New Beginnings

Thank you Zlaty & Karen for taking time to say "hi" & touch base! I'll admit to being a little excited to realize anyone even saw the blog yet :-) Simple things amuse simple people, I know.....

Anyway, I gave an bit of an introduction to start off.... it's been a rough year & yet something has been awakened in me that I can't quite put my finger on. Perhaps it was that we as a family passed by the dreaded 1-year mark since Montie passed away? Or perhaps it's that I've turned 40 & that seems to bring about a certain reflection?? I know some of it is just having tuned my heart & soul in to God's channel in a big way this past year. I've been His daughter for as long as I can remember, and yet this year changed things.

This year I was slowed down by incredible grief... I've lost loved ones before... and I've lost a 20-week pregnancy & a 9-week pregnancy, and I grieved for those babies I never really got to meet. But nothing comes close to losing Montie. Physically, I cannot remember another time when I felt so physically & mentally "slow". I didn't wake up & rush through my morning routines... because the routine of helping my boy get up & helping him through his day was gone. The void was incredible. I've also been taking a sleep aid, and you know what I found? I found through this "slowness" that I wasn't rushing to eat, guzzle coffee, put the dogs out & whatever, just so I could begin the whirlwind of homeschool, PT, OT, soccer practice here for one, soccer over there for another, and on and on. It all stopped when Montie died, and my slowness in the mornings allowed me TIME to pray & cry with God. Day after day I cried my heart out to God -sometimes only for 5 minutes & then all I could do was sit. But sometimes I can pray for so much longer than I ever used to. Because I was rushed. Because I couldn't quiet my mind before to slow down long enough, my mind racing, worrying about how much time before I was interrupted, how much time until the next thing...

So with all this introspection on my 40th birthday I made a list of goals. They seem a bit lofty, and I almost didn't dare write them out. After all, I've been so used to going with the flow with & for everyone else. This is not to say that suddenly I'll stop attending to the needs of my family. After all, both my girls are still at home & I have a hubby that wants attention too! But I'm one of those easily distractible kinds... I love to stop what I'm doing to play a game, go out & kick the soccer ball around with my daughter, or hop in the car & run to the bookstore. And I still want to be spontaneous, but I want to work on some goals too....

I think I'll share them eventually, but to start, I really am pushing to get sewing again. For the last few years, I've spent my birthday sewing something for me. So the bag at the top was what I sewed up on my birthday! I love that it's flannel & soft, and the colors are warm & cozy. However, in the end, I decided to give it to a very good friend for her birthday :-)

I have a quilt on the longarm & a top I'm piecing for an anniversary quilt in batiks. I'll try to post pics of those soon or anything else I get to working on!

TGIF everybody!

Denise