Keeping up with the Higginbothams!

It has been a LONG while ...

2010-09-10T17:01:00.000-07:00

Wow, well it has been 8 months since I last posted a blog on here! So sorry to anyone who has been looking forward to this. I just kind of got out of the whole blogging thing for a while. Well to update you on my life these past 8 months. Brandon graduated nursing school in March and we PCS'd (moved) back here to North Carolina. This time around we decided to buy our own home. It has been amazing having our own home and being able to do the little things that we want to do to make it our own. Living on base though, I do miss. I feel living on base made the military life seem more real. We live 30 minutes away from base so I seldom go there. When I do go on base I definitaly miss it ! Here is a picture of our house. Oh yeah, in February we also got a german shepard puppy. In this picture, however, he does not look like a puppy. He is 6 months old here. He is the best dog anyone could ever ask for. He is amazing with the kids, listens really well and it just a great ball of fur to have around :) Also, in this picture there is a whole in our yard. There was a tree there that we had to dig up because it had some disease. We just layed saud there.

Over the summer Kaitlynn fractured her ankle so we were very limited on the things we could do. It was a real bummer because I really was looking forward to camping on the beach and a good ole' trip to Myrtle Beach. Oh well, we made the best of it. Here is a picture of Kaitlynn on a day we did go to the pool. She was not the happiest here :(

We did go to Montana to visit my family for 2 weeks in June/July. It was so good to be able to get home and visit people I had not seen in 5 years. The kids had a blast too! We stayed with my mom and step dad the whole time we were there. My brother, his wife and three kids were able to make it up for a few days from Colorado. It was really good that my dad and his wife were also able to come up to Montana while we were there so we got to see them as well. We went and saw my grandmother, papa and uncle on my dad's side. It was so good to be able to see everyone again. Brandon had not really ever been up in the mountains so the day before we flew home my mom took us on a drive through the mountains and a few passes. He was in love with it!! The wildlife and the scenery made him in awe! Here are a few pictures from our trip.

Kaitlynn started 2nd grade this year and Brooklynn is going to pre-school at the YMCA. They are both absolutly loving school and are both doing great. Kaitlynn comes home with over an hours worth of home work every night plus her reading. Zoe seems to be enjoying her time alone with me while her sissy's are off to school. She is also very joyful when they come home. Brandon is working in the ICU at the hospital on base. He has been training to go to selections which he will be leaving to do that toward the end of October. Selections by the way, is a three week process he will go through to see if he gets selected to go through Special Forces traning. If he makes it and gets chosen he will then go through about a 2 year course here at Fort Bragg. I will keep everyone posted on that though. Oh yes, I forgot to update everyone on myself :) How easily I forget myself when I talk of my kids and husband! I though, do not have much to update on. I attempted to go back to school for my nursing this semester of school but unfortunatly I did not recieve a child care grant which I had applied for. With out that grant I can not go to school seeing how daycare costs a darn arm and a leg!! I am still on the list and I hope to be picked up for Spring semester. Until then, I will do what I do best and stay home and take care of my wonderful children. I will be a great wife and keep up with the everyday things life throws at ya! I will try and be better at this whole blogging this again. I promise ! Well I hope everyone enjoys hearing of me and my families life :) Oh and here is a semi-new picture of me and the hubby ...

We got our orders!

2010-01-10T09:47:00.000-08:00

I thought I would write and let everyone know that Brandon got his orders for our new duty station when he is all done with school in March. We will be moving back to Fort Bragg, North Carolina! We are really excited and happy about this. We will more than likely be moving back when Brandon graduates in March. He is trying to get into one more little school he has to go to in order to get his E6 rank, it is called BNCOC. If he gets in that then we will be here 7 weeks after he graduates so he can finish BNCOC. We won't find that out for a while though. Well I just wanted to write and let everyone know we will be moving back to Fort Bragg here soon!

Tree Lighting Ceremony

2009-12-02T17:32:00.000-08:00

Tonight we headed to main post and atteneded the annual tree lighting ceremony. It was SOO cold out so I made sure I bundled the kids up so they would not get cold. We were there a good 45 minutes. They had hot cocoa, cookies, crafts, Santa, and obviously the tree lighting. The whole thing was still going on when we left but it was just so cold I wanted to head home so the kids would not get sick. The weather forecast is calling for snow for us on Friday. I think that is crazy to think of snow in South Texas. They say it never snows here. Here are a few pictures from tonight.

Earlier today me and Zoe headed out to do a bit more christmas shopping. I got a few things and I am just about done now. I think I only need a few more things for the "stocking stuffers" and I will be all done. I am completly done with all the big items! Thank goodness. Brandon's birthday is 2 weeks from today so I still gotta go out and get him something! Also 2 weeks from Friday the holiday breaks start from school and work for the kids and Brandon. I am really looking foward to having 2 weeks off to spend with each other! My grammy and papa are going to come see us on Christmas for 2 nights and then Sunday when they head home we will be heading to Louisiana to go stay with Brandons parents for the New Years! We will be down there a good week so that will be really nice to be able to visit with all his family! I sent out Christmas cards on Monday so everyone should be expecting to get one. If you want one and I do not have your address please email it to me and I will send you a card!

Slideshow

2009-11-28T14:27:00.000-08:00

Just thought I would share a video I made. It is mainly of Brandon being deployed and then a few towards then end of him at home.

Make a Smilebox slideshow

Happy Thanksgiving!

2009-11-26T11:38:00.001-08:00

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! Hope everyone had a fantastic day! Here are some pictures from our Thanksgiving! We were supposed to go spend the holidays up with my grammy but unfortunatly we were not able to make it up there. So we just spent the day at home and had another couple come spend the day with us. I am getting up EARLY in the morning to do some wonderful black Friday shopping! I am hoping to run into some good deals! Well I just wanted to share a few pictures with everyone and tell everyone Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Anniversary!

2009-10-04T11:54:00.000-07:00

Today is mine and Brandon's 4 year wedding anniversary! We have been through so much that it seems as though we have been married longer than 4 years. He is the man of my dreams and I am so thankful to have such a wonderful husband! We are not going to go out to dinner like we normally would today, instead Brandon is grilling steak and shrimp while I make baked potatoes, bacon wrapped green beans, and home made peach cobbler for desert! Brandon and Kaitlynn left earlier on today to go get Brandon a haircut. When they came home he has roses and a sweet card for me.

Me and the love of my life =)

This coming up week Zoe has her 18 month apt with shots and I have to finish up shopping for our camping trip. I just have a little bit of food I have left to get. I am getting really excited to go camping on the beach. I just hope it does not rain. There is a chance of rain on Saturday. Brandon has been really busy with school doing clinicals everyday, which means he does not come home for lunch and it makes for one long day for me. Zoe and I find things to do though. Zoe is so active she is always having to do something. She refuses to watch T.V. which I guess is a good thing. She absolutly LOVES playing with her baby dolls. Brooklynn is doing great in school. She has finally overcome her crying battle every morning when I would drop her off. She is learning to count and say her ABC's. She is even getting really good with her hand/eye cordination.. example would be coloring and cutting with scissors. Kaitlynn is also doing great in school. I had parent/teacher conference with Kaitlynn's teacher on Friday and her teacher had no worries/complaints about Kaitlynn. She said Kaitlynn is a very focused and very organized student. She said Kaitlynn is always cleaning up and organizing when they have "5 minute breaks" between subject. I am so happy for Kaitlynn and Brooklynn both. I am thankful to have such smart and good kids! Well I hope everyone has a wonderful week ahead. =)

Much needed update

2009-09-22T06:20:00.000-07:00

Sorry everyone for not blogging. I really have not been in a blogging mode lately. Since the last time I blogged we have been a busy family. We have had a couple different bbq's with friends, Brandon has had an orginizational day at school for the whole family, we have planned a camping trip to the beach in October with lots of friends, and suprisingly it has rained here more days in the past two weeks than it has the past 7 months we have lived here. It is crazy how much it has been raining here. We were in such a drought and now everything is SO green and beautiful. We have decided to head to the beach one last time before it gets to cold here. We will be heading to Mustang Island October 10th - 12th and this time we are going to be camping out on the beach (at a campground) instead of getting a motel. It will be alot of fun espically for the kids. I am really looking foward to making a campfire and roasting marshmellow with the kids. This will be the first time they will have ever gone camping! We already know they all love the beach lets just hope they love camping on the beach. haha The campground in right on the ocean but the water and the campground is seperated by a sand dune (thank goodness because I was a bit scared to go to sleep thinking I would wake up with the water to my tent!!). I will take tons of pictures when we go camping and will share with everyone! Well this past weekend we have lots of friends over to bbq with us then we all watched the Texas Longhorns football game then we got the UFC fight. We had so much fun that night. We have become really good friends with a few of the people Brandon goes to school with and their familes. They are all such good, positive people that are alot of fun to be around. They are all the ones that will be going camping with us as well. On Sunday we had a really nice family day. We all just hung out in the house until the after nap time then we all headed out to play while Brandon washed the truck. The truck needed a washing BIG time since it has been raining SO much lately. But now we have the trunk in the garage because it is raining again! It is going to rain today and tomorrow then should be done for the rest of the week. For this coming weekend we do not have any plans yet. I am really wanting to get a dart board. Our next door neighbor has a dart board and we played with them Friday night and it was SO much fun! I did not know I would like playing darts so much. I do not even know the prices on dart boards to I am a little affraid to even look around. haha

The girls are all doing great. Kaitlynn had her first spelling test this past Friday and she got 100%! I am so pround of her. She got her new spelling words yesterday and she knows them all already. She is doing so good in school. She lost another tooth about a week ago so now she has lost all 4 front teeth, the 2 top and 2 botttom. Brooklynn is doing great as well. She recovered from her oral surgery very quickly and returned to school a week ago Monday. She is also doing very good in school and advancing very quickly. I am proud of her as well. She loves to "write" and draw and she is always making her drawing family oriented. It is always a picture of mommy and daddy or her sissy's. I love it! And my Zoe, she is growing up so fast. She is SO smart and she suprises me everyday at all the things she can do. Seriously, I do not know if it is because she has 2 older sisters to look up to or what but she is by far my most advanced kid at this age. I love my kids so much and I thank god everyday for blessing me with 3 beautiful children!! Brandon and I are doing great. Brandon has been busy in school doing lots of clinicals and one test a week. Starting next week he will have clinicals everyday of the week until the end of October.

Brooklynn had surgery!

2009-09-11T07:28:00.000-07:00

Well yesterday morning I woke up early to get myself ready for a long day ahead of me. Our little Brooklynn had to have oral surgery. She unfortunatly had 2 cavaties that were really deep and the dentist would not fix them while she was awake. So she had to be put under general anestisia. I did not know this until theday before surgery but while she was put to sleep they had to intubate her and a machine helped her breath. I was so sad when I had found that out. I was also very scared for my baby girl. I was strong for her and made sure she had no worries and she was not scared, but on the inside I was a vervous wreck!!! I cried when the dr and the anesthesiologist came and talked to me. It was all just very over whelming to me. We had to arrive to the United Methodist Children's Hospital two hours before her surgery time. Well with me and my time we were 2 1/2 hours early. lol I am always early to everything! I HATE being late so I am always super early. haha Anyways after we checked in they put Brooke in a hospital gown and put ID bracelets on both her and I. She had lots of time to play while she waited for surgery. Since this was a children's hospital they had a huge play area for her to play in. It had anything you could think of for her to play with. She was loving it, she was not scared at all. Also before we headed to surgery our awesome neighbor had brough Brooke over some color/sticker books which she did those when she took time out from playing and we were just sitting in her hospital bed. When it came time for her surgery I really thought she was going to cry and freak out when it came time for me to leave her in the OR, but they had given her some goofy/relaxing juice to drink and that stuff made her SOOOOOOOOOO funny. She was saying the funniest things and doing the silliest things. She kept making me laugh so hard!! I got to walk her back to the OR, well right before she went in the OR doors. I gave her a kiss and told her I was going to go get some coffee and I would be right by her side when she woke up. I wanted to cry SOOO bad but I was strong for her! I went to the bathroom and the cried a little bit. I wiped my tears away then went and sat in the waiting room for 1 hour 45 minutes. I thought something had gone wrong because it was not suppose to take that long but instead when the dr came and talked to me she said Brooke did great! It took a little longer because they went ahead and did a deep cleaning on her and they also put 8 sealants on her back teeth to prevent any more cavaties in her precious little mouth! We have good brushing habbits here at home and I really hope these cavity bugs stay away!! Anyways, when she started to wake up from anestesia the dr brought me back to her. She was VERY emotional and I could not get her to calm down for anything. It was weird to see her like that because she was not herself. She would look at me but it was a stared look, she really was not "looking" at me. It took her a good hour before she really came to. She was discharged from the hospital after an hour and 30 minutes in recovery. We then had to stop by Walmart and pick up her pain meds. We sat there while her meds were being filled and then it happened.. they warned me anestesia caused this but I thought she was fine sine it had already been 2 hours since she woke up.. but I was wrong. We were sitting there and all of the sudden she started throwing up EVERYWHERE and not only that but where her tube was in her nose from being intubated she started bleeding. Ugh, it was a mess and my poor baby was helpless. Nevertheless they bumped her meds and got us out of there asap! Once we got home she just slept for the next 6 hours, got up to eat dinner, took a bath and then went back to bed for the night. I kept her home from school today to just give her little body time to heal. She is back to herself completly already and I am so thankful she had a complication free surgery and a quick recovery! Here are a few pictures from her first (and hopefull last) trip to the hospital!!

dressed up in her cool gown and nice hospital

bracelet.. waiting to get her vitals taken

getting her blood pressure taken like a champ!

she was so excited to see all the toys!

playing house.. we had to be there 2 hours

before surgery so she had lots of play time

me and my baby girl

keeping busy until surgery

playing with her color/sticker book.. a

gift to her from our neighbor for surgery!

being goofy!

right before surgery.. they gave her

some "relaxing" juice

after surgery.. going home!!

