One year ago...

Kayla moved in with me one year ago. How time flies! I can't believe it has been a year since this little petite blue-eyed blonde beauty who was to be my daughter moved about 30 boxes of stuff!!! into my house. Last summer we were two strangers trying to get to know one another as mother and daughter. Talk about an adjustment. There were many times I wondered what I was doing and why I was doing it but I kept putting one foot in front of the other and here we are a year later. We are no longer strangers...in fact I can't get her to stop talking most days...or stop moving. She is no longer the scared quiet little girl. Walls have come down and yet many more still need to come down. But this relationship is a work in progress and we have definitely progressed. We have fun, laugh and tell jokes together. Some days I'm not her favorite person and some days she's not mine but we are forging a bond through thick and thin. We've already had to weather some storms with the delay of her adoption and then the loss of my job but I think (and hope) going through these things together will bring us closer together in the end. I have fought hard for her and I hope she knows I will continue to fight for her forever. I appealed to the school district to transfer her to a different school and won. I appealed to DHS to give us a subsidy and won--and our social worker said in all her years she has never seen anyone win a subsidy appeal on the first appeal. I did have a new house for her and was pretty much financially set but I guess God has other plans for us. I don't know where will be living or what life will be like one month, six months or a year from now but I do know that we are in this together and we will be okay, just the two of us.

And thanks everyone for your thoughts and prayers. Last week was rough but I do have some job offers on the table and hope to have accepted one by the end of the day. Now I've just got to figure out where we are going to live...