Tuesday, December 29, 2009

Christmas 2009

Our house before Christmas - this snow has melted, but we are now getting more of the white stuff!!
Hope you all had a merry Christmas!!!! Seems like every year gets busier and a bit crazier! It was a good time for us. A few days of rushing around followed by some very quiet days of R&R. It's back to work now and let me tell you - that first day back is hard!!!
Christmas Eve, I baked and cleaned and cooked - a nice way to spend my first day off. Then we got packed up and headed over to my parents house. We had a pretty low key evening with my parents and my sister's family. Had a great dinner, played some games and watched "White Christmas" which is a VanderBent Tradition. Funny, that not too many of us can honestly say they stayed awake for the whole thing :) We all stayed overnight - which was fun but not too restful.
Everyone checking out their fancy new phones
Hmm, what could it be??
On Christmas morning we all headed over to Val and Brad's and had a big breakfast and then opened some gifts. Val and Brad surprised Mike and i with a hard cover book made of our blog!! What a great keepsake this will be for baby. I look forward to the next editions. We both got spoiled big time -thanks everyone!!


After breakfast we had to run and be on our way to London, to Mike's brothers house. Luckily the weather held out - just a lot of rain, not the storm that was predicted.
Here is Uncle Mike trying to convince AJ to keep his socks on.
Uncle Mike giving AJ a drum lesson - hit the drum, not the dog!!

Granny, Auntie Brenda, AJ and Uncle Frank having a snooze in the back :)
AJ, Terri, Paul and Kyle


Like I said, it was a bit of a whirlwind and we aren't done yet. New Years day we have turkey on the farm and then on the 2nd we are having 'Cober Christmas' which is my extended family on my dad's side.
The comment was made again this year about how there will be an added high chair next year. I sure hope so. I think i know enough not to get too comfortable with that idea - but oh, wouldn't that be the best Christmas ever. This year has taught me alot of things. I pray for our own Christmas miracle next year. We have experienced miracles this year and know that they are possible and so we continue to hope.

History in the Making

The Olympic torch relay came to our little town this weekend. Pretty cool!! There were so many people out to see it!!! It really was amazing to see it come by and think of where its all been!! It was a nice afternoon - not to cold with just a few snowflakes in the air. Kind of neat to be part of 'history'.

Here it comes!

The next excited runner waiting for her turn!!

We had a great view of the hand off!


There it goes!

And then it was done and heading down the road to the next little town. I am really looking forward to the Olympics. I do every time really but this one will be special. Go team Canada!!

Thursday, December 24, 2009

Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!!

From our house to yours - may you all have a wonderful Christmas! Enjoy this time celebrating with family and friends.
Ho Ho Ho

Wednesday, December 16, 2009

Christmas Miracles

Today there were 2 referrals announced!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Oh my - we are in business. Congrats to the families and to all of us. Looking forward to hearing details and hopefully more referrals in the days to come.
We still haven't seen the promised list to show us where we are in the wait compared to the other families - we will see this in January. But now we can cross 2 names off the list as we climb higher to the top.
We have come such a long way.
Miracles do happen!!!!!!!!!!!!

Monday, December 14, 2009

14

how do you like that - 14 on the 14th. We have been waiting for our referral now for 14 months - and today is the 14th - shouldn't we get a prize or something???
Yep - waiting - fitting how Christmas is about waiting - and don't we know about waiting!!! Mostly i feel pretty good about the wait - as i mentioned in an earlier post -we are just thrilled that we are still in the game! However, its still hard when everyone asks and thinks that we will be getting our baby 'any time now'. I kind of smile and say 'well, it will be another year or so'. Waiting - come on already with referrals!!!
Anyhoo - on to other things. We have been busy with Christmas - Youth Christmas party, Christmas Parade (conveniently it goes right by our house so we watched from the porch this year), Christmas bun baking - yum (Mike helped me and is a good kneader!!!), Christmas plays(my sister's -and she said a bad word!! funny part was my parents were pre-warned and my mom missed the 'bad word' all together :) guess it wasn't so bad!!), Christmas decorating, barely started the Christmas shopping - but should be done by the end of the week, Christmas cards - i am totally getting a cramp over that one and lots of Christmas cheer.
Last Christmas i was pretty sure we would be home with baby by now, so I don't even try to guess if we will be home by next Christmas - but i do hope for a referral by then. I know about waiting and i can totally relate to the Advent season and the wait. The candles of Hope, Joy, Peace and Love (hope that's right) - we can have all those things in our waiting. They make the waiting all the more special.