A New Year

Happy 2009!

I hope you had a wonderful Christmas and New Year's. I know I did. We got to spend lots of time with family. Then we ended the old year with new friends and started the new year by spending time with old friends. How cool is that?

And today, the reality check--back to school for us all. Colton started Spanish this semester (at his request), and he really did a great job with his first lesson. He and I are also going to begin a strength training program and a homemade walking program. I say "homemade" because in an effort to keep it fun, I'm simply letting him pick a TV show, and we will walk through it (in place or forward and back). Today as the first day, I let him walk until he wanted to stop. We made it 19 minutes. Now that we have a benchmark, we have to try to beat that time tomorrow. Who knows? Maybe Mom will benefit from this too.

Eli got a taste of school today as well. He has agreed to start reading lessons and was quite excited about it until today. When I got the book out, he suddenly changed his mind and didn't want to anymore. With a little coaxing and some "I just want to show you something," he got suckered into looking at the lesson and participating in it. In maybe 5 minutes, it was over. I don't know if he was more surprised that it was already over or that it had ever started in the first place. He agreed that it didn't hurt or anything and seemed to have had fun. For those of you who think I might be pushing him too much (he will be 4 in February), you need to understand that he already knows all of his letter sounds and can use the magnetic letters on the fridge to build words I sound out for him. He also often asks to do his Bible lesson with me. In other words, he wants some school time with Mommy like Big Brother gets.

Just yesterday Colton was asking again when Keely and Maggie are going to come. He is so anxious to have them here. Sometimes I worry how devestated he would be if we never raised the money to go and get them. It's been quite some time since we were able to add anything to the adoption fund. As much as I rethink everything, I still don't feel like God is saying "no" to the adoption. In the depths of my heart, I think I would be "messing up" if I quit the adoption efforts. But instead, I am trying to stay focused on the goal while at the same time seeing the snail's pace as God's timing. After all, God knows the best possible moment the girls will be ready and the best possible moment for us to travel and the best possible moment for us and the boys to be ready for them, etc.

As I always remind you, we still have bracelets and pizza cards for sale. At last check we have lost a good bit of money on the pizza cards. If there is any way you can buy one or take them to people where you work or something, it would help us out immensely.