Where have I been?

Oh you know... doing the usual. Raising a now nearly 15 month old bucket of sunshine and toddler sass, exploring life as a stay at home mom, and waiting. Always waiting. C should be getting his next set of orders soon, so I am hopeful for great adventures in a new city/state, but hopefully back in the US.

Did I mention that I'm pregnant again? That was a shock. After years of treatment and negative tests, imagine my surprise that at an appointment to place an IUD the doctor tells me that won't be possible, as there's a little person in there. Imagine my shock to find out that it's another little boy who will be joining us in September (Oh, and we move in August. O.O I have lost my mind)

With Boy #1, the pregnancy I wrote of last time I wrote in here (nearly 2 years ago. Oy), we had a rough road. My OB couldn't believe my ridiculous (read: Absurdly normal, but poorly timed) weight gain, and so I was tested for Gestational Diabetes 4 times. and then had the shock of my life... and not in the pleasant way. After all that monitoring , all those blood tests, about 8 million ultrasounds.... My doctor missed a very crucial thing- my Son's intestines weren't inside his body.

I have a lot of writing to do, a lot of things to catch you up on. Know that my first son is fine now-you wouldn't even know what he had been through if you saw him now. I am varying levels of fine, depending on the day. My marriage is still one of the greatest blessings to my life. For all that has changed, for all that will change, there are still some constants like Family, Faith, and Food.

Snowflake Swap

Paris recaps are coming, I swear! I'm just getting around to the 700+ pictures Mr. took...   At the beginning of this month one of my friends, Jane, posted about a Snowflake Swap that she and a few others were hosting. I was expecting the holidays to be rough for me(spoiler alert-- I was right), and thought that giving more would help. Plus, I ran two winter gift exchanges, so it was nice to be able to just enjoy it, instead of worrying about everything. I happened to be paired up with the lovely Brittany of Aviation of Love, who is stationed at Ft. Bliss, Texas. Both of us have been at Ft. Bragg, and both of us have immediate feelings of inadequacy when it comes to gift giving. ;) I can say though, that her gift was super thoughtful. I didn't get a chance to take a picture of it all wrapped up, so here are the pieces: I got magazines- Food and Wine (now severely dog eared for all the recipes I want to try) and Self...which I had been wanting to buy but haven't.     

  A really cool Essie nail polish...it's chrome! I can't wait to paint my nails for NYE.  

  An awesome Ft. Bliss t-shirt...which made me wish I had sent her something German. (See above comment about inadequacy)  

Really excited because my preworkout  matches!

  And then she was thoughtful enough to include treats for both girls... Which have promptly been devoured! Thanks so much to Brittany, and to the "JAM Awesomesauce" ladies for putting this together! 

OCONUS Jealousy

 By the time y'all are reading this, the Mr. and I are on our way to Paris for my birthday! I just wanted to share some thoughts about living overseas for the weekend.   If you live overseas for any amount of time, two things will happen.  1. People will make you feel like you're not doing "enough" traveling at any given point. Maybe this is just a me thing, but we hear (often) about how everyone has all these plans for every. single. four day. See, if you were in the states,  your plans for a four day would probably be to relax, maybe see or do something in your town or just nearby, but that's about it.  Here, people go NUTS. The Mister is taking a four day for my birthday, and we're going to Paris. We're not traveling for Christmas or New Year's. When we say that...we get the wide, unblinking stare of disbelief. How DARE you have time off and not use it to see more of this country!
Look, we love it here, and we love travel. We just also have some debts to take care of, work to do, Pets that need us, and Doc appointments. We can't take off every month-and that's okay. We're still seeing as much as we can.
2. Related to number 1, your friends and family romanticize your time here. People say things like "I have no tips for you, not all of us can go to Paris for a weekend!". Or, "Gosh, I'm so jealous it must just be awesome to be there and get to Travel all the time".  Yes, it's awesome to be here. Yes, we feel very blessed to have these opportunities...however...
I get to go on a 4 day birthday trip to Paris, because I gave up having holidays with my family.  I get to experience this wonderful culture, because I am willing to deal with the 6/7/8 hour time difference from people I love. 
Not everything here is rosy, and it's not wonderful all the time (But it is pretty close!). Just remember that being in Germany isn't all beer, schnitzel, and traveling throughout Europe. It's also missing home, missing family, and a language/culture barrier that is insurmountable at times.

