Wishing you a precious season filled with blessings!

With love,

The Heart & Home Gang

John, Ashleigh, Troy and Merritt

Wellllp, folks, here we go again.

Late winter. Afghanistan. Thirteen months.

We’re trying to figure out the best way to prepare the boys for deployment this time around. They’re both so much older and more aware. Troy remembers enough about the Iraq deployment to fight tears any time we mention Daddy going away for a while.

Any military moms or moms with similar experience out there? Feel free to toss out suggestions. I’m all ears.

As I type, John’s packing a bag for another globe-trotting experience–a precursor to the real thing coming up in a few months.

But the big news for the three of us left holding down the fort is that, well, the fort itself is moving.

We’re going to take this opportunity to spend a bit over a year living in my Favorite Place on Earth… John’s Colorado hometown. We’ll be within walking distance of his parents’ house and a manageable drive’s distance from my mom in Omaha.

So this Christmas is finding us soaking up every minute even more than usual, being that as soon as it’s over, we’ll be filling and taping boxes.

And gathering up military field gear.

Here we go…