It's Over (this time)

If you have been hanging out with me during my husband's deployment I both thank you for your support and apologize for the spotty and sometimes woe-is-me posts. The moment we were waiting for since the day he left arrived last week. He came home.

We are so excited to have him home and he is off work for two weeks to spend time with us. Thank you for reading and thank you for all your kind and encouraging words! So, until next time....






This post is being linked up with Dumb Mom's Wordful Wednesday at parenting BY dummies.

The Countdown Has Begun

We started this journey on January 4. It has been a long four months. It has been a short four months. It has been a difficult and exhausting four months. It has been a fun and exciting four months.

I have bonded a little more with my children as we leaned on each other and helped each other out in our times of need. There were many nights where I held or laid next to a child while they cried for their Daddy. There were days where one of my children patted my arm or cleaned up a mess while I sat on the couch and cried, defeated. That is what a family does- we stick up for one another. We are there for each other and we are closer because of everything we have done and been through together.

But at the very heart of it all, our family was fractured. One fourth of our family has been missing but will very soon return. The countdown has begun. We cannot wait to have Daddy, Husband, Playmate, Friend, Lover, One-Who-Picks-Up-Dog-Poop back with us again.

When we started this journey, I posted this the first weekend when we sat down and made our deployment chain. This is what it looked like when we hung it- it draped all the way to the floor on both sides of the door:

Here is what it looks like tonight:

That's right. We are down to ten days. TEN DAYS. We have one hundred and eighteen days behind us tonight and only ten measly days in front of us. I won't say it has been easy- it hasn't. It still isn't. But, we are so close. We have it beat. Colbert Family: 118 Deployment: ZERO.

Suck it, deployment. You are such a loser.

** I got ahead of myself- we have ELEVEN days left. Damn. Still better than 129.

Honoring All Who Serve

Even if you are not affiliated with the military, chances are you know about Veteran's Day in November where we honor those that serve and have served. And you probably are also familiar with Memorial Day in May where we remember those that gave all for their country. But did you know that we also remember to celebrate our smallest of heroes?





April is Month of the Military Child and there are various activities around base for the kids. The whole thing wraps up the last Friday of the month at the elementary school with a celebration. This is by far my favorite activity to attend at the school every year. It is always cute, sweet, fun and emotional.

The celebration starts with a static display of various military vehicles. The kids get to climb on and in the "cool stuff" like an MWRAP. They love this part!





Then everyone is ushered inside for the assembly and treats. The fourth grade class always writes poems titled " I am a military child" and every year, the results are amazing! A few of the students are selected to read them to the school and I am always slightly misty-eyed as these young heroes, wise and strong stand there and talk about multiple deployments, missed birthdays and praying their father/mother will be safe but always end with each stanza with "I am a military child."

Afterward, the four-year-olds take the stage and sing along with a Lee Greenwood recording of "God Bless the U.S.A." It was adorable and touching.

Since the focus is honoring and saluting the children, at that point, they have military volunteers in uniform serve the children ice cream while they watch a slide show of various photos of themselves throughout the year set to patriotic music. Included were Battle Hymn of the Republic, You're a Grand Old Flag and a medley of all the armed forces songs. It really is a great experience as our base is a joint base and houses families and units from all branches of the armed services- Army, Air Force, Navy, Marines and Coast Guard.

I salute you, young heroes scattered all over the country and the world.

I also salute my two favorite little heroes who are currently helping to hold down the fort in their father's absence:

I love you guys.

I am linking this post with Jennifer at Momma Made it Look Easy- she asks that you "share your awesome" and link your favorite post from the week. Since this is my ONLY post, I suppose it is my favorite. Oh yeah.. it has my kids in it too.. so it has to be a favorite!

Eighty Down, Fifty-Two to Go

First of all, I wanted to mention that today is my husband's birthday. So- Happy Birthday, Sweetie! I wish we could all celebrate together.

Next I want to mention that we have survived eighty days of the deployment and have approximately fifty-two left. It feels good to see the deployment chain we created getting visibly shorter. A reminder- when we made the chain, it fell all the way to the floor on both sides of the entryway to our kitchen where we chose to hang it.


