The Shrewsbury's with the Birthday Boy!
Happy Birthday Steve-O!

We got in late on Friday night and just enjoyed some quality time in the hot tub. On Saturday, we went to eat in Gatlinburg and took on the climb to Clingman's Dome. We have been working on our physical fitness, so what better way to continue that trend than to workout by climbing a mountain! :) On our trek up, we saw a bear cub and bear poop. It was pretty cool I must say. I haven't seen a bear in all the times that I have been to the mountains so I was pretty excited. It was a hard and tiring climb but so worth it! You could see for miles and was B.E.A.U.T.I.F.U.L.! Our God is awesome! Love seeing His beautiful work.

Sam and I before the climb.

Steve and Amanda before the climb.

The group together at the top! We made it! :)

We stopped by Chimney Top on our way back down, but didn't make it too far before we just decided to take a picture by the water and head back. We were exhausted!

We made our way back to the cabin to rest up, get ready for dinner, and then back to relax in the hot tub once again to end the night.

Sunday was spent shopping in Tanger Outlet. Love that place. It is a must visit whenever we go to Gatlinburg. We all actually had luck too which normally doesn't happen. We had a night in after an early dinner and enjoyed the night with Sunday night football and some hot tub time. Well funny story...we accidently made the hot tub go to sleep so the temperature held at 90* all day, so it was actually a cold tub. We ran hot water in the jaccuzzi tub and all four sat in the tub until the boys decided that they had to figure out how to get the water to warm up. It was a pretty funny sight to say the least. Finally, the water got warm enough to feel like a warm bath at least, so we hopped in to end the night.

It was a weekend of laughs that was much needed for all of us, although it flew by! Until next year I suppose...

Special Delivery

2011-10-05T14:51:00.000-07:00

The long awaited arrival of our little nephew finally came September 4th! We thought he would be an August baby, but my nephew and I get to celebrate our birthdays exactly a week apart! :) We had a good time of family bonding as we awaited the arrival of our little nephew..plenty of laughs for sure! It could have been due to lack of consciousness or we are just that funny! :)

For nine months, our nephew was baby no name. We were not going to be told his name until he was born. At almost 1 in the morning, we were presented the precious "little" boy named Boone Avery Hampton! I use little lightly because he weighed 9 lbs 5 oz.

He is absolutely beautiful..or handsome! :) He has a huge family that are all about spoiling and loving on him.
Proud Aunt Holly and Aunt Libby. (Aunt Moriah visited with Boone before we got there.)

Uncle Sam and Aunt Holly with Boone

Congratulations to Regina and Michael! Your "little" boy is absolutely precious!

Results are In

2011-08-10T16:29:00.000-07:00

Well people, the anniversary date has come and gone. Let me first give the disclaimer that I left my camera in the truck and we took the car for our date night, so unfortunately there aren't pictures of our night. This is a pretty sad thing considering we were both looking pretty fine if I might say so myself! :)

Okay, now on to our night since I know you are anxiously awaiting to find out! ;)Sam made reservations at a restaurant in Germantown called City House. It was hard to find and looked a little run down from the outside, but I guess you have to go with the saying of don't judge a book by it's cover because it was good! I had a pizza and Sam had a sirloin, but I am pretty sure that just about anything on the menu was good. After dinner, we had more reservations to hit. We had dessert at the Melting Pot which was FABULOUS!! I am not a huge dessert person, but I could eat that fondu goodness any day!

We had such a great night! Now..what will the days of year four bring us? Who knows.

Three

2011-08-04T21:03:00.000-07:00

We are fast approaching that day three years ago when we committed to spending the rest of our lives together. Good times and bad times. Rich or poor. Sickness or health. Man have we covered all of these already many times and it's only been three years. :) It is so amazing to see where we started three years ago to where we are now. We argue and disagree sometimes. We hurt each others feelings sometimes. We laugh at each other and at ourselves a lot. We do not have a perfect relationship, but we do have a relationship that refuses to be complacent. We have talked several times over the past three years of our goals that we have for our marriage. Every time we agree that we want to continue to grow and learn about each other.

We started out in a one bedroom apartment. If you didn't have to start out this way, you definitely missed out on some get to know you time. When you only have one bedroom and one bathroom, there's really nowhere to run to and nowhere to hide. Literally, Sam once tried to surprise me with a movie night and you know where I was put while he set it up...in the bathroom. Told you..nowhere to hide..... but the bathroom. Now we are blessed to be homeowners, although sometimes we miss the closeness that the one bedroom brought us. It was tight, but we didn't have anywhere to go but to be with each other. I am thankful for the other TV that the move brought us because I can only take ESPN for so long and I begin to lose it! :)

We have had so many learning experiences over the past three years and there are so many more to come! We had to learn first and foremost how to live with each other! That was a little difficult, but we got the hang of it. Clothes in the hamper..toilet seat down..toilet paper must fall to the back not over the top (hard for me to catch on)...cooking is one I am still struggling with. We have learned over the past year how manage with both of us working full time jobs. This was an adjustment for both of us too! Overall, we have learned how blessed we are! We are truly, truly blessed and it is all due to the family and friends that God has given us! You guys are the best!

We celebrated year one with a trip to Florida and St. Louis. (separately of course)

We celebrated year two with a trip to Atlanta, Georgia and Huntsville, Alabama. (separately of course!) No picture available from Huntsville.. :(

We celebrated year three ______??????____________. The next post will reveal the answer to that question. I will find that out tomorrow on our surprise dinner date! :)

Vacation Shrewsbury Style

2011-07-30T13:40:00.000-07:00

This year we decided to vacation a little differently. You see, this year we took our very first Shrewsbury family vacation. Mrs. Terri, my wonderful mother in law, (no lie she really is awesome) decided that she wanted to get away with all of her kids and grandkids. We planned in May to take off the second week of July and head out to Hilton Head. It was a little rocky there right at the end as to whether or not we were going to actually go. Real estate can sure be up in the air, but after weeks of getting closings pushed back and an endless night before vacation time of moving out of a house into a new house, we made it! Sam and I got very little sleep. There are two things that I have learned while vacationing or traveling with Sam. One is that we leave early. He doesn't like traveling during the majority of a day if he doesn't have to. Two is that you hold your need of bathroom breaks and make yourself have a bladder of steel! Being able to do these things makes traveling much easier in this household! We spent the week together in an amazing house! We really did have a great time together. The girls are so darn cute!

Calyn asked us all week to swim with her. On our last night we finally got in the pool. It was a little small for all of us to get in, but we made it work!

This was our last day at the beach...and it rained. :(

Beautiful Shrewsbury family if I may say so myself!

Building sand castles was Calyn's favorite thing to do at the beach. We also taught her how to ride the waves.

Aunt and Uncle picture with our nieces!

Ready to start the trek home.

Sam and I took a date day and traveled to Savannah, Georgia. It was only 45 minutes away and was a perfect day. Well, aside for the downpour of rain that would happen every few hours, but it was still beautiful there. We were both pretty intrigued by the trees. We got a picture in one of the many park like areas.

I'd say for the first real family vacation it was pretty successful. There are not many families that can be put in one house and not be hanging each other up by their toenails by the end of the week..but I am glad to say that no hanging by toenails, hair pulling, or name calling occurred on this vacation! :)

Artistic?

2011-06-29T19:04:00.000-07:00

I have never considered myself artistic. I remember dreading art class in elementary school because I was never quite as good as the person sitting next to me. I do remember always being asked to write everyone's work down for them in their agendas because they liked my handwriting though...which did help boost my artistic self-esteem some..I guess. Okay Okay that's really beside the point. The point is that I have always wanted to be artistic, but never felt comfortable even trying to be. Well..out of shear boredom of how plain Jane our house feels and having absolutely nothing to do these days. I'm not complaining about that..just saying that there is only so much to do before you start to get bored. I guess if I was smart I would be getting ready for the school year, but I am just not quite ready for that SO I have been working on some projects for the house.

First up is a painting that I did based off of a painting that my friend Kim sent to me from another blog that she follows. I decided to put my ability to look at a picture and interpret it to my own taste to the test. My friend Amanda took the day off of work because she was jealous of my time off....I mean because her youngest was sick and needed to go to the doctor. :) HA!! I am SOO Funny!! Anyways..we decided to work on some projects that have been on our to-do lists. I decided to suck it up and get started on the huge blank slate before me.

Here is how it all went down...
First I drew the branches with a paint pen.

Then I started making a lot of dots.

Then I made even more dots.

Then I was finished and it looked like this:

Overall I think it went pretty well. I would show you how awesome it looks in the living room and how it adds so much to the space...BUT I can't because it's not on the wall. It is laying on our guest bed waiting to be put up. Sorry any guests that would like to stay over..you can't because there is a huge canvas staying in your spot. When it does get put up though..I will share the final result!

Now on to the next project...

I have been wanting to go to Sips-N-Strokes for FOREVER! The last time that I had the opportunity to go I couldn't, which was a big bummer, but I was determined to go again. I had had my eye on a painting that I thought look super super cute and signed myself up to go. Little did I know that I was signing for one of the harder paintings that they offer. The good news is that I didn't take a picture of what the original looked like so my painting is going to look awesome to you guys!

The beginning of the night...

Break time for a photo opt :) We weren't feeling too awesome about our painting abilities at this point.

Middle of the night...

We are finished!! Although we are not insane artists with some deeply hidden talent, we enjoyed ourselves and had many many laughs throughout the process!

Here's a close up of my masterpiece:

One thing is for sure though and that is that I am one messy painter!

This painting, again has not yet made it to its home home, but it is closer than the other masterpiece I created! ;) This painting is going into our newly painted office. Here are some before and afters of our office. It was touch up painted before we moved in and looked AWFUL so we painted it this weekend. I like it I do believe!

BEFORE

AFTER

BEFORE

AFTER

Hope you guys like it too!

Accomplishment

2011-06-07T20:15:00.001-07:00

I am not a runner. I actually have been a hater of running for some time now. I think it stems back from my cheering days when I had to run all the time and it just stunk! Well...I have really been working on my attitude toward running. I am working toward having a well rounded workout and I feel like my cardio is best when I run. There was a 5K on Memorial Day in Pleasant View. On Friday, I decided what the hey...let's give it a try. I couldn't even run a full mile. I hadn't ran/walked more than one mile. I just thought...well if anything I will run what I can and walk the rest. Luckily, I had some accountability partners to run with me. Libby and Amanda have been my workout partners. We keep each other in line...as best we can. Some of us are pretty stubborn..cough cough..me! :) We took off bright and early and while we did not run the whole thing..we FINISHED IT!

I did really well for the most part. I was feeling good. I was accomplishing something. I was so close to the finish line when out of no where...I threw up! lol It was a pretty nice way to finish the race if I may say so myself! :)

We are thinking about trying another 5K to try to beat our time. By the way..the winner won the thing in 16:33 minutes. That's a 5 minute mile. He was from Kenya. That's all you need to know.

End of An Era

2011-06-07T19:47:00.000-07:00

It has finally happened. All Claud children have graduated from high school. After seven years of graduations (although mine included two Claud's), I am happy to announce that we will not have to sit through another one until little baby no name graduates from kindergarten, if his school even does that.(Sad to say that many public schools don't do kindergarten graduations anymore!) Otherwise, we have at least 17 to 18 years of rest until then. :) Libby has finished her high school career!! She is extremely excited to leave the past behind her, both good and bad, and see what lies ahead.

Libby,

We are VERY proud of you! You have the most contagious laugh and are a beautiful young woman. You hold your head high and do not let little things get to you! It has taken me years to be able to do that..and still struggle sometimes. You are so confident in yourself and what you want to do with the start to grown-up life. I am very very proud to have gotten so close to my little in age..but bigger in height sister! :)

A few pointers that I learned from my college days...
*Go to sporting events of some kind. It makes your college experience better...even though some teams might suck!
*Don't eat Easy Mac all the time. Yes, it is an easy, cheap meal...but you will gain the freshman 15 pretty easy on that diet. (I had trouble eating it for awhile after I left TTU.)
*Wal-Mart is not a cool hangout unless you are a college redneck.
*Do your homework, but don't let it consume you. Have fun!
*If you need home, we are just a call away. I was tempted many times to pack up and come home, but a call always worked.
*There is a gym. It is nice to hang out in. Some people think you should actually use the equipment. I always just got on it for about 5 minutes and considered it a job well done. Thanks to you...I am much better in this area!
*If a teacher offers extra credit, DO it!! It will help you in the long run..unless you have all A's. You will just be an overachiever if that be the case! :)
*Ratemyprofessor.com is a great source to see which teachers you want to sign up for. It helps when you have choices. If you don't have choices are you're screwed.

Most importantly, remember your family is here for you no matter what. You will be expected to come home and see baby no name and see me...and the rest of your family of course. I will need a pick me up from my personal trainer every now and then so you can't stay gone all the time!

We love you and are so very very proud of your accomplishments. Now...if I could just get your abs....

Easter 2011

2011-04-25T19:49:00.000-07:00

This year Sam and I got to celebrate Easter with both of our families. I know that this is a daunting task and will only get more difficult when there are kids thrown in the mix, but I am pretty proud of our system right now! :) This year we went to my parents house on Saturday night to have an Easter dinner together because on Easter Sunday everyone was going in a different direction. We had yummy "Reggie Steaks" as Sam calls them with sweet potato fries and some other fixings, but those were the highlights of the night. We played Kinect, looked at old pictures, and got to hang out and enjoy each others company. Well when I say everyone I mean everyone minus one because Moriah didn't come home. She really needs to stop loaning her car out to her friends so she can hang with her awesome fam..but that's just my opinion! :) We stayed as long as we could..this year the Easter bunny wasn't coming around so no one needed to hit the hay early.

We woke up to a rainy, yucky Easter morning, but we didn't let that dampen our spirits. We got started our part of Easter lunch, got ready, and hit the wets streets for church. We had a great Easter service with plenty of worship and celebration of our risen Lord! Thank you Jesus that we can celebrate the hope of life with you!

We had to hit the road as soon as church was over, but we spared 2 seconds to get an Easter picture just in case we didn't get one later.

Emily had to be a part of our family picture too! She's part of the family. She even has her own room at our house. Ask her about it. She loves it!

Sam also thought that we would want to document us dressed up so nice. He never wears a suit, so we had to get evidence that this does occur once every blue moon.

We ran home, got a change of clothes, grabbed our dish, and were on our way again to Sam's mom's house. We all brought some goodies and had a delicious lunch. We are definitely going to have a circus running around when there are more kiddos added to the already rambunctious bunch we have. This year Chris's sister and her husband and daughter got to hang out with us too!

Although the rain did put a damper on the day, we didn't let it get us down. Sam and I went out and hid Easter eggs for the girls to hunt. They enjoyed every second of it. They kept saying, "I found one!" for every single egg they found. It was really cute. Samantha enjoyed getting into everyone's candy once they found all the eggs. I really like her approach: Let the big girls do all the work and then enjoy their candy while they are looking at the neighbors dogs. Smart little girl!

Here are some photos of the afternoon:

Aside of the time with family, the candy devoured, the stomachs stuffed to the brim...The most important thing is that we took time to remember why we have hope that this life on this earth is not the end. The struggles and heartache that we face will only last for awhile, but our hope is in the eternity of life with our Father. Thank you Lord!

One of my favorite songs that I got the chance to hear in concert is by Newsong called "Arise My Love". It brought tears to my eyes as I got the full understanding of the words and meaning of the song. I find joy knowing that these words could be spoken to me one day...

"Arise my Love, Arise my Love, the grave no longer has a hold on you. No more death sting, no more suffering. Arise, Arise my Love."

