Good morning everyone (and you new faces too, welcome!) I am in a surprisingly good mood today. I got a great night sleep last night which I can credit to Doc, he didn't come home so I had the entire bed to myself. (When that is the case for months on end it sucks but just a night here and there is a God send!) No, he wasn't stuck in a tree or anything he was working. He called at 12:30AM to tell me he was still working and would be staying on post. That made me happy, we currently live 25 miles away and I worry about him making that drive while he's sleepy.

I am having a little problem, well it's not a problem yet but I have a feeling it's going to be soon...none of my hair is falling out. You are supposed to lose a certain amount everyday but I am not losing any! I washed my hair today for the first time since Monday and I expected the normal handful of hair in the shower (going so long without washing it will do that) and there was nothing! I know it's because I am pregnant and I've heard of this happening but yikes, how thick is my hair going to get? Growing up my hair was twice as thick as it is now and such a pain to deal with but it was long so I could pull it back, now I have hair that rests on my shoulders, soon I am going to look like I am wearing one of those helmets from Spaceballs!

I know, if that is my biggest problem I am a lucky lady!

Anyway, I am excited to get packing this weekend, if we don't need to use it in the next 2 weeks it's going in a box! Oh and ball dress shopping, I will be sure to post pictures.

...no no, it's just Doc. I hate jump days, seriously hate them. Knowing that at some point this morning my husband will be falling from the sky just doesn't sit well with me. It's not really a big deal, he does it at least once every 3 months but still. I just don't get it, what's the point? He's never going to jump into combat in this day and age so basically it's useless. (Well other than him getting to talk trash about "legs.") Each time they lose a good amount of guys to broken legs, concussions, or even more serious injuries. Even if Doc does everything right if the guys ahead of him or behind him on the stick screw up he's going to be the one who is hurt. Can't you just picture him stuck in a tree somewhere for hours and hours waiting for the fire department to get him down? Don't laugh - it happens.

So those of you on my facebook page know we are right back into Army life. When he is deployed I get to forget about the day to day BS but once his training cycle starts again I am slapped in the face with it. FRG meeting tonight, wives only...oh fun! I don't know anyone in this company so hopefully I can slip in and out unnoticed. The boys have night range but it doesn't get dark until 10PM so I don't know why they can't be released for the meeting and perhaps dinner. Looks like he's back to 20 hour work days.

There was one really cool thing that happened yesterday, he went to his old company to get on their jump roster for today and he ran into his buddy from BCT. He had a great group of guys in basic but they all went OCS so they have lost contact over the years. We talked about going the OCS rout but working where Doc works the enlisted rout is the only way to make a career out of it, the officers are rotated in every few years or so and then they are gone. Anyway...his buddy has been rotated in as a new PL. We are going to get together with him and his wife at some point. When he told me I broke out the pictures from the BCT graduation to put a face with the name and it was so nice to look back.

We were a couple of kids, he was 24 and I was 25. I swear this life has aged us about 10 years. This was taken as I was dropping him off after graduation to ship to AIT, I wasn't sure when I would see him again. (Feb 2006) Yea, those Class As are going to need a lot of work...

I am convinced that God made a mistake, that He intended me to be 5'4" and not 5'7". He game me the center of balance and the coordination needed for a person 3 inches shorter than I actually am. That is really the only explanation.

I fall down. A lot.

I trip on pant legs, I slip in mud, I get my feet tangled up with each other. I don't know why, I am just a goof most of the time. 3 weeks ago Moses was going to be sick so I grabbed his collar and led him outside, well that was the plan anyway. On my way out my foot got stuck on the slider and I fell, hard. Moses got loose and I landed on my knee and elbow. It took Doc a moment to stop laughing to go get Moses, luckily he had run because he was too concerned with what I was doing on the ground. For the next few weeks I walked around with a skinned knee and elbow like a child (lovely iMac pic):

Over the weekend I managed to drop my alarm clock on my foot, I thought for sure that something was broken but after Doc looked at it and assured me it was fine I was OK. He asked my how I managed to do it and I really don't know. That night I grabbed a sock and an ice pack and went to bed. I awoke to a bruise across the top of my foot making it painful to wear flip flops.

