'Tis the Season and our new addition...

We are now only four days to Christmas Day!! We are all so excited! Most people know that I love Christmas. It is one of my favorite holidays (tied with the 4^th of July) and my house, during the holiday season, you can expect holiday music, movies and the beginning of decorations right after Halloween. And yes, it does drive my family a little crazy!

Well this year has been no exception. In fact, it has probably been exacerbated since we haven’t celebrated Christmas in Colorado since 2012 and it has been a magical season so far.

So far, there have been three really great events that we have been blessed to enjoy and one was seeing Manheim Steamroller in concert at the Buell Theatre. I LOVE MANHEIM STEAMROLLER (not yelling, just excited!) My family has played Manheim every Christmas day since I was really little and the tradition has lived on to my little family.

Mike, Hannah, Mason and I got all dressed up fancy, went to an early dinner and on our way we went to the Denver Center for Performing Arts – another really great attribute of Colorado/Denver is their performing arts -- top notch in my opinion.  

Manheim was amazing! It brought back so many memories all the while I was making more memories with my family. There was one time during intermission an older gentleman said to us how great it was that we were exposing our kids to such culture. All I could do was smile and say thank you – he has no idea!!

Another magical experience we have had recently was adding a new dog into our lives! Kiesel Turbo Diesel is a very sweet, big and adorable lab – a surrender from another State. It has been wonderful adding, what was obviously, a missing piece to our unit. It has brought up some emotions of Honey as Honey had to be put down due to mouth cancer this last winter. Honey will never be replaced but we definitely love having Kiesel!

The last and most important to me so far this month has been celebrating Christmas with my immediate family -- my parents, siblings and nieces and nephew. Again, we haven’t all been together for Christmas since 2012 and the evening was absolutely amazing and had a total blast!!

The fun isn’t over and I am sooooooo excited to celebrate more with family and friends, as well as, host some dear friends all the way from Indonesia. Lastly, I am so excited to see my kiddos faces when they wake up to a snowy, Christmas day (#2 on Hannah’s Christmas list, right after asking for world peace).   

As always, to be continued and wishing our friends and family from all over the world a very magical and blessed Christmas!! 

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On the flip side...

I read once that the phrase "catch ya on the flip side" had to do with vinyl records. There were times when people would say "I'll talk to you when the record is flipped". Which then guickly developed into "I'll catch ya on the flip side". That quirky phrase makes sense and it's a phrase so apropos to my life now. 

So much has happened and changed in the months since coming home but it seems like the "record has flipped". I mean that in many ways for example: in Tembagapura I had all the time in the world to cook but never the right ingredients and now I have all the right ingredients but never the time. Another is the weather in Indonesia and Australia was always beautifully pleasant -- a consistent, warm 72 degrees and now in beautiful Colorado it's FREEZING!! Lastly, every holiday we had in Indo my heartached for my Colorado family and this Thanksgiving as I was surrounded by 40 of some of my closest relatives and I could not help but miss my Tembagapura family. Seems ironic-- I am on the flip side of almost everything. A complete 180 degrees. 

Now don't get me wrong I am not complaining, it's an absolute blessing to have learned, met, hugged, lived and loved the friends and experiences that we had. Experiences that we may never have had without taking a huge leap and it's now gorgeous to be "on the flip side". 

Mike has been home a little over a month now and absolutely loves his new job. It's been an absolute joy to have him home in the mornings and our house has been filled with more happiness and giggles than ever before. 

Our house is nicely decorated for Christmas and in addition to Christmas we are looking forward to more sledding in the backyard (which has become quite the past time) and our newest and highly anticipated journey of teaching Hannah and Mason to ski. 

As always, to be continued and catch ya on the flip side...