Snow Days

Tim went back to work on Monday only to work one day and then has been off the last 3 for the all the snow that Oklahoma has been having. It is has worked out in that he has had more time to study for Master (which he takes in about a week). Here is Tim taking Max "sledding".

Max fell in the snow face first so that is why there is snow a coldness all over him. I felt bad that he fell in the snow, but at the same time it was kinda funny.
Tim pushing Max down our street in the make shift sled. Max loved it, he laughed each and every time he went.

Max after one of his runs. We didn't stay outside very long as it was cold and the wind was blowing. You can see Max's rosy cheeks here a little. You could really see them when we brought him back in the house.

Tim is suppose to go back to work tomorrow. There is still a lot of very hard packed/ice snow. The funny part is that we are suppose to more snow on Friday and probably through the weekend. I think Monday has been predicted for snow too. Fun times...and it was 75 on Saturday last week.

Playing with Photo Shop

Playing with Photo Shop, trying to get better using it.

Before
After I played

After reading the book

Final picture after screwing up and Tim doing some coaching with me on Photo Shop. Still learning, I want to get better at this.

A little bit of everything

I'm back again trying to figure out what I'm going to write on here, there are a few things that come to mind but not sure I'm ready to share with everyone yet. Nothing bad but just not in the mood to spill my guts I guess. Let's start with the easy stuff...life.

Max is getting big, he is weighing in at 16 lbs. 4 oz. as of the 7 September. The doctors are happy that he gained so much weight considering last time he only gained 3 oz. in 2 months. He is eating some "people" food, mostly cut up chicken and crackers. He is kinda off his Cherrio kick for some reason. Now when you put them on his tray he takes his hand and wipes them all off. That kid! Max loves yogurt, can pretty much eat a whole thing all by himself, no joke. His stomach seems to do okay with all of this so I keep feeding it to him. He is also a big fan of deli meat. Eat that at most meals, I'm trying to introduce a few other foods to him but he loves his deli meat. He is also starting to pull himself up to his knees. Last night we had to drop the crib level down for the first time. I was slightly saddened by this. It shows that he is growing so fast. Where has the time gone? I miss the little little boy. I'm trying to savor every moment that I have with him and not take one minute of the day for granite because before you know it, he will be big and doing his own thing. But for now, he is still my little boy and I'm going to enjoy it.

My mom came to visit about 2 weeks ago for the long Labor Day weekend. It was a little akwards at first but I made my peace with her. For those that don't know my parents are getting a divorce after 30+ years, and while it isn't a messy divorce (just really confusing due to lack of communication sometimes) it had/has its issues with me. I'm not going to air my parents' business on here but like I said, I have made my peace with all that has happened. I'm tired of being mad and/or angry all the time about it. It is time to move foward. All in all her visit was a good one. She got see Max and take care of him which I know she really enjoyed. We had new or first family pictures done with her and our family that came out really nice. Max is into Elmo so she went out and bought him the Tickle Me Elmo and this other one called Shake Elmo or something. He loves them both. She also got him Rex from Toy Story which he also gets a big kick out of. It was nice to see her and sad to see her go. I wish we were closer sometimes, it would make seeing everyone a little simpler. We are still a plane ride away from everyone. A cheaper plane ride but a plane ride none the less.

Tim is getting knee surgery a week from today. He has been having knee problems for months now and finally they told him that he as a menicus (I hope I spelled that right, it would be a bit embarrassing considering I use to do sports medicine :-0) tear. The whole surgery takes about 45 minutes. He is looking forward to it so that he can start running and getting back into shape. He will be home for a couple of weeks so I'll let you know how that goes.

Still no job, I don't really want to work unless I can do it from home. I like staying home with Max, I can't see taking him to someone else to raise. And yes I know that people do it everyday and that their kids are fine but I really don't want to do it. I want to stay home at least a couple of years with him and the next one, whenever we have him/her.

That's about all. I need to go and check on my pictures from snapfish. I'm working on my book for Max, Project Life. It is bascially a picture a day for a year. It is a pretty awesome project and have been doing it since his birthday. I'm pretty proud that I have kept up with it. I plan on doing it for the next kid too. From their birth to their first birthday. I'll take some pictures and post what mine looks like. I have seen so many different versions and different stuff that people have put in theirs and I think mine is pretty cool, like I said, I'm very proud.

