Random thoughts on This and That

As I type this, I'm about 15 minutes away from my 36th birthday. I don't feel 36- I feel about 19.
I think I'll like this Birthday. For one, my favorite number is 10.
January 10th, 2010 seems like a good day to have a birthday.

I have already recieved some very sweet birthday wishes from some very dear people in my life.  And thank you to you all. It has already made my day a little more special!

I think I get a little more contemplative around my birthday then I do around the whole "New Year" thing. Yes...I like starting off a brand new year with goals and plans, but for some reason I see my new year starting when I begin a new age.


I honestly thought that 35 would be a better year than it was. I think that I could have done without year 35. But maybe therein lies the problem.
I always expect things to be a certain way...and then when it isn't as I think it should be, I fall farther than I would have had I not thought anything! I frustrate me!!
I do this with everything.....expectations on myself, others, certain situations- ESPECIALLY relationships! How much easier my life would be if I didn't expect a THING!
I DO want to expect more from myself  (and work on getting to where I should be), and less from others -this 36th year.
Maybe I need to use the word HOPE instead of expect?
("Hope" IS a great word!)

I wanted to share this picture next....I never Expected anything this day. It was my family's New Years Day brunch. I did HOPE it would go well.....but for a change I didn't expect it would. In the past holidays around our place have been quite stressful for one reason or another. It seems when I look back on holidays or special times....I remember the bad and not so much good.

This past day was different. I never expected it to be one way or the other....I simply hoped.

I wasn't dissapointed.

It was a wonderful family memory.

This is Molly and I last night....watching Ben on his first night in Rec. Hockey.

I HOPE my kids turn out alright. I Hope they stay safe, and grow up into mature, responsible people.

I Hope they love God with their entire beings.

I will have Hope.

And this.....
this is a picture of hope for me.
It's a very long story....
but for those of you who know of the last year or more I've had...even parts of it....you may understand why this is hope.
This picture is actually of Snow Angels...one is mine- the other....my husband's.
I took this only about a month ago.
It's huge for me...I never dreamt I would see the 2 of us making this picture. Never. I definitely expected to be a snow angel- alone.
But.....Hope......
As I type this, my husband keeps coming into my room to throw clothes in a suitcase. We are going to the Caribbean later on tonight.....together.
And oh how I am tempted to have expectations on this trip.
I want to expect that it will go the way I think it should...and things will turn out the way I want....
But no.
I am now 36. It's time to implement my new goal for this new year.
I will not have expectations for this time together.
But I will HOPE in it!

(When I looked at this picture, I noticed something kind of neat- and it wasn't even planned! Behind the snow angels up on the hill right beside the fence- is a rock. That was the rock where Mike asked me to marry him...isn't that sort of special-meaning?:)


Goodbye for a couple of weeks.
And may we all expect less...and Hope more.