Happy New Year!

It's New Year's Eve and it is my last night on the mainland. My sister keeps asking me how I am feeling, but it is hard to explain, it just seems normal to me, moving around and all. I think she is looking for more of an emotional reaction like "I'm going to miss it here" or "I'm scared" or "I can't wait!" And all of those things are true to some degree I suppose (well... I won't miss it here... just our friends and family!), but to me moving half way around the world doesn't seem that odd or like something to get all emotional over. Sure I am excited to discover a new place that is a little out of the ordinary compared to my East coast life, but I have so much to do when I get there I haven't really had time to think about laying on the beach soaking up the sun in paradise (although I plan to do my fair share of that!). Plus, I am one of those people that it just takes awhile for things to sink in. After I've been there for a couple months I'll probably realize "ok, I really live here..."

Anyway, enough of that... I really got on here to post a couple holiday pictures and wish everyone a happy and safe New Year!

This is the whole gang that went to Deep Creek with Sam's family in this tiny 6-lane bowling alley somewhere in Western Maryland. They drive and hour every year to go to this place because it is always so much fun. This was my and Sam's first year.

My family took us out to dinner at Sakura, this Japenese hibachi place when we got back from vacation with Sam's family. It was sooo yummy! There's nothing like good hibachi with good company!

I hope all of you are ringing in the New Year with loved ones. Sadly Sam is working (surprise, surprise), but I will be visiting some good friends and then spending the rest of the evening with my family and my doggies :-)

Merry Christmas!

I hope all of you had a wonderful Christmas and enjoyed time with family and friends. This was our first Christmas apart. Sam volunteered to stand duty Christmas day in order to get several days off after Christmas. It wasn't as bad as I imagined it would be. I had a lovely day with our families and Sam had an easy duty day complete with a gourmet Christmas meal on the boat. Since we are in the middle of a move and all our stuff has been sent with the movers and everything we have fits into 3 suit cases we didn't expect much in the way of presents because everyone knew we couldn't have anything! But, our families were overly generous as usual and now I don't know how I will get all these things to Hawaii with me! I was particularly excited about the GPS system Sam's parents gave me to help me navigate our new home in Hawaii. I was also thrilled that my mom found the particular linen hemstitched napkins I have been wanting to go with our china and had them monogramed for us. My sister says I have definitely become and "old person" because I get excited over napkins!

Here are a couple pics from the Christmas day festivities at my parents house.


Even Bella and Winston were feeling festive in their red Christmas sweaters!

Sam flew down to MD the day after Christmas so we could go with his family out to Deep Creek Lake for their annual after Christmas ski vacation. The night we arrived Sam went with his brother and cousins out skiing in the pouring rain! I opted to read by the fire :-) Since then not much skiing has been going on... it has been unusually warm and as you will see in the following pictures from our hike to the falls, it was even warm enough for me to wear short sleeves!

Tomorrow we will be heading back to my parents house and then Sam flys back to NH the following day to stand duty on New Year's Eve. As for me, I am getting pretty excited/anxious about my move to Hawaii New Year's Day!

Take care everyone and have a wonderful New Year!

Moving

It's time for us to be moving along again! I can't say I'm sorry to leave New Hampshire behind, although I will miss some of the wonderful people I have met here. This will be our third military move (well 5th if you count the 3 months in CT and 6 months in MD) and so far it has definitely been the worst! For the past 2 weeks not a day has gone by that something unexpected (generally bad) has happened either with moving plans, our apartment complex, or Sam's boat schedule. I don't feel to stressed out about anything but I know the stress is lurking somewhere underneath the surface of my psyche just waiting to rear it's ugly head when I've gotten just one too many "surprises." On top of the many unwelcome surpises, Sam has been at work and unreachable for pretty much the entire process so I am left to deal with anything that may come up on my own.

Today was December 9th. There is a big banner hanging on Sam's submarine with the departure date of the sub. According to the banner they should have left today. Where are they you might ask? Still tied up to the pier. When will they actually leave you might ask? As of today, not for at least another month. Now you might think that is good news... that they will be "home" over Christmas... but you would be wrong... they will be working straight through Christmas, at least the nukes will be.

Anyway, it is good to have the household goods move over with. Our movers came Friday and Monday and now we have nothing but the 3 suitcases I have for my flight to Hawaii in a few weeks. It will be good to get out of this awful apartment complex in less than a week and go home and see my family, even though Sam can't come.

This has been a crazy couple of weeks but I can honestly say that I LOVE this life! I love being a military spouse and I love moving and getting to experience new places. I even love the challenge of dealing with everything on my own. I have a silly sense of pride that I have not lost it and have remained calm and flexible throughout this move so far. I know I have even bigger challenges ahead (shipping the car, shipping the dogs, finding a place to live in HI, buying a car, starting student teaching, accepting our HHG and dealing with damages, etc) but at the end of this move, if I have not lost my mind, I will be a stronger and better person for having done it.

Think of us these next few weeks! We hope to be able to spend a little time together over the holidays and would love if Sam were able to get a few days off to come home and see his family. All the guys working hard on Sam's sub could use prayers as well... they are working very long hours and many will not get to see their families this Christmas season.