I Hate This

Here it goes...and if you don't want to hear me vent then don't read. But you can all probably relate so that's why I'm writing.

I Hate This! What you say? DEPLOYMENT!!! AHHH. It's just getting to me right now. Probably because I've just started back in classes so I'm extra busy and stressed. Therefore, not having A to talk to whenever I want just sucks. I hate it. I want him home. I want him sitting here next to me right now. I just want him back. I feel like when he left in December it was hard...but now that he left after R&R it has gotten harder. It was such a tease having him home for 2 weeks. We had a great time together but I hated having to say good-bye again.

With the way his work schedule is right now, we figured out a couple days ago that the best time to talk is when he gets up for the day and I am off to bed (or half asleep as it was last night!). So I've just been leaving Skype up on my computer when I go to bed and he calls when he gets up. It's been great getting to talk to him and see him before I go to sleep and I've been able to sleep better for the last couple days. That of course has been nice. However, last night I got on facebook at the same time as talking to him and was looking at pictures. When we decided I needed to get some sleep and he needed to get to work, we got off Skype. He also was on Facebook so I sent him a chat message letting him know that I love him! At that point we talked on there for a couple more minutes and I started crying. I dunno. He was saying the perfect things and all but I hate it. I am just glad that I was able to keep those tears in until we got off Skype. I miss him so much and can't wait for him to get back. I'll be fine and get over this funk I'm in right now. But I still HATE IT!

There's my rant for the moment. For those of you who read this...thanks! I'm sure many of you can completely understand.

YAY for Awards!

YIPPY!! I got an award. I haven't gotten one in a while. I received this award from Rachel at Romancing Rachel. Thanks hun for the award! So now I have to tell you 10 things about me and then pass it along to 10 other wonderful bloggers.

10 Things About Me:

1. I have been in school for 20 years of my life. (And for 2 of the years that I wasn't a student in school, I was teaching!)

2. I have lived in 2 different countries, 3 different states, and 3 different cities in the state which I am currently living in.

3. I cheered for 8 years and for three of those years, I was on 2 teams at once (school and all-star competition teams). And when I was on 2 teams I was not driving yet...therefore my mommy had to drive me everywhere. (Thanks Mom for all you've done for me!)

4. A and I have been dating for almost 2 years. I miss him terribly and can't wait for him to get home! (Unfortunately that won't be happening anytime soon)

5. My favorite food is spaghetti. I could honestly live off of any short of carbs and water. (And yes, I know too much carbs in not good for me.)

6. Since A left for deployment in December, I lost about 5 lbs. While he was home on R&R, I gained 3-4 of it back. OOOOOPPPPSSS!!! So now I need to work extra hard to lose it again and lose an additional 10-15 before he gets back. :-)

7. My puppy is 2 1/2 years old. If not for her, I'm not sure if I'd be able to get through this deployment. Yes, I have a great roommate and great friends and family.

8. I sang in chorus throughout middle and high school. I miss singing.

9. I found out about my first teaching job only a month after graduating with my bachelors degree. I kind of miss teaching, however, I am enjoying being a student again and glad that I will be able to complete the program in 2 years since I'm in school full time.

10. I just cut out soda completely. Up until about a week ago, I would have 3-4 sodas per day. This past week I started cutting back and would allow myself 1 soda a day and today I went without one and didn't get a headache. :-)

And the 10 fab bloggers which I would like to share this award with are:
Carmen at We See the Same Stars
Whitney at Everything Happens for a Reason
Kayla Sue at In Every Good Love Letter There's a Soldier and His Girl
LMC at 'cause I don't know how it gets better than this
Lisa at must be doin' somethin' right
Miss Jody at Miss Fancy Pants
Field of Dreams at Mrs. Z's Field of Dreams
Life of an Army Wife at The "D" Word
Steph at Watching Airplanes
Doc's Girl at Issued to a Soldier

Back to School

I have only been out of school for the spring semester for a month and a half and I am now back in classes again. I am taking two summer courses. One started today and the other will start on Monday. Oh boy! :-) Gotta love being a student. HAHA. I actually do (in a way) because at least right now, while A is gone, it is keeping me busy so that I don't sit around a think too much. Because, I definitely think TOO much. The joys of dating a guy in the military. As far as school, I guess that I should just be glad that I didn't have to take any classes from May to June so that I was able to spend all of A's R&R by his side. It may have been nice if I could have taken a class then and just take one now...however, I would not trade the moments that I got to spend with A for anything. Now it's off to bed for me so that I can get up in the morning for class...Yes, that's right. You read that correctly, class...tomorrow...on a Saturday. YIPPY! (I REALLY hope that you hear the excitement/sarcasm in my voice while reading this!)

So Proud of Him

(The two of us after the ceremony)

(A with his parents, sister, and BIL)

The last night of A's R & R he was promoted. He was officially promoted as of June 1. Since his BIL is an officer in the National Guard he was able to conduct the ceremony. It was so great being able to do this with his family. Nobody in his family or myself were able to be at his last promotion. Therefore, it was really cool that we all got to be there for this. :-)

Yankees Game!

(Us at the game in Baltimore!)

A is a Yankees fan. So guess what I got him for his birthday present?!?! Yes...that's right! Yankees tickets (at Camden Yards in Baltimore!). We had SO much fun. It was a fantastic game. The weather was great and our seats were AMAZING. We had Club seats just to the left of home plate. It was just crazy ridiculous. I knew they were good seats when I got them, but had NO idea how good they really were. Not only were the seats good as far as location, but we were right near all the private boxes. Therefore, we had waiters and waitresses coming around taking food and drink orders. We had AC when we went to the restroom or concessions. It was just crazy. HAHA! Definitely not something that I could afford if we went to Yankee Stadium for the game. And plus we were going to be in the Baltimore/DC area anyway so it made sense. I am so glad that we were able to attend this game together!

