Prayers are Needed and Greatly Appreciated!

I'm sure most, if not all, of you prayer for our service men and women who are making a sacrifice for our country. However, right now I am asking that you please say an extra prayer for A, his company, and their families. I don't really know what to say right now, but I spoke to A this evening and he informed me that they had a bad week which ended in a way that none of them ever imagined...They found out this morning that the wife of one of their men had passed away. None of us know what has happened, but she was 31 years old and this is of course a tragic event for her family and friends...and especially her husband. He is on his way home to be with family. I pray that he has safe travels and that he is able to receive some comfort from those who are close to him.

But not only is this hard on close family and friends...it sounds like a lot of the guys overseas are having trouble with this as well. A said that it really made them put everything else that happened this week into perspective and start thinking about the important things and what really matters. He seemed to be in total shock and I was pretty much speechless on the phone. Well...I've done a lot of rambling at this point (obviously I don't stay speechless for long). I was planning for this to be short but then I got writing. So mainly and most importantly...say some prayers and remember that life can change in an instant so take in everything that is happening around you and enjoy all the time that you have with your friends and family. Don't take anything for granted!

Five!

Question 1: Where were you five years ago?
1. I was a sophomore in college at James Madison University.
2. I was studying Early Childhood Education
3. I was in a sorority.
4. I was probably at a fraternity party 5 years ago today!
5. I was single and loving it!

Question 2: What is (was) on your to-do list today?
1. Work
2. Mentor High School Student
3. Class
4. Eat Dinner with Daddy
5. Go to Lowe's with Roomie

Question 3: What five snacks do you enjoy?
1. Triscuits
2. Chocolate Chip Cookies
3. Popcorn
4. Ice Cream
5. Sour Cream & Onion Chips

Question 4: What five places have you lived?
1. Frankfurt, Germany
2. San Antonio, TX
3. West Point, NY
4. Richmond, VA
5. Harrisonburg, VA (and then also other places in VA)

Question 5: What five things would you do if you were a billionaire?
1. Donate money to St. Jude's Children's Hospital
2. Donate money to Breast Cancer Research
3. Buy a new car...not sure which one (if you ask A, I need to buy a truck)
4. Buy a house or condo (only problem is I don't know where I would buy) :-)
5. Pay my parents back for all they've done to support me!

I took this survey from Katie F. at The Life of an Army Wife. I absolutely love looking at her blog every day. She's usually very uplifting and positive but also down to Earth!

I Want It Wednesday

First and foremost...I want to pray to God that He welcome Mr. Art Carroll into his kingdom and watch over his friends and family as they mourn his loss. This man did so much good for others and was a dear friend of my father's. He will be missed by many, but most importantly the memory of him will never be forgotten. We all love you!

The other thing which I want for tonight is to understand why bad things happen to perfectly innocent people, especially children. I am referring to the shooting at Deer Creek Middle School in Littleton, CO. I just don't get it. What did these kids do wrong? Hasn't this city gone through enough of this stuff?

Along with this I want to say..."Thank You David Benke for doing your job and protecting the young children at this school! If not for your heroic actions, who knows how many more students and teachers could have been injured!"

Gangs!?!

I went to a presentation tonight given by the county police on gangs. I actually am going to be doing two projects this semester on gangs.

What do you think? Are there gangs where you live?

Grad School

I have really been overwhelmed this week with school work which is why I have not been able to post every day. I've been able to get everything done for school but it just all of a sudden starting getting crazy for about a week. Hopefully at this point I have been able to get myself caught up and a little ahead so that I am able to relax some more and get on here every day again. I have missed blogging because I feel like I have gotten a good group of followers already who will just "listen" to whatever I have to say and be supportive. I also really enjoy reading everybody else's blogs because it's so interesting to see what everybody is doing and quite a few blogs alway make me laugh. :-) But, I guess it's a good thing that I have my priorities straight and realize that I have to get school work done before I can be blogging. (Unfortunately I guess school's more important!) Hope to really be back into the blogging world tomorrow. Good night all! Thanks for being such great friends!

A Fantastic Friday Night

I first need to say thanks to some Blogging Beauties! I recently received 2 more awards! :-) YAY!!! I love awards.


The first award is the Beautiful Blogger Award which I received from Lisa at must be doin' somethin' right.



The rules of the game:
1. Thank and link to the person that gave you the award.
2. Pass this award on to 15 bloggers you've recently discoverd and whom you think are fantastic.
3. Contact said Blogs and let them know they've won.
4. State 7 things about yourself.



