You Are My Sunshine....

My Only Sunshine.
You make me happy when skies are grey.

Happy 1st Birthday to our little sunshine.  Lucy is a year old!  I can hardly believe it, but it is true.
She truly is the sunshine of our lives with her sweet disposition and sunny smiles all the time.
She has four teeth in that smile and is busy all the time trying to keep up with big brother and play with all his toys. She also reserves her best smiles for big brother.
She has started taking a few steps and will walk some, but mostly prefers crawling as the faster mode of transportation.  She already has several words and signs.  Some of her words are:
dada
Brooo (brooks)
ball
bye bye
all done ( spoken and signed)
more (spoken and signed)
yay! (said while clapping)
baby ( her favorite toy from Christmas)

She loves snuggles and hugs (which her mommy also loves) and LOVES to hug and snuggle stuffed animals and her "baby."

We celebrated our little Sunshine Girl with a "you are my sunshine" themed party.  Lots of friends and family joined us to celebrate Lucy and with her a happy 1st birthday.

A display of recent pictures with the "sunshine song"

The brunch Spread

Rainbow fruit on a stick

Birthday cake (inside are layers with coconut and lemon flavors) Yum!

Birthday cupcakes (for those who don't like coconut and favors for the grown-ups)

Love from Mimie :)

Sweet friends- Susan and Zoe Bolen

sweet former neighbors from family graduate housing- Rina and Emma Lobos

more great family housing neighbors- Kelly and Aida Okie

Getting ready to blow out candles and eat cake!

Big brother helped Lucy Blow out her candles

baby's first buttercream!

 Mrs. Denise ( above) and Mr. Carey (below) wishing Lucy a happy birthday.  These are friends from church staff at MABC.

we traded the cupcake for some fruit!

Love from Aunt Sharai

Hanging out with Papa and cousin Austin

Open presents with Mrs. Laura

Opening presents with Mommy

Eating a bow- much better than actual presents!

tired girl getting hugs from Daddy!

One more Texas Post

While in Waco, we stopped by our former home, Baylor University.  We have nothing but fond memories of this wonderful place and miss the people and places that make it special.
Brooks Hall was a residence hall where Larry worked and where he and I had our first date.  It was a special place to us and there are many special friendships connected to the original Brooks Hall.  Brooks Hall was demolished to make way for a new complex- one residence of which was our home for the last two years of our life at Baylor.  It is such a special place to us that we named our firstborn- Brooks. Brooks Residential College was our baby boy's first home and we have LOTS of great memories of this home.
We took our Brooks to Brooks (:)) and walked around.  Brooks (the boy) was so enamored by seeing his name everywhere- exclaiming "i'ts me! it's B-R-O-O-K-S- it's my name!"
Here are some of the best pictures:

 This was our front door at Brook's College.

 "to you I had the torch"  a famous Samuel Palmer Brooks quote over the entrance to Brooks College.

 The sidewalk and bridge over Waco Creek leading to Pat Neff Hall- lit up in Baylor Green!

Brooks and Ezra!

While we were in Texas, we made the drive from east TX  over to Waco and Baylor University.  We got the chance to visit with some wonderful friends that we haven't see in years- the Carlsons, the Garners, and the Gilchrests.
Ezra is Brooks' first friend literally.  They are 7 weeks apart and we have loads of pictures and videos of them playing together as infants and toddlers.  When we moved to GA, we have managed to stay in touch via blogs, YouTube and phone calls.  Brooks LOVES to watch Ezra on the computer and asks to look at the pictures on the Gilchrest's blog.
We were so blessed that this dear family took some time out when they had a TON of stuff going on (moving, family in town, holidays, etc) and spent the day with us at the Cameron Park Zoo.  Brooks and Ezra picked right up and had so much fun together running, playing and seeing all the animals.  Here are a few pics:

Brooks and Ezra both have little sisters, again 7 weeks apart! I think Kendle took some good pictures of all four kiddos together. Hopefully we'll see those either on our blog or the Gilchrest's blog in the near future.