He is home.

Life just does not seem normal at all when he is not here. I try my best to maintain normalcy for the kids. He was gone for 8 months. No matter what I do to try and make up for it there is no getting around the fact that things are so very very different when he is gone.

But the reality of it is when he comes home there is no perfect home coming. It takes work to acclimate. Right now we are still working on it.

One thing I really want to work on is getting back into the groove of this blog and back into the groove of Snapfish!! Pictures and stories are so important! And if we really do move to England I am going to want to make sure everything we do there is documented and shared properly. So back into the groove I go!!

Build A Bear

OK this has to be the best activity we did the whole time we were with Jason!! The hotel we were at was right next to the mall. So we took the girls clothes shopping and saw that they had a Build A Bear!!! We don't have one near us. When I saw that they do voice chips I knew we had to do this for Cameron!! We spent allot of time figuring out different ways to make this separation easier. This will be perfect!!

Another small bit of back story. Cameron's favorite book is 'Going on a Bear Hunt' Jason read it to him every night before bed. So when we knew we were going to get Cameron a bear it worked out that Jason read the first few lines of Cameron favorite book. So when Cameron pushes the button on the bear it has Jason reading 'We're going on a bear hunt we're going to catch a big one what a beautiful day we're not scared' Cameron LOVES it!!

But let's start building the bear!

Picking out our friend.

Playing dead! LOL

No screaming no head banging but he likes to do this when things aren't going his way. He didn't quite get why we were making him do this.

He makes me laugh.

Stuffing the bear! Now he is finding this fun!!

Picking out our bears heart! It was so cute he kissed the heart before he gave it to her but of course we couldn't capture that moment!!

Washing our bear!!

Picking out the bears outfit. When we went in we were going to dress it as a military bear but Jason wasn't to excited about the uniform they had. So we kept it simple with shorts and a t-shirt. Daddy has been known to wear those too.

At the dressing room.

Making it's birth certificate. Cameron named him all by himself. It is affectionately known as Daddy Bear.

So sweet!!

The girl told us that the voice chip was good for about 1000 plays. We actually got nervous after 2 days!! LOL Cameron loves to hear his Daddy's voice. And even though it has been a couple of weeks since we made Daddy Bear Cameron still loves to listen to it. Which is thanks enough to us for taking him and getting the bear made!

Bowling for Buzzards

Well it has been two weeks since the kids and I traveled to North Carolina to visit Jason and I am finally getting on here! Since I need to spend most of my time preparing pictures to share I will keep my typing to a minimum!

Recently we learned that Cameron thinks a bowling alley is pretty cool. So I put that on my mental list of activities to do with Jason during our visit!

Help from the girls.

What good form!!

Plotting out her next move!

Mouth full of cookies!

Jason helping out because the method Josie showed him seemed a bit scary. You know the chuck it down the aisle method? Let's try rolling......we roll the heavy bowling ball!

Josie is not impressed with this method.

Obligatory pose!

Matching profiles. Poor Josie.

Hannah looks so different!! She is having fun trying out different looks. And being my kid you knew it was going ot happen!!

Our babies.

I had to throw this one in because Cam's face makes me giggle. Bossing Josie around is hard work!!

The weather for the weekend we visited was horrible!! Freezing rains for almost 2 days straight. So finding a nice indoor activity for the whole family was nice.

More to come!!

the Hunt

The lone hunter stalking his prey.

Waiting for the right moment, he pounces on the unsuspecting clover.
After a gruesome display of predatory carnage, the hunter lifts his kill in triumph!


(Close-up of carnage--viewer descretion)

And like most young predators, he takes his kill back to his mommy for praise.

(p.s. you all know I didn't write this. This is ALL Jason. He makes me laugh.)

Uber Cool!!!

Jason can be so freaking cool sometimes!! I have always loved it when his artistic side comes out. With him it is pretty much a daily basis. I never get bored of it. But when he comes up with something new I am always pleasantly surprised! We went to the beach yesterday, another blog about it next, and Jason started drawing in the sand.

It took him awhile but this is the masterpiece he came up with!!

A amazingly cool maze for Cameron, and all the other kiddos, to go through!! Cameron LOVED it!!

Isn't Jason so cool?

100% MAN !!!!

Happy Birthday Jason! 35 years old!!

A few gray hairs on the side of the head now. A wee bit extra around the tummy line. And he goes to bed much earlier then he used to.

But he is still a computer nerd. Still doodling all the time. Still a reader. Still a metal head!


Back on to the hardcore face! Grandma Ann doesn't like it!!

Back in the day this pose would be obvious. Now it just looks like he is sticking his gut out ;) Thank goodness he doesn't read my blog!



How can this one NOT be on the next Air Force recruitment poster!?!?

The Magnum of course ;)

Rock on Jason!! Here's hoping you have at least another 35 years!Tomorrow we are going to celebrate with dinner and his favorite eclair dessert!

Little Drummer Boy

Prepare yourself for a whole lotta randomness. This what happens when I get stuck in the house!! When I am sitting in my Princess chair I can see Jason's drafting desk. I love it when he sits there! Such a serious face. Right now as I type I can't remember what he was drawing. But I am pretty sure it rocked my world!


Jason got ahold of Cameron's MagnaDoodle. I had to take a picture of this. Cam-Man the Alphabet Avenger!!

Cameron playing the drums on our RockStar game. What blows my mind about this is he knows what he is doing and is actually pretty good at it. I am not even coordinated enough!

I seriously have a death grip on it so he can't erase the drawing and Jason can take a picture!! This MagnaDoodle is the best $20 anyone ever spent on him cause he plays with it everyday but I hate it when he draws something cool cause he erases it so quickly and heartlessly!! Ra-Ra got it for his birthday last year!

Valentine's Day!! What do people get on Valentine's Day? Chocolate Banana Shakes!! Yum!

And they get pretty Gerber Daisies, my fave, from their friend Naomi!! We weren't home so she had to sneak it in the house and it was all set up on our kitchen counter. Jason said he now realizes we have lousy guard dogs :)


And you get some of your fave truffles from your Valentine!!

It's the next day and we are back to drumming!!! Got to get in alot of practice hours before the world tour kicks off!!

Silly face!

Just some random pictures from the last few days! Tomorrow Troy, Jason's brother, will be here. We are having an official Pizza Party for Cameron. We waited for Troy to get here and for me to heal a bit before planning this. It's not like Cameron is looking at the calendar wondering what the heck is taking us so long. Or maybe he is. You never know with him.