Introductions

Okay, my very first post to a brand new blog! I wanted to do a blog mostly because sometimes I think I have interesting things to share...or at least I think they are interesting. I'm not quite sure what I might blog about exactly yet but it will most likely center around my children, life here in Colorado, our recent adoption perhaps and anything else that might pop into my brain!

To start off, I was born in Arizona to two wonderful parents. While we lived in Arizona, my parents had two more children, Mary and Brian. My dad was in the Air Force and when I was around 3, we moved to Alaska for the first time. We spent five years in Alaska and while we were there they had two more children, Jason and Kevin. We moved to Utah next and then spent I think around two years there and they had my youngest sister there, Maggie before we moved again. It was at that time my dad retired from the Air Force and we spent a few months in Arizona until my dad found a job which brought us all the way back to Alaska. My parent's have been there ever since and most of my siblings are too. My parent's also about a year ago adopted my youngest brother, Eric.

I got married at 20 years old to a wonderful guy who just happened to be in the Air Force. We met through my sister and her husband when I was 19...who would have thought that a chance meeting would result in 11 years of marriage and counting, traveling the world and four wonderful children?

We got married very quickly because Steve was getting ready to PCS (move) to Japan and we didn't want to do a long distance relationship. We spent three years there and I loved it...although, I don't think we saw enough of it because being there produced two children with one more on the way when me moved. We did make one trip to Cairns, Australia but shortly after booking the trip I found out I was pregnant with Natalie. So, Steve and Emilie had a wonderful time and I slept quite a bit in the hotel :)

After Japan, we moved to Wichita, Kansas. We had our youngest daughter, Kodie there about seven weeks after we moved there. I will tell you one thing, I can be very motivated to get things accomplished to try and get normalcy back into our lives if I have to. In that seven weeks, we bought a house and had a baby. We bought a house figuring we would not move again but then an assignment to Germany popped up and it was just too good to pass up!!

So, we packed up and jetted off for more adventures to another country. We took advantage of being in Europe and traveled a lot. Some of my favorite places were Holland, Prague, Poland and many more but those topped the list. While in Germany, we also started the process to adopt. There is so much to share about that so I will leave it for another time.

Anyway, in January 2010, the Air Force started making quite a few changes and one was to change how long active duty members could stay in and because of this change, it resulted in my husband being forced to retire earlier than we expected. We left Germany in December 2010 and moved to Alaska to stay with my parent's while Steve looked for a job. I have to say that I was terrified of the future but had faith that we would figure all of it out and ultimately thankful that my parent's were willing to take us in in the meantime.

We were one of the lucky ones and Steve was offered a job in January 2011 to work for FEMA here in Colorado. He'd been also offered a job in Georgia but for us Colorado seemed like the right fit. We left for Colorado in February and within three days of being here, we found an apartment to live in, signed a contract to have a house built and got the girls enrolled in school...which would make this their third school in just one school year. They are such troopers!

We spent six months cramped in a three bedroom apartment while waiting for our home to be built and one thing I learned is I am not cut out for apartment living!! We closed on our home in August and moved in very quickly. We are unpacked and slowly adding our own touch to our new home. The girls are enjoying their school and learning more everyday. To end the year, we finally were able to finalize on the adoption of Ethan. He is three years old and full of spirit, laughter and stubbornness...but we would not have it any other way!

We are thankful for the new year, being settled and just waiting to see what the year holds. One thing is for certain is it will not be dull!!