The End of the Beginning

Well, this is it. Part 2. Two years, five months, and thirteen days after I introduced myself and told you the story of the time that I first saw Daniel, and 120 entries later, I am posting my last blog entry here.

First of all, thank you. Thank you to my dear friends and family who have been a part of my life and thus a part of all of the stories that I have told. Thank you to the wonderful people at ForYourMarriage.org for starting the blog and giving me with the opportunity to share my life with all of you. Thank you to my readers, some of whom I know have stuck with me from the very beginning, checking every week to see when a new entry would be posted. Thank you for all of your prayers for Daniel and me as we prepared for our marriage, as we started our married life together, and as we welcomed our son into the world. Thank you for your encouraging and affirming comments; even though I very rarely replied to them, they meant so much to me and were often very helpful.

I can hardly begin to say how much this blog has meant to me over the last two and a half years. So much has changed in my life since that first entry on August 15, 2008 (which is the reason I was writing in the first place, I guess!), and because of this blog I now have a weekly “diary” of sorts to look back on. In looking back, I will always be able to remember not only these special events in my life, but also what I was thinking and feeling surrounding all of these events. I will be able to share these entries with my children and grandchildren as the years go by, and even now I am able to read my past entries and remember how very blessed I am and have been in my life. I will always be grateful for my experience writing this blog.

And now we have come to the end. I’ve never been very good at endings, or goodbyes, so it has been helpful for me to remember that this blog in its entirety has been just a beginning. I have written about the beginning of Daniel’s and my life together, of our home, and of our family with the birth of our first child. This last entry is in a way the “end of the beginning”—this whole blog has chronicled the “once upon a time” for our “happily ever after.”

Like I said, though, I’ve never been very good at endings. And since I have become so attached to my weekly entries, I have decided to continue writing and posting them for a new blog that I will be doing on my own. If you would like to join me there, it is: http://mycatholicmarriage.blogspot.com/.

Regardless, this blog’s time has come. I write this last entry at the end of a snowy day as Daniel washes our dinner dishes and seven-month-old Charlie sleeps (and hopefully will stay asleep for awhile) in our room. From the Hammond family to you (yes, I figure I might as well tell you our name at this point!), goodbye! May God bless you all!

- Sarah