2008 already?

Christmas Morning!
Michael is shocked that his parents were dumb enough to buy him Heely's!
Charity is happy that she finally has a "home" for her Littlest Pet Shops and can keep them away from the dog who loves to eat the feet and tails off of them!
Charity and Olivia are worn out after so many days of running around and excitement.
Eric and I on the day before our anniversary. I finally figured out that my camera had a timer on it - only 2 days before I got a new one!

Michael with his friends and sister at his 7th birthday party. They made marshmallow guns and had a blast!











Michael with his collection of footballs. He's just slightly obsessed!












Charity, Olivia, and my college roommate's daughter being too cheesy for words!






My cousin, Charity, and Peanut the hamster. It wouldn't be Christmas at my cousins house without adding a live animal of some sort. Goats, kittens, puppies, tadpoles, hamsters...what will next year bring?






Is it too late to do a little New Year posting? I know the month is technically half over but I still feel like we should be celebrating Christmas. Of course, that could be because I just mailed my Christmas cards a couple of weeks ago! Better late than never, right?! It always seems to go so quickly and this year I only got about 20 pictures! Shocking I know but I just got sick of lugging around my big ‘ol beast of a camera. I really like that camera and the fact that I have a zoom and panoramic lens but it is just huge and isn’t convenient to stick in my purse. My father-in-law gave us a new one for our anniversary this year though (9 years on Jan 2nd!) and I’m having a great time playing with it. No worries about Christmas pictures – I’m sure between my step-dad and father-in-law I’ll be able to come up with quite a few pictures to fill in the gaps and help us remember the days.
The kids went back to school on the 7th. I was bummed. I’m one of those weirdo parents who loves having my kids at home – although not enough to home-school them. We just have so much fun when school isn’t getting in the way. They are my excuse for playing the Wii, reading Junie B. Jones, listening to Hannah Montana, and watching High School Musical! Without them around it looks pretty pathetic for a 30 year old woman to be doing those things! You would think that I would use some of that free time to check my email or update this blog but that would make way too much sense! Now, I’m going to avoid going into a rant about the evils of dial-up Internet. I’ll just say this though, if you have ever tried to call my house when I’m on the Internet you totally understand my frustration.
Eric is still studying hard for the Bar exam. As if going to class every day M-F isn't enough, we've also filled up our Saturdays in January with the classes required to become foster parents. We would eventually like to adopt and earlier in the fall some events got us started on the foster care process. Once we had started, it seemed a shame to not follow through and so far it has been really affirming for us that we are on the right track. It will be interesting to see what God has in store for us with all of this. In the meantime, we will finish navigating the red tape and bureaucratic nonsense. Keep us in your prayers!