Some days are more difficult than others, and those days are usually worse in the evenings when I come home to my empty apartment (other than my wild crazy dogs who always more than willing to keep me more than company!) and going to bed alone. It's crazy to think that in just a mere 2 more weeks we will have been married for 6 months already. Half a year. It seems hardly believable that it was that long ago already. And it's also crazy how quickly one gets use to having that other person around all the time even if he was only home for 3 of those months, and how having them gone for almost 2 months now doesn't always make it easier.
I was reading an entry in a book of deployment devotions tonight, and I wanted to share what I read:
"Give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you." 1 Thessalonians 5:18
Give thanks in all circumstances? I think I'd be much more comfortable with this verse if it said: "Give thanks to God in as many circumstances as possible excluding car breakdowns and deployments." After all, who could possibly expect me to be thankful during deployment?
The uncomfortable answer to that question: God does. God expects and desires my thanksgiving in all circumstances. God does not command us to be thankful for everything, but we are expected to give thanks in everything.
Consider the story of Shadrach, Meshach & Abed-nego. They did not know how God would act in their circumstances. In their lives, they had seen times when God provided safety and times when God allowed His people to suffer. They did not know if God would intervene, but they trusted Him completely, and they were prepared to praise Him all the way to the furnace.
The challenge is to recognize that God could choose to shower us with blessings--but regardless of whether He chooses to do so, we are to give thanks. God could keep my husband here at home with me all the time, but if not, I will thank God for the husband He has given me.
[taken from Faith Deployed by Jocelyn Green]
Sunday, September 26, 2010
Friday, September 24, 2010
X-communicated
Well, today is day number one of AJ not being able to communicate with anyone for the next two weeks while he and the soldiers are doing their special training in "the box." They had all electronic devices taken away from them so that they can learn to depend and lean on their fellow soldiers for support and encouragement rather than their friends and family back home. They will be doing intense training to simulate what they will be going through when they are over seas. Please keep AJ and the rest of the National Guard soldiers in your prayers as this is going to be a very difficult time for them!
Four Day Pass
The weekend of September 9-12 AJ had a four-day pass which allowed him to leave Camp Shelby and stay somewhere else off base for that weekend. I was able to fly down to meet him and spend the long weekend with him which was more than exciting. Uncle Troy and cousins Nina and Trevor also flew down with me. We went to New Orleans, Louisiana.
Our plane arrived in New Orleans around 3:45pm that Thursday afternoon, and AJ was at the airport waiting for us. And thankfully it did not take too long to get out of the airport and get on our way to the hotel where we would be staying for the weekend. Once we got everything dropped off at the hotel we decided to go walk around the city and find something to eat for dinner. Along the way we ran into the parade route of which the NFL kickoff game parade would be traveling. The Saints were playing the Vikings that night at the super dome. We stood and waited for the parade for what seemed like an eternity, but it was definitely worth the wait with the loud music and numerous marching bands (which definitely were NOT like the marching bands here in Iowa...as in these were MUCH better!) After the parade we went and ate dinner at a corner restaurant named "Mothers." It was definitely good to finally eat something since those of us who had been traveling all day had not eaten since that morning when leaving Des Moines around 7am :P After we ate we spent the rest of the evening walking around the city to see the night life. It was definitely a wild evening due to the Saints/Vikings game being watched almost everywhere!
Friday morning we all got up to go do some more walking around the city. We took a walk down Bourbon Street, when we knew we wouldn't be exposed to so much craziness during the day!
We walked down to the French Market and browsed through everything the people were trying to sell in their booths and at their tables. There was some pretty neat stuff! Then we went to the National WWII Museum. We started out by going to the 4-D theater to watch the movie first. It was a pretty neat experience with the vibrating seats, snow, and wind. It really did a good job of making it seem like we were actually there in the middle of the action of WWII. We then went across the street to the museum portion and walked through everything they had there. After we finished going through the museum we went to go find some lunch.
We ended up eating at a small little restaurant just off the main street in what seemed like an alley. It was pretty good food though. When we left the restaurant it had started to rain. We ran across the street to go get some stuff at the CVS (aka Walgreens). It continued to rain while we were inside, and once we were done we hung out under the over-hang for probably almost a half hour waiting for it to stop raining. It wasn't some light rain. The drops were the biggest rain drops I had ever seen, and it was POURING. The streets were flooded, and it was a mess. And we were at least a MILE from the hotel. Finally seeing that we were probably going to be waiting a while, we gave in and decided to just get wet. When we finally got back to the hotel we all looked like drowned rats, and we were able to ring out our clothes in the tub before hanging them up to hopefully dry.