A little update

2009-08-28T08:44:00.000-07:00

Well today is Friday and that means we have made it through the first week of school! Kaitlynn is doing great. She just absolutly loves school and looks foward to it everyday. I just hope she continues to like it FOREVER! =) I am a bit suprised though she has had no homework at all this first week of school. She has had paper work sent home everyday that she has done throughout the day and I am very proud of her because her hand writing is VERY good for a 1st grader, I think so anyways! It was pretty sloppy, well big letters and letters/words spaced out, at the end of her Kindergarten year. Now her letters are the size they should be with the correct spacing between letters and words and it just looks very nice! =) This is the first year she will actually be graded on things, not just S (for satisfactory) or U (for un-satisfactory). We are hoping for all A's, maybe a B or two! And little miss Brooklynn, she is doing great in preschool. The first 3 days were hard for her when it came time for me to drop her off and she would cry a bit but now she is doing awesome. She does not cry at all. She came home from school yesterday tell me about how she colored a picture and then got to cut it out all by HERSELF. She was so proud of herself as well as I was proud of her. It is amazing how time goes by so fast when you have kids. I am so thankful to have such wonderful children! Zoe is a bit lonley at home with both Brooklynn and Kaitlynn at home. Zoe is growing like a weed and is getting smarter by the day. I am amazed by the things she knows and the things she does. She really looks up to both of her older sisters! I will take some pictures of the girls this weekend and post them for ya'll. Hope everyone has a good weekend!

First day of school!

2009-08-24T07:16:00.000-07:00

Well this morning was the first day of school for Kaitlynn and Brooklynn. They both woke up excited and happy to start school! Today was the first day of 1st grade for Kaitlynn and was the first day of preschool for Brooklynn. Kaitlynn did not want me to take her to school, she wanted to be independent and ride the bus! She LOVES riding the bus with her friends! Me, Brandon and Zoe all took Brooklynn to school. Her school is really only a couple blocks away so me and Zoe will be walking everyday to pick her up! Brooklynn was so excited to go in and meet new friends and start school, but as soon as it came time for me and daddy to leave her there.. oh man she got SO sad. She started crying and Brandon took over and tryed to calm her down. I got tears in my eyes and wanted to start crying with her so there was no way I could have calmed her down. It broke my heart to leave her crying. I am hoping by the end of the week she will be better. This is her first time really being away from me all day! =( Here are a few pictures of the girls before they started school today!

Kaitlynn and Brooklynn in

there "matching" outfits!

first day of 1st grade!

Kaitlynn getting on the bus

Me & Brooke outside her school

daddy trying to calm Brooke down..

this look on her face breaks my heart =(

Also a quick update on Kaitlynn and cheerleading.. I took her out of it this past week. They are way to competitve and way to demanding of a 6 year old. I wanted her to be in it for the fun and the expierience, but the cheerleading here is a whole nother story. She was asking me to take her out for a few days before I decided. I want her to have fun with sports and if she is asking to get out, then I know she is not having fun!

Kaitlynn is a cheerleader!

2009-08-18T14:23:00.001-07:00

Kaitlynn is now officially a cheerleader! =) I registered her yesterday and she has practice all this week and then by the end of the week they will be breaking them down into squads. She is in a competitive cheerleading group so they compete with other cheerleaders from all around San Antonio. I think this will be a neat expierence for Kaitlynn! I am excited to see what the season brings. Here are a few pictures of her on her way to cheer practice!

Well school starts in 6 days!! Kaitlynn and Brooklynn both have "meet your teacher" day on Friday. I bought Kaitlynn and Brooklynn semi-matching outfits for their first day of school. They are SO cute! I will take pictures of them and post them after school has started.

Finally some pictures!

2009-08-09T09:04:00.000-07:00

Here are some pictures from our last week and a half!

A huge spider @ the snake farm

At the snake farm
Poor Kaitlynn was so scared of the animals
in the petting Zoo =(

Me and Brandon

Brooklynn & daddy feeding the animals

Miss Brooklynn

Cheese!

these animals would take the feed bags

right out of your hands!!

Brandon feeding

Zoe was not affraid of any of them!!

My grammy and Brandon having a water fight

at the splash pad!

Love her!

Goodmorning! My mom, Brooke and Zoe

The grammy's with the grandkids

My mom, Brandons mom and my grammy

Brandon's parents with the girls

Me and Zoe

Grammy Starla, Brooke and Zoe

At our housing office for National Night Out

Me and my girls heading out to dinner!

Me and Brandon at dinner

A week in review!

2009-08-07T18:49:00.000-07:00

Well I think it has been another whole week since I have blogged last. I have been crazy busy and this past week feels like it flew by so fast. Brandon parents got to our house Friday afternoon. They took us out to eat at our favorite restraunt, Texas Roadhouse, then we came home to catch up and visit with his parents. It was so good to have them here. Family is always great to see. This past weekend we just spent doing odds and end things and just hanging out and having a good time. Brandons parents cooked a delicious dinner for us on Saturday. They are from Louisiana and they brought some huge shrimp and stuff to make a stew, fried shrimp, meat pies and potatoe salad. We ate on that for a couple days. haha It was SO good! My mother flew in Monday night WAY later than expected. She was supposed to be in Monday night around 8 but she did not get here until about midnight. You just gotta love flight delays! Never the less she made it and it was so good to finally have her here! This to was the first time she met my in laws. My grandmother also called me Tuesday morning and SUPRISED me by saying she was only 2 1/2 hours from my house! Yay! This was great news! We sure did have a houseful for a couple days but it was great having lots of family surrounding us! Brandons parents stayed until Wednesday and then they got up and headed to Galveston for a couple days. Wednesday morning me, my mom, my grammy and the girls headed up the insterstate 30 miles to the outlet malls! The kids actually did alot better than I thought shopping all day. I got TONS of good deals on clothes for the kids. I took my gram and mom to the PX and commissary, they both think those stores are neat since they can not go to them everyday. lol Kaitlynn had her dermatoligy apt Tuesday afternoon and it was the most pointless apt I have ever taken her to. They did nothing and gave me no good advice. I really do not even know why she had that apt. ?? Military dr's.. sometimes you just have to wonder! We went to the splash pad yesterday just to show my mom what it was like and none of us went to get wet but everyone but me and Kaitlynn got wet. lol They all decided to have a water fight with the guns and have a good time even though they were all fully dressed. I have pictures I will post later, I have not uploaded any pics to my computer yet. Today my grammy went home and me and my mom and the girls went to Target and then just hung out at the house. We all as a family went to dinner tonight. We went and ate Mexican food! Tomorrow we have plans to go to a snake farm, it was my mom and Kaitlynn's idea. It should be fun. I will take pictures tomorrow while we are out and then I will upload them and share with everyone. Oh by the way, Brooklynn got accepted into the 3 year old pre school program!! Yay! I think this will be very good for her. She starts the same time Kaitlynn and has the same schedule and her. Well I hope everyone has a great weekend and I will try and blogg again with tons of pictures in a few days!!

My In-Laws are coming today!

2009-07-31T08:50:00.000-07:00

Time for an update I suppose! I am anxiously waiting to see if Brooklynn gets accepted into this preschool program they offer right here by my house. It is a preschool for 3-4 year olds. Today is the last day they are taking applications and then they are going to go through them all and send out acceptance letters later on today. Today is also the day we will find out who wins the San Antonio baby contest I entered Zoe in. Thanks to everyone who voted for her! Brandons parents are also on their way to our house today, they should be here around dinner time. We have no definate plans while they are here, I guess we will just play it by ear and see what happens this weekend. My mom will be here on Monday and I am SO excited to see her. It has been awhile since I have seen her. Me and Brandon have been together over 5 years and this is going to be the first time my mom and Brandons mom have ever met!!

School starts for Kaitlynn three weeks from Monday. I think she is ready to go back. She keeps asking about all of her friends from school and when she will see them again. I have started her school clothes shopping and I am done with her school supplies. (Thanks to my dad for getting Kaitlynn a gift card to Target, that was greatly appreciated!) Kaitlynn has a dermatologist appoitment coming up on the 4th. She has SUPER senstitive skin and her dr has finally given her a referal to see a dermatoligist.

Brandon is doing great in school, he just had a test on Tuesday and got a 98! He is doing clinicals three days a week now at the hospital and having class days the other two days a week, one of which is a test every week! He has been so busy studying and doing paper works. He has a paper due Tuesday and another test on Thursday then he has a whole week where he has NO test, thank goodness so then he can spend time with family!

I will take tons of pictures while his parents and my mom is here and update everyone with pictures later!

VOTE VOTE VOTE

2009-07-21T12:06:00.000-07:00

I entered Zoe in San Antonio's cutest baby contest. The voting starts today and goes until Thursday July 30th! Each person can only vote once per day. I am asking anyone and everyone to go vote for Zoe. Her photo is on page 6 and the last photo on the second row. PLEASE go vote for Zoe! Thanks!

http://www.mix961.com/cc-common/radiobase/rateapic.html?id=22632

2009-07-21T10:32:00.000-07:00

Just thought I would share a couple pictures of my girls with Aubrey, the little girl I am babysitting. Kaitlynn LOVES to hold her and help me take care of her. She acts like a little mommy! Aubrey is such a good little baby. She makes it easy to watch her and still take care of my own three kids. I am thankful that my girls are all wonderful big helpers!

Kaitlynn, Aubrey & Brooklynn

Kaitlynn & Aubrey

2009-07-21T05:59:00.000-07:00

Well I figured I would blog and update everybody on our life. I have just not really been in a blogging mood that is why I have not blogged much lately, sorry. We got Kaitlynn back from my grammy this past Saturday. She had so much fun with grammy and papa. Papa had to watch Kaitlynn one day because my grammy had to go to Dallas for a work converence. Papa took Kaitlynn to the movies and she also lost her loose tooth the day papa watched her! Brooklynn was SO happy to have her sister back. She shared her food, drinks and toys with Kaitlynn for about 2 hours..haha then it went back to normal. Brandon is doing clinicals this week in the hospital and I started watching a baby from 7am- 1pm. It is for my friend while she goes to school. It will be a nice little job to have to keep me busy. I will only be watching her this week then off two weeks because her family will be in town next week and then my family will be in the next week. My mom will be here on August 3rd and I am getting really excited to have her here. I wish it was going to be for longer but she will be back in November for thanksgiving! I am looking foward to that and seeing my step dad then as well. I am excited to for once in my life go shopping on black Friday with my mom and maybe my grammy, depending on if she will still be here then or not. Well I am going to try and update this blogg more often. We have a birthday party to go to this Friday at the Splash pad so I will get some new pictures of the kids then! Hope everyone has a good rest of the week!

A letter from a Soldier

2009-07-13T06:59:00.000-07:00

I came across this letter on facebook on a friends page. I just felt the need to share his letter with anyone I could. I feel it is so true. Enjoy..

Okay, I need to rant. I was just watching the news, and I caught part of a report on Michael Jackson. As we all know, Jackson died the other day. He was an entertainer who performed for decades. He made millions, he spentmillions, and he did a lot of things that make him a villian to many people. I understand that his death would affect a lot of people, andI respect those people who mourn his death, but that isn't the pointof my rant.Why is it that when ONE man dies, the whole of America loses their minds with grief. When a man dies whose only contribution to thecountry was to ENTERTAIN people, the American people find the need toflock to a memorial in Hollywood , and even Congress sees the need to hold a "moment of silence" for his passing?Am I missing something here? ONE man dies, and all of a sudden he's afreaking martyr because he entertained us for a few decades? Whatabout all those SOLDIERS who have died to give us freedom? All thoseSoldiers who, knowing that they would be asked to fight in a war,still raised their hands and swore to defend the Constitution and theUnited States of America. Where is there moment of silence? Whereare the people flocking to their graves or memorials and mourning overthem because they made the ultimate sacrifice? Why is it when a Soldier dies, there are more people saying "good riddance," and "thank God for IED's?" When did this country become so calloused to thesacrifice of GOOD MEN and WOMEN, that they can arbitrarily blow off their deaths, and instead, throw themselves into mourning for a "Pop Icon?"I think that if they are going to hold a moment of silence IN CONGRESS for Michael Jackson, they need to hold a moment of silence for everyservice member killed in Iraq and Afghanistan. They need to PUBLICLYrecognize every life that has been lost so that the American people can live their callous little lives in the luxury and freedom that WE,those that are living and those that have gone on, have provided forthem. But, wait, that would take too much time, because there have been so many willing to make that sacrifice. After all, we will never make millions of dollars. We will never star in movies, or write hitsongs that the world will listen too. We only shed our blood, sweat and tears so that people can enjoy what they have. Sorry if I have offended, but I needed to say it. Feel free to passthis along if you want. Remember these five words the next time you think of someone who is serving in the military: "So that others may live..."

-- Isaac.

Only two people have ever effectively given their lives for you. Jesus Christ and The American G.I.One died for your sins, the other died to give you freedom.

Flag Detail

2009-07-12T18:03:00.001-07:00

Well this past week Brandon has had flag detail with some other people in his class. They all have to take turns doing flag detail and they all will have it for a week. It starts on a Monday and ends on a Sunday. They put the flag up at 5:30 am and take it down at 5:30 pm. Sine they are in nursing school they are in charge of flag detail at the hospital. Well me and the girls decided to watch him on Sunday. It was actually pretty neat to watch. It was really hot outside though so it is a good thing it only takes a few minutes to take the flag down. I took a few pictures of the whole flag ceremony.

The girls waiting to go watch daddy

marching out to the flag

saluting the flag

bringing it down

folding it..

all done..just waiting to march it back in to

the hospital

And then there were four..

