17 Nov 08-I had a wonderful day today! I accomplished so much!! I got all of my Christmas shopping today and are you ready for the kicker??? I GOT EVERYTHING WRAPPED TOO!!! Whoo hoo! What a fantastic day! It is going to be so nice to not worry about shopping anymore. I got Harmony's birthday stuff too so I have no more money left but it's done. LOL I can actually start paying off Christmas BEFORE it gets here. Yay! Now I can just relax and enjoy the holiday season.
15 Nov 08-I had to go to work this morning but thankfully my 0800 meeting was finished at 0758 and I was home by 0830! LOL They had nothing for Ammo so I got to make all the calls for people that were in to go home and to brief the Chief and Captain. Now my day is not lost. My laundry is started and we'll be working in the yard today. Bulk pick up is on Monday so we'll be cutting tree limbs and stuff. It should be a nice day. I just got the e-mail from my mom that they are heading out to Arizona and they will be here on the 26th! We are all so excited to see them!
13 Nov 08-Today was the day from hell. Yikes! Work has just been a little nuts and I'm getting irritated with people making decisions to do things that affect my accounts and my custodians. That drives me nuts! Other than that, it's been a very quick week. It has just flown by which is great. I'm on Ammo super standby this weekend so I've got to work on Saturday but I'm going to finish my Christmas shopping afterward so that will be really nice. :) I have Monday off so I'm looking forward to that. Tomorrow is going to be rough. I have my annual maintenance training and it is "death by videos". Some of the videos are older than my time in the military and it's awful. LOL I get through it every year but God is it boring. Wish me luck!
11 Nov 08-It was so nice to have a day off in the beginning of the week. Happy Veteran's Day to everyone serving and everyone who has served. I had a "girls day out" with Harmony today. She has been getting a little worse in her behavior and has been getting 1-2 yellow lights a week at school. It's been frustrating and yesterday, I got a little carried away while trying to talk to this child who is jumping up and down, flailing arms, etc and I wanted to take her out today to apologize to her and explain calmly why she cannot behave this way. She needed new undies and she really likes ankle socks (but doesn't have a whole lot) so I took her to Target to get those things. After that, I took her to Starbucks so we could sit and have a drink. She was so thrilled and it was nice to get to sit down with her away from the house and talk to her about what has been going on. I think she understands better now and we just enjoyed being together. Then, out of nowhere, I decided I would take her to finally get her hair cut that she's been wanting. She asked for an A-Line cut and I wanted to give her what she wanted. She looks ADORABLE with her new "do". The pictures are on the website. She is so happy with it. She was just glowing. We got home and she let me fix it a little bit and then hugged me and squealed and asked if she could go see her friends so she could show it off. :) It was a great day! I spent quite a bit of time in the garden today. Everything was dead so Chris finally got in there with the weed eater and I came behind him and broke down all the corn stalks and sunflowers. That was hard work! Unfortunately, we have a rodent problem. We found another mouse in the garden and it came from another yard. Chris got some stuff to seal up the crack to try to keep these rodents from coming in our yard! Yuck! (Don't worry Mom, we'll have it taken care of by the time you guys get here. Ha ha!) We set up our compost bin finally too so we were able to put stuff from the garden in the bin instead of in the trash! That was fun! It's late here but I am finding it hard to unwind. Chief results come out tomorrow morning and I am waiting for a name to show up on that list. I've felt in my heart that it would be there for a long time. It is my friend Ralph who is one of my mentors and I am so excited for him! I think that's it for today. :)
09 Nov 08-I apologize for the break again. I had a 3 day seminar I attended this past week and I didn't realize how much NOT doing anything could just take it out of me. I need to be busy to keep my energy up and 3 days of sitting in a classroom sure did not do it for me. I have been busy with school too. I did not like having to do the majority of my work on the day it was due so I am trying to do a little bit each day which has definitely been beneficial. I have half of my assignments done that are due next week and it feels great to be ahead. Now I just have to pray I can keep this momentum up! Everyone has been doing well. Miles just got new undies and that's probably one of the most exciting things we've done lately. Ha ha! That kid is so easy to please. We will be getting their progress reports this week and I'm sure there will not be anything in them we don't already know. Technology is wonderful. I am in close e-mail contact with both of their teachers and I can even see Harmony's grades online. It is helpful to see when there is a subject she might need some extra work in so we can catch it before it is too late. I signed up for the Black Friday website and received an e-mail Saturday morning about a sale at Walmart. Normally I am not up as early on Saturdays because I sleep in due to getting up at 4:45 all week but for some reason, I was up earlier than usual and I'm sure glad I was. Walmart had a pre black Friday sale and I was able to send Chris to get some gifts for the kids that were a steal but we also got a laptop (for Chris) that was $650 on sale for $298!! What a steal! He came home with it and I smiled and told him Merry Christmas! LOL Now I don't have to worry about his gift. He really did need a new laptop as the old one he was using was in bad shape after Miles stepped on it after I got back from Afghanistan last year. Chris will be much smarter with this one and make sure it doesn't sit where it can be damaged when it is not in use. We couldn't pass up that deal. We put the old ratty one (that works fine, it's just in bad physical shape) in Harmony's room so she'e excited to have her own computer. All we need is one more an they'll all have their own computers which will stop some of the fights that go on in this house! I'm sure there is more that I could post about today but can't think of any more right now. I am anxious to get back to work after 3 days away to see what I have missed. We work Monday and then have Tuesday off so it will be a nice break during the week.
02 Nov 08-Nothing special happened today. I was able to catch up and get all the laundry done. I finished up my homework and was happy to see the all the grading caught up and I have a 92%. :) Other than those 2 things, I just watched football and got another 3 miles in today. Laundry took tons of time though so I had no free time today. I also updated the website with the kids Christmas wish lists finally!
01 Nov 08-Today was a good but busy day. The kids were beat of course from last nights festivities. I went with Elise to some type of home show where they showed all about how to use items you already have that you might be ready to throw them out and make them new. It was eye opening for sure and made me want to go out and yard sale! LOL It was a lot of fun. It was just nice to sit and chat with Elise. I forget how much I miss good conversation with good friends until I have it. I got 2 miles in tonight and only 2 because I got started about an hour later than I usually do. I missed the last couple of days so I really wanted to get it in. I still have some homework to do tomorrow and loads of laundry but it was so worth it to get out today. Oh, before I forget, we stopped at Walmart today so that Elise could get some yard for the kids to keep them occupied. (David was on call so she had to bring them along.) Anyway, they learned how to finger knit in Girl Scouts and Harmony learned in after school care so I picked some up for her too. She was so excited when I gave it to her today. She had been at a birthday party for part of the time that I was gone and it was a nice surprise for her to come home to 2 new things of yarn. She's really good at it. It's too cute. We have our sports fanatic (Miles), our scientist (Cody) and our creative one (Harmony). It's so fun to see how different they all are.
**Mom, I don't know if it's too late but I am going to make their Christmas wish lists tomorrow and post them on their bio pages. Sorry it's taken so long! :( If it's too late, I'm sure you already got them something great. You always do! Now that it's November, the kids already sense it's clsoe to your visit and we can't wait to see you guys!!
01 November 2008
03 October 2008
My ramblings-Oct 08
31 Oct 08-Today turned out well but sure didn't seem like it would for a while. We had commanders call this morning so I headed to the base for that. Afterward, we headed to Miles' school for his community contributors parade. It was so fun watching all the little ones walk the school grounds in their "outfits" for their jobs. Anyway, that was the good part of the day. I went back to work after the parade and finished up all my work and was excited to get off work an hour early because I had grocery shopping to do. I was halfway done with my shopping when the fire alarm in the commissary went off. Ugh! I was so tempted to just leave but I needed to do the shopping and it wouldn't be fair to the people that work there to make them put away my stuff so I spent almost 30 minutes sitting in the van waiting for the fire department to clear us to go back in so I could finish my shopping. I was just in the mood to relax at that point and knew that wasn't going to happen. Finally, I got it all done and still had to get gas. I rushed home (I use that term loosely because it was in the middle of rush hour traffic) to get the groceries unloaded and get the kids ready to go trick-or-treating. I missed the pumpkin carving but I told Chris to just go ahead but take pictures for me (which are on the website along with all the other pictures I hadn't posted yet that I thought I had. Oops!). Anyway, I was pleasantly surprised when I came home to find Cody already in a costume after hearing him say he wasn't going to dress up or go out trick-or-treating for the last couple of weeks. He ended up wearing my old blue M&M costume which was too funny! We've gotten a lot of use out of that thing! I got the kids ready, snapped a few pictures and off we went. We covered some good ground and the kids decided to use pillow cases this year instead of buckets and got A LOT of candy. I'll have to start sneaking some of it out to work for the boys soon! We had a great time and then came back to help Chris hand out candy. It turned out to be a great day. Cody is having a sleep over at a friends house and it's 9:30 p.m. and Harmony and Miles are still playing in the neighbors garage. I'm headed to bring them home, get them in bed and crash! What a day!!
30 Oct 08-I had a great day today! The wing quarterly awards were today and I was asked by the command chief's office to sing. I was nervous as always but I did really well. I always feel like I accomplished something when I sing. I have a couple more things lined up and I don't think it will ever stop. :) The kids are really excited about Halloween. They have worn their costumes more this year prior to the actual event than any other year. It has been fun though. The kids have been learning all kinds of cool things at school. The kids voted yesterday and even came home with their ballot receipts. I had never heard of that before. Too cool! They were not to be coaxed at all. Miles voted for Obama but couldn't tell us why and Harmony wouldn't tell us who she voted for. We were told not to push so we just left it alone. I am curious but I will respect her. Anyway, Miles also had a project where he had to choose a job he would want when he grew up but it had to be a job that he could explain how it contributed to the community. He chose being a soldier so he could "protect freedom". He drew a picture of a soldier standing in front of a flag. It was too cute! They are having a parade tomorrow where they will wear something that shows what job they chose and walk the school. I will post the pictures this weekend. We will both be there to watch our boy walk proud tomorrow. We've been having some issues with Harmony lately. She has been lying to us as most kids do and we just try to reinforce that you do not lie. Well, she lied to me yesterday which I found out about from an e-mail from her teacher. I e-mailed her teacher about it wanting to get her side of the story and then she talked to Harmony and she lied to her teacher. I was shocked that she would lie to her teacher but we're working on the issue. Anyway, I'm just looking forward to a nice weekend with my family.
28 Oct 08-Hello again! It's been a week. I don't know if I will remember everything that's been going on but I'll just start typing and see what comes out. I've been busy with work and school and just life in general. I finally got some pictures posted. I've been continuing with my walking/running and thankfully I've been able to run a lot longer/further. I still need new shoes but I'm trying to deal with it. Anyway, the kids are doing well. They enjoyed their red ribbon week last week and their crazy hair day was fabulous! They had so much fun with blue spray painted hair. School is still going well for me. It's a little confusing at some times and I had to call my mom for help but I know I will get through it just fine. I guess not a whole lot as changed around here. That's all I can think of for now.
21 Oct 08-The kids had crazy hair day today for red ribbon week and we just had a blast getting them ready. It started last night when I was trying to figure out what I was going to do with Miles. They were already in their PJs and I decided it would be fun to take them to Walgreens and pick up some spray color for hair. They thought that was the coolest thing to go out at night and in their PJs. Harmony's hair was easy to do this morning but not quite a fun to brush out tonight. They had a great day though so it was all worth it. I had to rinse out the blue bathtub after washing that stuff out of Miles' hair. Anyway, this is my busy week so I'm just hoping to get through it. I was able to get 3 miles of walking in today. I'm trying to increase the mileage as often as I can. My feet really hurt though. I really need to get new and decent shoes.
19 Oct 08-This time of year is so crazy. It seems like there is always something going on. Yesterday was by far my most favorite day! I finally got to go meet the twins and they are just precious!! I could have stayed there looking at them and holding them for days! It was so nice to catch up with Pam and Dwayne too. We miss them so much! This week has been a bit more challenging figuring out how to go back to work and get my homework done. I really need to get it in gear and figure out a plan that is going to work for me. Dwayne helped me out greatly by letting me load Microsoft Office on my laptop so I can take it and disappear when I have homework to do and need some quiet to get it done. I am a little more stressed out than I had hoped because of going back to school. I was out of the game for far too long and I'm afraid that I'm just not getting it. We'll see after this week how well I did with my first paper. The paper for this week is worth as much as the final paper so I can't afford to mess it up. Thankfully I have not lost my excitement for school though. This week we have tons of stuff going on. I have a key spouse meeting, some fundraisers for school, fall festival at the school, Seth's birthday party next Saturday and then a carnival on the base. I'll be thankful once this next week is over!
15 Oct 08-Nothing to report today. It was completely uneventful and I am exhausted. :) Good night all!
14 Oct 08-It wasn't as bad as I had expected going back to work today. I was tired but all in all, it was a good day. I actually took a small lunch break today which is something that I don't normally do. I had to go out and buy the new Kenny Chesney Cd! Whoo hoo! Ha ha! It's awesome as usual. It is a lot more mellow than most of his CDs but I really enjoyed it. I only listened to it 7 times or so today. ;) You just can't go wrong with any Kenny CD. That is about all I have for today. I continued my walking and thankfully, because I am back to work, I have 3 days a week of duty time to walk as well so on those days, I will get double! I am going to make sure that I still walk on those days. I really want to strengthen my back. It's been getting worse so I'm hoping the more I exercise, the better it will get but we'll see.
13 Oct 08-I've been trying to just enjoy my last few days off without being on the computer a lot which is why I haven't had an entry in a few days. The most exciting thing that happened in the last few days was Pam and Dwayne had the twins on Friday. They had 2 girls!! Isabel Adriana and Chloe Jayden. I cannot wait to meet them. We were hoping to go today but hopefully some time this week. They are absolutely perfect and they were great size for twins. Chris did some clearing out in the backyard today. It has definitely been cold at night and early morning. When I say cold, I'm talking 30s already. Brr!! We know the kids won't be using the pool so he took it down. We want to spruce up the backyard so he took the fence down too. He took some of the old kids toys out too which was great. The backyard already looks bigger. I listed all of the stuff he took down on Craigslist too and it was all gone quickly! We're discussing what we want to do in the area where the pool was. We'd definitely love to get some pavers or something to make it a nice patio. I know he's always mentioned wanting to knock out our window and making it actually a sliding door so we'll see if we eventually get to that. We don't have the money for that right but it's nice to think we can do that. It will be nice if we can do that eventually. Now that the kids are getting older, we can definitely take advantage of making the house more "grown up". I think that's about it for now. I am in a funk about going back to work. I could have used some more time off. It's always a little intimidating to go back after any amount of time off wondering what changed while I was away. Some of the e-mails I saw really make me question what's been going on.
09 Oct 08-I am beat today. I'm not sure what sucked the life out of me today but I'm looking forward to sleeping in on Saturday. I don't think we have any plans this weekend so that will be nice. I am so not ready to go back to work. I spent most of my time playing the Wii with Miles today. We had tons of fun. I had a pain in my side tonight so I only got a mile and a half in.
08 Oct 08-Today was a good day! I didn't even leave the house. Ha ha! My internet was down this morning so that wasn't a great way but it got better as the day went on. I got another great walk in tonight and my lovely kiddos drew some GREAT art. I was really impressed. I will upload them to their albums on my website tomorrow. For now, I am headed to bed. It was nice to have some extra energy and popped right out of bed this morning. I hope tomorrow is the same.
07 Oct 08-I had a nice quiet day at home today. I only left the house today to go get mice. Normally my leave feels like it flew by. This time, I felt like I should already be back at work but I still have another week and it's so great. I worked on some more of my assignments for next week. To my surprise, my instructor graded my 1st week assignments already. I have a 92% so far in the class! I learned some stuff today with the few things I was marked down on. That was a great thing for me. I finally decided on my next class as well. I'm not sure when I can sign up for it but I'm looking forward to it! I have been trying to improve myself over all so I have been trying to be more active too. My diet is horrible so I need to up my exercise so I don't gain all that weight back I lost while I was deployed. I got 2 1/2 miles in which isn't great but it's better than I've been doing. Besides my back pain, my knees have been giving me problems as well. I'm trying to just work through everything. I truly do not want to go back to the doctor.
06 Oct 08-My online class started today and boy was I overwhelmed at first. I asked Chris to print some stuff out for me and when I had printed stuff in front of me, it made a lot more sense. I spent as much time as I possibly could going through all of it and I actually got all of my first week assignments done, a quiz which I got 100% on and some of next weeks work done too! I am scared to death of failing but I'm just trying not to think that way. It's been 14 years since I've taken classes and the online world is definitely different! Goodness times have changed. I have to write 2 essays and a paper before this class is over. I have to figure out what I want to take next. Thankfully I have a little while to think about it but it's definitely intimidating. Wish me luck to get through this. I am hoping that I can get through all of this with flying colors. It's going to be so great getting to know people. Hopefully this will open up a whole new world for me!
05 Oct 08-It's been another busy and productive weekend. I got a lot of stuff done this weekend. Yesterday was a little emotional for me. It was my yearly walk for the Vasa Previa foundation. We have been doing this walk together since Miles was 5 months old. He still doesn't quite get what we do this for every year but some day he will and it will be fun for him to understand. The girls donated a bit to the walk too so that's always exciting to help the foundation out. The kids finally decided on their costumes. Harmony is going to be a Bratz cat and Miles is going to be a soldier. We found cute costumes for both which is how the finally decided. Cody said he is too old to dress up so he just wants to stay back and hand out candy. :( While it's totally understandable but I just wish they weren't growing up so fast! Elise got home today so I gave her turtle back and her mail and all that fun stuff. She was so sweet and made us some brownies as a thank you. The kids were having so much fun playing outside today too that our normal schedule was way off. (Mom I'll call you during the week since I didn't get to it today.) I've got one week off left to relax before going back to work.
