Feeling Kind of Sad

Today we are feeling kind of sad. Early in December we submitted our homestudy for a couple of sibling groups that were foster to adopt. We assumed we hadn't been chosen because it had been so long since we had submitted for them. However, we got a phone call on Monday afternoon saying that we had been chosen as one of three families for a sibling group of three and that the case would be staffed today. We have never been chosen as one of the families before and this brought excitement/nervousness. Three kids! Could we really do three kids! The answer was still yes and we moved forward with making a life book to tell about us. Today the children's CPS workers, CASA workers, lawyer, and current foster families had a phone conference with our social worker and the social worker for the other two families that had been chosen. Ultimately our family wasn't chosen for these three little ones. I'm glad that we had the opportunity to follow God's plan and see it play out the way He wants it to, but a saddened that we weren't the family chosen for these three precious children.

We are continuing to submit our homestudy for legal risk or foster to adopt children only. Hopefully one day soon we will have some forever children living in our home.

Foster Care Update

I haven't talked about our foster care journey in a while and decided it was time for an update. We haven't had children in our home since October and those were only here for two weeks. We have submitted our homestudy for multiple foster to adopt or legal risk placements in the past few months but weren't the ones chosen for those children. We have decided that for now we are mostly only going to consider foster to adopt or legal risk placements. However if our agency calls with an emergency placement and we feel led by God to accept it we will. We started the foster care journey with the hope to adopt one day. We aren't done with foster care, not by a long shot. We are in a place in our lives where God is leading us to adopt to expend our forever family. We will return to fostering. Fostering emergency placements has been an enormous blessing to us and we will do it again in the future.

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to all of our friends and family! I hope that today and tomorrow you are all able to experience some joy in the promise of Christ. He is the real reason behind this holiday and I pray that you are able to see Him and praise God for the gift of His son. I know how hard this season is for those of us living without loved ones, especially my friends living without our sweet children. I know that we all had dreams of Christmas outfits and eyes lighting up on Christmas morning and that for some of us that isn't going to happen this year. I'm praying that you are able to find peace this season.

I'm missing my baby boy. It's been 9 months since I held him and kissed his sweet face. I wish he was here with us to celebrate the holidays. I wish our trip this past weekend would have been more complicated because we would have had an infant with us. However, I know that the Christmas celebration in Heaven will be splendid and I love that my baby boy gets to experience it! I'm resting in the promise that one day I will also get to celebrate Christmas at the feet of God with my little boy.

Merry Christmas!

Meeting a Blogger Friend

On Sunday I got to meet a blogger friend from The Mueller Family I love reading her family blog and following along with their life. I love that she loves Gr names :) I love that she "get's it" when I am talking about baby loss because she has been there (although I wish she didn't know the pain and hadn't been there). Her and her sweet family were traveling through my area and they stopped to say hi. Her boys were so sweet. Little Grady shared his tank with me and told me all about it. I loved getting to meet them in person!

Thanks Hillary for taking the time to stop by!

Praising The Man I LOVE!

I am so incredibly proud of my hubby. So proud that I'm writing about him here for all the world to see. He has now completed a year and a half of college! He has completed school, and done a great job of it, while still being an amazing husband and great daddy to some foster kids. This semester he made 3 A's and 1 B. One of his A's was in English. Something he had never accomplished before! He worked so hard for those grades and I know he is just as proud of them as I am. I can't wait to see what he can do next semester!

Refinishing

We helped my parents move the weekend after Thanksgiving. During that process I inherited a few pieces of furniture and another high chair. Someone remind me to show a picture of the high chairs that we use (one was my Mom's when she was little). I got an old bookshelf (that used to be a credenza but the glass broke a while ago) that belonged to my Grandmother and a desk. The bookshelf was made in the 50's when veneer products first came out. It has these cool legs on it and is very well made. However, over the years it has sustained quite a bit of damage in the form of scratches and water spots. I really like the size, shape and look of the shelf, it just needed some new life put in to it. I researched how to refinish furniture (since I've never done this before) and then I got started.

Sorry. I forgot a true before picture. This was after it was sanded.

After paint! I used paint left over from one of our walls. It's called Coconut Shell.

In place in the living room. 

With my Mom's Christmas Village on it! 

The paint color I picked is the same as the accent wall in our living room and the shelf is placed on a regular wall that is light tan. However, for some reason the color on the shelf and the color on the accent wall are different shades of the same color. Very strange but looks good none-the-less. After Christmas I will put pictures and nic-nacks on the shelf. I love the way it turned out.

The other piece of furniture I got is a desk that my Grandfather made for my Dad when my Dad was a child. This piece is very special to me because I never got to meet my grandfather. After Christmas I am going to sand and re-stain the desk and place it in one of the kids rooms. I'm also going to repaint the high chairs and maybe recover the seats.

Soon I will show you the finished product of the quilt I am making for my Memaw. It's going to look amazing.

It's Beginning to Look A Lot (but not feel like) Christmas!

Can I be completely honest? I don't mind one bit that it is still warm and it's almost Christmas. I love the fact that I can wear my flip flops and t-shirts in December. I love that as I was working in the garage this week on a bookshelf I'm refinishing (more on that later) I was in shorts and a t-shirt and was comfortable. Do I wish it would get cold? Not really! I hate the cold! I hate bulky sweaters and jackets. They make me feel confined. I would never be a good northerner. I do enjoy cold days on occasion. When I don't have anywhere to go and can sit by the fire drinking cocoa, otherwise bring on the lows in the 60s and highs in the upper 70s.

This week I have been refinishing a bookshelf, decorating for Christmas and working on a quilt. Busy busy. We got our Christmas tree on Sunday. I LOVE real Christmas trees. They smell so wonderful and look so pretty. I have allergies but I'm willing to sacrifice myself for a few weeks to enjoy a real tree :) The house is now almost completely decorated and I love it. I love the twinkling lights, Nativity Set, Santa's and Snowmen, and stockings. This year I'm putting up a Christmas village that was my Mom's. I have to wait until the bookshelf I'm refinishing is done first so I have somewhere to put it. Hopefully I can get that done tomorrow and then I will be pretty much done. I have handled decorating without too much sadness. I had a few moments while hanging stockings and putting ornaments on the tree but I am enjoying the true meaning of Christmas this year and am celebrating that.

The outside of our house. No lights on the top this year. Saving money for the ones I really want for next year. This is the first year you can see the columns because we are re-landscaping. Those 2 trees are kids tress in the kid rooms.

Front Door Wreath I made this year :)

Grant's ornament on the tree. Love how he is represented there.

Grant's other ornament

Our Family Ornament from last year. I miss those 2 kiddos.

Stockings on the mantel with Grant's urn in the middle. The 2 stockings on the ends are for our dogs.

My Willow Tree Nativity Set. I love this set and plan on getting a few more of the pieces in the future. 

So, there you have it. Christmas decorations a-la-Bybee. I'll show the bookshelf and Christmas village when I get it up. The bookshelf is done but looks empty (cause it is) so I don't want to share just yet. My Christmas Card will be posted soon too :)

Merry Christmas!