Hi friends!
I just want to post a little update because I can (there is power and internet--miracle) and because I miss you!

I was thinking last night as I was frantically trying to get ahold of my grandma on the phone (didn't happen) that I am so grateful for the plans God has for us.

Many of you know that my relationship with my mom was tumultuous. My first and deepest wound came from the thought that my parents didn't love me. I carried that pain around for what felt like a lifetime. In the fast few years, God has really begun to heal those wounds.

Over the past few years I have had amazing women in my life that have mothered me. These women have allowed me to see how special my childhood was. God didn't have a plan for my brother and I to be reunited with our mother, that was painfully clear when she died when I was 19. But He did have a plan for us to be mothered. He handed us over to my grandma and grandpa to parent us. My response to that could have been gratitude. To look at what God had in store as a blessing, but it wasn't. I was hurt and my response was that of a spoiled brat, "This isn't my plan so I don't want it."

Today my attitude is different. Today I look back and see that the opportunity God gave me to be parented by my grandma and my Aunt Cricket was a blessing of the highest order. They have taught me so much, and even when my response to my pain was to take myself through immense darkness, they loved me through it.

Today, not only am I taking the opportunity to thank them for what they have done, but I am taking the opportunity to thank God for his perfect plan...in doing so I am trusting that His plan TODAY, though it is not what I thought it would look like, is still perfect and I will be grateful for it.

My grandma still parents, she spends a lot of time with my niece Jaylin. She does all of the same things with her that she used to do with me. Chuck E Cheese and all, I hope that Jaylin grows up feeling impacted by my grandma's love at a younger age than I did!!
I love and miss you!
Gigi