03 Oct 08-I have been having so much fun this last week on leave. Thankfully I have one more week off. I finished going through some boxes this week which was great. Now it really doesn't look like we have a lot of "stuff" even though most of it is in the attic! That was the biggest accomplishment of the week. Other than that, I've just been relaxing and working on more Key Spouse stuff. I went to my training appointment for it this week. The website is set up and I designed it this week as well. It was all perfect timing because the newsletter was mailed this week. I am so excited to get people involved! I feel like I've accomplished something now that I have the website done.
30 Oct 08-I had a great day today! The wing quarterly awards were today and I was asked by the command chief's office to sing. I was nervous as always but I did really well. I always feel like I accomplished something when I sing. I have a couple more things lined up and I don't think it will ever stop. :) The kids are really excited about Halloween. They have worn their costumes more this year prior to the actual event than any other year. It has been fun though. The kids have been learning all kinds of cool things at school. The kids voted yesterday and even came home with their ballot receipts. I had never heard of that before. Too cool! They were not to be coaxed at all. Miles voted for Obama but couldn't tell us why and Harmony wouldn't tell us who she voted for. We were told not to push so we just left it alone. I am curious but I will respect her. Anyway, Miles also had a project where he had to choose a job he would want when he grew up but it had to be a job that he could explain how it contributed to the community. He chose being a soldier so he could "protect freedom". He drew a picture of a soldier standing in front of a flag. It was too cute! They are having a parade tomorrow where they will wear something that shows what job they chose and walk the school. I will post the pictures this weekend. We will both be there to watch our boy walk proud tomorrow. We've been having some issues with Harmony lately. She has been lying to us as most kids do and we just try to reinforce that you do not lie. Well, she lied to me yesterday which I found out about from an e-mail from her teacher. I e-mailed her teacher about it wanting to get her side of the story and then she talked to Harmony and she lied to her teacher. I was shocked that she would lie to her teacher but we're working on the issue. Anyway, I'm just looking forward to a nice weekend with my family.
28 Oct 08-Hello again! It's been a week. I don't know if I will remember everything that's been going on but I'll just start typing and see what comes out. I've been busy with work and school and just life in general. I finally got some pictures posted. I've been continuing with my walking/running and thankfully I've been able to run a lot longer/further. I still need new shoes but I'm trying to deal with it. Anyway, the kids are doing well. They enjoyed their red ribbon week last week and their crazy hair day was fabulous! They had so much fun with blue spray painted hair. School is still going well for me. It's a little confusing at some times and I had to call my mom for help but I know I will get through it just fine. I guess not a whole lot as changed around here. That's all I can think of for now.
21 Oct 08-The kids had crazy hair day today for red ribbon week and we just had a blast getting them ready. It started last night when I was trying to figure out what I was going to do with Miles. They were already in their PJs and I decided it would be fun to take them to Walgreens and pick up some spray color for hair. They thought that was the coolest thing to go out at night and in their PJs. Harmony's hair was easy to do this morning but not quite a fun to brush out tonight. They had a great day though so it was all worth it. I had to rinse out the blue bathtub after washing that stuff out of Miles' hair. Anyway, this is my busy week so I'm just hoping to get through it. I was able to get 3 miles of walking in today. I'm trying to increase the mileage as often as I can. My feet really hurt though. I really need to get new and decent shoes.
19 Oct 08-This time of year is so crazy. It seems like there is always something going on. Yesterday was by far my most favorite day! I finally got to go meet the twins and they are just precious!! I could have stayed there looking at them and holding them for days! It was so nice to catch up with Pam and Dwayne too. We miss them so much! This week has been a bit more challenging figuring out how to go back to work and get my homework done. I really need to get it in gear and figure out a plan that is going to work for me. Dwayne helped me out greatly by letting me load Microsoft Office on my laptop so I can take it and disappear when I have homework to do and need some quiet to get it done. I am a little more stressed out than I had hoped because of going back to school. I was out of the game for far too long and I'm afraid that I'm just not getting it. We'll see after this week how well I did with my first paper. The paper for this week is worth as much as the final paper so I can't afford to mess it up. Thankfully I have not lost my excitement for school though. This week we have tons of stuff going on. I have a key spouse meeting, some fundraisers for school, fall festival at the school, Seth's birthday party next Saturday and then a carnival on the base. I'll be thankful once this next week is over!
15 Oct 08-Nothing to report today. It was completely uneventful and I am exhausted. :) Good night all!
14 Oct 08-It wasn't as bad as I had expected going back to work today. I was tired but all in all, it was a good day. I actually took a small lunch break today which is something that I don't normally do. I had to go out and buy the new Kenny Chesney Cd! Whoo hoo! Ha ha! It's awesome as usual. It is a lot more mellow than most of his CDs but I really enjoyed it. I only listened to it 7 times or so today. ;) You just can't go wrong with any Kenny CD. That is about all I have for today. I continued my walking and thankfully, because I am back to work, I have 3 days a week of duty time to walk as well so on those days, I will get double! I am going to make sure that I still walk on those days. I really want to strengthen my back. It's been getting worse so I'm hoping the more I exercise, the better it will get but we'll see.
13 Oct 08-I've been trying to just enjoy my last few days off without being on the computer a lot which is why I haven't had an entry in a few days. The most exciting thing that happened in the last few days was Pam and Dwayne had the twins on Friday. They had 2 girls!! Isabel Adriana and Chloe Jayden. I cannot wait to meet them. We were hoping to go today but hopefully some time this week. They are absolutely perfect and they were great size for twins. Chris did some clearing out in the backyard today. It has definitely been cold at night and early morning. When I say cold, I'm talking 30s already. Brr!! We know the kids won't be using the pool so he took it down. We want to spruce up the backyard so he took the fence down too. He took some of the old kids toys out too which was great. The backyard already looks bigger. I listed all of the stuff he took down on Craigslist too and it was all gone quickly! We're discussing what we want to do in the area where the pool was. We'd definitely love to get some pavers or something to make it a nice patio. I know he's always mentioned wanting to knock out our window and making it actually a sliding door so we'll see if we eventually get to that. We don't have the money for that right but it's nice to think we can do that. It will be nice if we can do that eventually. Now that the kids are getting older, we can definitely take advantage of making the house more "grown up". I think that's about it for now. I am in a funk about going back to work. I could have used some more time off. It's always a little intimidating to go back after any amount of time off wondering what changed while I was away. Some of the e-mails I saw really make me question what's been going on.
09 Oct 08-I am beat today. I'm not sure what sucked the life out of me today but I'm looking forward to sleeping in on Saturday. I don't think we have any plans this weekend so that will be nice. I am so not ready to go back to work. I spent most of my time playing the Wii with Miles today. We had tons of fun. I had a pain in my side tonight so I only got a mile and a half in.
08 Oct 08-Today was a good day! I didn't even leave the house. Ha ha! My internet was down this morning so that wasn't a great way but it got better as the day went on. I got another great walk in tonight and my lovely kiddos drew some GREAT art. I was really impressed. I will upload them to their albums on my website tomorrow. For now, I am headed to bed. It was nice to have some extra energy and popped right out of bed this morning. I hope tomorrow is the same.
07 Oct 08-I had a nice quiet day at home today. I only left the house today to go get mice. Normally my leave feels like it flew by. This time, I felt like I should already be back at work but I still have another week and it's so great. I worked on some more of my assignments for next week. To my surprise, my instructor graded my 1st week assignments already. I have a 92% so far in the class! I learned some stuff today with the few things I was marked down on. That was a great thing for me. I finally decided on my next class as well. I'm not sure when I can sign up for it but I'm looking forward to it! I have been trying to improve myself over all so I have been trying to be more active too. My diet is horrible so I need to up my exercise so I don't gain all that weight back I lost while I was deployed. I got 2 1/2 miles in which isn't great but it's better than I've been doing. Besides my back pain, my knees have been giving me problems as well. I'm trying to just work through everything. I truly do not want to go back to the doctor.
06 Oct 08-My online class started today and boy was I overwhelmed at first. I asked Chris to print some stuff out for me and when I had printed stuff in front of me, it made a lot more sense. I spent as much time as I possibly could going through all of it and I actually got all of my first week assignments done, a quiz which I got 100% on and some of next weeks work done too! I am scared to death of failing but I'm just trying not to think that way. It's been 14 years since I've taken classes and the online world is definitely different! Goodness times have changed. I have to write 2 essays and a paper before this class is over. I have to figure out what I want to take next. Thankfully I have a little while to think about it but it's definitely intimidating. Wish me luck to get through this. I am hoping that I can get through all of this with flying colors. It's going to be so great getting to know people. Hopefully this will open up a whole new world for me!
05 Oct 08-It's been another busy and productive weekend. I got a lot of stuff done this weekend. Yesterday was a little emotional for me. It was my yearly walk for the Vasa Previa foundation. We have been doing this walk together since Miles was 5 months old. He still doesn't quite get what we do this for every year but some day he will and it will be fun for him to understand. The girls donated a bit to the walk too so that's always exciting to help the foundation out. The kids finally decided on their costumes. Harmony is going to be a Bratz cat and Miles is going to be a soldier. We found cute costumes for both which is how the finally decided. Cody said he is too old to dress up so he just wants to stay back and hand out candy. :( While it's totally understandable but I just wish they weren't growing up so fast! Elise got home today so I gave her turtle back and her mail and all that fun stuff. She was so sweet and made us some brownies as a thank you. The kids were having so much fun playing outside today too that our normal schedule was way off. (Mom I'll call you during the week since I didn't get to it today.) I've got one week off left to relax before going back to work.
03 Oct 08-I have been having so much fun this last week on leave. Thankfully I have one more week off. I finished going through some boxes this week which was great. Now it really doesn't look like we have a lot of "stuff" even though most of it is in the attic! That was the biggest accomplishment of the week. Other than that, I've just been relaxing and working on more Key Spouse stuff. I went to my training appointment for it this week. The website is set up and I designed it this week as well. It was all perfect timing because the newsletter was mailed this week. I am so excited to get people involved! I feel like I've accomplished something now that I have the website done.
01 September 2008
My ramblings-Sep 08
30 Sep 08-Whew! Today was a busy day. The kids and I went grocery shopping today and I got way more than I had expected but I guess we needed it. We were low on a lot of things so now we're good for a while. One of these paydays, I'll be able to get the bare minimum but I figured while we were saving the money on daycare, I might as well take advantage to get the things that we need. I came home and put all the groceries away and grabbed some quick lunch and then decided to make some beef jerky. My friend Mike is in Iraq and I'm sending a goodie box out to him tomorrow so I figured I'd send something homemade to him. :) I started working on the website for the key spouse program today. That's going to be fun to design. That's about it for today.
29 Sep 08-Happy Birthday to my Mommy!! :) Today was my first day of leave and it was great to be off and relaxing. Of course, I did get yelled at by my boss for checking my work e-mail. Oops! She gave me a direct order to stop checking my webmail and enjoy my leave. I didn't do much of anything but some yard work and cleaning up the kitchen and computer room. I didn't feel like doing too much else. Actually the yard work took me a while. All of the houses on this street (and a lot of the other streets) have rocks at the other side of the sidewalk near the street. Anyway, all the kids that play in the neighborhood don't realize that they run through the rocks and kick them out into the street and all over the place. I was staying on top of it for a while but for some reason stopped doing it. I even had to sweep halfway in the road to get all the rocks back where they belonged. I'll definitely have to stay on top of that from now on. What a chore! Tomorrow I get to go grocery shopping and then I'm not sure what else I will do with myself with my time off.
28 Sep 08-I am so thankful that everything went well on Friday. I can't hardly remember what I said when I was in front of my squadron but I'm guessing it went well. I haven't been up to much this weekend. I went through some boxes and finished up the last few things in the closet after Chris cleaned it out. It's so awesome to have my closet back! I can walk all the way in to the back of the closet and it's wonderful! I am looking forward to 2 weeks off of work to get stuff done around the house and just hanging out with the kids. Tonight, I am enjoying all my favorite shows being back on. So far I've watched The Amazing Race, just finished Desperate Housewives and now I have The Unit and Brothers and Sisters to watch! Whoo hoo!! I'll need those 2 weeks off just to catch up!
25 Sep 08-So I have absolutely no reason for missing blogging yesterday. I think I just simply forgot! Oops! Anyway, today was quite the day. I had an 8 a.m. meeting at work, then a 10 a.m. meeting with the commander about the Key Spouse program (and it went wonderful and I am still completely excited!), then off to the Airman and Family Readiness Center (A&FRC) to schedule my training for the program, then to the BX to get shoes for a function tonight, then back to work for a bit and then to the 2:30 p.m. Booster club meeting (the commander asked if I could go so he could introduce me) and then finally to the Airman Leadership School (ALS) graduation. My troop Clint graduated tonight and I am so proud of him!! It is now almost 10 p.m. and I am BEAT!! Whew! I'm so glad this day is over. One more day and then I am off for 2 whole weeks! Tomorrow I get to do my most hated thing - public speaking! Yuck! I know I need to learn to do it so I'm fine with it but I have no idea at this point what I'm going to say. The commander wants to introduce me to the squadron. I will write more about the program and anything else tomorrow. I'm off to watch Grey's Anatomy or Survivor and then get to sleep!
23 Sep 08-Boy is it true what they say that when one door closes, another one opens. I was presented with an opportunity that is right up my alley! Michelle had mentioned my name to the commander a couple of weeks ago to possibly run a program that is very important to our squadron. It is called the Key Spouse program. What I didn't expect was that the commander would personally visit me at work and tell me some of his thoughts/views and to tell me that when she mentioned my name, he thought I would be perfect to run it. I was so honored to be given the opportunity to support the military spouses of my squadron and having a military spouse, I've been on both sides of it and I know I can bring a lot to the table. I already started researching tonight to get ideas and to see what I could do to really get this program to take off. I have an appointment with the commander on Thursday to hear some more of his ideas and to really get this program going. I am so excited to be able to do this and even more so because it's so important to him and he is an awesome commander! We are truly blessed to have 2 great commanders back to back! The program is basically making sure that the spouses of the military members are included in functions and know what events are taking place on the base. It is especially important when the military member is deployed that contact is made with their families left behind. I just get chills thinking of what this program can be. Michelle is just so awesome to have me come to mind when she hears of opportunities like this. I cannot wait to get started!!
I came home to a nice surprise today as well after my wonderful day! Chris went and bought all the supplies to go the attic. What I didn't know was that he was going to make 2. There was an original opening in my walk-in closet and he got up there and put the plywood down and cleared out the insulation so not only will he have one in the garage, but know I will have one as well in the closet!! I am so excited to put stuff up there this weekend!! Storage space is no longer an issue in my house!
22 Sep 08-I've got a busy week planned this week. Today thankfully I didn't have to do anything but work and take my new skirt in to be altered. It has to be a certain length so I had to go drop it off at alterations. Tomorrow is Leah's going away lunch and I'm so glad I don't have any prior engagements that would keep me from going. I wouldn't want to miss it for the world. I am going to miss that girl big time!! I have a training meeting after that. Wednesday Bella has a vet appointment for her last shots and then I can schedule her to get "fixed". Thursday I have an ALS (Airman Leadership School) graduation to go to. My troop, Clint, finally graduates so I will be there to support him. Friday we have commanders call in the morning and then a promotion ceremony in the afternoon. Whew! I'll be ready for leave. Chris bought our new faucet today and I like it!! It's shiny!! Ha ha! (Mom the picture is in the "House" album.) He plans on buying the supplies for the attic storage tomorrow and getting started on that, with Rich's help. I am excited for him to do that so I can have my huge walk-in closet back!! I'll just be happy to get through this week and have 2 whole weeks off! Oh and if you haven't checked out www.yearbookyourself.com go do it!! It is so funny! (Again Mom, the pictures are in the Chris & Tiff album. You'll LOVE them!!)
21 Sep 08-Okay, let me see if I can get back at this thing again. I've just been in a little bit of a funk. I don't know if it's been the weather change, my allergies acting up, crap at work or what but I just go through that every once in a while. It's no biggie. Anyway, there hasn't been too much going on around here. Just trying to get through the every day stuff. The kids are on their first week break. Chris is home on leave with them for the first week and then I'm on leave for the 2 weeks after that. It will be nice to save some $$ and give the kids a break from being at the school. I'm sure Chris will find projects to work on while he is off. Our faucet just quit on us today so he'll have to go get a new one tomorrow. That's about all I can think of to share what is going on. I am going to try to be better about keeping up with this.
15 Sep 08-Again, sorry for the break in posts. I was super busy over the weekend. I had to go shopping for a baby gift Saturday morning and I attempted to get my oil changed. There were too many people in line for the oil change so I got the gift and came back home. I wrapped the gift, scarfed down some food and then headed to the baby shower. After the almost 2 hour baby show, I headed to the commissary to do my grocery shopping. I ended up running to multiple people that I ended up chatting with for a while. After I got home, I started putting tthings away and then had to do some more rearranging in my pantry. Needless to say, after all that I was exhausted. All of this was after having been woken up at 5:30 by Cody asking to play a video game. Ugh! Sunday was probably the most exciting day because I finally got to line dry my clothes!! Whoo hoo!! I didn't end up with a clothesline but looking at the back patio, I asked Chris if he could figure out something and he sure did. It basically looks like a closet, but outside! It was so awesome to dry my clothes outside. It didn't take any time at all and I only had to put each load in the dryer for 5-10 minutes to soften them up and take the wrinkles out! Laundry is now officially my favorite chore!
