Saturday, July 26, 2008

It's 7am, do you know where your children are?

I was sifting through pictures, trying to get the number down to a manageable amount. Then I came upon this:





I suppose there are many worse things Elena could be doing....for instance, "making eggs" like Ava did while her parents slept....

Monday, July 21, 2008

Crazy Dancin' Fools

Lucy's 2!





Here are some great pictures from Lucy's 2nd birthday! Her birthday was in March (oops - little late!)

Kevin's Commissioning

Here's Kevin and General Casey in May at his Commissioning.

Boat Cruise






One of the things we did for Kevin's last week here was take a Paddleboat ride on out of Stillwater. Elena said she wanted to go on a boat! We played a great game of charades!

Monday, July 07, 2008

The first 49 days...

Awww....the loveliness of Independence Day. The holiday has a whole new meaning for me this year. Independence from cooking, washing stinky boy clothes, cleaning the newspaper off the bathroom floor...all those other wifely duties. It's just me and the girls now. Give me a break, I'm trying to look at the positives. Of course I'll miss spending $180 at the grocery store and gaurding my dinner as Kevin finishes his own and eyeballs mine. I do miss my husband, I'm just in denial that he is really gone for the better part of the next 20 months.

It really didn't help that my alarm at 5am was a recording of some historical military song. Really, couldn't we have come up with a better departure day than the 4th of July? I should feel proud of my husband as he drives 1200 miles to report for duty in the heat and humidity of Georgia. I do, and my anger towards the US Army is slowly subsiding. I've gotten better about this whole deployment thing. I can now explain to someone that my husband is leaving for months without them getting uncomfortable as I start to get teary eyed. Kevin won't believe that for a second, as he still denies that I even got teary when he proposed.

My weekend comprised of "normal" shifts at wor. I then went home to my mother's and barely falling onto the couch before I was asleep. I make a great houseguest (sorry, Mom!) I don't think I have felt the true impact of this event, as I am so emotionally drained, there isn't much feeling left to be had. Maybe I have worked through the feelings enough that I am dealing with everything just fine. Even so, I'm still waiting for that moment when the whole ground beneath me will collapse. POOF!

I remember reading the beginning of a book entitled "While They are Away"(I read many beginnings of books, but rarely get to the end.) It was a compilation of stories from military wives during the war in Iraq. There was one woman who dealt with the situation by keeping as busy as possible, any down time was too painful for her. I remember thinking how awful for her child, who was also experiencing this horrible change with his father gone, and now she was gone all the time as well. Although I don't think I have gone over the top with activities, I have taken to more of a busy schedule than one in which I'll have a lot of time to dwell on how things could have been different. The girls are excited for their first day at daycare in a few weeks (I am too!) They will spend a couple days/week meeting new friends in our community.

So far the worst part of the deployment process was preparing for Kevin's departure. Trying to get a full summers worth of chores complete in just a few short weeks, but not wasting all of our precious time working on the house. We did manage to spend some much needed time with family and friends. In the past few weeks we did a short cabin/waterpark vacation, took a train ride, a paddleboat ride, went strawberry picking, and hosted a large party at our new house. I remember last summer when Kevin said, "We should really sit down and talk about all the things that I usually take care of that are going to be your responsibilty while I am gone." My reply was, "Why do we have to sit down, go ahead, let's talk about it." Kevin said, "Okay, well first there is the credit card bill that needs to be pd every month...the trash is on Tues...hmmmm....I think that's it..." So I am going to make a list of all the things I have found that he probably would have done, had he been home.

1. Turn the sprinkler off at midnight (when I was the one who forgot to turn it off in the first place, but I am afraid I might be eaten by a bear.)
2. Charge the camera (where is the cord for that and what does it look like?)
3. Deposit the checks.

To be continued...