Happy Birthday Samantha!

2011-04-25T19:38:00.000-07:00

It really doesn't seem like we should have a 3 year old niece, but I'm pretty sure that we were just in the hospital to get our first glance at our second little niece, Samantha.

It had been a long day, so no judgement on the appearance of Aunt Holly! :)

Now a year has flown by and we are back together once again to celebrate Samantha's 1st birthday. She is such a doll! She's a chunk, but we love every little roll and her chubby little cheeks. She always has a smile on her face and is very photogenic if I may say so myself.

She is working on walking. I think by the end of this week she will be walking solo. All she needed was a little finger to help her balance and she had the rest. She is growing so so fast!

Happy Birthday Sweet Samantha! You are one loved little girl! Keep smiling your toothy smile!

Love,
Uncle Samuel and Aunt Holly

Play Ball

2011-04-20T20:15:00.000-07:00

I absolutely love spring. Spring brings some not so awesome things like allergies and storms, but spring brings so many great things such as warm weather, flowers, summer following soon, and last but not least BASEBALL! Sam watches all sports. Literally, he watches all sports. I don't catch a break from the sports, but the summer is my favorite time, aside from football in the fall, but still. We decided to take a night out and go support our local Minor League team. It was a great night. We hadn't been to a game since the summer of 2004, so needless to say it's been awhile. It felt like we were in high school again on a date. It was a great feeling. I think that we are going to be going to several games this summer. We are also wanting to hit some Braves games again this year too! We have to support our team with their new manager! :)

It's a.... and another update

2011-04-20T20:08:00.000-07:00

It's a baby boy for the Hampton crew. We had a fabulous night with family at the reveal party that Regina and Mike threw. They had a potluck dinner with a blueberry or strawberry filled cake for dessert. We gathered around the cake and finally saw the blue of the blueberries! Unfortunately, I will not be able to tell you the name of my new little nephew because we won't know until he is born. I am having to adjust to this idea. They say they haven't decided. I say Regina is going to keep telling me that so I won't try to get it out of her. :) Ahh, sisterly love!

Also I said that I would post a new year's goal update. Well due to the fact that I feel that blown up tick this week, I don't feel like doing this update. I will say that from January to now I have lost at least an inch from my waist if not more and have maintained a 10 lb loss. Sam has lost at least 2 to 3 inches in his waist. His clothes fall off of him. It makes me irritated as the female that doesn't lose weight unlike the male in her life. :) I am so proud of the both of us for setting to a goal and continuing to work toward it. I have 10 more lbs to go to meet my goal! We shall see how long this takes.

One Year Anniversary

2011-04-20T19:54:00.000-07:00

People celebrate their wedding anniversary. (August 9, 2008)
Some people celebrate their dating anniversary. (Decemeber 5, 2003)
There are people that celebrate the anniversary of their first kiss.(February 16, 2004)
There are people who celebrate the anniversary of the first time they held hands.
Some people remember and celebrate the first time they said, "I LOVE YOU!" (May 5, 2005)

I can remember the date of all these things, but we don't celebrate any of them but one now...even though they are nice to remember.

On March 31st, we hit the one year anniversary of owning our own home.

Over the past year, there haven't been many changes. We are still trying to grow some grass for our dirt yard. We are hoping to get a fence at some point to keep the crazies out and the dogs out of the woods. Really we don't have crazies around here, but seriously the dogs in the woods drives me insane! The house has encountered many, many days of snow. This is the very first snow in our new house! :) (a day or snow after!)

There have been many memories over the past year. Second anniversary here we come!

Mexican Getaway

2011-04-20T19:11:00.001-07:00

I have been in school for 17 years. Of those 17 years, I never went anywhere for spring break. This year being the first year that I am in school and not the student, Sam and I decided that it was time to get away for Spring Break. We LOVED our trip to Cancun almost three years ago, so we decided that Mexico would be the destination. We also thought that it would be much warmer closer to the equator in March. Needless to say, it was an absolute awesome vacation!

We left on Saturday afternoon and traveled ALL day to Playa del Carmen, Mexico.

Our resort was very fancy pants and after walking around noticed that there was more of an older crowd hanging around. It was cool with us though. We made friends with our lounge chair neighbors everyday.

We spent the first two days laying around the pool. The pool was made for me! It has lounge chairs at the edge of the water, so I could still layout with the coolness of the water. It is my kind of laying out!

We spent a lot of time in the sun, so on the third day we decided to take a trip into town. We took a taxi from the hotel. Our taxi drivers name was Alex. There were several Alex's actually. Easy to not forget a name, I suppose. Anyways, we were dropped off on 5th Ave. We spent the first hour and a half walking one little side of 5th Ave. We didn't understand what the hype was in this street. After finally finding our way to this gorgeous beach...

..we decided it was time for lunch. After lunch, we decided to head in a different direction and we were amazed! There were so many shops and restaurants. This was the place that people had been telling us all about. We walked and walked and walked, but never bought anything! It was truly an amazing feat. :)

We spent a couple of more days by the pool and then headed out into Mexico once again. This time we took a day and traveled to Tulum to see the Mayan ruins and then to X-la. It was an amazing day. We got to spend the day seeing all of God's awesome work. It was one of the most beautiful and interesting things that I have seen.

After seeing the ruins, we traveled about 20 more minutes to X-La. We got to snorkel and travel through a very long "jungle"ly place. We saw several zebra fish (my fav), Dorie fish, really big fish, really small fish, and three sting rays!

That night we got to have dinner with a true Irishman. Ironically enough, his name was Patrick from Dublin, Ireland! What a way to end Saint Patty's Day! :)

We spent the rest of our vacation soaking up as many rays as we possibly could. I got a little dark..and by little I mean a lot! Sam, my tanless man, actually got a TAN!! Not burnt an actual tan! This is a pretty big deal!

We had the most relaxing week of the year while in Mexico. We got to reconnect and let go of all the things that had been stressing us back home. We can't wait to plan our next getaway.

I Promise

2011-04-05T19:27:00.000-07:00

...to get an update on the life of the Shrewsbury's soon.

Things to be blogged about...

* A Getaway to Mexico
* A One Year Anniversary
* New Year's Goal In Progress
* A Little Bun in the Oven Reveal (again...not me)

I could be wrong, but I think that after all of these posts I will be all caught up on the goings on in the life of the Shrewsburys.

For now.. I am off to bed. Looking at my blog list made me a little tired!

There Must Be Something In the Water...

2011-03-08T18:42:00.000-08:00

...so I'll be sure to bring my own! For awhile it seemed like everyone I knew was getting married. Now that everyone is married...it seems like the new fad is to have a baby. In the past few weeks, the total baby count in the friend/ family department has upped itself to 5. One of the mommas to be is my wonderful older sis.

If it's a boy or girl it's name will be Flowerpot. It's only fair since that's what Regina wanted to name all of us. Also in the running is Ralph (what their cat was named until they changed it to Phoenix..come to find out Ralph would've worked best cause she was REALLY a he) and Marvin (the name of a little boy's homework found in the little baby shoes they got while in Costa Rica). Not sure which one is going to win out. I am a for real real aunt. :) I've been an aunt for three years now, but biologically this is the first go around.

Congrats to all my friends and family who are getting new additions this year! The Shrewsbury's are up for babysitting as long as we can send them back to you! :)

Needing A Little R&R

2011-03-08T18:38:00.001-08:00

Enough said...

December 2010

2011-01-11T13:57:00.000-08:00

I feel like such a blogger failure! I think I start off every post that way, but seriously last post in November?? Might as well do a catch up for December I suppose.

December was a whirlwind. I spent the week before Christmas break with some snow day downtime, so it made Christmas break feel a little longer which was very nice!

The girls have a tradition of having a Cookie Decorating/Ornament Party. This year we had a little addition, Kim's little girl Taylor, to the party with a couple of new girls that couldn't make it last year.

It's always fun to get together with the girls. We have lots of laughs that is one thing for sure! It's amazing how our conversations have changed over the years. We started out talking about our boyfriends, to our wedding, and now we are on to our husbands, big girl jobs, and family additions. Before you get any ideas, NO there is not an addition to the Shrewsbury family brewing!

The same day of the girl get together, Sam called with the proposal of a concert...Garth Brooks concert to be exact. I haven't been to a concert in FOREVER! Although, not as excited as Sam, I was excited to be doing something out of the ordinary for the Shrewsbury clan. We talked Sam's sisters into going too, so we made a night of it! We went to eat and then headed to the extremely crowded last concert Garth Brooks was doing in the 9 show run. When I say crowded, I mean packed like sardines, hold on to each other so you don't get separated in the mass, kind of crowd. We stopped for a photo opt before we headed through the crowd.

We finally made it inside and down to our seats, which would have been perfect if I was 6 feet tall. A mental note needs to be taken that I am short..therefore floor seats which are normally awesome are not so awesome when 6 ft giants are in front of you for two rows straight..we need to have stadium seating that will bring me up a little! :)

Regardless of the seats though (I sounded really bitter and ungrateful in that previous thought and that is totally not true..just the fact of the matter) it was an AWESOME show!!!!

My personal favorite of the night was when Trisha came out!

I belted out every word to everyone of her songs! It was fantastic! From 9:45 to 12:30 we were singing our hearts out to Sam's old time favorites from Garth to some that we forgot about but jumped in on the words we knew! It was definitely a night that we won't forget! We are still listening to Garth Brooks radio on Pandora!

We only had one day to recooperate before Christmas festivities began. We started off Christmas Eve with my mom's side of the family having lunch at my uncles house. We chatted and enjoyed time together. The day wasn't over yet though. We hurried home and threw together soup to have soup and sandwiches at Sam's family Christmas dinner. It was great! Mrs. Terri got all the girls family aprons.

We played tea party and played several other games with Calyn too. It made for a very fun night, especially with a little snow falling on the ground too! The night had to come to an end though because Santa Claus was coming to the McGuire house!
We woke up around 7:45 on Christmas morning to get Christmas Day rolling.

Sam went above and beyond this year and got me...

...ZUMBA!! I kept talking about how I wanted a Wii so that I could get the Zumba game. Sam heard my cry of desperation and got the MOVE for his PS3. I LOVE IT!! I take a Zumba class, but being able to do it whenever I want is exactly what I wanted!
Sam got some UNC apparel to wear to the UT/UNC Music City Bowl Game, which turned out exactly like he wanted!
After enjoying our Christmas together, we packed up and headed out to a day of Christmasing. It all started at my parents house and had a huge breakfast, opened gifts, took some pictures, and played on the Kinect, which is a very fun game and very tiring all at the same time!

Around lunch, we started off to Mt. Juliet to spend time with the Ellis clan. There were plenty going on with all the kiddos running around. Every year with this side of the family, instead of buying everyone gifts, we theme Dirty Santa. This years theme was "As Seen On TV" gifts. We had many many laughs thanks to this theme! Next year is hats! Snow was continuing to come down, so Sam and I had to leave a little early to get to my grandparents house on my dad's side of the family. Yes, so if you have been keeping count that is 4 Christmas's in one day. We could make a movie. Oh wait...that's already been done! :) Sorry had to throw that in there!

We came home to a wonderful snow covered house to end our Christmas night! We crashed. It was a long, busy, fun day!

I think that catches us up for the month of December. I know it was a lot, but congrats you made it! :)

Fall Happenings

2010-11-02T17:45:00.000-07:00

We have had a rather busy October. Sam and I took a trip to Gatlinburg with our friends Amanda and Steve to celebrate Steve's birthday. It was a much needed break for the whole crew. We rented a cabin which was fabulous. Anything would be fabulous if it had a hot tub! :) We spent the weekend watching football, relaxing in the hot tub, and did a whole lot of shopping.

Mostly recently, we had a decades themed party for Halloween. It was so much fun! We had several people show up! We had music, a little dancing..anywhere Steve is there is a little bit of dancing...firepit, and smores! I have decided that next year is going to be 80's themed! My birthday will be 80's!! It's a year from now, but I can't wait!

I also participated in the Making Strides for Breast Cancer walk. My friend Rachel put a team together named The Hot Pink Ladies. It was an absolute blast! It will definitely be an annual event!

I Will Get Better At This

2010-09-26T19:37:00.001-07:00

I am determined to get back to my blog! I have honestly been so busy or tired that I have been neglective of my poor little blog and my one or two readers! :) I like to think that someone likes to know whats up with the Shrewsbury's and is concerned that I haven't updated. Well there are definitely some things to share. We have added to our family...and no not by way of child! We have added a little fur baby puppy to the Shrewsbury house. Sam had been mentioning it every now and then and one Sunday afternoon we headed out to get ourselves Jack.
This is Jack in the car on our way home from picking him up.

He's growing like a weed! Bailey has seemed to take to him finally. At first, Bailey's poor little life was shattered into a million pieces...and Bailey being "my" dog I got a little defensive and sided with Bailey on everything. Jack didn't have a fighting chance, but now we are all one big happy family! It's been great to see the two of them become doggy brothers!

We also took a trip at the beginning of September to Atlanta, GA to the Chick-Fil-A GameDay kick-off between UNC and LSU.

You see, I married a diehard UNC fan. Sam was born in North Carolina and has been a fan as long as I have known him. I, on the other hand, was adopted into liking UNC. Being a SEC fan growing up with my daddy, life in the ACC is a learning experience! ;) It was so great to see Sam so excited and happy to be at the game. This was my first time at a college football game and Sam's first UNC game, so it was exciting for both of us. I wore down fast though. Let's just say a entire day devoted to college football is a little rough for a not so die hard fan, but it was well worth it to spend time with Sam. Plus I got to go to IKEA for enduring a day of sports, so again WELL worth it. By the way, I am officially obsessed with IKEA so if anyone is planning on going to Atlanta anytime soon, let me know and I will tag along. I won't be noticed...just drop me off at IKEA and come pick me up when you are heading home...with a U-HAUL in tow of course! :)

I am really enjoying teaching! It is stressful and tiring, but that comes with any job! The difference is that with teaching you get breaks every month! I am looking forward to that. Next break will be in two weeks and I am so ready! Overall, it has been a wonderful experience with awesome co-workers! I even landed a great class! I seriously could not ask for anything else....except new technology stuff for my classroom would be nice..but... it's just my first year. It will come in time!
Sam is still enjoying his job. He is coming up on his one year soon! We are very happy and thankful with what God has provided us. It has definitely been a year of blessings!

There has been much more going on I am sure, but I think this highlights the most recent and big things that have been going on. Hopefully, like my title says...I will get better at this.

So Much To Do...So Little Time

2010-08-09T18:08:00.000-07:00

There is so much going on in our lives these days it's hard to keep everything straight. Sam and I are trying to get use to a new normal for us. I am now working full time which is a really fun and odd thing to grasp. I was actually getting ready this morning to head off for my first full day of school when it hit me; This is your life now! It really didn't seem real last week. While I am still learning and trying to figure everything out, this is my real life now. I am no longer the student teacher, I am the students' teacher. It's amazing! I have had a great time so far with my kids. I think that we have lucked out and gotten a great bunch of kids this year, but I might be a little biased when I say that. :) It is definitely going to be a fun year!

