I snagged this from a friend and the only thing that I haven't gotten down is the military time..
-When someone asks when your spouse will be home, you say July or August instead of 5 or 6pm...
-You live on your own and by yourself more after you're married than before you were married....
-You know all of your husband's coworkers by their last name, and rarely know their first name and you don't recognize them when they are in civvies....
-You say "I'm going to the commissary" instead of "grocery store"....
-When you need I.D. to buy groceries...
-You are called "Ma'am" at the age of 18 by every MP or SF that comes into contact with you....
-When you forget you have a driver's license and take your military ID everywhere with you....
-When you hear of another death or injury of a US Military and weep inside for that wife or mother that loved that Soldier.
-You read everything you can get your hands on to learn more about your husband's job....
-You really want something but you say "damn, well I'm going to have to wait for the 1st... or 15th for it"
-You ask someone "what's your rank?" instead of "what's your job?!"...
-When half of your wardrobe has some kind of Military insignia on it and once belonged to your spouse....
-When the sounds of helicopters, and Jets flying over your house shaking your windows, surprisingly soothes you!...
-You only write in pencil because EVERYTHING is subject to change....
-You know that a 2 month separation IS short, no matter what your civilian friends say....
-You know better than to go to the Px/Bx or commissary between 11:30 and 1:30 unless it's a life or death emergency....
-You show your military ID to the greeter at Wal-Mart....
-You know that any reference to "sand box" describes a deployment to Iraq/Kuwait, not your kid's backyard toys....
-You have enough camouflage in your house to wallpaper the White House....
-You don't have to think about what time 21:30 is....
-You can't remember the last time you saw a doctor who wasn't wearing BDUs/ACUs....
-You pick apart uniforms on TV and in the movies for being inaccurate with your spouse....
-You are asked to stop talking in acronyms and translate it all to English
glossary:
MP military Police
BDU: battle dress uniform
ACU: Army combat uniform
Sunday, February 17, 2008
Bureaucracy: our government slowing down my life
Well, we did not receive our letter this week. I did however speak to our social worker and he has done his part, his supervisor has done his part, and now the next supervisor must do their part before letting the bureacrat known to me only as "Frankfort" do their part and sign off on our family as an approved foster/adopt family for the state of Kentucky. There was no time table given for this portion of the events. So now, our family is at the mercy of "Frankfort". Frankfort, whoever you are....please, please have mercy and act quickly so that my children will stop asking me daily, "when are we getting our brother and sister." and instead I can begin saying daily, "remember, you asked for another sister/brother"
My friend who is also going through this process, but has the benefit of knowing her kids, told me her social worker said about a month. So, I'm going to try and keep myself busy and not be heartbroken every time I check the mailbox. I think this may be worse than pregnancy, at least when your pregnant you know it will be time limited. This process has already taken years for our family and we have no idea how much longer it will all be. But, I will seek comfort in the knowledge that God knows and that that he is preparing us all for one another. In the meantime I'll try to find other things to share about our life here.
Per Aunt Carol's request: some common army lingo.
TDY: Temporary Duty assignment, (i really don't know why it ends with a Y when the final word begins with an A, but that's the army for you) Most people would know this as a business trip.
PCS: Primary Change of Station: A move to a new post.
I also used DH in my last post this is internet for Dear Husband
As my DH and I like to joke, we've become institutionalized, neither of us can imagine life "on the outside" anymore. A friend of mine recently posted an "you know your military when" on her myspace, I think I'm going to snag it and repost it here for your enjoyment.
Mike did return from his TDY on Wednesday and the kids greatly enjoyed the trip to the airport to get him. K even made a "Daddy Hieb" sign so he could find his ride. Tradition has it that you get a few days off when you return from a school so that combined with the 3 day federal holiday we have enjoyed a nice vacation. We are very grateful to Grandma and our friend E who took the kids for us on Saturday night, and Uncle A and Aunt K for taking the four legged kid, so that we could enjoy a quiet night alone. It was very relaxing and restorative. Thank you, Thank you, Thank you!
