Carolina weather

We have had some killer storms lately, complete with booming thunder that wakes up the kids.

I have never lived somewhere with weather like this. I am wondering what winter will be like. It can be 95 and humid one day and then have torrential rain with lightning and thunder the next. Crazy! This is how Eva feels about the storms.

Another month for Darby

Darby turns 8 months old today. I have to say that it feels different with her. With the older two kids, I was anxious for the next stage of development. With her, I'd just as soon she go as slow as she wants. She is hitting milestones later than the other two (still well within normal range) and that's okay with me.
She has become a rolling maniac and now rolls all over the floor. She is now very steady in the sitting position and does those crazy face-first-pancake-flat-forward reach that only babies seem to be able to do. She has good hand control and loves to reach for and examine little toys now.

She has become very social and LOVES to play with her siblings. Peek a boo is a great game to her. She is very patient with Eva who I am convinced thinks of her as an experimental doll.

She can feed herself little cereal treats with the pincer grasp and is excelling at eating jar food (the one area that she is ahead of her sibs when they were this age). However, we have yet to see a tooth come through.

Except when she had the croup (see previous post) she is an excellent sleeper. We get about 12 hours a night. Yay!! She is a big girl and is on the far end of 6-12 month clothes. Her height is 99th percentile still.

She is still super snuggly and I HAVE to kiss her cheeks on a regular basis because they are SO cute!! I'd be happy if she stayed a baby forever. :)

Definition of a boy

Boy, n.: a noise with dirt on it.

If that is so, what is this?

3, 2, 1 stories for Things 1, 2 and 3

Life is never dull with kids. They say and do silly things. They need guidance and protection. They are exhausting! But they make for good stories. This post was made to record some so that I will remember them later.

Thing 1

1. Brendan announced in the car one day that he didn't want to be married. He was very adamant about it. I asked him why and he told me that he wanted to be a diver, and divers don't get married. No amount of discussion could change his mind. Oh well. At least he still thinks girls are yucky.
2. His teacher told me this story today. Keep in mind she is very Southern and uses words like "honey" and "sweetie" all the time. She was directing clean up at the end of the day. After that, she said to Brendan, "C'mon baby. Time to sit down for a story." He got all huffy and exclaimed, "I'm not a baby! I'm Brendan and I'm a big boy!" Guess I need to teach him the difference between an insult and a nickname.
3. Brendan asked for a meat, cheese and BBQ sauce sandwich. I made one for him by putting the BBQ sauce on the bread, adding the ham and cheese and then putting the bread slices together. He refused to eat it because he said I made it wrong. The sauce had to go on the meat. Good grief!

Thing 2

1. Eva cannot say the letter "f". It comes out like a "b". So "frog" is "bog", "I found it!" is "I bound it!" and "fishy", well . . . it sounds like something not quite so nice when she says it. Also, her stuffed elephant is "Elevator". I have no idea why.
2. I had some ladies over yesterday morning for a meeting. One of the women brought her 8 year old daughter since she was out of school. They were all watching a movie when the meeting was over and it was time for the ladies to leave. The mom told her daughter, "C'mon, its time to leave." The girl held up one finger with a pleading look, indicating that the movie was almost over and could her mom please wait a bit. I called for Eva. "Eva, come here. I need to change your poopy diaper". She looked right at me and held up one finger, telling me to wait. Great. And thus begins the years of wanting to be like your friends.

Thing 3

1. Darby had what I thought was a cold. She was stuffed up with a runny nose. Jason was gone for the weekend to Utah. One night she began to cough. It was a barking cough. By morning she was wheezing and having trouble breathing. I suctioned her nose and sat in the steamy bathroom with her. She coughed more and even vomited up mucus. Her temperature was 103. It was a Sunday so I called the after hours nurse at the pediatrician's office. She heard Darby's cough and high-pitched squeaky cry and told me, "She needs to go to the ER, honey. And she needs to go now." Talk about a panicking mom. That was me. Since it was early in the morning, I grabbed some food, dressed the other 2 kids and we went to the emergency room. Thank goodness the older kids were really well behaved and thank goodness we were able to get right in. Darby was diagnosed with croup, a viral infection that causes the vocal cords to swell, creating a barking cough and cutting off the airways. She was given oral steroids and has now been on these meds for the past 3 days. Her cough is gone now and she is finally sleeping well. She was the crankiest, most pitiful little one for the last few days. If she was not nursing or sleeping, she was crying. It's been really hard. I am just glad she is on the mend.

