the story of the year

at our house

the story of 2011

was love.

there was a whole lot of love

given and received.

family connections grew stronger

extended family became closer

frienships battled and won.

love was delivered in

the shape of snail mail,

encouraging emails, soups, friendship, laughter,

 money, prayers, petititons,

grace, forgiveness, and acceptance of each other

just as we are.

love was delivered

through immense heartaches, sickness, loss and devestation.

love was demonstrated

every day in our immediate family

as we grew stronger and closer than ever before.

love is continuing to flow with us as we

anticipate a marvelous 2012.

love becomes stronger

and more steadfast

when we practice vulnerablility

and there was more openness and brokeness

and truth spoken

in our family than ever before.

oh there have been tough days.

heartbreaking days and with those

an amazing strength and solidity

that comes only after being faced with adversity.

love follows us.

it follows us as we struggle with the monumental changes that are coming.

love covers us as we have challenging conversations around

teenagers and money and health and careers and roles

and hopes and dreams.

2011 has been a challenging year.

we had a choice.

 we have a choice still

as to how we embrace those challenges.

we choose love.

we choose relationships

we choose forgiveness

we choose selfless giving to one another

we are pretty proud of how we made it through

still standing.

and more in love with each other

 and

with life than ever before.

2011 has been full of so many gifts.

happy new year's everyone!