Bringing In The New Year of Blessings

The first morning of the first day of 2009 has been perfect. I pray that I have many more blessed days like this to look forward too. Last night was the best New Year’s Eve. We picked Mirielle up and took her to John and Judy’s for a New Year’s Eve celebration with people from church. I’ve come to realize that these people are my family now. I love each and every one of them. I couldn’t have asked for a better group of people to spend the evening with.

The night was filled with delicious appetizers, games, and fellowship. We also surprised Mirielle with an early birthday cake and sang Happy Birthday to her. It was so…so…beautiful, amazing, heart-warming, insert any other warm and fuzzy feeling here, to see how happy Mirielle was last night when we put the cake in front of her and sang to her. It’s the first time that she’s ever had a birthday that was celebrated. To see how absolutely grateful she is for the little things that I do and the little things that we all do for her is so humbling. It’s actually pretty overwhelming. I find myself overwhelmed with emotion quite often when I’m with Mirielle. She is probably one of the most beautiful people I’ve ever had the priveledge of knowing.

Here are a few pictures from the evening:

Pictured here: Me, Mirielle, Supriya, Dori

Mirielle enjoying everyone singing Happy Birthday to her. Look at the smile on that beautiful face.

Blowing out her candles.

Mirielle and Sue

Mirielle and me

Supriya, Mirielle, and me

After singing Happy Birthday, we all sat down for a bit to talk about what 2008 had meant for us and what we were looking forward to in 2009 as far as our relationship with God went. It was a pretty powerful experience to listen to people’s testimonies. I of course ended up getting all emotional when I tried to explain how much this group of people has meant to me and the difference they have made in my life over the past few months. God really has blessed me and I was so happy when Jacob spoke up and provided testimony of his own. Jacob is a man of few words. He makes things short and sweet and to the point. His testimony was just that, but at the same time it was way more than I expected from him. I was so happy when he even said anything not to mention the fact that he shared not just once, not just twice, but three times while we were sitting with everyone.

Mirielle’s testimony was by far the most touching simply because of how much she has endured and gone through over the past few years. She conveyed just how happy she was while at the same time you could see that it was almost just as heart breaking as she remembered her family and the fact that she is the only one left. She spoke in her broken English of how her mama and papa are gone and her brothers and friends are gone. But she has made it here to the United States now. And she is so very happy. She has accepted each one of us as her new family now. She will forever be a part of my life now. I love her dearly, and have never felt the love and thanks that she gives to me so freely every time we are together. It’s truly just a blessing to be able to take her under my wing and be a part of her life. She is probably one of the people that I am most grateful for having in my life.

After our time spent talking about how God has worked in our lives over the past year, Jacob and I said our goodbyes and headed home. He had to work today and wanted to get home so he could get to bed. When we got home he had to change the packing in my ear. OUCH! I don’t know who I feel more sorry for… Jacob or myself. Of course I am in pain anytime he has to replace the packing in my ear, however I couldn’t imagine how he feels while he is inflicts this pain on me. What really sucked was the fact that he wasn’t able to go with me to the doctor yesterday morning, so he didn’t really see where the doctor wanted the packing to go. So he put the packing in once only for me to realize that it hadn’t gone in the right spot at all. We had to take it out and start all over. Lucily he was able to get it in at the right angle and after a few more minutes it was over and I was set to go. What’s funny is that when all is said and done after each time that he replaces the packing, I love him so much for doing it. I guess the sense of knowing that he is the one person that cares that much about me to help me by taking care of me during all of this overshadows the pain of it all.

After the packing was taken care, we rung in the new year together the best way that you could enter into the new year as a couple. I’ll leave it at that. =)

This morning, Dori stopped by and picked me up and we met up with Luann, Teddy, Supriya, and Mirielle for a birthday breakfast for Mirielle. We gave her a photo album which she had told me she wanted a couple of weeks ago. I put in some of the pictures from last night, and we each signed the front page for her. She loved the album as I knew she would.

Me, Supriya, Dori, Teddy, Mirielle, and Luann

Breakfast was delicious, and I couldn’t think of a better group of ladies to spend the first morning of the year with.

Well I just remembered that I forgot to take my antibiotics this morning. DOH! I’m off to take care of that now and spend the day relaxing. I’d like to get caught up on my bible study before next week. I need to finish a book as well, and I’m going to start the year long reading plan of reading my Bible from beginning to end.

Happy New Year!!!