Tired

I did not sleep well last night. So today my emotions are truly up and down. Where honesty is involved its been ups and downs for the last week or so. The closer it comes to Mitchell leaving for his field op...then home for a couple weeks..then deploy the harder its been emotionally on me. It really feels like trying to keep an independent teenager in the nest. You want them to stay but it feels like they can't leave fast enough. Mitchell's in no hurry to deploy by no means but his mind frame is the sooner he leaves the sooner he gets back. For all honesty sake I'm ready for this to be over too. During this process of waiting for the time to come emotions seem to be running high..not just for us but for KalieAnn..she knows something big is coming up. In fact I think she's starting to understand that Daddy's leaving for a little while. We've been talking to her about it since Hero's Summer Christmas but what I think helped it really click for her was watching two shows with me; Army Wives episode where their husband leave on deployment and Sesame Street Deployment Video. She's starting to hang out with her Daddy more. When she watched the Sesame Street one it looked like she was going to cry. She's been acting up herself lately and the more I am sitting at the this computer thinking about it the more I'm realizing what might be the underlying issue...I know a lot of this is pre deployment stress but to be honest again..It sucks! I remember the last time he deployed I was a mess for a few months before I got myself so busy that the time flew by. I didn't have kids then...now I will be doing it with three and I'm extremely happy about that. When he is home they keep me pretty busy and I am depending on them to keep it even more true while he's gone.
Well besides the emotional roller coaster that comes with that stuff I will also be busy with two other things..family...and friends. Our friend that has been living with us till the Marine Corps finally medically discharged him which turned out to be yesterday will be leaving tomorrow and coming back with his daughter in time for school. He and his wife enrolled their daughter in school out here so hat she could start Kinder garden and then Arizona schools would then take her as a transfer due to birthday and cut off dates. The family part? I will be blessed with my Cousin and her hunny coming out for ten days. Hopefully all will be gone by the time Mitchell's gets back from his training op. Think I'm becoming possessive of his time now with us? lol Just wait till he gets back.
Another Positive note he graduated Sergeants Course! And with that positive note I am going to leave it there I am exhausted.

Family Time

Living out here in California I get to see My Mom and Family an Awful Lot!!! Its been great! But moving out here I have had to learn to say No on events and things. For the first two months or so of living here we were off doing things every weekend. If not going out to do things people have been over. Our first weekend here as just our family was Fathers Day weekend in June. At the end of June Mitchell started Sergeants Course here on Camp Pendleton. Once he graduates that in August he'll heading to training for a few weeks...home for a couple of weeks...then he's set to deploy in the beginning of October for 6-12 months. So our time as a family right now is more special than normal...just knowing that soon we won't have his wonderful company around. I'll have to admit though that I am very happy about living out here. The deployment isn't going to be easy they never are..no matter how many times you've been through but I've just learned Life itself isn't easy.
This year we get the Privilege of being apart of Hero's Summer Christmas(aka Christmas in July). Impacting Military Families and our church South Shores have partnered up this year on it. I tried explaining to KalieAnn that we will be celebrating Christmas at the beach this year and I get "We can't have Christmas at the Beach Mom!"..
curious I asked "Why Not?"...
"Cause there's no snow at the Beach!!"
So I explained to her again that here in California where we are at we won't get snow even during the Holiday season unless we go up to the mountains. So now she's excited! I'm kinda excited!! The only reason I'm kinda not is cause it just turns out to be the day my older Brother, James is having surgery that day.
For those that don't know my Brother was injured during a Training Exercise. The trauma to his knee was so bad that it caused RSD. So he's having a temporary Nuero Transmitter(hope I spelled that right) put in his back.If this works it will greatly reduce his pain level so that he could possibly start living life the way he wants to..independantly...For me I just don't want to see him in pain. So if everyone can please keep him your prayers. Well that's all to really update on. Looking forward to the day at my Moms house one Saturday! God Bless!

