Deployment Week 1

Hey Everybody, we have survived our first week of deployment. I have gotten to talk to Justin a couple of times on the phone and a couple of times on Yahoo Messenger. He is doing good. He said that the only thing he could complain about was the Mt Dew doesn't taste the same. :) He is so funny!!!
My week was good. It actually went by really fast. I had another ultrasound and its still a girl. The whole ultrasound was a fiasco though. I took the kids to the childcare place on post. Since I didn't have the right box for Hopes inhaler they wouldn't take Hope. I had to take Hope to the ultrasound with me. When I got there they said they wouldn't be able to see me if I had her. I broke down! I went in and talked to my midwife. She took Hope from me and told me to go to my appointment.
Other than that the week has been pretty uneventful. I have spent A LOT of time at Krystals house. The kids LOVE going over there. As do I of course! I also spent a lot of time this week getting my house organized. I have washed EVERYTHING in my house and done ALL the dishes. Well I gotta go for now, my kids are fighting and I have to make dinner. I will update again next week.

Jen

Pre Deployment Week 4

This was a hard week for us. We got to spend a lot of time together as a family. But on the last day of this week...Justin left for Iraq. :(
This week we did a lot. We went to a birthday party for a friends lil girl on Sunday. We walked around Wal Mart on Saturday. (sounds like fun huh. LOL) We just tried to do as much as we could as a family before our time together was up. I don't have a lot to say about the rest of the week, so we will talk about D DAY!!!
Yesterday was D Day for us!!! We started the morning off with breakfast. Eggs and toast...MMMM. We watched some movies and just kind of hung out as a family for most of the day. At about 3 we had to pack the car up with all of Justins stuff and head out to his company. When we got there we were still a little early so Justin and I played tic-tac-toe and hangman on the car windows. (I had an erasable marker). We then went in and sat with Justin's bags for a while then he had to do formation and weapons draw. This part of the day was terrible because it was cold out and we didn't get to spend a whole hour with him. When he finally did that we took his bags over and dropped them off to be put on a bus. By now it was 6:30 and the kids had not had dinner yet. We decided that it would be best for all of us to just go ahead and go home. Justin walked us out to the car and put each of the kids in their seats. He told them how much he loved them and to be good for mommy. Then it was my turn. I held him and told him not to let go. I'm so selfish!! He told me he would be fine and that he WOULD come home...alive. He kissed me, and my belly. Told me how much he loved me. I told him how proud I was of him and how proud I was to be his wife. It was so hard to leave. I cried the whole way home. When I got to the gate the security guard asked how I was...I sorta lost it on him. He comforted me and told me that he had been through 9 deployments and that I just needed to surround myself with a good support group.
When we got home the kids and I watched the DVD that Justin had made for us of him reading Where The Wild Things Are to the kids. We watched it 3 times. The kids LOVED it. I really liked it too. Gabe kept saying, "we watch daddy again?" I had to tell him no cause it was way past his bed time. We didn't sleep very well last night. But most of us took a nap today.
Today we went to Krystal's house. It is amazing how much better I feel today. I think it is because I am not worrying about spending every second I can with Justin. I am just focusing on what needs to be done here. And trying really hard to keep busy. Anyway, that is all for now. Next week starts a new chapter in my blog. DEPLOYMENT!!! Love to you all.

Jen

Pre Deployment Week 3

Faith Stembridge

RIP SPC Kham Xiong

Sorry that this is a little late. I wanted to wait until I got my ultrasound to post it. First off...we are having a baby Girl!!! Faith will be here in March or April. We are super excited. Best part is Justin got to be here for the ultrasound. It was amazing. :) We even got her a dress today after the ultrasound.
Anyway, Justin will be leaving us in the next few days. Its very hard to think about him being gone for so long. I am very lucky to have so many people to support me here. We have been able to spend a lot of time together over the last week. I have LOVED it. So have the kids. I really think they are both going to have a hard time with Justin being gone. They freak out even when he just goes outside for a minute. We will deal with it though.
This week was a very hard and emotional week. The shooting at Fort Hood that left 13 dead and so many more injured was emotional when we first found out about it. It got even MORE emotional when I found out that one of Justin's good friends from Basic Training was one of the 13 dead. I have never in my life had to break such horrible news to anybody. The fact that it was my husband that I had to tell made it that much worse. We watched the memorial on the internet. I cried so hard when I saw Kham Xiong's (Justin's friend) wifes reaction when she got to his picture. They literally had to pry her away from it. I wrote a letter to the reporter who wrote a wonderful story about SPC Xiong. He forwarded that letter to his family. I felt so blank for a few days there. All I could think of was "That Could Have Been Justin!!" Then yesterday a thought popped into my head. Justin went to NTC last month. He saw SPC Xiong there. You go to NTC before you deploy. If SPC Xiong was there, was the man who shot him there for training? That got me all emotional too. I couldn't stand the thought that my husband had quite possibly seen this man, or even eaten in the same room or slept in the same barracks as him!!! It has all been a lot to process.
Anyway, since I don't have much time left with my husband, I will go ahead and end my blog here. Thank you all for your thoughts and prayers for our family.

Jen

Pre Deployment Week 2

So Halloween was this week as you all know. We had such a blast. The kids did so good. Gabe didn't quit get the concept of saying trick or treat because he would say it after they gave him candy and then expect MORE candy. It was so cute. We went with The Paeths in another friends community. After we were done trick or treating we took the kids and played at the park. I don't know who was the bigger kids. The kids or the husbands!!! All in all it was a great night!
We have decided to do an early Thanksgiving this year. Since Justin and my friend Krystal's husband will be leaving in a couple of weeks. We are going to be doing it this Saturday. We got a 23 lb turkey. I can't wait to smell it cookin in our oven. Today Justin and I decided that we are going to set up our Christmas decorations. I put an add on our local Freecycle today for a fake Christmas tree. I would LOVE to set one up for Justin before he leaves so we can take some holiday pictures and such in front of it.
This week I got involved with our Family Readiness Group (FRG). I helped set up our companies Halloween party on Thursday. It was really nice to meet some of the ladies in our company. We also found out last week that our friends the Paeths are getting a house on post and Krystal will be staying instead of going back to Michigan. I am so excited. She will only be a couple of blocks away from us.
Justin's work schedule is pretty relaxed right now. He is able to come home early for the most part. He is trying to get tomorrow off to take me to my last DR appointment before he leaves. :( We do have an ultrasound scheduled for next Thursday. We are super excited to find out what we are having!! Anyway, more to come next week. Keep us in your prayers.

Jen