7 things about me:
1. I cheered for 8 years, both for school and competitively.
2. I have only really had 3 boyfriends.
3. I have had 10 different addresses in the last 6 years.
4. I had lived in 3 different places in the first 2 years of my life.
5. 6. 7. Having trouble thinking of things that I have no already posted on here for other awards! :-)

I would like to pass this award on to:
Candace at The Future Mr. and Mrs. Edward Paul Mallue Jr
Meg at Harrison Clark
Steph at Watching Airplanes
...and anybody else who does not have it yet.


I received the second award from Miss Jody at Miss Fancy Pants. This award is the Just Because Award.




All you do for this award is:
-accept the award
-post it on your blog
-link back to the person
-pass it on if you'd like

Thanks lovely ladies for the awards. Anybody who does not have these awards yet please help yourself. I just know it's difficult to get the same award multiple times and I don't know who all has gotten them yet!

So...for my night. I had a great time. A group of us girls from my program at school got together at one of the other girl's apartment. It was great...wine, food, and just good conversation. It was nice to just get out for a little and do something.

I Want it Wednesday

First of all I want to say HAPPY BIRTHDAY, Expat Girl! (It's her birthday tomorrow!) I hope that you have an amazingly wonderful day tomorrow. I'm so glad that you chose to live with your in-laws during the deployment so that we could meet. I can't believe what a small world this really is. It's great having support from somebody close by who really understands it all!

Second, I want to say Thanks to all of you who responded to last night's post. I appreciate the support and am sure many of you understand. It's just a sticky situation because I don't want him to be upset and I of course also don't want his parents to be mad about anything. So, hopefully it will all get worked out and everything will be fine. All I really want is for him to be happy and be able to relax during his R & R!

Lastly, I want to say "Have a wonderful night and a great day tomorrow. Good night to you all!"

A Need to Vent

Just so you know...I'm about to vent/rant so be prepared. If you don't want to read it...then don't. But if you want to hear what I have to say...great!

So, A and I have been talking about plans for his R & R, but nothing has been planned. Many ideas have been thrown out there, but we had not decided the best option. He really thought it would be fun and a good idea to go to Europe or do something out of the states since he gets a ticket to anywhere. So that would mean it would just be a matter of getting me somewhere. All along I have agreed with him that this would be a lot of fun...but asked "Do you need to get home to see your parents? Or will they come with us?"

I guess he was talking to his sister last night and told her about the idea of going to Europe. Well...she tells his parents and they BLEW up. I just don't get it. REALLY?!?! Your son is in a war zone fighting for the freedom that we have and you are going to send him an email about being upset that he would want to go to Europe. How about you TALK to him first and see what he's actually thinking about before you react. I mean seriously...he doesn't even have a passport yet so he ain't going anywhere until he gets that done. And again...have I mentioned...HE'S IN A WAR ZONE!!! Although it is possible for him to get a passport, it's not a priority and he's a little busy. So, if he is able to get it done wonderful...but I'm not counting on it. All I know though is that if I were in his position and my parents went off about it, this would be my reaction to them..."Fine, if you are going to get mad at me for that, then I will definitely be going to Europe and now I don't want you to join me there!" :-) Yes...I love my parents (and my mom reads my blog daily) but I don't deal with BS. Which my parents are aware of which is why they would think before they reacted and talk to me about it rather than blowing up. Anyway...I tried to calm A down earlier. I could tell that he was really upset and annoyed because he couldn't believe that this is what they are concerned about when he's going through all he's going through in Iraq right now (Obviously I can't get into all of that...but I was almost in tears worrying about him, but I held them back!). And now I'm tearing just writing about this.

Well to those of you who have read...thanks for listening and letting me vent. It just really hurts me to see him upset and all I want is for him to have fun during his R & R. And hopefully we can make that happen no matter what we end up doing.

Well I'm off to bed now. And I had not posted a pic of me in my new jammies yet so here it is. There I am on my couch with my Vermont Teddy Bear that A gave me last year for my birthday. I thought it was too cute that we pretty much matched! :-)

Snuggling in my New Jammies

A had been upset on Friday when I "only" received one package in the mail...the flowers. Well, guess what? Today I got another package from him. It was a PajamaGram! YAY! They are pink (my second fav color) and super comfy. He said that he wanted me to have something to keep me warm and snuggle with me while he's not here. :-) He's so sweet and wonderful. A always spoils me but knows exactly what I would like. I love him so much!

