Finally! I found the camera battery charger.

Trying very hard not to smile, and showing off his huge eyelashes at the same time.



Still trying not to smile.


As soon as the camera comes out, these girls go a little nuts.

I told them to hug, and they did, but they were so eager to pose on their own that the hug only lasted 2 seconds.

Um.... yeah.



And a cheesy grin.



And this beautiful girl decided to arrive at a milestone yesterday. Can you tell what's new?


Here's a different angle....

Limbo again

Man is officially discharged from the hospital after an extended outpatient treatment. However, he isn't going back to his job at all, so in the mean time his job is to go to all of his appointments and otherwise keep in touch with his command. He may get to do some sort of internship to keep him busy once they figure out which unit in which to put him, and he may actually have another opportunity to attend school this fall. If he does get to do school again or even hang out half the day on Tuesdays and Thursdays, that would definitely make my fall life easier as I wouldn't have to find childcare. No official word on the medboard yet but we're told that we're "almost done" with that process. We'll have a chance to appeal once their decision comes back, but we're not sure what decision we'd really be happy with and whether to fight.

In the mean time, I'm going to go take some stress out on the gym.

Everyone's got somewhere to go

If we don't hear about the medboard before I start school, things will start rolling along for a few months in a new pattern: I'll have school on Tuesdays and Thursdays, the three older kids will have school 5 days a week, Freida will go to child care while I'm at school, and Man will have doctors appointments and office work. We'll all have some place to go.

I kind of thought that this sort of arrangement would happen just a little later in life, when Freida would be old enough to attend school full time. I've long wanted some occupation outside the home and it suits my temperament extremely well. But I just thought my youngest would be older.

I tell myself that it's only for 10 hours a week, and that she isn't even fully potty trained yet (much to my chagrin this morning, I tell you) but we're moving into a new phase of life where each of us, for a significant portion of each week, will have their own life outside the family. It's healthy to have some time apart. It's liberating and enlightening and I wouldn't have it any other way. But of course I feel some loss as I think back to when the older two kids were tiny, or even when the younger two were more tiny. Then I start to understand why people get themselves small pets. There are some seriously strong hormones released when a small, warm body cuddles lovingly on your chest.

Maybe I'll feel a grand huzzah when Thing 4 finally potty trains completely. Maybe I won't feel a wrench when my last baby grows accustomed to day care and no longer cries when I leave her. Maybe I'll head off to school but take a moment before starting the engine to sit and thoroughly recall the smell of newborn and the wonder of that first yawn, struggling all over again in amazement that their little heads could be cupped comfortably in the palm of my hand.

Right now I shake myself all over and look up at the sparkling blue eyes that want a bite of my breakfast and to tell me a story about Princess Peach and Luigi. Moving forward feels so slow and awkward for them still. Oh, they'll know better in time.

Limbo -- not a graceful place to exist

The past four years have taught me that waiting for life to happen is a sure way to waste precious time. My second semester of college looms before me when I could have taken online classes at any time over the past 9 years and maybe had a degree by now. I could have made and retained any number of friends if only I had been bold enough to reach out and feel a little more comfortable with myself.

There is nothing like tremendous personal discomfort to force someone to define their own identity.

Yesterday, Man spent several hours getting papers signed both here and at Walter Reed to get into something called the Warrior Transition Unit. The idea behind this unit to provide a place for wounded warriors to be accountable to the Army while still being able to go to their many appointments. Since Man now goes to half a dozen appointments per week, they've decided they're not going to get much real work out of him and it'd be best to put him in this unit until things are looking up for him.

We got the unofficial findings at his big Med Board hearing from a few months ago, wherein he was found unfit for duty. Now, it being unofficial, we're not quite packing yet. Especially since they said his level of depression was "medically acceptable," something with which we and his doctors don't agree. This means that we'll need to appeal if his level of disability is based purely on shoulder pain, and that could lengthen this process by a few months. Since we're so close to the finish line on the main portion of the medboard, I'm not sure whether to plan for school anymore, though.

Regardless of what's going on in the next few months, I'm taking delight in purging our closets and cupboards. There is a big pile of crap that has accumulated in the back portion of my house. It has now doubled and moved to the living room, awaiting the day Man will actually let me keep the van so I can go dispose of it at a thrift store. My room is now clear of the boxes through which I was pawing. My real treasures are safely stashed and my trash is prepared for jettison.

Princess is almost done with Harry Potter, has recently begun a new counted cross stitch project, and has moved her clothing from the Kid Clothing Collective by the laundry room to keep all of her possessions in her room. She's growing up a little more and turning her room slowly into the nest some adolescents prefer.

Tag has made a new friend! This time he found the son of a master chief petty officer. Hah! It's funny what friends your kid makes in a mixed rank neighborhood.

I guess that's it for now. I'm going to be posting a but more in the recipe blog now that I have five new Muses to keep me on track, thanks to my brother, parents, Uncle Jim, and E-mealz (low carb plan).

