Holidays » Lady Jess

Welcome 2010!

Holidaze, OEF 2009 No Responses »

Jan 012010

2009 is finally over. Swept under the carpet like crumbs you’re too lazy to sweep into a dustpan. I don’t remember alot of big shining moments really. Alot of it was spent in anticipation of "The Deployment", and dealing with the training and preparation that comes with that.

There was the Briefing From Hell, in which I learned that I’m totally doing deployments wrong.

There was my major epiphany that relieved alot of my stress.

And my Minor Epiphany, in which I stopped faking it.

There were adorable pictures.

There was FEAR but…

Then there was HOPE.

There was pride.

There was Self Acceptance.

And there was Silliness.

With 2010, there is only one thing that matters. THIS is the year my husband comes home. It may still be months away. But 2009, even before he left, started as the year he was going to leave. It was a cloud over our heads that remained there all year, and just got steadily darker. Now, it’s slowly getting lighter, and fading a way. One day at a time.

That’s all I needed for a Happy New Year. That, and a new computer.

Christmas Money FTW!

Holidaze No Responses »

Dec 272009

I spent my Christmas money today. My Mother in Law (Thank you!) sent me (and hubby and girls) $50. Money to spend on something we want, that we wouldn’t usually buy ourselves. My Mom did the same thing (thank you too), only I already spent that on video games. Shocking I know. So anyhow, I went to the PX today for dog food. I had decided that this year, my $50 would be spent on a Wallet. It was time for a new one, I’d been using mine for over five years. It was looking ratty and gross.

Now, I’m not a fan of buying high priced stuff normally. Especially purses, to me having "Coach" displayed on your purse is just another word for "Mug Me!". And I know I’m not the only woman to change purses on a fairly frequent basis. But wallets, I’ll use one of them for ages. So I decided to look at Dooney and Bourke. And I found one I just loved. Unfortunately it was twice as much as I had. So I went home.

Around this time Hubby was online checking out the Steeler game (we won!! Haha!!) and I told him about my shopping trip. I swear I heard his eyes rolling all the way from Afghanisuck. But he said he can’t use the money in his deployment account anyhow, so I could swipe the extra from there. Do I have the most super awesome man or what??

So, I made my one and only, high priced small item purchase for this deployment. The last one I purchased Ralph Lauren sunglasses, which I’m proud to say I still use. This time…

One Dooney and Bourke purple wallet. Which I totally didn’t need, would never have bought any other time, and will last me for years.

That’s what Christmas money is for right?

The girls spent theirs already. The youngest buying all sorts of art stuff and headbands, oh and a pair of shoes she liked. The oldest, bless her heart bought two new Sim’s Xpacs. Yes, video games. I’m so proud Day dreaming

Weekend Adventures Part 1

General No Responses »

Jul 062009

It has been such a nice two weeks. Hubby’s unit, after yet ANOTHER change by the “Big Army”, ended up giving them a suprise block of leave. So if soldiers had leave time left in the year, they were allowed to use it. This was great, since he has had almost an overabundance of allowed leave time since he deployed last. It would have all gone to waste really. So he jumped at it. We spent the majority of it staying up late, sleeping in, and loafing around the house. The girls started summer vacation at the same time, and I felt it was only fair to let THEM also cut loose and relax as well, rather than fill the entire two weeks with plans.

I know alot of families in our position (pending deployment) make a point of going out and “making memories”. And that’s great. But we’ve been married for 16 years. We HAVE memories. Tons of them. The priority for me right now is seeing him relaxed before he heads “over there”. No stress, no schedules. Just down time. And that’s what we had until the holiday weekend. That’s when we got off our asses and got out.

Saturday was Freedom Fest. A fairly large Fourth of July celebration on post. We spent the whole day there, took in a reptile demo, a concert given by Broken Trail (these guys were really good, definitely would see them again), ate the yummy carnival food, and got myself seriously sunburnt. Apparently sunblock quits working after it sits for a year. Who knew? Following the jump are the pictures from Saturday. Click to enlarge.

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