Baltimore

(Here we are at dinner overlooking the Harbor!)

We went to Baltimore for a couple days. The weather was absolutely beautiful. We got to enjoy the National Aquarium and walked around Inner Harbor. Tomorrow I'll write about the excitement of that night :-)

Happy Father's Day

(My brother with our parents at his graduation in May!)

Happy Father's Day daddy! I know how proud you are of both of us, but I hope you realize how proud I am to be able to call you my father. I would not be who I am today if you and mom hadn't raised me the way you are. You are a wonderful example for me. You have always been there for me (even when I asked you to watch Coyote Ugly with me at age 16!) :-) Thanks for all that you have done for me and will continue to do for me. I love you very much!

We Went to a Wedding

I figured that for the next couple days I would post pictures of A and I from R & R. Here is a picture of us at the wedding of one of his college classmates. It was great getting to meet some more of his friends and their wives. We had a great time! So glad we were able to make it to the wedding since we have not been able to make a few over the past year.

(He was tickling me and I couldn't stop laughing!)

A Long Drawn Farewell

(Jewels and A on one of our road trips! Jewels loves to drive)

GRRR!! I didn't really get into the details/specifics of my frustrations last night in my post. Well that would be because A didn't leave the states until this evening. Therefore, I couldn't explain what was going on until he was actually gone. Yes, that's right. I said goodbye to him yesterday morning at 10:15 AM and he didn't actually fly out of the US until about 7 PM today.

AHH Makes me so angry. Oh and he was supposed to leave yesterday at 6 AM. His flights got all kinds of messed up. We had gotten a phone call from Delta the night before his flights to let him know that one of the legs of his flight was canceled. Therefore he had new flights for getting into Atlanta. He was supposed to fly out at 9:30 AM. We got to the airport and the flight was delayed until 10:15 (ish). Now, of course it was wonderful getting to sit with him for a little longer, but it felt like it was just more painful. I kept building myself up for it being 6, then it was 9:30, and then it was later than that.

Once he finally flew out, the second leg of his flight was also delayed about 45 minutes or so. Therefore, he got into Atlanta late and missed his flight out of the states by 15-20 minutes. So he ended up being put up in a hotel and then he flew out tonight. Of course I was glad that he was in the states and out of a war zone for an extra day. However, I absolutely HATED the fact that he was in the states and I wasn't with him. It's just frustrating. But I did get to wake up this morning to a phone call from him. And that was amazing! So there's my frustrations right now. And I just can't believe that he is now on his way back to Iraq. I know that I'll get through it but it REALLY sucks!

Wishes I Could Sleep for 6 Months

(Waiting at the gate for his flight. ~ I look pretty horrible, but oh well. His flight was supposed to be at 6am, so we had gotten 3.5-4 hours of sleep and it was freezing so I didn't wear the dress I wanted to wear!)

I just got back home after driving for 12 hours. I unfortunately had to complete this drive after taking A to the airport so he can head back to Iraq. Yes, that's right...R & R is over! STINKY!

Now with having a 12 hour drive after this, I had A LOT of time to think. (Now please don't get offended by the way this might sound or whatever, especially since I'm working on 3.5 hours of sleep!) I feel as though I just "returned" A to the United States Army. They basically own him (definitely for the length of the deployment) and I got to borrow him for 15 days. However, I have to return him after that time is up. But, what if I don't want to return him? I don't usually return clothes, etc. that I want to have. I only return if I don't want an item for some reason. So, since I want him here with me right now, can't I just keep him?!?!

I know this was probably a ridiculous analogy, but it's what I got to thinking while I tried to stay awake and get home. So, now that I got home, I am off to bed with my puppy (instead of A) by my side! Missing him like crazy already. Can't believe it will be an other X (wish I knew for sure the number) months before I can hold his hand and kiss him.

Happy Birthday A!

Happy 25th Birthday baby!

I am so happy that we've been able to spend this day together for the past 2 years.

We had a bunch of people over to his parents' house yesterday to celebrate his birthday and his being home for R & R. It was an absolute blast. Cooked out for lunch, played some yard games, built a fire pit in the yard as it got dark (until it started to downpour on us!), and then played some Wii games til we were all ready to crash. And today we are just doing stuff with his family! He just went out with a couple of his friends for lunch and then we'll be heading to a movie and dinner with his parents, sister, and BIL.
(Here he is being a dork when we were playing Corn Hole!)
Overall it's been a great R and R so far, I'll write more later about what we've been up to! Hope you are all doing well.

And a message to Expat Girl over at The Sand is Different Here ~ Stay strong, we are all here for you. I cannot imagine the heartbreak you are going through with saying goodbye to Mum and then Mr Soldier. However, I do know how strong of a woman you are and I know that you can get through anything. And I'm here for you if you need ANYthing at all!

R & R Has Finally Arrived

Yep that's right! I have had A home for about 24 hours now. I can't believe it. I keep grabbing his hand or touching his arm/leg to make sure that he is really here. YIPPY!!! I'm just so happy and giddy right now. So anyway, don't be surprised if I'm not posting much. Sorry that I didn't post since last week when I said this was coming soon. I was just having trouble finding something to write about. Well I love you all and I will post soon with pictures! :-)