11 Sep 08-Today felt like Monday for some reason. It wasn't really bad or anything, just felt like Monday. Things are good when we're busy but when we're not, time ticks by slowly. Anyway, they were having another case lot sale at the commissary today. It's like going to Costco without the membership and they only do it every so often. Chris got a bunch of stuff and it's always fun to see how much is in one case of stuff that we need. I usually just go for the body wash because it doesn't go bad. We got cereal, body wash, toilet paper, fabric softener, some snacks, etc. :) That will lessen our grocery bill for a while. We had parent/teacher conferences today with both Harmony and Miles' teachers. They both went great as they knew they would. Miles' teacher is just so smitten with him. She said he was doing great and she has no concerns about him. She said she never has to worry about him and that he can sit anywhere on the carpet that he wants while they're going over their letter board because he doesn't get distracted by anyone or get caught up in talking. She said he's just such a sweetheart. I guess she let him do something one day that she wouldn't normally do but she said she just couldn't resist those big sad eyes looking at her. Boy has he got her number! LOL Harmony's teacher said Harmony is doing very well also and that she's right on track too. She said she has improved a ton since the school year started. The only problem with her this year has been her chattiness (can't imagine where she got that from!!) but we think we've all fixed that for the most part. I guess she also tends to shut down when she doesn't understand something but she's gotten better at that too. I was so proud of both of them today and so are their teachers. I would love to be able to go to Cody's conference when he has it but no such luck. Either way, I have 3 terrific, smart kids and I'm a proud mommy!
10 Sep 08-Today was another boring day on the home front. However, I did start my day with a good laugh. I just cannot get enough sleep like I mentioned yesterday. Well I guess I slept HARD last night because when my alarm went off this morning, I just felt like I was not awake yet. I couldn't focus, I couldn't think and I couldn't walk. I got around to the end of the bed and just fell for some reason. I just kind of veered away from where I was trying to walk. I dropped my shampoo in the shower, dropped my cup when I got it out for my milk, etc. Thankfully it was a PT day and I was able to walk my 3 miles before work so I could fully wake up. It's just before 8 p.m. right now and I am going to attempt to go to sleep now so I can try to get caught up on sleep. I think I need a full day in bed to recover from whatever this fatigue is.
09 Sep 08-So Mom, sorry you're not hearing this from me on the phone but it looks like the move to Cali isn't going to happen. It's still up in the air but they had 2 volunteers finally step forward that are stationed there. That definitely takes him out of the lime light. However, they have to go through the approval process. So, that means that he's still in the running for it if they don't qualify. It's so hard because I really want to go to be close to my family but it would be so hard to be away from Cody and to figure out what we were going to do with this house. It's definitely out of our hands so we'll see what happens from here. I think my iron may be low so I may be going to the doc soon to get tested. It happens every once in a while. I'm assuming that because I am just exhausted all the time. I can't get enough sleep. Nothing else really to report. I had a fun day at work today.
08 Sep 08-Oh what a month this has been already. Let's see if I can catch everyone up to date. Chris received news that he has an assignment as a non-volunteer to do instructor duty at Beale AFB in Marysville, CA. He still doesn't know as of yet if he has to go or not so we'll keep you updated. I sewed on my new stripe on the first so that was pretty exciting for me! Nothing has really changed though. LOL I've been busy since last week with a 100% inventory of our ammo. We do them twice a year and it's a busy time and just a bunch of work. We were at work until 7:45 p.m. Friday night and then for about 6 hours on Saturday. We're finishing up this week. That's pretty much all that's going on but the possible pending assignment to Cali is a HUGE deal. Obviously we're worried about the house and leaving Cody. Other than that, it would be a fantastic opportunity for both of us!
04 Sep 08-I will have to take some extra time this weekend to catch everyone up on what has been going on. Right now, I just don't have the time and I need to sleep instead of blog. I will do my best to update on Sunday with all of it!
02 Sep 08-Today definitely felt like a Monday even though it's Tuesday. Every messed up thing that could have happened, happened. I won't bore you with the details but boy was I glad when 4 p.m. came! Now I get to watch 90210! Whoo hoo! I am such a kid sometimes.
01 Sep 08-Forgive the last week of my site being down. I can only assume that the pictures I posted from Aileen's visit to the girls took up too much bandwidth on my site. Jen (my webmistress as I call her) doubled it so I hopefully won't have that problem again. Thursday was pretty exciting for me. I applied to the American Military University and signed up for an online class. I really need to finish my CCAF degree. I am so proud of myself but scared at the same time Wish me luck! We've had a fun weekend. Friday we didn't really do a whole lot. We painted the dining room which turned out fantastic! Saturday I went to my first football game. We went to see the U of A Wildcats play and the whooped up on Idaho 70-0. It poured the whole time but it was awesome! The pictures will be up on the site after I finish posting this entry. Yesterday I wasn't feeling well so Chris worked on painting the bedroom. I can only assume that it was the stadium dog that had my stomach upset but who knows. Thankfully whatever it was is gone now. Today, we watched Katie and Wade's boys so they could go riding on his motorcycle. It was nice to give them a chance to get out and I got my baby fix again. :) The most exciting part about today is that I am officially a TSgt now!! I get to show off my new stripe tomorrow!!
29 Sep 08-Happy Birthday to my Mommy!! :) Today was my first day of leave and it was great to be off and relaxing. Of course, I did get yelled at by my boss for checking my work e-mail. Oops! She gave me a direct order to stop checking my webmail and enjoy my leave. I didn't do much of anything but some yard work and cleaning up the kitchen and computer room. I didn't feel like doing too much else. Actually the yard work took me a while. All of the houses on this street (and a lot of the other streets) have rocks at the other side of the sidewalk near the street. Anyway, all the kids that play in the neighborhood don't realize that they run through the rocks and kick them out into the street and all over the place. I was staying on top of it for a while but for some reason stopped doing it. I even had to sweep halfway in the road to get all the rocks back where they belonged. I'll definitely have to stay on top of that from now on. What a chore! Tomorrow I get to go grocery shopping and then I'm not sure what else I will do with myself with my time off.
28 Sep 08-I am so thankful that everything went well on Friday. I can't hardly remember what I said when I was in front of my squadron but I'm guessing it went well. I haven't been up to much this weekend. I went through some boxes and finished up the last few things in the closet after Chris cleaned it out. It's so awesome to have my closet back! I can walk all the way in to the back of the closet and it's wonderful! I am looking forward to 2 weeks off of work to get stuff done around the house and just hanging out with the kids. Tonight, I am enjoying all my favorite shows being back on. So far I've watched The Amazing Race, just finished Desperate Housewives and now I have The Unit and Brothers and Sisters to watch! Whoo hoo!! I'll need those 2 weeks off just to catch up!
25 Sep 08-So I have absolutely no reason for missing blogging yesterday. I think I just simply forgot! Oops! Anyway, today was quite the day. I had an 8 a.m. meeting at work, then a 10 a.m. meeting with the commander about the Key Spouse program (and it went wonderful and I am still completely excited!), then off to the Airman and Family Readiness Center (A&FRC) to schedule my training for the program, then to the BX to get shoes for a function tonight, then back to work for a bit and then to the 2:30 p.m. Booster club meeting (the commander asked if I could go so he could introduce me) and then finally to the Airman Leadership School (ALS) graduation. My troop Clint graduated tonight and I am so proud of him!! It is now almost 10 p.m. and I am BEAT!! Whew! I'm so glad this day is over. One more day and then I am off for 2 whole weeks! Tomorrow I get to do my most hated thing - public speaking! Yuck! I know I need to learn to do it so I'm fine with it but I have no idea at this point what I'm going to say. The commander wants to introduce me to the squadron. I will write more about the program and anything else tomorrow. I'm off to watch Grey's Anatomy or Survivor and then get to sleep!
23 Sep 08-Boy is it true what they say that when one door closes, another one opens. I was presented with an opportunity that is right up my alley! Michelle had mentioned my name to the commander a couple of weeks ago to possibly run a program that is very important to our squadron. It is called the Key Spouse program. What I didn't expect was that the commander would personally visit me at work and tell me some of his thoughts/views and to tell me that when she mentioned my name, he thought I would be perfect to run it. I was so honored to be given the opportunity to support the military spouses of my squadron and having a military spouse, I've been on both sides of it and I know I can bring a lot to the table. I already started researching tonight to get ideas and to see what I could do to really get this program to take off. I have an appointment with the commander on Thursday to hear some more of his ideas and to really get this program going. I am so excited to be able to do this and even more so because it's so important to him and he is an awesome commander! We are truly blessed to have 2 great commanders back to back! The program is basically making sure that the spouses of the military members are included in functions and know what events are taking place on the base. It is especially important when the military member is deployed that contact is made with their families left behind. I just get chills thinking of what this program can be. Michelle is just so awesome to have me come to mind when she hears of opportunities like this. I cannot wait to get started!!
I came home to a nice surprise today as well after my wonderful day! Chris went and bought all the supplies to go the attic. What I didn't know was that he was going to make 2. There was an original opening in my walk-in closet and he got up there and put the plywood down and cleared out the insulation so not only will he have one in the garage, but know I will have one as well in the closet!! I am so excited to put stuff up there this weekend!! Storage space is no longer an issue in my house!
22 Sep 08-I've got a busy week planned this week. Today thankfully I didn't have to do anything but work and take my new skirt in to be altered. It has to be a certain length so I had to go drop it off at alterations. Tomorrow is Leah's going away lunch and I'm so glad I don't have any prior engagements that would keep me from going. I wouldn't want to miss it for the world. I am going to miss that girl big time!! I have a training meeting after that. Wednesday Bella has a vet appointment for her last shots and then I can schedule her to get "fixed". Thursday I have an ALS (Airman Leadership School) graduation to go to. My troop, Clint, finally graduates so I will be there to support him. Friday we have commanders call in the morning and then a promotion ceremony in the afternoon. Whew! I'll be ready for leave. Chris bought our new faucet today and I like it!! It's shiny!! Ha ha! (Mom the picture is in the "House" album.) He plans on buying the supplies for the attic storage tomorrow and getting started on that, with Rich's help. I am excited for him to do that so I can have my huge walk-in closet back!! I'll just be happy to get through this week and have 2 whole weeks off! Oh and if you haven't checked out www.yearbookyourself.com go do it!! It is so funny! (Again Mom, the pictures are in the Chris & Tiff album. You'll LOVE them!!)
21 Sep 08-Okay, let me see if I can get back at this thing again. I've just been in a little bit of a funk. I don't know if it's been the weather change, my allergies acting up, crap at work or what but I just go through that every once in a while. It's no biggie. Anyway, there hasn't been too much going on around here. Just trying to get through the every day stuff. The kids are on their first week break. Chris is home on leave with them for the first week and then I'm on leave for the 2 weeks after that. It will be nice to save some $$ and give the kids a break from being at the school. I'm sure Chris will find projects to work on while he is off. Our faucet just quit on us today so he'll have to go get a new one tomorrow. That's about all I can think of to share what is going on. I am going to try to be better about keeping up with this.
15 Sep 08-Again, sorry for the break in posts. I was super busy over the weekend. I had to go shopping for a baby gift Saturday morning and I attempted to get my oil changed. There were too many people in line for the oil change so I got the gift and came back home. I wrapped the gift, scarfed down some food and then headed to the baby shower. After the almost 2 hour baby show, I headed to the commissary to do my grocery shopping. I ended up running to multiple people that I ended up chatting with for a while. After I got home, I started putting tthings away and then had to do some more rearranging in my pantry. Needless to say, after all that I was exhausted. All of this was after having been woken up at 5:30 by Cody asking to play a video game. Ugh! Sunday was probably the most exciting day because I finally got to line dry my clothes!! Whoo hoo!! I didn't end up with a clothesline but looking at the back patio, I asked Chris if he could figure out something and he sure did. It basically looks like a closet, but outside! It was so awesome to dry my clothes outside. It didn't take any time at all and I only had to put each load in the dryer for 5-10 minutes to soften them up and take the wrinkles out! Laundry is now officially my favorite chore!
11 Sep 08-Today felt like Monday for some reason. It wasn't really bad or anything, just felt like Monday. Things are good when we're busy but when we're not, time ticks by slowly. Anyway, they were having another case lot sale at the commissary today. It's like going to Costco without the membership and they only do it every so often. Chris got a bunch of stuff and it's always fun to see how much is in one case of stuff that we need. I usually just go for the body wash because it doesn't go bad. We got cereal, body wash, toilet paper, fabric softener, some snacks, etc. :) That will lessen our grocery bill for a while. We had parent/teacher conferences today with both Harmony and Miles' teachers. They both went great as they knew they would. Miles' teacher is just so smitten with him. She said he was doing great and she has no concerns about him. She said she never has to worry about him and that he can sit anywhere on the carpet that he wants while they're going over their letter board because he doesn't get distracted by anyone or get caught up in talking. She said he's just such a sweetheart. I guess she let him do something one day that she wouldn't normally do but she said she just couldn't resist those big sad eyes looking at her. Boy has he got her number! LOL Harmony's teacher said Harmony is doing very well also and that she's right on track too. She said she has improved a ton since the school year started. The only problem with her this year has been her chattiness (can't imagine where she got that from!!) but we think we've all fixed that for the most part. I guess she also tends to shut down when she doesn't understand something but she's gotten better at that too. I was so proud of both of them today and so are their teachers. I would love to be able to go to Cody's conference when he has it but no such luck. Either way, I have 3 terrific, smart kids and I'm a proud mommy!
10 Sep 08-Today was another boring day on the home front. However, I did start my day with a good laugh. I just cannot get enough sleep like I mentioned yesterday. Well I guess I slept HARD last night because when my alarm went off this morning, I just felt like I was not awake yet. I couldn't focus, I couldn't think and I couldn't walk. I got around to the end of the bed and just fell for some reason. I just kind of veered away from where I was trying to walk. I dropped my shampoo in the shower, dropped my cup when I got it out for my milk, etc. Thankfully it was a PT day and I was able to walk my 3 miles before work so I could fully wake up. It's just before 8 p.m. right now and I am going to attempt to go to sleep now so I can try to get caught up on sleep. I think I need a full day in bed to recover from whatever this fatigue is.
09 Sep 08-So Mom, sorry you're not hearing this from me on the phone but it looks like the move to Cali isn't going to happen. It's still up in the air but they had 2 volunteers finally step forward that are stationed there. That definitely takes him out of the lime light. However, they have to go through the approval process. So, that means that he's still in the running for it if they don't qualify. It's so hard because I really want to go to be close to my family but it would be so hard to be away from Cody and to figure out what we were going to do with this house. It's definitely out of our hands so we'll see what happens from here. I think my iron may be low so I may be going to the doc soon to get tested. It happens every once in a while. I'm assuming that because I am just exhausted all the time. I can't get enough sleep. Nothing else really to report. I had a fun day at work today.
08 Sep 08-Oh what a month this has been already. Let's see if I can catch everyone up to date. Chris received news that he has an assignment as a non-volunteer to do instructor duty at Beale AFB in Marysville, CA. He still doesn't know as of yet if he has to go or not so we'll keep you updated. I sewed on my new stripe on the first so that was pretty exciting for me! Nothing has really changed though. LOL I've been busy since last week with a 100% inventory of our ammo. We do them twice a year and it's a busy time and just a bunch of work. We were at work until 7:45 p.m. Friday night and then for about 6 hours on Saturday. We're finishing up this week. That's pretty much all that's going on but the possible pending assignment to Cali is a HUGE deal. Obviously we're worried about the house and leaving Cody. Other than that, it would be a fantastic opportunity for both of us!
04 Sep 08-I will have to take some extra time this weekend to catch everyone up on what has been going on. Right now, I just don't have the time and I need to sleep instead of blog. I will do my best to update on Sunday with all of it!
02 Sep 08-Today definitely felt like a Monday even though it's Tuesday. Every messed up thing that could have happened, happened. I won't bore you with the details but boy was I glad when 4 p.m. came! Now I get to watch 90210! Whoo hoo! I am such a kid sometimes.
01 Sep 08-Forgive the last week of my site being down. I can only assume that the pictures I posted from Aileen's visit to the girls took up too much bandwidth on my site. Jen (my webmistress as I call her) doubled it so I hopefully won't have that problem again. Thursday was pretty exciting for me. I applied to the American Military University and signed up for an online class. I really need to finish my CCAF degree. I am so proud of myself but scared at the same time Wish me luck! We've had a fun weekend. Friday we didn't really do a whole lot. We painted the dining room which turned out fantastic! Saturday I went to my first football game. We went to see the U of A Wildcats play and the whooped up on Idaho 70-0. It poured the whole time but it was awesome! The pictures will be up on the site after I finish posting this entry. Yesterday I wasn't feeling well so Chris worked on painting the bedroom. I can only assume that it was the stadium dog that had my stomach upset but who knows. Thankfully whatever it was is gone now. Today, we watched Katie and Wade's boys so they could go riding on his motorcycle. It was nice to give them a chance to get out and I got my baby fix again. :) The most exciting part about today is that I am officially a TSgt now!! I get to show off my new stripe tomorrow!!
