Wikipedia

I saw this on someone else's blog and thought it looked like fun. Here are the directions:

Go to Wikipedia and do a search for your birthday (day and month only, exclude the year).

Post three facts, two births and one death on your blog including the years.

Here are my results (October 8):

Facts:
1582 - Due to the implementation of the Gregorian calendar this day does not exist in this year in Italy, Poland, Portugal and Spain.
1918 - World War I - In the Argonne Forest in France, United States Corporal Alvin C. York almost single-handedly kills 25 German soldiers and captures 132.
2004 - Martha Stewart goes to jail.

Births:
1938 - Walter Gretzky, father of Wayne Gretzky
1970 - Matt Damon, American actor

Death:
1944 - Wendell Willkie, American politician and Presidential candidate (b. 1892)

Happy Father's Day

This is a Happy Father's Day wish to all of the dads out there. For those of you who can't be with your families today, know that they are thinking about you especially today.

We were able to spend this special day with P.'s dad, and I'm very thankful for that. I'm glad that we'll have a couple of years that we'll be able to spend Father's Day with him. My dad passed away almost three years ago. I sure did miss being able to spend some time with him for Father's Day today. I just pray that he knows how much I was thinking about him today. I have some great pictures of him that I will have to try to share later after our household goods get here. I count my blessings so often that he was able to spend a couple of weeks with us just before he died.

Those of you who still have your dads with you, please be sure to let them know how much you appreciate them.

Update

Gosh, I'm so far behind it's not even funny. Been so busy trying to get as settled as I possibly can before our household goods get here that I haven't had much time to do the things I'd like to do.

P. left last Sunday to go TDY for three weeks for school. Fortunately, the school is in SC and is only about a 2 hour drive. Even as close as it is, it's still hard when he's not here. At least he's able to come home for the weekends though. Wednesday the kids and I moved into our house because some of the new furniture we bought was delivered. So at least we don't have to sit or sleep on the floor.

I started my new job yesterday, and my college classes started back on the 6th. So I've been really busy. I know I can handle it, because I was doing the same in Germany. The difference is that here I'm working from home, so can be here for my kids. Once I get back into the swing of things I'll be ok.

Hopefully as my schedule levels out some I'll be able to keep up with this blog a bit better. I'm still going to post the pictures I promised a few weeks ago. Now that I'm at my own house with my high speed internet, maybe I'll get them uploaded soon.

My Car

I don't know if I've mentioned it here before, but P. and I bought a new Volvo a few months before we left Germany. We shipped it out the week before our household goods were picked up. I called the local dealership where it was being delivered yesterday just to find out whether they had any information about it. This morning I got a call from the gentleman there that handles the overseas shipments. My car arrived at the dealership yesterday!! According to the time estimate that the shipping agent gave us, it was about a week early. I was able to pick it up this afternoon. Call me shallow, but that phone call just made my day. The kids were pretty excited too. :-) Having my car here makes it feel a little more like home. I guess we're one step closer to getting settled. Of course I had to take it and show it off to my mom!

I know I promised pictures from our visit with P.'s brother. My mom's dial-up connection is way too slow. Next time I'm over at our house I'll get them posted.

Little Washington

FINALLY! As I promised, here is the post about our visit with P's brother and his wife, along with pictures.

P.'s brother and his wife live in Washington, NC. P.'s mom calls it "Little Washington." We went to visit them a couple weekends ago. P.'s brother is a contractor, so he has done the work on their new house himself, with help from his dad. They've done a beautiful job, although they're not quite finished yet. It is a beautiful house, and their lot is in a neighborhood on the river.

Sunday we went out on their boat for a while. We went out and did a little fishing. The kids didn't really have the patience to do that for very long though. After that, we went to one of the little islands in the river to let the kids swim for a while. They really enjoyed that. We had found some bathing suits that had "floaties" built in to them. These gave them the confidence to get out and swim without hampering them the way that arm floaties do. J.'s pretty scared of water in anything bigger than a bathtub or small pool. While the kids were swimming, P. and his brother found a mussel bed. They decided to dig for mussels, and got more than enough for us to have with dinner. I think they had as much fun doing that as the kids had swimming. Aahhh, the little things. Here are some photos:

Getting ready to ride in Uncle J.'s boat

Zooming down the river...P. told J. to hold onto his sunglasses so they didn't fly off his face...probably a good idea.

J. and A. swimming and having a good time.

Princess A. - My little ham!

P. and his brother J. adding a mussel to their bag.

Busy, Busy!

With everything else we've had going on for the last two weeks, I just can't seem to find time for all the things I'd LIKE to do, like keeping up with my blog. I know in my last post I talked about how we had only been in the States for five days. Well, now it's been two weeks and it seems like we've been here longer because we've been so very busy!

The best news I have right now is that we found a house! It is adorable and I just love the way it's laid out. It's pretty funny, though, because I stand in that house looking around and comparing it to the house we just left in Germany. Those of you who know me and visited my home there know just how much room I had. Although it's a big house - about 2000 square feet - I'm still wondering how I'm going to get all my stuff in there. Oh well, we'll figure it out. I love the community; it seems to be really quiet. It's very comforting to know that my kids will be able to get out and ride their bikes without having to worry about traffic. The day we went to look at the house for the first time, we were there for about a half hour, and I think I only saw one car drive by the whole time. So we went ahead and signed the lease for it, although we haven't moved in just yet. Why stay in the house with no furniture when I can stay at my mom's until we have our stuff?

I got our electric and water turned on the day after we signed the lease. The same company handles all the utilities in our neighborhood, so I'll only have one bill for everything. That will be really nice. I got our cable and internet connected last week (priorities, you know), and my phone will be connected tomorrow.

We found out yesterday that the transportation office in Vilseck screwed up - imagine that! They didn't read P.'s orders as thoroughly as they should have and missed that his pinpoint assignment was already on there. He's assigned to a Battalion which is in Raleigh, but the Company is in Fayetteville. They sent our household goods to the military base that services the Raleigh area instead of to Fort Bragg. The transportation office here is trying to catch our shipment at the port so they can divert it. If they're unable to do that, then we're going to be waiting even longer for our things to get here. I know people make mistakes, but it's incredibly frustrating because P. specifically told them and pointed out that we were coming to Fayetteville. Oh well. We'll manage.

We spent this past weekend with P.'s brother and his wife. I'll make a new post for that one and share some photos.