We Are 1

Happy Expativersary to my beautiful family! 

A favorite way to sign off of an email here is to say "cheers!" Saying "CHEERS" makes me think of toasts and drinking and commemorating special times. I just can not get behind it as a way to say goodbye on email. So, in honor of a word I can not seem to adopt I made up a rather lengthy toast to the last year!

Here's to Livin' the high life in B class, if only once. 

Here is to a year that was never dull, predictable or boring.

Here's to moving across the world with a broken arm, having your new fancy cast fly off on the train
  and the very early navigation of socialized medicine!

Here's to a year that was both excruciating and exhilarating, and sometimes both at the same time.

Here's to the fastest year of my life. Please please please make it slow down.

Here's to overestimating yourself and underestimating the challenge ahead.

Here's to peaks and valleys.

Here's to clawing your way out of a valley just in time to enjoy the majesty of the peak.

Here's to not knowing what you don't know.

Here's to buying a booze filled Thomas 2nd Bday cake
b/c you did not speak Aussie as a second language

Here's to now kinda knowing it.

Here's to never letting a bloke from Melbourne pick where you are going to live in Sydney. EVAH! I don't care who's money it is, once you are an adult unless you are incarcerated or on a really cool reality TV show, no one decides where you live but you. Period. Non-negotiable.

Here's to surviving almost 3 months without a friend. I pray I never have to do that again. EVAH!

Here's to sacrifices

Here's to wonderful people who never think they have enough friends, and always keep their friend circle open for new additions, no application needed.

Here's to old friends who are missed daily and dearly

Here's to new friendships that form fast and deep.

Here's to the myth that it is always bathing suit weather in Sydney and packing for your move accordingly.

Here's to knowing that a foreign accent is a badge of courage.
When you hear one assume that person does not know a soul and act accordingly.
When we were in Denver I met a French lady at the boy's school and was friendly at school with her but never really extended an invite to my friend circle. Shame on me. I will never make that mistake again. 

Here's to living out of boxes.

Here's to occasionally having to give the "ugly American" right back to an "ugly Australian," Here's to their reaction when you do! Here's to discovering the secret hiding place of all those warm friendly Aussies that guide books wax on about, oh I know, they are actually Kiwi's!

Here's to 3 year olds well on their way to Platinum Status with their preferred air carrier, the Kangaroo Plane.

Here's to achieving goals that once seemed unachievable.

Here's to parents who "give you wings to fly but also roots to find your way back home."
(quote courtesy of Brenda Montaigne, 2003)
 I pray I can do the same, kinda, perhaps not so effectively, I mean do I want them so confident in their wing strength that they move so far away? Not really! Just kidding of course!

Here's to a husband that always makes me feel like the best Mom and Wife on the planet even when I am totally stuffing it up at my new job.

Here's to my beautiful babies. The sun rises and sets with you. Thank you for being polite enough to not mention my enormous learning curve this year.

Here's to long blacks, flat whites and babycinos and irrational fears about having to drink Starbucks Coffee.

Here's to knowing all of the accents of The Crown, and how to best use this info, for example, if it is a S.A or Aussie at the local watch out, pace with water accordingly, Kiwi you have a new bestmate, Brit don't make any overly familiar jokes , like, "Hi how are you?" unless you have known each other 25+ years. Most importantly, NEVAH EVAH guess the wrong Nationality!

Here's to the "local" and still not getting the CYO concept.

Here is to a life less ordinary.

Here's to the most beautiful city in the world, Sydney, Australia.

Most importantly, Here's to God for making it all possible.