01 August 2008
My ramblings-Aug 08
26 Aug 08-Ugh! That's all I have to say about today. :( Come on 4 day weekend!!
25 Aug 08-Today was back to the grind. It's always nice to get back to a routine although some days I dread going back to work. I really need some good time off of work I think. Anyway, you'll see this once my site comes back up but it's down because too much bandwidth was used. I guess that's because all the girls from my mommy's group were looking at the pictures from my visit with Aileen. From now on, I'm just going to upload them to Photobucket or something so it doesn't clog up my site. Hopefully Jen will get it fixed soon. :( I hate when that happens. Anyway, Miles had his home visit today with his teacher and that was a lot of fun. He really enjoyed having her here and getting to show off his room and his pets and playing Candyland with her. I think that's such a neat program that the school does.
24 Aug 08-Today was just a day to get caught up on everything that needed to be done around the house that we didn't get to Friday because we weren't here and then Saturday because we were just too tired when we got home. Nothing interesting happened at all. :)
23 Aug 08-Sorry I skipped a couple of days in there. I've been a little bit busy. A few months ago, I found out that Aileen from my "mommy's group" was going to be here from New York on vacation. We definitely wanted to make plans to meet so I told her that we'd drive to Scottsdale and then stay the night there so we could go do to dinner and then breakfast before they headed out for Sedona. So, yesterday after work, we headed out for Scottsdale (near Phoenix). It took us a little longer to get there than expected because is just construction everywhere! Anyway, we decided on just having pizza since her hubby was headed to a Diamondbacks game. Aileen and the girls met us in the parking lot when we pulled up and it was just so great to meet her in person. She is just truly a doll and so are her girls. After dinner and letting the kids run around while we chatted, we went down to the pool. The place that they were staying in was a timeshare and it was absolutely gorgeous. The pool had a waterfall and everything (which the kids thought was just the coolest). Harmony and Gabbi became fast friends and were inseparable for the short time we all had together. We got back to the hotel and got to bed about midnight and then got up to meet them for breakfast. I have been blessed to meet 3 of the girls now off the site and can't wait to meet even more. On the way back, we decided to stop at this ostrich farm that we've seen for years in between here and Phoenix and I'm so glad we did. I was wondering how interesting it could possibly be but little did I know that it wasn't just ostriches. They also had deer, donkeys and birds to feed. It was awesome!! My favorite part was the birds and had we had more cash on us, we might STILL be there feeding the birds. It's only an hour from here so we will definitely be going back before they shut down for the winter in October! On the way back, the traffic was horrendous and we had no idea why. Chris realized that there were no cars headed at all in the direction of Phoenix so that probably meant accident. We had taken a different route to come back so we had to backtrack a little to get to the ostrich farm. We missed a deadly tractor trailer accident by a very short period of time. We saw it on the way back and just knew that someone had to have died in it. We found out after we got home that someone had. :( How tragic and scary. Anyway, we had a wonderful time visiting with Aileen and her family and I am so glad that we got the chance to do that!
20 Aug 08-SSgt results came out today and I had reason to celebrate another promotion cycle. My troop, Clint, made it so I was excited to see his name today and also to be able to tack his stripe on. I guess the commander didn't expect me to be able to hit hard and was surprised when I put some weight behind in. LOL Also on that list was Ashley my favorite female troop ever, Shane my protege' and my girlfriend Monica. It was a good day to celebrate.
19 Aug 08-Happy Birthday to Auntie Katie!! Harmony was so excited to call her and wish her a happy birthday today. It was cute. Katie said she was cracking her up. I got to go see one of my favorite men today-the chiropractor! Have I mentioned that I love that man?? I wish I could see him every day. At least 1 day every 2 weeks, my back feels better! I got to visit with Sheree' tonight which is always a treat for me. She lives right next door but we hardly ever see each other and it's definitely made us appreciate each other more. Me, her and Elise are planning a coffee date for next week and I'm so looking forward to it! Life is just so busy, it's hard to get girlfriend time in!
18 Aug 08-Not much to report today. It seems as though everyone had a case of "The Monday's". It was very evident as I walked through the door and no one said a word. Normally when anyone that works in our office walks in, they're greeted with "Good morning". That was not the case today. Let's hope tomorrow is better. Thankfully I had tons of paperwork come back today so I kept myself busy was able to send my airman home early. I hate days like today. We had a nice dinner tonight so that means a good lunch tomorrow! Other than that, that's all she wrote for today!
17 Aug 08-Happy Birthday to my friend Amy!! I had one of the busiest days today. It's already 9 and I'm just now getting to write in my blog before I go shower, get ready for bed and watch Big Brother. Today after breakfast and relaxing, I took Harmony, Miles and Bella to Petco to get mice. That is our weekend routine now and all the girls there know me. One in particular always comes to see Bella and commented today on how she's growing. They all just adore her for sure! Today was "sheet day" and that is probably one of my least favorite chores. I cleaned the fish tank today, did more laundry, put all the laundry away that I never got to yesterday, went through the kids backpacks (finally), cleaned the kitchen, blah, blah, blah. Chris finally installed the last 2 lights and was also working his butt off outside. It was just so hot and muggy that neither one of us wanted to cook. I needed a few things so I decided to go to Fry's and check out the deli for something for dinner there. It was nice that we didn't have to cook. So, now that the bags are packed, laundry is put away, kids are bathed and in bed, I am off to relax before starting another week. Ugh! Thankfully we have a 4 day weekend coming up!
16 Aug 08-We had our visit with Katie and family today and it was so nice to see them. Her boys are just the cutest!! They enjoyed the dogs and the other animals and I even took Ali out so they could "pet" her too. I got my baby fix in today big time! LOL Thomas is just the sweetest little baby. Thankfully he took to me and I got to hold him a lot and it was so nice. They are all just so wonderful and it's so nice to have more family in town. I've gone from having no family around me for most of my career to now having Chris' uncle who doesn't live in Tucson anymore but at least Arizona, Chris' cousin Bruce and now Katie and her family. It just makes being here feel a little more "normal". I put pictures up on the website today so go take a look and you'll see just how cute their boys are. We had a nice storm tonight too. We got an inch of rain in only about 20 minutes. I was just telling Chris earlier today that I was hoping for some good rain so it would wash all the dirt in the street away from when he was hauling truck loads of dirt here so we could extend the grass in the backyard. Boy did I get what I asked for. The backyard started to flood so poor Chris was in the backyard in the rain with a rake trying to dig a path for the water to flow out. He was soaked when he came back in but we sure needed that rain. Just as he was able to go out and do it properly with a shovel, it started to rain again. I say bring it on! I had to laugh as I was tucking Miles in tonight. Apparently he has my OCD. He couldn't get something on his shelf just right and would not let me tuck him in until it was perfectly straight. All I could was be patient and laugh.
15 Aug 08-Today was really, really hot and sticky. Yuck!! We had Mike's (Koeller) retirement today. It was bittersweet. I know he's moved on to bigger and better things but it will be weird not having him around. I sang for his retirement too and I'm so glad. I wouldn't have missed it for the world! Chris is playing poker with the boys tonight so it's just me at home with the kids. Harmony is super excited because Auntie Katie and family are coming to visit tomorrow. I'm so glad we're finally getting a chance to get together. I know Harmony is going to have a hard time sleeping tonight. She was jumping up and down screaming when she overheard me mention to Katie about coming tomorrow. It's going to be so much fun to see them!
14 Aug 08-We sure did get those storms I was hoping for last night!! We woke up at 11:30 p.m. to Bella barking and we couldn't figure out why. It was hailing and it was hitting the window unit and caused her to go into protect mode although the poor thing was scared too. I ended up sitting with her on the couch for a bit until she calmed down. The storm was AWESOME!! The news said we had 450 lightning strikes per 10 minutes. The sky just looked like a big strobe light. I was laughing because Holly was just mentioning yesterday that the storms were weak here after we'd done all this bragging to the "newbies" about how the monsoons are so awesome here. We all told her today she needed to keep talking smack about them so we could get some more raging storms! My rain barrel is completely full today!! Other than that from last night, today was one of the most boring days of my life. I never thought we'd see 4:00. After I got home and finished up the nightly routine, just before Miles got in bed, he gave me a very proud mommy moment to brag about!
13 Aug 08-It was a HOT one today! My goodness! I was drenched after doing my PT at 6 in the morning. It was already almost unbearable. It only got worse as the day went on. Humidity is up and storms are all around us. Hopefully they will hit because I really need to have my rain barrel filled back up. The garden sure doesn't need it but I really need my Oleanders to start growing. They are sure slow starters. Other than that, there's not much going on at all. I finally got a chance to sit down and relax after emptying book bags, making lunches, helping with homework, cleaning up after the messy clan, etc. Chris moved the Wii into the bedroom for me so I could actually play it. I never get to use it because everyone else is always hogging the big TV. :( Now I can actually enjoy my Wii Fit daily like I've been wanting to. Wow! I just realized, I have a TiVo, a laptop, a scrapbook desk, a treadmill with weights AND the Wii in my bedroom now. I might never come out!!! LOL It's like my own mini apartment! It will really be nice once I paint it and hopefully rearrange some.
12 Aug 08-Today we had a squadron "stand down" and had to go to the theater for a briefing. What this means is that it was time for the commander to get us all together to brief us on what has been going on. In the group overall, there have been a rash of incidents that are concerning to senior leadership. I won't share them all here because it's like airing dirty laundry and I don't want to do that. It was basically a "come to Jesus" meeting and it was eye opening. Hopefully it does the trick because I was here 4 years ago when things went down the tubes and we worked long hours and life was hell. I have been praying hard that things don't go down that road again. Other than that, it was another quiet day in my world.
11 Aug 08-Boring, boring, boring is all I can say about today. I went to to the doc. He gave me some drops to try and said if it doesn't get better to make an appointment with my off base eye doc and they'll put in an emergency referral so that was good news. Hopefully the drops will work and it's just acting up because of my recent sinus infection but we'll see. Other than that, nothing to report. Be back tomorrow with hopefully more to talk about. :)
10 Aug 08-We had more fun shampooing carpets today! (Or should I say Chris did.) Anyway, the most exciting thing of the day was getting in the garden and harvesting veggies. We pulled out some huge radish and cucumbers and pulled a ton of lettuce. The kids had cucumbers (by request) for snack today and I made salad for dinner from the garden. We'll have to take quite a bit to people at work to get rid of it because there is just so much. Chris said that there are about 30 more cucumbers growing. He also pulled out two gourds. I have no idea what to do with them so I'll have to search the internet for those. LOL I don't think they'll make it to Halloween for decorations! My eye is bothering me unfortunately. A couple of years ago I had to have surgery to have some of my natural tube that connects my nasolacrimal duct (or commonly referred to as tear duct although that's not what it is) and have a plastic tube put in because the hole is so small on mine that it would get blocked easily. Well now my right eye is doing the same thing. What happens is that my eye constantly waters because what is supposed to drain out down the tube can't because I can get the tiniest speck of dirt in there, comes out of my eye instead. It's annoying because it blurs my vision and causes the skin in the corner of my eye and the side of my nose to become irritated from wiping away the tears and stuff so often. I really don't want to go through that surgery again and all the poking and prodding in my eye but it's better than the annoyance of my eye constantly watering. I can't wear mascara or eyeliner now on the bottom either which makes my eyes look small. That may sound silly to you but I'm pretty set in my ways when it comes to my make-up. LOL I go with what works and what looks good and I hate having to change it. Ugh! More to come on that.
09 Aug 08-I guess while I was at dinner last night, Cody was out front playing football with some of the neighbors. Well he jammed his finger and was complaining that it hurt but his range of motion was fine so I didn't think too much of it. I've had that happen and I know that it hurts. Today, we went shopping at the BX and I saw that it was turning a little purple so I showed Chris and he took him to urgent care to get it looked at. We were guessing it was sprained and that's what it was. The doc taped his 2 fingers together and ordered x-rays for him. However, the x-ray place was closed so he'll have to take him this week. They said it wasn't broken though so that's good. We got Miles his "big boy" haircut today and he really liked it. The stylist was just making such a fuss over him and his big blue eyes and long eyelashes. I was getting a kick out of it. He was quite talkative to her which is unusual for him to do to a stranger. I couldn't help but just sit there in the chair and smile at him. We bought a steam cleaner today for the carpets which was fantastic. I like our Kirby but we really needed something that could deep clean. Let's face it, with 3 kids and 4 dogs, the carpets get some spots on them that we can't tell which one of them made it. That thing is awesome. Chris is going to be busy for a while. I told him that I even want to move furniture eventually. LOL Poor thing. I have all these projects. I told him that the one I had for myself was to paint. I really, really, really want to change some of the wall colors, especially in the bedroom. I want some kind of warm brown tone. Something other than that green. I do not like that color of green at all. Yet another benefit of owning our home!! We all had a nice lunch together too and then came home so Chris could take Cody to urgent care. I took the other 2 and Bella with me to get mice and fish food. That's always an adventure. One of the girls there came up to us and spoke directly to Bella about remembering her. She is just so in love with her. How could you not be? She's adorable! LOL I think that's about all that went on today. I just love the weekends!
08 Aug 08-Thank goodness this week is over. It was sure a long one after my short leave. I really feel like I need a vacation! I went out to dinner tonight with Leah, Kelly, and Tiana. We went to Outback Steakhouse. It was the first time I had ever been there. It was a little expensive for me but it was really good. It was nice to get out and enjoy some time with friends. I am going to miss Leah so much when she leaves. I just adore her. :) Other than that, not much is going on or not anything that I care to talk about. Things are work are getting kind of crazy but not in my shop. It's things that the flight as a whole will end up having to pay for so I'll deal with/post about that when the time comes. Hopefully supervision has a handle on it so it doesn't come down to that. We'll just see how it all goes. I've been down that path once before here and I surely don't want to go again. We are taking Miles to get a nice big boy haircut tomorrow for his pictures on Tuesday. I'm so excited for his first school pictures! They are all doing so well in school. Cody just started back this week too and he said he really liked it and he liked his teacher. I guess people said bad things about his teacher so he was apprehensive that he might not like him. He said he did though so that was good. That helped to spark the conversation with him about hearing what other people say but not forming an opinion based off of what he hears. I told him to always find out for himself. I have always been that way and want to instill that in my kids as well. I'm not a first impression kind of gal. I hope that others are the same way because if people went off first impressions of me, I might not have as many friends as I do. I know that people have off days or just aren't good at meeting people. I never hold that against anyone. Anyway, since I've truly lived up to the title of my blog tonight, I'll close with that. I am ready to get a good night sleep finally. This is the first night that my OCD has NOT kicked in even though I'm still up late. I cannot wait to sleep in tomorrow!
07 Aug 08-I had another fun day cutting up at the office. I was a little moody today for some reason. I'm not quite sure why but I'm over it. LOL I paid off a few more bills today and figured out my budget and what we have coming in versus going out. I'm in major "planning for our first mortgage payment" mode. Scary! My lights came today so I was super excited for that and Chris was nice enough to put up the 3 out front for me today so we could see them tonight and they look so nice. It took me a while to find them but I think I did well! The pics are in the house album on the site. :)
06 Aug 08-I am such a dork. I just got done signing up for e-bills for every account I own. Most don't have balances but just in case, I wanted to set them up. I even created a new account just so the e-mails wouldn't get lost with all the spam in our main account. I was super excited when DIRECTV said they would give me a $5 credit for going paperless! Whoo hoo! I saved tons of trees today. Okay, so don't think that I am going to turn into a tree hugger or anything. I won't be quite like that (not that I think anything is wrong with it, it's just not my style) but I am really enjoying this whole going green thing. On my "Mommy's group" we do a weekly photo contest and Michelle, who is an awesome photographer, teaches us things that our cameras can do and urges us to use our manuals to learn more. She gives us tips and has us try new things. I did that today to submit my photos for the contest and it was a lot of fun. I'm going to need to learn how to do all this stuff anyway because I really would like to be a professional photographer when I retire and set my own schedule. After being the military's "drone" for 20+ years, it would be nice to call my own shots! In case you are wondering, I am starting to feel more human although I am still feeling quite run down. Besides that, I just really had a good day today.
05 Aug 08-I got to start my day by seeing one of my favorite men-my chiropractor. Besides him always making me feel like a million bucks, he's always such a joy to talk to. After I got to work I spent an hour or so cleaning the bathroom in our building. As a NCO, I shouldn't be doing it but no one else did it so I had to do it. It will be pointed out that I had to do it and how the bathroom should stay. I don't even like cleaning my OWN bathroom! Yuck! It was nasty!! The rest of the day was just catching up still from the week that I was on leave. I was busy at home tonight going through the kids backpacks, packing their snacks, my lunch, my gym bag, paying bills, balancing checkbook, etc. Whew! I am amazed at how much paperwork having multiple children in school generates. I decided to get a little more organized this year and start scanning in the papers that are important and keeping them in their own folders and then throwing away the actual paper copy. It's so nice to have that capability!!
04 Aug 08-It was so nice to get back to the grind today after my whirlwind trip. It was nice to have some normalcy again. I received a call from the Command Chief this morning thanking me for the interview again and letting me know that I wasn't selected for something I didn't do, that the interview was very good but he just went a "different route" whatever that means. He said that he could tell I had a bright career ahead of me and hopefully we'd cross paths again. I thought that was nice and it made me feel much better.
