What's Up?

Well it was a nice, relaxing, restful, and RAINY weekend! We got in lots of good family time, which was wonderful after Eric having to be gone last week.

We are planning to enjoy this coming week, since our family will get to spend it together-at night anyway :) And it's a 4-day week, and then Eric will be off Friday through Monday! Yay! We plan to squeeze every ounce of family time out of that long weekend that we possible can, because family time will be pretty scarce in September. It's going to be a long and probably frustrating month, but I am ready to do it and get it behind us. And maybe to test myself a little for the upcoming deployment-how well will I do by myself with three kids when it's more than just a week at a time? We'll see!

I'm also pretty excited that Eric won Apache of the Week this past week while he was gone (for being awesome, of course), and he now has a four-day pass to take in October. We plan to enjoy that as well!

It's definitely cooling off outside! The trees are starting to turn gold, too. It's been raining a lot and the temperatures are staying in the 50s and 60s. Won't be long now before that rain turns to snow. I'm kind of looking forward to it! I know that sounds crazy, since we have snow on the ground for more than half the year here, but after the beautiful summer we've had, I just feel ready to enjoy the winter, too. I'm especially excited that we will be able to spend a lot more time outside this year, since I won't be pregnant for the first half of winter, and then worrying about a newborn getting too cold for the second half.

Speaking of cooling off, Caleb got a package in the mail from my mom with a lot of fall clothes in it, which was really nice, since none of the boys really had any warm clothes that fit. So this weekend we went shopping and only had to get stuff for Nate and Sam. We went to Once Upon a Child and bought them each a fall wardrobe for a total of $46, even. I love that place! If you have kids, you should definitely find the closest one to you and shop there. It's such a savings, even over Walmart.

So, I guess that's all for now. I know this post is not written that well, it's just kind of a hodge-podge of what's been going on lately. I'm sure I will have something more profound to share soon. :)

Nine Years!

Tommorow is our ninth wedding anniversary. Eric had to be gone this week, so he took THursday and Friday off and we celebrated over a long weekend. It was really important to us to get to do something special this year, since Eric will deployed on our tenth anniversary.

So we decided to take a mini-tour of Alaska to the south of us! We left Thursday morning and drove down AK 3 through Denali National Park. We got to the southern viewing area for Mt. McKinley a little after lunch time, so we had a little picnic and spent some time looking at the tallest mountain in North America!


After that, we found a nice spot on a creek called Troublesome (appropriate for a family of three boys, yes?), and we let the boys throw rocks in the water, which I believe has become their favorite pastime.

Later that night, we went back to our hotel, and found that the sun was setting behind Mt. McKinley. I took a couple of pictures, and we talked about how pretty it was, just like most other mountain sunsets. And then we went to our room and started getting the boys in bed. We were getting them tucked in when we glanced outside, and this is what we could see:

We were blown away. We've never, ever seen a sunset like that. I don't even know what else to say about it except that it was incredible, and if anybody knows that new song "You Light Up the Sky", that's what it reminded me of.

The next day, we went to the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center, which I think used to be called Big Game Alaska. What a cool place! You drive in and they have these huge pens for all of the different kinds large Alaskan wildlife. You can drive through or walk through, and you can get our whenever and wherever you want to. We parked the van and walked through, checking out all the big game. We saw elk, caribou, black bear, grizzlies, musk ox, bison, moose and bald eagle. All very close up! And then we went to the cafe and gift shop, and they were selling reindeer sausage, hides, and had taxidermy of pretty much every kind of animal in the conservation center on display, including a huge grizzly! Ironic? Not really. This is Alaska, after all. :)

After that, we went to see Portage Lake, which is a huge lake that was created by a glacier. We brielfly considered taking the cruise to see the actual glacier, but it would have been over a hundred dollars for the family, so we just admired the lake. I would love to see this lake in the spring time, when the ice is melting. I saw a picture online, and it's looks amazing!

We spent that night on the air force base near Anchorage, and got up early the next morning to drive down to Seward to see Exit Glacier and the Alaska Sea Life Center. Both of those activities were a lot of fun. The boys wanted to throw rocls in the glacial melt that was running out of the glacier like a river, which was pretty funny to me. And they really enjoyed seeing the seals, sea lion, all different varieties of fish and sea birds at the Sea Life Center.

