Goodbye 2010, welcome 2011

I can't believe we are already in a new year and the first day of January! I'm really excited about this year and what it has in store for us. Hopefully that will mean welcoming a baby home but if not, we know God has us exactly where He wants us!

The year end review-2010 version

• January-We had our last homestudy meeting, the home inspection and learned it wasn't as bad as what we had thought!
• February- Became officially approved and on the waiting list.
  
• March-Went to Florida to visit our friends K and D after their failed match. Spent some time in Disney!
• April-Tommy has a small surgery to get him back into normal rhythm. Decided to change churches; started attending a new plant church and helping out
• May- Tommy's Dad has a stroke
• June-School's out :) I take a "girl's trip" with Tommy's mom and Grandma to Biloxi, Mississippi before the oil strikes. After returning, Tommy, my mom and I do a "week long tour" of the Outer Banks.
  
• July-Tommy and I spent a weekend away in Myrtle Beach, saw a show, and went shopping.
  
• August-Our friends K and D from Florida come up for a visit. Lots of fun! School starts back
• September-Tommy's Grandma loses her battle with cancer. We miss her so much!
• October- We participate in the American Heart Association's heart walk and raise quite a bit of money to support ongoing research for heart defects. We have a family reunion and we go indoor sky diving for the first time.
  
• November- We celebrated 11 years of marriage with a weekend to Savannah, GA.
  
• December- We have a great time seeing family, friends, and enjoying the spirit of the season.

So here we are with a new year upon us. We don't make New Year's resolutions because they are quick to fade away. We want to continue to be good stewards of the things God has given us. We are so thankful that Tommy has had a good check-up for 9 months now! That's a pretty good stretch for him. We know the changes we've made in our diet have helped this (watch that sodium)! We want to continue to seek Him and follow what He would have us to do while we continue to wait.

Money--that seems to always come up at this time of year with resolutions. We want to continue to save and pay off our IF treatments. We've been following Dave Ramsey's Total Money Makeover (it's a great book if you haven't read it) and we use these budget forms every month to help us see where everything is going. I highly recommend them if you don't have one to use. If you're not creating a monthly budget, get on that now :)

I also started couponing in the spring and I'm really excited about continuing that this year. Tommy wants me to keep up with how much we save from the coupons this year. It was rare that we spent over $40 a week in groceries (including toiletries, laundry supplies etc). I hope we can continue that trend this year!

Happy New Year!