Beginning of a new decade

I can't believe the things that have happened in just a few short days of a new year. I had been promising a friend of mine for years that I would make him a t-shirt blanket with his old paramedic t-shirts. They found the sack of them over Christmas, so now I had to do it. New Year's Eve his wife and I went to Walmart to purchase all the supplies. Thankfully we were not the only people at Walmart 11:30 pm. We are getting OLD :) The next day we worked 7 solid hours and up past my bed time. Roger's daughter was making a pillow with the extra fabric. She had fun putting it together.



Addie sewing her pillow up for her Daddie. That was so much fun.





On January 2nd we finished the whole blanket. The funny thing is that I had 2 men help me finish it. Roger sewed on his own patches and when I was tacking the back onto the front I had both Roger and Shane on the floor helping. It made it go by so fast. I was a fun evening.


FINISHED PRODUCT!!!

Christmas

What do I say about Christmas Break? I will try to make it short. The first few days were very peaceful and restful and then I got a second shot in my back.I spent the next 10 days VERY sore, never thinking it would ease up. That evening I drove to Dumas to spend a couple days with my family. Shane was going to come up the next day but he got snowed in here in Childress and pulled people out of the ditches with a tractor. I missed seeing all the 4 foot drifts. There was no snow at my parents house. We had a gigantic sleepover in Dumas with all the nieces and nephews while we all waited for Santa Claus. We had so much fun opening gifts with 3 year old's hands in everything. They made it so enjoyable along with the older kids faces lighting up too.


Nephew Colton holding new cousin Jenna


Jenna's first Christmas


Proud Grandpa!!


Neices - Aren't they gorgeous! Thankfully they do not look like their fathers!!



Little one's enjoying looking at the presents under the tree!!



After Christmas we just enjoyed our time off. Shane even had several "half days" off to enjoy because of the snow. My dogs, Kolton and Shane enjoyed the snow so much that they had to play in it and eat snow balls. When will Kolton learn that throwing snow balls at his dad just gets him in trouble even when he thinks he is getting bigger than him. :)




The dogs wanted to help with Kolton getting wet and cold....





Balee enjoyed chasing and eating snow!!

From The Heart

I am speaking to those women out there that do not have kids of their own. For the longest time (in my twenties) I thought I was Ok with not having kids. I was single and never saw myself as needing to have kids; I had a career and barely had time to take care of myself. I was busy coaching, traveling, playing and being me. Then when I turned 30 and married for the first time I REALLY began to think about my life and the relationship that I have with my mother. How wonderful it would be to share things with someone like we do. Thankfully I didn't have a child with my first husband - that would have been a train wreck.
Now that I am with the most wonderful man, the one that was meant for me, I have really felt the desire to have kids of my own. Having a step son who is a teenager and w been raised by other people is fun because he already knows how to clean dishes and mow the lawn and I love him and love having him around on our weekends. He has a heart the size of Texas; he gets that from his Dad and Grandparents. It still is not the same. When he is with us, he is a perfect kid. I know he is still a teenager giving people fits at times.
There have been people in the past that have said that I would be a better teacher, coach if I had kids of my own because I would understand how the parents feel and would better understand my students. How true is that? Who knows.
Here is where I am going with all of this. I would like to know how one goes through middle age and older life not having a child to share their love and life with. My 5 closest friends do not have kids and we never really talk about this issue. One friend decided a long time ago with her husband that they would never have kids. That is an OK decision for them. But I have NEVER totally made that decision. I feel like I am missing out on something BIG in life that has only been because of the circumstances dealt me in life. How does one figure out what to do with the reality that there is no one to share my past, future, and family history with? I have so much love that I would like to share with a child. Now I am too old to even think about having a child that it would be foolish to even think about it. Who wants to have parents that are almost 60 at graduation? It may be God's plan but I am not liking it right now. So if you are a praying person please pray that I have peace with what ever life gives me and be joyous in it. God does not give us anything we can not handle!!

Does God know better than I do and have a plan for me that I haven't figured out yet?

Winter Is Here

Since my last post we have celebrated MawMaw's 92nd birthday, I have gone to the State Volleyball tournament in San Marcos at the end of November.

MawMaw's 92nd birthday was success. All of her Kids so many of her Grand kids and Great Grandchildren got to attend. The pictures show how everyone enjoyed their time. My parents love having her around.