And then we drove back up to Anchorage, which was a beautiful, amazing scenic drive. We spent another night on the AFB, and headed home the next morning. Alaska is an incredible place, and we are thankful we had the opportunity to see a little bit more of it together!

Always love a rainbow. :)

Sooo...

We went to the fair today. TONS of fun, but I am too lazy to upload the pictures tonight, so I will blog about that later.

Speaking of lazy, I have all but stopped fixing my hair. It's kind of sad. I do it maybe once a week. Usually for church or when I know I'm about to see Eric. I used to do my hair every other day, at least. Of course, my husband used to be around a lot more, too. :)

And I was doing laundry the other day, and when I was putting my clothes away, I realized I was putting everything into the drawer I keep the clothes in that I wear when I don't care what I look like.

Does this qualify as "letting myself go"?

I would say "poor Eric", but he doesn't care, because I usually try not to let him see me in train-wreck mode. And I'm lucky enough to be married to someone who thinks I'm hot not matter how shlubby I actually look.

Anyway, I was just wondering how long before my friends nominate me for What Not to Wear...

Because I wouldn't mind that shopping spree......

:)

Verses

Oh, snap! She's blogging two days in a row!

Anyway.....

These are some Bible verses that I came across this past week. I have an NLT Bible that is divided up into daily sections so that you can read the whole thing in a year if you want to. I opened it on Monday to the section for that day, and I came across this:

Turn to me and have mercy, for I am alone and in deep distress. My
problems go from bad to worse. Oh, save me from them all! Feel my
pain and see my trouble. Forgive all my sins.
--Psalm 15:16-18

It stuck out to me that it was one that I should definitely hold on to, since I feel sure there will be plenty of times when I will feel exactly this way. I didn't know I would be pulling it back out by the end of the week! When I would start to feel totally overwhelmed and frustrated and just couldn't stand how mad I felt, I would read these words. "My problems go from bad to worse", and mostly "have mercy, for I am alone and in deep distress".

And I know that-at this point in time-I am not going through anything that qualifies as "deep distress". Certainly not when compared to watching my husband head off into a war zone less than a year from now, and knowing that he won't be back for at least a year. Maybe not at all....

But what you have to remember is that every single situation that comes up in my life has this huge, scary, dark and horrible shadow hanging over it. Deployment is coming. It's going to be miserable, hard and lonely for me and the boys. And it's going to be very dangerous for Eric. When he goes out in the field to train, I know that he's training to fight people who are going to be trying to kill him. He mentions things to me, like some medic training he had to participate in where they filled a stryker with a lot of fake blood and had them run up and look inside, not knowing what to expect. When I asked him why they had to have the fake blood, he basically said to take away some of the shock in case he comes up to one like that in Afghanistan.

Stuff like that doesn't seem to bother him too much, and he just says it like, "Oh, yeah, and I had a ham-and-cheese for lunch....". Maybe it does and he just compartmentalizes it well...I don't know. But when I hear him say that, I get this sick feeling, because he rides in a stryker. What if somebody else comes up to a stryker and opens the door and his blood is all over the inside of it?

And then I start thinking, "they are training for that because it happens. It could happen. This could be the last year we ever spend together." And that phrase, "this could be the last..." is the one that really makes stupid little problems seem so huge. "This could be our last summer together, and he's spending the whole thing in the field", or "This could be our last anniversary, and he's going to be in the field for it". And it goes on and on...Name a situation, and it could be "the last".

Anyway......I was curious how my NIV Bible would phrase those verses, so I opened it up and read them, and then my eyes drifted over across the page to these words:

Do not be far from me, for trouble is near and there is no one to
help.
--Psalm 22:11

I don't know exactly what my trouble will be, but I do know that it's near. It gets nearer every day. Remembering that God is not far from me becomes the challenge. He has proven himself to me before on many occasions, and I know I should trust Him more. Maybe someday I will be able to. Until then, I hope that He will forgive my weakness and be near to me, because He is the only one who can help.

