New Year's Letter 2014

Again, we didn't get to send this to very many people, but we did manage a few dozen! When you have families as big as ours, that doesn't go very far! So here it is for the rest of you awesome-sauce peeps!

We kept our word. 2013 our word was “faith,” and we spent the year busily “sowing” in faith, planting seeds wherever we could without worrying about the harvest. Here we are a year later, surprised and pleased at the growth! And since I hardly blogged in 2013, here is our year, month by month:

JANUARY : Eric and Marcee each started teaching a class at the local junior college. Emiline sings more than talks with Aunt Holli’s influence. A two-year-old singing Wonderwall? Adorable! 

FEBRUARY: Marcee started an online B-school course in preparation to start a business. Adam starts sleeping through the night. Sort of. Sometimes. Occasionally.

MARCH: Jane starts disappearing during the day and staying up late to read books. Marcee was diagnosed with Major Depressive Disorder and Anxiety and started an effective medication. 

APRIL : Adam starts crawling. The girls are struck by Mermaid Fever, and can’t get enough time pretending to swim across the carpet. Marcee was introduced to a new love—herbalism—via a hands-on class making tinctures and salves.

MAY: Eric is accepted to a Tax LLM/Masters in Accounting grad program! Emiline turns three (going on 13) and lives up to her nickname, “Genius Monster.” 

JUNE : Eric moves to Denver for the summer for school and networking. Marcee and the girls experiment with home schooling, since Jane insists she’s NOT going to kindergarten. Ever. 

JULY : Adam starts walking! And we all really, really, miss Eric. Jane discovers Magic Treehouse. 

AUGUST : Eric finishes his first class with a bang and comes home! Girls start spending hours coloring and drawing. Jane turns 5. Adam turns 1 and loves Grandma and anything to do with animals. We enjoy lots of family gatherings and end of summer fun all together! 

SEPTEMBER : Moved to Kansas City!! (What-the-What??!?!) Marcee and her sister launch a graphic design business, Jabberdashery. (check us out at www.jabberdashery.com) Jane chooses a career and begins drawing “fashions” on everything. 

OCTOBER: Our heads are spinning, our hearts are aching, our hands are busy, busy, busy! Eric grapples with being gluten sensitive/intolerant and Marcee learns all kinds of new skills in the kitchen: fermenting, sprouting, culturing, and making almost everything from scratch. The benefits are nothing less than miraculous, healing Eric’s gut and Marcee’s thoughts. 

NOVEMBER: Eric is busier than ever, continuing with job searching and his Tax program online, substitute teaching during the day, and delivering pizzas at night. Jabberdashery starts making money. We celebrate our first holiday of our married life with no other family around. 

DECEMBER : We have a sweet Christmas season in Kansas with new and old traditions. Eric and Marcee celebrate 7 fantastic and magical years of marriage.

It is with full hearts and sharp eyes that we approach 2014 with eagerness and enthusiasm. The lessons and love of 2013 have been more than we could have ever guessed. We feel our blessings deeply and fully. Our theme for 2014 is “See and Seek the Eternal.” Life is all about perspective. And the hard-won lessons of the last few years of employment and financial challenges have taught us that we have all the riches of eternity right in front of us. We resolve to never forget it, to let it continue to change our hearts, goals, dreams, and lives, every moment, the ones now and forever after.

If 3 Year Olds Wrote Holiday Letters...

This is what mine wrote when I turned to her for help in writing our annual letter:

Our year has been great. We love you so much. It’s a great service for everyone else I know but it’s so difficult of all. Walrus. I love you. So much about flowers. From Jane and Emiline and Mom. Monkeys. It’s so pretty. I love to play stinky feet.

Bring on the Rain, 2014

I say that with hope and fear and a rather large butterfly in my stomach that it might come to pass.

Let me explain.

2013 was a doozy (and 2012. and 2011....). It was a torrent of hard things raining down. It had felt so hard, so dark, that when the end of the year came, and the time for introspection and analysis came, I was scared to look. I was fearful and anxious to write the annual family letter, or even to just begin the process. I mentally put it off. But again, my commitment to introspection carried me through and I signed up for this webinar by Lisa Bryne. It was just the bit of motivation and guidance I needed. One of the things she talks about is changing your focus to see the good things in your life, and that if we don't, then we are leaving those good things behind instead of taking them forward with us.

Early this year I was diagnosed with Major Depressive Disorder and Anxiety. I was really lucky in that the meds worked well and fast. And even more that I was able to transition off of them into very specific diet and herbal supplement program recently (thank you Spontaneous Happiness and my cultured food pets). But it was this big dark cloud over my life, over everything else I wanted to do and be. I was "cray-cray," and surely that was controlling so much of my life and choices, right?

Well, depression is a Liar. While you are sucked down into the middle of it and while you are pulling out of it's abyss, it's a big, fat, ridiculous Liar. For me, the surest litmus test of actually being in Depression's Jaws, is that I think I'm not. It's breathing its fat, stinky lies on me and I think I'm sitting on the porch in a refreshing, evening breeze, internalizing all those lies. And it was still telling me lies, telling me that my year was a bust.

I am blogging this today to publicly proclaim that this year is probably the year of my most personal growth to date. A quote from Dr. Horrible's Sing-A-Long Blog says it best, or at least profoundly to me late last night during our New Year's Eve celebrations:
"everyday of rain brings water flowing to things growing in the ground.
And every drop of rain will keep you growing seeds you're sowing in the ground."

It has rained relentlessly the last few years, a near constant drizzle. But now, I can see that rain for it's function- growth. I am exploding with growth, like one of my beans in the sprouting jar on the counter. And even though I feel ready for spring, to be planted, to grow up strong and bear fruit, I am going to trust in the season instead. Because I've been saying I'm ready for spring for years now, and I'm sooooo grateful for the rain I've had instead. As hard as it has been, as dark and miserable some moments have been, I wouldn't trade it. It was more than worth it. Thank you for your gifts, 2013.

So Bring On the Rain, 2014!

Also, "Keep you're head up, Billy Buddy" ;-)

And if you haven't watched Dr. Horrible, treat yourself today. It's on Netflix, too.

And Happy New Year!