Not so fast 2014, I've got some stuff to say.

Dear 2014,
You were not horrible. And I truly appreciate that.

We did some amazing things this year. And if I were to just lay out all of the photos here, you would probably be like, "Cry me a freakin' river, Melissa!" And in so many ways, that would be true. We are so blessed to have had the opportunities for these experiences! But that isn't the whole story is it?

For one thing, we fought like hell to get away and do each and every one of these things. The days that are represented in these photographs and events are the ONLY days that JBA had off in 2014. And I don't mean in addition to weekends or in addition to regular days off......I mean the. ONLY. Days. It takes a lot of flexibility to pull this stuff off at the drop of a hat but if nothing else, our family has definitely learned to be flexible! We have learned to just drop everything and go whenever the opportunity arises.

 There are other things that are not represented in these photographs. There are the moments of toughness that go along with being married to someone who has done the job that JBA has done. Moments that would have never been part of our family's tapestry without the war. Without combat. But something different happened this year. We began to learn to roll with those moments. To not kick against them quite so hard. To accept them as just a part of the whole package that is our family. Not perfect. Just....US....as we are now, and armed with the knowledge that God has a plan for it all.

 Also unseen in my pictures, is the absolute fear and trepidation that JBA and I feel as parents as we watched our children begin to jump out on their own in 2014. We could not be more proud of them or more confident in their abilities. But as we listen to their plans and hear all about what their next move is going to be, we fight falling back into that oh-so- familiar protective role that we have had for so many years, as their parents. Savannah was on her own in the South African bush again this year, and the stories that she brought back are completely hair-raising! Jackson caught rattlesnakes out in Colorado with his bare hands this year! And Austin spent two weeks camping, without us, up on the Continental Divide trail.  To be truly accurate, there would be photos of JBA and I sitting on our hands, keeping our mouths shut, but showing an airline ticket for ourselves on stand-by.

 I also wish that I had pictures of all of the incredible people that we have met and spent time with this year. There were friends who have dropped back into our lives after years and years apart and people whom I had never met before, who became fast friends. I wish that I could put up pictures of the heroes who have sat at our table and laughed with us. I wish I could spill out their amazing stories of ordinary humans doing amazing things.

Friends and family were also lost in 2014, and I hope that the way we live our lives pays some respect to their memory and eases in some way, the pain of those that they left behind.

So, 2014, while you dealt us some difficult moments, you also doled out some pretty amazing ones as well. And as I look at our pictures, I am overwhelmed with thankfulness to be a part of this particular journey, with these particular people.

A few firsts this year: First time ever, snowshoeing. First time ice climbing. JBA and I traversed across two glaciers this year, in Switzerland, for the first time ever. We spent a night in a Swiss alpine hut. Jackson caught his first rattle snake this year. Savannah became the first girl in her MMA school to ever earn a black belt. Austin did his first work for Samaritans Purse and got his Wilderness First Responder medical certification.  As a family, we hiked further, climbed higher and camped longer than we ever have,

Here are a few pictures from 2014. It has truly been a great year and I am super happy to have been part of it all!

So..... This is 45.

Today I turned 45.
To me, 45 has always been legit, "you're-getting-old" territory. Here I am staring squarely into it's face. I am not sure what I thought it would feel like, but I must admit, it actually feels pretty good. In fact, I was given the day off by the three gentlemen who currently reside in this house with me, so I thought that I would use the time dust off this old blog and write about it.

I like it here. On this blog.
So much of my life has been recorded here. It feels like home again, writing about what I want the way that I want. I have a few writing gigs and when I write there, I have to bend my writing to someone elses standards......or even worse....put my thoughts in bulleted points because "people don't have the time to read all of that" . 
No.This feels good.

So, on this momentous day of my 45th birthday, lets take a good, hard  (read: light-hearted and embellished), look at where I'm at these days.

I am living in a beautiful home in Colorado with JBA (formerly Race, on this blog....gonna have to fix that), Austin and Jackson. Savannah flits back and forth between here and our house in VA. We love it here and I am incredibly thankful that I was dragged out here kicking and screaming. This has been and continues to be, an amazing blessing for our family.
I started a business! Yep. I became a personal trainer and started an online training business. Train With Melissa . Which I quickly realized, I hated and needed to change. SO.INCREDIBLY.ME. My life is marked by things like this. So much so, that when I read Jane Austens "Emma", I was appalled at how a few of those quotes stung in their description of my own inability to apply myself long enough to any one pursuit to become proficient at it! It's true.

As Mr. Knightly observed in "Emma":
"But I have done with expecting any course of steady reading (insert any serious undertaking here) from Emma. She will never submit to any thing requiring industry and patience, and a subjection of the fancy to the understanding."
Ouch. And there was more:
"Emma wished to go to work directly, and therefore produced the portfolio containing her various attempts at portraits, for not one of them had ever been finished...........She had always wanted to do everything, and had made more progress both in drawing and music than many might have done with so little labour as she would ever submit to.”

So, yeah. Thats pretty accurate, damn you Jane Austen. But this is how I learn. I pursue it passionately until I figure out what I don't like, and then I chisel it out and change it to fit what I want. And thats where my business is. The chiseling stage. I love to help people get healthy. I LOVE to encourage people in something that I truly believe will improve their happiness level and their quality of life. But being so closely tethered to so many people proved to be an unhappy (and probably unhealthy) place for this under-cover introvert. So. Not sure what is next for Train With Melissa, but here's to figuring THAT piece out, I guess. :-) (Not quite your hard-charging-feminist-business-type, I suppose, but it works for me.)
 I am about to break through the ribbon at the end off the homeschooling adventure race, with Jackson recently starting at the community college here. It is a very strange feeling. And while we definitely did not finish in first place, I'd like to think that we absolutely KILLED IT on the obstacles and we finished proudly. :-)
  What else? Still working out with weights 3-4 days a week, still eating whole foods, (except today. Today I'm eating pancakes and donuts.....it's my birthday), Still drinking wine, still doing hand stands and head stands and cartwheels and various other yogafied things every week. Still hiking a lot. Still not running very often. I like how I feel physically and what I am able to do. No aches and pains, no real issues. No complaints. (But don't even get me STARTED on my 45 year old skin at this point.....whole 'nother post, my friends.) 
 We are quickly approaching our vacation time and I am over-the-moon excited to be thinking about that! JBA and I are on the downhill side of a very difficult time in our lives and the lives of our family members. All through no fault of our own. I talked briefly about it here, if you'd like to read about it. And I hope, in time to discuss it all in great detail as we move farther away from it. There are many families dealing with the effects of unrelenting deployments during war and I hope to be able to lay our own struggle out there to offer hope and courage to someone else. I am thankful for those family and close friends who just listened to me over the years, even though they couldn't fully understand the situation, not having experienced it. That meant a lot. 
I am happy to say that we are once again becoming the happy, cohesive, driven, family-force that we had once been and that feels like the best prize in the whole world.
  So, sitting here at 45, I feel good. I like where I am in life, I like where I've been and I am excited to see whats next.  I am amazed at the path that God has carried me through. Seriously amazed. One thing has become crystal clear for me: He.Is.Faithful. To feel His precious grace and mercy fall freshly, on my life in such a personal way and on the lives of those that I love, is beyond words. I am 45 and I am blessed.

Cheers!
Melissa
PS~ Thank you to my Colorado photographer Wild Jinger Photography for the candid shots! Check her out on FB here or her brand new web site Wild Jinger Photography By Bronwyn Nicholoson.