Starting on a new Journey

I have decided to give bzzagent.com a chance and review items they ask me to do campaigns for. :) Today I was offered my first campaign. Its for the new Hill Science Diet Ideal Brand. I'm not normally someone to feed my pet Hills brand but after some research it seems as if it may be a decent dog food. So I will be blogging as I go along about how Miss Charlee does on it and how she enjoys it. And trust me she is very vocal about if she likes her food or not. :)

All so head over to petmd.com/mybowl

I havent blogged for a bit

A lot of new interesting things have happened. Okay maybe not a lot and not interesting but things have happened since my last blog. :)

Edward turned 3 on Oct 24. I cant believe it. He's getting to be such a big boy these days. He weighs in at over 30lbs FINALLY and stands just about 3ft tall. Anthony was the one who took him to the Dr's which is why I don't know 100%. lol He is a very intelligent little man. He can count to 10 and knows his abc's. He may not like to do it when he thinks you are listening but he does. He has recently learned to zip his own coat. Its so cute watching him do it. His vocabulary is impressive. We sit and can have conversations with one another. This time last year he knew maybe 50 words and was not understandable 90% of the time. He's becoming quite the boy. He LOVES Thomas and Friends, Batman, Spiderman, okay all super hero's, Cars, climbing trees. If you think boys love it then he probably does. His imagination grows daily too.

Lilliana is a growing weed too. The dr was concerned with her weight at her last appt and I knew it was a ridiculous concern. She was simply between a growth spurt. :) Little girl is up to 22lbs and is 30 inches tall. Yes still "small" compared to her peers maybe but perfect in my eyes. :) She is still rear facing in her car seat and wouldn't have it any other way. We are hoping she makes it to 3 rf'ing at least. Her vocab is amazing also. I never believed it when they said girls do things faster. Well she has probably a vocab of 75 words that she attempts to use and is putting 2 words together from time to time. Thats where Edward was last Christmas! I'm shocked.

Anthony is "deployed" right now to Romania for a few more days. He basically wont be home until Christmas Leave because of training. :( The kids both miss Daddy like Crazy and he misses them. Lil brought me my cell phone this morning and said "tak Dadda" :( Broke my heart. I miss that man too but it takes a bigger tole on the kids. Dont get me wrong I miss him like crazy but I can cope better than the kids.

Me well I'm just happy we have been able to save up as much money as we have for leave. Lets just say we will be living pretty for the those two weeks and hopefully coming home with some money to spare. :) I have learned how to budget like a mad woman and live off as little money as possible. Its amazing how little we actually do need to survive.

Oh and some pictures of the kiddo's I took today. Arent they precious!?!?

Back to the States!

Tony and I have decided that we are going home for Christmas! YAY! This came on because of the deployment but I'm not going to turn it down. When we got orders for Germany we said we weren't going home for 3 years. I used to think I was okay with that but I'm missing home. Iowa and Cali. I miss our families. I miss the convenience of going to wal-mart at 2 am if I needed something for one of us and not having to wait until the next day. I miss some fast food places(wendy's, hardees/carls jr, Arbys, Dunkin Donuts). I miss Dollar Stores, ordering in food, not getting looked at like a freak when I try to remember how to say something correctly.

I go tomorrow to SATO (travel agency on post) to buy our tickets! Tony reserved our rental cars today. Only thing left to do is SAVE SAVE SAVE until Dec! Its a good thing the kids presents have already been purchased or we wouldnt be able to save much. We are attempting to pay for everything in cash. If we can stick to our budget we should "hopefully" have plenty saved. I have us on a TIGHT budget. We literally will have no money for extras at all but it will be worth it in the end. I only have grocery (basically if it comes from the commissary) money, gas, bills and 20 for "blow" money the rest is going into savings. Its going to be tough but I know we can do it. We will take about 300 out of that for Eddies birthday and pictures that we had done. Otherwise nothing is being spent. Pray for us that we are able to do this.

