30 Days of Thanksgiving--Day 18: 30 Days!!!

Exactly one month from today, we will be loading up 3 very excited kids (and two equally excited adults) into the car to head to the airport to pick up the majority of Andrew's family who are visiting us over Christmas.  We are often asked about the hardships of living in a different country... there really are fewer hardships than you may think, but really the biggest one is having to be apart from our families and missing out on life together.  This is especially difficult because our kids absolutely LOVE their grandmas and grandpas and aunts and uncles and are growing up only seeing them once or twice a year.  We are so thankful that the Ippel family is sacrificing all of their family Christmas gifts, many hours of their summer spent doing manual labor on their backyard instead of hanging out with friends, time, money, and Christmas with in-laws, significant others, and extended family to travel to Nicaragua to be with us during this time when we so desire to be with our family.  We are so looking forward to exploring Nicaragua together, time at the beach teaching Grandpa Bob to surf, showing off our stomping grounds, a "Manners Meal" (Henry's request), convincing Ben & Biffy to move here, and all the inevitable laughter that happens when you put the Ippel family together in one place.  We can't wait!