President's Day Weekend

On Valentine's Day, George informed me that he would not be able to come home and see us President's Day weekend like he had suggested just a few days before.  We were all bummed and in tears because separation is hard and when you get your hopes up for something, disappoint is a little harder to bear.  So instead, we decided that I would drive the family 13 hours to see him.  My gracious sister (one week away from delivering her fourth child) offered to watch our kids at her house in Utah, but the kids were missing their daddy, so we visited with her and her family instead on our way to and from Las Vegas.  We just happened to come while my mom was in town preparing for another sister's wedding.  It was a mini-family reunion and was so refreshing to visit with them.

We arrived early Friday evening only to be disappointed again.  We would not be able to see George until late that night.  After 49 days of separation, two days driving, and telling tired, hungry children that they wouldn't see their daddy until the next day, we were not a happy bunch.  To add to our misery, when I arrived at the hotel, I was informed that I would not be able to check in because the reservation was under George's name.  Imagine the scene: three children in a hotel lobby, all of whom were tired, hungry and out of the car for the first time since the last potty break and an emotional mother just trying to hold it all together and keep her children from climbing on lobby chairs and running out the automatic doors.  The guest services manager was just performing his job for "security reasons", but did I really look like a threat?  Was I going to load my children into a $100+ room/night and go on a shooting rampage? After he refused my plea to make an exception, I was silent and began to cry (normally I'm not a crybaby, but under the compounding circumstances there was no stopping the flow).  After a few awkward moments of me looking around trying to figure out what to do, he finally made an "exception".   Next challenge of the night:  bringing our luggage, blankets, pillows, cooler and other junk up to the second floor and down two very long hallways by myself with three kids.  I was really beginning to regret my decision to come see George.

A happy reunion.

I saw George just after midnight MST and he was gone the next morning by 6, so the kids finally saw their daddy around 1:30 on Saturday.  We just hung out in the hotel room all day waiting and anticipating the happy reunion.  It was worth it and all my doubts were cleared up once we were all together again.  Though it had been extremely difficult the day before, we were happy, whole and all of our recent trials were forgotten.  We went to lunch on cloud nine and then came back to the room and took naps together. The naps were heavenly! Later that evening, George and I were even able to go on a date by ourselves thanks to the Nelson's, a family that we knew at a previous base.  The kids had fun swimming, playing and watching TV while we toured Pottery Barn, ate at an authentic pizzeria named Settebello's, and walked around outdoors until it was too cold and we decided to sit in a warm café and sip on hot chocolate. 

The next day we went to church and then afterwards we drove to see the Las Vegas temple.  Las Vegas is huge and it takes about 20-30 minutes to get anywhere, so while we were driving I had to keep George in check because he was getting drowsy (in his defense, others who have attended weapons school have fallen asleep in drive thru's because of sleep deprivation).  We made it alive and in one piece to the temple, but just barely.  Walking around the temple grounds was just what we needed to wake up and also to take in some of the beauty all around. We then jetted over to the base to check out George's living quarters. Of course, once we finished touring the room, we went back to our hotel room to take naps again.

The rest of our time with George flew by. We were gone the next morning. Was it worth it? Absolutely! But I hope next time we're together, George is the one making sacrifices to be with us! Love you hon! :)

Happy Valentine's Day

We started off the morning with red velvet pancakes and fresh strawberries.  In my haste to get Jaren to school on time, I did not take a picture.  However,  I do have a link to the recipe  if anyone is interested in seeing how beautiful they turned out! Of course, their picture is a lot better than anything I made.

Here are a few things we made for Valentine's day!  The kids were over the moon with their little mailboxes stuffed with suckers, Hershey's kisses and cards.  Hope your Valentine's Day was "Maul"velous!

Happy New Year...Sort of

Confession time. I have been dreading the new year for about 3 months now.  Why would I dread a single day marked by celebrations, resolutions and new starts?  January 1st, 2011, New Year's day, is the day that I would say goodbye to my husband and become a single parent for 5 1/2 months.  I know, I know.  A lot of people have had their husbands deployed for a year in the sandbox and my husband is in Las Vegas for less than half a year.  No big deal, right? I'm a military wife. Military wives know and expect that at some point they will be alone raising their family.  Still, separation is hard and being the lone parent to handle, deflect and absorb the craziness of raising three young children is even harder.

