Open Arms

I feel like I am welcoming 2011 with open arms. 2010 was a rough year for us ... and I just feel like I am ready to embrace something good this year. I'm ready for a change of constant highs and major lows to just finally being content and happy and full of peace.

This past Christmas was perfect. I love love love being at home with my family. I think that it gets a little harder each year being so far away from the ones that I love. I have lived down in Florida for going on 10 years now and each year I realize just how much I am missing out on what's going on with my family. You know just the day to day normal life stuff that I would normally be able to be apart of if I didn't live so far away. I love each one of my crazy family members dearly. I also loved having a white Christmas ... it was SO beautiful.


Alya and I on Christmas morning


My momma and me on Christmas


Me and my dad on Christmas


My beautiful niece and big sister and I on Christmas night


My big sister and big brother and I on Christmas night ... we are missing another sister though who lives in London now ... love you Tam.

Alya had to go back to work last week so we had to cut my vacation with my family short and return back to sunny Florida. Of course it would choose to snow super hard the morning that we left so the driving conditions weren't great almost the whole trip home. But we made it safe and sound!


I pretty much just sat around all week long. Actually, that was my plan. I wanted to sit in my comfy pj's all day and just read, knit, sew, and catch up on my DVR'd shows that I had missed lol. And that's pretty much all that I did. I got a new sewing machine for Christmas. I had asked for it because I really really wanted to learn how to make a quilt. My two great grandmothers were known for making amazing quilts and when they passed away the quilt making/knitting died with them. I have always been very crafty and I have wanted to bring that back into our family. It's just something that is special to my heart.



I am very proud to say that I made two aprons last week. I wanted to make a mommy and daughter apron for my bff and her little girl aka my niece. I am super bummed that I didn't take a picture of the Gracelynn's before I gave it to my friend but here's the idea of what the aprons looked like only the fabrics were switched for the smaller one. I really was quite proud of myself.



I had a little helper lol

Annnnnd JoAnne's had a 50% off their classes sale for the New Year so I just signed myself up for my first quilting class at the end of the month! There are four of them and they are like 3 1/2 hours long. I am pretty sure I could probably figure out how to make one on my own, but I want them to turn out really good so I figured learning it the right way the first time instead of experimenting like I did with the aprons would probably save me a lot of money, time and stress lol. I am super excited about it and can't wait to complete my very first quilt. And what I am really excited about is that once I learn I can make sweet little quilts for baby showers for all my fifty million friends that are preggo right now lol. Annnnd maybe a sweet, special little one for our own little miracle one day (hopefully soon).

So ... now things are back to normal again. We are currently waiting to hear back from another grant application that we turned in months ago. We just got a little questionnaire thing sent to us a few days ago wanting to know where things kind of stood for us right now. We have already been denied two other grants so this is kind of our last hope as far as a grant goes. We were supposed to be relicensed for foster care last Thursday ... I spent the WHOLE day cleaning my house and running errands for paper work stuff we had to get filled out and THEY DIDN'T SHOW UP! So, now they are coming tomorrow night instead and I have to re-clean my whole entire house because of course it couldn't stay clean for a whole week for them to come back again. sigh ... It's been a year next month since the boys left ... we haven't had any other foster kids since then. I really don't know what if anything is going to happen with us being re-licensed, but I would still like to keep our license just in case we do decide to take in more kids. I know that being foster parents will definitely still be apart of our lives in the future, I just don't know if it will right now. I just don't want to have to go through the hassle of having to start all over again to get licensed again ... so there is no harm in having our home visit (except the re-cleaning part ... sigh again) tomorrow night to get re-licensed for another year. I just contacted our agency today and was told that our profile has not been shown to any other birth mothers since our last adoption fell through. There could be a potential adoption situation that has been brought to our attention through a friend but I'm just really trying to guard my heart right now since we just went through the loss of our last adoption. It's too hard not to get your hopes up about a potential anything ... but I'm doing my best to just sit back and let God guide us. The ball is not in our court right now ... so if things progress then we will know that we are moving in the right direction. Right now I'm just praying for complete peace and guidance throughout this particular situation for all parties involved. Hopefully I can give a little more information as time goes by, but for now just pray for doors to be wide open if this is the way God wants us to go or for them to be completely shut if this is not what He wants for us right now.

Happy 2011! Love, Linds