Wow! I can't believe it's already 2010! I remember last year on New Year's Eve tearfully looking up at Andy as the ball dropped at midnight and saying, "This year just has to be better!" 2008 was a hard year with my Mom passing away of metastatic breast cancer. It was so unexpected and when she died I felt like my whole world was crashing down all around me. The whole experience was such an emotional roller coaster from her diagnosis to the repeated visits to the hospital to hearing "there is nothing more we can do" to planning her funeral to going through her belongings to selling her house to coming to the realization that I no longer have parents who are alive. I was so thankful to get through the year of "firsts" and to finally start the healing process of moving forward, not only for myself but for my family. I'm very blessed to have a loving and supportive husband, precious daughter, fantastic brothers (along with their loves) and in-laws who are always there for us, no matter what! The support from our friends was amazing too. The whole experience has brought us closer as a family and for that, I am thankful.
2009 was an amazing year! Andy and I have always talked about buying a larger home. Our first home together was the perfect starter home for us but once Sarah came along we realized we needed some extra space! So, the search continued! I say "continued" because the moment Andy and I were engaged we started looking for another house. I believe we visited every neighborhood in Cherokee county! We would find a home we liked but after coming home and doing a little number crunching we would say to each other, "let's just wait".
We decided to start looking again around January/February and found a house plan and neighborhood we loved! The builder was offering amazing deals so we cleaned out our house and put it on the market at the end of March, hopeful someone would want it. We tried being realistic because we knew the market was cruddy but deep down we were hopeful. Our house was on the market for 3 weeks when we were presented with an offer. We were thrilled! After some brief counter offering a contract was born. Woo hoo! We closed in June, told the builder to start building and moved in with Andy's parents for a couple of months!
Watching our house being built was very exciting! I had never been through this process before and we had so much fun picking out flooring, tile, etc. We treated ourselves to a few new appliances (Christmas came early) and were excited to see new things happening with our house with every visit. We will be forever grateful to Andy's parents for going out of their way to make us comfortable in their home! They re-arranged several rooms to accomodate us and all of our stuff. Sarah loved being able to see and play with her Grandma and Grandpa every day!
We finally moved into our new home in September and have now been in it for 3-months. It feels like we have been here longer than that. We love having the extra room and our neighbors have been wonderful. There are a lot of things we want to do inside and out but those items will have to wait until I am out of graduate school.
Besides the house, we had a fun filled 2009! Sarah started soccer last spring and while it was not a huge hit, she did enjoy kicking her new soccer ball! We spent three weeks at the beach last summer in Topsail Island, NC. I returned to graduate school to earn my Educational Specialist degree in Curriculum and Instruction and Andy made it through another successful marching season with the Sprayberry High School Band of Gold! Sarah continues to make us laugh each and every day as she grows and learns new things. She is enjoying her pre-school class at Primrose Woodstock. Sarah loves to color, play outside, paint, write her name and letters, read stories and just run around and play. We can't believe she's already 4-years old! The time has just flown by!
Overall, we feel like we were very blessed in 2009 and are looking forward to what 2010 brings! We hope all of our family and friends have a happy and healthy New Year!
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