Welcoming a New Year

(New Years Eve)

 New Years this year was very bitter sweet for me.

Letting go of the last year that Travis shared with us.

Welcoming a year without him.

It was strange, and really hard.

I was so grateful to a few of my widow friends who looked at it completely different.,

They were saying goodbye to a horribly hard year,

and welcoming one with a lot of hope, a lot of healing, and hopefully joy.

So, because of their example, 

I'm shooting for that also.

I'm really going to try to embrace everything that comes along this year.

We started out with skiing lessons for the girls.

I grew up skiing and have so many beautiful memories of being with

my friends and family up the Mountain.

When Travis got really sick,

we couldn't afford to go and take the girls,

and there was no possible way for me to live him all day on a Saturday...

Travis hated that. 

He hated that I wasn't able to share something I used to love so much with the girls.

 I think he'd be beyond happy to see them learning something

new, and something so good for all of us.

It's beautiful up there!

We also welcomed the snow with good intentions of making a snowman....
It wasn't the best packing snow so it ended up quite small..
but adorable nonetheless.

The girls are pretty amazing little things.

They are doing their best to be happy.

They are going to school, playing with friends, doing their lessons,

and trying to thrive in everything they do.

We have really tough moments.

Sometimes I just ache that they have to try to understand some 

really, incredible sad things...

but we are trying to work through it all together.

They know it's ok to laugh, to cry, and to be a little mad sometimes.

My hope for them is that they also know-that at the end of the day,

they better be smiling and not angry.

I'm really proud of them for the example they set for me.

I'm so lucky to be their mom!

I was able to spend my first day of skiing in years saturday with 

my Dad.

It happened to fall on the 3 month mark since Trav's passing.

Being up in the mountains,

seeing people having so much fun,

seeing the beauty of the Earth God created did make me feel full of hope.

So 2014...

Be kind to the Kidmans!

We are ready for you.