What have I gotten myself into?

If I have been scarce around here again (I know I have), it is because I started my temp job at the chapel. Our Parish Coordinator is out of town for a while and I am filling in. I am learning very quickly that things there are crazier than they ever seemed before. Most of the time, by the end of the day it all gets resolved anyway. It just keeps me super busy all the time. My AKO is constantly being checked so I don’t fall behind on certain things. Quite a bit of it seems to be learn as I go despite two different “training” sessions. The most recent issue is a parishoner emailing everyone to come to Mass for fellowship afterwards for Father’s Day. Then she calls me asking if there really is. I have no clue! So now if there isn’t, I get to find some people to bake cakes, set up, serve, and tear down.

While doing all this I proposed an idea to the FRG that apparently only had one response. I wanted to send care packages out once a month to our handful of guys and gals that get deployed. I am supposed to meet with our FRG leader for lunch next week. Haha! I have no idea when that will be. Between working and packing for the trip to see my mom, I have no idea when I will have time.

The CDC on WAAF really ticked me off yesterday. Every Wednesday I have a staff meeting to go to so I have John in hourly care there. Instead of him going to the hourly side of the toddler room, he went to the other side. Bry picked him up and John was soaking wet…his diaper practically falling off of him and his pants wet with urine. Not to mention the snack they offered was broccoli…what the hell? He didn’t eat it and most of the other toddlers didn’t either. Well, turns out the caregivers claimed to have changed him at 2:30. Mind you, Bry picked John up at 3:45. He has NEVER ever had a diaper that soaking wet, not to mention it going through his pants. The director was upset as well, but I dunno…I am still ticked about it. That is neglegence…that is abuse. My son was not cared for. By the way, his diaper bag was found across the room from the other kids’ things, on top of a play area. He had nothing at the diaper changing area. Usually they set up a spare cubby there to put his diaper things in. There wasn’t even a care sheet filled out for him.

Ok, enough. I need to get my momma z’s. Then it’s off to the chapel to print off bullitens and fold them so I don’t have a ton of stuff to do tomorrow.

*hugs*
~Jen

I’m a slacker!

Ok, ok, I’m updating, I’m updating!

As far as moving goes, our household goods go out in August so they can get to where we’re going in time for the baby. We are still fighting the uphill battle on getting 3 bedrooms instead of 2.

We were in the market for a new van but a couple from our church saved us from that. Which also saves me from having to go back to work right away once we move. We will soon be owners of a very loved 2000 Honda Odessey. The price they were going for was 5k, but they went down to 4k plus however much the tuneup costs. By next week the van should be ours.

No, we still do not know the gender of the baby. You cannot believe how many people have been asking me this. I’ll be 14 weeks this Sunday. Maybe, we will know next month. That’s a big maybe. Otherwise, July will be when we find out. Long wait, I know, but it is worth it.

In other news, my sister has grey hair now. I shouldn’t laugh, but I am.

*hugs*
~Jen

The Spa in Mainz-Kastel

I won a free hot stone massage from the newspaper here not too long ago. Yesterday, I decided to cash in that gift certificate and get my free massage! First deterrent from there was that there was only one person working there. Sure there was a nice lil’ “in session” sign, but one guy was waiting around for an hour and he finally gave up. When it was finally my turn, I went to the room and got down to my skivvies. I was freezing in there. The thermostat was set to 24 Celcius. Plus I literally had to climb onto the table it was set so high. Those of you that know me, know that I am tall. I can’t imagine itty bitty people trying to get on that thing. The massage therapist comes back in and starts his massaging while this strange syntesized style of nature music plays in the background…not at all relaxing. He then decides to try and make small talk. C’mon guy, I only get a half hour, I am a tired and pregnant mommy, let me friggen doze off! The oil he used was cold as well and I keep thinking to myself, “when are the hot stones going to be put on me? I’d love to be warm.” About 20 minutes in, after my back, arms, and legs have been massaged do the stones even get put on. They cooled off rather quickly. I had them on the bottoms of my feet, back of my knee, and middle of my thigh. By the time he reached my thighs, the ones on my feet were cold. Then up to my back where four were placed on my spine and then one right on the back of my neck, focing my face further into the lil’ hole in the chair that they give you to breathe. At that point I was alone in the room, but I could hear cars drive by, people shouting, the massage therapist go to the bathroom, blow his nose, etc. Not to mention that several times during the massage he had to leave to tend to customers waiting or a phone ringing. With all that, I was glad it was free.