2009-07-12T07:35:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, Saturday, morning we woke up early to drive four hours to meet Adrein's mother. He went home yesterday and we get him again for Thanksgiving! We also met up with my grammy and my cousin Dakota at a mexican restraunt and ate some yummy lunch. It was good to see my cousin, I had not seen him in just about two years. By the way it was his 14th birthday yesterday! My grammy took and is keeping Kaitlynn for a week and a day! I was really sad to have Kaitlynn go. I have never been away from her so long! The longest I have ever not seen Kaitlynn is a day and a half. I talked to her like three times after we left each other at the mexican restraunt at noon. She seemed to be doing great and having tons of fun with grammy and papa! I am sure they have tons of fun stuff planned to do! I am sure shopping is one of there things on their list because when I dropped Kaitlynn off I heard my grammy tell Kaitlynn they were going to have to go find a dress to match her new shoes I had just bought her. lol Between my grammy and Kaitlynn, I am not sure who like shoes and shopping more! As for me and Brandon, we have this next week with just two kids! We do not have any plans besides today just gonna run a couple places. All this week Brandon has clinicals at school then has to study for his test on Thursday!

My cousin Dakota, Kaitlynn, grammy, Brooke

Zoe & me after we ate Mexican food =)

again with Brandon after we ate lunch!

A week in review

2009-07-07T06:15:00.001-07:00

So sorry I have not updated this thing sooner. Tiffany and her son Connor got here a week ago today and left this past Sunday. I have tons of pictures and lots of updating to do. Sorry I did not do this sooner. When Tiffany got here on Tuesday I was so excited to see her and Connor. Kaitlynn and Connor were so cute together, holding hands where ever they went! We got lunch from Jack n' the Box, took the kids swimming and then once Brandon got home from school he watched the kids so me and Tiffany could go get pedicures together and have some alone time. It was so good to catch up! When we woke up Wednesday morning we took the kids to a family fun day event they had here on base. It was SO hot out but the kids still had fun. They had bounce houses, pizza, cotton candy, snow cones, puppet shows, and shamu! After our fun day even we brought the kids home so Zoe and Brooke could take there naps and the older kids just played outside. Later that night we went to dinner on the River walk and walked around so Tiffany could see around downtown. It was a really good night. Once we got home and got the kids into bed me and Tiffany snuck out to Walmart and bought some layout floaties for the pool! On Thursday we had planned on having a pool day all day but we were only there an hour before a little kid had an accident in the pool which closed the pool for 24 hours. Can we say bummer? On Friday morning we woke up really early and headed to Sea World. We started out Sea World by seeing Shamu, and the Dolphin show. They were both amazing. We went to the water park in Sea World and we all just had a really, really good day. We got home about 630 pm and we were all just worn out. On Saturday, the 4th of July, we headed to the Circus. It was my kids first time to the circus, well it was my first time as well. It was awesome. They had so many cool things. It was a little over 2 hours longs. Zoe fell asleep on Brandon. haha I can not wait to take my kids to another circus, it seriously so much fun! When we got home from the Circus me and Tiffany started to prep our food for our 4th of July BBQ with our friends. Everybodys food turned out super yummy! We set up a water slide for all of the kids to play on. It was so hot outside so the water cooled the kids off. We all hung outside talking, laughing and just having a good time until about midnight then we all headed to bed because I had to wake up really early to take Tiffany and Connor to the airport. It was so sad seeing them off. It was sooo nice to have them here. I am so thankful to have the true friends that I do have. Friends are an amazing thing. Thank you to all the good friends that I have! I am going to post pictures in another blog so be on the lookout for another blog later on today! =)

Quick Update

2009-06-30T06:11:00.001-07:00

Just a quick update. Sorry I have not blogged in a while. It just seems as though I have not been on the computer as much now that Kaitlynn is out of school and we are just so busy with our outside activities. I am posting just a few pictures of this past weekend. We went to my friends house on Saturday and had a little pool party. My friend Jenni just moved to San Antonio from East Texas. We have been friends for a little over four years now. She just loves the kids and we has such a good time this weekend with her. I am going to get Tiffany from the airport this morning. I am SOOOOOOO excited to see her. We will take TONS and tons of pictures and I will blogg sometime.. no promises but by Sunday for sure so everyone will be updated with our great time! =) Brandon has another test tomorrow so he has been super busy studying and staying up WAY way late. He is a perfectionist when it comes to his schooling and he says he will NOT fail on anything. I am proud of him but I know he has got to be tired. I guess it is a good thing he gets a FOUR day weekend this weekend for the 4th of July! Oh yeah also another one of our friends from Bragg will be here this weekend and we are going to go to either lunch or dinner with them on the 5th. It will be good to see them and catch up with them! Well sorry this is so short but I gotta go get myself and the kids ready so we can leave in less than 2 hours and head to the airport! YAY!

Kaitlynn going down the slide!

Zoe jumping in the water

Daddy & Brooke riding the scooter

Zoe playing with her baby doll

Me & Jenni back at my house

Only 5 more days!

2009-06-25T05:51:00.000-07:00

Only 5 more days and my best friend Tiffany will be here to visit us! I am super excited to see her and her son Connor. We have tons of stuff planned to go do while she is here. We will take tons of pictures and keep everyone updated! =)

Well this past week has been busy for me with all sorts of appoitments. They have ranged from WIC, to dental to regular yearly checkups. Brandon has been really busy as well preparing for his test today. He gets so stressed out before tests and studies for HOURS and HOURS. Going to bed super late and getting up even earlier. I wish him the best of luck today and hope he does good! His lowest test score has been a 90 and he hopes to keep it that way. Next week he has a 4 day weekend for the 4th of July, thank goodness because we all need it!

Coming up July 11th we will be taking Adrien back to his mother and we will also be taking Kaitlynn to go stay with my grammy and papa for a week. She is so excited to go be with them, ALONE!! They will have a blast. I just hope I do not miss her to much. I have NEVER been away from her that long. I think 2 days is the longest I have EVER been away from her. I know she will be in great hands so I have nothing to worry about.

Today I actually have no appoitments or anything that I absolutly have to do so it is going to be a lazy day for us until about noon and then I will probally take the kids to the pool after nap time. It has been getting SO hot here. 105 yesterday but it feels like 110 with the humidity. HOT!! This weekend we have not plans either, weird I know. We have had plans for the past 4 or 5 weekends and like the next 4 or 5 after this. So I have no idea what we will do. We will probally just make the best of it with the kids. Go to the pool and cook some yummy food on the grill for dinner! =) I will take some pictures this weekend and post them for everyone. I hope everyone has a good rest of the weekend & weekend to come!

Pictures of our weekend

2009-06-22T15:31:00.000-07:00

Here are a few pictures from our weekend. I just realized I have none of Kaitlynn up here. She was so busy playing with her friends I guess I just never got a picture of her. Enjoy these few pictures!

Zoe swimming everywhere with her water wings on

Zoe & a couple of her friends at the pool

Maka & Adrien

Brooke & Cole

Me & Brandon on Father's Day

My neighbors (Nikki, me, Crystal & Miranda)

Happy Father's Day

2009-06-22T06:19:00.000-07:00

Happy Father's Day (a day late)! Hope all the dads out there had a great fathers day. We had a great day. Brandon woke up super early and took Kaitlynn and Adrien golfing. They got home around noon and we spent the rest of the day with neighbors. We bbq'd and hung out all night. Three families on our block got together and we all brought food and had a good time. Brandon played basketball with the kids and then eventually the older kids started riding on the motor bike.

Thank you Brandon for being such a great dad to our kids. You are amazing and life without you I can not even imagine. You are a wonderful father and an amazing husband! Thank you!

Also, I hope my father had a great Father's day with his dad. They went fishing all day in Montana. I know he enjoyed his time with his dad and I am thankful I got to see my dad this past week!

HAPPY (belated) FATHER'S DAY!

The dentist visit!

2009-06-18T10:03:00.000-07:00

Yesterday my girls both had dentist appt's and my dad was nice enough to stay home and baby sit Zoe! This was Brooklynn's first time to go to the dentist and I have to say she was a bit nervous/scared. She cried at first but eventually she came around to it. They got to take pictures of her teeth and count them but she did not let them do the full cleaning. Kaitlynn was such a big girl. She and Brooklynn had there cleaning at the same time so I had to leave Kaitlynn by herself while I went off with Brooklynn. She did not get scared or anything. They brought her to me when she was done. They both got toys from the toy box, stickers, tooth brushes, tooth paste, mouth wash and fun flossers! Thanks dad for watching Zoe! Enjoy the pics of the girls dentist visit!

At the dentist office..standing in front of

the fish tank!

playing games while waiting to see the dentist

waiting in the play room area

Kaitlynn waiting to get her teeth cleaned

Brooke brushing the puppy's teeth

The past couple of days

2009-06-18T06:15:00.000-07:00

Here are some pictures from the past couple of days with my dad. I woke up really early this morning and took him to the airport. I had a wonderful visit with my dad. It has been really good to catch up with him. On Tuesday night we all went out to dinner at a Mexican restraunt that was so GOOD! It has a huge play place and the kids had a blast playing in it. We were there for a good two hours eating and playing. After dinner we all came home and my dad, Brandon and the kids all played basketball and rode a little motor bike. Well only Adrien and his friend rode the motor bike. My dad and Brandon seemed to have a really good time playing basketball. It was good to see them interact so well. My kids all had a good time with Papa and we all can not wait to see him again. We are hoping by the end of the year or the beginning of next year we will get to see him again. Well I hope you all enjoy the pictures!

Brooklynn riding her bike with no training wheels

Papa, Brooke and Kaitlynn
Me and Zoe at the Mexican restraunt

this is part of the play place

daddy and the girls way up in the play place

more of the play place

one more view of the play place

Kaitlynn and Zoe

Zoe had so much fun playing

Me and Zoe again

Adrien riding the motor bike

me dad, Brandon and Kaitlynn watching Adrien

Brooklynn =)

He finally made it to the road

starting to play basketball

action shot!

the sunset was beautiful!

Trying to keep cool!

2009-06-16T06:43:00.001-07:00

Well Monday morning we woke up and we decided to head to Target so I could get diapers and my dad wanted to get all of the kids a toy. The kids all picked out a fun toy and my dad decided to get the kids water guns so they could have a water fight after nap time. After Target we got a Starbucks coffee and headed home to have lunch with Brandon and lay the kids down for their naps. Once we got home my dad was filling up the water guns and 1 of the 4 worked, the other 3 were broken. This sucked but we took them back when the kids woke up. We ended up going to Walmart and buying different kinds of water guns. When we got home from Walmart we filled up the kids pool and the water guns and the kids and my dad all had fun with the water. It was SUPER HOT out so after about 30 minutes of being outside we decided to try and go to the pool for a bit. We were only at the pool for a short bit because Zoe was very crabby and Brooklynn was not in the best of mood either. It was not like my kids to not want to be at the pool. We just came home and shortly after we got home Brandon got home from work. I cooked some spaghetti, salad and rolls and we had dinner! After dinner we all hung out outside and Zoe and Brooklynn ended getting WET in there clothes..swimming in there pool! It has been really nice just hanging out with my dad catching up with everything in our lives! Today I am going to take my dad to the PX here on base just so he knows what one is like. Then after nap time we are going to take the kids to the splash pad and later on we are going to go eat mexican food for dinner. Hope you all enjoy the pictures!

Adriene getting Zoe with the water gun!

Zoe trying to get me wet
Papa filling up hit water gun in the pool as Zoe just
sprayed herself in the face with the water hose

Brooklynn smiling BIG =)

Zoe doing what she does best..putting

EVERYTHING in her mouth!

Zoe and papa right before bed

Zoe crashed out on daddy!

My dad is here!

2009-06-14T18:17:00.000-07:00

Last night we got Adriene, my step-son, around 1030 pm and then we headed to the airport to pick up my dad! My dad got in a little later than expected last night. His flight was delayed an hour or so in Denver due to rain so he did not make it here until about 1130 pm! We visited for a bit when we got back to the house but went to bed by 1 AM because we were all so tired. When we woke up this morning me and my dad ran to Walmart to get some stuff to grill dinner tonight and then around 11 we all headed downtown and went to the riverwalk. We ate at the Rivercenter mall and then went down and walked around on the riverwalk so my dad could see what it was all about. After we walked around down there we decided to go to the Alamo and walk around for a bit. It was so hot outside so we got all the kids snow cones and headed back to the house. When we got home we let the kids play in our little pool out in the yard while I cooked dinner. Brandon cooked the steaks on the grill and they were super yummy!! Thanks to my dad for buying our wonderful dinner!

My dad, me and my girls (so glad to see him again!)

A church

Me, my dad and my girls!

@ the Riverwalk

My dad, Brooke, Me, Kaitlynn, Brandon, Zoe & Adriene

Me, Kaitlynn, Brooklynn & Adriene eating snow cones!

The Alamo

Me & my dad!

Cactus =)

After we all ate dinner we decided to head to the pool for an hour. It was SO hot outside still and it was 630 pm! (It was still 99 degrees out!!) This is the first time I brought my camera to the pool in a long time. Kaitlynn and Brooklynn both have life jackets that they wear and they both jump in an swim all across the pool. Zoe has little arm floaties and she is braver than I wish. She gets in at all depths of the pool. I have to keep my eye on her at all times!!

Brandon throwing Brooklynn up and in the water!

Brandon tossing Zoe up and down

Now it was Kaitlynn's turn

Brandon, Zoe and Adriene

Papa Owen helping Zoe play in the rinse off water =)

Now that the kids are all bathed and in bed Brandon and my dad are watching the LAL and Magic basketball game and I am finally updating everyone with some new pictures! Sorry it has been a while since I have posted any pictures. Well I am going to go sit with the guys and spend some time with my dad. I will keep everyone posted on my visit with my dad! =)

Our weekend

2009-06-08T11:48:00.001-07:00

Sorry I have not blogged in a while. We have been busy with outdoor activities and I have just really not been on the computer that much. Kaitlynn graduated Kindergarten on Friday. I am so proud of her. We had a dinner with Brandon's school Friday night. We got to meet all of his instructors and meet everyone in his class. It was SO hot outside Friday that by the time we got home around 630 Friday night we all wanted to go swimming. The pool was so nice and warm and there were not a lot of people there. We stayed until they closed at 830. On Saturday Brandon woke up early and went golfing with some of his school friends. I took the girls to the pool for just a little bit while he was gone but Zoe got a little crabby so we came home so she could take her nap. Once Brandon got home from golfing we all headed to the pool again. Kaitlynn is no longer affraid of the water. She jumps in the deep end and swims right back. If you know Kaitlynn that is a HUGE step for her!! She told me yesterday when we were at the pool she could not wait for all her "visitors" to come this summer so she could show them all she is not affraid of the water anymore! All of our visitors would include my dad (papa owen), Adriene (my step-son), our BFF Tiffany and her son Connor, my mom and my grammy. I did not take any pictures this weekend. It is so un-like me to not take any pictures. I will make up for all of my pictures this coming weekend when my dad gets here on Saturday!

