Four Is Better Than Ten

Four broken bones in one foot isn't the way I had hoped to start out a week where I had planned on making some serious progress on getting our house ready to sell. Life threw me for a loop, for sure! 

After a less than graceful descent down some stairs, the ensuing trips to: the Insta-Care, the Emergency Room and a podiatrist, I finally had my foot fixed up and sent home. A week has passed and I get more x-rays tomorrow and will hopefully know more about how long healing will take.  

It's been a long week of staying off my foot and trying to rest. I always think that sitting around with nothing to do but watch movies and read books would be great but its not! I keep looking around at all the wallpaper that I want to be stripping and the walls I want to be painting and it's driving me a bit bonkers!! Asking for and accepting help is incredibly hard for me but I am very grateful for the wonderful family and friends that have brought by meals for us and checked in on me! 

My view over the last week! 

An interesting hiccup of the situation is that a month ago I signed my girls up for swim lessons that started today. Guess who is now going to the "Mommy and Me" swim lesson with Lilly in my stead for the next few weeks? What do you want to bet he's the only dad lucky enough to be there?

Don't they make a cute group? Scott has been a life saver in so many ways over the past week! Our house has never been so clean! (puts me to shame) The girls love all the extra one-on-one time with Daddy and they really thrive around him. The longer we are married the more I love and appreciate this awesome guy, he truly is my better half!

He even has the girls pick out flowers to bring home to cheer me up!

This is my first broken bone so I am curious, what bones have you broken and how long was the recovery?

The Most Inspirational Woman I Know

There are some people in life that you meet and never forget. My mom is one of those people. Her warmth and love touch everyone she meets, however brief that meeting. Her laugh is infectious and comes easily and often. Happiness just seems to follow her.

(My mom at my wedding reception)

When I was little and people would ask what I wanted to be when I grew up, I most often said I wanted to be a mom. Nurse, dancer, singer, etc... were also sprinkled in there occasionally but I always came back to being a mother. There is a very simple explanation for why I wanted to be a mom. My mother is THE BEST.

If you were to look my name up in the dictionary the word stubborn just might be listed as the definition. Despite this my mother has always loved me and showed me unconditional love, even though I didn't always see it or appreciate it. The definition after her name would be love, joy and patience.

(mother's weekend my first year of college)

My mom's brain is overflowing with knowledge. When she wants to know something, she learns it. She knows a little bit about just about everything and more about the things she really cares about and she has the memory of an elephant, she never forgets! Not only does she know things but she possesses the ability to explain things on different levels. She gauges her response to each persons understanding and maturity and is a magnificent teacher.

As the youngest of seven I spent quite a bit of one-on-one time with my mom and leaned on her and learned from her in so many ways (definitely a mommy's girl). She taught me how to bake, and sew among other things and now she teaches those things to my girls.

I don't think she has ever killed a plant in her life, she has the greenest thumb you'll ever see and willingly shares that knowledge and love.

My parents instilled in me a love of reading, and every time my kids are with my mom they are begging her to read to them and she happily obliges, mush to their delight.

She is committed to serving others and finds joy in giving.  She serves everyone around her, with a smile. When each of my babies has been born she has come down and taken care of us all! I couldn't have done it without her love and support and gentle way of teaching me what I need to know to be a good mom.

There are some people in life who seem to always find joy in something.  My mother is one of those people. I am so blessed to have her as my mother and the grandmother to my children. She inspires me to not compare myself to others but to just be myself as a wife and mother and reassures me that that is more than enough. I love you mom!

Air Force Job Offer

We finally heard back!!! Yay!! You might remember from some previous posts that over a year ago when Scott was accepted into the Delayed Entry Program he was initially offered a job that he was okay with, signed the 8 year contract and then when they realized he was colorblind they withdrew that job offer, understandably. They have been looking for a new job to offer him and we have been waiting patiently (well..mostly patiently!) for them to find one.

