Happy New Year

Tomorrow is New Years Eve. I have such a hard time believing that 2006 is almost over. This past year has been crazy and busy. My DH went out on deployment for 6 months. That was such a hard time for the boys and I, we missed him so much and couldn't wait for him to come home.
We visited family and friends, which was a nice break and gave the boys some distraction. Although I have to tell you, traveling with 2 small boys is not my idea of a good time. We flew to visit my parents and other family and friends. This is a cross country trip that usually takes 6-8 hours to accomplish. That may or may not include layovers in ridiculous out of the way locations. I decided that I had no desire to travel all that in one day with my boys, having their first meeting in a year with their grandparents be filled with whines of tired cranky and hungry boys. Yeah, that sounds like fun for the whole family. So instead, I booked our flight to Denver, spent the night, had a good nights sleep, and then the next day, spent a few short hours on the plane. We were refreshed and the reunion was laid back and easy. If you can swing it, I highly recommend doing it this way if you have small kids. I actually saved about $50 buck in airfare, booking multiple cities like I was traveling one way. Then I booked a one way non stop flight for the way back since we would gain 3 hours and could travel overnight.
We also spent about 3 weeks with my husbands family. It was nice because his mom flew here to drive with me. That way I had my car, and since I had lived there for about 5 years before I got married, there were a lot of friends to visit during the day while the Grandparents were at work.
We had a great summer, and had our first family vacation. Let me tell you, I am not at all impressed with Miami or Ft Lauderdale. Dirty Dirty Dirty. My idea of a great family place does not include cigarette butts and beer bottle caps on the beach. We still had a wonderful time though.
My business is doing very well, and appears to be growing! Which is always a good thing. I learned a lot when it came to advertising. What works, and what is a lot of hype. I put together a business plan for the next five years. And by February, I will begin the startup phases of what I hope will really put my name on the map in the next 5 years. I am so excited about this, and once it is in place I will share a bit of it with you!
And while we have had some disappointments this year, like finding out we are stuck here for another year, and will have to endure another long 6 month deployment, we have also been blessed immensely. We will add a new little one to the family in August 2007, and no we are not going to find out what it is! I have been blessed with some great friends this year as well. Some I knew from the year before, but this year I think we really strengthened our friendships. And good friends can be hard to come by sometimes. My children are healthy and have sweet spirits. We are making leaps and bounds with my oldests sleeping issues. This past week we moved him into the top bunk and my youngest into the bottom. And my youngest also seems to be moving past his wheat allergies. This has been a huge blessing, especially financially! Man, that Gluten Free stuff is EXPENSIVE! I am glad to be done with that. I always felt so bad having to tell him no, he couldn't have what I had just let his big brother have a bite of. They are smart, and loving boys. They are starting to understand the importance of prayer. That it is ok to pause during the day and say a little prayer. Or that God truly cares about the little stuff. My oldest had lost his Christmas Thomas train, I heard my DH tell him to stop and they would ask Jesus to help find it. It was found in a matter of minutes after that, and I heard my son say "Thank you Jesus!" My heart swelled with a little bit of pride. What better lesson, that God cares for something as small as finding a little boys toy train?
I am excited to see what God has in store for this next year! I am excited for another amazing year with my family. And even though we will be apart for a good deal of it, Thanks Navy, I know that we will grow in our relationships with eachother. I hope you all have a Happy New Year, spend it with your family and friends, and I hope we can all learn to better appreciate those around us this next year!!