The reward for honesty

We were at the Commissary today. Tag happened to find a small pile of folded bills on the ground. He picked them up, told me about them, and we took a look. There were three bills totalling $7. I said "well, we'll have to find customer service and turn them in." He said "wait, can I just give it to the guy who dropped them? He's right down there." I smiled, gave my approval and quietly followed him to watch his progress down the aisle. It was just crowded enough that I couldn't see the exact person to whom he ran, but I watch Tag's ecstatic face as he raced back to me, waving the dollar the kind man had given him as a reward for his honesty. Oooo, he made some big plans for that dollar. He wanted to save it to buy a motorcycle, or save it just so he could have a million more just like it. It ended up getting exchanged for a churro at Costco though. Honesty is so sweet.

Growing

I'm officially registered for fall classes! The next English class, next math class, developmental psychology, and sociology. It's 13 credit hours again, but none of them are online and I've arranged them to be only two days a week. I've got child care all lined up for Pebbles and some great prospects for Freida. She's only going to be watched for 10 hours a week, and there are a lot of child care givers who work from home on post.

A friend of ours, known on the interwebs as Sammy Sasquatch, told us that the movie trailer over which we were drooling, The Last Airbender, is based on a cartoon series called Avatar: The Last Airbender. Guess what we've been doing with our summer vacation? That's right. We've just finished the second season while folding Mt. Washmore.

Man's progress continues to be slow. He is occasionally taking sleeping pills when his pain gets so bad that he ends up with four hours of tortured rest at night, but half of one pill had him flat on his back for 14 hours last night. He's going to be moving to something called the Warrior Transition Unit, a unit that allows him to get some work done, but also to have the flexibility to get to all of the many appointments he has to go to. He just started weekly acupuncture which helped only slightly the first time, but is expected to help more as he continues to go.

My therapy seems to be going well. My therapist is very good at keeping me on task and validating my small but significant successes. For some reason it's been difficult to work up any projects around the house except for purging possessions and keeping bedrooms even remotely clean. All I've done is acquire some new pizza screens (here's an example of one) to make pizza and other bread items that would really like to have a crispy lower crust. The pizza stone is nice for any bread product, really, but sometimes bread with a large lower surface area has difficulty crisping before the top is overdone. It works pretty well, even on the grill. It makes grilling the pizza a lot easier to manage since lack of direct contact with the grill slows cooking time from 1 minute to 3-4 minutes, giving us time to actually melt the cheese and grill pepperoni or veggies as toppings. During the hot summer, there's nothing like grilled pizza to fill young bellies while keeping the house cool.

Princess is on the seventh Harry Potter book, Deathly Hallows. She had a rough start since she doesn't like learning all of those crazy long names (Dumbledore, MacGonagal, Hermione) and even now has some funny ways of seeing things. The Triwizard tournament became the Twizzard tournament, and Hermione is Hermain as far as she says it, but that doesn't get in the way of her story comprehension. Now I just need to think of what to get for her next. Her drawings are still amazing to me.

Tag plays with friends like no tomorrow. He loves the Avatar cartoon but goes out as often as possible to make friends and play, especially now that one of his friends has a trampoline. He surprises me all the time with how well he reads, too, but he just doesn't like to do it for extended periods of time. His greatest ambition is to collect enough money to buy an ice cream from the ice cream truck.

Pebbles' personality is taking a very goofy turn. Her hands have become her "hand spiders" who talk in a rather high pitched voice about tickling people. When her hand gets hurt she says "awww, the hand spider got squished!" She has taken to building forts out of any materials at hand, including a rather clever arrangement of pillows and blankets on the couch.

Freida is potty training. I kept thinking "well, the rest of them trained at about 2.5 years old, so I've got time." And then I realized that she was already 2.5 and had no inclination to train. A few weeks later, we're pretty close. The next step is to be able to wear pants again without wetting them, followed by having dry nights. She does swimmingly well (haha) with a bare bottom throughout the day, even cleaning her little potty seat herself.

Our summer has been a pretty decent break. We've been home bound for most of it but it has been very nice to spend time with the kids. I'm surprised all over again how interesting it can be to have a conversation with them about any random topic. Sometimes I feel like a great teacher, explaining and showing. Other times I can't believe my total ignorance on a topic. They sure do keep me on my toes.

More bonsai.

Some sort of bushy, ground-covery plant that I absolutely loved. There was no sign saying what it was.


I love these bonsai that are little scenes. The individual plants are brilliant and lovely, but these just transport me into a moment of total peace.


This looks like a squatting person to me.


This was brilliant. The spires that are taller than the canopy made it look majestic.




This was the oldest bonsai on display. Click on the picture below it to see it larger and check out the date.

We went to the National Arboretum today. They had an amazing bonsai display.


This little guy is over 100 years old:




Notice the little man on the bottom left.






This is a room in one of the indoor exhibits near the bonsai displays.


I loved the different colors of wood on this one.

There was a coi pond with a little coi food dispenser nearby. The kids had fun feeding them right from their cupped hands.



One area had a showcase where every state tree had its own little spot. This was home to the picnic grounds. A long wall had plaques representing each tree. I took pictures of each state I've lived in.





More pictures to come. I'm totally beat.

(note: edited to change "bonzai" to "bonsai".)