Goodbye 2010

Wow! This has been an incredible year! I have been blessed with the birth of my grandson, Robby. He is just the greatest blessing of our lives. Robby is so sweet and loving. Kelsey has become such a good mother. He is so very happy.
My 365 only made it to about 183 or so. In 2011, I hope to make it closer to 200 or 300. Maybe I should go for 52 - one picture a week. I also plan on continuing my journalling with prompts from Your Life Spelled Out.
Happy New Year All!

Left Cali

We've been in California for Christmas. It has been great seeing all our extended family. We are all getting older.
We left Tuesday evening because there was a snow front going through out route home. We kept driving until we were too tired to drive anymore. Unfortunately, the front passed us and we had to drive through the snow storm. Once we got to El Paso, we drove through a dust storm. We had tumble weeds rolling across I-10 and hitting us. Also got hit by a dead bird who hit one of the big rigs in front of us. Tried to walk the dog but she wanted no part of the wind.
Daisy dog did have a great time visiting the family. My sil has two rescued dachshunds, one who is also named Daisy. The two daisies became great friends. They loved to play chase. My Daisy is about twice the size of the other Daisy.
The drive home was really horrible because of the weather. I think it rained more than 50% of our time in Cali. Robby had a great time with his cousins. The girls enjoyed him. Actually, Maddie & Cami enjoyed him. Brie ignored him for the most part. She did teach him to cruise the furniture and while he isn't as stable as she is, he keeps on trying. He turned nine months on Christmas Day.
Your Life Spelled Out starts again on January 1st. There is a facebook and blogger page for the journal prompts. It is an awesome resource for journalling. I also joined Ali Edwards' course on Big Picture Classes 'One Little Word.' I think my word will be wisdom. I need to gain wisdom to help understand my adult children. Their choices confuse me at times but I need to gain the wisdom to let go. They are adults and I have to let go more. I have always over mothered everyone as it is.
My spring conference for Grace is coming together. I have four months to go and I have 2 speakers confirmed. Need at least one to two more professional women. Ideally, they will have gone to Jay. I will probably lead the dream boards section. The girls really enjoy the dream boards.
I hope that I can unkink my back after the long car trip. My back is really hurting from the ride. I am going to try a new doctor for my back this spring. I am looking into decompression of my disks. I have an extreme fear of surgery, so I am hoping that this will be a good alternative. It was recommended by a friend who got great results from it.
I forgot to take my contacts out before they dried out and thought for awhile I wasn't going to be able to get them out. Wearing my glasses for the last part of the trip. I wanted to try the dailies but they only go up to -7. My prescription is a -9. My vision is so bad that they don't have a laser big enough for me. I have to get the surgery that implants a lens into the eye. It costs about $7,000 an eye, so I will remain blind as a bat for awhile.

Christmas Firsts

Merry Christmas! We are also celebrating Robby's first word on his ninth month day. He called Gerry "BopBop". He was up at 1 this morning and has been a bit cranky ever since. We have a Wii bowling game and a chickenfoot game going on. Later we are going over to Bryan & Jeni's for dinner.

What an adventure

Today, I woke up to a small crisis. But really not sure if I actually woke. I didn't get much sleep. Last night, the boy had problems sleeping. So about 3am, he came and slept on the floor in our room. He kept hearing a ticking sound and a blue glowing light. Seems, Uncle Jim has a small robot that glows blue at night. He is taller than me now but he still is just a kid. Yesterday he had so much fun playing with his cousins. The girls just adore him. Just like Robby does. Seems that Tim's charm works on all small children.
After the boy woke us up, I was kept up by the dog. My dog was scratching again. I think she may be getting other food than the hypo-allergic (Sp?) stuff I paid $40 for. Or it could be the stress of hanging out with two other dogs. They are very close dogs and my Daisy thinks she is human. So, she prefers her humans to the other dogs.

12/21/2010

Today is the first day of Winter. In my family, all of my relatives have the unfortunate habit of passing away on holidays. I know they really don't have any control over the event but I am starting to run out of holidays without sad memories attached.
Today is the date that I lost my mom. 12/21/2001. It has been 9 years today and the pain is still there. I know that she is now out of pain and is happier than she was on Earth. But I miss her. In the 9 years she has been gone so much has changed.

Poor Puppy!

My poor puppy is now having food allergies. She is very itchy and has bald spots. Gerry is appalled at the cost of her food. She wasn't very thrilled with it at first but she did eat some of it. Now she is scouring the floor looking for scraps. She is also taking steroids. So, her portly size may get even bigger. She is 27lbs. The doc also suggested that we get her stairs to get on the bed.

So excited!

One little word is going to be explored in a class at Big Picture! I am so very excited. This year was my first year of focusing on one word to encourage me for the year. My word was COMPLETE. It has been a great word for me this year. I have already chosen my word for 2011. My Aunt Becky inspired me. She said we should pray for wisdom and that resonated with me so deeply that I knew it would be my word for next year. I really think wisdom is something that would help me.
On a more serious note, I started new hormones today. I am the first female in 5 generations of my maternal line to go through menopause, so I don't know much about how it will go. I'm in perimenopause which can last up to ten years. I am going with hormone therapy for now because of my age. I'm am very young to start this stage. I have been going through this for a year but I haven't talked about it because I don't want to believe I am old. I don't feel old.
So wisdom is excepting the bad and the good.

Call for Donations & Speakers

Some of you know that I teach at a very inner city school. We are a title one school which means that over 40% of our students receive free lunch. I work with a group of ladies who have started a club for young ladies called Grace. It stands for girls reaching for academics, confidence and excellence. We have a conference each spring. This year, our theme is "College We Can; College We Will."
For centerpieces, I would love to use those souvenir megaphones that you can get at college bookstores. They are about 7 to 8 inches tall. They have the college name and or mascot on them. If you would like to donate a megaphone to my club I would really appreciate it. Just send me a message on my blog or facebook if you could donate one from a college in your area. We have a drawing for the girls to get to keep the centerpieces and I know they will be so thrilled with the megaphones. I plan on picking up some during my Christmas break.
Also if you know of a professional woman who would be interested in speaking to my girls and are in the San Antonio area please let me know. I have one speaker who has committed already. I am so excited to have a former Jay HS graduate and the first female police captain in San Antonio as a speaker. I also tentatively have an Ob/Gyn who hopes to be able to speak. Her schedule is sometimes quite erratic. Babies have their own schedule.
Working with these young ladies is incredibly rewarding and I get so attached to my girls. I sometimes feel like I have about 50 little sisters/daughters that I get to see 5 days a week.
Many of these girls come from families who have never even considered college as an option and my mission is to inspire them to believe they can attend college.
Also pray for my conference to be successful and for me to have wisdom in the coming months.
Last year, I had such trouble of deciding on my word for the year and it seems one word is staring me right in the face. Wisdom will be my word for 2011!