28 Feb 09-Ah finally it is the last day of February. One more month down! I had to set my alarm for 6 this morning to get ready to take Bella in to get fixed. The drop off went smoothly but when I went back to pick her up, it wasn't so smooth. I will NOT be going back to that place. Anyway, I'll get to that in a minute. On the way back from dropping Bella off, the kids decided they were still hungry so I figured I'd swing by McDonald's and treat them to breakfast. Harmony mentioned wanting to go check out yard sales so after we ate breakfast, we headed back out. She is so funny about yard sales. She is really into it and enjoys going but once we get there, she gets a little shy and wants me to help her find stuff she likes. Silly girl. They both got a couple of things and I even picked up a couple of shirts. Chris called before we headed out and it sounds like things are working out with the tent. They were having some wall lockers made so they could put their stuff away. He said one of the guys that lived in the buildings that I lived in came over to check out the tent and said he'd rather live in the tent than the metal tin. I would have to agree. I'm glad there's a positive spin on it for him. He's having some trouble getting the pictures on the website because he doesn't have internet in his room and trying to use the Wi-Fi anywhere else is a joke. He might end up having to send home his SD card so I can upload them for him. I am still waiting on his address. I will share that when I get it. Okay, now back to the story of picking Bella up. I went to the desk to check in and the lady told me that she would put my sheet in the stack and the other guy in there would call me up to pay and have her brought out. Well, my sheet didn't make it in the stack and I didn't realize it until a guy that I recognized from the morning when we dropped her off came in after me and got his dog before me. Of course they apologized and he told the tech that Bella was ready to go home. Well SHE FORGOT!! Holy crap was I pissed. Lucky for them I had the kids with me or I would have made a scene. It was ridiculous. I finally grabbed the tech and told her that I heard him tell her that my dog was ready to go home and asked what the hold up was. The first girl saw me back at the counter and said "Again?" I almost lost it! Idiots! I will definitely not be going back to that place. I was thinking because shots were so cheap there that I would just take the dogs there but no thank you. I will wait for an appointment at the base vet where they are professional. So that was my day. Fun huh? :)
27 Feb 09-Chris finally made it to Afghanistan. He called me today while I was on my way home from grocery shopping to tell me he had made it. I was relieved to hear it. Unfortunately, he got some bad news about living arrangements once he got there. He is living in what I referred to while I was there as Camp Cunningham. They are completely booked on rooms so they converted the old cardio tent into a home for these guys. :( I was so disappointed to hear that. Who sends people over and they don't have rooms for them?? If it's not hard enough to deal with that place and you have to start out with living conditions like that. They say they're going to be there for the whole 4 months. I don't see how that is even possible but we'll see how it goes for him. I just hope that doesn't start getting his spirit down. I actually preferred living in a tent but it sounds like it's quite different for him. Anyway, I called his grandparents when I got home so they knew he was safe. I tried to call his dad but the home number I had was disconnected and his cell phone went to voice mail. I know his grandma will be spreading the word though so I wasn't too worried about it. The rest of my day consisted of 8 hours of working on my final paper! Yikes! I guess that's what I get for just starting it today but I work better under pressure but that was tiring. Now I just have my final exam to finish tomorrow and I will be all done with American Pop Culture! Whoo hoo! Miles was busy building blanket forts in the family room today which was adorable. I think that's about it for today. Tomorrow I have to set my alarm for 6 so I can take Bella in to get fixed. :(
26 Feb 09-Today was a busy day. We had our monthly commanders call which meant another key spouse bake sale. We ended up making $206 from it! It is so exciting to watch how the different flights get in to hosting the bake sales. I'm glad that people aren't complaining about having to do it. Chris is still doing well but very bored still sitting at Manas. He finally leaves at 4:30 a.m. tomorrow so he's almost out of there to make the short trip to Afghanistan. I know he is ready to get settled. He says that he has a new found respect for the traveling I had done over there twice now that he's gone through it himself. It is not fun and it is very exhausting. Anyway, he'll be there soon and I will start making my phone calls to his family to let them know he is safe and sound (they don't get on the internet so wouldn't be reading this). I am off tomorrow because the kids don't have school and the daycare is also closed. Every year they get 2 days off for the rodeo. It is still amusing to me after being here so long that they get out of school to attend a rodeo that we don't usually go to. We went in the past but it's just too hot and not very interesting to them so we don't bother.