03 Aug 08-I am back home now and finally settled. It was such a whirlwind of a trip but I had the best time ever and realized just how much I missed my family and I can't wait to get back and spend the kind of time I want to with everyone. My brothers wedding was so beautiful and everything was so perfect. It was such an emotional day for me and I hadn't even thought about it being that way. The whole setting was just beautiful and I could not be happier for them. We all just love Juliet so much. As far as we're concerned, she's been in our family for years anyway, now it's just official. She was the most beautiful bride. The reception was really nice too and I had a blast just watching my kids enjoy themselves. Harmony was the life of the party for sure. She showed off dance moves that I had no idea that she had. It was great. Miles ran around doing cartwheels and rearranging the chairs from the wedding. They were so good and did their parts so well. When the reception was over, I took them in the pool at the hotel until 11:30 and then they finally crashed at midnight. I am just exhausted and my whole body hurts from carrying luggage and everything else. I am going to recoup today and get back to work tomorrow. I don't think I posted yet either that I did not end up getting the job as the executive assistant that I applied for but I'm okay with it. I know I did well and I just wasn't what he was looking for and that's okay. I am thankful for the experience and I'm glad I put myself out there to go for it.
25 Aug 08-Today was back to the grind. It's always nice to get back to a routine although some days I dread going back to work. I really need some good time off of work I think. Anyway, you'll see this once my site comes back up but it's down because too much bandwidth was used. I guess that's because all the girls from my mommy's group were looking at the pictures from my visit with Aileen. From now on, I'm just going to upload them to Photobucket or something so it doesn't clog up my site. Hopefully Jen will get it fixed soon. :( I hate when that happens. Anyway, Miles had his home visit today with his teacher and that was a lot of fun. He really enjoyed having her here and getting to show off his room and his pets and playing Candyland with her. I think that's such a neat program that the school does.
24 Aug 08-Today was just a day to get caught up on everything that needed to be done around the house that we didn't get to Friday because we weren't here and then Saturday because we were just too tired when we got home. Nothing interesting happened at all. :)
23 Aug 08-Sorry I skipped a couple of days in there. I've been a little bit busy. A few months ago, I found out that Aileen from my "mommy's group" was going to be here from New York on vacation. We definitely wanted to make plans to meet so I told her that we'd drive to Scottsdale and then stay the night there so we could go do to dinner and then breakfast before they headed out for Sedona. So, yesterday after work, we headed out for Scottsdale (near Phoenix). It took us a little longer to get there than expected because is just construction everywhere! Anyway, we decided on just having pizza since her hubby was headed to a Diamondbacks game. Aileen and the girls met us in the parking lot when we pulled up and it was just so great to meet her in person. She is just truly a doll and so are her girls. After dinner and letting the kids run around while we chatted, we went down to the pool. The place that they were staying in was a timeshare and it was absolutely gorgeous. The pool had a waterfall and everything (which the kids thought was just the coolest). Harmony and Gabbi became fast friends and were inseparable for the short time we all had together. We got back to the hotel and got to bed about midnight and then got up to meet them for breakfast. I have been blessed to meet 3 of the girls now off the site and can't wait to meet even more. On the way back, we decided to stop at this ostrich farm that we've seen for years in between here and Phoenix and I'm so glad we did. I was wondering how interesting it could possibly be but little did I know that it wasn't just ostriches. They also had deer, donkeys and birds to feed. It was awesome!! My favorite part was the birds and had we had more cash on us, we might STILL be there feeding the birds. It's only an hour from here so we will definitely be going back before they shut down for the winter in October! On the way back, the traffic was horrendous and we had no idea why. Chris realized that there were no cars headed at all in the direction of Phoenix so that probably meant accident. We had taken a different route to come back so we had to backtrack a little to get to the ostrich farm. We missed a deadly tractor trailer accident by a very short period of time. We saw it on the way back and just knew that someone had to have died in it. We found out after we got home that someone had. :( How tragic and scary. Anyway, we had a wonderful time visiting with Aileen and her family and I am so glad that we got the chance to do that!
20 Aug 08-SSgt results came out today and I had reason to celebrate another promotion cycle. My troop, Clint, made it so I was excited to see his name today and also to be able to tack his stripe on. I guess the commander didn't expect me to be able to hit hard and was surprised when I put some weight behind in. LOL Also on that list was Ashley my favorite female troop ever, Shane my protege' and my girlfriend Monica. It was a good day to celebrate.
19 Aug 08-Happy Birthday to Auntie Katie!! Harmony was so excited to call her and wish her a happy birthday today. It was cute. Katie said she was cracking her up. I got to go see one of my favorite men today-the chiropractor! Have I mentioned that I love that man?? I wish I could see him every day. At least 1 day every 2 weeks, my back feels better! I got to visit with Sheree' tonight which is always a treat for me. She lives right next door but we hardly ever see each other and it's definitely made us appreciate each other more. Me, her and Elise are planning a coffee date for next week and I'm so looking forward to it! Life is just so busy, it's hard to get girlfriend time in!
18 Aug 08-Not much to report today. It seems as though everyone had a case of "The Monday's". It was very evident as I walked through the door and no one said a word. Normally when anyone that works in our office walks in, they're greeted with "Good morning". That was not the case today. Let's hope tomorrow is better. Thankfully I had tons of paperwork come back today so I kept myself busy was able to send my airman home early. I hate days like today. We had a nice dinner tonight so that means a good lunch tomorrow! Other than that, that's all she wrote for today!
17 Aug 08-Happy Birthday to my friend Amy!! I had one of the busiest days today. It's already 9 and I'm just now getting to write in my blog before I go shower, get ready for bed and watch Big Brother. Today after breakfast and relaxing, I took Harmony, Miles and Bella to Petco to get mice. That is our weekend routine now and all the girls there know me. One in particular always comes to see Bella and commented today on how she's growing. They all just adore her for sure! Today was "sheet day" and that is probably one of my least favorite chores. I cleaned the fish tank today, did more laundry, put all the laundry away that I never got to yesterday, went through the kids backpacks (finally), cleaned the kitchen, blah, blah, blah. Chris finally installed the last 2 lights and was also working his butt off outside. It was just so hot and muggy that neither one of us wanted to cook. I needed a few things so I decided to go to Fry's and check out the deli for something for dinner there. It was nice that we didn't have to cook. So, now that the bags are packed, laundry is put away, kids are bathed and in bed, I am off to relax before starting another week. Ugh! Thankfully we have a 4 day weekend coming up!
16 Aug 08-We had our visit with Katie and family today and it was so nice to see them. Her boys are just the cutest!! They enjoyed the dogs and the other animals and I even took Ali out so they could "pet" her too. I got my baby fix in today big time! LOL Thomas is just the sweetest little baby. Thankfully he took to me and I got to hold him a lot and it was so nice. They are all just so wonderful and it's so nice to have more family in town. I've gone from having no family around me for most of my career to now having Chris' uncle who doesn't live in Tucson anymore but at least Arizona, Chris' cousin Bruce and now Katie and her family. It just makes being here feel a little more "normal". I put pictures up on the website today so go take a look and you'll see just how cute their boys are. We had a nice storm tonight too. We got an inch of rain in only about 20 minutes. I was just telling Chris earlier today that I was hoping for some good rain so it would wash all the dirt in the street away from when he was hauling truck loads of dirt here so we could extend the grass in the backyard. Boy did I get what I asked for. The backyard started to flood so poor Chris was in the backyard in the rain with a rake trying to dig a path for the water to flow out. He was soaked when he came back in but we sure needed that rain. Just as he was able to go out and do it properly with a shovel, it started to rain again. I say bring it on! I had to laugh as I was tucking Miles in tonight. Apparently he has my OCD. He couldn't get something on his shelf just right and would not let me tuck him in until it was perfectly straight. All I could was be patient and laugh.
15 Aug 08-Today was really, really hot and sticky. Yuck!! We had Mike's (Koeller) retirement today. It was bittersweet. I know he's moved on to bigger and better things but it will be weird not having him around. I sang for his retirement too and I'm so glad. I wouldn't have missed it for the world! Chris is playing poker with the boys tonight so it's just me at home with the kids. Harmony is super excited because Auntie Katie and family are coming to visit tomorrow. I'm so glad we're finally getting a chance to get together. I know Harmony is going to have a hard time sleeping tonight. She was jumping up and down screaming when she overheard me mention to Katie about coming tomorrow. It's going to be so much fun to see them!
14 Aug 08-We sure did get those storms I was hoping for last night!! We woke up at 11:30 p.m. to Bella barking and we couldn't figure out why. It was hailing and it was hitting the window unit and caused her to go into protect mode although the poor thing was scared too. I ended up sitting with her on the couch for a bit until she calmed down. The storm was AWESOME!! The news said we had 450 lightning strikes per 10 minutes. The sky just looked like a big strobe light. I was laughing because Holly was just mentioning yesterday that the storms were weak here after we'd done all this bragging to the "newbies" about how the monsoons are so awesome here. We all told her today she needed to keep talking smack about them so we could get some more raging storms! My rain barrel is completely full today!! Other than that from last night, today was one of the most boring days of my life. I never thought we'd see 4:00. After I got home and finished up the nightly routine, just before Miles got in bed, he gave me a very proud mommy moment to brag about!
13 Aug 08-It was a HOT one today! My goodness! I was drenched after doing my PT at 6 in the morning. It was already almost unbearable. It only got worse as the day went on. Humidity is up and storms are all around us. Hopefully they will hit because I really need to have my rain barrel filled back up. The garden sure doesn't need it but I really need my Oleanders to start growing. They are sure slow starters. Other than that, there's not much going on at all. I finally got a chance to sit down and relax after emptying book bags, making lunches, helping with homework, cleaning up after the messy clan, etc. Chris moved the Wii into the bedroom for me so I could actually play it. I never get to use it because everyone else is always hogging the big TV. :( Now I can actually enjoy my Wii Fit daily like I've been wanting to. Wow! I just realized, I have a TiVo, a laptop, a scrapbook desk, a treadmill with weights AND the Wii in my bedroom now. I might never come out!!! LOL It's like my own mini apartment! It will really be nice once I paint it and hopefully rearrange some.
12 Aug 08-Today we had a squadron "stand down" and had to go to the theater for a briefing. What this means is that it was time for the commander to get us all together to brief us on what has been going on. In the group overall, there have been a rash of incidents that are concerning to senior leadership. I won't share them all here because it's like airing dirty laundry and I don't want to do that. It was basically a "come to Jesus" meeting and it was eye opening. Hopefully it does the trick because I was here 4 years ago when things went down the tubes and we worked long hours and life was hell. I have been praying hard that things don't go down that road again. Other than that, it was another quiet day in my world.
11 Aug 08-Boring, boring, boring is all I can say about today. I went to to the doc. He gave me some drops to try and said if it doesn't get better to make an appointment with my off base eye doc and they'll put in an emergency referral so that was good news. Hopefully the drops will work and it's just acting up because of my recent sinus infection but we'll see. Other than that, nothing to report. Be back tomorrow with hopefully more to talk about. :)
10 Aug 08-We had more fun shampooing carpets today! (Or should I say Chris did.) Anyway, the most exciting thing of the day was getting in the garden and harvesting veggies. We pulled out some huge radish and cucumbers and pulled a ton of lettuce. The kids had cucumbers (by request) for snack today and I made salad for dinner from the garden. We'll have to take quite a bit to people at work to get rid of it because there is just so much. Chris said that there are about 30 more cucumbers growing. He also pulled out two gourds. I have no idea what to do with them so I'll have to search the internet for those. LOL I don't think they'll make it to Halloween for decorations! My eye is bothering me unfortunately. A couple of years ago I had to have surgery to have some of my natural tube that connects my nasolacrimal duct (or commonly referred to as tear duct although that's not what it is) and have a plastic tube put in because the hole is so small on mine that it would get blocked easily. Well now my right eye is doing the same thing. What happens is that my eye constantly waters because what is supposed to drain out down the tube can't because I can get the tiniest speck of dirt in there, comes out of my eye instead. It's annoying because it blurs my vision and causes the skin in the corner of my eye and the side of my nose to become irritated from wiping away the tears and stuff so often. I really don't want to go through that surgery again and all the poking and prodding in my eye but it's better than the annoyance of my eye constantly watering. I can't wear mascara or eyeliner now on the bottom either which makes my eyes look small. That may sound silly to you but I'm pretty set in my ways when it comes to my make-up. LOL I go with what works and what looks good and I hate having to change it. Ugh! More to come on that.
09 Aug 08-I guess while I was at dinner last night, Cody was out front playing football with some of the neighbors. Well he jammed his finger and was complaining that it hurt but his range of motion was fine so I didn't think too much of it. I've had that happen and I know that it hurts. Today, we went shopping at the BX and I saw that it was turning a little purple so I showed Chris and he took him to urgent care to get it looked at. We were guessing it was sprained and that's what it was. The doc taped his 2 fingers together and ordered x-rays for him. However, the x-ray place was closed so he'll have to take him this week. They said it wasn't broken though so that's good. We got Miles his "big boy" haircut today and he really liked it. The stylist was just making such a fuss over him and his big blue eyes and long eyelashes. I was getting a kick out of it. He was quite talkative to her which is unusual for him to do to a stranger. I couldn't help but just sit there in the chair and smile at him. We bought a steam cleaner today for the carpets which was fantastic. I like our Kirby but we really needed something that could deep clean. Let's face it, with 3 kids and 4 dogs, the carpets get some spots on them that we can't tell which one of them made it. That thing is awesome. Chris is going to be busy for a while. I told him that I even want to move furniture eventually. LOL Poor thing. I have all these projects. I told him that the one I had for myself was to paint. I really, really, really want to change some of the wall colors, especially in the bedroom. I want some kind of warm brown tone. Something other than that green. I do not like that color of green at all. Yet another benefit of owning our home!! We all had a nice lunch together too and then came home so Chris could take Cody to urgent care. I took the other 2 and Bella with me to get mice and fish food. That's always an adventure. One of the girls there came up to us and spoke directly to Bella about remembering her. She is just so in love with her. How could you not be? She's adorable! LOL I think that's about all that went on today. I just love the weekends!
08 Aug 08-Thank goodness this week is over. It was sure a long one after my short leave. I really feel like I need a vacation! I went out to dinner tonight with Leah, Kelly, and Tiana. We went to Outback Steakhouse. It was the first time I had ever been there. It was a little expensive for me but it was really good. It was nice to get out and enjoy some time with friends. I am going to miss Leah so much when she leaves. I just adore her. :) Other than that, not much is going on or not anything that I care to talk about. Things are work are getting kind of crazy but not in my shop. It's things that the flight as a whole will end up having to pay for so I'll deal with/post about that when the time comes. Hopefully supervision has a handle on it so it doesn't come down to that. We'll just see how it all goes. I've been down that path once before here and I surely don't want to go again. We are taking Miles to get a nice big boy haircut tomorrow for his pictures on Tuesday. I'm so excited for his first school pictures! They are all doing so well in school. Cody just started back this week too and he said he really liked it and he liked his teacher. I guess people said bad things about his teacher so he was apprehensive that he might not like him. He said he did though so that was good. That helped to spark the conversation with him about hearing what other people say but not forming an opinion based off of what he hears. I told him to always find out for himself. I have always been that way and want to instill that in my kids as well. I'm not a first impression kind of gal. I hope that others are the same way because if people went off first impressions of me, I might not have as many friends as I do. I know that people have off days or just aren't good at meeting people. I never hold that against anyone. Anyway, since I've truly lived up to the title of my blog tonight, I'll close with that. I am ready to get a good night sleep finally. This is the first night that my OCD has NOT kicked in even though I'm still up late. I cannot wait to sleep in tomorrow!
07 Aug 08-I had another fun day cutting up at the office. I was a little moody today for some reason. I'm not quite sure why but I'm over it. LOL I paid off a few more bills today and figured out my budget and what we have coming in versus going out. I'm in major "planning for our first mortgage payment" mode. Scary! My lights came today so I was super excited for that and Chris was nice enough to put up the 3 out front for me today so we could see them tonight and they look so nice. It took me a while to find them but I think I did well! The pics are in the house album on the site. :)
06 Aug 08-I am such a dork. I just got done signing up for e-bills for every account I own. Most don't have balances but just in case, I wanted to set them up. I even created a new account just so the e-mails wouldn't get lost with all the spam in our main account. I was super excited when DIRECTV said they would give me a $5 credit for going paperless! Whoo hoo! I saved tons of trees today. Okay, so don't think that I am going to turn into a tree hugger or anything. I won't be quite like that (not that I think anything is wrong with it, it's just not my style) but I am really enjoying this whole going green thing. On my "Mommy's group" we do a weekly photo contest and Michelle, who is an awesome photographer, teaches us things that our cameras can do and urges us to use our manuals to learn more. She gives us tips and has us try new things. I did that today to submit my photos for the contest and it was a lot of fun. I'm going to need to learn how to do all this stuff anyway because I really would like to be a professional photographer when I retire and set my own schedule. After being the military's "drone" for 20+ years, it would be nice to call my own shots! In case you are wondering, I am starting to feel more human although I am still feeling quite run down. Besides that, I just really had a good day today.
05 Aug 08-I got to start my day by seeing one of my favorite men-my chiropractor. Besides him always making me feel like a million bucks, he's always such a joy to talk to. After I got to work I spent an hour or so cleaning the bathroom in our building. As a NCO, I shouldn't be doing it but no one else did it so I had to do it. It will be pointed out that I had to do it and how the bathroom should stay. I don't even like cleaning my OWN bathroom! Yuck! It was nasty!! The rest of the day was just catching up still from the week that I was on leave. I was busy at home tonight going through the kids backpacks, packing their snacks, my lunch, my gym bag, paying bills, balancing checkbook, etc. Whew! I am amazed at how much paperwork having multiple children in school generates. I decided to get a little more organized this year and start scanning in the papers that are important and keeping them in their own folders and then throwing away the actual paper copy. It's so nice to have that capability!!