So that is about all, gotta run and get some housework done while Max is sleeping. Check back for pictures.

September begins

So September begins and to me that means the holiday season is upon us which = NEW BABY! We are ahead of schedule when our stuff, at least I think so. We have the crib and the rocker and the car seats with the stroller accessories are on the way courtesy of Mom and Dad, thanks you guys. You're the BEST! So now I'm missing the stroller, which my FIL is buying, and the dressers for his clothes. They are on the way and fingers crossed that they get here soon. We are not setting up the nursery as we think we are going to be moving anyways right after I have my 6 week appointment. Where are we moving? Some where in Europe is all they have told us. But of course they want us to move right after I have the baby which I can't do because I need to go to a 6 week check-up and the baby is going to need a passport which can take up to month even if we do the really fast way. We'll see what happens.

If you also have noticed I'm still calling my son (it sounds so weird to be saying that) the baby. We still don't have a name yet. I'm hoping that Tim will give me my name. I have put a deadline on him of October 1st to chose a name. I hate calling him 'Him' all the time. Someone else also said that I should wait till he is born to name him cause he may not look like a (insert name). I guess we'll figure it out soon enough. We do have till December but that will be fast approaching as well.

I never thought I would say this but I'm happy for my new maternity clothes to be coming in. I don't have much in the way of summer wear but it is getting chiller here and the one pair of jeans isn't going to cut is for much longer and well I'm in need of some tops as well and a coat/jacket. I have it all coming but the mail is so SLOW right now. I'm waiting on a bunch of stuff now from like 5 different stores, it's crazy. Trying to get the Christmas shopping done now so I don't have to worry about it.

I have almost finished all of my unfinished projects. They are slowly coming along. I'm in the process of making a diaper bag for a friend who is having a baby any day now. She is due at the end of the month but probably not going to make it to her moved up scheduled induction. So I'm pressed for time.

That's about all for now, nothing else to really report. Sleeping is becoming a real challenge. I get up at least twice to pee and my stomach is starting to get in the way. Like I hit it with the frig door when I close it, or I can't put my water bottle between my legs because then I can't drive. Fun stuff like that. Sorry again, no belly shots. Tim is suppose to take pictures of me soon for his portfolio so I might post some of those. I feel as big as a house and I have the belly of fire from my stretch marks and yes I'm doing the lotion thing but I have a very strong feeling that this kid is going to be HUGE! They normally say your kid will be the average of what you and your husband were. Well I was 9 lb. 11 oz. and Tim was 9 lb. 2 oz. So that being said.....you do the math.

Okay, that's it, I'm out.

Random Thought #10 - Tim's Damn Alarm Clock

Okay so I have been wanting to do this for a while now and I finally have the time and, this morning I got the reminder to do it when Tim's damn alarm clock went off.

So in college I had an alarm clock, in fact I still have the same one. It has a setting for 2 different alarms, very convenient when you want to take a nap in the afternoon. Anyways, I place my clock across the room so I could still see it if I woke up before my alarm but I would have to physically get out of bed to turn it off. It was my own way of "making myself get up". Mind you there were many times I laid back down and went back to sleep but in turn I only hit the 'Snooze' button on the clock and usually by the third time getting out of bed I would just wake up cause I was tired of getting out of bed.

Well Tim leaves for work between 6-630 a.m. every day. It takes him about 40 minutes to get out the door by the time he does his morning routine and it is about a 10-15 minute drive to base. So he usually gets up about 5-5:30 a.m. sometime earlier depending on what he has to do. Tim has 2 alarm clocks (he doesn't have a cool clock like mine) and currently I'm ready to beat him to death with both of them.

The first one goes off at 4:50 a.m. He rolls over and turns it off. The second one goes off at 4:55 a.m. Then the first ones goes off again at about 5:01. The second one goes off again at 5:07 and then the first one goes off again at 5:15. This pattern of randomness continues till about 5:30 when he finally rolls out of bed. What's the point!? I mean by this time you know you are awake, get your ass out of the bed and honestly by 5:07 I'm awake too cause I don't get up till 7 a.m.

