Updates

A few updates and reminders. Dec 13th is fast approaching! That's our annual Christmas Party for adoptive families, families waiting and/or are interested in adopting. Everyone is welcome. It's a potluck. Please bring something to share. And please remember to bring a wrapped gift per child with their first and last names on it for Santa's bag. We have a new and excited Santa this year! An ole time family friend that watched me grow up from babyhood. Very exciting to have him come, support and be our star of the evening! We will have a craft table, we will have door prizes, a talent show and dancing! It's a fun filled evening of children! 

I can't believe it's that time of year again! That magical time to spend with family and friends. For us, we are staying home for Christmas and our door is open. Christmas Eve is our game board night with tons of food platters and the "steal the present" game. Little House on the Prairie will be playing and we won't have any Internet connection for two days. 

Christmas Day will be crowded with all our family attending. This year we're going simplistic. Only a couple practical gifts underneath our tree, with a sentimental twist. 

After the holiday season our littlest daughter Emily is scheduled to have her hip surgery on January 6th. It's perfect timing. Surgeries she needs to enhance her mobility, to anatomically correct her hips and stance. However her recovery will be long and painful. It will not only be very hard on our daughter, our family...it's going to be very hard on me. It's just that helpless feeling a mother has. 

In the meantime we are continuing with "Emily's Angels" So far we have raised $1500.00 towards Emily's all terrain wheelchair. We are also going to be at the fourth annual Christmas Faire with a Vintage Flair on December 7th from 9-4 at the Eagle Crest Golf Course. Emily will join us in the afternoon! 

Just this Thursday the Oceanside Star wrote an article, you can locate it at http://www.oceansidestar.com/news/having-a-family-of-18-is-awesome-1.1623821#sthash.Wc7Cmu2y.gbpl

Leaving you with this message....the season is a hard time of year for many for several reasons. Please be kind to the people that aren't - they need it.  Acknowledge and in some form, open up your heart and make a difference for another. Regardless if it's dropping off socks, or a warm hot chocolate to someone on the street, to lending a helping hand, a listening ear or opening up your home to ones in need. Just do something. Heres a story....I have been sitting in our sons Taekwondo parking lot religiously two nights a week in my van. It didn't matter what the weather was doing. I was there up to two hours some nights. I was waiting to sell our Shell Christmas Trees. Sometimes with no shows.....which was completely fine. One night a mother (I did not know) dropped me off a Starbucks coffee after buying a tree. Just that action of kindness touched my heart. It sends a trigger reminding us that there is others that care, even for strangers. - Everyone needs those reminders. Those reminders start the "Paying it forward" 

Start now and make a difference....... - me.