Our Family

Since we have moved here we have added two pets to our family. Jack Jack our cat and Bandit our new Puppy. Picture below are of the kids with Bandit. I'll post more at a later date. Kids have been getting into things non stop today. Its been one of those days where I have been constantly reminding myself that I do love our children. :)

Impacting Military Families Baby Shower

My Mom and a great group of Ladies got together 6 years ago to help Military Families expecting babies. They've been holding Baby Showers at our home church South Shores Baptist. Now they've turned it around into a Non profit Organization called Impacting Military Families(IMF). They do more than just Baby Showers. They also do Hero's Summer Christmas.




Heroes summer Christmas is for Military families that husbands are going to be deployed over Christmas. They in turn do a Christmas Celebration in July. They have us as one of the Families this year. Not sure If I came on and gave an update but Mitchell will be deploying in the fall for 6-12 months.




So why am I posting this? We got the joy of being volunteer's at this years Military Baby Shower. What made this years so exciting is that its the first time IMF has thrown a Baby Shower as IMF. It was great to see and be there to experience that! So proud of this group of people! Here are some Pictures!
Debbie, Josh(Soon to be Dad X2) and Anne(My Mom)

Josh was the winner of the speed diaper game.

Mitchell and Amanda

Mitchell announced the winners of the Baby Food Game and Dirty Diaper Game.

One of the Mom's opening her Gifts! :)

Once again it was a blast to be there! Here's their website! www.impactingmilitaryfamilies.org Just in case you're interested in Donating!!

Settling In

This last month hasbeen sooo busy that it feeliks lits been longer just a month! Thanks to some friends our house is just about to the point of up keep. I still have frames and pictures printed to put inthose frames..curtains to go up. For now....I'm just doing the up keep.
We are currently being blessed with the companyof our friends Bobby & Brooke and their three beautiful girls. I think intersting is the best word to describe it. I have learned that our kids don't take long to go from friends to acting like sisters. I think it only took a day..but I could be wrong. They are perfectly paired off too..and no that wasn't planned.
Along with having a house full Mitchell ended up taking me in to be checked out at the Naval hospital.Ihave ever mentioned that Idon't like Military doctors!? Thelady looked at my results...then proceeded to push really hardon myblatter.."Does it feel like you have a blatter infection?" "yeah kinda butI'm not a doctor..thats why I'm here" Pushing really hard over my blatter "you definetly have a blatter infection!" Then walks out. I was like "Are you freakin kidding me!?!" I have decided if we can...I'm not going to be seen by them! So my bodies been fighting off that infection. Well anyway I'm off to get the rest of my kids down for a nap!

Moving

We made it to Southern Cali Tuesday night. Its definitely been an interesting one with having to take care of one thing after another..can't wait for the day when I can just relax on my couch again and knit or even sleep in our own bed. Until then soo much too do. We signed for our house today on base. So we will be checking out of our hotel tomorrow morning. After we got the keys we went and looked at the house...all I can say is GORGEOUS! Even the girls are excited :) They've already got their room picked out. We still have soo much to do. We were hoping to have our house yesterday but my wonderful hunny needed some uniform items that he needed in order to check in. My mom joined us and I got to see my Best Friend/Sister Bekah. Plus I've gotten to see my Best Friend/Sister Ashley just about each day. She has been the biggest help to us. Tomorrow its trying to get started in getting settled. A lot comes with that. Big one is figuring out when we are getting our stuff. Once we get our stuff we can get Internet set up..a long with everything else. So I wanted to come on here before we left the hotel. Well I'm off to bed...here's a picture of the girls I'll leave you with.

Busy, Busy, Busy!!!

I thought I was busy before! This move has sped up into our sights! Its been an interesting journey! Mitchell hasn't been able to get a whole lot of time off which has been frustrating all in its own. He's still doing the boss' job or fixing things for him. However I've grown used to it.