It's official!

2009-06-04T09:10:00.000-07:00

Well my dad called me this morning and told me he booked his plane ticket to come see us. He will be here SOON! June 13th! I am so excited and I can't wait to see him!

My dad! =)

2009-06-03T18:15:00.000-07:00

Well I just got news from my dad that he is wanting to come see me and my family for a week this summer! I hope things work out and he can make it here. I have not seen him in a LONG time, I think Brooklynn was just 3 months old when I saw him last. =( I truely miss my dad and it will be so nice to see him. The kids will just love him as well. I am just waiting on the official word back on a date and then I will let the kids know Papa Owen is coming to visit!! Well I just wanted to share my happiness with everyone! Goodnight to all!

My dad! (about 2 years ago)

My dad and his wife

Kaitlynn's Kindergarten award ceremony!

2009-06-03T09:01:00.000-07:00

Well this morning we woke up and got ready to head to Kailtynn's school for her Kindergarten class award ceremony. I can not believe my baby girl is going to be in first grade. Time has gone by so fast. She is growing up to fast. She is so smart and is doing really well in school. I talked with her teacher and she said Kaitlynn is in the top 10 of her class. (They have 23 kids in there class) She struggled a little bit when she first started Kinder when we were back at Fort Bragg. Her teacher there though was awesome and worked so much with Kaitlynn, as did I at home, and we got her cought up to where she needed to be. Her teacher here said Kaitlynn knows everything she needs to know and she is not struggling at all. I am so proud of my baby girl! (well not so much baby, but my first born!) In just two more days of school Kaitlynn will be done with Kindergarten and will be heading to first grade! Yay! =) We have a fun filled summer planned for us and I will keep everyone up to date on our life! We found out last week that Brandon son, Adriene, will be here on June 13th! We are always excited when he comes. All of the kids get along so well and having one more kid in the house always makes it more exciting! Well I hope you enjoy the pics from Kaitlynn's award ceremony.

Kaitlynn before her ceremony (with her little

cap they made in class yesterday!)

Me & Kaitlynn =)
Kaitlynn waiting as her teacher names
all of her awards (she got four!)

Kaitlynn & her folder of awards

Class photo take 1

Class photo take 2

Final t-ball game & season party

2009-06-01T06:11:00.000-07:00

Saturday morning woke up and got ready for Kaitlynn's last t-ball game of the season. She did great. She has improved SO much since the season started. She caught so many balls this last game and her throw is amazing for a 6 year old girl. Brandon has been teaching her to hit the ball when it is thrown to her, not off of a tee. She does so good. I think softball is going to be her sport. I never did enroll her for cheerleading only because practice starts right when my mom will be here and they said practice is mandatory for the first two weeks or she won't make the team, so I decided to pass up cheerleading and just put her in soccer when it starts. After her t-ball game the coach and his wife passed out trophy's, awards and goody bags. After they got all the fun stuff from the coach there was an end of the season party at the splash pad. They had food for everyone and the kids had a blast playing in the water. One of our friends from Fort Bragg that is now here going to school came to watch Kaitlynn's last game. Him and his wife asked if they could take Kaitlynn to the Movie Up and of course we said yes. It was a 3D movie and it was her first 3D movie to ever see. She said she liked it and they all had a good time.

Kaitlynn right before the game

Kaitlynn & daddy on first base
running home!

coming in from the outfield

the teams last huddle =(

Coach Maawac, Kaitlynn & Coach daddy with her

award & trophy (along with her nice hat hair)

Her trophy is a little bobble head girl.

It has her name on it and her shirt number

The final team picture! (as everone is looking in

different directions for different cameras!)

Party time at the splash pad

my tan baby!

haha Kaitlynn "laying" out to dry off

who knows what they are looking for!

(probally each other!)

hahaha okay so Zoe snuck into the stroller and got

Kaitlynn's goody bag out and started eating the candy!

Brooklynn and two of the little girls from our block

Me & Brandon!

My Best Friend! =)

2009-05-28T13:52:00.001-07:00

Okay so I thought I would share with everyone I am so excited because my best friend from Fort Bragg, Tiffany, booked her plane ticket today to come see me this summer! Her and her son Connor will be here in one month! I am SUPER excited to see her! I miss her so much! Now I have to think of lots of fun things to do while she is here! Let the planning begin..

This is what true friends look like!

Our trip to South Padre

2009-05-27T10:03:00.000-07:00

To start off our Memorial Day weekend we woke up early Saturday morning and headed to the beach on South Padre Island. We met our friends, Brandi & Justin, at a gas stationed and we followed each other for 4 hours until we finally made it to our condo's that we were staying in. We got down there around 11, checked in to our condo, ate some lunch then headed to the beach! We were at the beach for a good 3 hours then Zoe needed a nap so we headed back to the condo so Zoe could nap and then all the other kids swam in the swimming pool and hot tub. They were in the swimming pool for another 3 hours atleast. I brought dinner to make that night so I cooked lasagna then after dinner we all headed out to walk and see around the town. We ended up eating some yummy ice cream at a homemade Italian ice creamery. It was a bit expensive but it was worth it! =) We also went into a store that put decals on shirts/shorts/pretty much any kind of clothing. I got the girls all matching dresses that have South Padre on it with a cute little flower. They are so cute. Me and Brandon also had a shirt made for each of us. Later on in the night (9ish) we headed to the bay of South Padre where they had fireworks for Memorial Day. We sat right on the water and the fireworks were pretty good. Kaitlynn was scared at first, she does not like loud noises at all. After the fireworks all of the kids crashed SO fast in the truck. By the time we made it to Dairy Queen for our second ice cream treat of the night only the adults were awake to eat it. We then headed back to the condo and put the kids to bed.

This dog wanted anybody to play with him. He even had his own ball!

Brandon playing on the wake board in the swimming pool at the condo.

@ the fireworks (I was a bit sun burnt!)

Sunday morning we woke up and decided to just let the kids all play in the pool for a couple of hours before we headed out to the bay to go on our Dolphin Cruise. It was a two hour cruise that took us out on the bay, through the canal and then on the ocean. We saw tons of dolphins and BEAUTIFUL scenery. It was so much fun for the kids and for the adults. I am so glad we decided to do the cruise. That was my first time riding on a big boat like that way out on water to! After the dolphin cruise we headed back to the condo so we could clean up a bit before we headed out to dinner. We went and ate at a seafood/steakhouse. It was really good yet another expensive outing. After dinner we just went to a couple stores & just went sight seeing.

Me and my girls on the dolphin cruise

A view of South Padre from the boat

one of the many dolphins

here are some more dolphins but the beach you see

behind them is way down almost in Mexico

Happy Memorial Day! Monday morning we woke up and had to pack the condo up and check out by 10am. We got out a little bit early, around 9, and headed to the beach again. We packed lunches and drinks and played on the beach and in the water until about 130. We had to rinse off the best we could at the water shower they had at the beach. Then we headed home. It took us 2 hours longer to get home then it did to get down there. We stoped way more on the way home. By the time we finally made it home the kids were SO ready to be home. We had such an awesome time and I really hope we have another chance this summer to make it down there again.

My girls on Memorial Day

My family!

Kaitlynn & daddy found a weird looking crab

Our Pool is now OPEN!

2009-05-20T10:52:00.000-07:00

Our neighborhood pool opened up yesterday! Yay! We took Brooke and Zoe around 2 and then when Kaitlynn got home from school Brandon went and got her from the house and she joined us for about and hour. The water was a bit chilly at first but I guess everyone got use to it because they enjoyed every minute of being there! When we first got there it was only our family and our friends but once school got out there were tons of people!

Zoe trying to catch the water!

Kaitlynn jumping in..over and over!

I finally attempted to put Zoe's hair in piggy tails and her hair was actually long enough to do so! I think she is pretty darn cute! =)

SOUTH Padre Island!

2009-05-19T05:03:00.000-07:00

South Padre Island here we come! =) We were invited by our wonderful friends, Brandi and Justin, to head to South Padre Island with them for memorial day weekend! They got a Condo that will sleep both of our family's and they invited us to go down with them for 3 days/2 nights! I am SUPER excited! First off we all love the beach and second off South Padre is suppose to be BEAUTIFUL! Blue ocean water and tons of stuff to do! It is going to take us about 4 1/2 hours to get there but it will be totally worth it! We are going to get up early-early on Saturday and head down. We are hoping to make it down there by 1230ish and get checked into the condo and then head to the beach! Since we are heading to the beach for the weekend we have decided to put Sea World off until a later date. We are still heading to the pool tomorrow since it opens tomorrow so I will take some pictures and get them posted soon!

Oh yeah I have been meaning to share my exciting news with everyone, my mom has booked her plane ticket to come visit me this summer. She will be here early August for about a week and a half. I can't wait to see her, I miss my mother! She plans on coming back with my step dad and possible my brother and his family for Thanksgiving! Also my BFF, Tiffany, from Fort Bragg gave me some WONDERFUL news yesterday and she is trying to come and see me for a week in July! I really hope everything goes as planned with her because I miss her SO much. True friends are hard to find and then when you have to move so far away from them it is even harder! I just hope everything works out and she can make it here in July!

Weekend Recap

2009-05-18T05:05:00.000-07:00

To start off our weekend Kaitlynn had an early out on Friday from school. It was teachers work day, or something of that sort. We had our friends over, Justin and Brandi, because I was making a gumbo for dinner. We let the kids play out in our swim pool and slip n slide for about an hour or so then we all headed to the splash pad but I guess we forgot to get the weather memo about rain because we were only there for about 20 minutes and then it start pouring rain on us. This rain was coming down so hard and so fast and the rain drops were HUGE! And of course after we all ran home and dried off it stopped raining. Oh well, it was time for dinner anyways. My gumbo was SO good and everyone loved it!

On Saturday we woke up and got ready for Kaitlynn's t-ball game. The game went good and Kaitlynn is getting better and better. It is so cute and funny to watch kids play t-ball. Kaitlynn is getting good at hitting the ball and she is doing great on being first baseman! After her t-ball game we all came home ate lunch and the kids all had nap time. It also rained again on Saturday which was a bummer because we had planned on taking the kids to the splash pad after there naps. Oh well, we just ended up playing the wii all afternoon. Brandi and Justin came over again as well as another couple and we had a little cookout once all the rain went away.

And on Sunday we had a cleaning day and then a relaxing day. I did some laundry and cleaned up the house a bit. Me and Brandon watched a movie when the girls took a nap. I have not sat down and watched a movie since I went to the movie theatre with Tiffany WAY back in February. After the movie and after the girls had there naps we finally decided to head outside for a bit so the girls could play. We had a good time and ended up being outside for a good few hours. The girls rode around on the power wheels and Brandon helped one of our neighbors weedeat his yard. I just sat around and talked with all the girls. Sorry there are no pictures this time. My camera had ran out of batteries and I have just been slacking on getting new ones put in. We are going to be going to Sea World on Thursday this week and our neighborhood swimming pool open on Wednesday of this week so I will take plenty of pictures coming up!

Splash Pad

2009-05-15T05:51:00.001-07:00

Well the other day it was over 100 degrees outside so we took the kids to the splash pad to play, have fun & cool off! We only stayed about an hour but the kids had a blast. Zoe was not to much into the water though, she is teething so she was a little crabby and just wanted to sit in her stroller. Zoe has all for molars coming in at the same time. The past 2 days and 2 nights have been not very good. Up in the middle of the night, all night, just crying. We all finally got some well needed sleep last night! Kaitlynn took a friend to the Splash Pad, his name is Cody. Brooklynn took her little friend Adreienne. After the Splash Pad all the kids came home and played in the pool while Brandon and Justin filled up water balloons then they all had fun shooting water balloons out of Justin's water balloon shot gun. We are planning a cookout this weekend with of course the water for the kids! That is if it does not rain on us! Kaitlynn has a t-ball game tomorrow at 11 then around 1 everyone is suppose to come over so the kids can play then we will cookout later on in the evening. We are planning on going to Sea World next Wednesday but that is not a definate plan yet. Cheerleading registration has started for Kaitlynn so I need to go Monday and get her signed up for that. I think she will be a cute cheerleader. =) Well I need to go for now. Brandon is gone to the gym and I need to get the girls ready before he gets home. Enjoy the pictures!

Brooklynn =)

Kaitlynn and her friend Cody

Zoe & daddy

Having fun with water!

Shooting water balloons out of the water balloon sling shot

This is how Zoe gets up the stairs..

and this is how Zoe goes down the slide!

Brandon & Zoe mowing our backyard!

Kaitlynn's school picture

2009-05-14T05:49:00.000-07:00

Here is Kaitlynn's Kindergarden picture that was taken here at Fort Sam Houston. She had her Kindergarden pictures taken when we were at Fort Bragg but I wanted to get them done again. I LOVE pictures! =)

T-ball pictures

2009-05-12T17:26:00.000-07:00

Well Kaitlynn came home from t-ball practice tonight with her pictures she had taken a couple weeks back. They turned out pretty good. I think it is so cool that Brandon is one of the assistant coaches. The actual coach is not the coach anymore. He is active duty army and he had to go out to the field for two weeks and there are only two weeks of t-ball left so that leaves Brandon and two other guys as the coaches. Brandon is on leave for the next two weeks so it worked out pretty nice. I should be getting Kaitlynns school pictures soon and as soon as I get them in I will be sending out TONS of pictures. I have family pictures, Zoe's one year pictures, T-ball pictures, and then Kaitlynn's school pictures. If I don't have your address and you want a picture or pictures please email me your address.

