Hello Old Friend

It has been over a year since my last post.  In my last post I was getting ready for Brody birthday party...which was a huge success! I will post some pics and some tutorials on how I made it all in the weeks to come. 

So much has happened in the last year....I started back to work in January, Brody turned 4, Marak turned 3, our lives became completely nuts with putting our house up for sale in August (which it's STILL up for sale!), the kids started school an hour away from our current house, to the town we will be moving to (we thought we'd be there by now!), my mother's cancer made a turn for the worst, she passed away in November, and then we had the saddest Christmas of my existence. 

I guess with all of that said, the best place to start is the beginning.  Work is fantastic, I didn't think I would like it this much.  It's a huge difference in place/people from where I used to work.  It's nice when you can actually enjoy working, as opposed to how it used to be.  I've been here a little over a year now and I am still loving it.  I knew that if I was going to go back to work, it would have to be for something great, leaving the kids and putting them in school was really hard.  Marak cried and cried for the first few months, it was torture.  I would cry all the way to work those first few months feeling like the worst mother ever for leaving her babies at school.

Trying to sell the house has been an exhausting nightmare! Keeping a house remotely clean with a 4 year old and 3 year old in the house....yeah right! Since August we have had to stop keeping it perfectly clean, it's too much work with working full time. We've had a handful of lookers come by, but none seriously into it.  I asked the boys to clean up their toy room this past weekend and Brody asked me if they had to keep it clean so we could sell our house.  When I replied,"Yes" he then said, "that's okay we can just stay here, we don't need to move!" I'm starting to think he may be onto something! We are all getting tired of the move that will never happen. 

Now onto the most horrible part of our year...my mom.  I won't say a lot on the subject right now for many of reasons.  Most importantly I'm not sure if I'm ready to put it all out there exactly how horrific it was to watch her pass away so painfully.  By the time she passed she was basically a big ball of cancer.  I have seen, smelled, and been through more horrific things last year than I ever thought humanly possible.  My mother has taught me a lot over the years, her last lesson for me was how to have strength and grace in the hardest moments of your life.  How to survive those tragedies you don't think you can live though.  She was strong, courageous, loving, giving, selfless, and so strong in faith.  I'm thankful for her, and the life she gave me every day!