Happy New Year!!

Happy, Happy New Year to you all! Hope you had a fabulous holiday season and a festive new year! We had a great holiday and brought in the new year at home with friends. Our dinner party ended around 8:30pm (friends with kids) and we stayed up long enough to watch the ball drop in Times Square. Since SF’s celebration really isn’t worth staying up for, and because we were tired, we hit the sack soon after 10pm. I know, not very exciting by c’est la vie!
This year will bring many exciting changes to our lives. This will be the year that the boys start preschool (hopefully this summer), I go back to school in August, Frank will, God-willing, be starting a new job this year, I went back to work PT this past week, we go camping for the first time as a family in July – for Malena’s first birthday, etc, etc. I just feel like this year is going to be a BIG year in terms of transition for our family…Lots of changes and lots of exciting, new beginnings.
Having said that, although I’m thrilled about all the new possibilities for us this year, I can’t help but look back at 2009 and recall how special it’s been for us. Yes, it’s been a tough year – for all of us. The economy is tanking, we’re in a full-blown recession, and Frank has been out of a job for almost one year. However, despite the financial ‘pinch’,  it has been so amazingly special to have our family together, 24/7, for the past 10 months. I know Frank feels stressed about finding work and can’t fully appreciate what a gift it’s been to be together, but there isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t smile when I look up and see my husband next to me at all hours of the day. No matter what happens to us for the rest of our lives, I know that I will look back on this time (and I hope that Frank will too) and just feel so lucky to have had the opportunity to be with our children when they are young and still in the home. Like I said, in just a few months they start school and I know it’ll be a blink of an eye before they’re graduating high school and that’s it…they’ll be all grown up. I thank God everyday for blessing us with Frank’s unemployment – it truly was a blessing in everyway – but most importantly, I thank God for our health and the love that we share for each other and for our family. We are very, very blessed. If Frank had lost his job a year from now or five years from now, or even 2 years ago, it wouldn’t have been the same. I have NO IDEA how I would have managed with 3 kids all alone, and having Frank by my side before/during/after Malena’s birth has made it so the boys get the same amount of attention from a parent, so there has never, ever been even an ounce of jealousy towards their sister. Sure, the twin-thing helps but even being the excellent sharers that they are, I’m sure we would have seen some drama if I were alone with the 3. Yes, having Frank around has been the most fantastic thing for our family. Things always happen the way they should, don’t they?
Anyhoo, lots of new beginnings. Lots to look forward to. But, as our friend Meghan once said, “Is it possible to be nostalgic for the present?” Yes, yes indeed…I know because I feel nostalgic every day. I wish I could slow time down. I wish I could bottle up our lives, their smiles, the things they say, their smells, their kisses, and save it forever. Our children are so amazing it just brings tears to my eyes. They are growing up too fast….