(This is the pic off their website of what I got...not me in them! HA...I wish I looked like that. :-) )

Valentines...With Many Tears

It has been an incredibly long day with many good parts but also many tears. I received an absolutely gorgeous bouquet of a dozen beautiful purple roses on Friday. A knows me so well considering purple is my favorite color. And also with these roses was an adorable purple bear. He's so wonderful to me and spoils me so much even when he's over 6000 miles away! I LOVE YOU!

So...you are probably asking, "Why the tears?" Although A was wonderful and it was great that I got to talk to him for a while yesterday on webcam, he informed me that he would be traveling today. I knew that he would be just fine but it is still nerve racking nonetheless. Every week at church we always make a point to pray for the military. But this week, that part just got skipped over. So there I was for the last 20 minutes of church crying. I know...ridiculous, but it was just not a good day for that. All I could think about was the fact that it's Valentines Day and all of our troops are away from their loved ones, A is traveling today, and there's so much going on in Afghanistan right now and you choose THIS week not to pray for them. Anyway...enough about that. I've gotten over it at this point I guess...but am glad I can get it out here as well.

Tonight I went to dinner with one of my good friends and her sister-in-law and then went to see the movie Valentines Day. It was an adorable movie and I definitely recommend going to see it. But then at the end I was in tears because of how it ends for the little boy (I don't want to give it away...but I promise if you see it, it's not really sad just sweet and you'll understand if you watch it why it might make me tear up!) :-)

Although there were many tears today and different parts of the day, it was a great day. After church this morning I got to enjoy the company of many other military family members, including Expat Girl. It was great to see her again since we've been getting so much snow. There was some great food, since it was a brunch, great company, and we all got a lot done for putting together packages for our troops! I absolutely love putting together packages for them because I know that receiving mail puts a smile on their faces. YAY!

I hope that you all had a great Valentine's Day with your loved ones and for those of you who are apart that you are doing well and have recently heard from your loved ones!

Valentine's Flashback

This time last year, A and I were on a dinner river cruise. It was the most romantic thing I have ever experienced. We got to the boat and were brought to our table. When we arrved at our table this is what I see:

A cute little teddy bear and flowers which are holding a Valentine's Day balloon!

Here we are inside at the table.

After dinner we ventured outside to see the view of the river.

And then we had a delicious and beautiful looking desert!

YAY for Awards!

I've received 2 more awards which I had not yet posted or thanked people for. So here they are:

The first award is the Bogart Award: You're Going Places, Baby! And the rules are:

1.Link back to the blogger who sent you the award.

2.Post where you would like to be in 10 years.

3. Pass this on to 10 other special bloggers.

I received this award from Expat Girl. Thanks girl for thinking about me!

Where would I like to be in 10 years? Well I will hopefully be married by then...preferably to A! :-) I hope that in 10 years I will have 2 kids, one boy and one girl (I know...I can't control that!). And I would like to be working in a high school as a school counselor. As far as WHERE I would like to be...I have no clue. That all depends on whether or not A stays in the Army or gets out. I guess wherever our jobs take us!

The second award is the Honest Scrap Award. "The Honest Scrap award comes with a caveat or two. First, you have to tell your readers ten things about you they may not know, but that are true. Second, you have to tag 10 people with the award. Third, let all the people you've given the award to know that they've gotten it (comment on their blogs or something). And finally, make sure you link back to the person who awarded you."

I received this wonderful award from Lisa. Thanks for this wonderful award!

10 things about me:

1. I was born in Germany...I'm an Army brat. My dad retired when I was 9 and that is when we moved to VA.

2. I have always loved working with children and taught 1st grade for the past two years.

3. A and I met through my brother. A joined my brother's batallion while he (my bro) was rear detachment commander.

4. The first time that I actually heard A's voice was on a drunken voicemail from my brother and A on St. Patrick's Day 2008. (We didn't met until that following July)

5. I was engaged from April 2008-May 2008. (I broke it off)

6. My favorite food is spaghetti...with grated parmesan cheese, but NO sauce.

7. I love musicals...when I was a senior in high school I went and saw our school musical 3 out of he 4 nights.

8. I have never had the same roommate for more than a year. (However that will be changing since my current roomie and I are planning to renew our contract!)

9. I've saved 3 lives in the past month.

10. I get really into sports when I watch them, even on TV. This is to the extent that A says he will no longer watch football with me.

Who to give these to? I really don't know because most people have them already. So, if you don't have it please take it. I just don't want to give it to people who have already gotten it 10 times. This is especially going to my new followers from the past few days! Help yourself...and welcome to the wonderful world of me. :-)

I Want it Wednesday

Last week I said that I wanted a travel charm for my bracelet. Obviously I need to do some more traveling first before I do that though. So, I said I would talk about some of the places that I want to go with A on his R & R this summer. These are just some of the options/possibilites.