I've had to be a single mom for much of the last 20 months.  Those 20 months were some of the hardest of my life.  I'm a stronger person for it and most likely it prepared me for this duration of separation, but a little break before starting a single-parenting marathon would have been nice.  Something like a year long break where we could have had a normal life with two parents in the home, 8-hr workdays five days a week, soccer games, family vacations, splitting up of household chores and parenting duties.  Ahhhh...to dream. And it was such a beautiful dream.  But those are not the cards I was dealt.

Perhaps it was better this way, to piggyback one trial on top of the other.  Yes, I am convinced that it is better this way.  Though, if I had my way, I wouldn't have to be so strong all the time and have to endure so much.  But it is what it is.  I can't change anything except my perspective.  Pardon the source of this quote, but I just love what Christopher Robin tells Winnie the Pooh when he goes off to school.  Hmm, my hubby is off at school too!

"If ever there is a tomorrow when we're not together... there is something you must always remember.  You are braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think."

I just have to keep telling myself that and pray 20 times a day and I might just survive the year! Here's to 2011 being a good year despite the circumstances.

Thanksgiving 2010...

Another year on our own. Sigh. We live too far away and in the middle of bad weather country that we decided to stay home for Thanksgiving this year. This may be our only Thanksgiving in our home and since it was just ourselves, we planned a very low-key meal.  If I had my way, I would have had more food, but in the spirit of simplicity and not packing or eating too many leftovers, we kept it simple.

When I was growing up, my family had a tradition of going around the table and sharing something we were thankful for.  I thought George and I had done this before, but it was unfamiliar to George as he had never done that growing up in his home.  So we decided to start this as a tradition in our home.  Here is what our children are thankful for:

Jaren:  I'm thankful for birthday presents.  (Obviously, his birthday was fresh on the brain!)
Dallin:  I'm thankful for trick-or-treating.  (Self-explanatory!)
Haydn:  If he could speak, I'm sure he would say he's thankful for his angel mother!

round 2:

Jaren:  Oh yeah, I'm thankful for my family.
Dallin:  I'm thankful for my daddy.
Haydn:  He was thankful for his food as he was chowing down on some turkey!

Halloween

Old School vs. New School Optimus

This year we had two Optimus Prime's and an adorable cowboy! We had fun trick-or-treating on base Friday, trunk-or-treating Saturday night, then handing out candy Sunday night. The boys didn't even know they were missing out on the real Halloween since they had trick-or-treated two days in a row. They just loved handing out candy and giving hugs to all the little trick-or-treaters. Though we barely finished the pumpkins in time, we had a wonderful Halloween!

Our five humble pumpkins!

The only shot with myself and the boys.

Our little cowboy!

Trunk-or-treating at the church.

Enjoying the spoils after all the Halloween fun!

Catch up Time

This is our holiday card. It took me forever to figure out how to get all four of us in this picture since none of it is real. The background is real; it is taken from our trip to Glacier National Park. Gotta love the Montana skies!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

We hope everyone is having a wonderful Christmas with their families this year. We are spending Christmas in Washington for the first time in five years! I can't believe it's been that long! The last time we were here was when we had just moved to Montana; and we are here again as we are spending our last winter in Montana.

We meant to send out holiday greetings before we left for Washington, but due to winter stormy weather, we decided to leave a few days earlier to avoid life-threatening driving conditions. So, due to the unexpectedness of our early travel, expect something in the mail from us after we return from Washington.

MERRY CHRISTMAS from our family to yours!

Happy Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving to everyone! Ours has been good but we miss our families.

Halloween Extravaganza

These are pictures of the boys at the ward Halloween party and on Halloween night. Jaren was a red dinosaur and Dallin was a cowboy (recognize the costume?). Both the kids were cute, but Dallin was definitely the star of the night. People were just handing him more and more candy because he was so dang cute! First, he would do his little toddler run, which ends up looking like a mix between a penguin and a chicken run, then he would reach in the bowls of candy and put one candy at a time in his bag. Then he would clap for himself--at every single house. It was time-consuming, but it was worth it and we enjoyed many laughs watching him. We only trick-or-treated on one street, but the kids scored big! Now we just have to be smart and find ways to utilize the loot into rewards for the kids throughout the next year!