I am going to search for coupons for things we want to do while at home to help save us money. We are going to search for free things to do too. That way we do not blow through everything we save. I hope that we can do this. I may go nuts not leaving post for almost 3 months but I know I can do it and that it will be worth it.

Preparing Once Again

Today we got the official word that Tony will be going down range with the next company leaving. ON Tuesday he makes the switch from the Scout Platoon over. Its scary to think that he's leaving soon. I dont want him to be put in Dangers way again. I secretly thank God that he had his allergy attack back in June and that he's not there right now. I just dont think I'm gonna get that lucky two times in a row. I know this is his job and I know I knew that when I married him. It still doesnt make the preparing any easier or the worry any less.

I have a few months to prepare but most of that time he will be gone training. In the next couple months he will be going to Romania for a one month deployment, will have a field op for one month and various other trainings. So basically from here on out he is not going to be around.

I am worried on how this will affect the kids. They are complete Daddy's kids. They admire him so much. Lilli and Eddie both run to the door as soon as they hear the key in the keyhole jiggling around, screaming "Daddy home". They love rough housing with him and I stink at it so I know that they both will miss it.

I ask that each one of you pray for Tony and a safe deployment and to pray for all of the soldiers who are fighting every day for our freedom. These guys put themselves out there so we stay safe everyday. They choose to do this as we choose to do our jobs that don't put us in the same danger as them. Please keep them in your prayers.

Potty Trained! YAY!

Edward is 100% potty trained! YAY! I'm so proud of my little man. He still has a few accidents here and there but he's trained. He's been pee and night time trained for MONTHS now but just decided to poo on the potty lately. He's growing up and I cant believe it. When did I give him permission to be a BIG boy? In just 2.5 months he'll be 3! He's not a baby at all anymore. I miss baby Eddie. lol

Its been a while...(a crapload of photos!)

Since I last blogged. Anthony has been on leave since just before the 4th so we've been busy. We went to Berlin for 5 days and had a blast, and have done other little things here and there. We've grown closer as a family and as couple. Its amazing how little time we take on a day to day basis to do stuff as a family until we take a vacation. Anthony goes back from Leave on Monday which is going to Suck. I've gotten used to his presence around the house.
While in Berlin we went to the Berlin Zoo, Lego Land Discovery Center, on a Bus Tour of Berlin and the Technical Museam. Nothing horribly fancy but something the kids enjoyed everyday. The Zoo was AMAZING. Its one of the oldest zoo's maybe it is the oldest zoo. I cant remember right off hand. lol IT had a 3 story Aquarium attached to it. Both were amazing. I want to go back and do the zoo again next year. Yup I liked it that much. LegoLand was a bit overpriced for what they had but the kids had fun which is all that matters. They did have some pretty darn good pretzels though. haha (if you dont know German Pretzels are way better then anything you can get in the states. lol) The bus tour took us all around Berlin. We were able to see pieces of the Wall and see where the wall once stood. There are still bits of the wall left standing but we were unable to get out and look at it since it was pouring down rain at that stop. We just couldnt take the kids out in the dog sized rain drops. lol We also say the American Embasy which is right across from the Holocaust Memorial. I got chills when we visited the Memorial. It also hit a few other sights in Berlin. It was a nice relaxing way to cover a lot of ground in a short period of time. And Eddie Loved the technical museum. They had tons of trains, planes and boats. Every little boys favorite things! LoL They also had a section on Photography, which if you know me you know why that was exciting for me. I would lie if I said I didnt LOVE that section of the place. haha
While in Berlin we were able to experience food from Australia (Kangaroo is actually really tasty! lol), Argitina (sp), American, and Mexican. Strangely enough we didnt eat anything German really. Maybe something for lunch one day. We found Starbucks and I had my first Strawberry and Cream Frap in over a year! It was HEAVEN! I also found out there are 243 Dunkin Donuts in Berlin. And I didnt get any because I was never hungry when we walked by the few by our hotel. Some other time. lol The guys (Anthony and our friend Josh) went out drinking nearly every night and had a wonderful time.
Before we left on leave, the 4th I believe, we went to a skeet range at a base near us. I shot a weapon for the very first time EVER! I didnt hit any skeets but I shot a weapon. lol Also on the 4th we went up to the freedon fest on base. Nothing fantastic but the kids had tons of fun. Isnt that all that matters in life?
Here are some photos from Berlin! Theres like 30ish out of like 300+ I took. I cant narrow it down more.
A Berlin Bum....
Eddie In Legoland
Lil in Legoland