Saturday morning we got up to go to the Audubon Zoo. We rode a street car to get there, so that was a fun experience getting to ride through parts of town with the biggest houses ever. The zoo seemed like it wasn't going to take very long to get through being it said to allow 2-3 hours to get through. But uncle Troy and AJ aren't exactly slow walkers :P I was disappointed with their lack of tree frogs, but I was pretty impressed with the "Louisiana Swamp Land" portion being that we do not have the climate for that kind of thing here in the midwest! It was pretty cool to see the alligators creeping around in the swamp water.
But this zoo was also my first time seeing particular animals in the zoo of which I'd never seen in a zoo before: RACOONS. I suppose they are not in our zoos because we have them running around in our back yards, but I still found it somewhat humorous :P They were pretty cute though!
When we were finished with the zoo, we rode a bus back to get to the hotel so that we could watch the Iowa vs Iowa State football game. I was the only Iowa fan among 4 Iowa State fans, but at least I couldn't get picked on too much after that game was over :P After the game AJ and I went to go walk around the city by ourselves. We ate dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe, and it was pretty good. Neither of us were really too terribly hungry at the time being we had ordered pizza for during the football game, but we ate anyway and simply enjoyed each other's company :) After dinner we walked around a little more and met up with the rest of the group to walk through some gift shops as well as walk past Bourbon Street at night to see the craziness. We didn't walk down it though :P
Sunday morning we got up to pack up our things and eat a quick breakfast before AJ brought us all back to the airport to head home. It was a great weekend to just get away, and it was even better to get to see him again even if it had only been 6 weeks since I'd seen him last and still another 10 1/2 months until I'd see him again once he returns home. It was definitely a fun trip :)
Our plane arrived in New Orleans around 3:45pm that Thursday afternoon, and AJ was at the airport waiting for us. And thankfully it did not take too long to get out of the airport and get on our way to the hotel where we would be staying for the weekend. Once we got everything dropped off at the hotel we decided to go walk around the city and find something to eat for dinner. Along the way we ran into the parade route of which the NFL kickoff game parade would be traveling. The Saints were playing the Vikings that night at the super dome. We stood and waited for the parade for what seemed like an eternity, but it was definitely worth the wait with the loud music and numerous marching bands (which definitely were NOT like the marching bands here in Iowa...as in these were MUCH better!) After the parade we went and ate dinner at a corner restaurant named "Mothers." It was definitely good to finally eat something since those of us who had been traveling all day had not eaten since that morning when leaving Des Moines around 7am :P After we ate we spent the rest of the evening walking around the city to see the night life. It was definitely a wild evening due to the Saints/Vikings game being watched almost everywhere!
Friday morning we all got up to go do some more walking around the city. We took a walk down Bourbon Street, when we knew we wouldn't be exposed to so much craziness during the day!
We walked down to the French Market and browsed through everything the people were trying to sell in their booths and at their tables. There was some pretty neat stuff! Then we went to the National WWII Museum. We started out by going to the 4-D theater to watch the movie first. It was a pretty neat experience with the vibrating seats, snow, and wind. It really did a good job of making it seem like we were actually there in the middle of the action of WWII. We then went across the street to the museum portion and walked through everything they had there. After we finished going through the museum we went to go find some lunch.
We ended up eating at a small little restaurant just off the main street in what seemed like an alley. It was pretty good food though. When we left the restaurant it had started to rain. We ran across the street to go get some stuff at the CVS (aka Walgreens). It continued to rain while we were inside, and once we were done we hung out under the over-hang for probably almost a half hour waiting for it to stop raining. It wasn't some light rain. The drops were the biggest rain drops I had ever seen, and it was POURING. The streets were flooded, and it was a mess. And we were at least a MILE from the hotel. Finally seeing that we were probably going to be waiting a while, we gave in and decided to just get wet. When we finally got back to the hotel we all looked like drowned rats, and we were able to ring out our clothes in the tub before hanging them up to hopefully dry.Saturday morning we got up to go to the Audubon Zoo. We rode a street car to get there, so that was a fun experience getting to ride through parts of town with the biggest houses ever. The zoo seemed like it wasn't going to take very long to get through being it said to allow 2-3 hours to get through. But uncle Troy and AJ aren't exactly slow walkers :P I was disappointed with their lack of tree frogs, but I was pretty impressed with the "Louisiana Swamp Land" portion being that we do not have the climate for that kind of thing here in the midwest! It was pretty cool to see the alligators creeping around in the swamp water.