So what is the point of have having your alarms go off for about 40 minutes if you are still going to get out of bed at the same time you did when you only had one alarm. I mean set it for 5:20 and if you hit the snooze button it should only go off twice, in theory. Sometimes I wish I could understand. I guess we all have our ways. Whatever.....

p.s. - I just want to let everyone know that I finally spelled convenient right without having to look it up in the dictionary. Yes this is a big deal because if you know me you know that I'm the worst speller and have a dictionary next to every computer that I work at. Because when spell check can't correct the word for you, you know you have a problem.

Hello.....anyone still out there??

Okay so I had a month or more of house guests and other social obligations and as you can see my blog was the one that took the brunt of the neglect, my email has as well. So what's been going on. I'll try to recap...

On being pregnant.....I hate it! I'm only 4 1/2 months and I think I look like I'm about 8 months pregnant. I'm sure not everyone feels that way but that is the way I feel. Nothing fits, again, I'm hot all the time, and I currently have a cold that I can't just seem to kick the cough part, which is the worst part. I miss my drugs. My face continues to break out as do other parts of my body (sorry for the TMI) and recently Tim has told me that I have started to snore....BADLY! He said that I'm snoring so bad that I have to go and get the breath right strips so that it would reduce it. He also said that when he rolled me over that the snoring got worse. Also my boobs have gotten bigger, which if you have big boobs to begin with this is already a bad thing. So now they are pulling on my neck. I get lots of pain right between my shoulder blades. So I can only sit and/or stand for so long before my shoulders and my feet start to hurt. What is even sadder is that I'm only 4 1/2 months pregnant. I'm just barely half way there. This sucks....bring on Christmas.

On my many house guests.....We had friends that came down from Lakenheath for the 4th of July weekend. It was really nice to have them here, they will be moving here later this week....I'm so excited for that I can't wait. I'm hoping that they like the house that is just in the next village, only 5 minutes drive from here. Very exciting as well. My parents were here for about 2 weeks as well. Mom, Dad, and I went to Ireland for a few days, it was really nice. We went to Galway on the west cost of Ireland. It was really relaxing kind of break. We mostly shopped and walked along the beach. The weather was good as well. We came home and that then we had RIAT or Royal International Air Tattoo. It is the largest military air show in the world held at our tiny little base. Tim took lots of pictures and the weather even held out for us. My father cooked for everyone so the burgers weren't over done and the chicken wasn't under done. It was fun. Mom and I went out and did some baby shopping. Mostly got clothes for me because I don't have anything. The clothes are nice, to me most of them look like tents on me but again, I'm not liking being pregnant so whatever at this point. At least now I have different options to wear besides Tim's old black t-shirts. We more or less hung out the rest of the time they were here. Dad left earlier than Mom so it was sad to see him go. While Mom relaxing she registered me for baby stuff online. I'm registered at Babies-R-Us. I don't think I'm going to have a baby shower at least not one in person. No one is here for me. I don't have many friends here and the friends that I do have already have stuff picked out for me. I'll probably do a virtual shower or something. I'm not going to open much of anything once I get it anyways as we don't think we are going to be here for very much longer and if we are we won't be here long after the baby is born. Timing is everything isn't it and well ours isn't great. But I'm not upset anymore, just a little stressed, the unknown always does that to me. Back to my house guests. Mom left on Saturday, it was nice to have her here. I didn't have to do anything. If I wanted it she made it for me. All my laundry is washed and folded, now I just need to put it all away (still working on that Mom, haha). That's about it for that.

On reading....I finished the whole Twilight Saga and I totally loved it!! I'm not as excited for the movie(s) but we'll have to see. I have the first one and I was waiting until I finished all the books before I watched it. It is a blue-ray and well currently my PS3 is on it's way back from being fixed so when it gets here I'll finally watch it along with several others that we borrowed from someone that Tim works with. Not sure what I'm going to read next. I mean I read all 4 books in about 3 weeks. I'm sure I'll find something in my collection to pick up.

On all things crafty.....I have been seriously slacking in all things creative. I have been either to tired or to busy. Yesterday I finally sat down and did some stuff. I would like to have all of my unfinished project finished by the end of August and if you know me that's a pretty tall order. But I think I can do it if I just do a little at a time. I mean it isn't like there is anything on TV these days. Sometimes I wonder why we even have cable.