Don’t think I am being ungreatful here. Back in November we went on a cruise and I had a GREAT hot stone massage there. When a stone cooled off, she put a fresh hot one on to replace it. I literally melted into that table. I do know what a proper one feels like. There was also soothing music playing very quietly, aroma therapy in the form of burning oil and then the scented oil also being put on my skin. That oil was also warm, the temp in the room there was perfect, the therapist didn’t feel the need to talk to me. It made for a very pleasurable experience.

Now, this spa in Mainz-Kastel also offers other services like mani’s and pedi’s. I have no idea how those are. I just know that this particular hot stone massage was sub-par. Be leary before you slap down 33 Euros for half an hour of what you expect to be bliss. Sure, he was working alone and was doing what he could to keep the business going, but when people come to relax and pay to relax, that is what they should get. There should -always- be two people that work there.

*hugs*
~Jen

Words and understanding

John is understanding more and more every day now. He gets excited when his diaper is changed because he goes to throw it away himself. He also lifts himself up to help us get his diaper under him. Lately, he’s been a big fan of helping clean the house. The most amazing thing I think he’s doing now is learning at least one new word a day! I’m not kidding. Just today he has tried saying duck, dinosaur (Elmo’s World topic of the day today), turtle, and baby. They come out as “duh”, “na” (said it everytime a dinosaur was shown. I thought he was saying no at first until I watched the screen with him. When it was the b-day cake he said nothing, but soon as dinos were on it “na”), “durdle”, “bahbee”. When the counting happens on Sesame Street he’ll say Doo and Dee for two and three. Now he also says bye bye to Elmo when he says goodbye. He also tries to say the letters of the alphabet. He likes a, d, e, i, r and s the most. These letters spew out when watching Sesame Street or Wheel of Fortune. I was honestly suprised at his attempt to say baby today. Most of the time he says “Mama” when I ask where is the baby when we are reading a book with a baby in it. We told him a couple of months ago that Mama has a baby growing in her tummy. So he’s been associating baby and mama since then. I’m just tickled that he is learning so much and so fast! By far, the most adorable thing he does is steal my slippers, put them on, take his “brief case” (emptied out First Aid kit with toys in it), go to the hall door and say “I love you. Bye bye.”. Then he shuts the door and runs off to his room like he’s going to work.

*hugs*
~Jen

Been absent

Ok, a friend poked me about a week ago wondering where I’ve disappeared to in he blogisphere. Sure I do have news to share, but I’m kinda meh, call it hormones. Yes, I’m pregnant We’re about 6 weeks along now and nausea is hitting me worse than ever before. Same with fatigue. Granted, this time I have an 18 month old to chase after all day. When he naps, so do I…that means less net time. I also battled a nasty sinus infection, right before I found out I was pregnant. As of now, the due date is November 30th.

We have our orders, we have had them now for about two weeks. We’re #500 something on the housing waiting list and they are in the 250’s right now, knocking out 100 families a month. What sucks is that they will only give us a 2 bedroom house. Children same gender can stay in the same room up until they are 10. Children of opposite genders can share a room up until they are 6. I really don’t like that at all. Newborn and toddler in the same room…just doesn’t mix well with me. We really don’t need both of them waking up at all hours of the night. Maybe the baby will stay in our room for a while, I have no idea. We’ll work it out when we get there or see what happens when Bry gets promoted (should be in August if points go down). It’s nice having orders this far out. It gives us time to take care of things. Only I want to jump right on them and get them done. I’m looking forward to October. We’re also trying to see if we can fly out just a bit earlier than what our orders say due to the pregnancy and my history of borderline pre-eclampsia.

Church has been keeping me busy as well. This week is Holy Week, so lots of singing to be done. I must say, the insence about killed me tonight though…ontop of the cala lillies (beautiful, but wreak havoc on my allergies) and the perfume for washing of the feet/hands. I was desperate for fresh air and was glad when I finally got it. In other news with the church, a lady that works there is going to be on vacation for two months and asked me if I wanted to take over. After two weeks of debating, I agreed to do it. Seriously, pray for me. I know she works hard and I know my limits might be pushed from time to time, but I want to do this. Extra cash would be nice.

It’s also been rather nice out, so we’ve been taking advantage of it, going to parks, playgrounds, and going on walks. Busy, busy, busy!

We’ve also worked out our mini vacation to the US this summer. We got a sweet deal thanks to a lovely lady at USAirways. She knocked out John’s and my change fees and found us a deal that would make the trip an additional $1,500 cheaper. Thanks to her, we saved about $1,900! Now to rent a car, and we’re set.

Ok, it’s time to snuggle under the covers and get some reading done. Yes, yes, I know I have read blogs, but not left a comment, bad me. I just need to find some more energy.

