Grace and Grit

One thing we do exceptionally well here at The Sheepfold is a special occasion. Whether it's a birthday, baby shower, Thanksgiving, Christmas, or graduation, we go all out with the help of our wonderful supporters! I loved spending Christmas morning here and it will always be a treasured memory ( click here to read that story ). But Christmas has not been the only awesome day we've celebrated. You can't tell but there's 110 gifts under that tree! Today we threw a baby shower for one of our new moms. I will call her Naomi. I made her and her children's favorites: Ceviche Tostadas, barbecue ribs, horchata, and blue cupcakes. Naomi is having a boy so we went with a circus theme (all decorations and gifts were donations). We had favors, balloons, a cake, streamers, and LOTS of gifts. Naomi received some cute baby boy clothes in all different sizes, a new diaper bag, baby blankets, as well as some beauty supplies and satin pajama's for herself. She ...

I am coming to the tail end of my longest shift of the work week. I've been at the shelter since Wednesday afternoon and I will be leaving tomorrow (Friday) morning, after debriefing with the incoming manager. It's always a challenge for me because I start to loose energy around 3 or 4 pm on Thursday, long before bed time. :-) But today was a little different from the normal Thursday running around. This was for several reasons: 1) It's the last day of school and our kids are ecstatic. 2) I spent my morning attending an hour long Kindergarten graduation... I didn't know it was a thing, but it is, complete with diplomas, professional pictures, a slide show, flowers, gifts, etc. 3) A mom who has stayed with us almost a year is moving out (a stay is typically six months so this is unusual and also hard to say goodbye). 4) Our youngest baby of the house has HFMD (Hand Foot and Mouth Disease) 5) The mother of aforementioned baby is a new mom battling some pretty heavy anxie...