Greece:

Colorado Rocky's and Hot Springs:

Bahamas:

French Riviera:

Niagra Falls:
















Where do you think we should go? One of these places or somewhere else? Where would you go if you could go anywhere? I would just like to do something/anything relaxing. And as long as I'm with A I will be happy. But I do want us to have fun.

Amazing Boyfriend! :-)

I, by far, have the most wonderful boyfriend ever. He's thousands of miles away but he still thinks about me all the time and finds ways to spoil me. Although this shirt is incredibly cheesy I absolutely love it. I have a Boston Terrier puppy, as you have all seen, and we always joke that she is a Boston Terror. I love her to death but she drives us all up the wall sometimes (well...most of the time). So this shirt is just perfect. And the little note that came with the shirt in the mail was super sweet as well (I won't share because I don't want A to get too embarassed :-) ). A is just all around great! He always makes me smile. Enough bragging about my great boyfriend...even though I don't think that I could ever really get sick of it. It's now time for me to go get snuggly in my new shirt from A and get some sleep. Good night all!

HH6...For All You Military Spouses

I recently received this from my mom, a former military wife, in an email. I thought all you military wives would enjoy this. It's too cute...and true! So, enjoy and pass it on if you'd like.

What is a Household 6?

A military man's wife. The head of the household. The one that keeps up with the arduous tasks of washing uniforms, picking up smelly PTs, going to the commissary and PX, raising the children, packaging care packages...you get the drift! A HH6 is the one in charge of everything!

The name is derived from where said wife spends most of her time (the household), and the number 6 is the designation for a commander of a Company/Troop, Battalion/Squadron, Brigade/Regiment, Division or Corps.

Used in a sentence- "I'd really love to go with you on the hunting trip, but household 6 pulled my weekend pass."

Super Bowl and A

I spoke to A a little bit earlier on facebook before the Super Bowl began. He was going to be able to watch the game and they were going to get 2 beers each. WOOHOO. HAHA. Oh the little things in life.

I asked him to smile and this is what I get! :-)

I ended up joining my parents to watch the game at one of my dad's organization's building. Good food, good company, multiple tvs, and beer...what more could you ask for. So I ended up having 2 beers as well...figured, why not? A got 2 beers, I might as well too. When I got home from the game I received a phone call from A. The connection was horrible so we got on webcam and talked for almost an hour. After a while though I had to convince him to get off the comp so that he could get some sleep (It was 7 am his time...OOPS!). So here I am now getting ready to go to bed myself but I wanted to touch base with the blogging world. It's been a great weekend with some more snow in VA. Unfortunately lots of things have been canceled the past 2 weekends because of all of this snow, but that's alright. I've enjoyed hanging out and just getting stuff done around here.

The Finished Product

For those of you who wanted to see the finished cake...here it is in many different possible ways:

The cake with some pretty red flowers:

The beautiful chefs and cake decorators:

The inside of the three layers: MMM...Yum!

A very simple way to decorate:

Now there's a little more color:

Adding a little more flair:

Look at that detail:

It's so pretty:

Don't these all look sooo beautiful! I think so. Just wanted everybody to see the final product. Remember...if you are in VA and need a cake let me know. I know my roomie would love to make cakes for people.

Adrenaline Takes Over

I know this is my second post for the day, but this is something I wanted to write about yesterday but hadn't and then didn't today either. And I still need to write about my second award and hopefully I'll get to that tomorrow.

But for now...have you ever had something happen where adrenaline just kicks in and takes over and you really don't know what exactly you are doing because you just react? ...

Well that definitely happened to me yesterday morning at work. I work at a local gym as a lifeguard. We have certain hours where the parents can drop off their kids so that they can go workout. And yesterday morning, I had about 10 childen that I was watching in the pool (school was canceled due to snow...so the place was crazy!). 2 of the children were brother (age 4) and sister (6). Mom had said neither of them needed life jackets. The little guy wanted a kickboard so he was just swimming around with that. Next thing I know, he looses the kickboard, panics, and grabs onto his sister, who cannot stand because the water is 4 feet deep. Of course they were in the middle of the pool, so about 5 feet from the side, therefore I could not grab them for the side. Also, he was holding onto her so he wasn't going to grab the rescue tube. So, what do I do? JUMP IN (of course) fully clothed. Of course at this moment I have my work shirt on, shorts, flippy floppies, AND sweatpants because I had been cold. Like an idiot, I had not taken off my sweatpants before sitting and watching the kids. Mom was upstairs (there's windows looking into the pool) and saw everything that happened. She fortunately got there right when I got the kids to the side because they were hysterical. He got back in once his older sister joined him. However, the little girl was terrified. I tried to tell her that I was already wet and would get in with her, but nothing would get her in yesterday. Mom was planning to bring her back today and get in with her, so I hope she did. It just wasn't worth pushing her to get in yesterday but I don't want her to be too scared to ever swim again. Mom felt so bad about what had happened and for me having to get in with all my clothes on, but fortunately a coworker was right there and saw it and she got me some towels, a new shirt, and stuck my pants in the dryer. So by the time I had to leave an hour later, in the snow, I wasn't freezing to death! I guess that's what happened. I don't know. I wasn't really sure what was going on at the time because I just reacted. I didn't really think about it, I just did what my body and mind told me to do. Now that I went off into WAY detail about what happened I think that's basically it.