Sam and I also are celebrating two years of married life together! While we have been a couple for almost seven years, two years of that we have been married! :) It has flown by! It seems like yesterday we were talking about our wedding and honeymoon and things of that nature now 2 years and here we are. Last year we took a vacation early in June to celebrate our anniversary and then took a weekend getaway trip to St. Louis when our anniversary actually rolled around. This year we had to do things a little different. This summer has been crazy so we never really got the chance to really get away and celebrate, so before the hustle and bustle of this week came along Sam book us a night in a hotel in Huntsville, AL. We went to the space center and downtown Huntsville, but the heat was a lot to take in, so we started back to Nashville early Sat. afternoon. It has been a wonderful roller coaster the past two years, but I wouldn't ask for anything different! Here's to many more years of this crazy, wonderful life for us Shrewsbury's!

Oh funny thing..writing our last name made me think of this..So the kids have to call me Mrs. Shrewsbury, which I am getting use to. I'm use to hearing Mrs. Holly a thousand times a day, but I'm getting the hang of it. Anyways..I have noticed that some kids all me Mrs. Shrewbury and it completely catches me off guard. There are so many other ways for people to pronounce our name that I don't think a thing about, but leaving out the "s" in Shrewsbury really makes a difference to its sounds. Just saying...ok well everyone have a great week and I am off to work...

Ready or Not...

2010-08-02T19:18:00.000-07:00

...The school year comes! It is hard to believe that 2 months ago I was writing about how I had a job! Man has time FLOWN by this summer! It feels like it was only yesterday that I was complaining about having nothing to do during the month of May. I have plenty to do now that is for sure! I have been working hard on my room ever since I got the key in mid-July and I still feel like it needs more to be done to it. Luckily, with the help of friends and family it has come together quickly to be ready for THIS FRIDAY!! It's crazy. This Friday, I will officially be responsible for these 6th graders. It is no longer a fun thing to THINK about, it is a REALITY! Tomorrow I meet the parents of my students and then come Friday the students are here. I have not managed to remember to take pictures of my room but don't fret! I will remember to take my camera tomorrow or at least before the kiddos get there on Friday and share with you my room! It is definitely my taste of a classroom. Alright everybody....ready or not..bring on the 6th graders!

4th of July

2010-07-19T22:32:00.001-07:00

I know that we are almost at the end of July, but better late than never to blog about the 4th of July. Last year, Sam and I and some other friends of ours decided at the last minute to set up a tent hangout area in Nashville to watch the fireworks. We didn't let the forecast of rain stand in our way. Needless to say, if any of you remember the 4th from last year, it didn't just rain...a monsoon came through! Well, this year we decided to try it again, but luckily this time the forecast was in our favor minus the heat part! We came much more prepared and set up three tents one for food and the other two for shade. We had a great time hanging out with our friends! Steve brought cornhole which kept the entire group entertained for the 6 plus hours we were down there.

The fireworks started at 9:30, but we got there at 4:30 and of course didn't leave until around 11:30 due to traffic avoidance.

We had a blast hanging out with everyone. We had even more fun enjoying the scene of our neighbors..true Rednecks at heart!

They kept us entertained the entire night. It was complete with a citronella candle on the pavement, dog on the roof of the van as well as children, men without shirts which got worse as the night progressed, and plenty of hilarious talk.

I think that we have definitely created a 4th of July tradition!

Let's Catch Up A Bit

2010-06-22T18:53:00.000-07:00

So I have been a slacker lately when it comes to blogging. It is not because there is a lack of time. No, it is because I get so fed up waiting on my photo uploader to actually upload pictures that I give up and decide to do it another day. Well, I can't wait anymore so it might take me all night, but I will get these pictures uploaded and I will blog!

Sam and I decided earlier in the year that we really wanted to go to Atlanta to see the Braves play. Growing up, I went to 3 Braves games every year with my family for Father's Day weekend, so going back got me all excited! For Sam's birthday and my graduation gift to one another we decided that we would make Atlanta our little mini-vacation. We booked two games, a stadium tour, and a day at Six Flags. Needless to say, it wasn't necessarily relaxing, but it was loads of fun! This was also a special trip because this is the Manager of the Braves, Bobby Cox's last year to manage the team. He's hanging up is #6 and going fishing after this year!

Day One

We left early in the morning to head to Atlanta. We had to make it by 2 because we had a tour to attend by 3. It was a fantastic tour!! I would do it again! Sam and I decided that it was the highlight of the trip. It was right before a game so we had to do things a little differently, but were still able to see all the behind the scenes stuff!

Our tour started in the Hall of Fame Museum. There were a lot of cool things to see.

One of the things we saw in here is the 1995 World Series trophy. Pretty awesome!

Our tour started on the field. This is Matt Diaz and J. Jergens that came out on the field while we were down there. Again awesome!

Photo opt to prove we were able to be on the field.

The dugout where Chipper Jones, Heyward, and many other players stand daily!!

SITTING in the dugout where Chipper Jones, Heyward, and many other great players sit daily!!!!!

Overlook of where the old field use to be. I remember going to that stadium very vaguely. Now it's just the outfield wall that can be seen.

Photo opt overlooking the field from the press box.

This is the lookout from the open air press box where Skip Carrey and Pete Van Wieren used to sit. Sorry if you don't really care about this stuff, but Sam and I loved it so I had to share.

After the tour it was time for the stadium to open to the public for the game. We went to batting practice where apparently you have to be a kid to get a ball. I was told that.."You're not a kid!" Seriously!? Anyways, we had a little rain delay, but the game went on.
Here's some pictures from game night.

Day Two

Another hot day, but we were ready for it. It was a day game and we had seats in the outfield. Needless to say we got some sun and got rather toasty. We ended up leaving out seats and going and finding empty seats in the shade. I wanted more sun, but Sam wanted shade so we moved. Fun fact from this game, we made it on TV! We recorded the game and watched it when we got home and were able to pause the TV and found ourselves. We are really little and hard to make out, but we know it is us. I have on sunglasses and a black dress and Sam had on a hat and softball shirt. We were easy to find thanks to the neon green shirt that the man in front of us wore! :)

Here are pictures of the day...

Those uploaded in reverse, but notice that what started out to be a hair down day did not last long!! :)

The games ended with Braves WIN!!! Always a great way to leave the game!

Day Three

We woke up early and headed to Six Flags over Georgia. It was a great day because there were hardly any lines. Unfortunately, I do not have many pictures due to the fact that my bag had to go into a locker to go on rides. It wasn't cool..but we still had fun!! Oh yeah..getting wet on water rides is not nearly as fun as it was when we were kids. I guess when you're kids you don't notice how incredibly uncomfortable you really are!

This is the Ninga. We had just gotten off of the ride and were in line to the Great American when we noticed this. The ride was stuck!!! The little man had to come up there. Glad we made it off when we did!!

We had a great trip! Sorry if you are overwhelmed at this point, but I had to share Now go rest your eyes for awhile.

P.S. During the time it took me to do this blog, upload photos and all, I was able to wash two loads of laundry, fold two loads of previous laundry, put away what was folded, and hang up the hang ups. I told you it takes forever, but I accomplished my goal!! (and multi-tasked!)

Putting On The Big Girl Pants

2010-06-07T19:38:00.000-07:00

A month ago today I walked across the stage at Austin Peay becoming an official graduate with a degree in Elementary Education. On Friday, after coming home from a vacation to Atlanta that you will hear more about soon, I received my official teaching license in the mail. Today, I got the long awaited call asking me to be a part of the staff at a middle school that I have really wanted to be a part of!! In a month, so many things have happened and I see God's hand in it all. It is amazing!! So now it is time to put on my big girl pants and head into the real world of teaching 6th grade Science and Social Studies!!!

What a Weekend

2010-05-17T07:42:00.000-07:00

To say this was an eventful weekend is a slight understatement. It all started on Friday. Friday was Sam's 24th birthday. He took the day off of work to celebrate the day. To start of the celebration day, we met up with our friends Kim and Josh at the Pancake Pantry. While I was getting ready, I heard Sam yelling at Bailey but not in a "you're in trouble" kind of way. He comes to the bathroom to tell me that we caught our not so friendly mouse. This mouse wasn't a big deal to me until he had chewed one of my Thirty One bags. After that, he had to go! After three weeks, we finally caught him.

Sam carried it to the woods while I screamed here and there everytime it moved. Oh did I mention it was still alive when we caught it! It peed on itself it was so scared! HA serves it right! That's how our day started. We went to the Pancake Pantry after taking care of that situation, which isn't the same as going in Gatlinburg. The atmosphere is completely different. It was still good though, just not the same. After breakfast, Sam and I went to Cool Springs for a day of shopping. Sam got all kinds of new stuff. I wasn't so lucky, but that's nothing new! We came home to rest for just a little while before we got dressed and ready to go see my sisters before they left for prom.

Of course we had to get a sisters picture before they left!

I tried to get a picture with Sam, but we can see how well that turned out.

After seeing them off, Sam and I left to have dinner at Stoney River. He's been talking about going to eat there for forever, so we finally were able to make it out. It was good food. We had a blast getting to have a real date night of going somewhere other than the usual! I think Sam had a great birthday!

Saturday was an interesting day. I was babysitting when I got a call from Sam saying that he had rear ended someone. You would think that I would believe him when he calls to tell me something like that, but I had to ask if he was serious. He was.

We are now down a vehicle and I am stuck at home for the time being. Hopefully we will get a rental car today! Needless to say, it was an eventful weekend!

Oh The Places You'll Go...

2010-05-10T19:21:00.000-07:00

This Dr. Suess book is always brought up around the time of year that students are graduating high school and college. This is the time that I am in my life as well. Oh the places I will go now that I am a college graduate!!! That's actually our next plan for our lives. We have spent the past 2 years planning what we would do the semester before I graduate. Well, now that time has come and gone so now we are going to start planning places we want to go...THEN we will talk about adding kids to this crazy household, so don't get any ideas about that happening anytime soon! :)

So back to the whole purpose of this post. On Friday, May 7th I walked across the stage at APSU becoming one of the many Spring 2010 college graduates.
It was a hot and crazy day, but the job is complete. I will be able to pick up my diploma in June, but I at least got pictures and a little tube to put it in! My family and friends came to support and cheer me on which was a fantastic feeling. Truth be told though, I don't feel any different than I did before the ceremony began. It felt like any other day. I think the reason why is because I never completed my student teaching placement. Schools closed for the week in Cheatham County due to the flood and I was unable to say bye. I did not have closure, but I am going this week to tell them all good-bye! I also didn't have to take a final or write a paper or anything else that other people have to do. I worked (without pay), so it was just a very different feeling than I think many other people experience. Here are some of the people who shared in my day...

There were other people who were there as well but I didn't manage to get a picture with them. :( My younger sister, Moriah, had a softball game so there were some people who left during or immediately after to make it to her game. They won state by the way to those who were wondering how that worked out.

I spent the rest of the night celebrating with my friends. We went to a restaurant called Lime that is in Downtown Nashville. Just as a side note, if you want some awesome Mexican food...this is the place that you want to go! It was fabulous! I had a great graduation night of celebration. Thank you to all my friends who made it out to celebrate such a big day in my life!

God has blessed me with an awesome family! Thank you for supporting me, for putting up with my rants and vents, for not letting me quit, for listening to my issues because we know there were many, for being a shoulder to cry on, for celebrating my high points and lifting me up in my low points, and for loving me through it all! I couldn't have made it to this point without all of you!

Oh the places we'll go....

Welcome Baby Girl!

2010-04-26T14:04:00.001-07:00

We are on the downhill slide of the exciting things happening in our family! I only have less than two weeks left until I will walk across the stage at Austin Peay! That's the next thing up, but that is not what this post is about! This post is about the newest addition to the McGuire family! On Wednesday, April 21st baby girl Samantha Claire came into this world! It is such a blessing to see and hold such a beautiful and wonderful little girl. I don't know who was more excited to meet Samantha, but I know one little girl who could not wait to see her! Calyn was so excited about her baby sister! I know that they are going to be busy little bees, but it will be well-worth it! We love our newest little neice! Congratulations Gina, Chris, and Calyn!!! We love you!!!

Easter Sunday

2010-04-12T19:53:00.000-07:00

This Easter came up on us fast with us even really preparing for it. Since we spent the weekend moving, it was nice to take a somewhat break from the craziness of it all. It was really hard for me to get ready on Sunday morning! Normally, Easter Sunday is the only Sunday of the year that I don't have to try on a million things before I decide on an outfit that will do. Well, an Easter dress was not to be found this year. I didn't really look that hard to be honest. :) Sam and I got up and went to the Easter service at our church. It was packed like I'm sure several other services were on Sunday! We came home and I made some sides to have at the Shrewsbury Easter gathering! We had delicious food and wonderful family time. We got to have a little Easter egg hunt for Calyn. Let me tell you, an Easter egg hunt is pretty fun to have with a 2 year old and it lasts for quite some time! We blew bubbles, played dress up, and colored eggs. Calyn learning to blow bubbles was hilarious. I got in the way of spit several times! :) After spending time with the Shrewsbury clan, we packed up our side dishes and headed to the Claud gathering. It was a family day and we loved it! Tiring for sure, but loved it!
Here are some of the pictures of the day:

Welcome Home

2010-04-12T19:33:00.000-07:00

A week and a half ago we closed on our very own first home!

It definitely was a whirlwind of a week. There has been a million different things to do with my student teaching, getting ready for the move, and Sam working, but we triumphed through and have finally settled into our OWN home! We have most everything in its place, although there is one box that I refuse to go through because I don't know where to put it! The kitchen is definitely the first room to fill up fast! Before we started the moving process, we had to stop to enjoy the moment. We had a nice, pleasant lunch at the fabulous Springfield restaurant, The Depot. After lunch we knew it was time to start setting up our home! Thankfully, we had wonderful friends and family who came to our rescue to help make the unpacking process a lot easier. By the end of Wednesday night (the same day we closed), everything but clothes had a home! It was a miracle by far! We cannot thank everyone enough for their help and prayers for our family as we have been going through such an exciting time in our life! The next adventure we have coming down the pike is the birth of Baby Girl McGuire and my graduation! All of this will be happening in less than a month, so stay tuned for the updates as they happen! I will be back on the grid now that everything is finally starting to settle down! God has blessed far more than we can imagine and we are so thankful for that! The blessings are just going to continue to pour and I cannot wait to share them with you!
It is so nice to be able to say Welcome Home!

We're Moving!!

2010-03-20T12:48:00.000-07:00

That's right people. Your eyes are not deceiving you! We are in fact moving to OUR OWN HOUSE!!! We have been looking for quite some time and in February we found the house we had been on the hunt for. Luckily for us, the price was right too! We have exactly 11 more days until we close on the house and begin moving from our apartment to OUR HOME! I love the thought and very soon that thought is going to be a reality! We are currently living in the state of destruction. We started the packing process about a week ago, just to get a head start. Ever since then, the boxes and junk continue to pile up on us. It is driving me insane, but I know that it has to be a mess for now until we actually can put things into a trailer and haul it out of here! I never knew how much stuff we acquired over the past year and a half, but man oh man there is a ton of stuff that this little apartment has been holding! I would love to share some photos of the state of the house at the moment..actually I wouldn't...but (un)fortunately the camera was never found so I can't! :) On a good note though, I was able to get a new one so that I can share all the wonderful moments that are coming up! In our very near future we will have a new house, a new niece, and a new graduate!!! All in a matter of 2 months, so I had to get a new one to capture it all! Needless to say, the Shrewsbury household is in for a whirlwind!

Things Learned So Far in 2010

2010-02-15T08:12:00.000-08:00

To start off this post, I must sadly report that a very tragic thing has happened and it will greatly effect the posts I make until it is fixed. Yes, to start off the things I've learned in 2010 so far is that it is not a very smart move to kayak behind a four wheeler with a camera in a sweatshirt pocket. In fact, if you do this it is very possible that the camera will fly out into the snow and will not be found. Even if your camera is a bright pink, which normally could be easily found, it won't be found, not even if you use a metal detector! Yes, I am sad to report that pictures of Shrewsbury happenings are on hold until I get a replacement camera. Lesson definitely learned on that one!

