Swimming right along

Here it is the end of January, almost, and I've got lots to report.
First, since Charlotte is now legally ours, as of Dec. 20, we were able to bless her in church and have her "sealed" to us in our church's temple in Birmingham. For those of you reading who might not be familiar with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, we believe that families can be together forever, not "til death do you part." So we go to our temples to have marriages "sealed," as well as children "sealed" to us. Since we adopted Charlotte, we took her to the temple for this ordinance. It was a very special day for us, and it was beautiful for all our girls to be inside the temple with us to share in it too. Now we're all in it together -- permanently! We are very happy about that. I put pictures of it on www.limfamily.smugmug.com.
I also started up a new website, www.ratedreads.com. I have been planning it for some months now and finally got the time (well, basically) to do it. The basic idea is this: since I'm a) an avid reader, and b) a newspaper book page editor, lots of people ask me what books I can recommend. Many want books that don't have objectionable content. So I'm writing reviews on RatedReads about books that aren't objectionable. I'm completely avoiding books that have lots of language or sex. I am including a three-level ratings system for the books that I feel I can recommend based on content. So if you need some good new books to read, you can check out the site. It's just beginning, so it's not heavy on content yet but it should pick up weight as time progresses. You can email and give suggestions too. I hope you find it useful.
Charlotte has been doing great lately but today seems to have a gunky nose and is not too happy. So, that's the end of my brief post!

Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, and acknowledging 2008

I had no time to blog during the "holiday season." I've concluded that it's really not a time of leisure and enjoyment for any women. My husband has always just LOVED Christmas -- the whole Christmas season. But I, on the other hand, do NOT. And I DO know the reason. It's just that I have far too much to do and not enough time to do it in. Same old song there. When it comes to just regular Christmas shopping for gifts, that's almost a piece of cake. But then, speaking of goodies, it ends up being treats for those I visit teach, Marce home teaches, the teachers -- and bus drivers and aides and all the other associated staff -- at school, people at work, and so on. I have to make sure goodies are baked (that's the fun part, though!) and then boxed up in cute little packages, with notes on them all. Then there's the Christmas photo card and the (gulp) newsletter. I have a reputation to keep up, and it gets a little sweaty around here come time to write that thing. This year we finally got to it right around the time our adoption was finally finalized. That turned out to be a boon because, hey, we could just say we waited until then deliberately so we could include it in the newsletter. Biggest news of the year. Happiest. I can say goodbye, mostly, to the whole adoption mess. I have my baby now for good, and the messy part is mostly over. Debts from the exorbitant costs of the whole thing remain, and extra poundage -- a whole lot -- is sitting around my midsection and the rest of my body, clinging tightly despite my daily trips to the gym. SIGH. The only cool thing is it's forced me to buy lots of new clothes. That was fun, but not fun because I was having to spend more money for those, and then I've had to see myself in the mirror a lot more than I'd like, with all that extra flesh. SIGH again.
Quite honestly, now that it's January and it's really time for a new start, I'm grieving for all the huge, gigantuan stresses of the last year and all they did to me physically and emotionally. That's the short story. I hope to grieve and move on, and hopefully moving on will include leaving behind some of the poundage, somehow.
So I'm going to start on some projects I've been wanting to do for a while. First is my "clean books" website. It's called RatedReads.com and it's in progress, at last. I'm very pleased. I think it will be a great resource for lots of people. I hope we can get the word out. Then after I get that settled, I can start writing (crossing fingers...) my new YA novel. I've been mulling it for over a year. High time to write it.
My book page job is still wonderful. Love those books!! Charlotte is now going to go to a "mom's day out" program one day a week so I can actually get my work done now. That will be very helpful now that she's 8 months old and mobile and very talkative. I WAS carting her to work with me and it was great for a while when she slept or sat quietly. Now that's going to change.
She's growing very fast. She's huge. Really. Over 20 pounds. But adorable, still sweet.
Hope you all have a wonderful 2008. That's MY plan.