Our counselor before we left Okinawa told us that Recruiting Duty will either tear your relationship apart or break it up. That its a make it or break it situation! I can't even tell you how close to the truth she is!!! If your not careful with your relationship it can tear you apart! They work such long hours and so much stupid drama that you have to be able to understand both sides! We've come to learn that to help us make it lol!

In the past three years I have honestly felt like a single mother with the benefits of being at home with the exception of last summer. Mitchell had an awesome boss and they were rolling along with their misson so well that he had most weekends off. We spent almost every weekend out on a lake with our boat. Outside last summer though I have to admit it, its extremely hard! Your life is literally spent taking care of the kids by yourself! Husbands are gone before you wake up in the morning and get home if your lucky in enough time to kiss the kids good night. If your misson isn't met they are working through the weekends. A lot of people around here ask.."Well if he's working this weekend he should get time off during the week right?" The answer is No. When we first got here Mitchell would be at work by 8 and home around 11pm and worked through all the weekends. For him to see the girls we'd try to meet him for lunch once a week. Its hard...but when it boils down to it Is there really any aspect of life that's easy? I've found the answer to be No. Especially in the Military lifestyle. Recruiting Duty your facing long hours...long days...the obstacles that you read about above...in the fleet/division your facing training months or deployments...basically months of them not being home and worried about them. We are now looking at being off of Recruiting Duty!!! Now here's the "However" lol he might be deployed in the Fall. So like I said there's always those obstacles in life!

Our move is happening next week. This update might be the last till April! Hannah and Alayna have their routine check ups next Tuesday. If I have the time I will come on and give the update on how all that went. Otherwise we have the Movers coming to pack our stuff up on Wednesday and then pick it all up on Thursday. I am working my tushy off these days trying to get the house in order. I've started packing things that we are taking with us. I'm hoping to have the house to the point that all we have to do is the basic clean up when they leave with our stuff. If that happens then we'll be hitting the road on the 25Th. I still have a lot to do before then I feel like my head is spinning every time I think about what stills needs to be done. I've made a lot of progress but its only a dent in what all has to be finished. So here's to hoping and praying!! Otherwise worst case scenario we'll be out of here on the 26Th. Here are some beautiful pictures of our wonderful little stinkers...

KalieAnn is soo excited about this move! She is such a Girly Girl!!! She wants to move so she can wear her dresses and flip flops! She keeps telling me "Mom it needs to get hot so the snow can melt and I can wear my dresses and sandals. No jackets, tights or boots!" We went and got her some dresses. I let her help me pack them in her suit case. She ran out of the room and came back with all her dress up stuff, toys, and sandals dangling from her fingers. I had to figure out how to explain to her that we still had some time before we needed to pack everything. It was soo funny!

Now heres our trouble maker! If she quiet it usually means she is up to no Good! I've come to the point I've tossed their crayons! I'm soo tired of finding crayons all over our walls! I went to Home Depot and they had those magic Erasers on sale for a box of four for two dollars. I bought 12!! I turned and asked Mitchell "You think this is enough?" He was laughing at me!!! I'd buy a box of four and it would only got two walls if I was lucky! I still have half a room to do and a hallway. So out of the 12 which translate into three boxes I have one and a half left. So I'm hoping that it'll get those rooms done.

Alayna is our Mommy's Girl. Right now she's not getting into a whole lot. She's happy as long as she's in the room where everyone is playing. She doesn't need a whole lot of attention but when she wants it she's pretty good about letting us know. She can't get herself into sitting position by herself but if you sit her up she'll stay sitting by herself for about five minutes before she throws herself into crawling position and rocks.

Now for the blankets I have been trying to get finished in this process of Moving and Cleaning

This blanket I made for a family friend that is pregnant with a boy. Its currently sitting in Mitchell's truck waiting to be delivered. He's hoping to get it to the husband or Dad to be tonight.

Now these two blankets are Hannah's and Alayna's. The pretty pink one I made two of and the second of it has been given to its new owners. I only have one more to make and its KalieAnn's. Trust me she doesn't let me forget its not done yet! Well off to get some more cleaning done!