Our Fun Family

We don’t get much winter here in central Texas, which is just the way I like it.  This week brings temperatures in the upper 60’s and 70’s before it cools off for Christmas.  My in-laws took the beautiful autumn day (on the first official day of winter) to do some yard work.  Here are some great pictures from their day.  View Full Album

All through the year, it is a great treat to experience the world through the new eyes of a toddler and infant.  Brenda and I are in constant awareness of how richly blessed we are to have 2 beautiful, healthy children, a wonderful home, good jobs, great friends, fantastic family and of course each other.  Though we haven’t always been very consistent with our blogging, it is my joy to share some of our wonderful family memories with you, our friends and family. It is our sincere hope and prayer that this is a wonderful and blessed Christmas and holiday season for you.  May you be surrounded by those you love, may you remember fun family traditions and may you create new joy for you and yours this season.  Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to your family from ours! Sean, Brenda, Grace and Hailey Cornish

Yesterday I had the privilege of meeting Grace at her school to have a Thanksgiving lunch with her and her classmates.  Grace was so excited when she came into the lunchroom and saw me seating near “her” table.  I say near her table because the Round Rock Christian Academy, where Grace attends Mother’s Day Out, has a lunchroom not terribly different than most schools.  Rows upon rows of folding tables and chairs, what is funny is that just beyond the last row of folding tables is a row of tiny little tables perfect for 3 yr olds!  It looked like a row of coffee tables, pretty cute.  Her class had a full day of Thanksgiving fun, including story-time in a teepee set up in her classroom, complete with a fake campfire.  They made hats and placemats that expressed the things they were thankful for.  Earlier in the week, I had told her that  I would be coming to have lunch with her on Wednesday and honestly, she wasn’t all that happy about it....

So Hailey said her first word. Any guesses on what it was? Drum roll, please.... "DADA"!!!!!! Sorry mommy.

Gram shared these pics with me earlier.  This is pretty funny.  Hailey just this week has started to put one hand in front of the other and actually crawl.  She has been up on all 4s for awhile now, and will rock back and forth.  Usually this is followed by the face first “swim in the carpet” and fuss routine.  Now that she is starting to get the motions down, looks like she is on to bigger and better things.  Katy bar the door, because we have a very M-O-B-I-L-E infant now!!   This girl will need jogging shoes in no time!

We made our quarterly trip to Portrait Innovations last week to have Hailey’s 6 month pictures taken. Here is a sampling of those pictures. You can also see more in the Public Album folder in the right navigation or on Facebook! View Full Album

I cannot believe how quickly the last 6 months have gone by.  Every parent I know tells me that this is nothing compared to what is coming.  “Just wait until she is 17” seems to be a common response.  I hope Brenda and I can take the admonitions to heart.  We truly treasure our beautiful girls and we are having a ball watching them grow.  I have added many new albums on our Public Photo Album.  Use the link in the right hand navigation area to check some of them out.   We also tend to keep things a bit more current on Facebook, where we can post single pics and quick updates throughout the day.  It’s fall and that means football.  And football season means UT home football games and tailgate parties.  That keeps us pretty busy most weekends.  Grace has started going to Mother’s Day Out this fall as well.  It is amazing to see how much she has opened up.  We have noticed it, especially when Grace plays with other...

Taking cooking classes at Young Chefs Academy has really paid off! Grace spent the last 2 days working on cookies with Gram. Yesterday, she and Gram made cookie dough, today it was time to actually do some real baking. It is amazing what a 3 year old can do given the right instruction, a few good tools and a lot of faith. I can't think of a more simple joy than watching and waiting for fresh baked cookies. I never have been particularly good at waiting, hopefully Grace will learn to have a bit more patience than I do. "Scoop, lift, flip!" Grace has been watching me make pancakes, well, for years now and that is what I have always told her a spatula is for, and how to use one. I wonder how many cookies Grace flipped before Gram convinced her that a gentle slide would do just fine. This week we dive headlong into the college football season with the first tailgate party of the year. I am sure my little sous chef will be busy by my side. Stay tuned for pics after the game.