My friend who is also going through this process, but has the benefit of knowing her kids, told me her social worker said about a month. So, I'm going to try and keep myself busy and not be heartbroken every time I check the mailbox. I think this may be worse than pregnancy, at least when your pregnant you know it will be time limited. This process has already taken years for our family and we have no idea how much longer it will all be. But, I will seek comfort in the knowledge that God knows and that that he is preparing us all for one another. In the meantime I'll try to find other things to share about our life here.
Per Aunt Carol's request: some common army lingo.
TDY: Temporary Duty assignment, (i really don't know why it ends with a Y when the final word begins with an A, but that's the army for you) Most people would know this as a business trip.
PCS: Primary Change of Station: A move to a new post.
I also used DH in my last post this is internet for Dear Husband
As my DH and I like to joke, we've become institutionalized, neither of us can imagine life "on the outside" anymore. A friend of mine recently posted an "you know your military when" on her myspace, I think I'm going to snag it and repost it here for your enjoyment.
Mike did return from his TDY on Wednesday and the kids greatly enjoyed the trip to the airport to get him. K even made a "Daddy Hieb" sign so he could find his ride. Tradition has it that you get a few days off when you return from a school so that combined with the 3 day federal holiday we have enjoyed a nice vacation. We are very grateful to Grandma and our friend E who took the kids for us on Saturday night, and Uncle A and Aunt K for taking the four legged kid, so that we could enjoy a quiet night alone. It was very relaxing and restorative. Thank you, Thank you, Thank you!
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Punk Kids!
Punk KIDS! That's all I can say. Well, not really then what kind of blog would this be? One thing i love about military is that when people move they give stuff away that they don't want to pack along. You can get some really good stuff that way. So, my kids were given a cute Little Tikes log cabin playhouse. We placed it at the bottom of the hill on the edge of the woods behind our house. We even found an old section of wood fencing to place under it for a floor. Now they could play Laura Ingalls in Little House in the Big Woods. They and their friends have had fun playing with this. Well, last fall, while my DH was TDY, it was stolen. YES, a large kids playhouse, gone. We hiked through the woods, found it and drug it back home. No problems, I just knocked on the door of the home we were behind and explained why I was in their backyard and went on.
Then Sunday (hubby TDY again) I look out my son's window and....NO PLAYHOUSE. I was so MAD. I thought about calling the MP's but, I didn't have time to wait, because we had AWANA, so i called hubby to complain and practiced slow breathing and decided like Scarlett.. I'd deal with it tomorrow. Well, now, or yesterday, umm.. Anyhow after our morning meeting i decided to drive the neighborhood and check out the yards on the other side of the woods. When what do I spy, hidden back in the woods. A large Blue thing, with a very familiar Green roof. What to do? Do I bang on every door on the street asking whose kids did it? Try to drag it out now? Well, again, after practiced breathing I decided to go home and we'd hike into the woods and assess the situation. Now mind you it's below freezing and I am not a cold weather outside fun girl. So, K, J,(also mad that their house is gone) and I hike with me and we discover the house, the thieves had cleverly covered the entire house in a blue tarp and used the roof to secure the tarp in place, thus insulating and disguising their hide out. They had also pinned a blanket in the door way. I wish I had taken pictures, they had gotten this house over fallen logs and a "creek" and set it securely between several fallen logs. Well, I'm not going to let a little thing like dense underbrush stop me. So, we pull the roof off and carry it home. I'm still quite warm (bloodpressures up I suppose) but the wimps, I mean kids need to get warm and eat lunch. So we go in for a bit. Now I knew the weather report was calling for snow and I didn't trust that the little punks that took this wouldn't move it again, once they discovered their hideout had been compromised. So I grabbed the older boys and we headed out on our mission to reclaim our property. While warming up, my brain had unfrozen, and I decided that we would place the cabin on top of the theives tarp to drag the darn thing home, because I couldn't get the walls to disassembe earlier. Fortunately with out the roof it lightened up a bit. So after positioning the cabin we began the drive home. It worked suprisingly well. I pulled and the boys pushed. Once we got a rhythm down we were able to move surprisingly smoothly until I realized we had followed the path to the wrong crossing on he creek. So a little turn and we found a narrow portion.