25 Feb 09-Another day down. Chris is at Manas now (Kyrgyzstan). He finally flies out for Afghanistan tomorrow night so I will update again once I know that he is there for sure. He is only having to spend a couple days at Manas so that's not too bad at all but as he quickly learned, there's not a whole lot to do there. They have a lot more places to get internet access now than when I was there so we've been able to IM back and forth which has been nice. I know he is just ready to get there and get settled. I had to go to the flightline again to count launchers some more. I had to drag the tables in to work today too for my key spouse bake sale tomorrow. Hopefully it will be a good money maker. We have a big event coming up for Easter so we need some funds for that. I ordered some business cards today with the website address for the key spouse website and we're going to hand that out at the function to encourage people to come to the site. I will be playing photographer for the day and I'm going post the pictures of the kids with the Easter Bunny on the site so hopefully that will bring more traffic to the site. Anyway, we just goofed around the house tonight and I did a paper for extra credit for my American Pop Culture class after I put the kids down. All in all, it was a good day.
24 Feb 09-I am exhausted today. I didn't sleep very well last night waiting for Chris to call from his stops. I left the laptop up too in case he got online. I kept waking up and checking to make sure I didn't miss a call or an IM. Chris forgot to turn his alarm off so that woke me up at 4 something. Miles woke up about 20 minutes before my alarm. Overall it was just a rough night. Hopefully I will sleep well tonight but I haven't heard from Chris yet so obviously that will be on my mind as I attempt to sleep. From where I last mentioned, he went to New Hampshire, to Iceland and then Romania. I'm not sure if there were any more stops before he got to Manas in Kyrgyzstan but I haven't heard from him again. He called when he stopped in Iceland and again before he left for Romania but unfortunately, I was on the flightline and cell phones are not allowed out there. :( Now I know how nerve wracking this was for him waiting to hear from me to know that I made it safely. Work was work today. I stopped to get water after work, stopped at H & R Block to pick up the amendment paperwork, picked up the kids and the mail and headed home to start dinner. I really want to start expanding what I cook so I found some pan fried chicken recipe on allrecipes.com that came out really good. The kids gave it "2 thumbs up". LOL I cleaned out Miles' hermit crab tank and then got them in the showers. Once I finally got them in bed, I cleaned up the kitchen and then got on my treadmill to run/walk for a bit while I watched The Biggest Loser. Yes, my life is interesting! :) This is how it's going to be for the next 4 months. I will have my routine and hopefully I won't go too stir crazy.
23 Feb 09-What can I say about today? It sucked. We said goodbye to Chris today. Harmony seemed okay but poor Miles had tears in his eyes. What was even worse for me is that he waited until he got to school to cry. I know he didn't want me to cry and he's smart and knows I would have if I had seen him cry. :( Breaks my heart! It was different taking him to the airport instead of the way that I usually deploy-in a big room full of crying and sad families. Poor Chris has been stressed out and he's tired and just ready to get there. It is 9:45 p.m. and I just got a text from him telling me he was boarding in Virginia to start heading over so please think of him. Hopefully he can get some rest and get there and get settled. He is unsure of his route at this point so I don't know if he'll be making the same stops that I did but I will update as I get those updates. Anyway, on a lighter note, I was going to take a break for a semester to get in a groove with the kids but I decided against it. I might as well keep up on it while I'm on a roll. :) So, I signed up for American Government today. We will see how that goes. It starts the day after my current class ends. Thank you to everyone for all the love, support and well wishes for Chris and our family. It means so much to us!
22 Feb 09-Today was another busy day. I packed all of Chris' stuff today and poor Scrappy is all too familiar with the moving of the bags. He definitely sensed it. Thankfully the kids seem okay at the moment. I'm sure tomorrow will be a different story. I need to stay strong for them so hopefully I make it through it. I am still excited for him to see where I've been though and to get the experience. I think he is going to enjoy himself. Please think of him as he makes his journey out tomorrow. I will keep everyone that reads this posted on how he's doing and when he gets there. Thank you. (Mom, I promise, promise, promise I will call you soon. I have been such a bad daughter.) :)
20 Feb 09-We had a good day today. We went to the annual Vail Pride Day at the fairgrounds (Vail is our school district). The kids climbed the rock wall, pet a horse, we checked out their artwork that was on display and ate lunch. It was a nice day. We played some more rock band tonight too. Chris is just trying to enjoy his last couple of days.
19 Feb 09-Today was another running around day. The biggest thing of today was dropping my van off for it's 100K mile check up. That was a little expensive but I guess not really for everything they did. I just hate spending money for something I can't see. LOL I guess "she" needs to keep running for me though until we pay the truck off. We went grocery shopping today too and determined that we are never allowed to go shopping again together. It was an expensive trip but it's good because I got all the Easter stuff and I won't have to grocery shop much next time while I'm adjusting to being on my own with the kids. I finally got a chance to work on my quiz too so that was nice. I really need to get cracking on it. :) Tomorrow should be more relaxing than the rest of the week.
18 Feb 09-Today was yet another busy day. We got some more stuff for the house and Chris surprised me with a flash for my new camera. So now, I have the camera, extra lens, carrying case, tripod and flash. Whoo hoo! I set up a drop cloth to see if I could take professional looking pictures in the house. We'll see how they look during the day. We picked up his weapon from the armory today and took it over to the main armory so he can pick it up this weekend. It's almost time for him to go and I know he's stressing out about it. Other than that, there's not much to report for today.
