“Life is what we make it, so I'm making mine with chocolate.”

“I'm so lucky to have a family, adopted or not! I'm so lucky to be alive!" Judy Ellis Taylor tells her three school-age girls.... They roll their eyes.”

“God give me strength God give me faithIn you & in myself In my unclear future And in life itself”

“The abscess is a distant memory. The pain is gone. This dinner with her hosts and her health-care team, this week of seeing another country and another culture, this time of being in demand, this moment is reality. I am a lucky girl, (Judy) thinks.”

“and I'm trying so hard, with all my heart and mind, to make your life as good as you've made mine...”

“If life is what you make it then make mine like my eggs, over easy.”

“We even make ourselves up, fusing what we are with what we wish into what we must become. I'm not sure why it must be so, but it is.”