Family Time, Etc.

My parents and brother have come and gone. [[Hello this is Brian, I just wanted to hijack part of Sarah's blog to say hi.]] I'll be seeing them again in less than 10 days so I'm not terribly sad. It was so nice to have them here for a couple days! They got to see what everyday life for me is like. Keith had never been here before so now he has some idea what it looks like around here.

Some things that happened while they were here:

^^Tiny was a bad boy and got on the futon upstairs. Look closely, I promise he's there.

^^Brian lurked creepily on the edge of the photo.

^^Mom and I went to church together and then met the boys for lunch at the food court.

^^Mom did her best celebrity impression.

^^We went to a "beach" on a lake. Keith's lurking in the background.

^^We also hit up a casino. Keith won $20 and the rest of us lost money.

We did everything in the pictures (except Tiny on the futon) in one day. It was a crazy long day but we all had fun. The other day they were here we just chilled. We got fast food for lunch and then drove around Leesville trying to find "the nice neighborhood". We never did. We found some really adorable houses, but they were always a few houses away from a creepy run down house. I'm glad I'm living on post. Ha!

They left early yesterday morning and I feel like I've been playing catch-up since then. I've caught up on emails, worked out some wedding stuff, did 2 loads of laundry, paid bills, balanced the checkbook, and finally filed our taxes. Wow, I feel super accomplished after writing all of that out!

In wedding news: the shower invitations went out last weekend so things are slowly being purchased off our registry. I don't think my mom liked the idea of me checking our registry, but I need to make sure there are enough things on there, right? I still don't know who bought what so some mystery remains. I see nothing wrong with it - am I wrong?

Brian got word he's going to the board for his E5 at the end of the month. To say he's freaking out would be an understatement. He thought this was months away still so he hadn't been working on anything and now he has 2 weeks to pull it all together. I have complete and total faith in him that he can pull it off, but things will be a tad bit stressful around here until then. It doesn't help that smack dab in the middle of those 2 weeks we are supposed to be going home to knock out some wedding stuff. I gave him the option to stay here, but he's already cleared it with his chain of command and he wants to get it over with. I may have to spend that 8 hr drive listening to study guides on tape. Ha! Oh well...any good thoughts sent our way would be greatly appreciated. It would be amazing if this all worked out and he became promotable. It would look really good for him and we wouldn't mind the pay raise!

That's all around here for now. Hopefully blogging gets back into my regular routine soon. I hate writing these long rambling catch-up posts!

S.