Inauguration

Today was an amazing day in my classroom.  We started off talking about the importance of today and MLK Day.  We did a lesson where we all read different article about the new president and his family.  Then we shared what we learned with each other.  

The most AMAZING part was watching my students eyes when President Obama was taking the oath and giving his speech.  While I'm not sure they understood everything he was saying, they did see that he was an African American man standing as the leader of our country.  Side note---he is a great speaker, isn't he?  I could sit and listen to him talk all day long.

We ended our lesson today by writing a letter to President Obama.  I walked by a young girl's desk and watched her write about her journey from El Salvador to America in the 4th grade.  She was saying thank you for giving her a place to go to school.  A place where she could learn to read (and play soccer :-) ).  I could tell by her writing that she felt blessed to have the opportunity to live in this great country. We have so much to be thankful for! 

Isn't Great To Be An American!!!!! Happy Inauguration Day!

studying.......

We haven't posted anything in a while. Both of us have been very busy - as I am sure many of you are.

I (Brad) has been studying for the Oklahoma Bar Exam non-stop since the beginning of the year. My typical weekday is get up early and study for 1 to 2 hours. Then get ready and go to work. Work until 6:30-7. Come home, eat dinner, then study for another hour or two then go to bed. I also try to study during my lunch at work. On the weekends so far I am studying around 6 hours a day. I think this will crank up after this week to 8 or more hours a day on the weekends.

I remember the day after I finished the Texas Bar Exam a few years ago. I took all of my materials and threw them away and swore that I would never take another bar exam! I guess that is really coming back to haunt me?

Good talk.

Merry Christmas

Christmas is a wonderful time of year, especially at our house. If you want to get technical about the whole event, since we were married we have not really done any of Christmas at our house (apartment). Ashley being a teacher gets 2 weeks off from work and usually utilizes that time to spend with her mom and dad in Enid. Brad usually stays home in Dallas and works. That was the routine again this year. Its always fun to travel around Oklahoma to see all or as much of our families as possible over the holidays. It just seems so short.

We blessed to get spend Christmas morning with our baby nephew David (or Gus, or 3 - whatever name you so choose to use for him). Although he was a bit pre-occupied while we were opening presents, it was breakfast time for him. Also, the Cunningham's traveled to Enid on Christmas morning for the day, which was wonderful as well. We had a great time!

Below we have included several pictures from the holidays that we wanted to share with everyone. We hope everyone had a merry Christmas!



To kick off the Christmas holiday we celebrated with the McClure side of the family. We went to our Aunt Carol's house in Alva, Oklahoma. We had a day filled with wonderful food, dirty santa, games, and even a trip to The Rialto (my favorite place in OK to get a coke...we have a T-shirt from here you have probably seen) to see Yes Man. We enjoyed playing with David James and of course the very violent game of spoons, competetive tournanment of Sorry!, and match of Pictionary. Dirty Santa was quite eventful this year. There were a ton of steals. The funniest was when our cousin Gavin decided he would steal the girly wallet (brown leather with a tourquoise peace sign) because it had cash money in it!!!




Christmas in Enid was much needed. We don't make it back to Enid very much so we enjoyed every second of being there. We had a great time Christmas and Christmas Eve. We went to the Christmas Eve service at church and game back for a fun dinner. As you can see above, it has been a family tradition for many many years that we get matching PJ's from SANTA. Just an FYI in case you were wondering why we were matching in all of the pictures. David James had a great first Christmas. He got many wonderful gifts from Santa. The Cunninghams (Dan, Judy, Kim, Corey, and Grandma) came to Enid to eat Christmas dinner with us. It was so good to have them there. The Mario Cart Wii Champion was (drum roll)......Kim! She pretty much killed all of us!



Ashley got the chance to be David's Nanny for a couple of days while in Enid. He was precious!!! He is growing up so much. He loves to smile and talk. We had the greatest day talking about Santa, playing, and reading. He was so happy that when I was trying to give him his bottle he would push out of his mouth and giggle and smile. HE IS SO MUCH FUN! Look at his cute face!!!




The 23rd was a very very very sad day for the Shepherd Family. Our loved Gaby passed away at the young age of 6. A couple of years ago she was diagnosed with an intestinal disease. On Wednesday. she had an episode she couldn't make it through. As many of you know, "The Girls" are our mom and dad's babies now that they have no kids at home. This was a very emotional day for all of us. It was very sudden. We treat our pets as part of the family, and she was a daughter, sister, and best friend to us. We know she is resting in peace now. We miss you with all our heart Gaby Girl!

Hank loved his candy cane from Santa. He just loves going to Enid to play. He his a very smart boy. While we have been here he sleeps with my parents, because they get up at 5:30 AM (yah I know they are crazy) and he gets to eat right when they get up. Then he comes down to sleep with us. Gizmoe and him have become BFFs this trip. He helped Gizmoe get through the loss of her sister. I think this picture of them is soooo cute!

we're not a pc anymore

this weekend we got a new home computer. it is the awesome iMac. as you can see we needed a computer to do grown up things like take these pictures with the built in camera. the best part about it (in case you don't know) is that there is no cpu tower. the entire computer is built in to the monitor - so it is only 3 small pieces (1) the monitor (2) a mouse and (3) the keyboard.

we recommend it to everyone!

surprise

I had the best birthday ever! My husband is so wonderful and planned the perfect surprise birthday for me! I thought I was just spending it with my dear Aunt Mary and cousin Anna Lee, but it turns out my Mom and brother Dave surprised me for the weekend!!! It was an absolute blast. We had the best time together. We all got together with Kelly, Wade, Grant, and Gavin for a crab crakin good dinner. I have always loved crab legs (thanks Nuni), so we were working for our dinner. :-) It was so much fun. I felt so special. Today I got to see the Teffts (it has been way too long), Don, and Molly...which made my weekend complete! Thank you everyone and I love you so!