Corpus Christi & Padre Island

2009-05-11T13:02:00.000-07:00

We woke up early Saturday morning and headed down to Corpus Christi. We checked into our motel, the Holiday Inn, unpacked our stuff and headed down to the beach. We were on the beach by 10 am and it was already perfect beach weather. This was Zoe's first time ever getting in beach water. She loved it. She would cry when the waves splashed in her face though. Kaitlynn was a boogie boarding girl. She wanted Brandon and Justin to pull her on that thing constantly. Brooklynn went pretty far out in the water with Brandon. It made me a little nervous but she had a good time. All of the kids dug in the sand and made little "pools" of water and tons of sand castles. I layed out most of the time and then chased the kids around the rest of the time. I only waded in the water. I only got my legs wet. We headed back to the motel room around 2 to let the kids take a nap. We showered and got ready to go out for dinner and then we walked the boardwalk and got a snow cone for our desert. We headed back in for bed around 9. The kids crashed out, they had a long day in the sun!

Happy Mothers Day! On Sunday morning we woke up and had breakfast at the restraunt that was inside our motel. I got a sweet card from my hubby and Kaitlynn had make me a couple little things at school that she had given me before we went on our trip.

Our family picture taken at our mothers day breakfast!

After we had our Mothers Day breakfast we packed up our truck and headed off to Padre Island. It was only about 18 miles away but took us about 30 minutes to get there. We only went to Padre Island, not South Padre Island. Our next beach trip will def. be to South Padre Island. It was cool though because we got to drive our truck right up on the beach and we played and swam right next to our truck! We all had a blast. The kids loved the water and had a blast playing in the sand. Brandon, Justin and all of the kids found so many live hermit crabs and sea shells. They put them all in a little bucket and before we left Kaitlynn let them all go. Padre Island was alot cleaner as far as the water goes but there was nothing around but sand and water. We had gone so far out that we passed signs telling us there was no gas beyond a certain point. It was very pretty though. We stayed on the beach for about 4 hours then headed back to town to go to a few little stores then we headed back home at about 3.

Happy Mothers Day

2009-05-08T19:23:00.000-07:00

I wanted to send an early Mothers Day message out to my mom and Brandons mom. Thank you both for being amazing women and wonderful mothers. I know my mom means the world to me. With Brandon being in the military and living so far away from my mom I wish I could be with her more often. It is hard when you only get to see your mom once or twice a year. I miss her so much. I love you mom and thank you for everything you do and for being such an amazing mom! Happy Mother's Day!

HOT weather!

2009-05-08T11:51:00.000-07:00

We have been having some HOT weather here this past week. I set the slip n slide up for the girls and the pool up for Zoe. The girls LOVE to be in the water and that is why we have decided to go to Corpus Christi for mothers day weekend. The weather is suppose to be perfect and we all love to be outside so I thought up of going to the beach for mothers day! We are going to be staying at the Holiday Inn right on the beach. We have an Ocean side view and we can walk right outside our motel and onto the beach! I am super excited! We are going to be going with our friends Brandi and Justin. Brandon goes to school with Justin and Brandi (Justins wife) has helped me out SO much since I had surgery. I have never been to Corpus Christi so it should be a fun expierience for us all! I will take plenty of pictures and blog when we get back home late Sunday night! Here are a few pictures of the girls playing outside the other day.

Finally back to blogging

2009-05-06T05:44:00.000-07:00

My get well flowers from my hubby!

Sorry I have been missing lately! For those of you that don't know I had surgery this past week, April 28th. So I have not been up to blogging or getting on the computer much. No a whole lot has gone on since I blogged last. I had surgery on Kaitlynn's birthday so since we had already had two parties for her we did not do anything special. I just took cookies to her class. She also had a t-ball game that day which the neighbor girl that is on her team took her to. I am so thankful to have a friend, Brandi, (which her husband is going to school with Brandon) who stayed with me all week to help me out with the girls. This past weekend we had a little BBQ at Brandi's house then we went to Target and let Kaitlynn get some accessories for her nintendo ds with her birthday money. On Sunday Brandon washed the car and the truck and I cleaned the house up a bit (what I could do anyways). Brandon took his last test of phase one on Monday and passes with a 94. He went out into the field all day yesterday and now he just has to outprocess the rest of the week and graduate on Friday. He will then have 15 days off before he starts phase two. I can not wait until Friday so he can be home with us! I am not to sure what we will do while he is off but we are thinking about going to Sea World. Mothers Day is on Sunday so I think we are going to go down to the River Walk and eat down there (maybe). That is if Brandon does not already have plans I don't know about! =) I promise I will start blogging more!

Happy Birthday Kaitlynn

2009-04-28T09:06:00.000-07:00

My first born is 6 years old today! It is crazy how time goes by so fast. It does not seem like I had her 6 years ago. Kaitlynn is so big and she is such a wonderful daughter. She is always wanting to help me out in some sort of way. She is so smart in school and a good t-ball player! I can't wait until she starts cheerleading this summer! =) I love her so much! Happy Birthday Kaitlynn!

Our trip to East Texas

2009-04-27T11:00:00.000-07:00

This past weekend my husband had a three day weekend as well as Kaitlynn had a three day weekend so we decided to go visit family and friends in East Texas. It was a long 6 hour drive (one way) but it was worth it. We stayed at my grammy's house and had lots of fun when we were there. The kids fed the fish and then decided to go fishing and caught the fish. Brooklynn was holding them and inspecting them, she was fasanated by them. We released them all back, they were all pretty small fish. Kaitlynn and my grammy painted a bird house. My gram and papa gave the girls their birthday presents Friday night. On Saturday we went and saw Brandon's brother and his daughter. We hung out all day and ate lunch at the Jalapeno Tree (one of the BEST east Texas mexican restruants!!) We came home on Sunday and I then had to go to the store because we were out of milk! Ugh I was so tired I did not want to go anywhere. Brandon studied for a test all night long which he made a 98% on today! He is doing GREAT in school and will be graduating phase one in less than 2 weeks. Kaitlynn and Brooklynn were so happy to see grammy and papa and Kaitlynn is looking foward to her visit this summer all ALONE with them!

Going to Gram's house!

2009-04-23T05:46:00.000-07:00

Well I am packing today because bright and EARLY tomorrow morning we are waking up and driving to grammy Donna's house. The kids are super excited to see grammy and papa. Kaitlynn has not stopped asking me about going this whole week. We are going to go celebrate one more birthday party for the girls. It is going to be a pretty short trip, only three days. Me and Brandon are going to go see a couple people that we have not seen in a while. It will be a fun trip. I will take plenty of pictures and I will post them probally on Monday. I am thinking we are probally not going to be home until late Sunday.

Also Kaitlynn had her t-ball pictures this past Tuesday and we should have them back in about three weeks so I will post those as soon as I get them back. Brandon is one of the assistant coaches so he got to be in the team picture. I think that is awesome that he is a part of her t-ball team! They have a make up game this coming Tuesday from this past Saturday when they were rained out.

Brandon graduates phase one on May 8th. He is doing so WELL in school. He is making high 90's in almost every test! There are three phases of his school and starting in phase two he will start doing hands on stuff in the hospital here on base. He graduates the actual school on March 10, 2010 so if anybody wants to come mark your calandar now! =)

The weather here has been SUPER hot here the past two days. High 90's but feels like 100's!! I tried laying out in the sun one day while the kids were napping but that only lasted 40 minutes and then there was a dang bee that scared me inside. I absolutly HATE bee's! Zoe loves to be outside and she espically loves to ride in Brooklynn's new power wheels. As long as she is sitting (buckled) into that car she is SO content and so good. She could ride around in that thing for hours (that is if the battery would last that long). We have a big field to the side of our house and we have decided to only let Brooklynn ride around on the grass. There are just to many cars parked on our road and we dont want her running into anything. We live on a coldasac so the traffic is not bad at all but there are plenty of parked cars. I think riding on the grass and little hills wears the battery down faster. I am going to go buy a three hour charger/battery combo!

Zoe has started to start talking SO much. She repeats ALOT of stuff that we say. Any time I give her anything I always say what I am giving her and then she repeats it back. She is just getting so smart and growing up WAY to fast. I think keeping up with her two older sisters has made her grow up faster! Oh and if anyone was wondering how we are going to see grammy tomorrow (when there is suppose to be school) well here they don't have school. It is called battle of the flowers holiday? I don't know what it is or why they celebrate it but I think it is VERY odd that even the soldiers get it off work but they did not get good Friday off! Odd I know! I guess it is just a San Antonio thing because I know east Texas does not have it off. Crazy! Okay well I am going to go finish up a load of laundry and start my packing.

Our Family Pictures!

2009-04-21T10:01:00.003-07:00

Here are our family pictures that we got taken a couple weeks ago. It was SO hard to get a good picture of all of us at the same time. None of the kids wanted to look at the same time or smile at the same time. Hope you enjoy our family pictures!

Zoe's ONE year pictures!!

2009-04-21T10:01:00.001-07:00

Well I have finally gone to pick up Zoe's one year pictures that I had taken a couple of weeks ago. They turned out pretty good. I think they could have been better if we had a better photographer. The lady that took her pictures was not to into it, I don't think she enjoyed her job. But never the less here are some pretty pictures of my baby girl turning one!

FIESTA time!

2009-04-20T09:07:00.000-07:00

On Sunday the base here had a Fiesta event going on from 1 - 9 pm. They had TONS of things for the kids to do. They had a train ride, bounce houses, tons of food, tons of booths, and fireworks. We went for about three hours before Zoe was DONE with the outside and being stuck in a stroller. We came home and just hung out at the house and the kids played for a bit. We called it an early night. We had the kids in bed by 7:30 and then I was on the couch catching up on my TV shows. I am going later on today (or tomorrow) depending on how I feel after the kids take a nap and I will finally be picking up our family pictures and Zoe's one year pictures. My allergies have been so bad since last night so if they are still acting up I am not going to go get them until tomorrow.

Kaitlynn going down the waterslide
My baby girl in one of her million swim suits
Brooke going down the waterslide

Zoe LOVES water!
The 82nd Choir was at the Fiesta

The girls birthday party!

2009-04-20T08:52:00.000-07:00

We had the girls birthday party on Saturday. I was so thankful that the rain went away because it was supposed to rain ALL day on Saturday. The party turned out alot better than I thought. It lasted until about 8 pm. We cooked out hotdogs and hamburgers, we rented a bounce house for the kids to play in, we had a water slide, a baby pool, a pinata, and a game like pin the tail on the donkey but it was called pin the dot on the lady bug. The kids had SO much fun and they got alot of great gifts. I was very busy all day Saturday setting up for the party and then it seemed like I never sat down the whole time the party was going on. There were 17 kids (including my 3 kids) and there were 14 adults (including me and Brandon). We all hung out outside all day while the kids had a BLAST!

SUPER busy weekend

2009-04-19T17:54:00.000-07:00

I am so sorry I have not posted any pictures of the girls birthday party yet. I have had a super busy weekend. I promise I will update everyone tomorrow and there will be TONS of new pictures! I am so exhausted so I am off to shower and go to bed. I will blog tomorrow.

Brooklynn's birthday present!

2009-04-16T12:53:00.001-07:00

I finally took some pictures of Brooklynn and her birthday present from us. We got her a power wheels that WAS supposed to be pink but when we got it in the mail it was NOT pink. I was so upset so I called and got some of my money back. Brooklynn loves the power wheels and she drives it so good! Zoe also loves to ride with her!

I have been busy all week getting stuff ready for the girls birthday party on Saturday. I am hoping there is not going to be any rain on Saturday. There is a 40% chance so I am hoping it goes away by then! I will take plenty of pictures of there party and I will post another blogg this weekend. On Sunday we have a fiesta event to go to from 1-9pm.

Happy Easter!

2009-04-13T04:26:00.000-07:00

Happy belated Easter everyone. I hope everyone had a good easter. We woke up bright and early and the girls went through there easter baskets. They got so much stuff!! Zoe was so excited all morning just going through everything. Around noon one of Brandons friends he goes to school with and his family came to the house and we all just hung out and let the kids play until around 2 and then we all went outside and had a big block party. We had a huge easter egg hunt for the kids, a water balloon fight, a slip and slide, a pool, and then we all had a WONDERFUL dinner. We had a ham & a turkey with all the yummy sides. We all played outside until about 7pm then we brought the kids in to take a bath and they all fell asleep so fast. We all had a really good day!

The girls easter baskets before they woke up.
Zoe was soo excited to see everything in her basket. She was in such a good mood!

Brooklynn going through her easter basket

Kaitlynn going through her easter basket

Thank you Mai for the hair bow!

Zoe was getting all of the water balloons out and popping them before the water balloon fight ever started..at first she was getting mad when the balloons would pop but after a few popping she started laughing at them thinking it was a game!

Zoe is such a water baby!

Kaitlynn &Zoe

Zoe loves the water!!

Brooklynn easter egg hunting

aw that sun is aweful but this is Brooke & Zoe after there egg hunt in the neighbors back yard

Zoe and her basket of eggs from the easter egg hunt

Me & Zoe (she was so tired in this picture)

Kaitlynn doing her easter egg hunt

Me & the hubby

Some of the kids on the block (we are missing four other kids that were there)

Saturday recap

2009-04-11T11:32:00.000-07:00

Kaitlynn had her second t-ball game of the season Saturday morning. We went as a family to the game but I had to bring Zoe and Brooklynn back home because it was pretty chilly and I did not want them to get sick. Brandon was out on the field again helping out the coach. I think it is pretty neat for Kaitlynn to have her dad out on the field with her. Brandon said the game went good and each player had a change to hit the ball two times. Here is a picture of her before her game.

We are going to a couples baby shower later on this afternoon. It sounds like it is going to be alot of fun. They are going to have tons of "couples" games and lots of food. After the baby shower we are all just going to hang out and have a good night and just let the kids run and play. I will blogg again tomorrow after the easter bunny visits and we have our neighborhood easter egg hunt and cookout.

Happy Birthday Brooklynn!

