Count your Blessings.

Photo by: Christina Foret

Happy New Year everyone!

Yes yes, it's been a while. A LONG while since I wrote. But never the less, as 2016 has come to a close and the New Year has begun, I have a heart filled with gratitude as I remember all the blessings and the amazing things that have happened! It has been a great year. It turned out nothing like I could have ever planned or imagined, which is probably for the best. Thanks God!

Here are some of our blessings from the last 365 days:

$25,192.03 of our student loan debt has been paid off!!! HALLELUJAH!!!

12 dogs and 2 cats we're under our care throughout 2016. We dogsat for friends, coworkers, and 5 new families that were complete strangers to us until they came across our online dogsitting profile! It's really cool how God connects us and how we become part of their lives just by looking after their pets. We've got a few crazy stories, but also great times and have enjoyed long weekend getaways. What a blessing!

18 days of my Montana family visiting us in Hawaii! My mom and grandma came over for Thanksgiving and my sister was on island for a week in August before starting college. What a blast! It's always so great to have visitors in town to take a break from the daily grind and enjoy Hawai'i for a bit.

3 days per week I have been back at D&N Autobody, a shop that I had worked at years ago, but started working part time again in July. Never saw that one coming! Long story short, the family business was in need of some extra helping hands, so I got a phone call to come back! It's been good so far, a nice income, great people to work with and I'm being trained to paint cars! COOL!

8 middle school girls were under my wing from October-December for my first season as a head basketball coach at Kamehameha Schools. (Not sure who learned more, them or me!) It was a lot of fun, and a lot of work. I now have a whole new respect for coaches! It was an incredible opportunity to be an influence to 7th and 8th grade girls, and be able to teach them more than just the game of basketball. I was surrounded and supported by incredible coaches, all of who became dear friends over those crazy 3 months. There were lots of laughs, lots of moments of complete bewilderment and more than a handful of times where we were all thinking the same thing at the same time…to the point of creepy. We had one mind! 

7 painted surfboards. My artwork has taken the back burner these past few months as I've been crazy busy with coaching and working at the body shop. But over the course of the year, I commissioned 2 surfboards, donated 4 to a local family to raise funds for their daughter battling cancer and I just finished a board that will be auctioned off at an event for a dear friend. One of my personal favorites was a collaboration piece I did with my very talented calligraphy friend! It turned out so cool! My surfboards have also been in several photo shoots and there are some exciting things to come in 2017. So stay tuned!
 
13 runs down the ski slopes of Montana! My Christmas present to Ramsey this year was a day at Bridger Bowl where I grew up skiing. I hadn’t gone since high school, but was pleasantly surprised at how easily it came back! Just like riding a bike! (Other than being a little sore for the next few days… haven’t used those skiing muscles in YEARS!) It was a great day and we couldn’t have asked for more perfect weather, plus taking Ramsey to my old shredding grounds was extra special. Hoping for more days skiing the cold smoke!
 
8 flights in 2016 and 3 more in the next few days! Ramsey and I were able to fly up to Montana in May for my sister’s graduation, attend our friend’s wedding in Oregon in October and also spend the holidays in snowy Montana. We’ve had safe travels over thousands of miles flown back and forth across the pond and are excited to spend some time with family in Arizona before heading back to Honolulu. We are looking forward to our 2017 travels to neighbor islands, the mainland and hopefully a road trip as well!

1 trip to the emergency room with Ramsey and a multitude of doctor appointments to follow! He had been having some weird episodes of stroke-like symptoms, which in the end after testing for tumors, cancer, blood flow complications, seizure activity and about a thousand other things, all turned out to be nothing! Praise God! Despite the anxiety, scare and unknown of it all, we were blessed with another year of good health!
 
9 blog posts (including this one). I never thought I'd be a writer, let alone enjoy doing it! But here I am, typing away on New Years Day and loving every minute of it! In my absence, I've had numerous people asking about my next post and I can honestly say I've missed writing. One of my goals for 2017 is to blog more. So hold me to it! 

0 (zero) babies on the way! For those of you who’ve been scrolling through this post to see if we’ve been keeping a secret, too bad so sad for you! Nope. No babies. No sir. No ma’am. Nothing. Zilch. Nada. Haha! We get asked this question a lot, especially since many of our friends are having kids. After almost 2 incredible years of marriage, Ramsey and I are enjoying time together as just the two of us before we start a family of our own little HaoleBrownies. 

After reflecting on 2016 and already getting excited about 2017, I'm reminded of an old hymn I grew up singing in church. Each verse talks about different realities of life. Disappointment. Financial struggle. Doubt. Conflict. But they all point back to the refrain, which puts it so perfectly:

" Count your blessings, name them one by one,
  Count your many blessings see what God has done." 

What a perfect way to end the year and step into the new one. To remember all the blessings of 2016, to name them one by one. To see what God has done in the last 365 days and to look forward to what the next 365 days will hold, regardless of how things come to pass. 

So with that, I thank you for being part of my 2016 blessings and wish you all a wonderful 2017.

~Mrs. HaoleBrownie

Photo by: Kevin Ulep