So, have I mentioned in the last year or so that we love Portrait Innovations? Hailey is 3 months old and Grace is coming up on her 3rd birthday, so it was time for another round of professional photos. The studio was very busy today, surprise, surprise but they did a great job getting great pictures from both Hailey and Grace. I have created an online photo album with some of the pictures we did not purchase. Click on the link in the right hand navigation area to access our public photo albums. Now begins the task of frame selection! It has been awhile since I posted on the blog, and we have been a busy family lately. Brenda is back to work full-time and we are settling into real life. Grace grows daily in her vibrancy and her joy of life. She is asserting her independence and sometimes that is even a good thing. Others... not so much. We are spending a lot of time in time-out these days. Last weekend Grace and I reached a bittersweet milestone. Grace and I attended our last Big Chef/...

For the 3 day weekend celebrating the 4th of July, we packed up the girls, loaded up a travel trailer and headed off to Gramma's house. We met up with Missy, Richard and the boys, and with Tracy and together we crashed in on Mom and Ron, taking over the kitchen and spreading toddler cheer from one end of their home to the other. It was a lot of fun and we did get a little something out of it. See, this was a business trip of sorts. We were there for blueberries and an experiment in jarring salsas. We spent hours upon hours in the kitchen on Friday, Saturday and Sunday freezing quarts of blueberries; mincing, chopping and dicing up mangoes, tomatoes, onions, cilantro and jalapenos for salsas and tomato sauce. But it wasn't all work. We did take a break on Saturday afternoon to cook up a fajita dinner for the rest of the family. Mom brought Mema to the house and Randy and Becky both brought their kiddos. It was a full house for a fajita and tamale dinner. Mema soaked up...

Hey guys, just a quick update. We had a fantastic Father's Day at our house. Bryan, Shannon and the boys and Gram and Granddad came over Sunday afternoon for some family time. Everyone had a good time swimming and eating. As always we ate very well, starting out with some yummy chilled shrimp and fresh fruit. We had meatball subs for dinner and ice cold watermelon and banana pudding for dessert. It was a great day and I am thankful to be such a blessed Daddy. We also recently had Hailey's 2 month well check. I can hardly believe she is 2 months old already. Dr. Enders was very pleased with Hailey, she liked to see that she had put on good weight (she is over 11 pounds) and seems to be doing very well with her motor skills. Brenda is back at work part-time now, she goes full time next week. It is going to be a bit of an adjustment for her, so your prayers are greatly appreciated. She enjoys her job and the people she works with, but we would love for her to be able t...

And so it begins... Brenda and I are blessed with lots of nieces and nephews. We love them all and do take lots of pride in their accomplishments. Last weekend we headed down to Houston to celebrate the Class of '09. Amber, Barbara and Cutter all graduated this year. They are our oldest nieces and nephews and it was a blast to celebrate with so many family and friends. We filled up Becky's pool with kiddos and filled up the adults with liquid refreshment from the margarita machine. The stars aligned just right for this weekend and ALL of the siblings were together! That has actually started happening with a bit more regularity, but this time we also had all the spouses and kids together. If I counted correctly, that makes 23 right now! That just doesn't happen nearly enough. You know you are getting old when you stop talking about "getting the family together" and you start "organizing a family reunion". Something tells me that our family reunions wouldn...

Hello SUMMER!!! Summer is here, so that means pool time. Here are a few pics to show what is keeping our family busy this year. Grace has turned into a fish! She loves being in the pool and she loves how her float suit and noodle let her swim all by herself. Tonight, she even asked me to help her swim UNDER water!! Woohoo! She didn't quite make it, but she is getting there. I am definitely a proud papa when I am in the water with her. Hailey is doing her job. She is eating, sleeping, crying and pooping. What more could we ask for? She sleeps through the night, and has practically since the night we brought her home. At 6 weeks old, she is starting to giggle and grin. Brenda seems to be the only one who can catch her in the act, but I am told it is pretty cute. Grace is still loving her cooking classes. Last week we made campfire potatoes and indoor smores! Her confidence in the kitchen has grown by leaps and bounds over the last 5 months since our first class back i...

How time flies when you are having fun, right? Can you believe that Hailey is already 5 weeks old? Crazy! I have been back to work and back on the road and Brenda only has a few weeks left until she returns to her job. Brenda has been making the most of her time off, and soaking up precious moments with both girls. Hailey is certainly a momma's girl for now. Brenda has also been working on potty training with Grace. We have hopes of putting Grace in some sort of Mother's Day Out program or pre-school program at least for a few hours each week, but most of them require potty training. It isn't going great, but we are making slow progress. Grace is still hesitant to give up the "baby" phase and fully embrace her big girl status. Recently, we noticed that Grace has been biting her nails a lot. They were really starting to look pretty bad and we were about to resort to some of that smell, nasty stuff that you put on them so that kiddos won't like the taste. This ...

