TBT: Disney World -- January 2007

Before I went to WDW this past Christmas, I hadn't been since this family trip in 2007. We went partly to visit the parks and mostly for Dad to run the WDW Marathon. I have quite a few pictures from this trip, but I only chose three for this post.

Mom, is that a fanny pack?

My brother and me with our grandparents. Things to note: Keith has hair and mine is blonde. My how things have changed!

This is the most perfect picture of my grandmother there ever was or ever will be.

We're making a weekend trip down to visit our families this weekend. I'll be back next week!

((Only four more weeks of work!))

Weekend Trip Recap: Firearms and Fur

I am really not a fan of travelling on normal 2-day weekends. Why? Well, because Mondays are always extra rough after being away. It's like I worked straight through the weekend. Not fun!

So, we made it to MeMe's and back. We survived. It wasn't particularly fun, but we both left feeling like we had done something important and nice for someone else. And we left with some new "goodies" to take home.

Brian finally took ownership of two shotguns that had been promised to him for years. They're not worth much and aren't even sentimental, but we have them now. Brian's gun collection is growing. I'll decide later how I feel about that.

What did I make off with? A glass baking dish and a couple rolling pins (Brian's grandmother has quite the extensive collection of rolling pins!). My biggest takeaway, however, has to be the floor-length black FUR COAT that was thrust upon me. Seriously, I didn't have a choice. There is a photo somewhere that Brian took, but I don't have it on the computer yet. It's huge and black and made of dyed rabbit fur. What the heck am I going to do with a fur coat?!?!?! I guess I could dress up as a bear for Halloween?

So, yes, crazy times were had in small-town Texas this weekend. We had two mornings of great hotel breakfast and ate some delicious deep dish pizza at BJ's Brewhouse. I'm choosing not to blame the pizza, but a middle-of-the-night trip to Walmart was required after that to grab some Pepto to calm my stomach. There are few worse things than not feeling well in a place far from home. It wasn't a good night for sleep, but I was feeling better by morning thankfully.

The drive home was easy (probably because Brian did all the driving). We stopped at a Golden Chick and had possibly the best fast food experience ever. You've gotta love small town Texas sometimes! They had hidden candy-filled eggs around the restaurant, offered us free cobbler, and a fellow patron asked if we were from the area or passing through before offering a sincere "if you need anything" offer. The candy in the eggs was even good -- Reese's and Rolos mostly!

There was a threat of rain for most of the drive, so I was glad to be safely home before any of it hit. I took a nap, snacked for dinner, and settled in to watch Game of Thrones with Brian.

It was a good weekend overall. And now, only five weeks of work until summer. Yes, I am totally counting down.

Off to MeMe's

There are two types of grandmothers: sweet and ornery. Brian's grandmother is the latter. She is easily angered and holds grudges. Luckily I (and Brian) have managed to stay on her good side for the last almost-8 years.

Brian and his grandmother at our wedding in 2009.

Neither of us have seen her since our church wedding in 2009. We haven't been to visit her since before Brian joined the Army in 2007. Brian has been pretty good about calling her on a semi-regular basis, but I suppose we're due for some face time.

The thing is, neither of us is particularly looking forward to this trip. I work all day tomorrow and then we have to drive all the way there after that. We'll spend Saturday with her, but we don't have any plans so there's a decent chance most of the day will be spent staring at each other and making semi-awkward small talk.

So this visit may be more obligation than anything else, but it's one of those things you just gotta do. She loves Brian, has been incredibly supportive of his career, and never misses either of our birthdays. I think we owe her.

She also has some impressive collections of random junk. Maybe I can find some cool stuff to bring back with us. Plus, it's never a bad weekend when it is spent in Texas! :)

((Today is my FIL's birthday. Card was sent and received and the necessary phone call was made.))

In closer-to-home news, Brian made a work decision today that pretty much solidified the rest of our time here. There's a better than decent chance that we'll have Deployment #4 under our belts before we PCS. The good news for Brian and his career, though, is that we are officially on the downhill side of this duty station. I know I'll be sad to leave, but I don't necessarily mind. It's an adventure, right?

Typical Monday

I woke up 15 minutes earlier than usual this morning so I would have time to curl my hair. Getting dressed required a sweater which was odd since it was 90 degrees yesterday. I packed my lunch, ate breakfast, and got to work at the usual time. I found a picture of one of my students in the post newspaper yesterday so my first stop was his classroom to show his teacher. She's jumped on this challenge-fitness bandwagon and would love to bring me to the dark side. I politely deflected. I'm generally plenty happy with my current gym routine. No need to mess with it.