While in San Marcos, I did some Christmas shopping and watched a lot of good volleyball while visiting with friends. I always learn something new about volleyball or get a great idea for the next year during the times sitting and talking about that sport.




I also got the chance to visit my brother Chet and his new baby Jenna who was born 7 weeks early. She had only been home from the hospital 5 days when I got there. She is so precious. I felt special since I was the first one from our side that has seen her in person. We are blessed to have her home healthy.



On my way home I visited a couple friends in Cleburne. One inparticular, Renee, is a wonderful lady who was always there for me during the fun times and bad times in Cleburne. I wish I had her faith, strength and determination. This fall she underwent a double masectomy and is so full of optimism considering she is still not finished with her procedures. Every year she transforms her home into a Santa Clause - Christmas palace with Christmas trees in every room and there is a Santa sitting on every shelf, door frame, cabinet and wall. She said that she was not going to let this little old thing called breast cancer beat her and keep her from her tradition. That is a person I could learn a few things from. I wish she knew how much I have appreciated her. Words can not do it justice.

While I was on my way home, my wonderful husband told me that I had a surprise waiting for me the next morning. I couldn't think what in the world it could be. Little hints made me think it was a puppy but we had decided (I thought) to wait till Spring to get one. Well I get home Sunday evening and guess what was waiting on me. I little Australian Shepard puppy. Shane said it cost him a bale of cotton so it was fitting to name her BALEE. She is an early Christmas present.


If you know me at all you will know that I absolutely HATE cold weather. So the mornings have been in the 20's and 30's have made me not want to get out of bed and leave before the sun is rising. And I really have hated taking a puppy outside every 10 minutes to "potty". She has done a goo job with the training but she isn't fast enough for me. What were we thinking getting a puppy in the winter. Thankfully she is just too cute, otherwise she might have to stay outside all the time. I have had a wonderful Fall, but am now ready for the Christmas holidays.

October is almost over!!

WOW. Time has really flown by this fall. It was just yesterday that we were starting volleyball 2-a-days. We are finished with the first round of district and ended on a GREAT note the other day with a win over Friona. That win should carry us into the last round. Right now it is a fight to get a spot in the playoffs. We need to win 2 of our last 3 games. No matter what, I will be very proud of these girls this year. They have overcome some adversity and won games that we were down and have hung in there with me during long practices and travel that took the whole day to get there it seemed. We are a well-traveled group of girls. Our last 3 games are on the road. Tulia, Dimmitt and end with Friona on the 24th.

Through it all Shane and his parents have been there for me and have attended every game possible. I could not do all this without their support. I also appreciate the middle of the week meals that my mother-in-law would have prepared for us. It usually was on a day that I was totally exhausted and I appreciated it even more.

And a BIG thank you to me biggest fan ever AMANDA. She is right there along with them and never failed to attend a home game. She even helped during our tournament when she had bigger and more important things she could have been doing. I am so blessed to have such people in my life.

After volleyball season I will have a few weeks to gather my thoughts before I think about "Little Spiker" in January and Softball begins.



Then during this week a special surprise came to our family early. Jenna Leigh Harbert was brought into this world 7 weeks early due to a cyst on Momma's ovary. Jenna weighing 5lbs on Oct 12 is doing GREAT and so is mom. That makes 6 nieces and nephews on my side of the family. I guess since I will not be having any of my own I can spoil each and every one of them.

Volleyball Has Started

Well, summer is over!! We started volleyball off with a BANG with a "midnight" run on August 3rd at 12:01 am. We had wonderful numbers. Later that morning we had our first practice in the gym. We had a GREAT week of practice. Everyone worked hard and I hope had a great time. It wouldn't have ran so smooth without the help of all the coaches. A special thanks to them. We had our first scrimmage Saturday at Highland Park. We saw some very good things, bad and some ugly. We are only going to get better in the next few weeks before district play. I am very excited about the year and expect to have a great time.

AFTER THOUGHT

I forgot these few pictures the other day. I thought these pictures would be fun to share. They are of Shane & I on our rafting trip down the Royal Gorge and we stopped to jump off the cliffs a couple times. We learned last year that wet suites were the way to go. The water is around 45-50 degrees during the month of July.


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The lady that took the picture with our water camera was a Professor from a small Southern California University. She was a blast to get to know. We had all day to get to know the people on our raft. She had a hard time getting us at the right time jumping.