Another lesson I have learned is that it is not a good idea to try to hard boil an egg in the microwave. I also learned that directions from the internet on how to hard boil an egg in the microwave are not correct. In fact, I learned that you cannot put an egg in a microwave safe boil, cover it with water, and put it in the microwave for 10 minutes. If you do happen to do this, it is very possible that the egg will explode and make a noise as if you have been shot. The egg will smell awful and you get to clean up a huge mess! I do not recommend this at all. I recommend doing the old fashioned hard boiled eggs on the stove, even if you are trying to save time. It could end up looking something like this...

I have learned that snow days are awesome, although I really should be getting to student teach, but I won't complain! I have not learned what it feels like to work for an entire 5 day week. I actually have not had a full work week for the entire year of 2010. I will soon learn I am sure, but for now I enjoy being able to say that! :)

Finally, Sam and I have learned that all you need is an awesome real estate agent and you can get the house you've been looking for! We have been looking for a house for quite some time and gave up for a little while, but decided to get back on the bandwagon and start over with a new real estate agent. We are very happy to announce that we are officially under contract on a house and will be closing March 31st! We are SUPER excited about it all! I would share pictures, but you know what happened to that!

Adjustments

2010-01-23T19:37:00.000-08:00

Don't you just love having to get adjusted to things?! It has to be one of my least favorite things ever. Okay, so it's really not that bad, but I do not adapt fast to things. This past week was my first week in the world of teaching real-life style and man was it something that I am going to have to get use to! Getting up early...really early for me... does not work well with me at all. Then I realize that Oh crap..this is going to be my life from here on out. Getting up at 6 AM (or earlier), going to work, coming home, planning lessons, doing dinner, clean the house?, get ready for the next day, go to bed, and repeat. I think that should go on a bottle of something, like it's on shampoo: wet, lather, rinse, repeat! That would take a large bottle! Sorry got off track..let's get back on. This week Sam and I have been getting adjusted to the new way of our lives. He is still in the state of adjustment with his new job. He is driving a lot longer and getting up a lot earlier than he use to. There have been a whirlwind of emotions and frustrations and excitements and so many others this past week for me, but MAN it is taking some adjusting!

I did have a great first week student teaching for those who are wondering. There is a lot of stuff that I have questions about, but it has nothing to do with actual teaching, just the formal APSU stuff. I am excited about getting to actually teach real lessons that I plan. If they bomb, then they bomb and I will make changes to try again. That's what happens in the real world. If its great, then its great! Everything can be changed and adjusted as needed and that is what I like. This week I will be teaching about World War II. I have been running ideas in my head like crazy for the past week and am finally going to put them to action this week. It's nice to know that the aggravation that I have been through was well worth getting to be at the point that I am now. That does not mean that the chance for aggravation is over, but it is worth it that.

Sam reminded me the other night of why I am doing what I am doing because to be quite honest I was just not feeling it at all. He wanted me to try and forget about everything that I have been through with this thing called college and remember why I decided that teaching was for me. I remembered...

Sam and I were sitting in a classroom at his parents church 3-4 years ago. At the time, the church was meeting in a school building while their church building was being built. I remember sitting there not paying a lick of attention to the class (cause it was way over my head) and staring at the walls. I looked at the posters, the signs from the students, and everything else in that room. I felt at home. I felt that this is what I am suppose to be doing. I sat in that room and thought back to the teachers that influenced or put a mark in my life. That's when I knew that I wanted to be that teacher. I wanted to be a teacher that one day a student thought back to while sitting in another class and say "Man, she was the best teacher! She taught me so many great things and influenced my life!" I want to make a difference in childrens lives even if it is in the smallest way possible. This is what I have to remember. I have to forget all the frustrating lesson plan formats, the tears of anger from being so frustrated at it all and remember that this is what I have to do to one day make a difference to just one child. That is why I chose to be a teacher and that is why I WILL get up early, I WILL go to work, and I WILL get adjusted. (and then get the summers off! ;)

Getaway to Gatlinburg

2010-01-18T14:06:00.000-08:00

This past weekend Sam and I decided to take a little getaway before I start to student teach. He had Martin Luther King Day off, so we decided to go to Gatlinburg for the weekend and came home Sunday to enjoy a relaxing Monday off. We met up in Nashville and took off for our weekend retreat. We rented a cabin that was very secluded from the rest of the world.

The name of the cabin was
I found this really cool since that is the song that we walked out to at our wedding! Sam picked out the cabin it was a really nice surprise..even if he didn't do it on purpose. :) It was complete with a hot tub and wood burning fireplace!

Sam immediately made a fire as soon as we got there, but had to be creative due to the lack of matches. He used the oven to light paper and then make his way back to the fireplace. It was pretty fun to sit back and watch actually. We enjoyed a day of shopping in Tanger Village, got a little relaxation time in the hot tub, and then went out to dinner that night.

We went to Calhoun's which is somewhere that I will not be returning to for awhile. My food was disgusting! (just a side note) We shopped a little more on Sunday on our way back from Gatlinburg. Sam had some great finds, but I wasn't so lucky. We have been enjoying our day off today, but tomorrow starts a new adventure! I am very nervous, anxious, and excited about it all, but this weekend was a great way to start off!

Start to the End

2010-01-14T14:33:00.000-08:00

Today I woke up for the last first day of my undergraduate classes and it is an overwhelming, wonderful feeling! I drove to APSU for the first of only a very few times I will have to be there this semester. On Tuesday, I start student teaching. This is what I have been waiting for. It has not been an easy road to say the least and I know the road ahead will not be either, but I can see the faint light at the end of the tunnel. This semester I will be doing something that I feel that I will love. I am putting what I have learned these past few semesters into practice and I am nervous and excited all at the same time. Today was the start to the end of this college career, but it is a beginning to my real career! How exciting! :)

Bringing in the New Year

2010-01-02T19:31:00.000-08:00

Sam and I celebrated the New Year with our friends at my sisters house this year. It was blast to get together with a lot of our friends and just spend some time together. The boys watched football and the girls chatted in the kitchen for awhile. We had A LOT of food, at least it seemed to be a lot of food since that is what we ate the entire next day! We tried to play some board games, but the guys would never come and join us. The girls took it upon ourselves to play the game, even though we didn't really play it the right way! It's called Encore! and it is one fun game. If you haven't ever heard of it, you should look it up. It involves singing, so of course it makes for a funny game! . When it got close to the time for the ball to drop, we all gathered in the living room and started our countdown! 5...4...3..2...1... HAPPY NEW YEAR!!! We had so much fun this New Years! Thank you Mike and Regina for opening up your home to all of us! Sam, Steve, Amanda, and I even got to stay the night and watch football at their house the next day..and watch Elaina take some steps all on her own! Now on to see what 2010 has in store for us!

Christmas 2009

2009-12-30T19:41:00.000-08:00

WARNING: THIS WILL BE A LONG POST SO SIT TIGHT! (Or don't...I'm not being bossy!)
This year we decided to spread out our Christmas with family. Some of Sam's family has to travel to spend time with other family, so we had our Shrewsbury Christmas a little earlier than normal. We met at Gina and Chris' house to have dinner and spend some time together. It was so much fun to watch Calyn this Christmas because she could communicate and get excited about the gifts that she opened. Eventually, we will learn to give Calyn the clothes and smaller presents first BEFORE the big presents. She always loses interest after the big presents. These are a few pictures of the night:

We went to my mom's brother's house on Christmas Eve. We had some people feeling a little under the weather, but that didn't stop us from having a wonderful time getting to sit and chat with each other.

Christmas Day is a fun-filled, jam packed day but so worth it! We started out Christmas morning together. This is us Christmas morning fresh out of bed. I am amazed that I am willing to put this up, but not everyone can come straight out of bed looking fresh and clean people! :)
We opened our presents from each other and had to start getting ready to leave right after we got finished.

Our first stop was my parents house. We enjoyed a nice breakfast and then opened gifts. After finishing presents, we got together to try to get family pictures. This is easier said then done, especially when you are doing self-timing with 3 different cameras going off at three different times. It makes for quite a laughing filled experience...and pictures! We finally got some good ones after SEVERAL retakes!
The whole family together:

Sisters:

All the kids together now:

On a side note, it even spit some snow at us while we were there, so that was nice to see on Christmas even if it didn't stick!

We left from there and headed to Sam's aunt and uncles house. This is always an enjoyable experience for me! I laugh my head off the entire time I do believe! We had some great food, talks, but then came the Sock Swap Dirty Santa game. This was a hilarious experience!! Grandma Ellis got cat socks..this means a stuffed cat sewn on top of a black sock, not cats printed on socks! I told you funny stuff!These are the socks I speak of:

There were an assortment of socks. Socks with cats, fur, zebra print, hunting, white, black, and sportwear! O yeah and house shoe socks! I got those!

We left and headed to my grandparents house, dad's side this time! Sam was tired of taking pictures by this time can you tell? We spent some time with family and opened some more presents. The three amigo cousins all have matching sweatshirts now! Aren't they just too cute!?!?

By this point in the night, Regina and I started getting a little tired. When we get tired, we start doing slightly silly things. Well, we found out that our cameras can take pictures repeatedly several times, so thought it would be funny to make different faces for every picture. Now that I say that, I just looked through my pictures and I guess I must have been the one who laughed the whole time while Regina took the pictures...I don't have any funny one's on my camera! :( O well still thought I would share that little bit of information!

We had a great Christmas season spending some much needed time with our family and friends. I hope that you all had a wonderful time as well! Now we are heading on to see what God has in store for us for this new year! I know some great things are going to be happening!

To come in 2010:
*A New Niece
*A Diploma
*A Big Girl Job

I'd say that God has some things in store for the Shrewsbury's that for sure!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!
(And no your eyes are not deceiving themselves..this post is now over!)

1st Annual Tacky Christmas

2009-12-20T21:38:00.000-08:00

As promised this post is about the Tacky Christmas Sweater Party that Sam and I went to on Saturday night at Steve and Amanda's house. It was really fun to all get together with people we have met before and people we just got to meet that night. The interesting thing to me is to see other people interpretations of what exactly is a tacky Christmas sweater. Many of us hit Goodwill in search of the perfect Christmas sweater. This was easier said then done, but all of us found something. Mike found an iron-on Christmas tree with blinking Christmas lights inserted. That is Steve's foot in the picture. Sorry the whole thing is basically covered. Sam and I searched and searched for the perfect sweater and finally Saturday afternoon we hit the motherload (in women's wear). Sam's creation won the overall prize of the most tacky Christmas sweater. He had on a woman's sweater with Minnie and Mickey Mouse sewn in on the sides (complete with candy canes). He had a Santa shirt underneath and to top it off wore a slightly small Santa hat. Now that you can mentally see the picture here's the visual. I wasn't tacky tacky, but I wouldn't wear the sweater normally, so it fit. Other people got creative and made their own. Lindsey attached ornaments to a sweater she's really didn't know how she got and then made John a snowman sweater from cotton balls and tissue paper. Creative I know! Way to go Lindsey. I voted for her to win, but Sam won. I got out voted. Anyways...we all chatted, Elaina got in a box all by herself, we took pictures,
and then came the game. Catchphrase to be exact. This is when the fun happened. It was girls against boys and unfortunately (possible with some cheating mixed in) the boys won 2 out of 3 games. It was a sad defeat, but the girls still had a great time making fun of the boys and the boys had a great time...well..being boys I guess! :)
. The night ended with snow on our cars, but not on the grass or roads. I'll take it though. Snow is snow! It was a great night and a great way to start off the Christmas festivities for the week! Hope you all have a very Merry Christmas if you do not hear from me before then!

Girls Night Out

2009-12-16T07:26:00.001-08:00

Sam and I try to have time to spend with just the guys and just the girls. Friday night was that kind of night for me and Monday was the time for him! Girls night first! Our friend Kim invited some girls to her house for an ornament swap and cookie decorating. There were some things that came up that made it where some girls couldn't make it, but we didn't let it stop the party. We had some snacks, chatted, swapped ornaments, and then headed to make some cookies. This was an experience for me because I have never made Christmas sugar cookies. Yes, you heard me right! Never made them. It was slightly messy and thanks to our lack of sugar cookie knowledge the cookies came out very puffy. It was a fun time though regardless of how messy the cookies might have turned out. We all had a great time just relaxing and having some girl time. We ate the dough, got powered sugar all over us and the floor, created some interesting frosting colors, and hung out! We've decided to make this an annual event, but swap up the houses we go to. Next year, the destination is undecided, but we will be making gingerbread houses! Here are some pictures of the night..

This week, Sam is on vacation..at home. He had built up hours, so hey why not take them right before you start a new job?! Sunday, he and John decided that they needed a guy day too. The three boys (Sam, John, and Trav) look off at 4 AM on Monday morning and drove to Indiana to go skiing. They said they had a great time. No waits on the lifts, did some crazy jumps, fell a lot, but had a fun. I think that Sam is a little spoiled after going skiing in the Wyoming. This hills seemed like a piece of cake. Sam did take my camera with him, but he did not take pictures, so I guess we will all just take him at his word! :)

Coming soon: Ugly Christmas Sweater Party

Let's Do A Little Catching Up

2009-12-08T19:09:00.000-08:00

It has been forever since I have given everyone an update and we have definitely been up to a lot of stuff. Let's start at the beginning of November...yes a whole month ago. Sam and I volunteer to work with the youth ministry at our church. He co-leads with 8th and 9th grade boys and I co-lead with 6th grade girls. Well, in the beginning of November we took off one weekend with them to Gatlinburg to be a part of Crave. It was a youth retreat...more like a lock in really. We did not sleep too terribly much! We both had a blast, but needed some rest by the time we got home. Here's a few pictures of that weekend...
Everyone was so great and it was nice to get to know each other in a different atmosphere than at Remix on Wednesday nights! Just so you know the 6th grade girls are so much cooler than the 8th and 9th grade boys! :)

So November continued on...I did my field experience placement which went fantastic! I also started on a new business adventure. I will not be able to work when I student teach, so I have been looking for an avenue for making some money while I am student teaching. I thought about cleaning some houses, babysitting, but then an opportunity came for me to be a Thirty-One consultant. It has been fabulous! I love doing this job! If you are ever interested in anything, just let me know. We then came to Thanksgiving, which was on hectic but well worth it day! It started Wednesday night when I was cooking away in the kitchen making Sweet Potato Suffle and Oreo Balls all of which were a hit! We got up and went to my parents house for a Thanksgiving breakfast. We were really excited that we were able to see both of our families on a holiday that is only one day! We went to Sam's grandma's house in TN for lunch and then left late afternoon to travel to West Virginia. It was a long trip, but waking up to snow made it sooo worth it!
We took a little trip to Turkey Spur to look at the gorgeous scenic views of West Virginia.

We spent some quality time with Sam's family over the weekend. And yes, I did miss the Black Friday sales, but the snow made it ok with me.

So here we are. It's now December! We have put our Christmas tree and had plenty of Christmas music being played despite how bad Sam doesn't like it! :) I LOVE Christmas music..Sam not as much! This is Bailey's first Christmas, so we look a few pictures of him with the tree just for fun.

