Happy New Year!

Just a month late!  January was a busy month.  We started the new year at my mother-in-law’s house.  She lives near the beach in Galveston, and we always have a great time hanging out with her. 
We celebrated New Year’s Day with our annual Ice Cream Sundaes! We even get dye-free maraschino cherries from Whole Foods! Somehow, I was too busy enjoying the ice cream to get any pictures of it this year.  Oh well!  We also played plenty of Wii games to burn off the ice cream calories.

We can’t go to Galveston without going to the beach, even if it is the middle of winter!  We bundled up and headed to the beach for a shell-collecting mission.  Of course, we weren’t there for 2 minutes before Bug was playing in the water.  She was enjoying herself like it was summertime.  Crazy girl!  Her pants are wet all the way up to her coat!



Bug drew this picture of a bug all by herself!! LOVE it!
One day, Bug decided she wanted to be a mouse, so she enlisted Grandma’s help making a costume!
 

Unfortunately, on January 2nd, we received a call from my mom that my grandmother (my mom’s mom) had passed away.  We knew it was coming, but that didn’t make it any easier.  We loaded up and headed home so I could be with my mom.  While we miss her very much, it is also a blessing to know that she is with our Lord and no longer in any pain.

We had my parents over the next day for dinner and some game play on the Wii.  We wanted to give mom a night of fun and laughs in the midst of her stress.  I think it worked!

Mom getting a little instruction from my Hubby!


Getting serious about it!


Meanwhile, Bug enlisted Grandad to play dolls with her!


A few days later we had the funeral, and it was short and sweet.  Praise God she’s in Heaven! She’s no longer in pain!  I heard a couple really great stories about my grandmother at the funeral.  One relative told me that my grandmother once spent her last $1 to buy her a pair of shoes because she didn’t have any to wear to school.  Another relative told me that once she didn’t have any shoes, and my grandmother took the shoes off her feet, gave them to her, and went home barefoot!
Wow.

I hope that those stories stay in my mind forever, and that I can shoot to live my live like that…..truly loving others and putting them before myself.