This is the face of Christmas Magic

On Christmas Eve, I was walking around the house srtaightening things up before we had our Chinese take out supper. As I walked around I said "HO HO HO Merry Chirstmas!" Suddendly I hear Ava repeating me, so I quickly grabbed the camera and recorded this:

This is one happy little girl. Now I just wish it was warmer outside so we could have a little more outdoor play time. I think she was overwhelmed with all of the fun things she got. She has been playing with limited toys for a long time. Her world just got a whole lot more exciting!

Things We've been doing

These are a few of the things we've been up too lately.

We have taken our 2009 Christmas Photo. Those of you who are getting a picture in a Christmas card I apologize for the fuzziness. It was not until after I started printing out the 38 photos that I realized the "too much zoom" issue.

Decorated our first fireplace. It's weak and a little cheesy but it's still our first!

Bought and decorated David's first FAKE Christmas tree. I love fake trees, you can make them into whatever shape you like. This year because of our small living room we have chosen the "half put together" look, so that it fits tightly against the patio doors.

I made Cinnamon Ornaments. These are really fun and easy to make, and they give awesome smell to a fake tree.

We have worn our Christmas Dress from Grandma Miller. Isn't she gorgeous!

Played in the snow. I'll tell you what, the British people (at least where I live) do not know how to drive in snow, they do not know how to brush off their car, and they sure don't know how to shovel their walkways.

We have tried on fun hats, and made Big Cheeser smiles.

Made our first Fort in the living room. Ava has started to pull off all the couch pillows and so I decided it was time to make something fun out of the mess. She thought it was perfect.

Something is Missing

There’s just something missing, it’s a sense of belonging. Sure our ward is great and friendly but that just it, there’re friendly “church members.” We haven’t been invited over for dinner or asked to hang out and enjoy an evening of games. Our ward is only a couple of steps up from a Branch so you would think that a new family would be flooded with love. I normally would be the first to invite people over but honesty our house isn’t organized and there isn’t much room. I have a calling to teach Gospel Principals but this Sunday was my first official day and no one showed up except the missionaries and my husband (thanks for your support sweets.) My last fast Sunday in Germany I prayed that I would get the feeling of “completion.” The entire PCS had been quick and hard. I don’t think I prepared enough and I had major YW President duties that kept me busy right up until our last week. My best friends were leaving at the same time we were and I knew Germany wouldn’t be the same without them.

Now the novelty of England is starting to wear off and reality of small living has been hammered in. If I could choose a new PCS season for the Miller Family it would definitely not be during the 2 most family orientated holidays of the year! When we first arrived in Germany (Nov 05) we were still newlyweds and very much into each other, I didn’t need friends I had a best friend/husband to share everything with. Now almost 5 years later I still have a husband /best friend but I also need a little girl time on the side. When I married Dave I left my best friends in Canada (Chantel and Kristy) and had gained Larkin in Delaware. I left Larkin and quickly added Lori and Jennifer in Germany. When they both moved away I found Suzy, Holly and Liz. Now I’m waiting to meet my “New Best Friend.” You might be thinking I just need to give it more time and I do, I know that but I still want one right now!

As our families get close to each other this holiday season its hard not to want to celebrate with them. Our plan was to spend Christmas with the Millers if we got stationed in the USA. Then a surprise invitation came from the Robison’s to join them for a Canadian Christmas but we couldn’t give an answer since Dave’s in-processing wasn’t over and he didn’t want to jeopardize anything. The salt in this wound is that a couple of days ago Dave came home and said a trip to Canada might be very doable, and we immediately began looking for the “deal” my mom had found a few weeks earlier. Unfortunately it was gone!

We have come to the agreement that moving when our contract is finished is what we have to do if we want to add another baby to our family. I’m ok with that. Do it Yourself Moves are hard but It will be worth it, when I have room to set up a baby swing and still play on the floor with Ava. As of right now I don’t care if we stay within our ward boundaries I feel no loyalty to them as of yet, but we’ll see in a year.

I know I am greatly loved and blessed by my Heavenly Father. I have so much to be thankful for and I really am thankful for my good life and neat experiences. People have dreamed about living my life and never get to but sometimes it’s the smaller things in life that can make you feel like something’s missing.

I'm two! UPDATED

These are short videos of Ava's 2nd birthday. It was humble and sweet, good thing 2 year olds don't know the difference when it comes to birthdays. We bought her a bike and she was so excited about it. She also got her first helmet, it's pink with panda bears on it. She will say to me "bike mama, ok, now hat, ok." She can reach the peddles but doesn't have the concept yet of pushing with her own legs. We push or pull her across the street to the park, then she says all done and gets off. Short and sweet bike rides, that's what we like.