I know he's such a model! :)
Finally, let's get to the great news! I saved the best for last of course! We both have some great changes coming our way! Sam has been offered a new job that will be in Nashville. He will be starting the new job right before Christmas! God is SOOO great! We have been praying for a new job for him for over a year now and after putting our way to the side, an offer came our way! It was so amazing! I also much give credit to our very good friend Lindsey who put Sam's name in the hat for the position! THANK YOU! My big news is that I have made it to the end of the semester. I still have finals, but the schoolwork is complete. I will no longer have assignments and tests and useless classtime that I learn absolutely nothing. I finished my last assignment of my college career tonight and it was an awesome, yet unreal thing. It is amazing that four years ago I was nervous about my first finals ever and moving back home to change schools to Austin Peay. Now, I am done! I am on the downhill slide to graduation. Yes, student teaching will be challenging, but I will be doing what I want to do and not sitting in class doing busy work! That is what I am so excited about! So we want to thank you all for all of your prayers. There have been many people who have been supporting us through prayer and words and we cannot thank you enough! With all that said, I guess I have caught you up on the Shrewsbury Happenings! I should have more time to blog now, so hopefully I won't have so much to do in one post from here on out!

In Case You Are Wondering...

2009-11-14T18:50:00.000-08:00

..we are still around. To say it's been crazy is a slight understatement. Every little bit of free time I have had has been spent doing homework. It's the homework that never ends, but the end is in sight so I can make it. I want to thank everyone for their prayers and support. I have been holding my head up thanks to you! There's some new stuff going on in our house. Sam's going to start working under another company at his property and I have started my own business. Yes, your eyes are not deceiving you..I am going to be selling purses through Thirty-One. It is a bibically based company that I am really looking forward to get involved in. It's actually me and my friend Amanda that are working together. I am actually working under her, but we will be working together. If you ever want anything or want to see a catalog, let me know!;) Just throwing that out there! I am really excited about what God has in store for this new chapter for us! It's going to be fun.I will start getting really into it once I get out of school in three weeks. On another note, this week is going to slightly stressful for Sam and I so if you think about saying a quick prayer for us that would be great! Sam is meeting the new company and they will be checking everything out. I will be doing a field experience all week teaching in a fifth grade classroom. To get ready to do this has been the biggest pain ever, but hopefully it will get better once we get into the week. I am really nervous about it, but I know everything will be alright. If anything it is a learning opportunity whether things go good or bad! Just wanted to give you all a quick fill in before this week starts! Hope you all have a fabulous pre-Thanksgiving week!

I can do this!

2009-10-25T18:44:00.000-07:00

It's less than two months away from when my time as a college student will come to an end. Technically that doesn't happen until May, the 7th to be exact, but I won't be in classes after Dec. I will be doing what I want to do as a career, minus the pay part. I will be planning lessons how I want to plan them. It will be the end of group projects and doing stupid little busy work things. I will be working in a school system that will hopefully soon be the school that I will teach at. I must continue to keep my eye on the goal and trust that God will not give me more than I can handle. At the moment, I feel completely overwhelmed and do not see the end in sight. I have decided that the only way for me to make it through the rest of this awful semester is to have two things: a) a countdown, so that would be 25 more class days from right now and b) prayer. I have never been this confused, frustrated, mad, and any other adjective that you can think that goes along with these. I need prayer! So for the next 25 days (class days) or 1.5 months please pray for patience, understanding, and calmness as I complete this last semester of college classes, because this has been the most difficult semester I have faced. I just needed to vent, but also get some support and be real about how things are going for me at the moment and here is the best place for me to do just that! I know that I can do this, but it will not be done alone!! Thank you so much for your prayers and support for our lives!

Funny Story

2009-10-19T20:22:00.000-07:00

As I said in my last post, I went today to observe my teacher that I will be student teaching for in the spring. Well I thought that I would share a funny story from the day. I signed in the office that I always do at every school I go in to. Today was no exception. I talked to the office ladies and went on down to my classroom. Well if you sign in you think to sign out. I go to the office to sign out and find about three different sign out sheets. I get confused and ask the lady I talked to earlier which one I needed to sign out on. She said word for word "The bus bell has already rang. You don't need to sign out." I was in shock, but flashed my little badge because words didn't come. She said "Oh don't worry about it. You're good!" I walked out laughing. I know that I look young, but middle school young!? I haven't gotten that one! Even though I felt slightly belittled on that one, I walked out with pride...my short, young middle school looking self! On the bright side, at this rate when I am 40 I will look about early 30's maybe late 20's! I thought I would share my funny story from today! (Just so you know, I love my teacher and the students! The school is pretty great too! Obviously I fit right in!) :)

Camping Getaway with a Little History Lesson

2009-10-18T19:25:00.000-07:00

This weekend is my fall break weekend. Being in the school of education means you don't get a fall break, so Sam and I decided that I would get a fall break weekend instead. I say this because I have to spend my fall break observing the teacher that I will be doing my student teaching with next spring. So Sam and I asked our friends Josh and Kim to come along with us and we headed out Friday to Piney campground. All signs pointed to not going this weekend, but we weren't going to let a little rain, sleet, frost, cold, or anything get in our way. Really all we were missing was the hail and snow and we would've completely met the postman motto! We set up camp Friday and stayed until this afternoon. We had a great, relaxing weekend. We sat by the fire, played Uno, went sightseeing, sat by the fire some more, cooked, ate, played more Uno, and slept. It really was great! Here are some pictures from this weekend.

The last picture is a candle lit dinner camping style...or just a source of light, but I like to think it was a "candle lit" steak dinner!

On our way home, Sam and I took a little detour and had a quick history lesson. We went to Fort Donelson and took a little drive tour of a Civil War landmark. If you don't know, I love American history, but I love seeing American history more than learning about it in a class. I am a huge Civil War buff you could say! I love visiting all the Forts and landmarks and stuff. I think that started in 4th grade, renewed in 8th grade, and has continued on a little since. So anyways, we saw trenches and an eagle's nest, canons, and other significant things.

It was a fun little detour! We left from there and headed home to watch the embarrassing act the Titans put on today! I told you I would catch up and I sure did! I wouldn't let you down!

Good Times With Family

2009-10-18T19:16:00.000-07:00

Last weekend, Sam's cousin Daniel came in town from South Carolina. He brought his girlfriend with him who loves to dance and listen to country music, so what better place to take her than the Wildhorse Saloon! Sam and I met up with Daniel and Paula and Sarah and Jake and went to the Wildhorse. They had already been to see the Grand Ole Opry before this. Sam and I went to hang out with our favorite and temporarily only niece Calyn.
She's pretty fun to hang out with. She can say our names which is really cool, but anyways on with the story. We all went to the Wildhorse and just hung out. Sam, Sarah, Paula, and I all learned the line dance to the Purple People Eater song. If you would like to learn it, I will give lessons, but it will cost you just so you know! :) Sarah and Sam danced...Paula and Sam did the electric slide...Sam sat down cause Paula kicked his butt...it was all just one fun night! It was great getting to meet Paula and hanging out with the family!

Newest Tarheel Fan

2009-10-18T19:05:00.001-07:00

It should be no surprise to many of you that this household supports UNC. I was converted many years ago when I was forced to watch UNC college basketball. By forced, I mean that I did not have the remote and college basketball is what was on TV and I just had to deal with it! This really hasn't changed much over the years, we've just added more sports that we watch such as all football and all basketball and a little baseball. I at least get a break with hockey..we don't watch that! Anyways, I have become a Tarheel fan too you could say, at least with basketball. So Sam has Carolina shirts, I have a sweatshirt, but poor Bailey had nothing to show support for the team. This was an easy fix! I went to the flea market in September and told a lady who sold sports wear for dogs that if she got North Carolina stuff I would get it. Sure enough, October flea market came and there in a nice little row was a sweater, jersey, and bandana all North Carolina. I got Bailey the jersey, so now this whole Shrewsbury household has North Carolina gear we can sport when needed. Bailey wore his jersey for the last game and they won just so you know! **Side note: Please excuse Bailey's appearance! He is getting groomed this week due to this long haired look! Thanks!

Happy 30th Steve!

2009-10-18T18:48:00.000-07:00

I'm a little behind with my blogging, but I will soon catch up! No worries! Amanda called me probably in June or July and told me she had decided the theme of Steve's birthday surprise! Needless to say is birthday was in October, so I thought she was crazy for being so ahead of the game! I am a procrastinator at heart, although I try my hardest to hide it! I don't do a very good job at that! Anyways, so the week finally came of Steve's birthday and I helped Amanda get some things finished the day of. His friends and family came out to surprise him at his Vegas themed surprise birthday. Amanda is a party planner at heart and will one day do that full time! (I'm pulling for you Amanda!) She went all out with decorations and had to hide them from Steve. Hard task when you live with the person who is impossible to surprise. It was a great night for Steve and I really think he enjoyed himself! I mean his name was on the sign and everything! Here are some pictures of the party:

A Perfect Day

2009-10-05T07:36:00.000-07:00

It is pretty safe to say that it has been a crazy couple of weeks around the Shrewsbury house! Last weekend I was down for the count with flu-like stuff. This past week flew by with school and getting ready for Regina and Mike's wedding! We have finally slowed down enough that I even have time to blog!! Now that should tell you something! Friday was spent doing little odds and ends to get the ceremony and reception site ready. They got married at my aunt and uncles barn, so there was lots of preparing to do these past few months! I wish we had a before picture because then you could truly see the transformation! Anyways, Saturday morning we set tables, cleaned up, and put everything in its place. Regina's day was finally here! There were no clouds, no chance of rain, annoying wind but that's alright, and the sun was shining bright! She had a dramatic entrance coming in from a field like she just appeared out of nowhere! I can't lie it brought tears to my eyes! The ceremony came and went and then the party started! They had tables set up in the field for dinner and a dance floor in the barn! It was so much fun! Steve Barrios was the DJ for the night and he did a wonderful job! We had some oldies but goodies, a little cha-cha slide, and many more! My favorite was doing the dance line like from the end of Hitch! We all had such a good time! They finally left and are now enjoying the pleasant warm beaches of Jamaica while we are back to work on this cold, fall-like Monday morning! We love you two! Congratulations!

Womack Wedding

2009-09-19T16:27:00.001-07:00

It has been the season of weddings around here or at least it seems that way! August has been the only wedding that we have not had a wedding to attend since June! In two weeks, we will be celebrating Regina and Mike's wedding, but today it was all about Rachel and Tyler. Sam was a groomsman and he looked rather sharp! The wedding was beautiful! It brought in fall in with navy and burnt orange. Lindsey and I were each others dates for the day because our men were both busy. John was working and Sam was on groomsman duty. Tyler is a HUGE Florida fan, so the fact that the wedding and kick-off to the Florida-UT game was at the same time at the wedding made for a good opening ceremony! The reception was gorgeous, but nothing came near Rachel! She was stunning! Congrats Rachel and Tyler Womack! We are very happy for you two!

Happy Birthday to Me!

2009-09-19T16:17:00.000-07:00

Last Friday was my 21st birthday! I celebrated in style by taking the entire day off! I don't have school on Friday's, but I took the day off of work the day that I started back to work in August! :) I figured I might as well do it now while I still can! Birthdays here on out will be while I am working in a real job, so I took the opportunity while I had it and what better birthday to do it than your 21st! I went to lunch with Sam and spent the rest of the day shopping. I came home with some jewelry to wear that night, so it was a success I guess. When Sam got home from work, we took off to Nashville to go eat at Nero's Grill in Green Hills with some friends. It was a great night, even though we got caught in the pouring rain at one point! It was a great birthday! Sam got me a camera which was very much needed as I have already explained. It has been great to have around too!

Fabulous Finds...

2009-09-11T08:52:00.001-07:00

So Lindsey has introduced me to something new that I have never been too before. Last month, a small group of us girls took off one Friday morning, rather early for me, and headed to the Flea Market in Nashville. This was my first experience and WOW I was in in shock of all the fabulous things that were there. Sam and I have been wanting to "amp up" our living room and other areas around the house, so this is what I had in mind as I walked around the many, many places. Well, low and behold, what do you know I found some perfect things for our living room! The best part is that it was all 75% off, so I paid basically nothing for it! So here they are.
I added the pop of color with red and green from Hobby Lobby and with those adds, I love them in our living room! I also found some great Fiestaware at a booth that is again adding more color to our kitchen too! My dad and I have been working on a box thing to put on the wall in our kitchen to display some of the wonderful colors that can be found our fiestaware! I will post a picture of that when I get it up on the wall! The last find was two plates that I have put a candle on as a centerpiece to the coffee table! It is all wonderful! I cannot wait to return in two weeks to make another go at it! I get so many ideas, it's just insane! Oh yeah, I got to post pictures thanks to my wonderful husband Sam who bought me a new camera for my birthday!!! Thanks babe!!! More about my birthday later though, since it is only 11 o'clock and I've only been sitting on the couch! It's been a wonderful, relaxing birthday morning though! Now, off to lunch with Sam!

New Things

2009-08-31T20:59:00.000-07:00

We are so excited for new things that are going on with us, granted some of the new that we want is a waiting game, but still we are anticipating and look forward to the things ahead even if it means that we will be waiting awhile! Wow, that was a long, possibly run-on sentence, but o well! Today, I had my last first day of college classes!!! It was a great feeling to know that I am on the downward path to graduation! I am getting "senioritis" really fast! :) Which graduation day is May 7th, not that I looked at that today at all! lol It was great to sit in class and my teacher say "A year from now you will be in your first classroom on your first day and getting paid for it!" That was an awesome realization! I also got my parking decal today which expires in August 2010...I will be long gone by then! That was awesome! We are both just absolutely ready for change! We are excited to see what this upcoming year has in store for us! Please be in prayer for us for this year as it will definitely bring its challenges!
*By the way, I thought about taking a self timed picture of my first day of my last semester of school classes, but decided against it! lol If someone would have taken it for me then maybe, but I could not bring myself to self-time the whole deal! Just thought I would share that!

Celebrations

2009-08-29T19:46:00.000-07:00

We took a trip back in June if you remember for our vacation/first year celebration because in August, Sam can't take vacation time, so we decided to celebrate slightly early. Well, we couldn't let our anniversary pass without doing something and we both needed a little getaway, so we packed up after work on a Friday and took off to St. Louis! I must say that I absolutely love that place! If I were willing to move out of state, I would definitely be alright living there! There is so much to do that Sam and I will have to go back...there just wasn't enough time in the weekend to get to all the places. We spent Saturday at Six Flags St. Louis which was so much fun! It was extremely hot, but we had a blast (aside from all the awful smell of BO!) We were able to enjoy ourselves even more once we bought the free refill with purchase of Souvenir cup! Being there brought me back to when I was little and rode on the rides I was tall enough to go on with my dad. He was the only one who would ride them aside from me! Good news though, I finally grew enough that I didn't get my height checked this go around! Sam didn't either for those of you wondering about him! :) We both got tossed around in several of the rides though, which again brought me back to when my head was barely out of the little bar things and my head would bounce side to side due to the jerkiness and it still did it! Not quite tall enough I guess! :( I got to get a picture with Elmer Fud..he was the only one out and about on this hot hot day! We were exhausted, smelly, sweaty, and down right nasty so we headed back to the hotel. We decided we had to get something to eat, so we asked Sarah, Sam's sister who has been to St. Louis many, many, times for suggestions on places we really needed to try out. She directed us to "The Hill' where we at some authentic Italian wonderfulness! To say we were stuffed to the max is an understatement! I felt like I was carrying a small child of food in my stomach on the walk back to the car! Anyways, before we headed back home from our weekend getaway, we had to go to the arch. I mean who can take a trip to the "Gateway to the West" without going to see the gateway?! We waited for awhile, but got to learn a lot about the city and how it all started. Let me just say that if you a person who is claustrophobic you should NOT go up the arch! You are packed into a 5 seater little mini-mobile and taken up the side of the arch. It is BEAUTIFUL when you get up there, but man oh man, the ride up and down is really no fun! You are better off asking to take the stairs for a little bit of exercise...okay that would be a tremendous amount of exercise that no one should really do, but you get my point. It is a tight squeeze! We took the ride anyways and at the top looked to the east and west of the city and it was amazing!This is us in the top of the very crowded arch, but we managed to snap a quick photo to remember the moment! :) We left from there and found Ted Drewes, a wonderful place to eat some frozen custard (ice cream)!We had to have some authentic, only found in St. Louis lunch, so we ate at St. Louis Bread Co. and what do you know it turned out to be Panera Bread! So much for being authentic! We still need to visit the City Museum, the Zoo (free), the Science Museum (free), Busch Stadium, and probably some other things that I don't know about yet, but will do them once I learn about them! On a side note, we kept driving through the city limits of "Shrewsbury", so we had to get a picture to document "our little town", but it would come and go very quickly! Bound and determined we were and sure enough were able to snap a quick pic before we left, in motion and everything, but please disregard the foot in the picture! :)
It was definitely somewhere that both of us want to return to! We had a great time on our one year anniversary weekend getaway!
The other celebration that we have had is the passing of my 4 praxis tests, but we all know about that, so I won't go back there! We did go eat at Shogun's though for a little Congrats! It was wonderful too!

