Italy here we come :)

Well, here is my last post until we get to Italy later this week. It's very surreal feeling. It's an odd thought to walk out the front door and go live in Sicily for 7 mths. Yesterday DJ and I were making plans for this coming weekend. Going to see a live nativity and dinner with friends.
Our ticket situation was taken care of and we have our new tickets in hand. Orbitz will not be getting our business again.
I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and many blessings to you in 2009! Ours was quiet. We will celebrate with DJ this Friday. We did go see Marley and Me. What a sweet story and a tear jerker.
I will post again next weekend to let you know we are in Sicily. I'm putting a couple pictures of our kids with this post. They were taken at Thanksgiving with cousins from my family.
Talk to you soon!

Finding Joy In Lifes Ups and Downs!

We have less than 2 weeks! Yikes. I woke up this morning feeling overwhelmed with all the little things left to do. My "List" tells me I'm on track and things are going good but my eyes were looking around at all the spots in the house that still need packed. DJ and I had our usual morning chat (this one lasted over 2 hrs!) and I felt much better after that. He truly is my better half.
Yesterday we found out that our flight from Rome to Palermo (capital of Sicily) was cancelled. I called Orbitz and they got another flight scheduled for us. So now we get to spend almost 9 hrs. in the Rome airport waiting to fly to Palermo! I'm sure there's joy in that somewhere!! I had to mail our tickets back to Orbitz and then wait 48 hrs before I have to call them so they can send us new tickets. Not so impressed with their customer service. At all.
The smell of gingerbread cookies is hanging in the air and there were smiles on the kids' faces as they came in from school and saw their after school snack.
Another snow storm is moving in tonight and we are so happy there'll be a white Christmas:) I hope you are finding joy in the simple everyday things.
Thank you for all your comments. We appreciate you!

Blessings......

Time is flying! I feel like I'm getting done what needs to be done. I keep crossing things off my list but why does it always seem that as I cross things off more piles on!! We have enough luggage now. We are only taking clothing and some toiletries. Our apartment is furnished and whatever we need we'll buy there (oh bummer...shopping the markets of Sicily!). As we go about life in the last couple of weeks before we leave I'm looking at certain things with renewed appreciation. Sunday as we sang praise and worship songs at church a couple tears found their way to the corner of my eye. As far as we know the closest english speaking church is 3 hrs away, definitely not an every Sunday trip. Our church, Alpine Community Church, puts their sermons online at their website each week. (check it out @ alpinechurch.org for some great Bible teaching ) We're grateful for that. Also another huge blessing is Klove radio ( positive and encouraging christian radio). You can listen online at their website. I'm appreciating my dryer as they don't use dryers in Sicily. It will be neat to experience another culture for a few months.
My brother John is here visiting for a day or so on his way to Grand Junction, Co. We're going to walk historic 25th St. today, window shopping. We drove by it yesterday and he thought it looked neat so it'll be a nice way to get some fresh air and exercise. I always enjoy his visits.
I'm grateful for the many blessings in my life......we all have many, we just don't always stop to recognize them.
Thank you for being one of the blessings in our life!

A quiet moment......

Another day has come to an end and there is a beautiful quiet moment hovering in the air. Our kids are 16, 14 and 12. I do cherish the fact that they love talking to us (for the most part:) but I also love quiet moments.
I have eveything in the living room packed that needs to be packed and started on the kitchen tonight. It's mostly pictures on the walls and taking decorating things off of shelves in each room. Our friends that will be housesitting for us are very sweet and don't expect the house to be completely packed up. They will be staying here for the 7 months we are gone and taking care of our dog, Koda and my cat, Fuddrucker ( I adopted him from Petsmart...they found him in a dumpster behind Fuddruckers). What a blessing to be able to walk out of our house and go experience Italy knowing things here are in good hands! Tomorrow my goal is to keep looking for luggage. What a challenge to find big suitcases w/o buying the set.
I hope you're having a wonderful week. As we all hum along to christmas carols and put up beautiful trees lets remember that the greatest gift truly is Jesus.

My first blog post.....Hello:)

Dec. 1st. Where does the time go? I finally got my blog up and running. Only 4 weeks until we leave for Italy. It's hard to believe but exciting. I'm tired tonight but wanted to say hi. Will write more soon. Many blessings to you all as we head into the Christmas season.