*hugs*
~Jen

Funny Signs, nope not the DeMotivational crap.

Seriously, this lady, who has no voice today, enjoyed silent laughing her ass off at this:

*hugs*
~Jen

Cameos, revisited

I know I did a post about cameos before. What can I say, I love them! Also, the gentleman who sells them at our PX every year made an early visit this year. Typically, he comes to our PX around Mother’s Day. He was here most of this week. I was rather saddened by what he had left to sell.

Three years ago was the first time we bought from him and he had three tables full of great jewlery, most of it cameos. There you could chose between Blue Agate or the Shell cameos. Instantly, I fell in love with the Blue Agate. Here is the cameo Bry bought me then:

The following year he was down to two tables. Bry bought me two cameos then:

This year he had one table and this time the remains of the Blue Agate did not impress me. I toyed with the idea the day we saw him about getting a Cameo bracelet and then figured it would probably be too much. Yesterday, we went to the PX again and dropped by his table. I peeked at the price of one of the Blue Agate bracelets and stuck it back where it belonged…$930! It was then that I drifted over to the shell side of the table. There, in silver and mother of pearl, was a bracelet that I just had to have. It turns out The Teacher made it in 1940. This particular piece is considered an antique. This Teacher is in the hospital and has been there for nearly two months now. It is so sad! All the pieces I have, he made. Now he is not doing so well and his factory has no new workers. Here is the beautiful bracelet Bry got me for an Early Mother’s Day present:

*hugs*
~Jen

Sweet!

Bry will be home tomorrow! It will be great to have him back and move in October. The downside is that the company commander now views Bry as a quitter. It is not that he is a quitter at all. Nobody was sleeping well due to the stress of the entire situation, the FSTE was denied twice already, why waste time and have it be slammed down again? Plus he did not want to risk deploying from here, moving, and deploying right after the move. They were trying to say that it wouldn’t happen that way, but I have known that to happen to several people, I’m not going to trust the fluff they were trying to shove our way, neither was Bry. I told Bry to just take whatever they throw at him when he gets back to show that he is not a quitter. He’s worried that all this will keep him from the board next month. Who knows. I’m prayin’ though.

*hugs*
~Jen

Will the crap stop getting flung at me and my family?

Ok, Bry is on TDY, but apparently it might not be for long. It turns out that his paperwork got all mixed up. Why? How? The TDY was last minute and he had retention breathing down his neck to re-enlist right away. So he did. Soon as he signed the re-enlistment papers stating that he’d move to station of choice, he was on orders. The FSTE paperwork (the papers that would extend his tour here so he could deploy) got denied by branch and HRC. He was told to re-negotiate his re-enlistment to fix the problem, or if he didn’t, he’d be returned to 1st MI and we’d move to Bliss in October. He’d still eventually deploy though, no biggie. I can handle that.

I told him to go ahead and not re-negotiate. I would rather him be actually part of a unit that deploys instead of being attached to a unit that deploys. Especially since the unit we’d be at with Bliss is a great one that I have heard nothing negative about. Whereas the unit he’s attached to right now…just don’t even get me started. The unit we’ve been in looks like a group of angels compared to this one. They’ve done more negative bs to my husband in the past two weeks than we dealt with in nealry 4 years with our original unit.

The thing that irks me about all of this is that we planned a trip for John and I to go to the US and see Bry while he was there. So if he does get sent back here then the tickets are kinda worthless. We’d have a year to use them, but we’d have to fly from here. Basically, it means John and I can go to the US solo or we could pay for another ticket and pray Bry gets leave approved so he can join us.

A plus side I just realised from all of this if things go the way -I- would like them to…we can try for #2 this summer as originally planned. Needless to say, we need prayers that this all gets sorted out.

*hugs*
~Jen

Day one w/out hubby

He got up at 4am to leave the house a half hour later with a sleepy kiss and “I love you” from me. I dreamed sweet dreams for an hour more before I just couldn’t sleep any longer. Good thing too, because he called about a half hour after that and I was right there by the phone.

Not one tear did I shed today. I’m proud of myself for that. Without stressing, I was able to get everything ready for today. Everything went smoothly and it made me appreciate Bryan even more.

Tomorrow will be the bigger test. I have a lot on my “to-do” list that needs done so I’m praying I can get through it all.

Luckily, I also get to fly out on the 10th to see him. The hard part there is having John sit in my lap the whole flight over. We’ll make it though. It’ll be a lot better than pushing a stroller, lugging carryons and a car seat through two airports. Yeah, I get to experience a layover with the little one on my own. Fun

*hugs*
~Jen