happy happy new year :-)

Wow, it's been way too long since I wrote, but then of course I've also been way too busy! I had a very nice Christmas and New Years though. Lots of time spent with family, lots of laughing and fun times. All that was missing was Heidi and little Kegan, but they'll be with us next year (hopefully). I had prayed for God to help me really enjoy Christmas, the joy of celebrating the birth of Jesus, and not dwell on my loss and He answered my prayer. On Christmas, for the first time since September, I felt really, truly happy. Most of it, I'm sure, was seeing Ed and the girls so happy. The kids got a lot of nice things for Christmas (and of course we try to stress to them the importance of giving over receiving and they seem to truly enjoy surprising everyone with the cute little gifts they make!) and Ed was so relieved that there were no awful family arguments between his mom and aunt to ruin things, everyone got along just fine. Of course, we had quite a "family juggling routine" that day--first we went to his Uncle Clyde's place for the traditional dinner, then back to our house for dinner with Gram and Tom, Lynda & Kathleen (because they were still upset with Mary Jo and didn't want to spend the day with her) then off to my parents house to exchange gifts and spend some time with them. I must admit, I was sort of dreading it, expecting a lot of chaos and stress, but the day turned out wonderful, and it was nice to see everyone.
New Years Eve was good too, although I think Lynda was a little upset that we went to the party at Mary Jo's instead of going over there, but we have gone to the party at Aunt Jo's every year and Ed and I refuse to get caught up in the mess between them--we just hope eventually they can straighten it out too.
Ed and I made an important "resolution" (although I hate to say it that way because resolutions are so often broken)--we are going to lose weight. So far we're both off to a pretty good start. We've been watching what we eat, exercising, trying not to "diet" but to actually make some lifestyle changes. And at this point I have lost 3 pounds and he's lost 2.
Well, I've got kids to get to bed and a husband to spend some time with, so that's all for now. Hopefully it won't be as long till I write again!