House A or B?

House A

House B

So it came down to House A or House B. One was within our cap and one was 75 pounds over. One was newer and one was newly carpeted. One had satalite dishes and one had none (instalation to be paid by us) One had 3 bedrooms and one had 4 bedrooms. One had tight parking for 2 vehicles and one had tight parking for 3 vehicles. One had almost 150 pounds in realtor's fees and one had none. One was 5 minutes from base and one was 15 minutes from base.

WHICH ONE DO YOU THINK WE TOOK?

House A - It all came down to money! We have no realtor's fees to pay for this two year old house. We have a dish for British tv and AFN. We have 3 rooms and parking for 3 vehicles. We are at the end of a compact group of homes but there is literally a play park across the street. And we are within our CAP, which means a lot when the exchange rate is so low. So I guess the 15 minute drive will have to do. I must admit that I did put up a really good fright for house B though. The extra bedroom (even though it was as small as a en-suite would have made a perfect office)

We move in on the 25th and we can't wait. Getting settled is a big deal right now, it feels like forever since we had our own furniture and stuff.

Oh my gosh REALITY check

Ok, I figured that moving from Germany gave me a heads up on European living, but I had no idea. The homes here in England are tiny! When I say tiny just think about the smallest room in your house (usually a bathroom) and pretend it's going to be your master bedroom . The houses around here are crazy small. We had been browsing at an online let agency before we moved and we thought the houses were decent but it's not until you drive up to them and take that first step into the home that you realize things are going to have to be SOLD. We have too many everything: beds, dresser, desks, clothes, couches. . . .

We have arrived!

I thought I would give all our friends and family a quick hello from England. We started our trip by leaving Ramstein a little later then we would have liked to but things were running smooth. Filled up on gas and away we went until all of a sudden the driver side wiper started to work it's way off the blade. We pulled over and quickly pushed it back on, since it was raining and we were on the Autobahn. We took a quick lunch break and gas stop in Spangdahlem and continued on. About 30 minutes out of Spangdahlem that same driver side wiper lost all control and quit working. This began the 2 hour delay of trying to find a parts shop and the goose chase that accompanied that. I had the ingenious idea to just switch the 2 wipers and keep going. Dave borrowed a wrench from the Nissan dealership and got the job done. A 5 hour trip turned into 8, but we got to Calais France safe and sound. Ava was wired so we went for a swim at 9pm! The next morning was a piece of cake compared to what we thought was going to happen. As back story, we applied for our Visas in Düsseldorf Germany and had submitted a date that we expected to cross the border. When the visas came back that date was clearly marked on them as the 20th of November. Unfortunately we had already planned everything out and we were going to be crossing on the 10th. Dave tried his best to find out if things would still be alright but no one could give us an answer. Fortunately the lady at the border/ferry crossing couldn't have been any nicer, there wasn't a single hassle. The Lord blessed us.

England is very new and I have a crazy internal pull telling me that I need to be on the other side of the road. It's like a magnet is inside my body. I never thought about this but even the lanes are different, slow vehicles keep left and fast stay right. I hope things feel more comfortable soon. The base is awesome so far. It's nice to be in a smaller environment without all the people and no parking. England is defiantly where the Miller's are supposed to be right now. Miss you all, and we will start looking for a house that can welcome visitors ASAP.

There is no wireless in our TLF, but what it lacks in internet it makes up for in down home comfort. No early check out for me, i'll stay until I find the perfect house. So unfortunately moms we can't talk on the computer in our room but I am in a really nice coffee shop that offers free internet access.

A Lame Halloween

Ava used to be scared of anything skull and bones but she has over come that fear and now she loves to touch all the "scaries" as she calls them. We attended the ward Halloween party on Wednesday but we were LAME-O when it came to the costume part. I had a cute chicken outfit for Ava but she refused to wear it, so I decided that I would have the movers pack all costumes. If Ava wasn't dressing up then there is no point in saving costumes for me and Dave. Instead Dave came up with the PCS costume. It was cheap and easy. The party was fun and Ava got lots of candy. She kept going back to a mini van that had a skull with glowing eyes. As you can see many kids were mesmerized by it's Halloween powers. Officially on the 31 we had to finish packing up our house and move into TLF. I can't believe it but moving that "gotta have stuff" took almost all day. Halloween was totally lame and not even scary, but there is always next year.

