Maddilyn's Birthday

Maddilyn's Birthday is on Christmas. She was so excited to celebrate her birthday with Jesus. She also was very excited to think Santa would bring her gifts for her birthday. We ended up throwing her a special party after the holidays were over. She had the best day ever! She started out the day with spending time with Aunt Mandy and the boys. They went to Carl's Jr and played on the toys. Then they came back to the house where we had a princess party with all of her cousins. And to end off the day, her best friend Amber came and visited. It was a special, fun day!

 Helping mommy get the party ready!

 Birthday Girl

Loving her presents.

The boys were more excited about Laloopsy than Maddi was:)

Pin the rose on Belle game! 

Birthday Cake Time

Poor Maddi burst into tears when her cousins said they needed to giver her 3 birthday spankings. She obviously had no idea what that meant. She was heart-broken that on her birthday she was getting in trouble. We quickly told her that she was being a good girl and Aunt Stacy saved the day by saying we would give her birthday kisses instead of spankings.

Christmas

We had a great Christmas! It was so nice to have Jason and his parent's home for such a great break! We had a wonderful Christmas party with all the Kiesters. Sadly, Mandy's family was sick, so we really missed them. The kids put on the Nativity and it was so fun to see them carry on the tradition. When I was a kid, because my last name was Sheppard I was usually put in as a shepherd at the Richardson Family Nativities. So, this year I put Maddi in as a Sheppard and boy was she cute. Christmas is a wonderful time.

Here are some memories to remember!!!!

Thanksgiving

About a week before Thanksgiving I got a call from my one and only awesome brother, Joseph. He called to invite us to Thanksgiving. My entire family would be there. Now this may not seem like that big of a deal, but to me it was a huge. My family all lives in Missouri and the last time we had all been together was 2 years ago. Incredibly enough we were able to work everything out so we could fly our family of 4 to Missouri for Thanksgiving.

It was the best vacation ever! Everyone was so happy! The grand kids all adored each other which was a relief since my kids had never met Chloe and only met their other cousins once or twice before. Alyson and Joseph made everything perfect. The food was yummy but most importantly it was just so much fun to be together  There was no stress, just love.

We took family pictures, which turned out adorable. One of Alyson's friends came and gave all the girls make-overs. That was a fun day. We celebrated Joseph's birthday and had many moments of laughter. I am so happy we could experience this time as a family. It was so wonderful to be all together.