04 Aug 08-It was so nice to get back to the grind today after my whirlwind trip. It was nice to have some normalcy again. I received a call from the Command Chief this morning thanking me for the interview again and letting me know that I wasn't selected for something I didn't do, that the interview was very good but he just went a "different route" whatever that means. He said that he could tell I had a bright career ahead of me and hopefully we'd cross paths again. I thought that was nice and it made me feel much better.
03 Aug 08-I am back home now and finally settled. It was such a whirlwind of a trip but I had the best time ever and realized just how much I missed my family and I can't wait to get back and spend the kind of time I want to with everyone. My brothers wedding was so beautiful and everything was so perfect. It was such an emotional day for me and I hadn't even thought about it being that way. The whole setting was just beautiful and I could not be happier for them. We all just love Juliet so much. As far as we're concerned, she's been in our family for years anyway, now it's just official. She was the most beautiful bride. The reception was really nice too and I had a blast just watching my kids enjoy themselves. Harmony was the life of the party for sure. She showed off dance moves that I had no idea that she had. It was great. Miles ran around doing cartwheels and rearranging the chairs from the wedding. They were so good and did their parts so well. When the reception was over, I took them in the pool at the hotel until 11:30 and then they finally crashed at midnight. I am just exhausted and my whole body hurts from carrying luggage and everything else. I am going to recoup today and get back to work tomorrow. I don't think I posted yet either that I did not end up getting the job as the executive assistant that I applied for but I'm okay with it. I know I did well and I just wasn't what he was looking for and that's okay. I am thankful for the experience and I'm glad I put myself out there to go for it.
02 July 2008
My ramblings-Jul 08
31 Jul 08-What a fun but busy day. Today, Harmony and Miles and myself flew to California for my brothers wedding. I am so tired today as I did not get much sleep at all thinking about everything that needed to be done. The kids were so excited to fly and did surprisingly well through the 2 flights. I had forgotten about a car/booster seat for Miles so my parents had to go buy one for him and ended up being an hour and a half late to pick us up. I just wanted a shower and a chance to relax before the rehearsal which I did not get but no biggie. After we got settled and after the rehearsal, we headed to the rehearsal dinner which was really nice. My folks were hosting it so they had to be there a little bit early. I found out at the dinner that I like margaritas! LOL I had no idea that I would. I guess that could be dangerous. Ryan and Juliet were so cute and they had put together gifts for the wedding party. Miles and Harmony got cute gift baskets with markers, bubbles, a book, a beach ball, etc. Harmony's was an adorable butterfly basket, that I told her I would have to steal from her, and she also had a diary and some Tinkerbell markers. Miles' basket had baseballs on it and he had some squirt guns and Cars markers. They were both really excited about that. I got a heart shaped compact mirror that had my name engraved on the lid and a nice frame with their engagement picture in it. Everything turned out really nice and it was great to get to sit and talk with family and get to know some of Juliet's family. I put some pictures up on the site and will have a ton more tomorrow for the big day!! I finally got to take them to the hotel pool late last night too. We finally went in about 10 p.m. so we all got to bed late again but they loved being in the pool (indoor). They can't wait to go in it again tomorrow too.
30 Jul 08-I had a fantastic day today and I am so excited to share it with everyone. I had my interview with the Command Chief and honesty, I've never felt so good walking out of an interview. I had no idea that you could dance in the ca while driving but it sure can happen. I did it all the way home and people looked at me like I had lost my mind. LOL Who cares though. I had a blast. I definitely rocked the interview and I should find out today or tomorrow if I got the job or not. The most surprising thing is that the job starts on Monday and that I was not prepared for. I will definitely keep you posted on that. I had so much stuff to do today. I went to the doc in the morning and then came home to get Bella for her vet appointment. After we took Bella to the vet, I stopped and grabbed lunch for Cody and I. We came home and got Bella settled and ate our lunch and then headed to Target so I could get a swimsuit for my trip adn then off to Petco so I could get a mouse for Ali because I knew that Chris sure wouldn't be feeding her. Then I came back home and started getting ready for my interview. I just decided to start from scratch. I was so glad I did because I felt like it gave me the confidence I needed. Tomorrow I am off to Cali and I am sooo excited!!
29 Jul 08-Wow! What a day today! I am in packing/leaving mode for sure and boy did I have a big surprise thrown in on me. I got a call today that my interview appointment was made. However, it was originally scheduled for Thursday when I was going to be gone. Thank God they were able to reschedule it for tomorrow at 1630 but that put me half in panic mode. I am scared to death but so excited at the same time to know that I finally get to go show off my stuff. I felt better after talking to my mom today as well as Michelle. I really needed to talk to both of them for some support and encouragement. Apparently, the person currently in the position is leaving for the NCO Academy on Monday so that means jumping in head first for sure and I will have to definitely learn some things but I am up for the challenge. The Command Chief will be making his decision very shortly as to who will take over the position. I just pray that whatever is supposed to happen, happens. I will definitely be posting when I get home from the interview to share my feelings on how it went. I could use all of the positive thoughts I can get for tomorrow.
28 Jul 08-Whew! That was some kind of bug. I'm not completely back to normal yet. I am still only about 70% but it's nice to be up and moving around again. The last couple of days, I've only gotten up to eat and it's been horrible. I am so needing to get better so I'm not miserable on my way home. Nothing would stop me from making it but I definitely don't want to be sick. I was going to go back to the doc today but I am feeling better and my ear has almost cleared up. I ended up with Strep throat, a sinus infection and an inner ear infection. If my ear is not completely better tomorrow, I will go back in and get on another round of antibiotics but we'll see. I had all 3 of the kids home with me today so it would have been difficult to try to go today so we'll just see how things are in the morning. Tomorrow, it's just me and Cody so it will be much more manageable. Obviously because I've been so sick, there hasn't been much going on. Thankfully I am on leave this week so I have been able to be at home to recover. Thursday and Friday last week at work was brutal. I felt awful and just had to be there at work. I am looking forward to this week of leave and seeing my family very soon! I am sooooo excited to be back in Cali and watch my brother tie the knot, even if it's only just for a few days. It will be so nice to actually take leave and go somewhere instead of just sitting around the house. Sorry I haven't posted. I just have not been feeling up to it.
23 Jul 08-I haven't posted in a couple of days because there really hasn't been anything "blog worthy" going on at all. It's been a quiet couple of days. However, I am pretty sure that I have strep. If it's not, it's a really bad sinus infection. I am going to sick call in the morning to find out. Good thing about it is that I'm getting it out of the way so I won't be sick when I go home for my brothers wedding. It's definitely better to have it now although I hate being sick.
21 Jul 08-There isn't too much to report today. My commander kind of let the cat out of the bag about the job that I applied for. He mentioned it in the middle of my shop and no one in my shop (other than my shop chief who is TDY) knew about it. I must have gotten a look on my face that said I didn't want that information shared. I asked him if he wanted to step in the hall so we could talk about it and he apologized for saying anything. He told me that he knew I'd be an asset to that job and he was sorry to have to let me go. It's been so nice to hear that. He had also asked me if I had heard when they would let people know so I told him that I didn't have any information. It was a good thing that he came in to the office and brought it up because now he's going to look into it for me. :)
20 Jul 08-We went to the nursery today and bought Oleanders to put on the side of the driveway. We had Rosemary plants but we decided they weren't serving us any purpose so we ripped them up. Boy was that a chore for poor Chris. Hopefully they will grow quick. (The main reason to put them there was to hide the eyesore.) That's about all for today. :)
19 Jul 08-Today was a good day. We all went out shopping today. Our neighbor, Frank, just got new bulbs for his porch light and Chris just had to know what they were. Turns out they were energy efficient bulbs and they are BRIGHT! So, he asked where he got them from and they were from Bed, Bath & Beyond so we headed there today to get some. They are awesome! I also picked up something kind of like a cappuccino maker today but a lot cheaper. It does hot chocolate and stuff and I'm so excited to have it. LOL I was a busy girl today. Chris headed to his friends house at 3 this afternoon to play cards. I decided to clean out the fish tank, I pulled some more weeds in the garden, fed the snake, did load after load of laundry, played the Wii for a bit, sprayed down the driveway because of all the mud that came off of his truck, made dinner for the kids, etc. It was nice to be busy. Now I'm just hanging out and relaxing and watching the storm. The satellite dish went out because of the storm so it is quiet in my house (besides the thunder). Thankfully Miles fell asleep fast but the other 2 aren't sleeping very well. It is right on top of us. There's no break between the lightning and the thunder. It's nice to have the rain but hopefully the rest of it passes soon. Chris got the doggy door put in yesterday as well so here are some pictures of it. The dogs like it and it's so nice to have 2 sliding doors that we can use to get in to the backyard!
18 Jul 08-Bear with me. This one is going to be long today but I would really appreciate you taking the time to read it. It's been a crazy week. So, earlier this week, I was presented with a job opportunity that I had to do a lot of soul searching about which I mentioned yesterday. Well the job was made publicly available and after talking long and hard with my mom, my supervision and 2 great friends, I decided to go for it and put my name in the hat for it. The job is the Executive Assistant to the Command Chief for the Wing. It is a HUGE responsibility and a HUGE job but I think I'm up for it. It's amazing what you learn about what people think of you when you present something like this to them. I am so honored to know that people think so highly of me. The select few that I discussed this opportunity with told me that they would be sad to lose me to the job but that they thought I would be perfect for it. I'm so glad that people have faith in me because I don't always have the most in myself. People that know me, know that I don't take compliments well. The best way to embarrass me is to compliment me. I am a humble person. Anyway, I do not have any details about how the process works or what the time frame is and I don't know if I have a chance at actually being selected but it was a big deal for me to even get the courage to apply. It was hard for me to consider leaving my ammo family although the job won't be forever. It will only be 1-2 years. I considered my troops, my shop, my supervision, my family, even my custodians. I did not come to the decision lightly and it was really hard for me talking to my chief today but he was very supportive. I made it clear that I did not want people to know that I had applied unless I got the job. I don't want to make people feel like I am "jumping ship". I have to look out for myself and my future with the Air Force and this is an excellent way to do it. Please keep me in your thoughts that whatever is supposed to happen, happens. Either way, I'm just proud of myself for getting the nerve. Here is the job description:
**Click here to read the Command Chief's bio
17 Jul 08-What can I say about today? Today was kind of crazy. I laughed... A LOT! That was mostly towards the end of the day but it was the hardest that anyone has ever seen me laugh at work. At one point, I was squatted down against the wall because I just couldn't move anymore. The reason we were all cracking up was completely inappropriate and probably not be funny to anyone who wasn't there so I'll spare you. Just know that I'm a little hoarse now from laughing so hard. Anyway, I was faced with an opportunity yesterday that is weighing heavy on my heart and mind. There will be more to come on that later if it's what I choose but I am definitely struggling with the thought of it. I know it will be awesome if I do choose to do it but for now, it's something that I'm discussing with Chris, my Mom and a friend. Just pray for me to make the right decision and that all goes well if I do.
16 Jul 08-I was quite irritable today. I haven't been sleeping well and I think it's finally catching up with me so I don't have anything interesting to report today or even anything to babble about. I am off to hopefully get a good night sleep.
15 Jul 08-Today was just the silliest of days. I don't know what got in to me but even the captain was camped out in the office today for a bit for a morale boost. It started with me throwing the football at the guys one at at time. I got Roy in the back of the head while he was on the phone with the CAS help desk, then I got Todd square in the back of the head while he was on the phone. After that, I threw it at Charlie and it hit his keyboard and locked up his computer. Oops!! Everyone was just dying laughing though. Then we got our toner in for our big printer and it came with those big "poppers" and Jason put them in them in his shirt and I had to take a picture. Of course I turned around and e-mailed it to the whole shop. We just had a long day of cracking up and it was fun. I also got to go out and visit my favorite custodians at the shooting range. Those guys are a barrel of fun so it always makes my day to go out there. Other than that, we're just tinkering around with more stuff at the house and it's fun.
14 Jul 08-Happy Birthday to me! :) Today was definitely bittersweet. My kids started school today. For those that don't know, our school district is year round so they got out the end of May and started back up today. It was bittersweet because my baby started Kindergarten today. They both had a great time though and I was so proud of them! Miles was just such a big boy and we had a nice proud parents moment when the first thing we heard the teacher say was to Miles about what good eye contact he had. It was so great to go at the end of the day and pick him up. It was all I could think about today. Thank you to everyone who sent me birthday wishes today. I really did enjoy my day even though it was an emotional one.
13 Jul 08-Today was hard for me. It was kind of a lazy day but then we were in the garden pulling weeds and stuff. Chris uprooted the lemon tree and moved it to the other side of the yard. We had a very nice storm too. The hard part was packing Miles' backpack and making his lunch. Tomorrow is going to be a huge day! Harmony and Miles are both super excited to start school. I'm excited for them too but sad at the same time because I will officially have no more kids not in school. :( They grow way too fast!
12 Jul 08-We had a good day today. It was exhausting but it was fun. I'm not the kind of girl who likes to shop a lot. I just don't enjoy it. However, today was fun. Being that we're homeowners now, we got to have some fun getting some stuff for the house that we wouldn't have if we were renting. We bought new locks for the house and I actually did one of them myself and was proud of myself for being able to do it. Chris joked that I can now change the locks on him one day while he's out and I told him that's why I wanted to learn how. LOL We also went to look at trees to put on the side of our house to block the eye sore camper next to us. Everything is so expensive though so I'm not sure what we're going to do. It appears as if we may have to go with Oleanders but we'll see. Everything else is not hearty enough or we'd have to buy too many that are too expensive. We need to do something though. I don't want to look at it anymore. We also had to get more grass seed because we're extending the grass in the back yard all the way out to the wall. It will look really nice when we're done. We went to the nursery today out by where we live and I fell in love with their pond that they have. I would really like to do it so we're going to consider it. First we have to figure out where to do it and if we can really afford it but it was just beautiful and peaceful. I could have sat right there for hours and watched the fish and the turtle and listened to the running water. It would be so nice to sit outside with a book and listen to it. We all went out to lunch too which was a treat for us. I also had to buy some toys for Bella as she is our first dog that actually cares to play with toys. It was a good day. Here are the pictures of our rain water collection point. It's awesome! We bought the tabs to keep the mosquitoes away and everything.
11 Jul 08-We got our final paperwork today that said we are home owners! It was awesome to get that. I came bounding out of the title company. LOL I have so many things in my mind that I want to do around the house. I came home today to find that Chris had started moving rocks and getting ready to extend our grass. It's going to look so nice when it's done. I am on this serious going green kick and I printed out instructions for Chris on how to set up a container to catch and use rain water. Much to my surprise, and delight, when I came home today, Chris had used the directions and had the container all set up. I was thrilled to see it! It's the coolest thing. He's so funny because I had mentioned to him while he was gone about my reusable shopping bags and he just kind of rolled his eyes at me. Well, he was watching something on the TV and said, "Do you know how many plastic bags it saves when you use your bags?" Well duh honey, why do you think I got them?? I'm glad he's paying more attention to things like that now and hopefully it only continues with the changes I want to see around here. It will probably be a slow process but I would definitely like to keep introducing more "green" things to him to see if he runs with it as well as the container for collecting rain water.
10 Jul 08-I was completely shocked today when Chris got a call for us to come sign the paperwork for the house. Apparently my gentle "shove" about the increase in insurance was enough to make them call it quits and finally let us buy the house! As of around 5 p.m., we were officially HOME OWNERS!! Thank the Lord it's all over!! We don't have to make a payment until 1 Sep either so that was a nice bonus. Chris has been anxious to start his "projects" throughout the house now that it's ours. I just ordered the in wall doggy door yesterday so we'll be excited when that gets here. As of now, I am just drained and so glad I can finally say the saga is over!
09 Jul 08-Ugh! Just one more nightmare in the house saga today. My bank called to say that the lender was trying to increase the amount of our insurance. Arizona state law says that they cannot ask us to insure more than it would cost to rebuild the house and they were trying to increase it by $60,000. I had had enough by that point and I called them on it. They changed their tune when I called and I expressed my concerns about how out of hand this was getting and why we still hadn't closed. I let them know that no one is explaining things to us, we're not feeling like we're getting any first time buyer "benefits" or anything. All we want to do is close on this house and make it our own. I'm afraid that I won't even care about this house by the time it's finally ours. The lenders are 2 hours ahead of us so we won't be getting an answer back today so now we have to wait until tomorrow to find out when we close and I'm just plain irritated. Please keep your fingers crossed that we can close this week. Luckily, the property manager is fantastic and we are not having to pay rent this month. Anyway, I did have a good day minus the house drama. Michelle called me to tell me that she had a promotion/birthday present for me and I met her before heading to my "pee duty". Look at what that sweetheart gave to me!
