From Live Journal 7-1-11

Today is our 39th wedding anniversary. How fortunate I have been to spend most of my life with this amazing man! We had a relatively small wedding with just a cake, coffee, and punch reception afterwards in the church basement. Poorer than church mice! My sister Sheila was my maid of honor, my sister Terri my flower girl, Tom's best man was his brother Dan. Tom's stepfather Wally Johnson performed the ceremony at First Lutheran Church in Mt. Carroll IL. (he was a fire and brimstone type preacher so he took advantage of the captive audience LOL) It was 101 degrees and humid outside that evening, it was even hotter inside the church. Tom's sister Faith made my wedding dress, Tom's mother encouraged me to choose something non traditional for the fabric, white voile printed with yellow centered daisies (and she bought the fabric for me) my sister Sheila gave me a pair of her shoes. I had planned on wearing a hat rather than a veil, but my mom borrowed a veil from a neighbor I played with when I grew up. Looking back, I'm glad that she did that! It was a lovely wedding in all its simplicity, with the people we loved most attending. We have always wanted to keep things simple. Life handed us enough complications along the way. :-) A majority of the years have been happy ones, we both agree we'd do it all over again. :-)

We have plans for a quiet evening at home together. Steaks on the grill, maybe watch a video, maybe some celebratory beverage, and just hanging out. I love this man more than I ever imagined I would! I was so young! Only 20 at the time. :-) My family adores him too! My in-laws are good people. We have 3 amazing children who continue to bless our lives. What's not to do over?

It's been a quiet work week. yesterday I closed with another family, which means currently I only have two families on my caseload. One of my three families had court on Wed. The guardian ad litem asked the judge to remove family counseling from the court order. The CHIPS (Child In need of Protective Services) will probably be removed from the family at their next review. I was kind of shocked seeing as the GAL hadn't contacted me prior to making that recommendation, one of the kids just got home Monday from placement for the psych evaluation. But the dad and his girlfriend (who is an awesome parent especially considering that she has never had children of her own!) family is much more stable than it was prior to when I began working with them 6 months ago, while dad was in treatment and all the kids in foster care. So I've done all I can. It may be that I will go back into the home sometime in the future, but I can feel good about where they're at now. :-) I'm looking at taking off a lot of time in July so this makes it easier. :-)

Today I have consultation with Dr. D. and the girls so that will be fun, and I'll be able to start the holiday weekend at 2:00 when I'm home from that. We have plans to go to a friend's house in Baudette to watch the fireworks on her deck Monday night. It will be fun! I'll get some time to play in my journal and stuff this weekend too. :-)

Life is good!