Thankful Thursday and Year Wrap Up

It is hard to believe that today is the last Thursday of 2011. I have so much to be thankful for this year. We have had very little illness in our family. My depression has done pretty well at laying low. I have subbed some this year, made many quilts and enjoyed so many relationships with friends online through facebook and my Blog. I even got a sweet Christmas card from a customer this year. I made a quilt for her daughter out of marathon shirts. It meant so much to be on her Christmas List. Paul has had many side jobs that have helped us out. We have given of our time to Society of Samaritans this year, they in turn have helped us a couple of times when the kids went back to school and with Christmas. I am thankful for organizations like this that can help us in difficult times. They also helped connect us with someone at the end of the summer to install a 220 outlet so we will now have a better window unit to help in the summers for the main part of the house. I am thankful to a particular friend for helping out this year by purchasing me two quilting tables, it will really help with all the queen orders I am praying the Lord will be sending our way. Outside of just having wonderful friends and family I am so so thankful that my dad made it out for Thanksgiving. I miss family so much during the holidays. I have been in Texas 17 years in January and they have never spent a holiday here. It was a nice change for us. I am thankful for the growth of my blog, I am thankful to live in a country that allows freedom of speech and worship too.

This week I have much to be thankful as we just celebrated Christmas with family and friends. We have had much enjoyment playing games during this Christmas Break with the kids too. I think we have managed to do so nightly. It has created many memories I hope they treasure. I am thankful for the washer and dryer we were just able to purchase. I am thankful that our remodel to make them work is going smoothly and almost complete. I am thankful that my husband has several days off and we can spend some time together. I am thankful for all the food we have eaten, some of which was provided to us, that makes me all the more thankful, I love watching the Lord work in our lives.

Here are some pictures from this week to show the Thankfulness from the week and Lord's provision.

Sequence Night 3, it was rather fun because it was just Three of us playing.

 Kenzei won, she loved that. We played for second place because we "roll" like that.

Day 2 of Remodel. I am so thankful Paul had the day off. It really helped us get so much done. He started by adding a sub floor to level everything out between the existing wall and the floor under the washer/dryer. Then he added a flat surface to the wall. Its kind of neat because this is a cut of wood left from Kenzei's desk.

We have an electrical cord to hide and he came up with this clever idea to run it in the middle of the end framing. Great thinking!

I am so excited it was coming together quickly. He even reused that baseboard we worked so hard on, its now the top piece to this wall.

I love how this is looking. It makes me excited to think how the rest of her room will look once we get the wall framing up and the ceiling redone.. In time right now we don't have the extra money for the nails we will need. I think we might have enough wood.

This week I am really thankful I turned a picture Paul took of the kids into a Free Canvas, we had a no gift policy for adults, rather hard this year but necessary. Since this was free it didn't count. I love the photo too!

Zekaryah and I went on a date last week, Mekenzei and I went on one this week, that left Jakob. It became a little more complicated when we discovered there weren't any movies he was interested in. (We have a local theater that is still $2.50, it isn't the best but for $5 we can have a nice date.) I had a gift card for a local restaurant. I had been saving it for our anniversary but we used it tonight to pull off Jakob's night out. Paul also tagged along, since he had the day off. We rented Rio, which the boys had not seen yet, so after a game of Monopoly we will watch our movie.

Family time at its finest

A game of Monopoly that has taken hours. I got so cold I folded out of the game early but it is now almost one and they are still playing!

I am truly blessed to have met a great man 17 years ago. I am excited to think that 17 years ago we had made the decision to get married. I was anxiously awaiting him arriving in Utah, so that we could find a local courthouse and get married on New Year's Eve. Of course my plans got changed when we couldn't pull that off, but we did get married the sixth of January in Vegas. Well worth the wait. I hope everyone has a very Blessed New Year and that you too are enjoying your family this Holiday season. That is what life is all about..the little things.
(thankful tonight to Jakob for taking this photo for us too)