At the ward Halloween party

Family shot, I'm dressed as a pirate again, but took off the patch
because Dallin wouldn't stop looking at me.

Omi was here to Trick-or-Treat too!

Here they are scoring big with some witches!

Keep running Dallin, we'll get some more next year!

Summer Time Festivities

My fancy schmancy bike, a Trek 4300, smooth like butta!

A glorious 28 years! I can now die (before 30 please)!

George, Jaren and his fickle friends, the ducks.

Dallin and Daddy, a little father-son time.

Jaren enjoying sparklers this year (last year he was too afraid).

I love the summer time. The seasons in Montana are much too short. It seems summer doesn't start until late June and ends in late August. So, I relish the time I have to enjoy the long days, warm summer breezes, popcicles, walks as a family, barbeques, swimming pools. I also love that my birthday is about a week before the Fourth of July. It just seems to be one big party.

This year for my birthday, George bought me a bike. He planned this amazing day where we went on a bike ride by ourselves along the River's Edge trail (one of my favorite places in town) to eat at a restaurant that we love to frequent. It was a lot of fun, just the two of us, riding along enjoying the scenery, avoiding mosquitos, and eating sandwiches and ice cream in the shade. It felt like a real date, which we don't do often enough. The best part of it was that I was able to relax and be myself, not be mommy or the wife, but just be me with my best friend!

Summer time is also a time where I see much more of my husband or at least it has seemed that way the last few days. I love that George does not have to work the day before, during and after the Fourth of July. It's so nice to have some family time with him. Although we need to get our house ready to sell in the fall, I just can't help wanting to play and do family activities instead of landscaping our yard, painting the house (again), and all the mundane cleaning chores that require daily attention. No thank you. I'll procrastinate and play a little while I can.

We spent the first part of the 4th of July preparing food and gardening. I would have preferred to delay the gardening for another day, but George insisted. After a little break in our cool basement (as in no air conditioning upstairs), we ventured to the duck pond and playground. On our way there, we heard a severe thunderstorm warning on the radio. Golf ball-sized hail was spotted in some counties. We thought our plans for the evening were ruined. We indulged the boys for about an hour before the wind picked up and we could see lightning in the distance. Although I love a good storm, the worst of the storm passed us by, but the wind and rain did not. It was a little problematic as we were trying to light our fireworks but we managed to do it, though we were a little wet and received a few drops of water in the eye as we were looking skyward towards the exploding fireworks. The kids seemed to do better than last year and we all had a great time.

Easter in Washington

Well, it's been a couple of days since we returned from a visit with my family in Washington. I'm so sad we had to leave. :( We were able to spend a few days, including Easter, with my family--all of whom were present except for Caitlyn, who is enjoying her freshman year at BYU-Idaho. Jaren and his cousin Ellie were able to go on two Easter egg hunts--one was put on by ARC of the Tri-Cities and the other in my parent's backyard. They had a lot of fun meeting the Easter bunny and finding the Easter eggs. Jaren was all business about his eggs. On the first egg hunt, he loaded up his extra large bucket to capacity and had fun eating all of his candy. Later in the day, we had the second egg hunt with real eggs. Previously, Jaren just dropped or threw most of his plastic eggs into his basket. Can you see where this is going? So, he did the same with the real eggs. I cringed every time I heard a thud in his basket. On the plus side, it made peeling the eggs that much easier--all 54 of them. Egg salad sandwiches anyone?

A Chapman Christmas

Make a scrapbook - it's easy!

Our Little Family Thanksgiving

Dallin is happy he's about to try mashed potatoes.
Look at that beautiful turkey, my best yet!
Jaren patiently waiting to eat our feast.
A few hours after eating.

