The Short is I have been waaaay too busy to post for the last 5 months...and a little lazy too. So, the purpose of this blog is to catch you up on the Howell Family adventures for the last few months.
December was probably like yours...that is, if your husband drove to Texas and you flew with your toddler to Houston, just to be picked up to drive to NC via 'Nawlins, Mississippi, the Gulf Coast, Florida, Alabama and Georgia! We had an amazing time.
Christmas was frankly amazingly great and amazingly bad all at the same time. If you were part of it, then you know this is no smack towards my NC fam. I love them dearly...we just happened to have some major disaster nearly every day for over a week. I am talkin' real disasters: people in the hospital, fraudulent credit card charges, cars breaking down, pinched nerve in my neck...I'll stop, but there is more. The good news is that with the bad, there was an overwhelming sense of peace and comfort for our Father in Heaven and it was a growing experience both personally and as a family.
In February I ran a 24+ hour relay race with 11 other crazy 30-something-year-old moms. It too was a mixed bag of emotions, triumphs, some girl drama and disorganization. But darn it if our memories don't just somehow drop the bad and turn everything golden. I look back and already a race that I swore I would never in my life EVER do again I am already conceding that, okay...I would.
Literally just an hour after crossing the finish line I got news that my dear Aunt Mitzi passed away. She had, I guess in the scheme of things, a brief (thankfully), but brave battle with cancer. She was and is amazing and her strength and courage astound me; as that of my family members who were on hand during her final days and hours. She will be deeply missed, but her example gave me the courage to face my own mortality with gusto. I was diagnosed with early onset osteo-arthritis just the day before my race. It was devastating for me as the Doc said "no more running. Period." When I heard about my Aunt Mitzi I just decided to give arthritis the "bird". I want to be healthy and live a good life, but I don't know how long I have, so I will do the things that make me happy and bring me joy. She certainly did and died with a clear conscience and touched countless lives with her courage and vision in her life and employment.
In March Evie turned 2. Wow. That is all I can say...and also, LOOK at the cute cake I made!(Thanks Elise for letting me borrow your stuff and giving me confidence...and thank you Al Gore for "inventing" the Internet on which I could research how to make a Nemo cake.)
Just prior to Evie's birthday, we ditched the kid and Andy and I spent some time on the Yucatan. It was a long over-due adventure as nearly everyone (it seems) that we know has already been there. What a great and relaxing trip. I highly recommend it to anyone with beach fever and a steel gut. I got some food poisoning and a tan.
Lastly, but certainly not least, we had a Howell Family reunion last weekend. Amazingly, everyone made it (except Hans who is faithfully serving his mission in Spokane). We had a wonderful time, great food, sledding, a new tradition the winter Howlympics, and fond memories already of our time together as a complete family. That is no small feat with 1 set of grandparents, 6 "kids", 1 son-in-law, 4 daughters-in-law, and 10 grandkids. Yowser!
Okay, I'll stop hanging my head in shame and try to post again...sometime this year.
OH, AND BTW--We did complete our 500 mile Adventure Challenge, early, with extra miles!!!
It has struck me this week how very blessed I am to have people in my life that love me, but maybe even more importantly, love my child. I'll be honest...I'm not a KID kind of person, so the fact that we have so many people that genuinely love my child and (gasp) remember her name and ask me about her, even though we don't even see them on a regular basis, kind of floors me...and me makes me a little ashamed that I am not more engaged in others around me. I'm selfish.