2009-04-10T05:22:00.001-07:00

Happy Birthday Brooklynn! Brooklynn is now three years old! She is getting so big and she is advancing in so many ways. Her vocabulary is getting so good and she just seemed to have grown up over night! I can't call her a baby anymore. =( They grow up to fast. For her birthday we went to Chuck E Cheese with a friend of Brandons he goes to school with and his wife and his 2 kids. We were there for THREE hours! The kids had a blast though. We bought a cake from there and it was really good! We only gave Brooklynn one of her presents we bought her for her actual birthday. Her BIG toy we got her won't even be here until Monday. And then the other little things we got her we are going to be giving her at her birthday party next Saturday. I will post pictures next week of her BIG toy because we are going to give it to her once we get it delivered to us. Well I hope you enjoy the pics of Brooklynn's third birthday!

Brooklynn while we were singing the birthday song
blowing out her candles (it looks like Kaitlynn is going to hit her. haha)

Brooklynn and sissy riding one of the little ride at Chuck E Cheese

this was Zoe's first time to really be able to do anything here and she LOVED it!!

She is always posing for the camera!

Happy Birthday baby girl!!

Me and the birthday girl!

Me and miss Kaitlynn

This is what daddy comes home to EVERY day.. these two always want him as SOON as he walks in the door! Can we say daddies girls??

Happy Birthday Zoe!

2009-04-07T10:50:00.001-07:00

Happy birthday baby girl! Zoe is finally one! Her first year of life went by so fast! There has been so much that has happened in this past year. For her birthday me and Brooklynn made her cupcakes and we gave her our present we bought her. We got her a sand box/water table. She loves it!! We got her a couple other little things but we are going to give those to her when we have the girls birthday party on the 18th. Here are some pictures of Zoe's first birthday.

She was SO excited to play in her sandbox with her purple sand =)

the cupcakes me and Brooklynn made

she started off just barley putting her fingers in it (if you know me then you know I NEVER let my kids get messy, espically when they eat)

then she decided to try and just take a bite of it without getting her hands messy

then she just gave up and picked the whole thing up!

when she was done with cupcake one..she wanted another one so daddy gave her a second cupcake

she ate them both..well sort of..the floor was pretty messy

she was SOO mad when daddy finally decided to give baths..she wanted to eat ANOTHER one

playing outside

I LOVE this little girl SO much!

Oops

2009-04-06T05:21:00.001-07:00

I forgot to put up all of the pictures of the family fun day. Here are the rest of them.

Brooke again with a person dressed up. I just don't know what this one is suppose to be. I am guessing one of San Antonios mascots or something!
Kaitlynn doing her egg hunt

After the hunt she was looking for us

Kaitlynn and her basket =)

Brandon watching the older kids play baseball

Me and Brandon!

Zoe sitting in a big girl chair

Family Fun Day

2009-04-05T07:04:00.000-07:00

After Kaitlynn's t-ball game on Saturday they had a family fun day for all military families. They had easter egg hunts for all age groups, they had bounce houses, cake walks, face paintings, food, and a couple other things for the kids to do. The day started out pretty cloudy and a little chilly but by noon it was SO hot outside. All of the kids had such a good time though. The easter egg hunt was so crazy because there were so many people. It was sort of nice how they did it though. It did not matter how many eggs your kid had because all of the eggs were empty and you just turned them in for a bag of candy. So all of the kids received the same amount of candy. They had prizes in some eggs. If it had a piece of paper in it then your child got a HUGE easter basket filled with all sorts of goodies. None of my kids got one but they didn't care. They were satisfied with the candy they had. Although we only let them have a couple pieces that day. They would have ate all the candy in one setting if we let them! After the fun day was over we just came home and let the kid get there swim suits on a play in the water. I even put my swim suit top on and sat out to get some sun. We all sat outside for a good 5 - 6 hours just talking and playing. Here are a few pictures of the fun day.

Brooke getting ready for her egg hunt.
hahaha she was SO funny because this was really her first egg hunt by herself and she ran by ALL of the eggs. I had to go out and remind her she was suppose to be picking up eggs. I guess she thought it was a race with all of the other kids running.

Zoe actually did VERY good. She picked up the eggs and put them in her bucket all by herself!

Sitting with her easter basket

Zoe did not like the easter bunny to well

Brooklynn LOVED all the different people they had dressed up. Kaitlynn missed out on all of these because she was still playing t-ball.

Me and my baby girl!

Zoe watching Kaitlynn play t-ball

This picture was taken last week but I still wanted to put it up!

And to finish up our weekend on Sunday we FINALLY went and got family pictures. They turned out pretty good. Not as good as I was hoping but they will do. It is just SO hard to get all three of my kids to smile and look at the same time. SO the picture that I chose to get for our family one Brooklynn is not smiling that good. But it is still cute! After pictures Kaitlynn and Brandon went golfing. They did not get home until 7 pm! Me, Zoe and Brooklynn ran to Walmart and got a few things. Then we just hung out at home and I did some laundry.

Tomorrow is Zoe's first birthday. It is CRAZY how time has flew by. She is getting so big and doing so many new things. We are going to give her birthday present to her tomorrow instead of waiting for all of the girls party on the 18th. I will take some pictures and post them either tomorrow or Wednesday. Hope everyone has a good week!

Kaitlynn's first t-ball game

2009-04-05T05:55:00.000-07:00

Kaitlynn had her first t-ball game yesterday. It was an hour long and it was so fun to watch all the kids playing. Kaitlynn did really good when she was batting. Her first hit did not go that far but all the other times she hit it went pretty far. When she played outfield they put her on 2nd base. Brandon was the "assistant" coach this game because the original coach is active duty army and they sent him on TDY to Flordia for a week right before the game. He helped the actual assistant coach. It was good for Kaitlynn though to have her dad out there on the field with her. She was proud to have her daddy out there helping her team! In t-ball they do not keep score, but me as a mom, I was just keeping tally in my head and Kaitlynn's team actually won. Kaitlynn's team was really good about getting people out on first base! The other team always fought over the ball so they never got it thrown to first base to ever get anybody out! lol The kids were so cute and funny! Kaitlynn has a game every Saturday at 11 am until May 30th. Here are some pictures of her first game. We also had a family fun day right after the t-ball game. I will blogg about that and post some pictures on that later on today.

Kaitlynn right before opening ceremony
The actual assistant coach and Kaitlynn when her name was being called out for opening ceremony

standing out in the field while they call the rest of her teams names out

some of Kaitlynns team (they only have 9 on there team)

Kaitlynn was the first one up to bat for either team..she was excited about this!!

making her first run around the bases!

Brandon assisting on first base

Kaitlynn out on 2nd base (not to sure what she is looking at because she is not even looking in the right direction on the game!)

shaking hand with the other team at the end of the game

Kaitlynn and daddy after the game!

A little update on us!

2009-04-02T04:03:00.000-07:00

Sorry I have not blogged lately. There is nothing new to blogg about really. Kaitlynn has just been busy with school and t-ball practice. Her first game is this Saturday. I will take plenty of pics. There is going to be a family fun day after her game so it will be fun for everyone! =) Brandon has been SUPER busy this whole week studying. He had a test on Tuesday and now again today, Thursday. School has been keeping him busy so he has not really had a social life at all this week. Me, Brooklynn and Zoe have just been hanging out at the house and with the neighbors every once in a while. The weather here is crazy. It will be like 70 out in the morning but it feels SO cold. You would think 70 would be warm but its weird here. The wind has been really bad the past week so it makes it even cooler out. This weekend is supposed to be really nice to it will nice to get out and hang out outside more! I would really like to go to Sea World now, they are opening up the water park this weekend. Our weekends are busy thouhg until April 25th weekend. Maybe then we can go! Only 5 more days and my baby girl turns one! It is crazy how time has just flew by. She is so cute and she amazes me everyday with all of the new things she is catching onto and learning. Well I will blogg again after Kaitlynn's game on Saturday and our family fun day that follows her game!

Our weekend recap

2009-03-29T07:39:00.000-07:00

By Friday afternoon I had Kaitlynns room for the most part all unpacked and decorations put up. I still have a few odd and end things to do but for the most part it is done. Here are a few pictures of her new bedroom set.

I ordered Zoe an outfit for her first birthday. Here is a preview of the bow that it matches!! In the middle of the bow it has a Z embroidered on it for Zoe. The outfit I got her she wore for her first birtday pictures which I took her to get on Saturday. I actually ordered her two outfits but they all go with each other. So the bow matches both outfits. We were supposed to get family pictures on Saturday but my husband woke up with a zit and refused to get pictures with a zit on his forehead, so I re-scheduled for next Sunday.

On Saturday our neighbors asked us if we wanted to go help/watch him feed the horses he uses for military funerals. He had duty this weekend, which means he has to feed the horses twice a day. We followed his wife and kids here on base to where they keep the horses. It was pretty neat. They were BIG pretty horses that had cute hair cuts! This was the first time any of my kids had seen a horse up close. They LOVED it. Brooklynn was scared at first but she warmed up to them and ended up feeding them and petting them. Zoe loved them from the begenning. She was not scared at all. She was kissing them and petting them! Kaitlynn liked them to. She hung out with the bigger kids and fed them there little snack bites they get.

Saturday night we went and ate Mexican food at this HUGE restraunt that had a big ol play place for the kids. We went with our neighbors again and they have older kids so they took Kaitlynn and Brooklynn in to play. I mean this play place was bigger than any play place my kids have ever been to. It was HUGE! They had so much fun! After dinner we all just hung out outside with a few of the neighbors. We just hung out while all the kids played. We had a good time.

And today, Sunday, we just hung out at home and around the neighborhood with friends. I cleaned until about noon and then we took the kids outside and played. We all got some sun, espically Brandon. He is BURNT! I cooked out on the grill and Brandon washed his car. Kaitlynn and Brooklynn both ended up in there swim suits by the end of the day.

Tomorrow I have a dr appt because I have allergies so bad here. Other than that we have no plans for tomorrow. Oh and just an update, Zoe is now a WALKER! She is so fast to! Well I will take some pics throughout the week and post again in a few days.

T-ball

2009-03-25T05:24:00.000-07:00

Well Monday afternoon t-ball kicked off for us. Monday night was Brooklynn's practice. And after only one practice we know that t-ball is not for Brooke. She is just not ready for practice anything for an hour. She just wanted to run around and play. She was suppose to be 3 to even get on a team but they let her get on one seeing how she will be 3 next month. I took her off the team yesterday though. I think in a year she will be more ready for sports. I took some pictures of her practice though, hope you enjoy them!

showing off her glove

Zoe playing while we were waiting for Brooke to practice

Brooke paying NO attention!

Kaitlynn did WONDERFUL in t-ball. She loves it. She runs fast, she throws hard and she actually hits the ball pretty good!! She practices Tusdays and Thursdays from 5-6 and her games are on Saturdays. She is so funny because when she would see me trying to take her picture she would STOP whatever it is she was doing and she would pose for the camera. haha Her coach is pretty good. He has been a coach for 2 years now she and his son is also in t-ball so he knows what he is doing. He is really nice and he works one on one with the kids so that is good.

hitting the ball!

running fast!

stopping practice to pose for the camera!

Kaitlynn posing for the camera!!

Yesterday I went to the PX and got Brooklynn a bike. She kept riding everybody elses bike so I figured it was time to get her her own. She actually picked up on it very good. She just has to get off and push the pettals foward every once in a while. Me and Brandon took the kids our last night after t-ball practice and dinner and just let the kids play. They love to be ourside!! Here are some pics of them playing!

Me & the hubby

Brooke on her new bike

Kaitlynn posing on her bike

my girls!!

She is getting so big!

walking up the driveway

giving up and doing the bear crawl

This morning me and Kaitlynn got up a little early so we made sure we had enough time to do her hair cute for school pictures!! She has school pictures this morning. Me and the girls have to run to the store here in a bit and pick up a few things. It is going to be nice here today so we won't be out long so we can get back here so the kids can play outside. Ashley Furniture will be here tomorrow, finally, with Kaitlynn's new bedroom set! Her and Brooklynn have been sleeping together ever since we have moved in Feb. I know they are both ready for there own space in there own beds! Well I am going to go get me and the girls ready for the day. I will post some pictures tomorrow or Friday of Kaitlynn's new room!

Fun in the SUN!

2009-03-22T06:03:00.000-07:00

We have had a fabulous weekend! Yesterday, Saturday, we started our weekend off by Brandon going golfing I am cleaned my whole house! Fun I know. haha I was done by noon then got ready for the day. It was so nice outside so our neighbor hooked up her sprinkler, filled up a baby pool, and all the kids had a water gun fight. I did not let Zoe get wet just because she is just getting over her ear infection and I do not want her getting sick again. The kids had a blast playing in the water. They played for about 3 hours and Kaitlynn and Brooklynn both got a pretty good tan line going on! We had a cookout with 4 other families/neighbors last night. We had alot of people but it was fun. They had 3 big folding tables outside so we all just ate outside and sat around and talked. When the sun went down we came home and gave the girls a bath then went back to the neighbors house and played Texas hold 'em. The kids were so tired they just crashed out!

And today, Sunday, my husband is going to his study group after lunch but until then we are going to just hang out with the kids today. We will probally just play outside (because that is where all three kids LOVE to be) and then when Brandon gets back from his study group we have to run to Academy and get the kids baseball gloves, practice starts tomorrow!!

Kaitlynn cheesin' for the camera!
Brooke running through the sprinkler attatched to the baby pool

The girls having a water fight

Brandon washing the truck

Daddy playing basketball with all the older kids

Zoe is now climbing up on everything!!

Girls day out!

