Merry Christmas Everyone!

Wishing you and yours a happy holiday season! May you be blessed by time with friends and family, safe travels, and the warmth of the season!
Merry Christmas and Much Love-
Daniel and Melissa

Enough already....

Get ready for my most spastic post ever! I am eventually going to turn our blog into a scrap book of our travels and my transition between events this time is very sporadic...so hang on for the ride of the past few months! So much to tell you about...Halloween, our anniversary, another win for Hershey, Thanksgiving, and snow!

Daniel asks me every day if I have made a new post for the blog. My response is always why don't you do a post..and obviously that is not going to happen! ;)

We have been so incredibly busy since the last update about our not so short stay in a hotel. In all we called it home for a month! We made the best of it and spent Halloween day at a Corn Maze in La Union, NM. It was quite different from the corn maze of Omaha but still a lot of fun to see the NM take on a pumpkin patch.
We spent Halloween night along with our neighbors with pizza and stories around the fire pit. Halloween is on another level in El Paso and to be honest and we didn't want to venture out amongst the locals. On Sunday we all headed to Cloudcroft, NM, to see the snow as well as have some fun in the mountains. The area was gorgeous, the hiking and views were amazing, and all the animals were out to greet us. We had dinner in the cutest little restaurant in the village before heading back over the mountains. What a relaxing way to spend a Sunday!
We celebrated our 2nd anniversary by having dinner at a great Italian restaurant. We stayed with the traditional anniversary gift of the second year of marriage of Cotton. We both came up with thoughtful gifts and I am very excited to use the hand knitted scarf and hat by one of Daniel's patients! ;) I love you Daniel and can't wait to see what this year holds!
As I said earlier we finally got the 5th wheel back (from the hail repairs) after a long awaited reunion! ha It was so nice to be back "home" after being in a hotel for a month! Ahh the joys of the little things in life. The same weekend we left for Scottsdale, AZ, so Hershey could compete in the 2009 Splash Dogs Cynosport World Championships. Hershey did great and won 1st place in her division with a jump in excess of 13 ft! Don't worry Chance got just as much attention as Hershey! We had so much fun watching all the dogs jump as well as all the other sporting events.
Cynosport is the Olympics of dog events and dogs from all over the world competed! It was an amazing experience and hopefully we will go back next year! Thank you Stephanie for all of the ideas on things to do in the area! We really appreciated the time you took to send us the information. Daniel and I can't wait to go back and explore more Scottsdale!
On Sunday we decided to stop by Tombstone,AZ, on the way back to El Paso. Daniel has always wanted to go and I was excited to see an old western town. The town was preserved well and we had so much fun going in and out of shops. We visited the Birdcage Theater, Graveyard, OK Corral, and Courthouse and learned some new information while touring each. We ended the day with dinner at Big Nose Kate's Saloon and it was a hoot and worth the memories! Its well worth the trip if ever in the area!

I headed to AR a few weeks ago to accompany my mother to a doctors appointment. Everything is fine its just always nice to have another set of ears at an appointment to ask questions. While in AR I got to make a quick impromptu trip to NWA to see Andrea and her new little one Jaxton. I was so excited to see her family and visit with them for a few hours. Jaxton is just as adorable as I expected. Andrea I am so glad I got to see your family and am ecstatic to see you so happy! I also promise next time to get some great family shots for you..oops! I also got an opportunity to meet Kerryanne and Shannon for dinner. We missed everyone who had plans but I completely understand! I had a great time catching up you ladies..it had been quite some time since I was in the area. I also had the time to meet with Alta while in Ozark. It was great to see you Alta and I hope someday Daniel and Ryan can meet!!! Its always so hard to fit in a visit with everyone while home so hopefully next time we can meet up if I missed you! FYI I have no idea when that will be! My dad went hunting while I was visiting so mama and I we were able to spend a little time Christmas shopping. I can't believe Christmas is coming up and I still have so much left to do! I don't feel too bad as it seems like everyone is behind this year!
I drove down to Austin with my parents to meet everyone for Thanksgiving. Daniel drove over with the puppies on the same day and surprised his mama by arriving a day early! Mary-he is getting good at that isn't he. Mama and I cooked for my parents, Daniel, Ben, and Ann, Ann's mom, and Ann's sister Tori. We had a great Thanksgiving and the food was amazing (if I do say so myself!) Mama said I cooked and she assisted!
That night Daniel and I headed over to the Shellenberg's house to watch the Texas game with the whole clan. It was great to see everyone and I am so glad we were able to meet up with you guys twice while in town! Friday we celebrated Thanksgiving with Daniel's side. We had a great time catching up with everyone as well have a surprise party for Daniels mom and Aunt Martha. Happy Birthday Mary and Martha. We hope you guys had fun on your special day. We can't wait see you all again at Christmas!
We had a great extended holiday and like always were not ready to leave. I finally got to meet my nephew Connor. He is absolutely adorable and of course makes my parents smitten! We all loved playing with him and making laugh out loud. Their really is nothing like a baby to make you smile!
We returned back to a snowy and cold El Paso! This weather has definitely made it feel like the holidays. We put up the mini Christmas tree and made a few changes this year to make it feel more like home. Last week we had 3 days of snow totaling 8 inches..who knew snow in El Paso! Last week was a busy one with Daniel's work Christmas party as well as a trip on Sunday to Ruidoso, NM to hit up the ski slopes.
We had an absolute blast snowboarding at Ski Apache! Daniel had been to this resort several times and enjoyed going on several of the harder runs. I stuck to the easy to moderate ones as I like to be in control! This time the snow was perfect and I was able to maneuver the board with confidence. I already know we are going to go several times this year!
So as you can see its been quite busy the past several weeks! During this time we also replaced my car from the hail storm loss with an early Christmas present (as I am thinking of it)! We decided we were playing with fire since we are at the mercy of job availability and can have to move at a moments notice. I love the Sequoia and all the room as we are on the go so much! Also, several of you have asked and my migraines have been ever present. I am going to start working on another plan of action to get better control of them. I am feeling good today! ;)
We are both really looking forward to Christmas and spending time with family and friends. We can't wait to see everyone! As far as an update on our next location, as of now, we are staying in El Paso until mid January. That changes almost on a daily basis and (to be quite honest) we are really hoping that works out so we are not in the same limbo as we were last January! As far as another location, Daniel is in contact with his recruiter and we have hopes of having a new contract signed before the holidays..so please keep your fingers crossed for us!

I love reading all of your blogs and just by the amount of time it has taken me to catch up over such a long period of time..I think I am going to try more frequent posts! ;) Christmas cards (ok more like holiday cards now that I look at the calendar) should be going out soon!
We miss you all! Please let us know how you are doing! PS can you believe we have almost hit Daniel's two year mark of traveling?
Love, Daniel and Melissa