She was the one that continued to tell me to be positive and that she knew in her heart that we had both made rank this year and she was completely right. That woman is just amazing. I've never met someone like her before and I know I never will again. She is everything that I could only hope to be. She's more talented, driven, positive, etc than anyone I've ever known and I just love her! On another note, I had to laugh at the guy that runs the "pee duty". He is just a riot. Well, him and the head guy were commenting on how I looked like a celebrity to them and I just figured it was Sharon Stone because that's always what everyone says. Well, as it turns out, it wasn't. Turns out they swear that I resemble Tippi Hedron. I had to go look her up to see who she was. I don't really see it but I don't see Sharon Stone either. I just thought it was cute of these 2 men to be staring at me and comparing me to a movie star. They said it was the eyes. They now simply refer to me as "Blue Eyes". LOL
08 Jul 08-Today was the first day of my urinalysis duty and boy was it boring!! I actually wrote 15 pages in my journal today just because I had nothing better to do and my hand was actually cooperating and allowing me to write. It was slow for the girls so that was nice but I'd much rather be at work. I am beyond exhausted. I did not sleep well because of Bella. She was a hyper little thing last night. Other than that, today was kind of a blah day. We got a new plan for our cell phones. We've been looking at ways to reduce our monthly bills to help us better afford our mortgage. We talked to the mortgage consultant today and the papers are done and they were working on one more thing and we will be closing FINALLY within the next day or two (granted the entire world doesn't blow up in that time). I am so happy to finally be getting this done. Chris is on leave with kids this week since the daycare at the school is not open the last week before school starts so he's getting things done around the house too. I still need to upload this weeks installment of garden pictures but it is amazing! I cannot believe how fast they have grown but we've had some great rain lately as well as the watering system on a timer and Miracle Grow. We'll have plenty of veggies soon. Those who know me, that's really not all that exciting for me because I don't eat them but I'm excited to be able to feed the lettuce to my lizard!
07 Jul 08-Today was a lazy day. None of us really wanted to do much of anything. That could be because Harmony and Cody both had someone sleep over last night and we didn't even do lights out with them until 11 and they still didn't go to sleep right after that. Oh well. They had a great time and that's what matters. I did, however, finally pick up a Ped Egg today and that thing is amazing!! I was so tired of wearing tennis shoes and socks but my feet dry out so darn quick if I wear sandals. I finally decided to try it and boy am I glad that I did. It took me quite a while and I realized there was more damage than I thought but after I was done, my feet felt awesome!! I would recommend it to anyone! We'll see how often I have to do it but after my first time, I'm happy! The rest of the day was spent downloading music and updating my IPod. Every time I do that, I immediately break out my headphones and lose myself in music. I hadn't been listening to music as much lately. I'm not sure why, just hadn't but every time I do that, I remember just how much I can lose myself in it.
06 Jul 08-I ventured out with Bella today. I needed to take advantage of the BOGO sale at Payless so I took Harmony and Miles to get them shoes for school. I was worried that they wouldn't let me bring Bella in there but she's so small, they didn't care. Man, shoes are expensive! Anyway, I headed to Petco afterwards to get some puppy food for Bella, a mouse for Ali and a collar and leash for Bella as well. Everyone just ooh'd and ahh'd over her. It was so great. Who doesn't love a little puppy?? It is another hot one today (like I expected it to be any different) but the humidity is also up today. Yuck! The kids are not on their best behavior so I decided to give Chris a break and get the kids out for a while so he could relax. Now we're just hanging out and waiting until dinner. It's a "grilling weekend" so we're having burgers and dogs again tonight. He's been marinating steaks for a couple of days as well so those are going to taste yummy! I'm thinking of having Chris move the Wii into the bedroom so I can actually play for a little bit. Since we got the Xbox 360 fixed, it seems that I never get to play the Wii so it would be nice to disappear for a while and play especially since we have the Wii Fit now and I LOVE that game! The bedroom is also the best place to do that too since we have the a/c unit in the window. :)
05 Jul 08-Today was just a blah day. I don't know if it was the garbage I ate yesterday or if I took my vitamin too soon after eating this morning but I got sick and spent half the day in bed. I feel better now, just worn out. It's been that way for the last few days. I just feel like someone has sucked the life out of me. I don't know what I need to do to fix that either. Anyway, I've just been hanging out on the computer and waiting for the storms to roll in. We're supposed to get hail and stuff tonight but it's been moving in slowly. Chris stopped by a 3 family yard sale this morning, on the way to take Cody to his mom so he could go fishing with his grandpa today, and came back with a neat popcorn maker and a container with some colonels in it. It had the recipe for kettle corn on it and so he made some tonight and boy was it yummy! No more spending $4 on a bag from the stand! I have been on the hunt for an affordable but nice cappuccino maker. I can't remember if I told this story or not but I had to complain to the general manager of AAFES because 2 days so far, there have been ants in my cappuccino that I've bought from the shoppette. It happened on Thursday week before last and on this past Tuesday. I was so mad and while it only costs 99 cents for a cup, it makes me wonder how many other times I've drank ants and not known it! I'm supposed to go in this week and talk to the manager of that shoppette. Anyway, the reason I told the story was to explain my "need" for a cappuccino maker. I figure if I can just get one and make the flavor I like at home, then I don't have to worry about what I might be drinking. It sucks to have to do that but I don't feel like they're taking me very seriously and I'm very upset that I can't just go to the other shoppette. The don't have the flavor I like (English Toffee). That's enough rambling for one day. I'm off to get the kids their giant glow sticks to play with for a bit and then I'm off to bed to try to get my energy back.
04 Jul 08-Happy 4th of July all!! We went to a BBQ at Joey's house today with people from my shop. I made my chicken biscuits as usual today and we had a really nice time just hanging out. Then we headed to the base for the annual festivities. Things did not go as planned. We had storms roll in from 3 different directions and when the lightning was within 3 miles, they finally evacuated us. Thankfully the kids were able to play in the water. They must have realized how big of a hit the fire truck spraying water out was last year so they did it again this year but with a fire hydrant. The kids were soaked but the really enjoyed running around through it and of course were soaked. Oh to be a kid again and and be able to enjoy it. Anyway, they evacuated everyone to the enlisted club but it was just too many people and we finally decided to leave. The kids were bummed but they didn't seem too broken up about it. Once we finally heard one of the shows start from home, we headed down the road a few miles to just watch from the truck. It was fun for the kids because they were already in their PJs but they got to sit in the back of the truck so the night wasn't a total loss. We were not the only ones who had that idea. There were probably at least 15 other vehicles out there as well. It's almost tempting to do that every year. It was nice to just sit without having to fight crowds to get out when it was done. The pictures that I was able to get are on the website.
03 Jul 08-Thank God it's Friday!! (Okay, it's Thursday but it's my Friday!) We have the next 4 days off and boy do I need it. I did all sorts of running around today. This morning, I had to sing the National Anthem for a POW/MIA vigil/run. It was pretty neat. It was outdoors on the base parade grounds and I think I did well. It was the very first time that Chris and Harmony have heard me perform. Harmony came home with a "Great Job" ribbon which I thought was adorable. She really seemed to enjoy it. After the ceremony and they started their runs, I came back out to the house to pick up Harmony's lunch and take her to daycare. After that, I headed to my orderly room to attempt to get some paperwork signed. Every so often, my squadron has it's turn to do urinalysis duty and next week is our week. I was lucky enough to have my time come up again for this duty. NOT! I hate, hate, hate that detail. All week long, I have to watch girls pee in a cup. It's not glamorous by any means but it's part of my duties as a NCO. Hopefully by the time my name comes up in the rotation again, I will be a MSgt and won't have to do it! LOL After that, I had a dental appointment to make sure my mouth guards that were made for me fit. That was quite the experience and so not what I was expecting. I figured, they had taken a mold of my teeth so all they had to do was make sure they fit and send me on my way. Not the case! They had to fit it, have me bite, grind my teeth, etc and then file the stupid thing down so my bottom back teeth wouldn't touch my top back teeth. He had to put that thing in and pull it back out about 20 times. Each time he filed it down and then had to blow the "dust" off, I could see it flying in front of me so of course it was in my mouth as well. Ugh! Hopefully they will do the trick and I don't ever have to go through that again! After that, I headed to work for a bit only to find out there was still nothing going on. Then I went out for lunch. After lunch, I came back to find out that there was STILL nothing going on at work but thankfully after the 1300 meeting, we were released for the day. I still had to go back to my orderly room to pick up the paperwork blessing me to perform my "pee duty" next week. Now I am finally at home and ready to relax. I am so sleeping in tomorrow!!!
02 Jul 08-Whew! What a couple of days we've had. The termite guy came yesterday and blessed the roof and the roofer came today and blessed it as well. So, Chris talked to the mortgage consultant and made sure that they had gotten the notification that everything passed and to see if they could contact the lender to get on the paperwork. It would be great to close tomorrow so we could put in the doggie door this weekend but I doubt it will happen. We can hope though. Otherwise, we should close on Tuesday. Keep your fingers crossed for us! It has continued to be miserably hot. I was so excited for the summer to get here, now I just want to go back a couple of months to where it was comfortable! The storms have been few but they have been nice. We definitely need the rain for our garden to save us on our water bill. We're going to have to penny pinch. I want to collect the rain water as well. That should be fun! We finally broke down last night and gave Miles his first mohawk. He'd been begging us for it for a long time. He looks so adorable with it too. I did, however, explain it to him that it's only temporary. I don't want him with a mohawk for my brothers wedding. Ha ha! I know there's more stuff going on but I'm officially brain dead and can't remember right now!
30 Jul 08-I had a fantastic day today and I am so excited to share it with everyone. I had my interview with the Command Chief and honesty, I've never felt so good walking out of an interview. I had no idea that you could dance in the ca while driving but it sure can happen. I did it all the way home and people looked at me like I had lost my mind. LOL Who cares though. I had a blast. I definitely rocked the interview and I should find out today or tomorrow if I got the job or not. The most surprising thing is that the job starts on Monday and that I was not prepared for. I will definitely keep you posted on that. I had so much stuff to do today. I went to the doc in the morning and then came home to get Bella for her vet appointment. After we took Bella to the vet, I stopped and grabbed lunch for Cody and I. We came home and got Bella settled and ate our lunch and then headed to Target so I could get a swimsuit for my trip adn then off to Petco so I could get a mouse for Ali because I knew that Chris sure wouldn't be feeding her. Then I came back home and started getting ready for my interview. I just decided to start from scratch. I was so glad I did because I felt like it gave me the confidence I needed. Tomorrow I am off to Cali and I am sooo excited!!
29 Jul 08-Wow! What a day today! I am in packing/leaving mode for sure and boy did I have a big surprise thrown in on me. I got a call today that my interview appointment was made. However, it was originally scheduled for Thursday when I was going to be gone. Thank God they were able to reschedule it for tomorrow at 1630 but that put me half in panic mode. I am scared to death but so excited at the same time to know that I finally get to go show off my stuff. I felt better after talking to my mom today as well as Michelle. I really needed to talk to both of them for some support and encouragement. Apparently, the person currently in the position is leaving for the NCO Academy on Monday so that means jumping in head first for sure and I will have to definitely learn some things but I am up for the challenge. The Command Chief will be making his decision very shortly as to who will take over the position. I just pray that whatever is supposed to happen, happens. I will definitely be posting when I get home from the interview to share my feelings on how it went. I could use all of the positive thoughts I can get for tomorrow.
28 Jul 08-Whew! That was some kind of bug. I'm not completely back to normal yet. I am still only about 70% but it's nice to be up and moving around again. The last couple of days, I've only gotten up to eat and it's been horrible. I am so needing to get better so I'm not miserable on my way home. Nothing would stop me from making it but I definitely don't want to be sick. I was going to go back to the doc today but I am feeling better and my ear has almost cleared up. I ended up with Strep throat, a sinus infection and an inner ear infection. If my ear is not completely better tomorrow, I will go back in and get on another round of antibiotics but we'll see. I had all 3 of the kids home with me today so it would have been difficult to try to go today so we'll just see how things are in the morning. Tomorrow, it's just me and Cody so it will be much more manageable. Obviously because I've been so sick, there hasn't been much going on. Thankfully I am on leave this week so I have been able to be at home to recover. Thursday and Friday last week at work was brutal. I felt awful and just had to be there at work. I am looking forward to this week of leave and seeing my family very soon! I am sooooo excited to be back in Cali and watch my brother tie the knot, even if it's only just for a few days. It will be so nice to actually take leave and go somewhere instead of just sitting around the house. Sorry I haven't posted. I just have not been feeling up to it.
23 Jul 08-I haven't posted in a couple of days because there really hasn't been anything "blog worthy" going on at all. It's been a quiet couple of days. However, I am pretty sure that I have strep. If it's not, it's a really bad sinus infection. I am going to sick call in the morning to find out. Good thing about it is that I'm getting it out of the way so I won't be sick when I go home for my brothers wedding. It's definitely better to have it now although I hate being sick.
21 Jul 08-There isn't too much to report today. My commander kind of let the cat out of the bag about the job that I applied for. He mentioned it in the middle of my shop and no one in my shop (other than my shop chief who is TDY) knew about it. I must have gotten a look on my face that said I didn't want that information shared. I asked him if he wanted to step in the hall so we could talk about it and he apologized for saying anything. He told me that he knew I'd be an asset to that job and he was sorry to have to let me go. It's been so nice to hear that. He had also asked me if I had heard when they would let people know so I told him that I didn't have any information. It was a good thing that he came in to the office and brought it up because now he's going to look into it for me. :)
20 Jul 08-We went to the nursery today and bought Oleanders to put on the side of the driveway. We had Rosemary plants but we decided they weren't serving us any purpose so we ripped them up. Boy was that a chore for poor Chris. Hopefully they will grow quick. (The main reason to put them there was to hide the eyesore.) That's about all for today. :)
19 Jul 08-Today was a good day. We all went out shopping today. Our neighbor, Frank, just got new bulbs for his porch light and Chris just had to know what they were. Turns out they were energy efficient bulbs and they are BRIGHT! So, he asked where he got them from and they were from Bed, Bath & Beyond so we headed there today to get some. They are awesome! I also picked up something kind of like a cappuccino maker today but a lot cheaper. It does hot chocolate and stuff and I'm so excited to have it. LOL I was a busy girl today. Chris headed to his friends house at 3 this afternoon to play cards. I decided to clean out the fish tank, I pulled some more weeds in the garden, fed the snake, did load after load of laundry, played the Wii for a bit, sprayed down the driveway because of all the mud that came off of his truck, made dinner for the kids, etc. It was nice to be busy. Now I'm just hanging out and relaxing and watching the storm. The satellite dish went out because of the storm so it is quiet in my house (besides the thunder). Thankfully Miles fell asleep fast but the other 2 aren't sleeping very well. It is right on top of us. There's no break between the lightning and the thunder. It's nice to have the rain but hopefully the rest of it passes soon. Chris got the doggy door put in yesterday as well so here are some pictures of it. The dogs like it and it's so nice to have 2 sliding doors that we can use to get in to the backyard!
18 Jul 08-Bear with me. This one is going to be long today but I would really appreciate you taking the time to read it. It's been a crazy week. So, earlier this week, I was presented with a job opportunity that I had to do a lot of soul searching about which I mentioned yesterday. Well the job was made publicly available and after talking long and hard with my mom, my supervision and 2 great friends, I decided to go for it and put my name in the hat for it. The job is the Executive Assistant to the Command Chief for the Wing. It is a HUGE responsibility and a HUGE job but I think I'm up for it. It's amazing what you learn about what people think of you when you present something like this to them. I am so honored to know that people think so highly of me. The select few that I discussed this opportunity with told me that they would be sad to lose me to the job but that they thought I would be perfect for it. I'm so glad that people have faith in me because I don't always have the most in myself. People that know me, know that I don't take compliments well. The best way to embarrass me is to compliment me. I am a humble person. Anyway, I do not have any details about how the process works or what the time frame is and I don't know if I have a chance at actually being selected but it was a big deal for me to even get the courage to apply. It was hard for me to consider leaving my ammo family although the job won't be forever. It will only be 1-2 years. I considered my troops, my shop, my supervision, my family, even my custodians. I did not come to the decision lightly and it was really hard for me talking to my chief today but he was very supportive. I made it clear that I did not want people to know that I had applied unless I got the job. I don't want to make people feel like I am "jumping ship". I have to look out for myself and my future with the Air Force and this is an excellent way to do it. Please keep me in your thoughts that whatever is supposed to happen, happens. Either way, I'm just proud of myself for getting the nerve. Here is the job description:
Job Requirements/Qualifications Needed (must have/be):
Highly motivated
High energy level
Be able to do multi-tasks
Outstanding organizational skills
Computer related skills (Outlook calendar, Email management, Word,
Excel, Powerpoint, Hardware/software capabilities, etc.)
Have an insight to protocol experience
Have outstanding military bearing, and a keen sense of custom and
courtesies
Have superb image
Be able to work long and often odd hours
Be savvy on most Air Force programs (i.e. DTS, GTC, IMPAC, etc.)
Plus many others too long to list
Key duties, tasks and responsibilities:
Responsible for the overall management of all administrative functions
in the office of the 355 FW Command Chief Master Sergeant, guide the
command chief's demanding daily calendar; all travel, lodging, and
transportation arrangements. Coordinates with the Group Chief's, Unit
First Sergeants, First Sergeant Council, Top Three Association, First
Six Advisory Council, and several on- and off-base agencies, for all
kinds of people business (i.e. annual awards banquet, quarterly awards
ceremonies, monthly induction ceremonies, commander's calls and special
DV visit's from start to finish. Types, edits, reviews, dispatches, and
quality controls incoming and outgoing executive correspondence, senior
enlisted performance reports, awards and decorations, special awards
being submitted for wing commander/higher headquarters consideration,
and all enlisted personnel packages. Also Davis-Monthan focal point for
four Enlisted Leadership (Chief Suites) Business suites. Also web page
maintainer. Plus any other assigned duties as needed.