A TTC Update

I realized the other day that I hadn't posted a TTC update for awhile, so here goes. 
The Mr. and I were on a break for a few months. I wanted to make sure (as much as I could, anyways) that I would be able to make it to my friend Staci's wedding, and hopefully to Alpha Chi convention.  We have since started "actively" trying again, which means taking temperatures, OPK's, etc. 
I was due for a well woman exam, so I spoke with my PCM(Primary Care Manager) here about how we have been trying for awhile. She said that since we were so close to a year of trying, and it's hard to get in with the doctor here, that she'd go ahead and write me a referral to a doctor here for a female infertility workup.
We've seen him once so far, and I just had some blood work done today. He's thinking that it's a hormonal issue, which should be reflected in today's testing.  I've had an ultrasound (Me and Wandy...we're not friends) and he's taken all our history and information. We go back to see him again in just over a week to get our results, and the Mister goes in for testing the following day. From there, we just work with everyone to hopefully formulate a plan and get pregnant!
Because I have TriCare, it is unfortunately not the easiest process. After this next appointment, my German doctor will write up a report. This gets returned to TriCare/my PCM who then decide what their course of action is. They could decide to handle it themselves, send us a Military Treatment facility, or just hand us back off to our German Doc. We are hoping that the plan will be to allow us to continue seeing the German doctor. His office is convenient to our apartment, and he is just a really kind, reassuring man.  If you know me, you know I tend to be a worry wart and jump to the worst possible conclusions at all times. The fact that this guy calms me down is pretty big. ;)
So, we're starting the process. We're not sure infertility is even something we're dealing with just yet. Right now is the information gathering phase.. hopefully things get to working soon!

Christmas Rush

Like most people, I am of the whole-hearted belief that Thanksgiving doesn't get a fair chance. Between Candy and gifts, most people are rushing through the season of Thanks dreaming of Sugar Plums.

I'm a planner-I like to have things set and ready far in advance. But this most recent challenge? I didn't think even I was up for it!

Have (nearly all ) of the Christmas shopping and wrapping done by 12 NOV.


WHAT?! I do my gift draws in October, but spend most of November obsessing over what people may want, before purchasing in early December. Unfortunately, since we are in Germany it's recommended that we ship anything we want to arrive by Christmas back to the states by 12 NOV.

With this in mind, the Mister and I headed out to a few different souvenier shops this weekend to try and take care of our gifts. We did great (and got to see the supposed World's largest cuckoo clock!) and only have a few more to go.

What are your usual patterns as far as Christmas shopping is concerned?
 

Sunday Slowdown

I love Sundays.
It's one day of the week that I strive to really slow down, not rush through things and just enjoy the day with the husband and the animals. We go to Church, we might eat lunch out, or we might just come home and do laundry and hold the couch down.
Believe me, after this week-this slow down  was MUCH needed. Nothing was overwhelmingly bad, just seemed like we had a hard time getting things to break our way. 
Of course, it's also much easier to slow down when you have a cold and the Mr. has Arkham Origins to keep him occupied.
What's your Sunday ritual? Are you a slow down person, or do you keep running?

         

I remember....

I remember when the Mr. first told me he wanted to join the Army. I was 19, and after he told me I cried. You see, I was dating a goofy theatre kid and I never thought the military would be a plan (I should've...serving in the military goes way back on both sides of his family). I cried because I didn't know what that meant. I cried because I knew at the least we were a country at war and that meant he was going to be deployed.

He had just busted out of his cocoon and is now a beautiful butterfly.

I cried because I was a drama queen. (Seriously. Pulled my Gbig aside to ask her advice and cried at meeting. Drama queen).
Then that Summer he dumped me. I remember sitting in my sorority sister's apartment and watching chick flicks and talking about how he'd be back and he's just a dumb boy.
Then that fall he realized he's really dumb sometimes, and we got back together.
I remember doing pretty horribly on an assignment right after he left for OSUT (basic Training). I remember that professor pulling me aside. He'd never had me in class, but said that it didn't seem like me. I cried to him and told him my boyfriend had just left. He patted me on the shoulder and said his son had left too, but it gets better.  I remember that extension of grace. (And I remember that I was yet again, a drama queen)

Photo from Ciulla Photography

I remember after we got married, that I was so excited in April because he was done with school, I was about to be done with school, and we were going to be able to be done with long distance! (I can hear my veteran spouse friends laughing...). I remember him holding me when he told me that he'd be deploying the following month. 
I remember the joy of buying our house, and getting a puppy.

She's grown just a tiny bit...

I remember crying when the rumors of the next deployment came up.   I remember crying the nights before he left, but not at the parade field...which garnered me criticism. (Seriously).
I remember crying with relief to hold him in my arms again both times.   I remember the blast we've had on marriage retreats, at balls, and at Hail/Farewells. 

I remember falling apart on the drive away from our first base, our first home.   I remember crying on the plane to Germany. 
Why post this? (Other than to illustrate that I'm a pro-level crier/drama queen)
So often as military spouses we tear our fellow spouses down... whether it's that she's crying over him being in the field, or NOT crying during the deployment. That our civilian friends couldn't possibly understand what it's like to live through a deployment, and how stupid they are for thinking that a business trip is in any way equal to one. (For the record, most know it's nothing alike. They're just trying to connect on the premise of missing their person). What if we remembered how it was when we first started out? When that first week of him gone felt like walking through hell? The time we learned to turn off the news when he's gone? 
I have a feeling we'd be much kinder to each other. And in a life like this-where we are often uprooted away from family and friends, and expected to do it all with minimal resources- shouldn't we be more focused on helping one another, instead of laughing at or criticising someone who is just starting out, sad and scared? When will we, as a community, realize that our war stories are very rarely helpful?
I remember...the day I decided to start living in and extending the grace and understanding afforded to me many times over by many people.