April is always a crazy month in the Special Education world. There are so. many. meetings. My morning was boring, but my afternoon was split between therapy groups and preparing for the three meetings scheduled for tomorrow. We played Easter Bingo with M&Ms. I threatened the loss of stickers and the moving of clips. I physically stopped the impulsive grabbing of various items, redirected distracted minds, ignored excessive talking, and attempted to remediate some horrendous coloring skills (someone could possibly use an OT eval?). As frustrating as some students can be, there are always the ones that insist on saying hi in the hallway every single time they see you and the ones who drop by your room even though they were dismissed from services months ago.

I drove home thankful that the clouds cleared and the temperature got over 50. There were delicious leftovers to eat in the fridge and plenty to watch on the DVR. My pajama pants seem extra comfortable! Usually Monday means I sit on the couch all night, but something must have gotten into me because I managed to be productive! I updated my Reading Log and cleaned/cooked/packaged two family-sized packages of chicken. I don't know about you, but I love having plenty of chicken (cleaned/raw and cooked/chopped/shredded) in the freezer. We eat a lot of chicken around here.

I feel like I'm stretching out an old muscle that I haven't used in a long time when I'm writing in here. I'm still struggling to figure out what to write. I am making notes and brainstorming ideas, but in the meantime, I'll just have to force myself to record my everyday life. After all, that's what will be most interesting years from now.

Only five more Mondays until summer!

Where Does The Time Go?

Truly. It's already practically mid-April?

I really fell off the blogging train. I thought getting a new computer would fix that, but it just caused more headaches. I mean, why is my wireless-enable desktop not recognizing my wifi?? And Windows 8? How does that work?? How much does Microsoft Office cost these days? It took me longer than anticipated to sit down and figure the darn thing out. Honestly, I still haven't. I haven't used it nearly as much as I thought I would. The touchscreen is pretty cool, though!

So, how about I hit the highlights?

I just published my end-of-2013 posts....FOUR months late. Oops. So, those pretty much recap last year.

This year...

Disney World was equal parts amazing and exhausting. Those were some of THE longest days, but we packed so much into those five days. Not much had changed in the seven years since I had been there last, but it was incredible experiencing it with Brian for the first time. Plus, we got to spend quality time with my brother and his better, more handsome (haha!), half. I may have needed a vacation to recover from my vacation and I know I didn't take enough pictures, but it was awesome nonetheless.

I am six weeks away from the end of my second year of work. I'm not sure how many more years I have here (doubtful it'll be more than one) and it's hard to believe the last two have flown by. I signed up to do summer school in June, so I won't be completely free until July. The extra money will be nice though! Maybe I should start thinking of some way to treat myself.

Brian and I have been pretty rock solid. We have friends and go on dates (impromptu dinners out count, right?) and get away every now and then. I even agreed to go camping for his birthday. There was a fire a tent and everything! Now, I am in no way a camper now, but it can be fun occasionally. Next time maybe I can win a round or two of horseshoes! Ha!!

We celebrated seven years in the Army a couple days ago. It's gone by rather quickly. There's a possibility of another deployment at the end of the year, but Brian has a number of things up in the air, so we'll wait and see how it plays out. No matter what happens I know we'll be fine. I feel at peace about the whole thing.

Next weekend is Easter weekend. Instead of going home to see family or even to stay here and chill out (since I don't get a single day off between now and the end of the year), we are heading down to see Brian's grandmother. She's crazy, but she's always been good to us, so we owe her a visit while we're still relatively close. We're staying at a hotel about 45 minutes away from her and I doubt she's all that happy about it. She made sure to remind Brian that she has a bed and we can stay with her. Of course we know all of this and definitely made the conscious choice to NOT stay there. I have a feeling it'll be an interesting and probably tiring weekend.

Despite Brian being in the country this summer, I am ditching him in July to accompany my parents to the Northeast once again. I'm conflicted about leaving Brian behind, but the thought of two weeks on the lake again is too enticing to pass up. It is good for my soul to be there. By the time summer school is over, I think I'll really really need the break to recharge before getting back to work in August.

So there's the quick and dirty update. No promises moving forward, but I have high hopes.