Then once across the creek the tarp started shredding from the sticker bushes. We kept pulling and shoving trying to keep the thing together until it becam a bigger hindrance than a help. We stopped to reassess the situation, we were about 2/3 of the way home, it was now starting to snow, and we saw and heard a group of kids on the edge of the woods. Were they our thieves we pondered, only God knows. We decided to push on without the tarp. I'd pull using the window shutters and the boys would continue to push. This actually seemed to work even easier than using the tarp, I was starting to see that some motivated kids could get this through the woods. Only two more obstacles and we were home. A huge pile of decaying branches from a tree that had fallen the previous year and "the hill" a 65 degree incline that separated our house from the woods. J and I managed quite handly to navigate the fallen trees, but I wasn't so sure about the hill, which now had about an inch of snow on it. K came to our rescue, they pushed and I pulled, and we cheered each other on to the top of our mount everest. Only to realize, it wouldn't fit through the fence gate, because, now this baby was going in the yard! No more hikes for homes for this girl! And once again J helped me out. We flipped the house on the side, balanced it on the fence rail and passed I held it while he ran around to help his sister and they lowered it to the other side!
VICTORY was ours! I must say that it was a proud moment for us and I dare say one that will live in our memories. I just wish that I could have seen us dragging that thing through the woods. I hope God let's us watch video of our goofier moments in heaven.
But, now I'm paying the price as this very out of shape body is aching from it's work out, DH warned me this would happen should I actually start doing real exercise. I guess my only hope now is to keep exercising, that or popping ibuprofens. I tried the hot bath thing only to discover my drain doesn't seal and my tub won't hold more than 3 inches of water with the faucet running full strength. But, I'll leave that fix to maintenance. At least for today I'm a hero, and the kids and the dog now have a shelter in our back yard And I will go to sleep knowing the punk kids didn't win this round and praying they won't start another one!
Then Sunday (hubby TDY again) I look out my son's window and....NO PLAYHOUSE. I was so MAD. I thought about calling the MP's but, I didn't have time to wait, because we had AWANA, so i called hubby to complain and practiced slow breathing and decided like Scarlett.. I'd deal with it tomorrow. Well, now, or yesterday, umm.. Anyhow after our morning meeting i decided to drive the neighborhood and check out the yards on the other side of the woods. When what do I spy, hidden back in the woods. A large Blue thing, with a very familiar Green roof. What to do? Do I bang on every door on the street asking whose kids did it? Try to drag it out now? Well, again, after practiced breathing I decided to go home and we'd hike into the woods and assess the situation. Now mind you it's below freezing and I am not a cold weather outside fun girl. So, K, J,(also mad that their house is gone) and I hike with me and we discover the house, the thieves had cleverly covered the entire house in a blue tarp and used the roof to secure the tarp in place, thus insulating and disguising their hide out. They had also pinned a blanket in the door way. I wish I had taken pictures, they had gotten this house over fallen logs and a "creek" and set it securely between several fallen logs. Well, I'm not going to let a little thing like dense underbrush stop me. So, we pull the roof off and carry it home. I'm still quite warm (bloodpressures up I suppose) but the wimps, I mean kids need to get warm and eat lunch. So we go in for a bit. Now I knew the weather report was calling for snow and I didn't trust that the little punks that took this wouldn't move it again, once they discovered their hideout had been compromised. So I grabbed the older boys and we headed out on our mission to reclaim our property. While warming up, my brain had unfrozen, and I decided that we would place the cabin on top of the theives tarp to drag the darn thing home, because I couldn't get the walls to disassembe earlier. Fortunately with out the roof it lightened up a bit. So after positioning the cabin we began the drive home. It worked suprisingly well. I pulled and the boys pushed. Once we got a rhythm down we were able to move surprisingly smoothly until I realized we had followed the path to the wrong crossing on he creek. So a little turn and we found a narrow portion.