17 Feb 09-Sorry I missed yesterday. We had a very busy day shopping because we got our tax money. Of course my disclaimer before I post this is that of course we saved and paid off bills too. I finally, finally, finally got my wonderful SLR camera and I LOVE IT!!! It takes such fantastic pictures so I am going to learn how to use it so I can start posting pictures. I bought a tripod and camera case for it today and I can't wait to use everything. Chris needed some stuff to take with him on his deployment to help pass the time and we picked up all that stuff today. It was a good day.
15 Feb 09-Happy Birthday to my brother Ryan!! I hope you had a great day! :) Today was PJ day for me. It has been kind of nice without football and having people over every Sunday so I could just relax and stay in my PJs. Of course, I still got plenty done around the house. (Sunday is laundry day! LOL) I will be glad once this class is over so I can have my days back. I just finished my paper and now I can relax and hang out with the kiddos and get caught up on some T.V. shows! The paper that I had due today was rough. It was all about "zines" which I know nothing about. Even reading about them on the internet and picking 2 of them to write about, I struggled my way through it. I just hope it was enough! I am off all week to spend Chris' last week with him. The kids have school tomorrow even though it's a holiday so we have all week to just hang out while the kids are in school. I will be packing him up this week and we'll be do some shopping to get some stuff he needs for his trip.
14 Feb 09-What a great Valentines Day!! Chris put out roses in a vase and then some mini roses in pots that he hung on the wall while I was getting ready for our Saturday outing. It was a nice surprise. We went to "A" Mountain and let the kids hike around. They had a lot of fun and I got some great pictures (which are on the site already). We were going to go to this cute little Italian joint that I love but Chris and the kids haven't been to yet but the wait for a table was too long so we went to Texas Roadhouse instead. I'm glad we did because we had a great time and a great (whew, but expensive) meal. The kids thought it was so cool to eat peanuts out of the shell and throw the shells on the ground. :) I had never been to a place like that before and we really enjoyed it. While we were in this little lookout spot on the mountain, Chris pulled a box out of his pocket that shocked me! I had no idea he had another surprise in store for me. He bought me a tennis bracelet!! I had been wanting one for a long time and I was so surprised that he got me one! It was a great day!
13 Feb 09-Thank God it's Friday!! That is all I have to say about today! I had a nice lunch out with Holly today and that was the highlight of the day. :)
12 Feb 09-Much better weather again today! I got to see my favorite doctor today (after over 3 weeks without), my chiropractor! Whew! I needed that. That was probably the most he'd ever been able to crack my back. Other than that, I have nothing else to report for today. I am just ready for this week to be over with. Mom, I am on leave last week (to spend Chris' last week with him) so I will call during the week. :)
11 Feb 09-The weather was much better today thankfully. I went back to see the doctor today about my back. I never got the results of the MRI so I wanted see what the outcome was. The report said that my disc was worse than the last one. It wasn't a whole lot worse but it was still worse. He gave me some pain meds and updated my profile so we'll see how that goes. Other than that, it was a pretty boring day.
10 Feb 09-I got a call at 12:30 a.m. telling me that we were not to report until 9 a.m. do to weather. At 2:30 a.m. (ish) Miles came and woke me up to tell me that it was snowing outside!! They said we were going to get it but I wasn't sure I believed it would be that much! It was nuts! It was nice going in late and it made the day go by fast but it was cold!! Other than that, not much to report. It's still cold but the snow is all gone. Back to the grind as usual tomorrow.
9 Feb 09-Today was a good day. I was lucky enough to find an old wonderful friend from when I was stationed at Whiteman. We were dubbed as twin sisters and everyone knew us. I was looking for her for years and finally found her. She had no idea who I was because she didn't recognize me after all these years. She remembered me with long, brown, curly hair. Anyway, it was fantastic to find her and I enjoyed catching up. I also got a wild hair to pull out old pictures a few weeks ago and I finally got around to scanning them all in tonight and posted them on Facebook. It was fun to make people smile with old pictures. Not a very productive day but it was fun. Tomorrow, we're supposed to get snow in the valley. That ought to be interesting. I'm thinking warm thoughts tonight!
8 Feb 09-I thought I would miss football being on today but it's 6 p.m. and I'm still in my PJs and it's wonderful! :) I was super busy today doing laundry (which had been neglected for a while because of everything else I had going) and working on school work. Due to the fact that I have homework due on Wednesdays and Sundays, I don't normally get my homework done for Sunday until Sunday. She hasn't posted the assignments ahead of time either so I can't get ahead like I did in my last class. She did post ahead finally yesterday so I'm going to try to get ahead a little bit so it's not quite so stressful. It was a cold and rainy day today so there was another reason not to get dressed. Dinner is going now and then it will be bath time, time to put the laundry away, then I have to dye my hair and get all my stuff out to get ready for work tomorrow so that will take up the rest of my evening. Whew! I could have used a couple more days off though.
