[x] Happy New Year's Eve, friends! I can hardly believe 2010 is coming to a close. What an amazing year! LF's addition to our family has been such an immense blessing; I couldn't ask for more, truly. I have three of the best kids on the planet! We are so blessed with love, health, and happiness and now--more than ever, really--I appreciate this so, so, so very much. Hopefully, we'll add one more to the brood within a few years and that will complete our clan. :)  But I am more than appreciative and thankful for the three rock awesome littles that I have. I'm a very lucky mama. <3

[x] Five years ago today, I married the most amazing man on the planet. We've had our trials and tribulations but always came and always will come out on top since we're traveling side by side. I am so lucky to have such a great husband. NYE is the perfect anniversary; we start each new year celebrating our love for one another and it just grows and grows from there. Five years! Five years ago (and two weeks--it was mid-December), we found out the "belly resident" was, in fact, a boy. Sweet Bear! How quickly time has flown by... <3

[x] December was a good month indeed. The 14th marked the third anniversary of Beauty's homecoming. Three years! I swear it was just 2007, and I was just at the airport, waiting (im)patiently to meet my daughter. *happy sigh* I love her so freaking much, I do. Beauty is by far my most "difficult" (well, I actually prefer the term "spirited" to be honest) child, but that doesn't make me any less crazy about her. I can't believe she'll be four in March. Four! My sweet chapina. :)

[x] On December 15 of last year, I received a phone call from G. (our amazing social worker) about a baby girl born ten weeks early (in October) with Septo-Optic Dysplasia. That very email was the beginning of something so incredibly beautiful. My sweet Little Flower! How I love you so, so very much. Since she was in foster care for Christmas last year, we're celebrating this year's as her "first" Christmas and my heart is bursting at the thought--I just want to fly up to her room and pick her up for endless cuddles. Life is good, my friends. If I've learned anything over the past few years, it's to never take a single second for granted.

[x] Christmas was fantastic. As usual, I was spoiled rotten--and that doesn't even come close to describing the gifts received by the kids! ;) It was just so lovely. The best Christmas ever, I'd say, and having the sweetest Little Flower on my lap the whole time? The icing on the cake of happiness. :) Shortly thereafter I came down my pneumonia (which sucks, btw), but am feeling better now. And thankfully, it didn't detract a bit from the holiday.

[x] We're planning a low-key night for the rest of the evening. The girls are asleep, and K. is reading Bear yet another book before bed. We made pizzas and cookies (homemade times two!) and did some laundry/stuff around the house. We cleaned this joint top to bottom earlier today, so we're starting 2011 on a fresh, clean slate. :) I dig it! We went to the florist to get some fresh flowers to drop at a cemetery (more on that later), and K. came out with a HUGE bouquet of wildflowers for me. Love them. Love him, too. :) Last night we were able to escape for a quick date--I wasn't expecting it, so it was a great surprise--so tonight is the quiet night. Maybe we'll see midnight, but maybe not. And I don't particularly mind either way. :)

[x] All this being said, I've gotta get a move on; Bear's book is almost finished so my computer time will be no more. Happy New Year, friends! May it hold all the prosperity and happiness possible!

<3