Sweet Gifts

A few days before Robert arrived home for his little visit, I received the most beautiful gift in the mail from his Grandmommy! She's a potter and had made us these fabulous mugs. The back of them say Okinawa 2010. I'll have to post some close ups later. Robert used to have a mug similar to the one in the picture but it broke in the move to Okinawa. Thank you Grandmommy for your sweet gift, it made my day! 

As you can see, I convinced my husband to snap a few photos before he left. He had a little time after he went in to work that morning and before he had to head back to the ship. Thanks baby for always being so great to me! We had a wonderful time while he was home. Every time we're separated for a significant amount of time, no matter how long or how far, it just confirms that I definitely married my best friend!!

To My Dad

As Father's Day is coming to an end in Okinawa and just beginning back in the States, I've had a lot of time to think about my dad today. I'm so very thankful for his influence in my life for so many reasons.

Thank you Dad for:

• Loving me
• Tucking me in at night
• Checking for monsters under the bed
• Waking up in the middle of the night when I thought the monsters came back
• Piggy back rides to the breakfast table
• Never being too busy
• Making Jay put back the covers that he had stolen off of me during nap time :D
• Taking us to pep rallies on Friday
• Apologizing when you made a mistake (ie: the pencil incident) 
• Curling my hair even though I'm pretty sure you ended up w/2nd degree burns
• Putting my hair in a perfectly slicked back ponytail
• Being my third base coach in softball
• Buying me and all my friends ice cream when you came to have lunch w/me in elementary school
• Always encouraging me in my endeavors
• Leaving meetings at work early to make my volleyball games
• Constantly telling me you were proud of me
• Meeting me for coffee at the local Starbucks in college
• Lunch dates at Angelo's
• Always listening
• Taking my phone calls during staff meeting
• Having a great sense of humor 

The list could go on and on, but thank you most of all for the Godly example you set for Jay and I. You have taught me so me things, but of all of them I think that's the most important. You were always the same person at home as your were in pulpit on Sunday mornings and I think that's a rare thing. Thank you for making life choices that I don't think many people would have made and trusting God to become the incredible father that you are. I love you very much and am so proud to call you Dad! I'm proud of you...you're doing good stuff. :D

Happy Father's Day from Oki!

Finishing Touches Are For the Birds!

I'm approaching the 4 month mark of living in Okinawa! I was teasing Robert the other day that by the time he got back I would have been here longer without him than with him...haha! I think that's the story of many wives here on the island (or any base), except their time encompasses much more than mine. In those four months, I have been quite busy making our house apartment a home. If you know me pretty well, you know that I constantly add or rearrange things until I'm satisfied. There's no such thing as finishing touches in my book, but I think I'm getting close!

I finally have our bedroom exactly almost how I want it. It took awhile and I still have a few things left...like that open wall to the right of bed, I'm thinking a collage of random frames filled with photos and random art...I let you know how it turns out. I still have a full length mirror that looks very blah and needs to be hung somewhere, I keep putting it off....oops. After all the work on the bedroom one of my favorite things about it are the birds.

In reality I hate birds. I have extremely bad luck when it comes to them. Seriously, three stories come to mind...

Exhibit A: I have been pooped on three times...all of those instances it got in my hair. One of the times I was actually running...that's efficient aim if you ask me!

Exhibit B: I've also been attacked...seriously. When I was in college working on campus over the summer, a bird swooped down at my head and it must have had some depth perception problem or it was extremely vindictive because its little claw got caught all in my hair. I was in an outdoor stairwell screaming my head off and throwing all the files I had in my hand everywhere. I don't know who was more freaked out me or the bird or the person walking up the stairs...probably the latter of the three.

Exhibit C: I also ran into a peacock in Hawaii, literally turned around ran right into it. I said I was sorry and made my way to the bathroom. When I opened my stall to go wash my hands it was standing right in front on my stall. Even though I insisted it, "shoo! shooo!" it didn't budge. So I settled for instant hand sanitizer and ran out of that bathroom. Poor Robert had no clue why I was so freaked out. When I explained the peacock followed me into the bathroom and was taunting me, he probably thought I'd been out in the sun too long that day.