Tonight, it looks like this:




Wow! What a difference! I am so glad I decided to do this because Noah gets the concept of the months going by, but for Zoe, it is just an endless sea of her father's absence. This is very visual and she can actually see the time passing by.

Spring has sprung in New Jersey. And by that I just mean that my daffodils, hyacinths and tulips are coming up and the trees appear to be sprouting buds. We did, however, have snow flurries this morning and the weather is forecast to be cold for the next week at least. As in, not getting out of the 40's, cold. Ugh!

Zoe's school implemented a new rule on March 1 that no outside food was allowed into the school. Only items prepared in the kitchen on premises would be served to the children and so therefore, the Saint Patrick's Day "Green Party" they usually have did not come to fruition. I did make treats for Noah's class, though.


We had a spring clean up day outside where I raked up the leaves that fell after leaf collection in the fall and Noah and his buddy bagged them for me. I LOVE seven-year-olds! I only had to offer them $5 a piece and they bagged the leaves for me.




The day after this photo was taken, I took Noah to get a haircut. It was driving me nuts hanging in his face. He wanted it long and I kept having it trimmed and telling him he could keep it long as long as he kept it out of his face. At this point, he was staring at me through a curtain of hair and looked like a sheep dog. He's still mad at me for having it cut.. because I had it ALL CUT OFF!

During the brief period of warmer weather we experienced, Zoe got some time to play on her scooter she got for Christmas.

Both kids had a really rough week last week, so I let them have a rare treat- I allowed Noah to sleep in my bed with me last Friday with the promise Zoe could sleep with me this Friday. When I told Noah he could get in my bed, I expected the usual entourage- his blanket and his bunny- but when I went to bed I found Noah with his blanket and SIX of his closest friends taking up the bed! Left to Right- Rexie the Dinosaur, his bunny, there's a penguin under the blanket and I don't remember the penguin's name, Daddy Doll, Max and Chirp. Sheesh! I promptly evicted everyone but blanket and bunny and we slept peacefully.

Last Sunday, the kids were driving me bananas and so I decided we needed fresh air. I took them to Smithville and we walked the trail through the woods alongside the creek and over the floating bridge on the lake. When we finished the loop and arrived back at our car, I let them play on the playgrounds. Thankfully, I wore them out!

We've been over this before- my kids do not sit and/or smile for photographs. They are always moving and always making weird faces, so when I managed to get this...

... I considered myself very fortunate.

THIS is more like it:

Finally, these were taken on the playground at the end of our hike. I was totally being lazy and all of these are taken from across the playground with my zoom lens.

Our plans for the weekend include our weekly Skype session with DJ tomorrow afternoon after the kids get home from school. Saturday is Noah's last soccer day- they play a mini- tournament (they play each team for about ten minutes) and then have pizza and get their trophies afterwards. And Sunday, we have absolutely nothing planned. I like those days.

I apologize for the sporadic posts lately. I don't know if it is the deployment getting to me or what is going on, but I am suddenly exhausted all the time. No matter how much sleep I get, I have to fight myself to keep from taking a nap at 4 pm everyday and by evening, I just want to crawl in bed. I have been taking my vitamins and exercising, but it isn't making me feel any better. I think I am just mentally exhausted and that is manifesting itself physically in me. I hope to get my groove back when the weather gets warm enough that we can actually hang out outside for extended periods of time. I mean, I guess we can do that now.. but I just get cold and then mad because I am cold and go inside.

I'm Going Through the Big "D" and Don't Mean Dallas

I don't mean divorce either, I mean DEPLOYMENT. That's a big enough D, dontcha think?

Okay- so I haven't updated you in awhile. I was all gung-ho and let's make this deployment fun and then we all got sick, and then got better and then got sick again and the wind is out of my sails and well, I'm lazy.

Unfortunately, I have also been lazy about taking pictures of what we have not been doing. I am sure you would love to see a photo of us all lying near-comatose on couches staring, napping and drooling, but alas, I did not capture that- as exciting as it was.

Okay, first we will start off with Valentine's Day. I did what I do best (ahem, copy other people's ideas off the internet) and copied THIS idea because it was adorable and so, so easy! And, incidentally, that blog in general is full of great ideas.