Gonna go with smaller sizes for the rest. Check out my flicker for the full size


there was a group of Art Students sketching at the zoo



Pieces of the Berlin Wall

Starbucks! Honestly I've never wanted something so much in my life! LMAO



Holocaust Memorial

Germany's President Palace


Technical Museum

Our Good Friend Josh

Has ended his backpacking trip through Europe at our house. He got here Tuesday night from Praque and is staying with us until the 10th when he flies out of Berlin where we are going on monday for vacation. He was Anthony's Medic back at Ft Drum and is a GREAT young man. We are truely blessed to have him as a friend and to have him here visiting us. The kids absolutely LOVE the kid. He is Eddie's newest "bes fiend" (best friend) He loves to play cars, rawr and all those boys things with him. Its like the two havent missed a day in the last 1.5 years that we've been seperated from him. We took him to our favorite Mexican place tonight and to do a small tour of Regensberg. (ok they guys were drunk and I didnt take a stroller so it was short walk lol)

Here are a few pics of tonight. I will probably not post again til after vacation next week. Too much is going on. lol

My yummy Eis tonight! Germans make the best deserts!

My hunnies and Josh!

Walking

St Peters Cathedrail. (They are restoring it from a fire)

Josh at dinner.

Lilliana Walking (VID)

I was able to get this short video of Lilliana walking to me earlier.

Such a goof and Lilli update!

This is what happens when I tell Edward to let me take a nice picture of him. The kid doesnt like nice pictures being taken of him at all. He thinks it funny to be silly. All I wanted was a semi nice photo for our wall that was updated. I guess I'll have to try again later this week. I just hope it gets nicer outside. I'm sick of overcast's or rain. Here are some others from todays trip outside. Our first semidecent morning in awhile. The afternoon ended up beautiful before the rain started tonight but alas I didnt take my camera outside with me then. lol

Sissy's favorite thing to do at the playground. Swing. She'll do it all day long if you let her.

This child was just so excited to see Daddy when he came home for lunch. This is the first time in awhile Anthony felt well enough to join us outside for a bit. So we had a picnic lunch.

Just playing on his "Orage" dog. lol (if you cant tell its not a dog. Its like a deer or something along those lines)

Swinging some more. See she loves it!

He loves going down the slides!

AND for the big Lilli update. She decided this evenign that walking is WAY cooler then crawling! She is still crawling but there is deffinatly more walking going on. Its not even just to things she really wants anymore. Its a mode of transpertation! YAY! I will attempt to get a video of her walking tomorrow but we are going to go look at getting me a new car! (YAY YAY YAY!) Hopefully I will remember to take the camera with me EVERYWHERE so I can catch her if she does it.

Our newest Girl!

Her name is Ferra and she's a ferret. I got her for Anthony for an early anniversary gift. If you know anything about me I do not like anything that slightly could resemble a rat. lol I do have to admit she's a sweetie. She's won all of our hearts over. Our neighbor rescued her but couldnt keep her as she was allergic. So I bought her off of her. She was hardly played with at her last home and is loving being able to run about as she wishes (for the most part anyways.) She loves to hide things in typical Ferret fashion. Its adorable to watch her as she thinks we arent watching. She is a toe licker and perfers Daddy's toes the most. Isnt she pretty?

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