Well that is all for now. I'll update again here shortly with pictures from my parents' visit and air show pictures, etc. My next doctor's appointment is on 15 August and that is when we find out what we're having so I'll be sure to let you all know in a very timely manner. Until then....

London Trip (pic heavy)

These aren't in exact order and I'm to lazy to try and put them in order so I'm just going to post them. These are the pictures we took when we went to London last Friday.

Bri, Dad, and I on the London Eye
Bri, me, and Tim on the London Eye
Street entertainers. They were outside the London Eye and they are Bri's favorite. You drop money in their bucket and they start doing their thing, what ever it happens to be.

On the bridge
Bri's pic of tulips in one of the gardens
Bri on the Tube (a.k.a. subway)

Bri taking pictures on the London Eye
I think this one got taken on accident???
Tim taking a picture of Dad and Bri and Dad taking a picture of Tim taking a picture. Did you get all of that?? Confused me too.
My picture of the tulips.

The Cocoon Tuck

I don't think I have properly made a bed since I got married. I think the one time that I tried the top sheet ended up pushed all the way to the bottom of the bed which means on the floor because we didn't have a foot board until a few years ago. Tim is a "tucker." You know the kind. When you get into bed at night half if not three quarters of the blankets are cocooned around him. It almost looks like he has turned the flat blankets into a mummy sleeping bag.

The Cocoon Tuck has been going on for many years. Tim wasn't a fan of the top sheet ever. If you look at our sheets the top sheet is twice as bright as the fitted sheets because we never wash the top sheet because it is never used.

Recently we bought new sheets. They are pretty sheets, Martha Stewart and they are stripped with yellow, white, some green, and a little bit of brown. Very pretty. I got all the pillow cases to match and I even got extra in a coordinating color to add some interest (I secretly want to design stuff). Last night before going to bed, Tim asked if I was going to change the sheets. I said if you want you just need to go and get them. Tim brings the basket upstairs and starts putting on the fitted sheet. He looked in the basket and said we had another sheet. I told him that was the top sheet, he said that he knew and started to put the sheet on the bed. At this point I'm totally amazed. Once the sheet was on I started to tuck the sheet in, like you do with sheets. The whole process of how to make a bed was coming back to me.
Tim-what are you doing
me-tucking the sheet in
Tim-oh yeah...
me-this is how you are suppose to sleep in a bed. Are you going to tuck in the sides as well
Tim-Tuck in the sides? I guess
me-Are you going to be okay with sleeping with a sheet on the bed
Tim-We'll see how this goes.
So last night was one of the first nights that Tim and I have slept together without so much as a remote Cocoon Tuck. We have been married 6 1/2 years. Small victories people...small victories....

EVERY Single Time....

Tim goes away, stuff goes wrong. Let's look at the past...

2001 - In the sandbox. The day I was suppose to leave to go back to school, his truck that I was driving decided not to work, got the better truck in the end, only to get a speedying ticket in for doing 44 in a 35 in the rain. Damn cops! Oh yeah, and came home a whole 9 days later than he was suppose to...Damn AF!

2003 - Went to a different sandbox. While he was gone, his truck broke leaving me stranded for a few hours before I could get a hold of the flight chief to come and get me and well fix the truck so that I could go home. That same year, 2 days before he came home, the battery in his motorcycle decided not to work and then when he came home the truck (Blazer) that was working fine the whole time he was gone and the day we decided to leave for vacation the battery went TOTALLY dead!

2005 - Another Sandbox. The blazer failed MOT (the yearly inspection) for more things than you can count. Had to have my mom bring over $800 in car parts in her suitcase so I could have the blazer fixed b/c the part were dealer parts. Go figure. I had to drive my 6'1 father around in my Mini, and old one, and almost had to do the same with my mom. oh yea and a year later when we had to do the same job again, the parts were now avaliable to from Napa and about $250 less a piece.