But this zoo was also my first time seeing particular animals in the zoo of which I'd never seen in a zoo before: RACOONS. I suppose they are not in our zoos because we have them running around in our back yards, but I still found it somewhat humorous :P They were pretty cute though!
When we were finished with the zoo, we rode a bus back to get to the hotel so that we could watch the Iowa vs Iowa State football game. I was the only Iowa fan among 4 Iowa State fans, but at least I couldn't get picked on too much after that game was over :P After the game AJ and I went to go walk around the city by ourselves. We ate dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe, and it was pretty good. Neither of us were really too terribly hungry at the time being we had ordered pizza for during the football game, but we ate anyway and simply enjoyed each other's company :) After dinner we walked around a little more and met up with the rest of the group to walk through some gift shops as well as walk past Bourbon Street at night to see the craziness. We didn't walk down it though :P
Sunday morning we got up to pack up our things and eat a quick breakfast before AJ brought us all back to the airport to head home. It was a great weekend to just get away, and it was even better to get to see him again even if it had only been 6 weeks since I'd seen him last and still another 10 1/2 months until I'd see him again once he returns home. It was definitely a fun trip :)
Thursday, September 2, 2010
Update #3
Well, we have officially passed the 'one month' mark! So I guess that now when people ask me how much longer AJ is going to be gone, I can say "just 11 more months" now instead of one year! Personally I want to be able to make the countdown shrink a little more often than just once a month, so I am keeping track of weeks. Each Friday I subtract a week, and that means tomorrow will mark 47 weeks until his return (that sounds SO much better than 330 days if you ask me!)
Training for AJ continues to go as well as it can be. He's been keeping busy for the most part each day now. This week he had more medical stuff done and had to get his second anthrax vaccine as well as his small pox vaccination. Apparently his body wasn't too thrilled with that idea, and he ended up almost passing out when making his efforts to leave after getting his shots. But they allowed him to rest that day and get some sugars into him to help with the symptoms, and since then he has felt fine other than the tenderness in both his arms.
I asked him if the weather has still been pretty hot down there and if his allergies have been bothering him much since we've started to cool down a little up here but the pollen levels seem to be pretty crazy right now. (I know that MY allergies have been horrible at least!) He said that it's still pretty warm down there, but it doesn't seem to bad anymore. But whether that is because it has started to cool down a little down there as well OR if he's just now used to the excessive heat, that's another question! :) But he also said that his allergies haven't been bothering him at all, so that is also a good thing with how much he's out and about doing things :)
I know that AJ can't be missing our tree frog Alfie too much either because he seems to be having his own fun with his wildlife encounters down there! Earlier this week he had gone to go purchase a bottle of water, and when he pulled it out he noticed that there was something on it. So he went to shake whatever it was off, and it turned out that it was a tree frog! Obviously not as cool as Alfie I'm sure :P
Continue to keep him in your prayers to remain in good health and to also stay well rested as the days are slowly yet quickly counting down until he will head overseas. We truly appreciate all your prayers and encouragement so far. We know that we would not be able to do it without you! :)
Training for AJ continues to go as well as it can be. He's been keeping busy for the most part each day now. This week he had more medical stuff done and had to get his second anthrax vaccine as well as his small pox vaccination. Apparently his body wasn't too thrilled with that idea, and he ended up almost passing out when making his efforts to leave after getting his shots. But they allowed him to rest that day and get some sugars into him to help with the symptoms, and since then he has felt fine other than the tenderness in both his arms.
I asked him if the weather has still been pretty hot down there and if his allergies have been bothering him much since we've started to cool down a little up here but the pollen levels seem to be pretty crazy right now. (I know that MY allergies have been horrible at least!) He said that it's still pretty warm down there, but it doesn't seem to bad anymore. But whether that is because it has started to cool down a little down there as well OR if he's just now used to the excessive heat, that's another question! :) But he also said that his allergies haven't been bothering him at all, so that is also a good thing with how much he's out and about doing things :)
I know that AJ can't be missing our tree frog Alfie too much either because he seems to be having his own fun with his wildlife encounters down there! Earlier this week he had gone to go purchase a bottle of water, and when he pulled it out he noticed that there was something on it. So he went to shake whatever it was off, and it turned out that it was a tree frog! Obviously not as cool as Alfie I'm sure :P
Continue to keep him in your prayers to remain in good health and to also stay well rested as the days are slowly yet quickly counting down until he will head overseas. We truly appreciate all your prayers and encouragement so far. We know that we would not be able to do it without you! :)
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