For all this I am truly grateful

What a year it has been!  I am a lucky soul and have much to be thankful for....

Of course my children, they are amazing little beasts, diverse in personality, and my reason for getting up each and every day. I am thankful for their good health, their love of one another, and their sweet and kind dispositions.  I am also thankful that many, many days they are real, normal kids who are too loud, too whiny and too needy, because otherwise they would not be human :)

I am thankful that Finn will be born soon.  I cannot wait to meet him and introduce him to his siblings who have been waiting to finally meet their baby brother.  I am also looking forward to feeling slightly less huge and tired, and I am ready to take on the adventure of #5.

I am incredibly thankful for my husband.  That we fought, tooth and nail, through the hard early years together and have come out on top.  That we share the same dreams and hope for our lives, and that he is an incredible father to our children and perfectly fills in the gaps that I leave with them.  He can talk me down, bring me up, make me laugh and make things right, and I am lucky that we chose to stay together and have this amazing life.

I am thankful for the health of my family and that my husband's family has not yet imploded...trust me, that is a huge thing to be thankful for here!

I am grateful for the roof over our heads, the food in our bellies and the secure jobs that we have. I am very thankful that I am working on my dissertation and that the end of my education is in sight, and that we have made choices as a family that will help us make our dreams come true in the next few years.

I am eternally grateful for the people we share our life with, and for having the strength to see that what I know to be right and just is what is best for my family.  As I look forward at our lives, I see that the choices we make, from jobs to friends to physical location all weave together, and is what makes us strong or weak as a family unit. I am thankful we made the choices to be strong.