THIS JUST IN...

2009-08-25T05:33:00.001-07:00

I PASSED ALL OF THE PRAXIS TESTS!!! I have made this announcement on any form of status update possible..twitter, facebook, don't do myspace, but it I would put it there too! I can now focus on my last semester of college classes! I can officially student teach in the spring! I am going to be a teacher! WOW!! I feel awesome right now! Thank you so much for your prayers and support! YAY!

One Year Ago..

2009-08-15T19:12:00.000-07:00

This post is slightly delayed, but being posted now that I have a computer that will cooperate with me! I am getting use to this new computer so postings are taking me slightly longer than normal and I can't figure out how to get my pictures from my memory stick to my computer, so this will take me awhile! Anyway back to the purpose of this post..One year ago we said "I do"!On August 9, 2008, we became our own little family and have been loving every single second of it! This past year has definitely been a year of ups and downs, but we have been enduring them together and I cannot think of a better person to be experiencing it all than with Sam. On that day we set aside all of our worries and what ifs, and focused on us! It was a perfect day to say the least! The men always find a way to have fun even when it is crazy hot outside and in tuxes... I thought it would be pretty cool to wear the hottest shoes created, but they are better to look at then wear...I mean seriously look at these crazy awesome shoesok ok back to the day..we took a million pictures and had extreme pain in the jaw area from all of the smiles, but it was worth it! Our pictures are amazing and although I can sit here and type about it all I thought I would just share some of my favorite pictures of our wedding day.

Please note that these pictures were taken by Shannon Basel from Mint and Sage photography. We would like to thank her and her girls for capturing our day so that we will have memories for a lifetime!

As we start another year of our life together, we look forward to all that comes our way knowing that we are not alone!
Thank you God for all that you have done and continue to do for our family!

SIDE NOTE: This post looks a little funny when I "posted it" and viewed it, but it took me too long to get it to look like what it does, so until I figure out all of these technical difficulties, I guess this is what it will be! :)

We're Back In With the World

2009-08-15T19:09:00.000-07:00

That's right ladies and gentleman we are back in tune with the outside world! Sam went today to get us a computer and came home with a MacBook Pro and an itouch! We have been enjoying both of them all night long and I must admit, we are slightly addicted to the itouch! We are trying to figure out how we can share it because we both have fallen in love! This is not the point of this post. The point is that we are back to blogging which is what really matters!

Just So You Know..

2009-08-12T10:06:00.000-07:00

..we have not fallen off the face of the planet. No this is something much more serious than that! Our computer has gone to a better place! It has officially had its last blog, last paper, last anything else that it can do as of the weekend. We are going to just have to buy a new one cause fixing the dead one is pointless. So with that said...I sadly, very sadly must say that my blogging days are on hold for the moment...well until we get a new computer. At the moment I am updating on my friends John and Lindsey's computer because I just had to tell you all! I could not keep you hanging wondering where in the world we are! :) But there is lots to blog about such as a trip to St. Louis, our one year, a new hair style, and I'm sure there's something else I am leaving out, but those are somethings coming soon! Well coming as soon as we get a computer that is! :) Alright well now you know what has been recently going on in our house that has been keeping me from sharing it with all of you!

Busy, Busy, Busy

2009-07-26T20:05:00.000-07:00

The title sums up how I feel we have been this past month. Every weekend we have had something to do. It all started 4th of July weekend..but no sense in talking about that again...just scroll down if you need a quick refresher! :) The following weekend we celebrated Cody and Lindsey's wedding, friends of ours. This is their first dance picture..but let's get back to the wedding!Let me tell you that was an exhausting, but fun filled weekend. Lindsey M and I were the runners, the steamers, the send 'em down the aislers, and a little of everything else in between, but MAN we enjoy ourselves. We decided that we should go into business after a really good day of teamwork and success. I won't lie..we did a little dance in the foyer of the church when the bride made it down the aisle..celebrated that little moment and then found ourselves a seat! We danced the night away at the reception with a little Twist..Cha Cha slide..and more!I could have a biased opinion..maybe..possibly..but I think I had the best looking dancing partner on the floor!! Although..I can't lie I think that we all had a mini-crush on the photographer...he looked exactly like Dr. McSteamy for those Grey's Anatomy watchers out there! Just throwing that out there...Alright so moving on..the next weekend we thought we had off, but that plan was thrown to the wayside when news of a charity softball tournament made its way to this household. The wives of the men spent Friday night ironing on numbers and names to shirts with the intention that they would be worn quite a bit the next day! Don't they look fabulous! :) We even made shirts for ourselves to support our men...I mean team! ;) And yes my shirt was suppose to say "Shrewsbury's Wife"..but it was too long to fit the " 's" on the shirt so I am THE Shrewsbury wife! haha It was a first! Claud always fit on everything..test bubble things...shirts...anything..now Shrewsbury not so much! Well, to our wonderful surprise a tournament with 12 teams went down to 6 then 4..3..and finally just 2! It was us and the "Domestic Angels" and there was nothing angelic about this team so I think they should really consider a name change! A double elimination tournament turned into best 3 out of 5 after defeating the other team twice! So needless to say it started getting nasty by the end of the day..swinging for the pitcher..yelling..screaming..name calling! AHHH that's what I did! So we left our 2nd place trophy and got out of there. The whole thing was for charity and they ruined it! But our team got along great and played really well even if they lost what they originally had won! The next day we celebrated my sister Moriah's 18th birthday! I can't believe how old we are! I am almost 21, Libby will be 17 in Dec. and Regina will be 23 on Friday! This is insanity! Anyways, we enjoyed some grilled food and socializing with my family and friends for Moriah's birthday! She actually bought herself her first car last Friday, so happy birthday to her! Now where was I...Oh yeah it was during this week that I decided to rid myself of all the blondeness and go back to my brunette ways..getting use to it, but liking it! Ok so back to the busy life of the Shrewsbury's...This weekend was no fun for me! Yesterday I took my final two PRAXIS test. And I think we all need to take a quick moment to breathe..ok that was for me really, but I honestly do not think that it went very well! I am generally one of those who says "I failed!" and then don't but really, truly, honestly I do not have a good feeling about this one! I just want to know why getting your degree comes down to four little, strike that, big tests anyways! I then came home and had to take yet another quiz for a class that I am taking online..so needless to say my brain was officially burnt out by 5:30 last night! We went out to eat with Cody and Lindsey in Nashville and had a great night! Oh but to go along with the not so wonderful day..I got pooped on in the hair by a stupid bird while walking downtown! And the strap on the beach cover up...I mean long green dress that I love...was hanging on by string so we had to stop at a convient store to get a safety pin. I did not want to be the next wardrobe malfunction! Janet has that title..I'll let her keep it! But overall it was a great night and I enjoyed myself regardless of how not so wonderful I make it sound! :) Today I decided to take the day off! We went to church this morning, ate lunch, and although I did a little laundry, I took the day off! The 2 hour nap helped tremendously too! We have had a lot going on it seems..birthdays..work..schoolwork (which will thankfully be over with next week!)...wedding...and everything else that has been going on! It has been one busy month for sure, but it has been enjoyable! Up next for August is our 1 year anniversary! YAY!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

2009-07-14T10:57:00.001-07:00

Happy Birthday to a man who...

was a wonderful father.

was a great "granddiddy".

loved God and showed everyone.

inspired many.

was always talking.

helped shape my husband to the man the he is today.

was loved by many.

loved fishing way more than working.

was always getting into something.

could beat anyone at Scrabble.

was a lover of western movie.

always had questions to ask Sam when there was a ballgame on.

always called me Holly Rose although that is not my name.

IS GREATLY missed, but won't be forgotten!

WE LOVE YOU and MISS YOU MR. SAM!
Happy 55th Birthday!

The Results Are In

2009-07-14T05:37:00.000-07:00

...and I PASSED!! Four weeks ago, you might remember me saying something about having to take 4 tests this summer called Praxis tests. I told you that I would let you all know how it went and I totally, definitely PASSED the two that I took! Now I only have 2 more to worry about and I will be taking them next Saturday. It is a big relief to know that I only have to worry about 2 more though! Thanks for your prayers about all of these because I have slight freak outs about these things!! But for today..I am going to have a fabulous day because I PASSED! Woo hoo!!

4th of July

2009-07-05T19:51:00.000-07:00

I am very sad to announce that our first 4th of July married was not photographed by me. I had my sad camera that works when it feels like it..but left the memory stick in the computer at home leaving me pictureless! It was sad..but luckily Regina had her camera so there is evidence that we celebrated our day of independence! Sam and I along with our friends and family set up camp in Nashville despite all the calls for rain and bad weather. It wasn't very crowded at least! The first wave of rain came through, but we held out like champs! We huddled close together...the boys around the food table of course..and waited out the rain. We had about an hour of no rain but no sun either! The guys threw around football, the girls chatted, and we all ate some great hotdogs and hamburgers! Due to the weather threat, the fireworks started an hour early. Luckily, we had put some of the stuff that we were not using back in the cars so if we needed to make a fast exit we would already have a head start. We watched almost half of the fireworks when the bottom dropped out of the sky. I mean sideways rain sort of deal! We all took off running in any and all directions trying to get stuff put up, but after realizing that we were already drenched..we decided to hold down our tent and finish watching the fireworks. I mean really when you think about it..we would have just been sitting in the car joining the crowd of people trying to get out, so we just waited it out in the rain. Unfortunately, there is no picture evidence anywhere of our appearance after we got everything put up. Regina had her good camera so that was one of the first things to make it to the car. If only I had my memory stick, I would've been willing to sacrifice my camera for the sake of that picture to hold as a memory! :( I mean I am going to have to get a new one one of these days anyways! So after making a feeble attempt to wring out my clothes..which just got rained on again before getting in the truck..we made our way back to my parents house to unload the gear in the safety of a house instead of the pouring rain! We got dry clothes and headed home after a very eventful night! This 4th of July will definitely be one to remember..even if I have to copy some pictures from my wonderful sister! ;)

Our Vacation Getaway

2009-06-21T14:27:00.000-07:00

It's hard to believe but it has been a year since Sam started his job, which means vacation time!! Sam and I decided to celebrate our one year anniversary and have a vacation all in one because he can't take time off in August which is our anniversary month. We left early Monday morning, 6 o'clock to be exact, and headed down to Panama City Beach. We finally got down there a little after 3. We went to eat and then to Walmart, but due to the massive insanity at the one Walmart in PCB, we left. We spent day one getting burnt, day two shopping in Pier Park, and three at the pool, day four at the ocean and pool, and unforunately day five we spent driving home. The ocean had a lot of seaweed, so we didn't go in it that much. It was so nice to get to spend time together without work or anything else to worry about and of course I loved sun bathing! Sam on the other hand...he's just not much of a sun bathing guy. We got him an umbrella, but he still got a fun little tan! Sunscreen has never been a part of my getting ready for the pool ( I know..thats not a good thing, but I don't), so I just put it on Sam's shoulders like he asked me and went on about my tanning. Well, that night Sam had one fun tan...this is what it looked like: It was a great week! Neither one of us are looking forward to getting back to work, but ready or not here the work week comes!

Quick Update

2009-06-14T19:55:00.000-07:00

I thought I would give a quick update on Sam and I. It has been a busy past few weeks. I didn't have the girls this week which was a really good thing for me. As a hopeful teacher, I am required to take the Praxis, which for me is 4 tests. I had two to take on Saturday, which was stressing me out! I didn't study and to be quite honest...we are going on vacation so I was slightly distracted! I think that they went alright though...but I will let everyone know in 4 weeks! (if I pass!) :) Sam has been doing the working thing. We are praying that maybe something else will pop up out there jobwise, but until then he is continuing doing what he does. I did have a first this week...I attempted chicken salad. Sam had said that he wanted some chicken salad, so being the loving, attentive wife that I am I decided to give it a try! Well it did not go very well to say the least! First of all the chicken had the red grose tendon things in it and slimey and well it just grosed me out! So then after trying to boil eggs three times going through 5 eggs...I finally had boil eggs to put in it. It was all going good until I put in mayo and miracle whip. Let's just say I wanted a little chicken with the mayo! I was too scared to even try it so Sam ate it when he got home from work. He said it was good, but I have still yet to give it a taste! Maybe round two I won't put so much mayo in it! I learned my lesson there! Well Bailey is off at my parents and we are off to vacation, so pictures and stories will be coming soon!

Smilebox Sunday

2009-05-31T20:22:00.000-07:00

Some of you have heard of "Not Me Mondays". Some of you have heard of "Show Us Where You Live Friday's", but there's a new trend out and about these days...you might have heard about it. It's called Smilebox Sunday's. Lindsey started this trend of Smilebox Sunday and I am joining the bandwagon! She gives instructions in her blog, so just click on the link on her name and you can see how to do it too! Hope you enjoy our first "Smilebox Sunday"!

Make a Smilebox scrapbook

The Love Affair of Bailey and Heidi

2009-05-27T20:06:00.001-07:00

Just for fun and because I am on a blogging roll I thought I would do a photo post tribute to Heidi and Bailey.

New Patio

2009-05-27T19:58:00.000-07:00

The patio has always been known as "Sam's area" in this home! This grill is back there and he makes sure that it is swept and looking nice all the time. I got him a bistro set for his birthday which started an overhaul of our patio. We went to Lowe's on Saturday and loaded up on stuff to put on the patio. We got some flowers, top soil, hanging planter, a rug, and some other odds and ends. We looked like weirdos walking around there though because we did not have a clue about flowers or anything. I did not get a before picture, but just think of concrete everywhere and dirt! These are the after shots of our back patio.

We had a great time planting flowers. Sam was in charge of the digging and I was in charge of the planting and watering! Great teamwork I must say!

Memorial Day

2009-05-27T19:48:00.000-07:00

We spent Memorial Day relaxing at John and Lindsey's house. Bailey and their dog Heidi got to spend the entire day playing outside..which was really messy! I think Bailey was trying to look like his friend if you ask me! We grilled out all day, talked, threw some football, grilled some more, relaxed, and just really enjoyed ourselves. We made sure to not miss Jon and Kate Plus 8 season premiere, which answered no questions! We had a great time hanging out together! Oh yeah..and we had a photo session by the fire because the guys love taking pictures so we wouldn't want to disappoint!