I am still recovering from my traumatic foot injury and my elbow and knee have been healing nicely, well they had been...Once again I hit the deck. I was not even 50 feet from my apartment door when I some how lost my footing and fell re injuring my knee. Moses looked at me as if to say "are you kidding?" I got inside and found that the entire scar on my knee was gone and in it's place was a lot of gushing blood.

Why? Why can't I stay on my feet? Sure it's funny now but when I am about 7 months pregnant it won't be so easy to peel myself off the pavement!

After 4 days off with nothing exciting to do I gotta tell ya, it's hard work coming back to work! Doc and I had a nice boring weekend and the only thing I had to do was my dentist appointment Friday afternoon. That went well, no cavities and nothing to be worried about. I got a "you have beautiful teeth" pat on the back, a pack of floss and I was on my way. They hygienist I had this time was the same one I had at my first visit there a year ago (not the one who yelled at me in Jan) and she is super sweet. When we move I am going to have to find a new dentist because I am not going to make the drive from Lacey to Milton (about an hour without traffic) just to have my teeth cleaned! I'm bummed about that but oh well, it's only twice a year.

I had the craziest craving for buffalo wings all weekend so I ordered some from Domino's one night and they were sooooooo good! We decided that we can just make them at home, Doc tried to talk me into boneless buffalo chicken then into full size buffalo chicken legs but neither of those sounded as good as wings so that's what we got. So good....so good that he ate them all! I had some but Doc ate the entire second batch. Jerk.

I also heard that Lemon Heads were a great cure for nausea and anyone who knew the 10 year old Amber knows that Lemon Heads are my weakness, if I had an extra dime in the summer time I would be at the campground snack bar getting a box of them. I grabbed 2 big boxes from Fred Meyer's and they were just as good as I remembered. They are smaller but just as good. I guess Doc loved them too because he finished those off as well! Seriously what is wrong with that man? He said it's not his fault that I am suddenly craving all the food he loves.

Finally I have traded in my prenatal for Flintstones Vitamins. Twice this weekend I forgot to take my prenatal and twice this weekend I felt better than I have in months. I know it's not the best idea to stop taking them all together so now I am taking 2 Flintstones Vitamins before bed and feeling so much better when I wake up. The folic acid and iron are about the same and the rest I think are comparable so I am not worried. It's just nice to feel almost human again.

That's pretty much it. Oh and here is a little something I created this morning at work...I was bored!

When my dad took his last trip to the camp ground in Plymouth, MA it was just him and A's dad, he told him the theme for that summer should be "Shout the good news." Being a campground run by the Episcopal Church who welcomed everyone there wasn't a better theme. Even though my father didn't make it to that summer A's dad carried on and did his part to be sure that through our grief we all remembered to shout the good news.

It's a great thing when your best friend's father and your father are also amazing friends. They were brothers within the church and brothers in life, when one veered off track the other was there to help them find their way. I know my dad misses spending time with A's dad but he's going to have to wait for quite some time before they are reunited in paradise. Yesterday's surgery was a success. The doctors are confident then got all the cancer and now it's time to recover.

Now it's my turn to shout the good news. Praise God! I love you A and when you get back home from Nashville be sure to give you dad a big hug from me.

So it looks like Doc and I have to figure out a way to go to the ball at the end of the month. We need to come up with a deposit for the new house so money is pretty tight right now which sucks but it's manageable. Doc thinks the ball is going to cost us like $300 but I think he's crazy. I can find a cheap dress, honestly why would I want to spend a lot on a dress right now? I am so fat and bloated! Apparently Doc is pregnant too because he is pretty sure that his Class As aren't going to fit him. Grrrrrrrr He does have a beer belly from leave so we'll see, I will make him try them on after work. I really really really don't want to have to buy him a new set, before we know it we are going to have to shell out hundreds of dollars on dress blues!

Oh he's also fighting me about his shirt, I told him he needs a white shirt and bow tie and he things he can wear his green shirt...formal wear is the white shirt dude! 4 years in the army and he's only worn his Class As twice, Basic Graduation and AIT graduation and neither one of those is considered formal.

I am glad he's being pressured into going, 4 years as an army wife and I've never been to a ball! I just hope I can find something cheap that wont make me look like a beached whale. I don't think I will even look pregnant, I will just look fat. :(

Think this girl will let me borrow her dress?