This year, we were unable to travel to our families' homes so we stayed here and celebrated Thanksgiving with our own little family. Even though this was our first Thanksgiving without our families, it was laid back (except while I was preparing all the food and cleaning up after, too) and fun. We enjoyed not having to worry about traveling on dangerous winter roads for hours on end or spending over $1000 to fly out of our dinky little airport. So, we slept in, had a nice breakfast, watched part of the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, talked with family, and then tried to balance taking care of the kids and preparing our feast. The food turned out wonderful (yeah me!) and we had the kids to bed by 7:30. So, since we were not able to spend our holiday with any friends or family, we want to share some photos and say that we're grateful for all of you.

Happy Halloween!

Here are some pictures of the family during Halloween. Yes, that is Peter Pan and Captain Hook sparring at our church Halloween party. It made for really good entertainment and in my eyes, was probably the highlight of the evening! All in all, Jaren was able to get three pumpkins full of candy between trick-or-treating at the church, the base haunted house and the Colonels' street on base. Funny story, we went to the base haunted house about a half hour before they were closing only to find firetrucks, policemen and bomb-sniffing dogs surrounding the building. Apparently the fog machines triggered a smoke alarm in the building and everyone had to be evacuated causing a half-hour interruption, frozen toes and fond memories. This was a Halloween to remember!

Winter is best Forgotten/Happy Easter!

Once again, I have fallen behind and lots has happened. I think that I have tried to block out or simply survive the last few months, as I really do not enjoy winters here. Spring has arrived, though some days it still feels like winter and we are now approaching baby's due date (April 25) and we still have not picked out a name. Big surprise--not really! We do have a list now and have narrowed it down to 20 names. Seriously, this is really good for us! So, hopefully, we'll have a name when our baby is born.

We have been super busy lately. I wouldn't say so much me because I am walking around like a duck and moving like a snail, but George is still up to living his busy lifestyle. He is three classes away from finishing his master's degree. He should finish up in July. He is also training for the Teton Dam Marathon, which means he is now running religiously and is now home much less. The other day, he ran 13 miles! It's a little crazy, but he is very happy to be running again. Jaren is still as active as ever and if it weren't for him, I am sure I would have gained over 50 lbs during this pregnancy. We are nearly done with the basement after 3 years. All George has to do is finish painting, hang some closet doors, put up the trim, finish the bathroom and put the carpet in. Sounds like a lot, but it's really not. Everything should be wrapping up real soon, hopefully!

Spring is in the air here. George took Jaren on two hour walk while I cooked dinner today. I later joined them while our Easter meal was cooking. It turned out pretty good, however, this Easter has been a little different. We have been so busy lately that we weren't fully prepared for our usual Easter traditions. Jaren skipped out on an egg hunt, and we didn't get to dying the eggs, but we did have a basket of stuff (thanks to my mom) for Jaren to enjoy at the end of the day ( I forgot about it until my mom mentioned it--thanks again). Next year, we will definitely be on top of it as we will then have a child who will remember. We hope everyone had a wonderful Easter, and it will probably be a while before I get to blogging again. Hope you all understand! But, I will try to get pictures out as soon as I can! Until then...

Christmas 2006 Slide Show

We didn't get very good pictures, so these are some of the best. Enjoy!

Halloween 2006

Here is our family dressed up for Halloween! The costumes fit us all well. George is a Rastafarian, suiting his personality well. Jaren is a cowboy, also suiting him well as he currently lives in Montana! And I am a witch....which probably isn't the best fit for my personality since I am an angel! Just kidding. Hope everyone had a great Halloween!

Firework Tank

All credit goes to George for the tank, our beloved INIMIGO (the enemy)!

4th of July

Last year and this year as well, we were able to go to the Ferguson's house for the 4th of July. Margaret, the mother, is probably older than my dad, but is one of the craziest ladies I have ever met. She is from Canada, but because she love's fireworks so much, this is her favorite holiday (Halloween is a close second). After several hours of partying, including blowing up homemade tanks powered by fireworks, Jaren was ready for the party to end. The party also included Bruce Springsteen and several other patriotic musicians, dancing around like crazy with sparklers, an awesome backyard firework show, a trampoline, and plenty of mosquitos! I think I'll have to incorporate some of these traditions after we leave Montana, if we're allowed to!

Christmas in the tropics!

Christmas in Florida at Oma and Opa's house! We had a wonderful time and were sad to leave and return to Great Falls.