But my question is still...have you ever had a situation like that where your body and mind just take over, you look back and kind of wonder what happened?

Awards

I've recently received 2 awards both of them are from Expat Girl. I received the first award a few days ago, but I hadn't taken the time to figure out how to pass it on and thank her. So, first of all, Thanks Expat Girl. It's been great meeting you in person and following your blog. I can't believe how small this world really is.

This first award is the Blogger BFF Award. The rules are:
1. Thank and link the person that sent it to you.
2. Present this award to at least five people and explain why you chose them for this award.
3. Copy and paste the award on your blog.


















I would like to present this award to:
-Lyzz at Chronicles of Team Smitty because she's going through the same deployment as I am.
-Meg at Harrison Clark because she really is my best friend and sister.
-Lisa at Quest for Success because she always understand what I'm going through.
-Candace at The Future Mr. and Mrs. Edward Paul Mallue Jr. because I've recently realized that we have a lot in common.
-Miss Jody at Miss Fancy Pants because her blog makes me laugh which I need right now!

I will be sure to post the second award later but I don't have time right now. Thanks again Expat Girl.

I Want It Wednesday

This is a bead from http://www.pandora-jewelry.com/

It is a suitcase charm and I would love for this to be one of my next beads for my bracelet because I want to travel. I am really looking forward to A's R & R because we are planning to do some sort of traveling. We are not positive what we are going to do yet, but I'm positive that it will be a blast and I'm just happy because I'll be spending time with A. Maybe next week I will talk about some of the places that I WANT to go with him. But for now, I want a new charm for my wonderful bracelet that A gave me for our 1 year dating anniversary this past summer. I absolutely love this charm and it's already pretty full. But I'll find room for more beads. I think this would be a great bead to add once we do some more traveling together.

Home Cooked Meals

MMMMmmmm...YUM! Makes my mouth water just thinking about it. I mean, don't you just love a good home cooked meal. (Especially one made by mom!) I can cook, but nothing compares to mom's cooking.

My brother, parents, and I at the MBA tailgate prior to the opening Notre Dame football game. (Just wanted to show my mommy who cooks me great food :) )

Well my roomie and I had a wonderful meal cooked by my momma tonight and it was delicious. On the menu: Roast Beef w/ Gravy, Yummy Potatoes, Carrots, Salad, Bread. Couldn't have asked for more. Thanks mom!

Can't wait for A to come back for R & R and of course for good...so that I can make him so home cooked meals. I absolutely love cooking for him. And don't let him lie...he likes my cooking even if he does give me a hard time about it! :-)

ARE YOU KIDDING ME, JAKE?!

My roomie and I have been watching this season's, The Bachelor, and I really just do not undestand this guy right now. I totally agree that Tenley, Gia, and Ali should still be there. However, how could Jake choose Vienna over Corrie tonight?? AHHH!!!

First of all...I CANNOT stand Vienna. But it's not even just that. How could he say goodbye to Corrie? She totally opened up to him tonight. Is it because she actually has morals unlike some of the other girls? I don't know...it's just pretty crazy and he's been driving me crazy almost all season. I say this and you probably think..."Then why do you still watch it?" And my answer to that...Because it is incredibly addicting! HAHA. It's just to hard to walk away and not see what happens.

All in all, I think the real reason is because I think that good things eventually happen to good people and we all have a chance at falling in love. I know I have fallen in love. I just can't wait to continue the journey of love. It's not completely on hault right now, but for the next 10 months or so it will definitely be slowed down. I'm just glad that A and I are able to get through this deloyment together. While he's gone we can just grow together and get to know each other better. I mean, I couldn't have a 2 hour conversation on webcam with just anybody.
But with A? TOTALLY!
Can't wait to see how our adventure continues!