Olivia Eileen

Words cannot express my relief that August will soon be here...although I know full well it will bring challenges of its own...ending one month and starting the next is like a breath of fresh air and boy do I need some fresh air. Fresh salty air with sand under my toes would be really nice, actually. July essentially compounded the stresses of this first deployment experience. Because on top of the obvious: being a solo mommy to our toddler living 12 hours away from both sets of doting grandparents; the less obvious: is that I am the FRG Leader for my husband's Company. What the heck is an FRG Leader? Basically, aside from having a toddler in the house, its the sole reason I haven't had the time, nor the energy, to blog this deployment. And probably is the reason why I don't respond to your emails or text messages in a timely fashion, if at all. But really, FRG Leader stands for Family Readiness Group Leader. In the Army, it's the leader of a volunteer organization that

Words cannot express my relief that August will soon be here...although I know full well it will bring challenges of its own...ending one month and starting the next is like a breath of fresh air and boy do I need some fresh air. Fresh salty air with sand under my toes would be really nice, actually. July essentially compounded the stresses of this first deployment experience. Because on top of the obvious: being a solo mommy to our toddler living 12 hours away from both sets of doting grandparents; the less obvious: is that I am the FRG Leader for my husband's Company. What the heck is an FRG Leader? Basically, aside from having a toddler in the house, its the sole reason I haven't had the time, nor the energy, to blog this deployment. And probably is the reason why I don't respond to your emails or text messages in a timely fashion, if at all. But really, FRG Leader stands for Family Readiness Group Leader. In the Army, it's the leader of a volunteer organizat

 "A person can discover that no matter where he is right now, he is still the creator of his own destiny."  Joseph Zinker Not much about this first deployment went exactly as I "perfectly" plotted and planned it out in my mind. Especially my high hopes of blogging regularly about the experience. I shift all blame of my unintentional blog sabbatical to our sweet easy going non demanding 18 month old (when my husband first left) who turned into a much more attention needing toddler almost immediately! :-) But, here I am. It's July 2012 and we are about to finish up our 5th month of this deployment. Our house is still standing. All the appliances are still working. Both cars are still running. The cat is still alive. The bills have been paid on time every month. Our daughter has been bathed and fed each day (okay, well, maybe not bathed each day;)). I've even managed to keep my small garden alive. At this point since our deployment length has been changed I am

 "A person can discover that no matter where he is right now, he is still the creator of his own destiny."  Joseph Zinker Not much about this first deployment went exactly as I "perfectly" plotted and planned it out in my mind. Especially my high hopes of blogging regularly about the experience. I shift all blame of my unintentional blog sabbatical to our sweet easy going non demanding 18 month old (when my husband first left) who turned into a much more attention needing toddler almost immediately! :-) But, here I am. It's July 2012 and we are about to finish up our 5th month of this deployment. Our house is still standing. All the appliances are still working. Both cars are still running. The cat is still alive. The bills have been paid on time every month. Our daughter has been bathed and fed each day (okay, well, maybe not bathed each day;)). I've even managed to keep my small garden alive. At this point since our deployment length has been chan