Super Nanny

2009-05-27T19:40:00.000-07:00

I quit working at the Christian school daycare to pursue to new job..nannying Emily and Elaina for the summer! We were busy the first week:

Day 1: Park and my house

Day 2: Park and my mom's house

Day 3: Bicenntienal Mall and Park

There will be many adventures this summer, but this first week was really fun!

Sammy D Turns 23

2009-05-27T19:33:00.001-07:00

May 14th is Sam's birthday. This year it landed on the day before we left for Texas, so we spent the night packing, dropping off Bailey, and getting to his moms. Because we knew we weren't going to be able to get together on the actual date, we went out to eat with John and Lindsey to Shogun on Wed. It was delicious! We came back to our house and enjoyed chatting out on the patio. Since Thursday night was booked, I took Sam out for a birthday lunch to Chili's. I got him a bistro set for his birthday, which is something that he had been begging to get for the longest time! Friday night we celebrated Mrs. Terri's and Sam's birthday at a restuarant in the hotel. They each got a free dessert. This was Mrs. Terri's. This was Sam's. They both had great birthday's with friends and family!So did Cayln and I!!

Trip to Dallas, TX

2009-05-27T14:26:00.000-07:00

Mrs. Terri invited Sam and I to go to Dallas, TX to attend a rememberance get together of the founder of Saxon publishing, but they were also going to do a rememberance to Mr. Sam. Mrs. Terri, Sam, Gina, Chris, Calyn, and I all went to Dallas and stayed in the Gaylord Texan. It was fabulous, much more easier to find your way around there then Gaylord Opryland! Bailey wanted to go too but he had to stay at my parents house! Sam, Mrs. Terri and I got there first and were able to walk around and get to know the lay of the hotel. We even had time to shop at Grapevine Mills, Opry Mills in a bigger version! We enjoyed a family dinner together that night with Gina, Chris, and Calyn. The next morning "the kids" went to breakfast at Cracker Barrel and Mrs. Terri stayed behind to have breakfast with a friend. Calyn loved the toys at Cracker Barrel! We went to the celebration/rememberance get together that afternoon. Sam got up in front of everyone and told stories about his dad. We were all teary eyed, but all VERY proud of him!! He did a fantastic job! That night we went to Pappadeux for dinner. Sam and Chris had crawfish..it looked gross..I didn't try it, just took pictures of it. The next morning before we left to head home, Sam, Chris, Calyn, and I went to the JFK Memorial and to the 6th floor. That was awesome! I love to see historical stuff in real life, not history books! We learned quite a bit about all the controversy and conspiracy behind it all! We flew home that afternoon and were very tired to say the least! Texas was great though! We really enjoyed our time with family!

Bailey Meets Eyeshadow

2009-05-27T14:17:00.000-07:00

I know it seems like I am posting a lot about Bailey, but honestly I am going in order of my pictures I uploaded finally! (Thanks Momma!) I was getting ready for work putting on my makeup going through my normal routine. Bailey had been running around like a wild man, but I noticed that I couldn't hear him. I turned around and he had his face and paws in my eyeshadow. It was not funny at the moment, but a little after I was finding my blush puppy's face and paws hilarious! (Although the makeup spot in the floor is not really funny!) I took some pictures, but the flash kept making him close his eyes so it makes them a little funnier! (The brownish-pink areas in his beard and front paws is eyeshadow!)

Bailey

2009-05-27T14:12:00.000-07:00

I took a trip one Saturday to my parents house to help Libby get ready for prom. I was in charge of makeup! Anyways after Libby left, I took the opportunity to take some pictures of Bailey. This is the best, cutest picture that I got!

Lots of Blogging is to Come

2009-05-23T18:53:00.000-07:00

Just so everyone knows, we have not fallen off the face of the planet. We have been pretty busy lately and due to camera crap out, I have borrowed my mom's camera to take pictures of it all. I am waiting to blog about it all until I can get the pictures up to go along! I have been blogging a lot with no pictures and it is driving me crazy! So until then just know that we have flown out of state, had a birthday, updated our back patio, and softball season is going full force! Pictures and stories are hopefully soon to come!

Finally Finished...

2009-05-05T18:46:00.000-07:00

with this semester although I really wish I could be typing ..."with college" but that won't happen until this time next year! I am very proud of making it through this semester because there were several times that I tried to convince Sam that I should drop out (even though I would NEVER do that) No worries! This was a semesters of firsts..first time teaching in a classroom...first time making real lessons...but the biggest and hardest one for me was first time I've had all classes in an actual classroom! I've taken at least one if not more online classes every year until now! lol Come finals time...its craziness with all classes on campus! :) In a little less than 2 weeks I start an online class and will take two online classes this summer, but that is alright! I have one more semester of in class classes and then student teaching! I am officially a SENIOR!! YAY!! WOO HOO!!! :)

As for the homefront...life has been pretty uneventful! We thought I had a possible case of the swine flu, but that turned out to be well..we really don't know, but whatever it was it is thankfully gone! Just a note if you ever look up on WebMD the symptoms of something...you start to think that you have everything! I had all the symptons of swine flu, thus the reasoning behind our thinking...but it was not! Sam was wonderful and took care of me while I was sick so points for him!! We spent Saturday in and Sunday afternoon in, but I think that is just what we needed! The rest of May weekends are kind of jammed pack so it was nice to have a weekend to completely relax! Well that is really all that has been going on around here, pretty uneventful but I needed to update! It's been over a week!! :)

FUN FACT: Today is the day that Sam told me he loved me four years ago!! How sweet! OH and I reminded him of this fact and he remembered exactly from location to dress! Amazing!

WAY 2 GO GINA!!

2009-04-25T18:51:00.000-07:00

Today Sam, Sarah, and I (and Bailey) met up with Chris downtown to watch Gina run the 1/2 Marathon. This is something that she has been training herself for since Mr. Sam passed away. She was determined to run the marathon in memory of her dad. She had an awful cold and that didn't stand in her way. She has been working for a long time and today all that hard work paid off! She started the race at 7:55 and finished around 11 o'clock. She wore a shirt that said "Sam I Am" on the front and "Running In Memory of My Dad Sam Shrewsbury" on the back. We stood at mile marker 9 to see her running during the race. Sam and I both got a little emotional when we saw her run up to our side. We left from there and went to the finish line where we were able to see her cross the finish line! We were all very proud!! After the race, Gina said that there was a woman who was running who saw her shirt and told her she knew Mr. Sam. He was the rep at her school in Maury County. How cool is that?! She also said that people would yell "Go Sam I AM!!" It was a great to see her succeed at something that she has had her mind on for so long! Mr. Sam was definitely remembered today!! Congrats Gina!!

On another note, Bailey was definitely worn out today too! He had such long walks today! At one point, he sat down and refused to walk any farther! He was hot too! This is where he started out at the beginning of the day... and this is where he went when we got back in the car after it was all over. Yes, he is laying right under the a/c vent in the floorboard!

Mid Week Update

2009-04-22T18:58:00.000-07:00

For all you Shrewsbury blog followers out there (because I know there are sooo many) :) I thought I would give a quick update! I can really tell that there were some prayers for me this week and I wanted to thank you! I was looking forward to this week, but at the same time dreading it. I was nervous about being observed by a teacher that has a lot of experience and runs a tight ship, but it has been a blessing! My nerves subsided yesterday as I taught my first lesson and it has continued to get better and better. I officially completed my lessons that I am required to teach today and got some great feedback from my teacher. She said that I was doing a great job! This is something that I really needed to hear too because teaching was something that I was starting to question during this semester. I wasn't sure if this was the job that God really had planned for me. (I think I contribute a lot of this feeling towards working with 40 4-6 year olds!) After talking with my mentor teacher and actually teaching lessons, I know that this is what I am suppose to be doing with my life. I look forward to going to the classroom tomorrow even though getting up at 6:15 is starting to wear on me a bit! :) I LOVE LOVE LOVE being off at 3:30!! I can get use to that real fast! But overall, I love working with these kids. They are hilarious in 1st grade by the way! You get some pretty funny stories! But I just wanted to give you guys an update about my week because I know that your prayers have been what has kept me at ease!

Loving the Weekends

2009-04-20T17:54:00.000-07:00

Sam and I had a great weekend. It has been great to actually enjoy them now that my schoolwork has almost come to a complete stop thankfully! Friday is my day off from school, so last Friday Bailey and I went to Chick-fil-a to get lunch for Sam and I. I picked him and and the three of us went to the park to have a picnic lunch. It was marvelous! The weather was perfect and food was perfect along with the company! We had dinner with friends that night to cap off the day! We enjoyed a Saturday hanging in with the family with a nice grilled lunch and a little bit of frisbie mixed in! Sam, being the wonderful husband that he is, took me out for a date night to Spaghetti Factory which is my favorite place ever and to a movie. The food was great..the movie could have been great if the audience would have been mature and not the most rude people I have ever seen! I hate when people talk and cut up and get up during a movie! It is so distracting!!! Sam and I both were irritated! No more late movies for us at Opry Mills! Nope not again! I love my weekends with Sam! By the way...first day went pretty well! I had a sub instead of my mentor teacher, but I got to teach a lesson off the seat of my pants and it went well! Now if only the same can be said about the lessons that I actually have planned! We shall see! Tomorrow I have math and language arts...Wednesday reading of all kinds!

BIG WEEK

2009-04-17T06:57:00.000-07:00

If any of you think about it, next week would be a great week for prayer for me! I will be doing my first student teaching next week at Kenwood Elementary in Clarksville. I have been working on lesson plans this whole semester, but reality is setting in that these lessons will actually be taught to real students, eighteen first graders in fact! I am really nervous because I am the actual teacher for two days and want these students to learn and succeed. I want to succeed. My mentor teacher will be observing me as I teach with some of my teachers coming in every now and then. I am excited because this is making what I have been going to school for real! I am on the downhill slide until I graduate and get a job so that makes it even more exciting. All I have left is one more semester in school and then student teaching. So if you think about it next week, pray for patience (first graders at the end of the year will be rather interesting), courage, and confidence, and whatever else! I know that this next week will be really fun, but it is slighty nerve racking at the same time!

Easter for the Shrewsbury's

2009-04-12T19:52:00.000-07:00

Our Easter was fantastic! I will start off with the story before our Easter morning though! It has always been my tradition to get a new Easter dress every year. I have slacked off as I got older, but this year I really wanted to get a dress. I dropped the hint several times during the week and Saturday and even flat out asked, but never got an answer. Well, at 9:00 Saturday night, we went on a dress hunt at Kohl's and Target after spending time with our small group at a grillout. To my great disappointment, I did not find a dress, but I must add that I was very proud of myself too! I normally will just buy whatever when I want something and refuse to go home empty handed, so with that in mind I did really good! Well, Sam being the sweetest, best husband dropped me off at home told me we would look together to find something for me to wear, but that he was going to get us some coffee from Starbucks. He came back empty handed because Starbucks was closed, but was gone for awhile. Now on to Easter morning...We woke up at 8:00 because we were going to Sam's mom church out in Brentwood and had to drop Bailey off at my parents house, so we got an early start for us. (This might be late to some, but Sunday morning we normally get to sleep till 9:00 or 9:30 because our church doesn't have Sunday school and we go to the 11 o'clock service.) Sam let Bailey out and when he came back upstairs he brought me a chocolate bunny, a stuffed bunny, and a card! It was soo sweet! It made for a good start to the day! We went to church and had an AMAZING service! I love Mrs. Terri's church! We left Brentwood to eat lunch with my family. It was a wonderful meal and great family hangout time! Bailey and Sassy once again made for lots of laughs! It definitely wore him out! We had a wonderful first Easter....but someone left the camera at home from blogging earlier and there are no pictures!! Oops!

Bailey to the Vet on a Stormy Day

2009-04-10T11:55:00.000-07:00

On this wonderful Friday off with the thunderstorms and tornadoes about we had to take Bailey to the vet for his next shot visit. Sam was the one to take him last time so it was really nice to get to tag along this time! He had to get two shots today. He has two more visits and he'll be done for the year! He is 3.9 lbs only 3 oz more than 2 weeks ago. He was the hit of the vet's office. Everyone was holding him and talking to him. We were proud parents! :) We had to wait off the tornado warning at the vets office. When that cleared we went to PetsMart to get him a dog tag and some new treats. Again we walked in with no rain, but had to wait for it to clear when we were getting ready to leave. I filled out a PetsMart rewards thing while waited! When we got home we found nice hail piles all over the front of the house. We missed all that, but are now enjoying our day inside!

Give Emily Barrios Cheese...

2009-04-10T11:51:00.000-07:00

and this is what happens...

At one point she had all four fingers in the cheese and all of them in her mouth! It was ridiculous! I had to take a picture of it!

A Night Out!

2009-04-10T11:41:00.000-07:00

Woo Hoo to the title! It was really nice to go out to the Sounds game last night. I have had so much homework to do every night that Sam and I really haven't been able to spend a night together just the two of us. I am always sitting in front of a computer writing lesson plans, a paper, or something so to have a night out was wonderful. It felt like the start of summer which was really nice. I got slighty bored and started writing in my planner and realized that there only two and a half more weeks for me in school so summer is almost here! I also started taking pictures. Emily sat by me the majority of the night, so we took some pictures and she even got to get a picture with Ozzie! Steve and the rest of the crew started the wave which made it all the way around the stadium quite a few times after a little practice! It was a really good night for the two of us even though the Sounds lost! Sam was real into taking pictures if you can't tell!We left early to go pick up Bailey from my mom. The life of parenthood! :) just kidding no need for that right now at all!!

Give a Camera to Emily Barrios...

2009-04-10T11:36:00.000-07:00

and that is what you get! Sam and I went to the Sounds opening game last night thanks to an invite from Steve. We left to go get some food and when I came back this is what was on my camera. Thought it would make for a good post!

Riding in the Car

2009-04-10T11:29:00.000-07:00

Bailey is pretty entertaining when he rides in the car. He whined a lot at first, but if you put in on your shoulder like he was a parrot he quiets down and just sits. We took him to my parents on Sunday to hang out and get my computer worked on. These are just a few pictures of him on our way there. He was interested in the wind that was blowing in his face from the vents.

Fun and Stress

2009-04-04T18:56:00.000-07:00

This weekend has been filled with fun, but there was one big stressful moment for me! First, I will tell the fun! We had Mo, Libby, and their friend Cortney over Friday night. Mo and Cortney were taking their ACT today at APSU, so they stayed here so they wouldn't have to get up so early. We played a little Guitar Hero and watched Twlight. It was really nice to get to spend time with my sisters because I hardly ever get to see them. We only live 20 minutes apart, but we have very hectic schedules on both sides. We spent today enjoying the weather and relaxing, well after my huge stress was somewhat resolved. So now on to the big huge gigantic stress that was brought upon me at 11:30 last night! Our computer has been working fine..it worked fine all week, it even worked fine all night. At 11:30 my computer decided to turn evil and freeze. When I got it back on, the computer had crashed eliminating all of my schoolwork!!! I was going off the deep end. At first I was so overwhelmed I couldn't cry, but all of the sudden the water works came and they didn't leave until I finally fell asleep. You see, all of my schoolwork is on my computer most importantly a group project! It has all of our pictures, Sam's resume', and all sorts of stuff. If I actually thought while I did schoolwork, I would save it to a jump drive and the computer. I never backup my computer, but will now do so once it gets back to normal. I dreamed about all the work that I was going to have to do by Monday! I slept stressed. Well, we got up this morning and Sam found the folders located somewhere different and we saved them to a jumpdrive. The computer will still not load right, but my dad will get to look at it tomorrow! I felt so pathetic to be so upset about a computer! It's crazy how important a computer is to my life and the things that it holds! We think there is a possible virus of some sort going on, but we are not sure! We shall see tomorrow hopefully! I will say there have been lessons learned..but you would think I would've learned when it did this last year around this time! Maybe this time it has sunk in!