As you can see, birds and I have never quite figured out how to coexist in peace on this very large earth. Even though in reality we have a mutual hate for each other, I just love the way their silhouettes look on my walls. I am quite proud of how they turned out!

They were very easy to make. I sketched the outline of the bird on scrapbook paper and then cut it out with an exacto knife (once again...my solution for everything these days). Then I framed them in some super cheap frames I picked up at the store and painted white. The background is actually some old wrapping paper that I had on hand with a subtle texture. Just goes to show you can make fun creations for under $10! Enjoy and watch out for birds (Hitchcock was one to something, I think we're kindred spirits).

Deployments and High School Dating

Last night in a moment of weakness I sprayed my husband's cologne on my pillow. I opened the medicine cabinet/bathroom mirror to do my nightly routine (wash, moisturize, brush, floss, rinse, etc) and there it stood, his signature scent. I thought back to when we were dating and I would send him a shirt with my perfume on it sealed in a plastic baggy (gag...i know). My only excuse is that we were thousands of miles apart and were lucky to see each other once every six months (I didn't say it was a good excuse). So I did the unthinkable...yes...I took that cologne and sprayed it on my pillow. As I was lying there surrounded by his smell and wishing I hadn't been so generous with the amount I had sprayed (cough, cough), it hit me...our deployment relationship has so many similarities to dating...even high school dating. Maybe I'm the only one, I'm not sure but the parallels kept coming to me one after another as I flipped the pillow over to try and weaken the smell. Here's a few things that I couldn't help but laugh about:

1. Any little reminder of them can brighten your day or bring you to tears
2. You name drop...you can't help it, it's like word vomit. Everything makes you think of him. Case and point, my last few weeks have sounded like this, "Oh ROBERT loves this dessert!" "ROBERT is so good at this game, he's just a natural." "This is ROBERT'S favorite book." You get the idea.
3. If/when you get a phone call from him, excitement flows.
4. If/when you miss a phone call him, you are so mad at yourself for not having you phone on you 24/7, even if you were in the shower it's not excuse and you add a waterproof phone case to the shopping list.
5. Your phone conversations may only last 5 minutes but your emails/letters are epic novels.
6. You go to bed thinking of them every night.
7. You do the craziest things to remind yourself of them, sleep in their tshirts, spray their cologne on your pillow, or make their favorite foods.

Like I said before, maybe this is just me, but I couldn't help but notice what was right in front of me last night. Your deployment relationship is so different that your actual relationship. The before-mentioned list was meant to be somewhat entertaining, but in all seriousness I'm realizing the challenges that this can bring. You go from being independent and having your own schedule to having this person who was absent for the last (insert number) months thrown back into your daily life. We don't even have children, so I can't imagine how much it impacts your life when you have that in the mix. I guess what I am learning is that it's all a balance and you must above all things be flexible.

Also, you must cling to the positive. I know that when my husband comes home I will be so much more thankful for him than when he left. I know that even though it will cause an adjustment to my routine, I'll be grateful to have my best friend back. And I know even though our time apart isn't easy, it's a time that I've been given to grow. I can choose to rely on myself or others for comfort or I can choose to rely on my Heavenly Father. I think sometimes I forget how much I can choose in this life. I will choose to be positive and thankful. I will control what I can, and that's my attitude and my daily habits. After all, I did choose to be a Marine's wife and I'm so thankful that I did!


 

Sweet Irony

WARNING: This blog post will contain at least three stories to tell one story. The good news is there's an interesting tid bit at the end!

Story #1: Robertisms:
My lovely husband has some Robertisms that he's aquired over the years. A few examples would be:
A. "Control your offspring" whenever we see an insane child reeking havoc, it never fails that he will say this under his breath...if I'm lucky...sometimes it a little louder. Movie theaters have been a great source for this Robertism.
B. "Liars go to hell" I'll never forget sitting in our current church here in Oki, it was probably our 2nd or 3rd week there and our pastor used this phrase. Robert grabbed my leg and looked at me wide-eyed and grinning ear to ear and said, "I like him!" It took everything with in me not to bust out laughing in the middle of the sermon.
C. "You know, this would be good over rice." God bless my husband, he was born and raised in Louisiana and it shows through and through. Any time I make a new dish, doesn't matter what it is, I hear this phrase. Seriously, stew, pork chops, chicken, beef, turkey...it's always the same. It's become a running joke around the White house.

