BLESSED!

Tonight, I am itching to blog about one thing: how amazingly blessed we are!! There are a few reasons why I am feeling this way.

#1: Caleb is cleaning his room by himself. This has been a bear of a day with the kids as they went to bed late last night and woke up bright and early this morning. Their "listening ears" have been on vacation so there have been quite a few "time-outs" and quite a few times when Chris and I were ready to just put the kids to bed and be done with the day!! (Of course, putting them to bed at 4pm would have been anything but helpful....) Anyway, it was hours and hours of me mentioning to Caleb that he would need to straighten his room before bed and hours and hours of Caleb protesting. Finally, he said "I'm going upstairs!" and headed up there, only to clean his room! Whoo-hoo! It's only the second time he's done this, so I'm very impressed with it. :)

#2: Hannah potty-training. In the past week, Hannah has told us several times that she's needed to go potty, and we were able to get her to the toilet before she went "potty" in the diaper. Tonight was no exception---she really impressed Chris and I. This is amazing to me because it's almost a year earlier than Caleb potty-trained. Girls really ARE different! Wow!

#3: Vikings Football. We are the NFC North champions this year and will make it to the play-offs!! Sweet!!!

#4: Most importantly: MY BABY SISTER IN BACK IN THE UNITED STATES!! Torie arrived on U.S. soil this afternoon, and while I won't see her until Christmas, my mom has seen her and can say that she's really here!!! This is the one thing that softened my heart tonight and has made everything seem that much better.

Praise the Lord for all the blessings he gives us this holiday season and throughout the year. :)