Home Sweet Home

This post is for those interested parties who have been asking for details about our new place, and for the blog book so that years from know I can remember it. It is not a bragging post and hope it will not be taken as such. To all the dental students who are reading this - your time is almost here. Your days of student-type housing are going to be over soon. It will happen (even if it doesn't feel like it sometimes).
After years of apartment living, a house is fabulous. I marvel at the space we have nearly daily. I also love our neighborhood. Its quiet and beautiful with kind neighbors. I am enjoying decorating it but I realize just how long that might take. There are so many choices and we do have to budget or I'd put us seriously in debt trying to do it all at once. Plus, I am a bit restricted by the fact that its a rental and, since we are military and are destined to move over and over, I want the colors to blend throughout the whole house in case they have to be in the same room in a future home.
Anyway, here are the rooms as they stand now.
The living room, mostly done. We are going to replace that desk and cover up the unsightly cords. Jason got the recliner for his birthday.

My kitchen
Where we eat. It's so nice to not have carpeting under the dinner table. :)

There is a formal dining room which we aren't using. We turned it into this . . .
We also have an empty room that we are going to turn into a sitting room since it looks out over the porch and the front yard. I can't wait to get some outdoor rocking chairs for the porch.
Here is the garage. It's huge, which is good since we have so much stuff to store.

Here's the master bedroom. I am not crazy about the wall color but I love the ceiling.

And Jason's "office"
The master bathroom. I don't know who thought that this wallpaper was a good idea. It's horrid! I bought brown towels and am living with it.
But at least I have a great tub, with jets. However, I have no time to take a leisurely bath.
One of my favorite things is the kids bathroom. I loved this bathroom set and I bought the bubble decals for the wall.
Eva's room has been the hardest. Can you believe that purple is a hard color to find for a girls room? But I LOVE the floral alphabet cards for the wall. I still have to figure out what I want to do with the other wall.
Darby's room. If you enlarge the picture you can see the Olivia crib set and decor. Gotta love ebay. I put that dresser together (yay for me!)
Brendan's room. Since he is the only one who can navigate stairs well enough for me to trust that no accidents will occur, he got the bonus room over the garage. He spends a lot of time up there with his latest obsession - Legos.

And here's a picture of the crazy girls that live here. :)

Chocolate shake

Today when I picked up Brendan from school, as his teacher was putting him in the car, he told her about the chocolate shake that he had last night. Ms. Rakia is his teacher, a wonderful black lady who Brendan adores. She asked where he got a chocolate shake. He told her and then asked if she liked chocolate shakes too. She replied that yes, she did, very much. Brendan then turned to her and said, "Is that what makes you turn black?" Ms. Rakia started laughing hard. I was embarrassed but it was so funny that I laughed too. Oh, the things kids say.

What happens when Daddy is in charge

Daddy Jason and Eva were sick so I left Darby home with them while Brendan and I went to church. I got this picture in a message during third hour.

Yep, that's a pickle and yes, she liked it.

101st Pathfinders

Jason here. Last weekend was the first 101st Pathfinder Company Reunion. I served with the Pathfinders from 1998 to 2000. I left that unit almost 10 years ago to go to college so I was anxious to see my old friends and tour around Fort Campbell again.

It is hard for me to overstate how important those few years were. It was during this time that I found my testimony, received my patriarchal blessing, took out my endowments, went to Airborne and Ranger school. It was not easy being the "bible thumper" in a unit of uber macho and irreverent paratroopers, but it helped define and shape who I was as a member of the church and my approach to living the gospel.

So, needless to say, I look fondly on my time spent there. It is almost holy ground, kinda like the mission field. So last Thursday we all packed into the Mazda (again) and drove the 750 miles to Fort Campbell. We stayed with a new Army friend from BOLC, Doug MacArthur, who was kind enough to put us up.

