Kanigan Family: October-Now Catchup

October to February. A lot of space to fill! Let's see, as family we haven't traveled much at all. Training in D.C. doesn't allow for a lot of time away from the office, but that's okay. We HAVE enjoyed the freedom of living in a place where we can send our kids outside safely to play, and finally widen their territory a bit. I love that my oldest is now bigger than his Dad. It helps me worry physically about him a lot less. Two more boys to go. I'll always worry about my little girl, but at least she has three older brothers to toughen her up. :)

In October our family got to travel south of Falls Church about an hour to a pumpkin patch called Great Country Farms. It has a big corn maze, pig races, apple-spice donuts and plenty of fresh country air. It was an outing I had been dreaming about for the years that our family was out of the country and it was just about exactly what I'd hoped for. Halloween and Thanksgiving were perfect. The kids went out to trick-or-treat with their friends, and played in a Turkey bowl Thanksgiving morning. I don't think they had ever played American Football before! :)

This fall Logan wrestled for a few months, Owen joined an 'Odyssey of the Mind' group and Linc has been having fun with his scout group and staying very busy with school. Ellie has loved going to her Activity Days meeting and participating in all of the fun activities available to us here at our apartment. The kids have really enjoyed seeing a bit of snow too.

Christmas came and went and because all of our belongings are in a storage unit in Belgium right now, we decided to get a real tree this year. We brought our ornaments, but not a lot else. The tree was beautiful and smelled so good. We had a lot of fun picking it out and strapping it to our car, just like in the movies, then bringing it home together to decorate. I have to say, that because we are the type of people who put the tree up the day after Thanksgiving, by the time Christmas rolled around, our poor tree was looking pretty pathetic. It had dried up and was a fire hazard for sure, lol! Still, it was a perfect, small, little Christmas with just enough of everything we needed.

Dan and I continued our French classed through December. We learned right after Christmas that we would be leaving for Belgium a bit earlier than planned, so I decided to stop classes then to get things ready. Now, we are up to our eyeballs in tasks to complete. We have to get everything squared away with our dog, schools, shipments, cars, a place to live over there, a job for me, Dan's job, ect. You'd think we'd have everything down by now, but we still feel a little frazzled. I'm sure it will all work out. I'll be sad to leave this city and our ward here. We've really loved it.

It seems that in every stage of life, I'm learning something new. I feel like right now, I'm learning to have faith all over again. Faith that if I do my best, my Father in Heaven will help me. Faith in understanding agency and allowing my children to make mistakes. Faith in not being perfect, and in not expecting my family or those around me to be perfect. There is a lot of confusion in this world, but the one thing I am sure of, is that love is a super power, and that everyone needs plenty of it.

I guess that's about all for today. I always say that I will write again soon. I hope I mean it this time, because I love writing. Until next time!