Year in Review

Well, 2010 is in the books for the Barnhills. It's been a fun and furious year like most. Here are our highlights:

January:

Watching our beloved Crimson Tide win the National Championship

Me driving to Alabama for a fun weekend with Karen and Tesney

Upwards basketball for Bryon, Matthew, and Thomas.

February:

Matthew trying out and making the Waco Thunder select baseball team.

Snowstorm!

Bryon and I enjoyed a long weekend in Vegas.

March:

The boys, Bryon, and I went to Houston to watch Baylor play in the Sweet 16, and all the boys went back the following day to see Baylor lose a heartbreaker to Duke in the Elite 8.

April:

Lots of soccer, Little League, and select baseball!

Mary Beth and I got to model together at Fashion with a Passion.

May:

Went to California to see my cousin, Kerry, get married.

Matthew's last soccer game ever.

Matthew's last day of elementary school.

Mary Beth's kindergarten graduation.

Endless end of the year activities!

June:

Mary Beth's last ballet recital

Bryon and I going on a couple's retreat to New Mexico with friends from church.

Mary Beth graduated from swim lessons and now swims like a fish.

Thomas participated in the TMEA piano ensemble, and we enjoyed a weekend by ourselves.

I co directed our church's children's musical.

July:

Our Cape Cod trip.

A fun few days at the JW Marriott in San Antonio

Astros game

August:

Back to San Antonio for Bryon's annual conference. Thomas got to enjoy a few days with Aunt Lauren as he was sick of travelling!

Beginning of 1st, 3rd, and 5th grade.

Saying goodbye to nearly 8 years with our minivan and getting a new Chevy Traverse.

Mary Beth's 6th birthday

September:

We added to our family! Gus, our miniature Aussie, came to live with us, and we couldn't love him more!

Mary Beth began piano lessons.

October:

Matthew hit his first home run. He also had his first pitching win. Lot of baseball was played in Sept-November.

November:

Trip to Alabama to see Bama play Mississippi State

Matthew's 11th birthday

Mary Beth's 1st grade musical

December:

Church Christmas musical

Piano recital

Endless Christmas parties

Thomas's 9th birthday

Baylor bowl game.

Texas Bowl Baylor vs. Illinois

Well, it had been a long time coming....

Baylor enjoyed a better than average season and we made it to a bowl game for the first time since I was a freshman at Baylor! We were thrilled that the bowl was an hour away from my in laws, so Mary Beth got to stay with her grandparents and make fun of us that we didn't get to stay there with her! My in laws are extremely hospitable and let my parents and brother (and his family) stay at their home.

As usual, it was pouring down rain in Houston, and as usual, Baylor didn't show up for the game (don't tell Bryon I said that!), and lost terribly. We played Illinois which was really neat, since my Dad got his Ph.D. from there, and I lived there the first 4 years of my life. My brother was even born there. Illinois is my 3rd favorite football team, but there was no doubt we were cheering for our Bears on Wednesday night.

We had fabulous seats on the 30 only three rows up. Just high enough to see over our bench and close enough to hear every catch and punt. It was a fun evening despite getting creamed. As Bryon says, "There's always next year!" ;)

I caught Baylor's first touchdown run. It was right by our seats!

Christmas 2010

Christmas is our favorite time of year! For the first time since I was 2, I didn't spend Christmas day with Michael. His family came the weekend before Christmas, and we had our traditional Thanksgiving meal (since we are never all together at Thanksgiving). I was nervous cooking a 22 pound turkey, but it turned out perfectly! I love our family's Thanksgiving meal!

Christmas morning excitement!





Gus was unimpressed with out festivities! ;)

Easter Island research

Thomas is in the Venture program in our school district. Once a week, he boards a bus and spends the day at our local intermediate school to do research. This semester, he focused his research on Easter Island and the Moai statues. For his technology portion of the research, he got to "interview" the Moai statues on television. The parents got to spend an evening at the intermediate school viewing the children's work. Everything was adorable!

Thomas challenged Deedah to a math puzzle called "24". You have to use all the numbers once and either add/subtract/multiply/or divide to come to the number 24. My two math lovers enjoyed the game very much!

Thomas made a Moai statue out of playdough.

Parties! Programs! Projects!

We had 2 1/2 days of school this week that were jam packed with parties and programs!

1st grade party:

5th grade party: I don't get the opportunity to be in Matthew's classroom like I used to, so I enjoyed seeing him in his element during his Christmas party.

5th grade Choir concert-Matthew has really enjoyed choir which thrills my alto singing heart! He got to sing bass in a song which makes him so proud. Apparent Mrs. Koch told him that he had one of the lowest voices in the 5th grade, which he couldn't tell me without a huge smile on his face! ;)

3rd Grade Party

One of Thomas's numerous projects! He had to make a snowman and give a summary of the book, "Guardians of Ga-Hoole".


A 3rd grade tradition: Reindeer game!