Rainbow

Eric was out in the field these past two weeks. He was able to come home on the weekend in-between, which I am thankful for, because I know a lot of times training in the field can go on for weeks. And I was actually able to see him when we went out to the range for the FRG, and also when he came back on Tuesday to volunteer at the airport military lounge with me.

The week was definitely fun for Caleb, who got to go to Bible camp. We had no idea the camp date was even coming up, but Jimmy and Fawn called the camp and found out about a military scholarship AND got Caleb the very last available spot. It was such a neat thing for them to do, and we are so thankful that Caleb was given the opportunity! He had an absolute blast!

So, all-in-all, these two field weeks should have been pretty easy, compared to the other stuff coming up in our near future. And I definitely did manage to enjoy a large portion of the time, since my great friend, Fawn, took me berry picking! We went to a nice little spot she knows and got some wild Alaskan blueberries, which are much more tart and flavorful than any other blueberries I've had. They are SOOOOO delicious, by the way.

Here is a picture. Be jealous......... ;-)




She also took me (and Nate and Sam) to her mom's house to pick raspeberries. Nate really enjoyed the picking, but wouldn't try an actual berry. He's silly that way-doesn't like to try new things.

Actually, he did eventually try some of them. I put the blueberries in pancakes, and the raspberries in jam, and he ate both of those, and really liked them. Silly boy.

Somewhere around this past Thursday night, though, things started to get kind of hard for me. I've been incredibly busy these past few weeks, and three boys are a lot of work all by themselves. Add in keeping the house in order, and I think by Thursday night I was just feeling a little bit burned-out and lonely for my husband. I'm usually fine during the day, but the nighttime gets harder because that is when I'm used to having help with the house-work, the cleaning, getting boys fed, bathed and put to bed, and without anyone to help me or even to talk to, that stuff gets overwhelming at times. The worst is not having him here to hang out with after I finally finish everything. The tv and my dark, quiet house just don't cut it.

I think what actually made it really get to me, though, was the knowledge that my life is going to be like that for a year straight, with no husband coming home on the weekends, and there won't be anything I can do about it but just get through it. So I got kind of emotional and stressed out. Ok, really emotional and stressed out...

Poor Eric. By the time he got home on Friday night, I had pretty much let everything get to me to the point that I was just really stressed out, angry and crabby. I was working feverishly to get the house cleaned and I was vacuuming when I saw the front light come on and knew he was home. But I was so mad at my army-wife-life that I didn't even want a hug and I didn't even turn the vacuum off.

I know. That's horrible and mean and awful and so very, very selfish. I know. Believe me, I know. But in the moment, I just couldn't do any better.

But he was understanding and he just walked in and gave me a hug anyway, even though I was still vacuuming- and let me tell you- that was the BEST hug of my life. It just felt so good to have him there for me, to lean on. Such a relief. So I turned the vacuum off, and actually thought to myself, "that hug made all the stress worth it."

We went on to have a really awesome weekend. We spent most of it outside, enjoying the beautiful place we get to live in. And we enjoyed each other's company so much! I think we are starting to learn how to really get the most out of the time that we have together, since we know it is limited. A lot of times, I'll hear people talk about how they wait for the weekends to get various mundane chores done, but that is not our life anymore. We used to do that, but now, I need to make sure all the mundane chores get done while he's gone, so that when he's off, we can spend that time just enjoying each other and making memories to smile at when times get harder.

It's actually kind of cool. I hate the separations. I hate having to run this house by myself. I hate not having my best friend around to hang out with. I hate it and it's hard. And it's only going to get harder. But, if we didn't have to go through those bad times, we wouldn't have these awesome reunions that we get to have. I don't think we would have the same appreciation that we have for just being together. So that is something that I can try to hold on to while he's gone next year. It's going to be like a honeymoon all over again when he gets back! How cool will that be?

We saw this rainbow yesterday. Isn't it pretty?

It didn't occur to me until later, but it kind of reminds me of the end of a field problem, or some training or school, or even deployment, which is still in our future. It sucks and it's hard, but when he comes home, it's just beautiful.

Like a rainbow. You have to get through the rain first.