While I was off from work, we decided it was our best chance to get a quick trip to Tyler in. We got to introduce Hailey to Grampa and Mema . We tried to see Granny as well, but we didn't make it. We will plan to spend some time with Granny Jean and Derwood on our next trip, probably over the 4 th of July. We tried to surprise Mema by basically sneaking into town. Usually, I would call her several days in advance so that we can make plans to meet for lunch. Sadly, I think that will be the last time we try to surprise her. I think we have discovered that Mema enjoys looking forward to our visit as much as she enjoys the visit itself. We think that she also tries to rest up and really put her best self forward when we are together. Also, we would normally take her out for lunch but now with 2 car seats filling the backseat, it would take a caravan just to get us to a restaurant. Instead, Mom called her and told her to invite her out to her house for lunch. Mema was suffering f...

Yesterday was pretty busy day in our family. With the family visits wrapped up for the day, and the baby snoozing, Brenda and I tried to get some sleep. The nurse helped Brenda get out of bed and helped her get refreshed a bit, we checked on Hailey one more time and then at long last, lights out. Brenda and I had only slept for about 3 hours the night before, and aside from a couple of very brief cat naps, we were up all day. So with the lights out, we laid down to sleep... for about 20 minutes before Hailey cried out. The poor girl was pretty gassy and just wanted to be held. Brenda was wiped out from all the days activities and after trying in vain a couple of times to get her to settle back down, I picked her up and rocked her in the glider in our darkened room so that Brenda could try to get some rest. When you are tired and the baby is restless and your options are limited (we can't very well take her for a drive to help her fall asleep or take a walk around the block), this i...

It's 6:45 am right now and we are at the hospital, in pre -op, preparing for Hailey's arrival. We are so excited to welcome Hailey Michelle Cornish into our family. It's kind of funny how different Brenda's pregnancies have been. Part of it is because as first time parents with Grace, everything was new. With Hailey, there haven't been many surprises. We were blessed to have wonderful, healthy pregnancies with both, and fantastic care from Brenda's doctor and the staff at the hospital. With Grace, we had hoped for natural delivery. Since Grace ended up being a c-section, and the opportunity was available, we actually scheduled this day for Hailey quite some time ago. Since we actually still a week away from Hailey's actual due date, baring any emergency, we have known that today would be the day. With Grace, the change from a natural to a c-section delivery brought a bit of sadness. We had been here at the hospital for a couple of days, trying after being in...

It is not even noon yet on Easter, and we have already had an event filled and busy weekend. On Good Friday, we ate dinner with some great friends at Posado's, one of my favorite spots to eat Mexican food. We talk a lot about wanting to get together with so many of our friends. It is something that we actually do far too little of. It was great company and Grace did very well eating and playing by herself. On Saturday Grace and I went to cooking class at Young Chefs Academy while Mommy and Gram went for some pampering. Grace and I learned how to make carrot cake with cream cheese frosting (yum!) with a full class of kiddos. Its funny to think back to the first couple of classes at YCA when Grace was the only kiddo. This weekend, there were 5 kids and the full class made it so much fun. All of the kids were very excited to help and they all did a great job of being patient and waiting their turns. They also were fantastic at encouraging each other. It is truly special to hear toddle...

We saw this at church a couple of years ago, just before Easter. It really stuck with me and I think it is AWESOME. And here is the rest of the story. May you and your's be truly blessed this Easter.

Grace had "vewy bizzy" day today at Gram's. Gram helped her dye Easter eggs! She was excited to tell us about it tonight at dinner, and Gram sent pictures. There are more pictures on the Photo Album. You can access our photo album from the navigation bar on the right. Grace has really been enjoying her cooking classes at Young Chefs Academy. At our last class, Gram came with us and got to see how much she is learning there. Because Grace really does seem to enjoy being in the kitchen, Gram and I welcome her in our kitchens as often as possible. One of the wonderful benefits to having Grace "play" in the kitchen while we cook is that she is far more apt to try something that SHE helped cook. Brenda kind of cringes when she sees Grace eat raw onion, like she did while we were cooking tonight. But I think it is great. No, I don't particularly care for raw onion myself. But Grace is discovering texture and taste and learning, whether she knows it or ...