2006 - Same sandbox as previous deployment. Tim isn't gone 2 days and both cars break. At this point I just have to laugh. Even before he left he checked everything over to make sure it was okay for my little Honda and well I blew a hole in the radiator about 6 inches in diameter. To make this even better I couldn't drive the blazer b/c we were waiting on the fuel pump from the states (again, another dealer part). Then about a month before he came home, the battery totally went on the blazer and I couldn't drive that either. This was the WORST deployment out of the bunch.

2009 - School in Germany. The day Tim leaves for school in Germany the internet goes out in the house. Not a huge deal, it was really only in my room, it is a minor fix, just have to go to the store and buy it. With that being said, buying stuff, the people that pay me for doing my very boring job (but a job none-the-less) decided that they were going to pay someone for it. They paid my paycheck to the girl that works at ANOTHER BASE!! It is being worked on as we speak, hopefully will get taken care of my tomorrow but well, we all know how the military works so who knows. He's only been gone 3 days, lets hope this is the worst of it. Not sure who I'm going to call or how I would pay for it if the car broke on me again.

Fingers crossed, knock on wood....

May I Introduce...Joe Dirt

Okay, so Tim has his group Christmas party last night. It was a Hollywood theme party. So you could either go dressed to impress in a nice ball gown or as oen of your favorite movie characters. We thought these would be pretty easy so Tim went as Joe Dirt and I was Rocky or the Million Dollar Baby, which ever your prefer. These were taken by a friend. I'll upload the pictures from our camera later but I wanted to put these up here for everyone to see. It was a very fun night. Neither of us won the costume contest, poltics were involved, but Tim's shop did win the Christmas Card contest. He was very proud. Anyways, without futher a due...I Introduce Joe Dirt....

Beth, Michael, and Tim getting ready to take a picture. It was too funny not to put it up here.
Beth and I sitting in the VIP area of the party. It was great, we were on couches all night.

It's late and I'm not sure why I'm posting

It is late here in England, after midnight. There is nothing much on and I'm fighting not to sleep. Not sure why but just not ready for bed. I finally got my new book. I'm reading Dragon Fly in Amber by Diana Gibaldon. I haven't really gotten into the meat of the book, only about 20 pages in, good so far though.
Not sure if you know or not but Tim and I are doing the Biggest Loser on base. Guess who is winning for the base....not me....TIM! He has lost 14lbs. I think. He is doing well. I on the other hand haven't lost much, but my pants are starting to fit and to me that is all that really matters. Putting more effort in this week. I hate to lose, in competition that is.
My father left for Iraq today. I didn't get a chance to say good-bye, at least on the phone. Not sure when he is getting to his last stop but Mom said she would let me know when he was there. Once he's all set up he'll call in once a week or so like he did before. I'll get to see him soon, March, around my birthday, so it should be fun. My sister might be coming as well.
Other than the weather getting really cold tonight, nothing else to really report. I think I might try and go to bed. We'll see..

Spider, Crab, or Lobster???

Today we carved our one pumpkin. Last year we had a minor set back in carving pumpkins, as in we didn't do it. Although we went to the patch, picked like 6 pumpkins and took a ton of pictures and then did nothing. So our thought this year was to get one in hopes of carving it, and we did, well Tim did.

Our pattern, its a spider. Tim doing the outline

More outlining

Outlining and taking the guts out.

Our pumpkin lit up. This was taken through the window.

It is suppose to be a spider but it kinda looks like a crab or lobster. Who can really tell? Just put it this way, it looks way better lit up than it did when it wasn't. We both laughed when we saw the finished product. We'll see what we come up with next year.

Another few pages

As I wait for my fabric to come in I have been inspired to try and catch up on my scrapbooking pages that I needed to get finished. I have so many pictures that need to get done. These are just a few that I have done.

Isabelle and Viviana

A page I did about Tim. I have so many pictures of him sticking his tougne out.


Just finished this one. I found the paper when I was cleaning my stuff out. These are some of my favorite pictures of Tim.

Pictures as promised

Here are the pictures I promised a few days ago...this is the "normal" walk for the dogs, well at least most of it.

Puppy swimming in the river, we call it the puppy treadmill cause he will do this for as long as you let him.I'm working on my camera skills, they are getting better.

The huge field that the puppies get to play in

There were some others but I didn't think they were good enough to put in here but when I take some more/better pictures I will post. ttyl