2009-03-20T06:58:00.000-07:00

I had my first girls day out yesterday! It was actually alot of fun! Me and two friends (that just happen to be my neighbors also) had an all girls day out with no kids, well almost no kids. I had to take Zoe but she was PERFECT! She was so good! I got Brooklynn enrolled in CDC (child development center). It is a place I can take her an pay by the hour and she gets to do all sorts of arts & crafts, educational learning, and lots of interactment with other kids. I am not going to take her there much but I do think it is good for her to go maybe once a month to give me a break and her a chance to interact with other kids. While we were out we went to get our nails done, we got pedicures (they were AWESOME!), then we ran to Target, ate lunch at Chili's and then we ran to Ross. I needed to go to Academy and get the girls baseball gloves but we did not have time. We had to get back to get Brooklynn out of CDC and then Kaitlynn was about to get home from school. We made it a date to do go out and have our nails done and lunch once a month!

Yesterday afternoon after Kaitlynn was all done with homework we sat outside and let the kids play with the neighbor kids. It was so hot out yesterday! I got a tan line where my shorts were on my legs just from sitting out for an hour! I took some pics of the kids playing. Zoe LOVES the sand box and she does so good NOT eating it!! Oh and by the way Zoe is walking ALOT! She is still not walking everywhere but she is taking many many steps at one time!

We were going to be getting family pictures this weekend but I changed my time and place for them so we will be getting them taken next Saturday the 28th. I will be getting Zoe's one year pictures taken then to! We are going to have a cookout with the neighbors this weekend and then my husband is going to play golf then study on Sunday. I am planning a birthday party for all three girls on or around April 10. We are just going to have a little cookout with all of there friends they have made here in the neighborhood. Then the last weekend in April I think me and the girls are going to go to my grammy's house for the weekend and we will do there birthdays with her.

Happy St. Patty's Day!

2009-03-17T11:47:00.000-07:00

Happy St. Patty's Day to everyone! I dressed the kids up in some shirts from Old Navy and some mardi gras beads my mother in law gave the kids a while back. Our housing office had a little St. Patty's Day get together for all the kids after school. I took some pics of the kids. They are so cute!!

Well I found out today when Kaitlynn and Brooklynn start t-ball. Brooklynn has practices on Monday and Wednesdays and Kaitlynn has practices on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Then they both have games on Saturdays. That makes for a pretty busy afternnons for us! We have some pretty awesome neighbors. Our next door neighbor is actually Brooklynn's t-ball coach. I am pretty excited for t-ball to start. I will take plenty of pictures for everyone! =) Also every Tuesday me and a couple of the neighbors are going to be taking our kids to open gymnastics from 10:30 - 11:30. Kaitlynn will be in school so it will just be Zoe and Brooke. They say there is stuff there to do even for Zoe's age so I am pretty excited to go find out what that is all about next Tuesday. I would have gone today but I had orientation at the school age service building and found out different programs they have to offer Kaitlynn's age in the summertime. Our housing office is trying to get our pool opened up in April. I am hoping because it is so nice here and I can't wait to get to the pool! My family LOVES going to the pool!! I got all the kids some pretty cute swim suits this year. Kaitlynn and Brooke's came from baby gap and Zoe's came from Old Navy! Plus Zoe has like 3 swim suits that were Brooklynn's from 2 years ago.

Yesterday was Brandon's first day of school. He says it is pretty fast paced. This first 8 weeks is the most critical. This is where if you do not pass then you are kicked out of the program. There are 11 test in these first 8 weeks! So I gotta keep busy with the kids so we are outta the way so daddy can STUDY!! He is going to get a study group together with a couple guys he has made friends with and they are going to study together before tests. Our schedule for this next year while Brandon is in school is going to have to be adjusted just a little bit from what we are use to.

Oh this past weekend we went to Lowes and we bought some fertilizer and some other stuff for our yard. The grass is HORRIBLE around here so we are going to try and get our grass growing and get it green. We can only water after 8 pm so we are doing that for an hour each night. We are hoping by the time summer gets here we have pretty grass so we can hang out outside and the kids can play in grass and not just dirt with patches of grass!

PICTURES!!

2009-03-14T19:57:00.000-07:00

Okay so I could not wait to take pictures of my house. I did not take a picture of my room, any of the bathrooms or Kaitlynn's room because those are the only rooms not finished yet. I also forgot to take a picture of the outside before it got dark so the quality of the picture of the outside is not the greatest. You will aslo have to excuse any messes you see. They will be cleaned up SOON. I am hoping to have my house completley DONE by Tuesday!! Kaitlynn's room will not be done until March 26 because we ordered her a whole new bedroom set from Ashley Furniture and that is the soonest they could deliver to us. Also you will have to excue the occasional BARE wall. I seem to have alot more wall space in this house. Well I hope you enjoy the pictures and once I get the rest of the house done I will post more pics! =)

Zoe's room
I need a few more decorations for her wall

Brooke's room

Brooke wanting to be in every picture (this is one of the dressers that got broke in the move. you can not really tell in this picture but the cabinet door is broken on the inside so they are going to have to replace that whole door) Also I need to get curtains for her room still!

Our living room.. we need something to go over the tv

Another view of the living room

My computer desk along with the kids toy box

Another view leading into one side of the kitchen

A view of the dining room.. sorry I did not get a picture of the dining room. I don't know how I forgot that one.

Walking into our laundry room

Our laundry room with the deep freezer

And even further into our laundry room..more storage!!

The hall leading to the bedrooms and bathrooms

One side of our small kitchen =(

The other side of my kitchen and over the bar is my dining room area..and I also need decor on that wall

The front of our house

SUPER SUPER messy garage...full of boxes!! I wish they would have atleast painted the walls!

One half of our back yard. The other side is the same size I just ran out of room on my camera memory card so I could not take anymore pics.

We are HOME!

2009-03-14T12:29:00.001-07:00

Well we are finally in our new home! It is alot bigger than what we thought it was. Now that we have all of our stuff in the house and we are decorating, we have alot more room than we thought. Thank goodness because we have ALOT of stuff. The movers came yesterday and brought us our stuff out of storage. The next door neighbors took Kaitlynn bowling from about 9 am until 1 pm. They are so nice of them to take her and keep her out of the movers way. Brandon actually was able to stay home and not have to work so it was alot of help having him home to help out with the kids. We have done alot of unpacking already. The living room, kitchen, dining room, laundry room, the kids bathroom & Zoe's room are all done. Now all I have left is our bedroom, our bathroom, Brooklynns bedroom and Kaitlynns bedroom. We should be done in a few days and then I will take pictures and post them. The cable guy came today and hooked up our cable, internet and phone. I will send out an actual email, not a blogg, later on today and let everyone know our house phone number.

Today we are going to go to Lowes and get some grass seed and a new watering device so we can get our grass growing and looking all pretty. That way the kids can go out and play in grass..not dirt!! We are also going to go look for a rod iron design for one of our walls that we need to put something one. My husband wants to get one of those Texas stars but I am not to sure if it will look good. I guess we will just have to see. We also have to go by our apartment that we were staying in a get the rest of our stuff out of there. I think all we have left there is food.

The kids were so thankful to have there own rooms and beds back. Zoe slept SO much better last night. Thank goodness because she was waking up every few hours when she was having to sleep in her pack n play. They kids were also so excited to see all of there toys again. They were in heaven and were so good playing yesterday and today while we unpacked boxes. Okay well we are going to head to town now.

We get our keys tomorrow!

2009-03-11T19:48:00.000-07:00

Sorry I have not blogged lately. I have been busy with dr appts and getting the kids signed up for sports. Brooke and Kaitlynn had their sports physicals yesterday and then I went and signed them both up for t-ball. I think they will have alot of fun. The baseball field is right by our house so we will be able to walk to practice and to the games. Little miss Zoe got sick on my last night so I had to take her to the dr today and she has an ear infection. Poor baby. I just hope she gets better soon and stays better. I hate when my kids are sick. =(

Well we go sign for our keys for our house on base tomorrow. We get the keys at noon then I am going to start taking stuff to the house from our apartment. We don't have to much stuff but we have enough to make a few trips with our truck. Transportation will bring our stuff from storage Friday morning. We will be getting cable/internet set up on Saturday so it might be a few days before I can get back on here. I am really excited to move on base! The girls need their own space and their own beds. I will take pictures of our house and post them later.

I am going to go crawl into bed with my hubby now. It is getting sort of late and I am really tired. Goodnight everyone!

A few new pics

2009-03-08T06:54:00.000-07:00

Here are some pictures for everyone to enjoy. This weekend was the start of 9 days off of school for Kaitlynn. She has spring break ALREADY! It is crazy early here in Texas. Yesterday we just took the girls to the park and then went down and hung out with one of our neighbors. The kids all played outside while we just sat around outside and talked. It was a very nice day, besides the gusts of wind every now and again. Today we are meeting some friends at a pretty big park here in San Antonio. My hubby is off golfing this morning and should be home by noon (we hope!) I will put some picture up of the park trip later on today.

My beautiful baby girls!! Kaitlynn posing with her jump rope

Brooklynn posing all cute

my baby Zoe walking to me while I take her picture!!

Kaitlynn cheesin'

Brooklynn walking across some wiggly things at the park on base

Zoe cheesin' big time!!

Quick Update

2009-03-07T10:02:00.001-08:00

Just thought I would let everyone know that we get our house on base on Thursday March 12th!! Yay! The storage company is delevering our household items on Friday March 13th! I can't wait. I am so excited. We still have a 4 bedroom house we just chose to get a one story vs. a two story. I personally liked the layout of the one stories here. We met our neighbors yesterday and hung out with like half the street last night. We ordered pizza and had a movie for the kids. It was pretty fun and nice to meet some people. Thankfully they are all cool and are our age with kids in the same age group! Now all we need to do is MOVE IN!! Only 6 more days!

Moving earlier!!

2009-03-05T18:37:00.000-08:00

Okay just thought I would share our good news with everyone. We were offered a house on base sooner than April 1. We get to go sign for it tomorrow but we can not move in until our 1 month lease is up at this furnished apartment. I will know the exact date tomorrow but our lease is up here March 19th!! I am so happy to be moving on base a couple weeks sooner! It is also going to save us ALOT of money moving sooner! I will blog tomorrow and let everyone know the exact details! Yay! Also I will send emails out to everyone (well everyone that I have there emails) and I will send you our address on base! If you wanna know if let me know your email address!!

Busy Tuesday

2009-03-03T17:39:00.000-08:00

My day today has been busy with appoitments. I had a WIC appt this afternoon that took FOREVER and then I had to take little miss Zoe to the dr at 3:30 because she woke up with pink eye pretty bad this morning. The hospital had all of the kids names & birthdays wrong in the computer system so it was a PAIN to get Zoe back to see the dr. It took a good hour for them to figure everything out. Anyways, once I got Zoe back to see the dr they just prescribed some medicine for her eyes and an additional prescription just incase one of the other girls gets pink eye. I hope she gets better soon.

Last night I went to bed a little after Brandon did and when I went into the room daddy had Zoe all cuddled up in bed with him. SPOILED!! It was so cute though. I took a couple pictures for you to see.

Well this coming Friday is Kaitlynn's kick off at school for her American Heart Association Jump Rope for Hearts fundraiser. They are having a big event at her school for friends and family to attend. After that Kaitlynn has to try and fundraise money for the AHA and turn it in by March 31.

The weather has turned warm again for us today. We are once again in shorts and tank tops. Tomorrow is going to be super NICE. We will probally take the girls to the park after we pick Kaitynn up from school. I talked to the housing office yesterday and they told me they will have a house for us to look at by Friday so we know what our house will look like before we move in April 1. For those of you who did not know we do have a house to move into April 1 but we do not know what the inside looks like yet. We have only seen the outside. Well I just got the kids to bed and now I am going to do the WII fit for awhile then I am headed to bed.

Our Sunday

2009-03-01T15:07:00.000-08:00

Well our Sunday was filled with golfing, the beauty shop & the park. My husband woke up early and went golfing. He played until noon and came home to watch the kids so I could go get my hair highlighted. While he was golfing my gram and papa brought Kaitlynn back to the house on there way out of town. I cleaned up the house a bit and then played with the girls. I went and got my hair done and was home by 3. I have a before and after picture of my hair below. I took the girls to the park when I got home and played for a while. When we were done we took a walk around this apartment complex and looked at all of the pools they have here. They have three pools all together. I cooked an early dinner and we were done eating by 5. Zoe took a few steps on her own today. She is going to be walking on her own so soon. She also has MORE teeth that have came in. She now has 8 teeth. Back at Fort Bragg my friend Alli had her daughters first bday party today and I really wish we could have been there. I miss all of my friends back at NC so much. We are so used to having game night and just hanging out with our friends, it is sort of lonely without them. I hope we make some friends once we move on base. We have a month from today until we get our base house!! Yay! Well I gotta go get Kaitlynn's clothes picked out for school tomorrow and make sure her backpack and everything is ready for tomorrow.

BEFOREAFTER

Family Time

2009-02-28T18:06:00.000-08:00

Well my grandparents have been in town these past few days. Me and my grammy went shopping the first day she was here. It was nice to be able to go out with just her. Brandon stayed home and watched the kids so we could have "us" time. We also went and got pedicures together. It was wonderful! Brooklynn and grammy got to bond pretty good while Kaitlynn was in school. Grammy tought Brooke how to cook eggs and just yesterday I cought Brooke in the kitchen with the butter on a spoon and a pan out with an egg on the counter. She is trying to be miss independent! Zoe's new thing is to get in with all the pots and pans. She thinks it is SO funny to get in the cabinets and play. Kaitlynn went on a field trip on Friday with her school. They went to the San Antonio Zoo. She loved it. We took the kids to the park again Friday night then went and got icee floats from Burger King. It was super hot on Friday and the kids were so sweaty and nasty after we got done at the park. Today, Saturday, we hung out with my grandparents again all day. We played Wii for a while and then went down to the riverwalk and had dinner. We met some of our other famiy down there that are in town from Indiana. We had a good time. Kaitlynn went back to the motel with my grandparents and are staying the night with them. I am going to get my hair done tomorrow. I will post pictures tomorrow of my hair. Brandon is getting up super early to go golfing tomorrow. Kaitlynn was going to go with him but she wanted to stay with grammy and papa instead. There motel is like 20 minutes away so they are just going to drop her off on there way out of town. Well I am going to play my hubby some Wii golf now. I will blog again tomorrow.

