Home Sweet Home

My time in Sicily is officially over. We arrived in San Diego late last night and were met by my parents who were as ecstatic to see us as we were to see them!  The flights weren't too bad and Pumpkin did great! Now we are just taking a bit of time with family and recovering from jet lag. Some time in the next day or two the house hunting will commence.

I don't think it will fully sink in that we aren't going back to Sicily (at least not any time soon) until we have a place of our own. Still, as of right now it feels so good to be "home."

Captured during our last visit to Taormina

Now that I'm home and with family I think I will finally start to get into the Christmas spirit.  Our last weeks in Sicily were spent in a nearly empty neighborhood (military housing that is closing) with loaner furniture and very few of our worldly possessions, certainly no Christmas decorations.  It didn't  feel like Christmas was coming.  However, today, as we walked into my Grandma's house, adorned with holiday decor I feel a bit of the Christmas spirit coming on.  I'm so glad that we came back in time to spend Christmas with family.

Wow, I did it!!

I set a goal for myself to blog each day for 30 days.  I wasn't sure if I could do it.  Some days were harder than others.  Some days I had a hard time thinking of what to say, other days I was out so late that I barely squeaked by and got my post up in time, but I DID IT!!  I'm so glad I participated in NaBloPoMo and Thirty Days of Thanksgiving.

Thirty Days of Thanksgiving has really helped me focus on how blessed I am, even though I've faced a lot of challenges in the past month.  In addition several of my friends joined in the challenge and I got to connect with them in a new and fun way and get to know them a bit better. I also made new online friends through NaBloPoMo and TDOT. I even had non-blogging friends participating in the TDOT challenge via Facebook!

I'd like to send a special thanks out to my blogging friends and family who participated in Thirty Days of Thanksgiving at:

• Dandelion Days
• Creative Disaster
• My Captivating Images
• Steph Abbott Says
• The Thomas Mother Load
• Thru Catz Eyes

We'll do it again next year.  Mark your calendars for November 2011!!