Then once across the creek the tarp started shredding from the sticker bushes. We kept pulling and shoving trying to keep the thing together until it becam a bigger hindrance than a help. We stopped to reassess the situation, we were about 2/3 of the way home, it was now starting to snow, and we saw and heard a group of kids on the edge of the woods. Were they our thieves we pondered, only God knows. We decided to push on without the tarp. I'd pull using the window shutters and the boys would continue to push. This actually seemed to work even easier than using the tarp, I was starting to see that some motivated kids could get this through the woods. Only two more obstacles and we were home. A huge pile of decaying branches from a tree that had fallen the previous year and "the hill" a 65 degree incline that separated our house from the woods. J and I managed quite handly to navigate the fallen trees, but I wasn't so sure about the hill, which now had about an inch of snow on it. K came to our rescue, they pushed and I pulled, and we cheered each other on to the top of our mount everest. Only to realize, it wouldn't fit through the fence gate, because, now this baby was going in the yard! No more hikes for homes for this girl! And once again J helped me out. We flipped the house on the side, balanced it on the fence rail and passed I held it while he ran around to help his sister and they lowered it to the other side!
VICTORY was ours! I must say that it was a proud moment for us and I dare say one that will live in our memories. I just wish that I could have seen us dragging that thing through the woods. I hope God let's us watch video of our goofier moments in heaven.
But, now I'm paying the price as this very out of shape body is aching from it's work out, DH warned me this would happen should I actually start doing real exercise. I guess my only hope now is to keep exercising, that or popping ibuprofens. I tried the hot bath thing only to discover my drain doesn't seal and my tub won't hold more than 3 inches of water with the faucet running full strength. But, I'll leave that fix to maintenance. At least for today I'm a hero, and the kids and the dog now have a shelter in our back yard And I will go to sleep knowing the punk kids didn't win this round and praying they won't start another one!
We're almost expecting!
Ok, so I've been thinking I should Blog about this, but have been too lazy to find another blog site, so I'll start here. We are so excited. Ever since, well before even, we got married Mike and I have wanted a large family that included adoption. We decided to start with the biological and then add. Well, after several years of false starts we are 1 piece of paper from being officially allowed to find our kids. We just need our official approval paper recognizing us as approved Foster/Adopt parents by the state. Except we aren't allowed to actually Foster due to living on government land.
The kids are as thrilled as we are. Daily they ask when their brother and sister are coming home. K is desperate for a sister and the boys are fighting over who gets to room with the new brother. (Did I mention we want to adopt a sibling pair?) I know these next weeks (hopefully not months) are going to be probably the most difficult we've experienced as we try to locate the children God is preparing us for, but, I'll try to remember to bring you along for the ride :).
Oh, did I mention J got an 8 month old Boxer for christmas (he's taller than A!) and much to our cat Bad's dismay the other cat returned from his month's long wandering (I was sure that he'd been eaten by the coyote's! Glad I didn't have money on that one.)
So, now I'm daydreaming of a stuff list that includes bunk beds, a table that seats 8 with leaves to extend (for company of course), a sectional sofa to fit us all, and a twelve passenger van with all the comfort of a minivan: especially DVD. Oh, the little things that make a mom's life easier. I really never imagined that being a wife and a mother would fit so well. Now, don't think I'm all Pollyanna, we have our daily stress times, but I can't think of another life I would want.
The kids are as thrilled as we are. Daily they ask when their brother and sister are coming home. K is desperate for a sister and the boys are fighting over who gets to room with the new brother. (Did I mention we want to adopt a sibling pair?) I know these next weeks (hopefully not months) are going to be probably the most difficult we've experienced as we try to locate the children God is preparing us for, but, I'll try to remember to bring you along for the ride :).
Oh, did I mention J got an 8 month old Boxer for christmas (he's taller than A!) and much to our cat Bad's dismay the other cat returned from his month's long wandering (I was sure that he'd been eaten by the coyote's! Glad I didn't have money on that one.)
So, now I'm daydreaming of a stuff list that includes bunk beds, a table that seats 8 with leaves to extend (for company of course), a sectional sofa to fit us all, and a twelve passenger van with all the comfort of a minivan: especially DVD. Oh, the little things that make a mom's life easier. I really never imagined that being a wife and a mother would fit so well. Now, don't think I'm all Pollyanna, we have our daily stress times, but I can't think of another life I would want.
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