Sunshine Pumpkin Patch

My friend Brooke called and asked if we wanted to meet them at the German Pumpkin patch on Monday. I was a bit chilly but a lot of fun. First we were able to stroll through the pumpkin field and pick out the perfect one. Then we all got on a tractor wagon and were driven in to the small town to tour the family farm. Ava started to freak when the tractor moved but as soon as she saw the cows she was excited. She was busy saying all the names of the animals and their sounds. It was a really fun, autumn night. Sorry for the red eye, our new laptop doesn't have any photo programs, we have to wait until our stuff arrives in England to load those. Yes I did say NEW LAPTOP, Christmas came early for the Millers after our Hard Drive decided to burn out last Sunday. It's a good thing we had backed up our photos about month ago, or I would be bawling my eyes out.

At this point Ava decided I had taken enough pictures of her.

Packing it all up!

We are so lucky to have the military pay to have all of our stuff packed and moved to England. The only thing I had to worry about was de-junking, cleaning, and organizing everything to it's right and proper spot. It's funny how I can hold on to something for the entire 4 years we lived here and in one split second say "throw it out, it's garbage!" After long hours of cleaning and many trips to the base dump, and recycling bins we were ready for the movers. Our bathrooms were the no pack zones, everything we wanted to keep was tossed in there, and I mean tossed. I would go from room to room and see something new that I just had to keep. Now I look at all the KEEP stuff and wonder if was worth the effort. We are driving ourselves from Germany to England and I seem to think I can pack the world with me. The stuff was packed and loaded in one day, these 3 guys worked fast. They took apart anything that had screws, things that I have no idea how to put back together. Good thing that assembly comes with the moving package. In the end we had 6 crates, loaded like a game of Tetris

The sound of tape being pulled across a box and cut is a sound that I don't want to hear for a long time. It's loud and obnoxious. This picture was only about an hour in and only from the loft.

A friend took Ava for the day so we could concentrate on watching the packers. So when she got home there was only the "loaned" furniture in the house. I thought she might be sad but instead she ran around the house saying "Wee, wee!" It was hilarious.

Moving, we have a love hate relationship

There is a thread of anxiety in everything I do lately. I know that almost everything we own is going to be packed up on Tuesday 20 and shipped off never to see it again, well until early/mid December. I need to have the basic things for me, Dave, Ava, YW In Excellence, the camping period that we will have in an empty house for a week and a half, the TLF (temporary living facility) we will have in England, and anything I can think of in between. Oh and everything has to be washed and cleaned, which means the couches need to be vacuumed, the spiderwebs sucked up in the laundry room, dust bunnies swept away from under the beds, every last dish clean and in it's place and who knows how much black dog hair is floating around? It could make a mother go crazy, but I don't go crazy because I know there are thousands of families that make this PCS (permanent change of station) move every year. It just so happens that this is only my second, and who knows how many more I have to go. I only hope that I get better with every one. We are taking our computer with us but will have to place it on the floor and sit on the floor to use it. So I will post updates as soon as I can. There won't be much to do, or play with once everything is gone so Ava and I might have to become very creative.

I am excited for this change in life, the 4 years we have spent here have been full of awesome adventures and family milestones. We loved living in Germany and I know England will bring even more memories.

The Things Ava Says

Wow that takes a long time to upload a video, so I hope you enjoy Ava talking. She has started to say lots of things including putting words together. Like "Ava, apple juice all gone." It's very sweet. I can't believe I even got a video of her, usually when I pull out the camera it's mass chaos. All she wants to do is look at the pictures. We bought a new camera because our old one was having shutter problems and I'm not very happy with our purchase. The pictures all seem to be fuzzy with unclear lines. Maybe it's me the picture taker but I don't think so. Even this video isn't the best. But oh well, we aren't made of money!

Here are recent pictures of me and Ava. I couldn't find one of Dave so I'll just have to take some more fuzzy pictures and try to get a good one of him. He makes it on here more then I do anyway.

This was the neat Cornucopia I made for our October Canadian Thanksgiving. It's made from an ice cream waffle cone, which has been steamed and shaped, then filled with yummy candy. You should all try it, it's fun and you can eat it. There's nothing better then eating the decorations.

Have You Seen Elmo?

We have just last week! Elmo and his friends came to visit the kiddos of the KMC (Kaiserslautern Military Community) Ava hasn't watched too much Sesame Street because it comes on early and she doesn't wake up until 9am. That's right I have a girl who lets me sleep in! But she does catch a little "Elmo's World." The kids all got FREE Elmo toys before the show. Ava thought it was really cool because it could spin and light up, and now she likes to sleep with it. She kept copying the other crazy excited kids yelling "Elmo, Elmo!" We sat on blue mats and were very close to the whole gang and they danced. At one point Ava made a break for it and a friendly volunteer had to catch her before she became part of the show.