2011: A Year In Review

Another year flew past the Flexible House. We started the year with an emphasis on serving others and ended the year serving our family and friends. It was a year of learning and loss with lots of fun and even more growth. As usual, nothing went as expected but looking back, I can see God's fingerprints all over the past 12 months. Here's how things went down...

January

With winter comes lots of time for crafting, cooking, blogging and blogging about crafting and cooking. It's exciting to see some of my posts from last year up on Pinterest. We exhausted our snowed-in activities and I confessed some things about being a mommy. The highlight of the month was our service trip to the Baltimore Free Store.

February 

We kept on cooking and crafting through February and even made time for a spur of the moment craft night and a girl's night of painting pottery. I made the first of many sweater dresses for Hannah and we had a fun Valentine's Day. The highlight of the month was our service trip to the cold weather shelter.

March

More cooking this month as I stepped way out of my comfort zone and let the kids make pop tarts. I went quilting with The Aunts and tried my hand at stuffed crust pizza. The highlight of the month was our service trip to Philly.

April

Easter was tons of fun! Hannah and I kept on making cookies and I kept on sewing. We did lots of things I never blogged like a day at the park in the rain, an adventure to Fort McHenry and a trip to the zoo. Unfortunately our Adventure Service Club activity was canceled this month due to the weather (no fun camping and cleaning trails in the freezing rain).

May

I blogged a bunch about parenting a strong willed child, Hannah kept up with Ballet and Christopher started track and field. Matt's parent's came home early from their missionary trip to India with Matt's dad very ill. Instead of Adventure Service Club our time was spent mowing grass and trimming trees at their place. This picture of the kids with their Grandpa is from Matt's birthday.

June

The end of school and the beginning the summer. Two of the greatest times of the year! We cooked a little, but mostly we played outside with friends and on the swing set from our neighbor. The kids joined the Oriole's Junior Dugout Club again this year and we had a great time going to the games.

July

Camp, camp and more camp! Camp training was a blast and the first couple of weeks went really well. Christopher was diagnosed with Lyme disease and strep (at the same time) and spent five days in bed. During his more lucid moments I fulfilled a personal dream of reading him the first Harry Potter book. He loved it and is now Potter obsessed. The highlight of the month, other than camp, was definitely our annual July 4th picnic at Michelle's and Hannah and Ella's first fireworks.

August

August was jam packed and full of ups and downs. Camp continued and camp ended. There was an earthquake, some hurricanes and a flooded basement. Hannah turned five and I also celebrated a birthday. We went to the beach and enjoyed some time in the sun. While on vacation we got the terrible news that Matt's dad had passed away only two months after being diagnosed with leukemia and we came home early for the funeral. Two days later the kids started school with Christopher in 1st grade and Hannah in kindergarten.

September
I started cooking again in September and we took a couple of fun trips to the Science Center and Dutch Wonderland. We enjoyed the last warm day of summer and I got to participate in an amazing Stop Hunger Now event.

October

Hosting a belated birthday sushi party for Corinne and myself was definitely MY highlight of October. The kids had fun going to their first bonfire, visiting a pumpkin patch, carving pumpkins and trick-or treating with friends in our local historic district.

November

Christopher went on his first Cub Scout camp-out with his dad, then he turned 7 and we celebrated Lego style with his friends. We wrote a Winter Fun List and had PIE NIGHT!! I went on a service trip with Ember and Thanksgiving was a lot of fun.

December

This month has been pretty crazy. My dear friend Michelle was diagnosed with stage 3a invasive ovarian cancer. It's been hard on all of us but Michelle has been handling it with a grace and strength that makes me proud and I was honored to document her wig adventure. The rest of the month has been spent gearing up for Christmas, enjoying our traditions and celebrating with our families.

So long 2011. I pray that 2012 has far more ups and far less downs. I trust that whichever way it goes God will be right there supporting, loving, guiding and teaching us all. Above all, I pray that in everything we do, see and experience, the LORD will be praised and glorified. Amen and amen.