On Valentine's Day, we had pancakes for dinner. The kids were delighted that I added food coloring and we had pink pancakes. Okay- Zoe was delighted, Noah was perturbed, but I assured him they tasted the same and no one had to know he ate pink pancakes. At least, that is, until now when I decided to tell the whole world about it.



I also got a few photos (albeit terrible ones with my point-and-shoot that completely up and died after this) of Zoe's Tumble Tots class. She insists on wearing the tutu every week. I don't know. I just don't argue.







I only half-heartedly decorated for Saint Patrick's Day. I just downloaded and printed a fabulous print from the same blog where I got my Valentine card idea. and added some green M&M's to a candy jar. Nothing spectacular. I can't wait to decorate for spring.




Speaking of spring...look-y what greeted me this morning in my flower bed:




Weeeeeeeee! It's a promising start!

And lastly, I have a small rant. They told us when Zoe started preschool not to dress them in nice dresses and such, because they play and are going to get dirty. They paint, color, stamp, cook and do everything that makes a mess and I get that. For that reason, when one of Zoe's nice Gymboree shirts comes home with a stain, I don't get angry. The stain is usually around the sleeve from ink or paint, and usually with a little diligence will come out. I expect these things. HOWEVER... I am not sending my child to school in dirty, old stained clothing. I'm just not that person. I want her to look nice. But, honestly, if she keeps coming home like she did the other day, I don't know what to do. I can't afford to keep buying her new clothes. There was no way I could get this out ( I am not even sure what it is) and there is absolutely no chance she will wear this out of the house again. (and sadly, that was one of my favorite shirts) But, seriously, WHAT where they doing? I mean.... COME ON?




Happy Not-Quite-Spring-But-I-Am-Going-To-Pretend-It-Already-Is-For-My-Own-Sanity-Now-Please-Don't-Burst-My-Bubble ! (Do you think that would fit on a Hallmark card?)

I am linking this up with Wordful Wednesday over at parenting BY dummies. (and incidentally- Amanda from parenting BY dummies is more than just a bloggy celebrity now, she is a full-on celebrity as she was featured on TLC's What Not to Wear last night! You can head over to her blog right now where she posts the behind-the-scenes photos and tells you all about it!)

Letter from Zoe

Tonight as I was putting Zoe to bed, I kissed her goodnight and she told me she loved me. I heard a crack in her voice and I turned around to look at her and she had big crocodile tears in her eyes and her bottom lip was trembling.

I sat down on the side of her bed and asked what was wrong. "I miss Daddy." she replied. I hugged her and told her I missed him too. She started crying- really crying like she was heartbroken. I was heartbroken having to witness it. I told her we could go and send Daddy an email and tell him how she feels.

I typed while she dictated.

Daddy, I miss you. I want you to come home and play with my tree house (Little People Fairy) with me. I want to hug you. I don't want you to go to work no more. Good night.

I miss him too, sweetheart.

The Party

Yesterday marked one month since DJ left. We marked it on the calendar weeks ago as a day to look forward to. The first milestone reached. The first hurdle cleared. When we marked the date on the calendar, we wrote, " one month party" and planned on having a little party to celebrate one month behind us.

Last night, after having our once-a-week Skype session with DJ that lasted only a few minutes because of the poor connection, we ordered Domino's pizza (Noah's favorite), watched Where the Wild Things Are and then baked cookies and decorated them. Earlier in the day, Noah's class made homemade ice cream at school and then got to eat it. Zoe's class celebrated her teacher's birthday with cupcakes. Both kids claimed it the best day ever. Sweets at school, pizza and cookies at home and a movie.

I took some pictures of us on the couch watching the movie with the webcam on my laptop. I love this one because look how crazy Noah looks!

I like to call this one, "We just heard there was more snow in the forecast."

One month down. Three to go.

Deployment- Days 5-8

I haven't been blogging about these days because none of them were full enough to warrant an entire blog post. And then the snow happened. It wasn't as bad as initially predicted, but my back still hurts from shoveling it.

Day five was Sunday- it was a pretty laid back day. Zoe has started to question when DJ is coming home and no matter how I try to explain it to her, she just isn't understanding that he isn't just right down the road and can't just come home. She knows he went on an airplane-but we live near an air force base and she sees them every day. Every time one is taking off or landing, she thinks her daddy is on it. In an effort to try and get her to understand, we got out the globe and I showed here where we lived. Then I showed her where Texas was and she knows that is where all the grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins live. Then, we spun it around and showed her where her daddy was. She was excited to look, but I am still not sure she really understood.