It had been so long since we had heard anything definite that we had started looking into other career options when Scott got THE PHONE CALL a couple weeks ago. They called on a Thursday afternoon with the new job offer and gave us until Monday to decide if we wanted it. It was a long weekend of introspection, research into the job and praying. Monday morning Scott sent off his acceptance letter and received his training date for O.T.S. at Maxwell A.F.B. Wahoo!!! This new job offer really opens up the options of where we could be stationed which is exhilarating!

It's been a crazy couple of weeks. I'm still having a little trouble wrapping my mind around the fact that it is actually going to happen and that we are headed for an Air Force life. Overall we are very excited and looking forward to the opportunities this life will bring.

I've been busy trying to make a plan for getting the house de-cluttered, garage-saled (is that a word?) and ready to sell. I am a bit of a pack rat so this is rather time consuming! Also, I am trying to get all of our paperwork super organized and throw out anything I don't have to keep. I don't want to be moving things around with us that we don't need or use.

 I've also been doing some (okay, a lot of) reading about moving with the Air Force and looking into different bases. I think that Scott might secretly think my spreadsheet about the pros and cons of different bases is a bit silly, but it helps me remember, in all this chaos, what I've read and heard. I want us to be prepared to make good choices with Scott's dream sheet when the time comes. We would love to live overseas or near the coast in the U.S. Lets be honest, who wouldn't be excited about the idea of putting Hawaii, Florida, Washington, Germany, Italy etc.. on your dream list!  We will have to see what options he gets to choose from to make his list...  If we actually got one of the ones I'm leaning toward right now we would be overjoyed but we will be happy wherever we end up. Finding joy in the journey is something I am really working on.

(It's more than that but still a bit crazy)

I have loved reading blogs by military spouses and getting their unique take on the Air Force life!

Which bases have been your favorite and which would you try to avoid?

Easter Fun

This year our Easter Celebrations had a new addition. Adult Easter Egg Hunts. Who knew they were a thing?

The Sunday before Easter my girls wore their Easter Dresses to church, they've been dying to wear them for weeks! 

They were so excited!!

About half way through the week before Easter a friend in another state posted a photo of she and her husband at an adult Easter egg hunt. My mind was blown!! I immediately started googling to see if there were any in my area. Happily, I found one. 

Sorry for the dark selfie, but we were super excited and antsy to start our Easter Egg hunt!! 

We had to pay a small fee to get in and each person could only grab one Easter Egg (there was a lot of candy loose on the ground), but if you were lucky enough to get one of the eggs, the rewards were good.  

Scott had egg number 2 and redeemed it for the cooler which had the corresponding number and I was egg 19 and got the air mattress. (The cute photo bombers did not come with the prizes)

Scott's sister was gracious enough to watch our girls so we could have a fun night out. We ended up taking the, uuhhh... scenic route to our destination, since I was the one driving, which made us a bit behind schedule.  Don't say anything, I am not always the best navigator... Our date night still went incredibly well and was a nice chance for us to talk and just be together. And the Easter Egg Hunt was pretty exhilarating on it's own!

Easter Sunday my parents and two of my clan of brothers and their families came over for dinner and an Easter egg hunt (the hunt was for the kids, not adults!! I ate enough candy while filling the eggs to make our whole block sick of chocolate.) My brother Andy brought a bubble machine, which really intrigued Lilly. She was more excited about that than the Easter egg hunt!

Being able to spend time with my family on Easter Sunday was the perfect ending to Easter week. 

Valentines in Bryce Canyon

A month ago I entered yet another giveaway, this one by Maverick Adventure Getaways, not expecting to win. Imagine my surprise when I won an overnight stay at a hotel, dinner and tickets to a concert! The giveaway didn't specify where the overnight stay was, just that it was over Valentine's weekend, so I was a little surprised to discover it was four hours away! I had never been to Bryce Canyon, but I had seen the beautiful pictures, so it was a happy surprise.

