My 2015

I am not really sure where to begin in summarizing 2015.
It was a year of learning and growing in every aspect. There have been a lot of tears but more laughter. Life is good because God is good. He has been with us every step of the way. Even when we weren't walking towards Him, He was ready and waiting with open arms.

Ann Rainey has grown so very much and it has been such a fun journey watching her learn and develop. Her little personality is so fun and I am so excited to watch her continue to grow... but time PLEASE slow down!
Financially it has been a hard year of dealing with consequences of bad decisions, doing without and learning the hard way. I feel like we are finally taking baby steps in the right directions. It has been a year of job loss and job changes.
We are healthy. It has been a year of relapses, struggles, early discoveries and treatments. These don't make the financial end any better or easier but we are making it.
We are in a beautiful house now instead of our tiny townhouse. I am so ready to be fully settled in and make it HOME.
I think mentally and spiritually this has been a year of discovery for me. I started going to a Celebrate Recovery group with JP. It was initially "to support him" but I know now that I have SO much to work on and deal with. My addiction? Control. I plan everything. And when it doesn't go the way I expect I don't know how to function or react. I really want to focus on this in the next year. Now that I realize what my problem is, I want to acknowledge it more and recognize when I am starting to go into freak out mode. We finally found a church home after trying several. We met with our small group for the first time at their Christmas party at the beginning of December and we had such a good time. I am so excited about getting more involved there in the next year.

I have realized that I don't always use my time wisely. I think it is so easy for us to say "I don't waste any of my time" but in all honesty, I know there are better ways I could have used a LOT of my time in 2015. My hope and prayer for 2016 is that I am more intentional with my time and that my efforts are relevant in respect to my role as a wife and mother. The first step in this was deleting Facebook(and messenger) off of my phone several days ago. It has been so freeing but also very eye opening. I catch myself picking up my phone and going to check facebook way more than I would like to admit. I can't completely delete my account because I have to have a personal account in order to be an admin on a business page but I am going to making more of an effort to steer clear of it whenever I am on my laptop. It is way too easy to get caught up in scrolling, looking and browsing. And it usually is more negative than positive. I am not saying I will never check facebook but I want to be use that the time I am on it is spent wisely and not when I could be(and usually should be) doing something else. I would love to post here rather than on facebook, even if it is short and sweet - something for our little family to look back on in the future.

I hope 2015 has been a year of blessing, growth, fun, adventure and love for you and your family. I look forward to recording more of our life here in 2016.

And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose. Romans 8:28