Day six- Monday- while the kids were in school, I attempted to make the house a little festive for Valentine's Day. I made the "Love" sign with scraps from my scrapbook stash and die-cut letters from my Cricut.



Monday evening, Noah started his indoor soccer practices. The practice was from 7-8 which seemed really late and we were all exhausted by the time we got home and got everyone to bed. I'm sorry for the poor quality of photo- all I had with me was my cell phone and, of course, they were moving and a distance from where we were sitting. That's Noah kicking on the goal.


On Tuesday, day seven, Zoe awoke sneezing, snotty and with that awful croup-y barking cough. I kept her home from school and she drove me bananas all day long!! I received a package in the mail with a surprise for me. My mother had my favorite bakery back home ship some cookies to us in anticipation of my birthday coming up. Zoe and I feasted on cookies and fought over the television.

Since she clearly felt fine, I took her to her first Tumble Tots that evening (a gross motor class- kind of like the Gymboree classes). She was initially angry because she wanted me to sign her up for ballet, but when we got there, she really enjoyed it and had a ball! Again, sorry for the poor photo- I didn't take my camera because parental participation was required and I didn't think I would be able to tote the camera around while playing with her. This was taken from my cell and is blurry from all the movement.


Tuesday night at about nine, we got the automated call from the school district that there would be no school today because of the impending snow storm. The snow started around eight or nine and it snowed until three this morning. We ended up with seven inches (not nearly as bad as they had initially anticipated).

I got up this morning, dreading shoveling us out all by myself. I decided I would quickly put on my boots and coat and shovel a small path from the doorway so the dog could go to the bathroom and would shovel the rest later. When I walked out the door, half of my driveway (the tough half- the bottom where the plow truck piles all the snow) had been shoveled. The teenagers across the street shoveled for me. I was so happy and thankful! So, I shoveled the sidewalk, a place in the yard for the dog and the other half of the driveway and went inside to feed the kids breakfast. After they were fed, I got dressed and went back outside and shoveled a path through the yard to the mailbox, around the mailbox so the mail truck can get in and a path to wheel the garbage cans and recycle bins out to the road. It could have been so much worse, but my back is still hurting me this evening.

While I was shoveling a path to the mailbox, the UPS truck pulled up and honked. My dad had ordered me one of those massaging chair pads and what timing! I took it inside and plugged it in and got a massage! Woohoo!

After lunch, the kids wanted to go sledding. We got everyone stuffed into their snow clothes, I dug my way to the shed to get the sled out and we packed the car and took off. On the way there, the clouds began to move back in and by the time we got there, the wind had picked up and was really blowing. As soon as we stepped out of the car, Zoe let me know she was NOT happy!
I got a little bit angry and told the kids they wanted to sled and we drove all the way out there and we were going down that hill at least once! I drug them both out to the hill, both crying and complaining, and Noah refused to get on the sled. Zoe and I got on and she cried and screamed all the way down the hill and then refused to walk back up. Noah had followed us down on foot to continue complaining to me about how NOT FUN the entire outing was, so I said, "Fine! Let's go!" And then Noah refused to climb the hill and I had to pull them both up the hill in the sled with the wind trying to push us back down.

On the way home, I had my point-and-shoot camera and I took a couple of random pictures. This first one is the pile of snow left behind by the snow plows. If you think that is big, you should see the parking lot of our grocery store!


The second is just blowing snow as we passed an open field.


Tomorrow, one of my friends is taking me out to lunch for my birthday and then on Friday night, our adopted family- the people that have invited us to spend every Christmas eve with them for the past four of five years, is taking the kids and I out to dinner for my birthday. I really feel like a lucky girl. Sometimes, I get caught up in the loneliness of being a military spouse and how my best friends and my family are so far away. And how when I do manage to make really good friends where I am at, they always seem to move away and then I have to start all over again. I get wrapped up in feeling sorry for myself and then something like that happens to remind me that there are people all around me that care for me and I just need to remember to reach out to them.

And now, looking forward to another day down and another day closer to seeing my husband again.