Halloumi

This will probably seem silly, but I am excited about cheese! Ha ha. At the store yesterday, we came across Halloumi cheese in the imported cheeses section. Don't ask me why we were looking. Back in my flight attendant days, I had a lot of layovers in Cyrpus. Sometimes I would layover there 5 days at a time, then be back a week later for another several days. It was my most frequent place to layover. I love Cyprus. It is an island mostly owned by Greece, but partially owned by Turkey. The sectioned owned by Turkey is bare for the most part. But the larger part owned by Greece, has resorts and a beautiful beach with clear water. Halloumi cheese is made in Cyprus and hard to find anywhere else. The hotel we stayed at, would serve it every morning for breakfast. I love it. Aaron tried a piece, and he thinks it tastes a bit like mozzerella at first. You can grill this cheese by itself. It doesn't melt like regular cheese. And it is so good. I haven't been to Cyrpus since I quit flying, but I miss flying very much. And I miss the people and the places, and the job very much. So coming across this cheese kind of takes me back as silly as it sounds.

A few pictures

We are all doing fine. Life is just a little crazy right now. I am beginning to wonder if we will ever finish unpacking and getting organized. Bethany and Shea are playing in one of the boxes right now. They are happy. I was invited to join another playgroup, so I am going to try to get the girls out and about. Today I have an appointment to see where I should begin on getting Bethany squared away and in school. Here are a few pictures.

We are in Texas

Well, we have arrived in Texas. It's umm okay. Actually it is just going to take getting used to. We couldn't stand Columbus for the longest time, but the last year or so, we got really attached. So hopefully it won't take us too long to like Texas. It is a huge change. GA had lots of trees and green. It had humidity, but I think i got used to it. Texas is less humid, but very hot! It is also flat and brown for as far as I can see. But I do like that despite it being like 100 degrees during the day, as soon as the sun sets, it goes down like 20 degrees right away. I do like that there seems to be things from both the western part of the US and the East coast. And there is a 7-11! For anyone who doesn't know, when I was pregnant with Bethany, I craved slurpees like you wouldn't believe! There were commercials for 7-11 slurpees on all the time, but no 7-11 stores in the state! We had to drive to Florida, lol. Anyway, it kind of became a joke that the next place we live better have a 7-11.

We are still in a hotel. Aaron will sign up for housing on Monday. We hear there is little to no wait for housing right now. We drove around Fort Hood yesterday and got a good look around. I have also found a playgroup for the girls. We are just very eager to move out of the hotel and into our own place. Bethany is about to start helping me type, so I better wrap this up.

Knock Knock!

Bethany is cracking me up lately! Well I shouldn't say lately. She makes me laugh all the time. Her latest thing is trying to get the hang on knock knock jokes. It is pretty funny. She says "Knock knock!" I say "Who's there?" then she yells something totally off the wall and falls apart laughing hysterically. It makes no sense, yet it makes me laugh. Aaron taught her the one that goes "Boo" "Boo who?" "Well you don't have to cry about it!" I don't think she even gets the joke which makes it even funnier.

Some other funnies... Aaron has 2 missing teeth that simply never came in. so he has a retainer thingie with 2 false teeth attached. The missing teeth are toward the front of his mouth. Well Bethany noticed the silver bar that goes across his teeth last night and wanted to know what it was. He tried explaining it, but she got confused, so finally he just popped it out. I wish you could have seen her face. Her eyes got really big. Now she wants to know why her teeth dont come out too.

She is such a bossy little mommy. She is always fussing at Shea. She literally follows her around all day and takes things away or tells her to finish her food, or get out of something she is not supposed to be into. She also has started playing with a baby doll but all she does is tuck the baby into bed and tell it, "Go to sleep, DO NOT get out of bed again!"

Bethany is one of the pickiest eaters ever. I have never seen the child eat a piece of meat until today. Today I went through Wendy's for lunch since it was 1 om and they had not had lunch. We were on our way back from Wal Mart. Aaron and his mom had been working in the yard too so I knew they would want food. Anyway, while we were eating Bethany looked at Donna's ( my mother in law) burger and asked her, "Is that a crabby patty!?" Donna told her yes it was and asked her if she wanted to try it. Bethany said yes, and took a bite. I totally expected her to spit it out, but she didn't! She said she liked it, but would not take another bite. But this incident has given me some sneaky ideas... Thank you Spongebob!

Speaking of Spongebob, little miss Shea whose vocabulary consists of the words, ball, no, baby, mine, etc.. tries to sing along to the Spongebob song. whenever it comes on I hear her say something that almost resembles Spongebob, lol. Have I mentioned we watch a lot of Spongebob these days? That portable DVD is a lifesaver when you are traveling.

Another Shea story: The other night she was making noises in her sleep, and then I heard her say, "Nee nee! NO!!" I had to laugh. Nee Nee is what she calls Bethany.

Well I think I am done telling sotries about my babies for now. Rest assured there will be more. There is never a dull moment with those two.

A Homecoming and a PCS

So much is going on right now. We are busier than ever. Aaron came home on July 8th! I spent that day having my hair done and making myself pretty, then left the kids with my mom who was visiting. His flight was an hour and a half delayed, but he finally got there. Funny, but as soon as I saw him it was like he had never been gone. We stayed in Atlanta for 2 days and just enjoyed being alone. Aaron had some requests such as eating at the Waffle House and Longhorn.

