Goodbye 2009!

2009 seems to have gone out with a gluttonous bang. The holidays have been so crazy this year that gluttonous seems to be a good word to describe the "glutton" of activities, parties, things to do, things to get done, new toys for the boys and of course, the gluttony of food we've had over the past 5 or so weeks. We had Justin's birthday, Thanksgiving, Christmas, our anniversary, New Years, Logan's birthday and a multitude of family gatherings, church and work and friends' parties and all the loads of food and running around and everything goes along with all those things. (Not to mention I still need to upload pictures and blog about all those things). I'm not complaining though, I know we are blessed to have so much and have so much to do, but I'm exhausted. I'm so ready for normal life to resume and to move on from 2009.

Justin and I celebrated our 5th anniversary this New Year's Eve and I think I can say 2009 was the hardest year out of our 5 years. In the grand scheme of things and the grand scale of hardships you can experience, ours really haven't been that bad. But for our little family and our own little scale, this year was probably the hardest. January started out with me going to Utah for my grandmother's funeral. I didn't live near her for most of my life and when I finally did, she had Alzheimer's and didn't really know who I was anyway. But going to her funeral affected me alot more than I expected as I learned things about her and her life I had never known. We followed up in February with a completely unexpected miscarriage which is one of those things you hear about and sympathize with, but never really understand the emotional and physical toll it takes on someone until you go through it. The miscarriage also happened to start its process on the same day Tolan was having surgery on the inside of his upper lip. So that was all very hard, but we had some great friends help us through it with meals and tons of support.



We knew it was coming on the horizon, but not long after all that we came to the decision that it was now time for a change in Justin's job. There are lots of "fun" things that go along with working for a large company in corporate America that I won't go into, and those things along with just the normal progression of a career and the guidance of the Lord in our lives, we knew it was time for change and we felt strongly that we needed to get back to Pittsburgh. We didn't know how or why, but we were going. This was just the beginning of a very long and stressful process - finding a job in Pittsburgh, figuring out how financially and logistically we were going to move to Pittsburgh, getting our house on the market, trying to sell it, preparing to move & packing up everything on our own this time, then the move itself. Moving is so stressful on so many levels and all the processes of this move just seemed to drag on for most of the year.



Once we actually packed up and tearfully drove out of our driveway and across the country, we stayed with my parents for a few months. That was truly a blessing, but also a trial. It's hard to move back in with your parents after living on your own with your own family. And while we were there we were still stressing about our house sitting empty and unsold in Texas. We were also trying to figure out where we were going to live here amidst a very unpromising and discouraging hunt for a rental. But after many prayers and lots of faith, it did all work out. We unexpectedly found out I was pregnant in July and eventually our house rented out in Texas, we found a great house to rent here for a really great price and moved in the week I would have been having the baby that I miscarried in February. So after all the stress and trial everything did work out.



We are so glad that whole ordeal is over with. Moving gets harder every time and I never want to move again unless the company pays for it and hires a moving company! So we shall see. We are settled in here and really enjoying having family close-by. I only had one living grandparent growing up, and she lived far away, so it's been really fun to see my kids get to have all four grandparents here, healthy, close-by and eager to be with their grandchildren.



We do miss Texas a lot though, and that has been hard. We lived in Austin for 2 1/2 years - the longest we have ever lived anywhere and long enough to establish good friendships and have it feel like home. I'm not the most outgoing and social person, so it's not easy for me to just make new friends. Making friends when you are married (for me anyway) has been different from making friends in high school or college, and then different all over again when you have kids. I was just establishing those good friends that I could call up anytime just to talk and not feel like I was interrupting her day or just to say, "my kids are driving me crazy, why don't you come over with your kids and we'll hang out while they play." It was also nice that our husbands were friends too. Justin has made some friends at church here, but they aren't married, so I'm a little jealous and still missing having that kind of friend here.



I guess the only other hard thing we've gone through this year was Tolan's little adventure to the Emergency Room and all the weeks of bandaging and doctor's appointments that followed. But he's fine and it definitely could have been worse!



I know our trials this year really haven't been that great and I know we have grown from them and many have even turned out to be blessings in disguise, but goodbye 2009 and welcome 2010! Who knows what 2010 has in store for us. I know it has at least one thing in store for us and that's what I need to focus on now that the busy holiday season is over....



There are only about 10 or 11 weeks until this baby could realistically come. I am due April 7, but Logan came 14 days early and Tolan 7 days early. So we could be seeing this baby in 10 or 11 weeks. And are we ready???



This picture pretty much sums it up:
That's her room. We are so not ready. See that little pile of pink there on the floor? That's about all this little girl has. A carseat cover. A few onesies and her designated "blanky." No crib set up. No baby paraphernalia unpacked. No girly wardrobe purchased. Oh, and no name. We are totally clueless on the name. Her middle name will either be Celest (mine and my mom's middle name) or Whitney (my ancestor's last name). So do not ask. We do not have a name for this poor girl and I need to get into the nesting mode!