Fabulous Army Life

I think one of the most beneficial events a battalion can put together is one that prepares Soldiers and Families for upcoming separations. In our unit, we've tweaked the traditional Deployment Brief concept where Soldiers and Families sit in an auditorium and listen as a stream of presenters use PowerPoint to share their resources. This is such a good idea, but we felt that many were overwhelmed by the sheer volume of information provided and began brainstorming ways to make this event more user-friendly. The result? A Deployment Fair. Very similar in concept, but very different in execution. We asked our community resource points of contact to set up a booth with their information and any hand-outs they could provide our Families to let them know what assistance/resources they can provide during a deployment.  Each company-level FRG also set up a booth and were able to see each of their Soldiers and Family members face-to-face, even if for a few minutes.  Th...

Four fun friends together again. We were thrilled when some good friends called to let us know that they would be in town this weekend.  We met this family in 2005 when our oldest children were starting Kindergarten.  My Trey and their Madi became friends right away and soon established the kind of fun, easy friendship that lasts a lifetime.  They remained in the same classroom for the next three years and continued to be fast friends, even when the teasing started about a boy-girl relationship.  They simply ignored the teasing and continued on in their steady bond of friendship. Our youngest two children also became friends, entering their Kindergarten class together at Grace Lutheran School.  My Joshua and their Ali have similar personalities and get along beautifully together.  We were very sad to learn that the family was moving in 2008.  Trey, especially, took the announcement hard as he and Madi spent much of their time together and he would...

Every Spring, the boys' school hosts a Kite Day. All kids bring their own kite and they spend their P.E. time flying kites and listening to fun Spring tunes. It's a favorite day for my boys and a fun chance for me to spend time with them at school, outside the classroom. This year, Lori and Greg were visiting on Kite Day and got to participate as well. Greg worked with Joshua on his 3D airplane kite before Joshua dubbed it inoperable and picked up one of the P.E. 'extra' kites. All was well after that. Trey and his 5th grade friends played kite doctor for much of the day and enjoyed flying their own kites in the afternoon. It was a fun day and another good memory-making moment in elementary school.  Greg helps Joshua get his kite in the air.  Joshua is a kite master. Trey gets the P.E. kite ready to go. Trey's kite takes a dive.

Greg and Lori are visiting this weekend and I'm so thrilled to have them here. We had a slight mishap on their first night here last night, but managed to overcome without anyone going to jail. ;) It turns out that they arrived while Nate and I were still at a farewell dinner. She texted me when they arrived and I let her know we were still in the speech-making part of the evening and would be along in a bit. She texted a few minutes later and said that the police were outside my house! Apparently, one of my neighbors had called the police when their truck sat in front of our house for 15 minutes. They had gotten out of the truck and walked the street to stretch their legs then got back into the truck when two police cars pulled up. They checked their IDs and their reasons for being here, and eventually decided they were no harm to society. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. So we got over that part of the trip pretty easily and spent today doing all kinds of fun stuff....

As I was cleaning out our home office today, I came across an old college notebook from a writing course I had taken at Baylor. Our assignment was to write a letter to someone filled with memories of time spent together. I had chosen to write to my cousin Lori and, although it was a rough draft, I just had to post it. I finished out the last part and laughed out loud at some of the superfun memories with Lori, my cousin and friend. Dear Lori, As I reflect on the time we have spent together, I remember so many wonderful memories with you. Laughter always comes first to mind because we have shared so much of it. We start out giggling over some trivial nothing and soon are rolling in teary-eyed, side-splitting, I-can’t-catch-my-breath laughter. Days later, we will laugh again when one thought triggers another and we think of the same funny thing. After all, we are ‘more funny repeated.’ Our memories together are vast and varied for they have been collecting since, well, basically fr...

Trey with his pre-TAKS dinner. On Sunday afternoon, we gathered with a group of about 20 fun church friends for a yummy lunch at Chuy's (one of my all-time favorite restaurants ... have you had their creamy jalapeno dip?).  It was so fun to visit with old friends, make a couple of new ones, and enjoy a delicious Tex-Mex lunch, too.  As we were visiting, Cristy and I decided a trip to IKEA was in order to scout out some shelving units for our homes. Nate and I had previously researched and planned to purchase a wall shelving unit for our soon-to-be renovated home office.  (He's really great at home budgets, I'm working on it).  We've been in this home for over five years and have yet to really utilize the wonderful fourth bedroom at the front of our house.  It has been a guest room, then changed into a guest-room-storage-unit, then eventually morphed into a where-is-the-bed?-storage room.  It was not functional as a guest room with all the 'stuff' we ha...

How I was greeted at church this morning.  Veronique, Lizzie, Joshua, and Trey working on their worship bags. As I was sitting in church this morning, I was overcome by a sense of gratitude and joy.  On my right sat Cristy, a wonderful friend I made the first day our church opened in January of 2010, and her fun husband, Kendal.  On the left of Nate and me sat our sister-in-law, Rachel and her two sisters, Abby and Anna, a beautiful trio of amazing godly women that I feel so fortunate to know.  Just ahead of us, our children sat at a table together, busily working on their worship bags and volunteering answers to Pastor Danny's questions as they came. After worship, we chatted as we gathered table supplies and broke down tables and chairs to load for next week's service.  Again, I was caught in a moment of pure thankfulness.  This group of people -- our church family -- are truly some of the most selfless, caring, and genuine people I have ever known....