Christmas 2009 Continued

After we got back from Jackson, we made a trip to Smut Eye to spend "Christmas" with my parents. Even though it was a few days earlier than Christmas day, it was fun! David, William, and Lily decorated Grammy's tree for her while she was busy cooking food for all of us to enjoy! They did a pretty good job!

Aunt Flossie came over to eat and to open presents.


Joseph had a great time "opening" his presents.

Lily got too many presents to name, of course! This is her enjoying her new silver hairbrush.

The big thing Lily got from my parents was a kitchen for her room.

She loved it and was totally surprised, even though she was with me when we found it at Sam's!

Every year my Mom and Dad (mostly Daddy, since he usually picks them out) give me a pair of quirky Christmas socks.

David got a paper football set.

And this was Aunt Flossie's face as she opened her gift from us-a very silly yearbook picture of David that I think she will treasure forever :-) (notice the very nice wrapping paper!).

Christmas 2009 Begins

To begin Christmas break, David took the last day of school off and we went to Jackson. It had been 4 years and 2 children since our last trip. It was WAYYY overdue! We only got to stay for 2 nights and had to leave very early the last morning (I'm talking 6 a.m.), but we had a great time. Mamaw and Papaw cooked for us, Mrs. Hall came to see us and meet Joseph. Aunt Julie made us cupcakes and came to visit. And Uncle Paul came to eat dinner. Uncle Daniel and Aunt Hali came our second day and spent that night. Lily loved going to mamaw's beauty parlor, where she got her hair curled! The kids all enjoyed being somewhere different and getting to visit with so many people. We had a great time and hope to go back much sooner than 4 years!

Baby Dedication

My parents were the only family able to come to Joseph's dedication. We, as usual, did a crummy job of planning our family event, so we missed a lot of family that got to be at Lily's and William's dedications. They all were able to watch on taylorroad.org thanks to our communications director! We love our church family and are glad they are so committed to helping us raise our children in God's ways. My Mom had the camera for the dedication and missed us crossing the stage, so here a couple of shots of us getting ready to go on stage.

Ruth turns...Almost 30!

This year I turned 29 and celebrated with David, the kids, and my parents. We had pizza and ice cream cake. They made it a very special party!

Thanksgiving 2009

I know this post is a little late, but get ready-I'll get you caught up!
This Thanksgiving was a great one! We started out by having breakfast at David's parents' house-Daniel and Hali and Gran and Grandaddy were visiting. Gran and Grandaddy brought Lily's birthday presents and boy were they a hit! At around lunch time, Uncle Danny and Aunt Rosemary came. The plan was for lunch to be at 2:00 and we were leaving to eat with my parents in Montgomery, since my mom had been busy working all week. We met up with them at our house and made our way to Cracker Barrel. Our original plan was to eat Chinese, but none of the restaurants were open. Apparently we got Thanksgiving confused with Christmas-they are ALL open on Christmas. Anyway, Cracker Barrel turned out to be a great thing! We thoroughly enjoyed ourselves and had NOTHING to clean up!

I could NOT resist posting these pictures! You may have heard the rumor that when there are 8 or more Givens together there will be head measuring and a "Biggest Head" winner will be declared! It is true and here is proof! I believe the winner on Thanksgiving day was Uncle Danny with Jason as a close 2ND and Ruth as a VERY close 3rd. You may think this is weird, but it is so funny!

Lily's 2nd Birthday

We did so many fun things for Lily's 2nd birthday! The day started with candles in her pancakes and a round of "Happy Birthday, to You." It was such a hit that we put candles in a food item at every meal that day: in the banana at lunch and in her small cake at supper.


We went to Bass Pro Shops after lunch to try and catch Santa Claus. He wasn't there until that night, so we just played some of the games and took some pictures of the kids.

We had a "party" for Lily the night of her birthday, with just us and a small cake. The next day we had the "real" party. Uncle Daniel, Aunt Hali, Grammy, Pop, Mimi, Papa, Uncle Kevin, and William, Joseph, Mama, and Daddy were all there to help Lily celebrate.



For each birthday party, the kids get to pick what they want to eat and what kind of cake they want Mom to make. Lily picked Pizza and a "Word World" cake. For those of you who may not be familiar with Word World, it is Lily's favorite APT tv show. It involves a group of animals whose bodies consist of their name spelled out. It sounds wierd, I know. But trust me, if you saw it, it would all make sense!

It was a fun birth-day and party!

Happy Birthday, Lily!

Two years ago on November 24, 2007, I woke up at 1:30 a.m. and knew something was about to happen! We called David's mom to come stay with William and we headed off to the hospital. It was the Saturday after Thanksgiving. I had been worried for weeks that I might go into labor on Thanksgiving, and would not be able to eat my Thanksgiving favorites (sad, huh?). I had made it through the holiday with all of my favorites and even some leftovers! This Saturday was not just two days after Thanksgiving, it was also the day of the Auburn-Alabama game. Needless to say, there was some apprehension over whether she would be here before the game. When I arrived at the hospital I was about 2 centimeters dilated. They felt like breaking my water would speed the process up and that I would have Lily in no time ( I think some of the staff wanted to get to watching the game!) . After hours of waiting and hardening contractions, I still had only progressed to 5 cm. They again, thought that in no time I would go ahead and be ready to deliver. The 7 cm mark, that I eventually reached, meant that I was close the 8 cm, which meant an epidural was almost completely unnecessary. So I waited, with no epidural, because I thought I didn't have time for one. After a few more hours of pitocin (which they also thought would only speed things up) I was ready to deliver. So were several other people. Needless to say, it was a LONG, HARD labor. After 20+ hours of labor and a couple hours of pushing, and NO pain relief whatsoever, Lily was born. She weighed 6 lbs. 11 oz. She had a head of light hair and a beautiful smile. Her big brother greeted her with homemade cupcakes to celebrate her "birth-day." Mommy was just glad to be ALIVE!
Today Lily is energetic, bright, funny, and still beautiful. She loves to laugh. She loves Elmo, Pooh, milk, pizza, girly things, big brother's toys, cake, brownies, jewelry, Handy Manny, Clubhouse Disney, Word World, the piano, singing, and listening to "Uncle Regi" play guitar and sing. She also loves her family, her baby brother Jo-Jo, her big brother Bubba, her babies (stuffed animals), her pink blankets, and so much more! She has funny names for some of the people in our family-why, we don't know! Uncle Jason is "Uncle Regi," Uncle Daniel is "Uncle Do-Do," Grammy is often "Nami" or "Nana," and of course there's "Seven." Gran is often "Gram" and Papa is "Papoo."
She is a joy everyday and a mess! We love being her parents and couldn't think of a better way to spend our lives, than loving and raising her to be a godly woman.