The day before the reunion was supposed to take place, we decided to take a little tour of my old stomping grounds. The Pathfinders have moved to a different location on post. The spot where I worked has been abandoned and is in bad shape. It is overgrown with weeds and they chopped down the rope climb, company sign, pull up bars, and aircraft mock ups. The last trace that the unit was ever there was some paint on the door. After we visited the old unit location, we drove over to the Pre Ranger Course, which was also closed due to the war. Post had changed quite a bit since I left.
Before

After



My old barracks looked the same though.

On the day of reunion, I left the family at the MacArthurs and drove to G's Pancake house to meet up with everyone. It was really cool to see Pathfinders old and new get together. There is quite a bit of esprit de corps among us since we were one of the only Airborne units left with the 101st. Guys who hadn't seen each other in 20+ years were catching up and telling funny stories.

Part of the reunion was to link up with the current Pathfinders and see the new location. It was awesome. The new compound was surrounded by concertina wire and had a big fat sign that said "No Legs Allowed!" (a "leg" is a derogatory term for someone who is not Airborne).

All of us were kind of bummed about the old spot, but from the looks of things the Pathfinders were doing pretty well. The Platoon Sergeant now was a new private when I was there. I used to give him a hard time, as is customary for brand new guys in a good outfit. He has since been to Ranger School, been deployed to combat 5 or 6 times, has a Bronze Star and a couple Purple Hearts.

My old roommate, Mark Darcangelo,(far right) was there. We were the oddest couple of roommates in the entire army, but we actually got along pretty well. In the years since he left, Mark went on to become a Policeman, then Air Marshall, and recently joined an Air Force Reserve Special Ops unit. The lucky dog will be going to the Military Free Fall school (HALO) in January.

Then there is Bill Butler (far left). We went to Pre-Ranger together and we also broke our legs on the same ill fated jump ten years ago. He lives in Minnesota with his wife and runs his own business.

Jason Cluxton (to my right) here spearheaded organizing the reunion through Facebook and spent some big bucks in the process. He and I were in the Team 1 for about six months before I left. He got out of the Army to work for a private security contracting firm and has spent 5 of the last 7 years in the Mid East.

This last fellow is Gus Vignart (to my left). We were also teammates on team 1. He has been on active duty ever since and now trains soldiers somewhere in Alabama. From the looks of things he is pretty good friends with a tattoo artist.

It was fantastic being with these guys again and I hope to see them again at future reunions. Here are some pictures of those days from my old Army photo album.

BOLC

Jason here. Christine tells me that I am neglecting my blogging duties and need to start producing some material. Graduation has been covered and the next big thing after that was Basic Officer Leaders Course (BOLC) in Fort Sam Houston, Texas. I literally flew out the next day to start. The class itself was a composite of 500 doctors, dentists, and veterinarians. In-processing took up most of the time for the first week and then it was PowerPoint followed by more PowerPoint and then some more PowerPoint. It was pretty rough.

One plus was that we had a couple of awesome instructors, Mr. Ness and Mr. Clark. Both had really funny (if somewhat salty) stories and vast stores of experience to draw on (Mr. Clark spent 20+ years with 10th Special Forces Group). We did PT occasionally, but not as often as I thought we would which was okay since it was ridiculously hot and humid.

After 3 weeks I came home for a long weekend and that was heaven. Upon return to Ft. Sam, everyone packed up their gear and we headed out to Camp Bullis for Field Training. It was fun and I had a good time for the most part.

On a training mission

Here I am coming out of the gas chamber. Fun, fun, fun.

Our platoon was full of pretty silly guys so we did what all silly people do and grew mustaches. The Battalion Commander made us shave em off before graduation though. Here's Captain McDaniel saving the day with his groovy mustache.


I will say that there were some people in the platoon that I didn't think would make it, but they did unfortunately, and the Army will have to deal with them for a long time.

I was selected as from our platoon to go to an Officer of the Cycle award along with 7 other people. I didn't win.

All in all, I had a fun time. I made some good pals and had a lot of laughs. Other than missing Christine and the kids terribly, it was good times.