We got home on the 10th and right away Bethany just looked at him and said "Hi Daddy!" I was so glad she remembered him. Both her and Shea took right to him. Bethany h as been having some big fits though. We think she is testing him to see what he will do. He is a lot tougher than I am, so she doesn't get away with much.

On the 12th my mom went home to CA and on the 14th the movers came and packed away all of our things. On the 15th the movers packed everything into the truck and we had an empty apartment. Bethany and Shea handled that a lot better than expected although Bethany did keep asking where things were and insisting that we have to find them. We tried explaining everything as best we could, but it is still a bit confusing to the kids.

On the 16th we cleaned up the apartment and packed up the car. It was Bethany's last day at Easter Seals, so we brought cupcakes for her class. It was especially hard to leave Easter Seals. I started bringing her there soon after we were told that she was delayed in speech and socialization skills. She was diagnosed with PDD-NOS (Autism spectrum) soon after. We saw amazing improvement in her in just one month and she continued to do well. Shortly after she turned 3 she was moved from Toddler 1 class to Preschool 2. She had wonderful teachers. Miss Sandy and Miss Melissa were wonderful. It was so sad to take her out. You always hope that your child will be in an environment where they flourish and the teachers love them. I really hope I can find her a great place when we get to TX.

Last night we drove to Orlando and we are staying with Aaron's mom here for about 2 weeks. On Sunday we are going to church with Aaron's Grandma. She lives in a very small community about 2 hours away. Most of the people in the community are elderly and have lived there forever. They have known Aaron his whole life. Not only are they excited to see his kids, but they are so proud of him for his service in the Army. He has agreed to wear his dress uniform to church and the whole community has left up their July 4th decorations for his visit. I am very proud of him too, and excited for Sunday. I will take pictures.

I will have a lot of pictures to upload when we get settled in TX, so be prepared for it! I took pictures of Bethany's last day at school, and of some of our friends in GA too.

We are planning some fun things that the kids will love while we are in Orlando. We plan to take them to the beach and Sea World. We will go on to Texas around the first week of August, and work on getting housing. That's all for now!

10 days left!

Oh wow! 10 days left until Aaron will be home! I am so excited! When I think about seeing Aaron's face it still seems too far away. But when I think about how much I need to do before he gets home, I don't think I have enough time! I have been working hard to get our things organized before the movers come, and getting paperwork done and updated and gathering records, etc. I finally got to check something off my list, then Aaron called and told me about 2 other things I need to add to the list! I know I should be happy he thought of it, or we would have problems later. I am just pretty overwhelmed. I keep getting rid of stuff we don't need, but the apartment looks as cluttered as ever. On a positive note, Aaron spoke with the housing office and it looks like we will probably walk right into housing and not have to wait! I am glad because we will have a yard for the kids to play in. It may not be fenced in, but I think we can get it fenced. But I am just so happy they will have some space to play outside. Living in an apartment is hard for such active kids. Going to the park takes planning. Not as easy as just opening the door. I want them to have fun kid experiences like playing in the sprinklers. I can't believe there is just 10 days left. I was totally set on losing my baby weight before he got home. But I am still pretty darn fluffy. Good thing he loves me for my sparkling personality. Oh well. I will lose it eventually. I am nervous too. I hope the kids do well with all of the changes coming. I feel sure that Shea will go along with things, but I think Bethany might have a hard time. Aaron and I have talked about it, and we know that all we can do is make sure to give her plenty of attention and talk to her about whats going on and reassure her.

On a good note, I think I am winning the bedtime battle! Bethany has been using some really good tactics to get out of having to go to bed, and be allowed to lay on the couch instead. I made the mistake of giving in a couple of times, but once I wised up to what she was doing I realized I had to get her back to sleeping in her own bed. It has not been easy. She is really persistent. But yesterday she didn't have a fit when I sent her back to bed every time she tried to come out. It was hard not to laugh. She tried casually walking out, she tried doing a belly crawl to the couch, she tried running to a piece of furniture and hiding behind it then going to another piece of furniture, etc. But tonight she didn't even try to come out of her room. So I am pleased. Well thats enough babble for now.

Bethany Funnies

~ After bedtime prayers, she asked, "Where IS Jesus Christ?" I told her he is in Heaven watching over her to help her make good choices. She looked at me like I was crazy, then started calling out, "Jeeeeeesus!!! Where are youuuuuu?!!!"

~While singing Old MacDonald had a Farm, I usually stop to let her say which animal was on his farm. She really threw me for a loop when she called out "Caribou!" Since then Old MacDonald has also had a turtle, a fox, and an eagle on his farm. I have no idea what sound any of those animals make.

~Bethany is always pulling off my shoes and socks. Recently I was wearing new socks and they left some lint on my foot. Bethany picked off the lint, held it up to look at it better, and said, "Oh! a sheep!"

~When Shea took one of her toys that she was playing with, Bethany got eye level and says, "No Shea. That's mine. Do you understand?" Funny because she got that from me. Whenever I tell her something, I tend to say, "Do you understand?" She sounded like such a little adult.

~For a few weeks now whenever I tell her to do something, she yells "YES SIR!" Like she is in boot camp or something. It makes me laugh every time.

That's all I can remember right now. I will add more another time.