7 Feb 09-Okay, so contrary to popular belief, I'm alive. I apologize.... again... for taking so long to post in this thing. I just have not had the strength or the energy to do much of anything. Let's see if I can pick up where I left off. Grab a snack, this will be a long one. :)
Thankfully I survived the exercise although it sucked!! It had been way too long since everyone had done one and it got messed up from the very beginning. I won't harp on it because I don't even want to think about it anymore! ;)
On the 16th of January, I sang for the Martin Luther King Jr. breakfast. It was a good time and thankfully I did well. I was amazed at all the work that went into setting that event up. I really enjoyed it and was happy to be a part of it. I received multiple e-mails afterward thanking me for my participation. I also received a picture that was taken of me and the chaplain while we were waiting for everything to get started. I will put that in the photo albums tomorrow. I got another e-mail saying that we should be receiving a letter from the wing commander thanking us as well.
My class that started on the 5th of January is going well. I currently have a 95% in the class and I am so happy that I'm getting the hang of it. It's still very stressful. My last class had homework due on Sunday and it was one assignment per week. This class, I have a discussion post with 4 replies due on Wednesdays and then a paper due every Sunday. I also just took my midterm on Superbowl Sunday and scored a 95% on it!! Whoo hoo! The class is American Pop Culture if I haven't mentioned it yet. I realized that I don't know crap about pop culture but I'm learning. :)
Let's see... what else? We filed our taxes on the 24th and I'm enjoying the benefits of buying a house. ;) It couldn't come at a better time because of Chris getting ready to deploy. Speaking of that, have I mentioned it?? See, I can't even keep track of myself! If I haven't mentioned it, Chris is leaving for Afghanistan on the 23rd of this month. Thankfully it's only 4 months and I know I'll be glad that he'll get to see where I've spent so much time but we're all going to miss him. It will be interesting to hear his take on that place.
Next, just before my second week long exercise started, I got a bad sinus infection. :( I am still trying to kick it some 3 weeks later. Chris had it too and it lasted a long time. I survived the second week of exercises too but it was sooooo boring! I spent the whole week on the verge of tears though because of being sick and just dealing with stress. I have been having a rough time lately.
Now finally on to February. This month is inventory time for me at work which means an extremely busy schedule. I had two troops at work and one just left for Korea so I only have 1 left. He was on leave last week so it was just me. It was kind of nice though because a good friend just left for Italy and it hit me harder than I could have expected so it's been nice to keep busy. Wednesday I had my monthly meeting with the commander for the key spouse program. It was lunch at the golf course this time so that was a nice change. It is so refreshing to see how excited he still is about the whole thing.
The Superbowl was a blast but of course we hated the outcome. We had a nice turn out and a lot of good food. I made my chicken biscuits of course and they were a hit again. Chris and I were up until 4 a.m. so I was exhausted the next day but thankfully we had the day off.
Now onto my nightmare turned awesome ending! So, every year, I sing for the yearly Maintenance Professional of the Year banquet. It is a HUGE deal in semi formal uniform at Pima Air and Space Museum. I love doing that one but I get completely stressed out before doing that one because it is such a big deal. Anyway, they booked me for it last August. Then, I got a call a couple of weeks ago and they said they had asked someone else to do it and I was not happy about it. Well, as it turns out, they had already printed my name in the programs and the group commander asked if I was who did it last year and said he wanted me to do it again. So, they called and begged me to do it and I agreed. It was hard to say yes but my name would have been mud had I not done it. Anyway, I got there and they showed me as a Staff Sergeant in the program AND my name was spelled wrong. :( I tried to let the emcee's know that my rank was incorrect so they wouldn't call me a Staff in front of everyone. They called me a Staff when they announced me anyway. However, it was made known by someone else and the Chief that said it publicly apologized to me and told me he owed me a drink!! (He asked me to stand up and everything.) I was shocked and embarrassed but it was great! :) Anyway, the best part of the night was that it was the best performance of my life!!! Sick and all, I nailed it and was so proud of myself!!! I just LOVE singing at that place. The acoustics are fantastic. I had tons of people coming up to me afterward telling me what a great job I did. I was grinning from ear to ear all night!
That was last night and today came the highlight of the year... getting to sleep in!!! Whew! Exhausted doesn't begin to describe me.
So there it is Mom. Sorry to worry you. I had tried to call a few times (and on Dad's birthday) just never left a message. I didn't know if you had service with the cell. I still have his card here because I had nowhere to mail it! Ha ha! I just need to get through this month and hopefully things will be back to almost normal. Normal except that Chris won't be here.