After dropping off our girls, who practically threw them themselves out of the car to spend the night at Grandpa and Grandma's, we headed down to Ruby's Inn at Bryce Canyon. We were so excited to be there and start exploring and doing that we didn't even take a picture of the Inn, which was beautiful. It's a HUGE place with a log cabin feel, it's own grocery store, post office, restaurant and beautiful swimming pool, among other things. We found this picture, which shows early visitors to Bryce Canyon, while waiting to get seated in the restaurant, and it made me grateful I had air conditioning and a comfy ride on our way down there.

It isn't often that I see a sign translated into multiple languages, without Spanish being one of them. Judging by the conversations ebbing and flowing around us in the restaurant and other areas of the hotel, people from all over the world were staying there that weekend.

After our awesome, and free, meal at the hotel restaurant, we headed over to the concert across the street. The tickets were for a Ty Herndon concert. It was in a much smaller building than I had expected, a place where they do dinner theater, which made it more personal and super fun!

Ty Herndon gave a great performance, and I would go to another of his concerts in a heartbeat!

The next morning, after an invigorating swim in the pool, we headed to Bryce Canyon. 

Bryce Canyon was inspiring. Such a huge expanse of red rocks in odd, beautiful shapes stretching across the horizon!

 We had a wonderful, super romantic weekend! Who knew that without kids around I could sleep through the night?

It was great to spend time with the love of my life and just get time to focus on us.  I have an awesome hubby who was ready to drop everything with 2 days notice to spend the weekend with me! We love exploring new places together and this was a great chance for us to relax together. Thanks Maverick Adventure Getaways for the weekend away!!

Fairy Tea Party

The most beautiful fairy at the Fairy Tea Party

Every Spring our local library has a Fairy Tea Party. We decided to take Abby this year, as she is old enough, and we thought she would enjoy it. Scott waited in line for a couple hours early on a Saturday morning to get the tickets and we are so grateful!

The library transforms a ballroom into a little girls fairy dream. 

The library director played the part of the Fairy King with a court of fairies. Ballerinas performed excerpts from Sleeping Beauty and everything was magical. (It kind of made me wish I was a little girl again) Abby loved watching the ballerinas dance right in front of her! (Scott picked a great table!)  All the little fairies in attendance promenade and get to meet the Fairy King. 

 Abby got a purple wand at her place setting and really loves it. Lilly inherited my blue wand when we got home and she has developed similar adoration of her wand. 

After the tea party the fairies could walk through a room filled with the cutest, tiny fairy houses and at the end, trade in their magic coin for a book. The library director says the purpose of this fairy tea is to help little ones develop their imagination and be able to envision the things they read in books, which I think is pretty awesome. This was Abby's favorite part, as you can see from her face....

This girl is a wonderful addition to our lives. She has the best giggles, smiles and hugs. She is so caring, she looks out for others all the time, and wants everyone to be happy. I love this girl so much!

Air Force Update

I've been absent from the blog for far too long! Really there is no excuse. Everything with the Air Force has been more than up in the air and I just didn't want to even think about it, let alone write about it!

Here's a quick update (as part of my resolution to post once a week) of where we are and what we are up to.

We had applied for a waiver early in the summer for Scott's eyes, as he is partially colorblind and the post they had slated for him required full color vision. Early October we finally heard back that they wouldn't approve the waiver (understandably, I suppose) and they were going to put Scott's application back into circulation to see if other areas of the Air Force were going to have openings for the coming year that would be a good fit for him. The info about the waiver denial came in the first part of October and the end of December we finally heard back, sort of! The recruiter contacted Scott to say that the Air Force had some jobs they wanted to offer him but wanted to make sure he was still interested, after more than a year of hurry up and wait :) before they did all the paperwork of a formal offer. Umm, hello, yes! Yes, we are!!

So, we are still waiting, but with more of an idea of what's coming our way and perhaps a little more patiently. We had started to look into what else to do after graduation since we hadn't heard anything for so long but now we feel are back on track a bit.

Despite all the hurry up and wait we are still pretty excited about the Air Force and a little nervous to see what the job offers are. Who knows where we will end up?