Zoe's mischevious look
Grammy, Papa and the girls

Grammy me and the girls

My great aunt, my grammy and ME

miss Kaitlynn waiting to eat dinner on the river walk

Brooke cooking eggs with grammy

Grammy and Brooke and the Rain Forest Cafe

Daddy & Zoe looking the fish at the Rain Forest Cafe

Papa & Kaitlynn

Daddy playing horsey with the girls

Time for another update

2009-02-25T11:23:00.000-08:00

Well since the last time I blogged we have been quite busy. Kaitlynn had her first day of school on Monday and she LOVES it. I am so relieved she transitioned so well. She loves her teacher and she has made a few friends. We have to get up 30 minutes earlier than we did back in NC but she does well with that to. Yesterday me and my husband went to the PX here just to check it out and we ended up buying Guitar Hero for the WII. My husband is addicted to that game already. I did my Wii fit and I LOVE it. It really works and I can feel the areas of my body that it works. I am actually sore. haha It is a really good workout! I am going to dedicate myself to doing it once a day. After we picked Kaitlynn up from school we took the girls to the park. I took my camera this time so I have some pictures to share. I also took a picture of the cemetary on base here. The picture does not do it any justice because the cemetary is just amazing to look at. It is so huge and no matter which direction you look the tomb stones are always in a straight line. So pretty. Today we went to Ashley Furniture and bought Kaitlynn a new bedroom set. It is so pretty. It is a pearl white color and I just love it. We are getting it delivered once we get moved into our house on base. I will take a picture of it once we get it so you can see it. My grammy that lives here in Texas called us this morning and asked if she could stay at our house tonight, SUPRISE. I can not wait to see her. It is about a 6 hour drive for her so she should be here when Kaitlynn gets out of school. I did not tell Kaitlynn so she will be really excited to see her. She will be here until Saturday but tomorrow my papa will be here and then they will get a motel. By the way, when we went to Ashley Furniture we ended up in a NICE part of town and it had EVERYTHING so we ended up shopping more than we planned. We went to Target, Childrens Place and Old Navy. We got the girls some summer clothes. Today is supposed to be HOT HOT, atleast 90. Its crazy to be so hot and it is only February. That makes for a super hot summer. But I love warm so I won't complain. I love to wear shorts and tank tops! (Which I am today) =) Well I am going to post some pictures then clean up a bit before I have to go get Kaitlynn and then be with my gram.

Daddy & Zoe at the park
Zoe LOVES the slide

Fort Sam Houston Cemetary

Kaitlynn rock climbing

Her facial expression says it all!

Me & Zoe (the sun was in her eyes)

The end to a good birthday

2009-02-22T18:44:00.001-08:00

Well just one more quick blog before I head off to bed. I had a wonderful birthday! When my husband was done golfing I ran to the mall and got me some clothes and I bought myself a birthday present! I bought a WII and a WII fit! =) I am soo excited to try it out tomorrow! Tonight we went down to the river walk and walked around for about an hour and then we ate some yummy mexican food. I took some pictures while we were down town. I am going to go on base tomorrow and take some pictures of the base for everyone. Goodnight and enjoy the pictures!

My wonderful family
My & my hubby

Our lovely girls

A waterfall at the riverwalk

Homeless person # 1 that we saw

Homeless person # 2 that we saw

They were having a Mardi Gras parade of boats on the riverwalk

A decorated boat

Another boat throwing out beads

Looking down the river

Pictures

2009-02-22T05:36:00.000-08:00

Okay well I finally uploaded pictures to Brandons lab top. Here are a few for you to enjoy. Some of them are from back Fort Bragg and then some from Brandons moms house. I have not taken any here yet, I will today though. Enjoy.

It's my BIRTHDAY!

2009-02-22T05:12:00.000-08:00

Okay well first off it is MY BIRTHDAY!! Yay I am the big 24. My husband went golfing this morning at 7 and he should be home by noon. Later on this afternoon we are going to go down to the riverwalk and eat dinner. Not sure where yet but I am sure we will find something, probally mexican! =) Kaitlynn starts school in the morning so we can not stay out to late. We have to be at her school by 7:30ish so I can finish getting her enrolled in school. School here starts at 7:50 which is 30 minutes earlier than what we are used to!

Well it is day two in our temporary home/apartment and it is nice to have our own space back again. Although this place is pretty small. We drove by the house that we will be moving into in April and one thing I am pretty excited about is we have a BIG backyard with a wooden fence! Now what I am going to do is get the girls a swing set for there birthday! It will be nice to let them be able to go out and play and not have to worry about them taking off. We went to the commissary here yesterday and it is pretty nice. I would have to say I think I might actually like as much as the one at Fort Bragg! Then they have a PX and a PXtra. For those of you that do not know what those are the PX is our "mall" and the PXtra is a a garden center/toyland. After we drove around base just getting to know where we are going we took the girls to the park over by the house we will be moving into. The girl had SO much fun. It was such a nice and big park. This was Zoe's first time really "playing". Me and Brandon took turns taking her down the slides, which were BIG slides. We also put her in the baby swing. Zoe did not stop laughing the whole time we were there. Kaitlynn and Brooklynn aslo had a blast. Brooklynn is really scared of heights so she was a little scared to go down the slides the first few times. I forgot my camera but I will get some pics of the kids playing there next time. After the park we went to the mall that was HUGE. Everything here just seems to be bigger than normal. lol The mall was super duper busy and the kids by this point were just ready to be home, so we did not stay long. I am going to go back today and get a few things for my birthday!

We finally made it!

2009-02-20T13:50:00.000-08:00

WE ARE HERE!! We have made it to Texas. We woke up EARLY early this morning and left Louisiana and headed to Texas. We were up at 3:30 am with a baby that had a very gassy belly. Zoe kept tooting and whinning because her tummy was hurting so we decided to just get up and leave. We left by 4:30 and made it to Fort Sam about 11:30.The kids have been awesome for how long we have been driving. We were offered a house the other day (on base) and we get to move in April 1. We signed our papers for the house today. In the mean time we are staying in a furnished apartment right outside the base.

While we were in Lousiana we visited Brandons family and one of our good friends Starla and Josh. We had a good time and ate alot of good cajun food. I sort of wish we could have stayed down there a few more days because this weekend they have all sorts of parades for Mardi Gras.

It is really nice to finally be all done driving and just be able to relax. When we got done and unloaded into the apartment Zoe decided she was just going to start letting go of whatever she is holding onto...I think she will be walking pretty soon. She is getting braver everyday. Kaitlynn and Brooklynn are sharing a room for the next month and Zoe is sleeping in her pack and play in our room. Our base house is pretty nice although we have not seen the inside of it yet. It is totally not what we are used to from Fort Bragg. The base here is nice but just not as new as Bragg. Things are a little overwhelming here but I think once we just drive around a day or so we will get the feel of things again here. Well we are all going to lay down and have some quiet time before we head to the store and get some groceries.

We are in Louisiana!

2009-02-17T06:28:00.001-08:00

Okay first off I should say I had a wonderful time with all of my friends back in NC before we left on Monday. Tiffany and Alli threw a suprise going away dinner for us which was a TOTAL suprise. It was really nice. After the dinner we all went back to Tiffanys house and hung out with everyone. And of course when it was time for people to start leaving I started crying. It is sad leaving all of my friends. They are all so great!

Well we left early Monday morning, 630 ish, and we decided to drive ALL the way to Louisiana. The kids were awesome, thank goodness. Me and Brandon had to follow each other since we had to drive both our viechels. Brandon took Brooklynn with him and I had Kaitlynn and Zoe. We stopped a few times to eat and gas up. I was soo tired I could have stopped at a motel at noon and went to bed for the night. I had to stop and get some fresh air and a starbucks coffee. It did the job because I made it all the way to Brandons mom. It was about a 16 hour drive all together. It should have only been a 15 hour trip BUT me and my husband some how took TWO different exits off the interstate so we were both trying to find each other. To make things worse his phone was DEAD so there was no way I could get a hold of him. I was crying I was so upset. Luckly the exit we both took different exits on was to his moms house in Louisiana so I decided to just keep following my GPS directions to his moms house. We finally both met up at his moms house but it was definatly an hour later than it should have been. We will be staying with Brandons mom until Friday morning. The housing office should be calling us today and be letting us know a move in date. Hopefully it is not to far away!!

By the way I hope everyone had a WONDERFUL valentines day. We BBQ'd with some friends and all hung out and had a good time.

BUSY packing

2009-02-11T18:02:00.001-08:00

Okay well today I have been super busy packing the rest of our stuff up that we are taking ourselves to Fort Sam. We have both the car and truck packed up. The movers will be here in the morning to pack our stuff and will be back on Friday to load it on the truck. Our internet is going to get shut off tomorrow so this will be my last blog until I get to our motel on Feb. 17. I may be able to pick up a wireless signal on Brandons labtop but that is no promise. The kids are getting excited to be moving. Kaitlynn is really excited but she also keeps asking when she has to go back to her school here, so I dont know if she 100% understands that we are moving for good. It might be hard on her once she realizes we are not coming back. We finally will be able to apply for base housing tomorrow so I am hoping to get GOOD news and I hope we do not have to wait to long to move on base. I will keep everyone updated on our move as much as I can. I will still have my same phone number as I do now. We are not going to change our numbers at all, we will be keeping our NC numbers. Right now our mail is just fowarded to general delivery to Fort Sam but as soon as we get there we are going to get a PO box and I will let everyone know what that is once we get it. Well I am off to bed for now. Another busy day tomorrow. Goodnight!

Our Weekend

2009-02-08T10:25:00.001-08:00

Saturday I started off my day by going to Old Navy, the mall, Lowes and Walmart with Tiffany. I needed to get Kaitlynn a couple of spring outfits since it will be so nice when we get to Texas. Brooke and Zoe have warm clothes all passed down from Kaitlynn. Kaitlynn lucks out by getting all the new clothes. At the mall I bought myself a new swim suit from Victoria Secret, it is SUPER cute! I love it! We went to Walmart and I got the girls some little goodies to make a little Valentines day basket. While we were out and about we took Zoe with us so daddy stayed home with Brooke and Kaitlynn. He once again washed our truck and the girls played outside. My husband LOVES washing our viechels. I think he would do it every weekend if the weather let him! It was so nice outside though so the girls wore little capris and played outside all morning/afternoon. Later on in the day we all went to Allis house for a little cookout. We had ribs and steaks. Dinner was so good! There were alot of kids there so it was fun for the kids to play out back on the swing set. All the girls just sat around after dinner learning how to curl our hair on this really cool straightner/curler that Alli just bought. Brandon even tried curling hair! haha. We only were there until about 9:30pm and then headed home so Brandon and Matt could get up early and go golfing on Sunday.

Well to start the day out on Sunday I woke up and started by Sunday ritual, CLEANING! My husband left about 8:45am to go golfing with Matt. I feel like I have a thousand things to do to get ready for the movers to get here on Thursday. I am a very organized person and moving sometimes is not a very organized process. The movers that come and pack us up just pack our rooms/house up how it is. They dont seem to want to organize anything so I make sure I have everything I want packed together next to each other so it gets in the same box. Anyways, enoguh with that. Alli came over mid morning and we hung out for a few hours while the guys were golfing. We took the kid to the park. Kaitlynn learned how to go across the monkey bars yesterday. Brooklynn LOVES to go play at the park. She is the crazy girl that is always doing things backwards. She goes down the slide upside down and backwards and loves to be swung super high. She truely is our thrill seeker! Zoe just enjoyed hanging out in the stroller. She just like the fresh air and is so content just sitting there watching everyone play. Oh yeah, I finally got Zoe's hair in an itty bitty pony tail this morning! She does not have much hair but it is kinda cute!

And finally to end our weekend my husband gets a call from work saying he has to go in to work at 1700 because two soldiers messed up. (Even though he is complety signed out of work and ready to head to Texas) He has to go sleep at work until he starts his leave on Tuesday. He has to go babysit his messed up soldiers. I just got done cooking dinner and feeding the girls. I am about to take Brandon some food up to work as well as his sleep system so he can sleep on the floor. When we get back from his work I am just going to give the girls a bath and finish up on my laundry. I will blog probally one more time before our internet gets cut off on Feb. 11. After that I will probally only be able to keep you all updated once a week until we get a home and internet set up in Texas.

Quick Update

2009-02-06T15:12:00.001-08:00

Well just a quick update before we take the girls out to eat Ci Ci's pizza for Kaitlynn's school fundraiser night. It has been a busy week getting things ready to move. Brandon cleared and he is good to go. Transportation came on Wednesday and looked through our house just to see what we have. They will be here around 9 am on Feb. 12. I made our hotel reservations for when we first get to Fort Sam Houston. We will be there for 10 nights. I am PRAYING that a mariacle will happen and we will get base housing by the end of those 10 nights. If not, well then we will have to see when that day comes to see what we will have to do.

Since the movers will be here to pack our house up and we will be houseless on Valentines day my husband decided to suprise me the other day. He came home with a bag for me and said "Happy Valentines Day!" I was shocked at what I got! He got me DIAMOND earings, $200.00 gift card to American Eagle (because we all know I NEED clothes, desperatly!!!) and then he got me some new perfume! I was so happy and shocked at everything. He is so sweet! I love him!

The kids are all doing good. On Wednesday it was Tiffany's birthday so we decided to take Kaitlynn and Connor to the movies. We went and saw Hotel for Dogs. It was pretty good. A bit boring at parts (for the parents anyways). The kids thought it was pretty funny though! Today was Kaitlynn's 100 th day of school so they had a little party with lots of things that have to do with 100. Zoe is just cruising EVERY where, she is seriously just about to walk. She goes every where if she is holding onto something or someone. She is just scared to let go. Brooklynn has just been helping me do things during the day to get ready to move. While Kaitlynn is in school Brooklynn really likes to help me clean and organize! She really LOVES the vaccuum! =) Well this is all for now. We are meeting Tiffany at Ci Ci's pizza for fundraiser night! I will blog again sometime this weekend and I will definitaly take some pictures to put up!