Highly motivated
High energy level
Be able to do multi-tasks
Outstanding organizational skills
Computer related skills (Outlook calendar, Email management, Word,
Excel, Powerpoint, Hardware/software capabilities, etc.)
Have an insight to protocol experience
Have outstanding military bearing, and a keen sense of custom and
courtesies
Have superb image
Be able to work long and often odd hours
Be savvy on most Air Force programs (i.e. DTS, GTC, IMPAC, etc.)
Plus many others too long to list
Key duties, tasks and responsibilities:
Responsible for the overall management of all administrative functions
in the office of the 355 FW Command Chief Master Sergeant, guide the
command chief's demanding daily calendar; all travel, lodging, and
transportation arrangements. Coordinates with the Group Chief's, Unit
First Sergeants, First Sergeant Council, Top Three Association, First
Six Advisory Council, and several on- and off-base agencies, for all
kinds of people business (i.e. annual awards banquet, quarterly awards
ceremonies, monthly induction ceremonies, commander's calls and special
DV visit's from start to finish. Types, edits, reviews, dispatches, and
quality controls incoming and outgoing executive correspondence, senior
enlisted performance reports, awards and decorations, special awards
being submitted for wing commander/higher headquarters consideration,
and all enlisted personnel packages. Also Davis-Monthan focal point for
four Enlisted Leadership (Chief Suites) Business suites. Also web page
maintainer. Plus any other assigned duties as needed.
**Click here to read the Command Chief's bio
17 Jul 08-What can I say about today? Today was kind of crazy. I laughed... A LOT! That was mostly towards the end of the day but it was the hardest that anyone has ever seen me laugh at work. At one point, I was squatted down against the wall because I just couldn't move anymore. The reason we were all cracking up was completely inappropriate and probably not be funny to anyone who wasn't there so I'll spare you. Just know that I'm a little hoarse now from laughing so hard. Anyway, I was faced with an opportunity yesterday that is weighing heavy on my heart and mind. There will be more to come on that later if it's what I choose but I am definitely struggling with the thought of it. I know it will be awesome if I do choose to do it but for now, it's something that I'm discussing with Chris, my Mom and a friend. Just pray for me to make the right decision and that all goes well if I do.
16 Jul 08-I was quite irritable today. I haven't been sleeping well and I think it's finally catching up with me so I don't have anything interesting to report today or even anything to babble about. I am off to hopefully get a good night sleep.
15 Jul 08-Today was just the silliest of days. I don't know what got in to me but even the captain was camped out in the office today for a bit for a morale boost. It started with me throwing the football at the guys one at at time. I got Roy in the back of the head while he was on the phone with the CAS help desk, then I got Todd square in the back of the head while he was on the phone. After that, I threw it at Charlie and it hit his keyboard and locked up his computer. Oops!! Everyone was just dying laughing though. Then we got our toner in for our big printer and it came with those big "poppers" and Jason put them in them in his shirt and I had to take a picture. Of course I turned around and e-mailed it to the whole shop. We just had a long day of cracking up and it was fun. I also got to go out and visit my favorite custodians at the shooting range. Those guys are a barrel of fun so it always makes my day to go out there. Other than that, we're just tinkering around with more stuff at the house and it's fun.
14 Jul 08-Happy Birthday to me! :) Today was definitely bittersweet. My kids started school today. For those that don't know, our school district is year round so they got out the end of May and started back up today. It was bittersweet because my baby started Kindergarten today. They both had a great time though and I was so proud of them! Miles was just such a big boy and we had a nice proud parents moment when the first thing we heard the teacher say was to Miles about what good eye contact he had. It was so great to go at the end of the day and pick him up. It was all I could think about today. Thank you to everyone who sent me birthday wishes today. I really did enjoy my day even though it was an emotional one.
13 Jul 08-Today was hard for me. It was kind of a lazy day but then we were in the garden pulling weeds and stuff. Chris uprooted the lemon tree and moved it to the other side of the yard. We had a very nice storm too. The hard part was packing Miles' backpack and making his lunch. Tomorrow is going to be a huge day! Harmony and Miles are both super excited to start school. I'm excited for them too but sad at the same time because I will officially have no more kids not in school. :( They grow way too fast!
12 Jul 08-We had a good day today. It was exhausting but it was fun. I'm not the kind of girl who likes to shop a lot. I just don't enjoy it. However, today was fun. Being that we're homeowners now, we got to have some fun getting some stuff for the house that we wouldn't have if we were renting. We bought new locks for the house and I actually did one of them myself and was proud of myself for being able to do it. Chris joked that I can now change the locks on him one day while he's out and I told him that's why I wanted to learn how. LOL We also went to look at trees to put on the side of our house to block the eye sore camper next to us. Everything is so expensive though so I'm not sure what we're going to do. It appears as if we may have to go with Oleanders but we'll see. Everything else is not hearty enough or we'd have to buy too many that are too expensive. We need to do something though. I don't want to look at it anymore. We also had to get more grass seed because we're extending the grass in the back yard all the way out to the wall. It will look really nice when we're done. We went to the nursery today out by where we live and I fell in love with their pond that they have. I would really like to do it so we're going to consider it. First we have to figure out where to do it and if we can really afford it but it was just beautiful and peaceful. I could have sat right there for hours and watched the fish and the turtle and listened to the running water. It would be so nice to sit outside with a book and listen to it. We all went out to lunch too which was a treat for us. I also had to buy some toys for Bella as she is our first dog that actually cares to play with toys. It was a good day. Here are the pictures of our rain water collection point. It's awesome! We bought the tabs to keep the mosquitoes away and everything.
11 Jul 08-We got our final paperwork today that said we are home owners! It was awesome to get that. I came bounding out of the title company. LOL I have so many things in my mind that I want to do around the house. I came home today to find that Chris had started moving rocks and getting ready to extend our grass. It's going to look so nice when it's done. I am on this serious going green kick and I printed out instructions for Chris on how to set up a container to catch and use rain water. Much to my surprise, and delight, when I came home today, Chris had used the directions and had the container all set up. I was thrilled to see it! It's the coolest thing. He's so funny because I had mentioned to him while he was gone about my reusable shopping bags and he just kind of rolled his eyes at me. Well, he was watching something on the TV and said, "Do you know how many plastic bags it saves when you use your bags?" Well duh honey, why do you think I got them?? I'm glad he's paying more attention to things like that now and hopefully it only continues with the changes I want to see around here. It will probably be a slow process but I would definitely like to keep introducing more "green" things to him to see if he runs with it as well as the container for collecting rain water.
10 Jul 08-I was completely shocked today when Chris got a call for us to come sign the paperwork for the house. Apparently my gentle "shove" about the increase in insurance was enough to make them call it quits and finally let us buy the house! As of around 5 p.m., we were officially HOME OWNERS!! Thank the Lord it's all over!! We don't have to make a payment until 1 Sep either so that was a nice bonus. Chris has been anxious to start his "projects" throughout the house now that it's ours. I just ordered the in wall doggy door yesterday so we'll be excited when that gets here. As of now, I am just drained and so glad I can finally say the saga is over!
09 Jul 08-Ugh! Just one more nightmare in the house saga today. My bank called to say that the lender was trying to increase the amount of our insurance. Arizona state law says that they cannot ask us to insure more than it would cost to rebuild the house and they were trying to increase it by $60,000. I had had enough by that point and I called them on it. They changed their tune when I called and I expressed my concerns about how out of hand this was getting and why we still hadn't closed. I let them know that no one is explaining things to us, we're not feeling like we're getting any first time buyer "benefits" or anything. All we want to do is close on this house and make it our own. I'm afraid that I won't even care about this house by the time it's finally ours. The lenders are 2 hours ahead of us so we won't be getting an answer back today so now we have to wait until tomorrow to find out when we close and I'm just plain irritated. Please keep your fingers crossed that we can close this week. Luckily, the property manager is fantastic and we are not having to pay rent this month. Anyway, I did have a good day minus the house drama. Michelle called me to tell me that she had a promotion/birthday present for me and I met her before heading to my "pee duty". Look at what that sweetheart gave to me!
She was the one that continued to tell me to be positive and that she knew in her heart that we had both made rank this year and she was completely right. That woman is just amazing. I've never met someone like her before and I know I never will again. She is everything that I could only hope to be. She's more talented, driven, positive, etc than anyone I've ever known and I just love her! On another note, I had to laugh at the guy that runs the "pee duty". He is just a riot. Well, him and the head guy were commenting on how I looked like a celebrity to them and I just figured it was Sharon Stone because that's always what everyone says. Well, as it turns out, it wasn't. Turns out they swear that I resemble Tippi Hedron. I had to go look her up to see who she was. I don't really see it but I don't see Sharon Stone either. I just thought it was cute of these 2 men to be staring at me and comparing me to a movie star. They said it was the eyes. They now simply refer to me as "Blue Eyes". LOL
08 Jul 08-Today was the first day of my urinalysis duty and boy was it boring!! I actually wrote 15 pages in my journal today just because I had nothing better to do and my hand was actually cooperating and allowing me to write. It was slow for the girls so that was nice but I'd much rather be at work. I am beyond exhausted. I did not sleep well because of Bella. She was a hyper little thing last night. Other than that, today was kind of a blah day. We got a new plan for our cell phones. We've been looking at ways to reduce our monthly bills to help us better afford our mortgage. We talked to the mortgage consultant today and the papers are done and they were working on one more thing and we will be closing FINALLY within the next day or two (granted the entire world doesn't blow up in that time). I am so happy to finally be getting this done. Chris is on leave with kids this week since the daycare at the school is not open the last week before school starts so he's getting things done around the house too. I still need to upload this weeks installment of garden pictures but it is amazing! I cannot believe how fast they have grown but we've had some great rain lately as well as the watering system on a timer and Miracle Grow. We'll have plenty of veggies soon. Those who know me, that's really not all that exciting for me because I don't eat them but I'm excited to be able to feed the lettuce to my lizard!
07 Jul 08-Today was a lazy day. None of us really wanted to do much of anything. That could be because Harmony and Cody both had someone sleep over last night and we didn't even do lights out with them until 11 and they still didn't go to sleep right after that. Oh well. They had a great time and that's what matters. I did, however, finally pick up a Ped Egg today and that thing is amazing!! I was so tired of wearing tennis shoes and socks but my feet dry out so darn quick if I wear sandals. I finally decided to try it and boy am I glad that I did. It took me quite a while and I realized there was more damage than I thought but after I was done, my feet felt awesome!! I would recommend it to anyone! We'll see how often I have to do it but after my first time, I'm happy! The rest of the day was spent downloading music and updating my IPod. Every time I do that, I immediately break out my headphones and lose myself in music. I hadn't been listening to music as much lately. I'm not sure why, just hadn't but every time I do that, I remember just how much I can lose myself in it.
06 Jul 08-I ventured out with Bella today. I needed to take advantage of the BOGO sale at Payless so I took Harmony and Miles to get them shoes for school. I was worried that they wouldn't let me bring Bella in there but she's so small, they didn't care. Man, shoes are expensive! Anyway, I headed to Petco afterwards to get some puppy food for Bella, a mouse for Ali and a collar and leash for Bella as well. Everyone just ooh'd and ahh'd over her. It was so great. Who doesn't love a little puppy?? It is another hot one today (like I expected it to be any different) but the humidity is also up today. Yuck! The kids are not on their best behavior so I decided to give Chris a break and get the kids out for a while so he could relax. Now we're just hanging out and waiting until dinner. It's a "grilling weekend" so we're having burgers and dogs again tonight. He's been marinating steaks for a couple of days as well so those are going to taste yummy! I'm thinking of having Chris move the Wii into the bedroom so I can actually play for a little bit. Since we got the Xbox 360 fixed, it seems that I never get to play the Wii so it would be nice to disappear for a while and play especially since we have the Wii Fit now and I LOVE that game! The bedroom is also the best place to do that too since we have the a/c unit in the window. :)
05 Jul 08-Today was just a blah day. I don't know if it was the garbage I ate yesterday or if I took my vitamin too soon after eating this morning but I got sick and spent half the day in bed. I feel better now, just worn out. It's been that way for the last few days. I just feel like someone has sucked the life out of me. I don't know what I need to do to fix that either. Anyway, I've just been hanging out on the computer and waiting for the storms to roll in. We're supposed to get hail and stuff tonight but it's been moving in slowly. Chris stopped by a 3 family yard sale this morning, on the way to take Cody to his mom so he could go fishing with his grandpa today, and came back with a neat popcorn maker and a container with some colonels in it. It had the recipe for kettle corn on it and so he made some tonight and boy was it yummy! No more spending $4 on a bag from the stand! I have been on the hunt for an affordable but nice cappuccino maker. I can't remember if I told this story or not but I had to complain to the general manager of AAFES because 2 days so far, there have been ants in my cappuccino that I've bought from the shoppette. It happened on Thursday week before last and on this past Tuesday. I was so mad and while it only costs 99 cents for a cup, it makes me wonder how many other times I've drank ants and not known it! I'm supposed to go in this week and talk to the manager of that shoppette. Anyway, the reason I told the story was to explain my "need" for a cappuccino maker. I figure if I can just get one and make the flavor I like at home, then I don't have to worry about what I might be drinking. It sucks to have to do that but I don't feel like they're taking me very seriously and I'm very upset that I can't just go to the other shoppette. The don't have the flavor I like (English Toffee). That's enough rambling for one day. I'm off to get the kids their giant glow sticks to play with for a bit and then I'm off to bed to try to get my energy back.
04 Jul 08-Happy 4th of July all!! We went to a BBQ at Joey's house today with people from my shop. I made my chicken biscuits as usual today and we had a really nice time just hanging out. Then we headed to the base for the annual festivities. Things did not go as planned. We had storms roll in from 3 different directions and when the lightning was within 3 miles, they finally evacuated us. Thankfully the kids were able to play in the water. They must have realized how big of a hit the fire truck spraying water out was last year so they did it again this year but with a fire hydrant. The kids were soaked but the really enjoyed running around through it and of course were soaked. Oh to be a kid again and and be able to enjoy it. Anyway, they evacuated everyone to the enlisted club but it was just too many people and we finally decided to leave. The kids were bummed but they didn't seem too broken up about it. Once we finally heard one of the shows start from home, we headed down the road a few miles to just watch from the truck. It was fun for the kids because they were already in their PJs but they got to sit in the back of the truck so the night wasn't a total loss. We were not the only ones who had that idea. There were probably at least 15 other vehicles out there as well. It's almost tempting to do that every year. It was nice to just sit without having to fight crowds to get out when it was done. The pictures that I was able to get are on the website.
03 Jul 08-Thank God it's Friday!! (Okay, it's Thursday but it's my Friday!) We have the next 4 days off and boy do I need it. I did all sorts of running around today. This morning, I had to sing the National Anthem for a POW/MIA vigil/run. It was pretty neat. It was outdoors on the base parade grounds and I think I did well. It was the very first time that Chris and Harmony have heard me perform. Harmony came home with a "Great Job" ribbon which I thought was adorable. She really seemed to enjoy it. After the ceremony and they started their runs, I came back out to the house to pick up Harmony's lunch and take her to daycare. After that, I headed to my orderly room to attempt to get some paperwork signed. Every so often, my squadron has it's turn to do urinalysis duty and next week is our week. I was lucky enough to have my time come up again for this duty. NOT! I hate, hate, hate that detail. All week long, I have to watch girls pee in a cup. It's not glamorous by any means but it's part of my duties as a NCO. Hopefully by the time my name comes up in the rotation again, I will be a MSgt and won't have to do it! LOL After that, I had a dental appointment to make sure my mouth guards that were made for me fit. That was quite the experience and so not what I was expecting. I figured, they had taken a mold of my teeth so all they had to do was make sure they fit and send me on my way. Not the case! They had to fit it, have me bite, grind my teeth, etc and then file the stupid thing down so my bottom back teeth wouldn't touch my top back teeth. He had to put that thing in and pull it back out about 20 times. Each time he filed it down and then had to blow the "dust" off, I could see it flying in front of me so of course it was in my mouth as well. Ugh! Hopefully they will do the trick and I don't ever have to go through that again! After that, I headed to work for a bit only to find out there was still nothing going on. Then I went out for lunch. After lunch, I came back to find out that there was STILL nothing going on at work but thankfully after the 1300 meeting, we were released for the day. I still had to go back to my orderly room to pick up the paperwork blessing me to perform my "pee duty" next week. Now I am finally at home and ready to relax. I am so sleeping in tomorrow!!!
02 Jul 08-Whew! What a couple of days we've had. The termite guy came yesterday and blessed the roof and the roofer came today and blessed it as well. So, Chris talked to the mortgage consultant and made sure that they had gotten the notification that everything passed and to see if they could contact the lender to get on the paperwork. It would be great to close tomorrow so we could put in the doggie door this weekend but I doubt it will happen. We can hope though. Otherwise, we should close on Tuesday. Keep your fingers crossed for us! It has continued to be miserably hot. I was so excited for the summer to get here, now I just want to go back a couple of months to where it was comfortable! The storms have been few but they have been nice. We definitely need the rain for our garden to save us on our water bill. We're going to have to penny pinch. I want to collect the rain water as well. That should be fun! We finally broke down last night and gave Miles his first mohawk. He'd been begging us for it for a long time. He looks so adorable with it too. I did, however, explain it to him that it's only temporary. I don't want him with a mohawk for my brothers wedding. Ha ha! I know there's more stuff going on but I'm officially brain dead and can't remember right now!
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