What a Difference a Year Makes

As Thanksgiving came and went this year, I found myself getting more excited than usual for the approaching Christmas Season. I couldn't get our tree and decorations up early enough (even though Andrew did make me wait until AFTER Turkey Day), and everything about the holiday season was making me positively giddy.

It took me a couple of days to realize that I was making up for how miserable and stressed out I was at this time last year. Although I didn't care to admit it at the time, Christmas 2011 was one of the hardest times of my life, and definitely a low point of the deployment. I was over the deployment, and the lack of communication. I was happy for families who were welcoming their soldiers home from shortened deployments to Iraq during the withdrawal, and part of me was excited that main body flights from our brigade were starting to return home to Fort Knox, but I just wanted it to be our turn. The days and weeks leading up to Christmas and watching others' joy surrounding the season just re-enforced the fact that I would be spending yet another holiday without the one person I love the most in the world, and after nearly twelve months apart that really started to wear on me.

But I did "survive" Christmas and the holidays, and welcomed my husband-to-be home a mere eleven days later, and all of that stress and worry was temporarily forgotten. It took me nearly a year into the reintegration and homecoming process for me to realize that a part of who I am was missing last year.

When Christmas started creeping up this year, I couldn't contain my excitement. I had so much Christmas Cheer to make up for! All is how it should be in our world. This year will be the sixth Christmas that we celebrate together, and yet it is only our very first Christmas Tree. I found myself getting so emotional when we were decorating our tree, thinking of all the time we have spent apart in the last couple of years, (and all of the time we will spend apart in the future)- and knowing that no matter what, nothing will every be able to take away this very special memory of our first real Christmas together.

We have been having such a blast this month, doing every Christmas-y activity we can think of and soaking up every moment of this joyous holiday season that we are so blessed to be able to spend together.

The Most Magical Day...

I suppose that it is time for my brief (and unintentional) hiatus from the blogging world to come to and end. To say that life over the last six months has been busy and exciting, would be nothing but an understatement. Two moves, a wedding, and a new job for both Andrew and myself is just the tip of the iceberg.

I've been finding myself really missing the blogging world, and now that Andrew's unit is back into full-swing training, I think it's a good time to reintroduce myself as the newest Mrs. Dolan!

Of course, the biggest milestone of the past six months was August 4th, our wedding day. People constantly ask me if it was the best day of my life, and it's a question that's hard for me to answer. Was it the best party of my life? Yes! The most fun I've ever had? Absolutely! But I will always have a very special place in my heart reserved for a mere six months and twenty eight days prior to our wedding day... Andrew's safe return home from his first deployment. It's impossible for me to chose between the two as my "favorite day", and truthfully I consider myself so blessed to have that problem.

Click here to view our Wedding Video!

One more goodbye

A couple of years ago, when we were really just starting out on this military journey and long distance relationship, a good friend of mine gave me one of the best pieces of advice I have received. I was getting so upset every time I would have to leave Andrew to go home again.

She told me: "every goodbye now is one goodbye less until you won't have to say goodbyes anymore". At the time, I couldn't even imagine a world without long distance phone calls, good morning text messages and airport goodbyes, but here we are. This weekend will be my last trip to Kentucky (and my first attempt at cooking a holiday meal- yikes) before moving down to be with Andrew next month. It is hard to believe we made it through four Army training schools, including ranger school, and a 12 month deployment and now the beginning of our lives together can actually start.

Of course, the Army throws a wrench in the traditional American family lifestyle, so we will have our fair share of "see ya laters" coming our way, but I love knowing that for the foreseeable future I will get to see my future husband every day. We've almost made it... Just a couple more weeks to go!

Thank YOU!

I checked my blog this afternoon for the first time in a couple of days (I love how busy and back to normal life is lately- between visits to see Andrew, working, job searching, planning a wedding and getting ready for a move, blogging seems to be the thing being left behind) and was absolutely astonished when I saw that it had over 15,000 hits.

MY blog! My little itty bitty corner of the internet.  (What's even more amazing is that the several dozen email subscribers never even opened the URL, just got updates right in their inbox. Imagine the numbers I would have without that feature!) That's pretty impressive, if I do say so myself, for a blog that has only been public for just over a year.

It's pretty darn cool to think that what started as a way to journal my thoughts and our journey while Andrew was in Ranger School (because honestly, it's a million times faster for me to type than it is to write with a pen) became what it has. I needed this venting mechanism over the past year. I needed a place to (try to) be positive even when things weren't looking so great; when I felt scared or lonely, or just sad. And when those times hit, sometimes it felt really good to put on my happy bloggy face and pretend like everything was peachy-keen for that moment in time.

So thank you, whoever you are, and wherever you may be, for letting me share our story. The feedback I have received from friends and family, along with complete strangers has been truly a gift, and has given me such strength.

Leap!!!

Well it only comes around once every four years, so I always think February 29th is a great time for reflections. Four years ago I was living in beautiful Florence, Italy and Andrew was on a transatlantic flight to come visit me and explore my new home.

I can honestly say that four years ago I had no earthly idea that I would be living in Hershey Pennsylvania today. Or that we would have just finished a full year away from one another- that's "deployment" and "platoon" stuff Andrew was always talking about. We also had no idea what branch he would be in, or where we would be stationed (although, one time, very early on, Andrew asked me "so how do you feel about Kentucky, babe?"-- funny how things unfold).

So here we are, with a lot of the same questions about Leap Day 2016. Where will the army send us? What friends will we meet there? What will be going on in the world?

I don't know about you, but I'm excited for the ride and the adventures ahead of us!