Bailey's First Week

2009-04-02T07:34:00.001-07:00

Bailey's first week has been pretty eventful! He saw everyone! Playing at my parents went fantastic! Sassy and Bailey were pretty funny together! Bailey was not the least bit scared of her, but Sassy was scared of him! It was hilarious! He met Sam's family on Sunday. Calyn was really funny meeting Bailey! She wasn't so sure what he was and why he was there! It took her a little while, but I think that they will get along! :) He got to play with Heidi last night because we had dinner with John and Lindsey in their brand spanking new beautiful house! This was hilarious! We are pretty sure that they were playing, but it was a lot of wrestling and mouths open and madness! It lasted all night while we were there! They both wore each other out and went straight to sleep when it was bedtime! So in the week that Bailey has been with us he has learned to climb the stairs and go down the stairs, jump off the couch, and go to the kitchen to go to the potty! We are very proud of our little Bailey! Now if we can just get him to stop biting everything would be great!! I have a bruise on the arm from those teeth!

The Newest Shrewsbury

2009-03-25T17:53:00.000-07:00

I have asked Sam for a dog for a very long time. I even decided that I could wait till I graduated next May and get a puppy for a present, but I would still ask just to be sure! Well one day we had spent the day getting Sam a grill and I said that it would be nice if I could get a dog. To my surprise he said that we could look and as long as we got the approval from our landlord that we could. Well, Sunday we got the approval and we went and got Bailey, a 9 week old Maltipoo heavy on the Malt light on the poo! :) It has been rather interesting since Sunday night! Within the first 2 to 3 hours of having him, he was introduced to his future girlfriend Heidi and fell off of a table. He started out sleeping in our bed, but an hour later was well rested and wanted to play, so he went to his crate. He is a very good dog and loves to watch TV which is really funny! We are working on the potty training and he went poop and pee outside today!! We were such proud parents! He even learned how to go up the stairs all by himself, which leads me to this somewhat funny story. I had been cooking dinner and Bailey had been right on my feet. I turned around and he was nowhere to be found. I looked in the kitchen, in the living room, and low and behold I found him in our bedroom where he decided to take a leak! Sam shut the door to our room and the spare bedroom, so if he went back up there he wouldn't go to the rooms. Well at 10:30 we were going to bed, exhausted from our day and we were locked out of our bedroom. Neither one of us know how that happened, but we had to take the doorknob off to get back in! It was ridiculous! We have been having a wonderful time with Bailey, the newest Shrewsbury. He gets to go to hang out with his dog sister, Sassy tomorrow! We will see how that goes!

Good Times With Good Friends

2009-03-15T14:40:00.000-07:00

Friday night Sam and I volunteered to dog sit Heidi while John and Lindsey went to dinner with John's family. For those of you who do not know Heidi is John and Lindsey's adorable Maltipoo! Anyways, Sam and I have been talking about getting a dog. Actually, I have been asking for one and trying to talk him into the dog idea which has been going fairly well even though I think that I will be waiting for another month or two to get one. We thought that keeping Heidi for a little bit would help us see how we would do with a dog. We'll call it a trial run! It went really good too! Sam and I played with her on the stairs which was pretty funny to watch. She'd go up and run back down and repeat! When John and Lindsey got back from dinner we decided that we wanted to play Twister instead of watching a movie like we had planned. We got Twister, which I haven't played in years and years, and it was an absolute blast! We laughed and had a great time. Twister is one of those games that is funnier when you are older and trying to play because reaching those different colors was a whole lot easier back in the day! We fell often and then fell from laughing quite a bit too! Feeling like Twister was not enough of a workout, we got out P90X and let John and Lindsey experience the pain! We all tried a video which definitely made us call it a night a lot faster than normal! We were worn out including Heidi! Saturday Sam and I had a night to ourselves. We went out on a date to eat at Shogun and were planning on seeing a movie but the poor choice of movies led us to the Walmart $5 bin where we got We Are Marshall. It is a wonderful movie! Hopefully last week was our last cold week so we can start spending more time outside and grilling out! We shall see!!

Bringing the Outdoors In

2009-03-12T20:34:00.000-07:00

Sam and I wanted to go camping this weekend, but due to the unpredictable nature of Tennessee weather it looks like that won't be happening. We got the nice spring tease and now have an inch of snow in our grass! We were talking tonight and decided to bring the camping indoors. We got a tent as a wedding present and haven't gotten the chance to use it yet. After a little debate and measuring, we decided that putting the tent up in our living room would work and be a wonderful idea. Sam got it out of the closet and we put it together. We lined up the tv and the door...added a few pillows and blankets...and we had ourselves a camp site. All we needed was a little hot chocolate and fire and we would've been set! Here are some pictures of our camp site:

We Moved!!

2009-03-01T20:36:00.000-08:00

This weekend was a whirlwind to say the least and it all started on Friday. The wonderful storm came in overnight and decided to make our power go off. We realized we didn't have power when we were burning up due to the lack of ceiling fan. It wasn't on when the alarm went off and there was no point in washing my hair when I can't dry it or straighten it. (Short hair..no taming...bad idea) Low and behold at 7:45 on the dot the power came back on! I decided to get a shower and rush to get out the door by 8:15 because I had to work all day at the preschool. I wasn't going to be back home, so this was my chance and I wasn't going to pass it up! I was a trooper and made it to work on time with dry straight hair. I must confess that I did makeup in the car! lol Sam and I had a night out with our friends. I went to the Selah concert with Regina, Lindsey, and Mallory while Sam went to eat at Bosco's and saw Jack Black on his night out too! He would like that I threw that in there! We both had a great time out. Shout out to Selah...It was a great concert even though I cried! It was a wonderful night of worship! Saturday we moved to a townhome that is literally 50 steps or less away from where we were. It is amazing! We were getting really cramped in our one bedroom apartment. With only one closet there was little storage for anything which is really depressing. We now have a his and her closet along with a spare bedroom which is now our office/study area. We have 1.5 bathroom which is great! I'm getting used to having so much space! When we were getting ready to call it a night, we thought it felt like being in a hotel. It wasn't home yet, but it is feeling more like our home as we are here. Sam and I spent last night hanging pictures getting the home feeling in this place. There are a few things that need to be worked on maintenance wise, but these people worked all week to get it ready for us to be able to move before the rent for our old apartment was due, so I am not complaining in the least! I must give a BIG THANK YOU to my mom and dad, Mike, and Tyler who came and helped us move. We would have never gotten over here as fast as we did without your help! Mike and Tyler we owe you 2 moving days so just call us when you need us! One day when I am satisfied with how we have it, I will post pictures of the old and the new! Good news! Spring Break is next week for me so YAY for the break from school even though I'll still have schoolwork!

6 Months+Valentines+Babysitting+ A Heart Shaped Pizza=Wonderful

2009-02-16T19:08:00.000-08:00

Sam and I decided to make our celebration of our 6 month wedding anniversary and Valentine's Day a combo this year. On Monday, Feb. 9th (6 months) we went to the Melting Pot for celebration. This is our favorite celebration spot and we seem to be making it a trend to go every 2 years! We had such a great time. Sam had called ahead and made plans for roses to be on the table and to have our picture taken. This was done for a 2 year dating anniversary too so it would be interesting to put to two pictures side by side and see how much we've changed in four years!! WOW! That seems like such a long time ago now that I just wrote that! Anyway..that picture will have to be tracked down. I think I purposefully left it at my parents house. It wasn't the best picture. I would still have the roses too but Sam told me that my dead dried up roses couldn't make the trip to the apartment, so they are now part of my parents lawn! Back to the blog, we had a wonderful night together and wonderful food. To those of you who are wondering, yes we definitely broke the diet and it was WELL worth it! Dessert was fabulous!! For the real Valentine's Day, Sam and I babysat Calyn so that Chris and Gina could have a night out. We had a blast even though it took us until 9 o'clock to get Calyn to sleep. She was so funny! She is making up her own conversation and telling us no and walking everywhere and barking like a dog! She is a pretty entertaining kid to say the least! For dinner, we broke the diet again and ordered a heart shaped pizza from Papa John's. It really was heart shaped, yet not cut. It was too funny! To be honest, it wasn't as good as pizza normally is for the two of us, but it is still cool to say that for Valentine's Day we had a heart shaped pizza. I mean what says love more than a heart shaped pizza?! haha We finally got Calyn asleep and I got some really cute pictures of her and Sam. She would only lay on Sam's chest. It was so sweet! This is bath time. At first it was all fun and games and then came the soap! When the soap came so did the tears and screams and everything else. I did manage to create a cool hair style before we pulled her out, so I had to share!

Prayer Please

2009-02-04T08:02:00.001-08:00

Lindsey and John are extremely close friends ours and they asked for prayer for us when we needed it the most, so I am returning the favor and asking for prayer for them! Lindsey's mom has been admitted to the hospital and as of the time of my posting they do not know what is wrong with her. They have run several tests with all of them coming back normal. Please pray that God will give the doctors wisdom to find out the problem and that Leah will have a quick recovery! Pray that God will give Lindsey, John, Sterling, April, and Larry the peace and patience that can only come from Him. Thank you guys so very much! The power of prayer is a wonderful thing!!

One Busy But Fun Week!!

2009-02-01T14:19:00.000-08:00

We had a busy week this week! Monday was Sarah's 25th birthday, so Sam and I had all of the family over to celebrate! We had lasanga and salad with a little birthday cake and ice cream on the side. We had so much fun. We got out Guitar Hero and everyone played...Sam, me, Chris, Sarah, Gina, and Mrs. Terri!! Calyn danced and tried to help some of us! We laughed and laughed at everyone's rockability! Tuesday and Wednesday were my relaxing day thanks to the ice and snow that we got! Sam actually got a snow day too on Wednesday!! I was informed that when you get a big people job that you don't get snow day's anymore and then I informed Sam that I will always have snow days even when I do have a big people job! So HA! (I am going to school to be a teacher if that didn't make since to some people!) Thursday night I had a girls night out with Gina, Sarah, and Mrs. Terri. We met at Panera Bread downtown for dinner and then headed to the Ryman to watch Chonda Pierce. She was hilarious! I knew and had heard her before, but everyone else had not! We laughed, we cried, we laughed till we cried...it was a wonderful night! They will actually use that show for the DVD which will be out in March. The show is called "This ain't Prettyville" which now I will have that song stuck in head my head for awhile, but I would definitely get it! She is Cheatham County native... Ashland City folk! She was a few years ahead of my dad in school at Cheatham County Central! Fun Fact! Anyways, we all had a great night and enjoyed each others company. Friday, Sam and I went to Homecoming. It is amazing that it was 5 years ago that Sam graduated and 3 for me!! Time flys when you are having fun I guess...or working...! Hope everyone has a great week! We start P90X tomorrow! Woo HOO!

Happy 1st Birthday Calyn!!

2009-02-01T14:07:00.000-08:00

Friday was Calyn Marie McGuire's 1st birthday! I cannot believe that it was a year ago that Sam and I had the brillant idea of spending the night at the hospital waiting on little Calyn to get here. It turned out the be the most unbrilliant idea since we slept in the waiting room and people who are having planned c-sections get there WAY early in the morning and talk as if noone else is in the room! Finally, on Jan. 30th at 3:07 P.M. Calyn entered this world and has brought nothing but joy to the Shrewsbury family! We all went over to Mrs. Terri's to celebrate! There were about 20 people all gathered around this little girl, who is now walking and trying to talk. We are pretty sure she said Nana and balloon and then a lot of babble! She got a lot of great outfits and toys! She loved eating her cake! She had icing smeared all over her checks, which ended up getting stained just a little with a hint of pink! Everyone had smiles on their faces! We all knew that Mr. Sam was not missing out on a party! He was there and enjoying everything right along with us! Now all I need to do is starting working on getting Calyn to say Holly..or Hawee! It works too! :)

90 days.....

2009-01-27T20:38:00.000-08:00

Sam and I have been feeling the newly wed pounds lately. We both are getting tired of our "love handles" and "tires" we've had going on! We've tried to watch what we eat, plan on working out, but nothing has been motivation enough! We decided that we would be each others accountability partners and do this thing called P90X. It has a nutrition guide and DVD's that last for 90 days. We are in for a treat...or hell...because this stuff is extreme!!! I do not like half the food that is on our meal plan. That could be why I have a very nice double chin and ring around my midsection! So if you see us within the next 90 days starting Feb. 1st we might...hopefully.. look different. If all goes the way we plan, we will be bathing suit ready come April which is just in time!! (I thought that an old bathing suit picture would work here!..and this was from 2 summers ago and not much working out has happened since then!)O yeah and if this isn't going to be challenging enough, 90 days will end right when school is ending too! This is going to be one fun semester!! Maybe we will keep you updated with our results...if there are results! We are suppose to take pictures day 1, day 30, day 60, and day 90 so we will see!

Jackson Hole Fun

2009-01-16T07:52:00.000-08:00

Thanks to my grandparents and my dad, Sam and I were given the opportunity to go to Jackson Hole, Wyoming with our flight, stay, and limited activities paid for. How could we resist?! We got off from work and headed out on Sunday to the most beautiful winter wonderland! Our plane ride was slightly turbulant, but well worth it! We spent Sunday getting to know the lay of the land. Lesson learned was to not walk around in tennis shoes in the snow. I fell back to back down the stairs! :) No injuries to report though! We went snowmobiling and skiing on Monday and Tuesday! Both were amazing! We saw moose within feet of us! The mountains and snow....it just proved how amazing God is! Skiing was really good, but tramatic at some points for me! Going down the slopes in Wyoming is a lot different than going on the ones in West Virginia that I'm use to! I went down a very steep blue and almost flipped out..ok I basically flipped out, but the wonderful husband that Sam is talked me down and encouraged me the whole way down! The picture was our "Holy Cow I'm glad we made it down and Wow that was tiring" picture! We also had a spa for men and women on separate floors which we really loved too! After a little trouble on the way home of trying to catch our flight home due to delayment on the first flight, loss of Sam's carry on bag, and leaving his hat I gave him for Christmas on the plane...we made it home! I officially missed my first day of the semester, but it was well worth it! We came back to extremely cold temperatures, so I have an extended vacaction with no work or school till Tuesday! It was a great experience that Sam and I will never forget!

Meet Mitchell

2009-01-04T18:03:00.000-08:00

So this blog has nothing to do with me and Sam. This is just a cute kid I wanted everyone to meet! This is Mitchell. I know you might think he is the kid from Home Alone. I know his name, but I don't know how to spell it, so the kid from Home Alone will do! Anyways...do not be fooled..this is Mitchell. He is one of those kids that can do something wrong and you have to keep yourself from laughing because he will make you laugh when you have to get on to him! Well one day he was sick and just wanted to be held. He came and got up in my lap and I was trying to get his mind off of not feeling good so I showed him the Home Alone face. He did it once or twice..got a few laughs out of it..and then remembered that he wasn't feeling good. He really wasn't too. His fever was 102.5! When he came back to school the next week, he remembered what I showed him and starting doing it for everyone! He is soo cute! I just thought that everyone should see the cuteness of this kid and share my Mitchell story!