aaron.anica.emily.isabel.claire

Christmas 2016 Bernkastel-Kues Christmas morning Our Christmas was a little different this year, or I guess a lot different because of being in a different country and far away from the family and friends we love. We celebrated about a week and a half early because Emily went to spend Christmas with her other family and Aaron had to work on Christmas. Emily left the day after the girls' last day of school, so when they came home from school we opened presents from each other and then by popular vote spent the rest of the night eating pizza and bowling at the bowling alley on base. The next day we woke up early to deliver Em to the airport. We were able to hit a couple of Christmas Markets in the beginning weeks of December with her and then we did a couple after she left. We thought it was kind of fun how each Christmas Market has their own mug that you can collect, so the collecting motivated Aaron a little more to hit multiple markets rather than to just stay ho...

Claire's playdate to the Treehouse Museum with her friend 'Baby Olive' Goodbyes are hard, especially when you're leaving a pretty great place with pretty great friends and family that you've lived near and relied on for many years. It generally is easier to be the one to leave, but many times we have had to wonder if we were choosing the right path because the one we were on felt pretty darn comfortable. We left behind a fantastic neighborhood which we felt was a wonderful place for kids to grow up. We often felt we were making a choice between better and best and some days we didn't know which path seemed 'better' and which one was 'best.' Even still, some days we don't know which one would have been better and which one best. I realize that sometimes I spend too much time worrying about the shoulda-woulda-coulda's and have recently found these bits of advice that stop me in my tracks and help me to just keep moving forward: You d...