Happy New Year~ 2015

Another year come and gone. 2014 was truly one of our best years yet. We were blessed beyond measure to welcome Faith Ann this year. Other than having our sweet baby girl, our year was pretty uneventful....which is a blessing! Uneventful may mean 'boring' to some people. But to me, uneventful means simple, healthy, secure, and fun! So, I am grateful for our year of simplicity, health, happiness, security, and lots of love! Good bye 2014!!!

Hello 2015!! With a new year comes unknowns. Fear, worry, anxious, 'what if' are all words that come to mind when you are anticipating the unknown. However, the unknown also brings dreams, hopes, imagination, desire and excitement! As we ride the ride of 2015- I pray that I allow myself to turn the unknowns over to God and enjoy each day! This is my biggest New Years Resolution...don't look or worry about tomorrow- just enjoy right now! As a mother, there will always be something to worry about. But, I challenge myself to fully live in the security of trusting God!

We went to Lake Livingston for New Years Eve. My brother has a lake house. My siblings and our families loaded up and took over Beau's house! It was COLD! The kids had a blast! Some of Beau's friends have a lake house there too, so we all joined together. I know most of the people because they live in our neighborhood, so it was nice to get to know them better. There had to have been 25 kids between the cousins and friends, all ranging from Faith Ann to 15 years old! Faith Ann is too cuddly and kissable even for cousin Sam (who is 15 and obviously 'too cool' to do kid stuff!) What can I say, she is so dang irresistible!

We all made food and put it together for a delicious meal. We all visited and hung around the campfire. The kids were all over the place...jumping on trampoline, playing with sparklers, dancing, playing pool, and doing gymnastics. Yep, they had a gymnastics bar. The adults started doing gymnastics too as the night went on...hilarious! There were lots of laughs, and I was a bit sore the next day!

Faith Ann was such a rock star! She fell asleep in the car on our way to their friends house. So, I put her carseat in one of the bedrooms, and she slept the whole time! She was sound asleep for like 5 hours with screaming children and loud music. The countdown to midnight woke her up. So, she got to reveal her New Years Eve party dress right after the ball dropped! Everyone said she was like Cinderella...all of a sudden appearing at midnight in a beautiful, sparkly dress!

She was admired by everyone. Everyone wanted to hold and kiss on her. She got plenty of New Year kisses!! Hunter and Trent stayed awake the whole time. Party animals. They didn't skip a beat and were in the middle of everything. They crashed the second their head hit the pillow at 1:00 in the morning!! This goes down in the record book for the latest they have ever stayed awake!

Our family of 5 all slept in the same room. The boys shared a pallet on the floor and Faith Ann was in the pack-n-play. They slept great until 4am! Hunter woke up and said he was cold. That got Faith Ann stirring. Hunter got in bed with us right when Faith Ann started crying. So, there were 4 of us in our bed while feeding Faith Ann. Hunter playing peak-a-boo with Faith Ann over my shoulder! Lovely!

Faith Ann never got settled after that. I tried to put her back in her pack-n-play, our bed, on the floor Trent. By the way, I ended up sleeping on the floor with Trent because I can NOT stand sharing a bed with a child! I'm sorry, I know many people enjoy sleeping with their kids...not me! I can't sleep. Their legs are here and there, they make random noises, the blanket wraps around them...I end up hanging on the edge of the bed with a corner of the sheet! Nope, not for me! So, I slept the rest of the night on the floor!

Then, Scott's alarm goes off at 5:45 because he wanted to go hunting. Annoying! The alarm woke everyone up right when we were all getting back to sleep! So Scott heads out in his kayak to go hunting while I have 3 babies awake in a quiet house full of sleeping people! Thank you Scott! ha! We loaded up after breakfast because it was a cold and rainy day. Staying inside all day would have been a challenge, and Scott needed to go to work the next day for a few hours anyways. The kids would be way too sleepy if we decided to stay all day or another night- so we headed back home to regroup.

We decided to keep the kids awake for the ride home so they would take a long nap at home. That was hard, but worth it. They all slept a long time! The boys were recharged, but Faith Ann was overtired. She cried off and on during her nap. But night time was a different story...all 3 kids were passed out by 7pm! Faith Ann woke up with really really gunky eyes. They were almost sealed shut! I washed them with a warm cloth and put a few drops of breastmilk in them. They almost immediately got better! So, I am going to keep up that regime for a couple days. I will call the doctor if it persist.

We had a wonderful New Years Eve. I look forward to 2015. We look forward to the ride of the unknown. This year we will embrace the good and learn from the bad- grow from the hard and enjoy the easy! Happy 2015 to you!!