Story #2: Susan's Creation
I grew up in Denison, TX and one of my mom's best friends was and is Susan. Susan, who had just moved to TX from LA, was an amazing cook and quite crafty lady. One of her lovely creations that's still around my parents' house today is the "sock 'o rice." Seriously, it's a sock filled with rice. To anyone else this is a waist of food and clothing...to us it's a heating pad! Once again...I'm serious. Put rice in a sock, sew up both ends, pop it in the microwave and you have homemade heating pad! Warning, your heating pad will smell like rice...crazy, I know. My parent's still use this. Anyone who works with my mom can attest, they can walk into the office and tell you if she's having back trouble by the smell of the room.

Story #3: New Isn't Always Good
I've been getting up at 4:30 am for the past several months and hitting the gym! There's a group of girls that I usually go with and most days I go to this amazing spin class. I come out about an hour later dripping in sweat and feeling extremely productive and energized for the day...don't ask me how! This week, we got a new instructor. I'm sure he was sent to be the death of me. Day one, RESISTANCE, MORE RESISTANCE, EVEN MORE RESISTANCE, LET'S ADD MORE RESISTANCE AND SPRINT!!!! Needless to say my knee was killing me after this insane workout. Day two was better and had less resistance but it went something like this: RESISTANCE, SPRINT, MORE SPRINT, EVEN MORE SPRINT, NOW HOVER, HOVER SOME MORE, GET YOUR BUTT BACK and HOVERRRRRRR! GET YOUR BUTT BACK FURTHER and HOVERRRRRR SOME MORE! Let me tell you, I don't know where the heck he wanted me to put my butt...it couldn't go any further back without detaching from my body! He kept shouting FORM, IT'S ALL ABOUT FORMMMM! He's a yeller if you couldn't tell. It was a great work out, but my knee and back had just about had it. I made it home, iced my worn-out little self, and hopped in the shower. As luck would have it as I was drying my hair, I flipped my head upside down like I've done my entire life and every muscle in back decided to seize. It sent me to floor immediately and there I said for a bit contemplating my situation. The thoughts running through my head were things like, "I'm stuck, my apartment door's locked, i'm in a towel, i'm stuck, no one has a key to my apt door except robert, robert's in indonesia, i'm stuck, maybe i can crawl to the couch." I made it to the couch and was smart enough to grab my phone on the way. I laid there for about an hour and my back finally started to untwist itself. I knew that once I was able to get up, I should grab a heating pad and just relax for a bit.

The Final Story: Sweet Irony
Turns out our heating pad didn't get packed in the things to bring to Oki box...oops! I was in so much pain by evening I knew I couldn't get out and buy one. I thought about soaking in a hot bath, but decided that the probability of getting myself out of that hot bath was slim to none. Finally, a fantastic idea came to mind...I have socks and I have rice! I ran hobbled to Robert's drawer (his socks are much larger than mine) and pulled out the biggest, oldest looking sock I could find. Then I ran hobbled to the kitchen and dumped all the rice I had left into his sock, sewed it up on both ends, popped it in the microwave and then went to bed and placed it under my back. As I lie there, looking up at the ceiling...all these stories flooded to my head. There is was lying over cooked rice and it was the happiest I had been all day long. So Robert, baby you're right...I wish I would've realized earlier that "this would be really good over rice."

Later on when I have more time, I think these would be great presents if I bought some really cute socks!

The following are some pics of my new best friend:

Lost Cause Lamp Shade

I have to apologize because I didn't take pictures of the process that it took to get to this lamp shade...oops! Honestly, the entire time I was thinking, "I hate this, this is going to be so horribly ugly." You may still be thinking that, but I definitely like how it turned out! I can give you the details of how I made this and that will have to suffice. What started this whole thing what our move to Okinawa. We unpacked our boxes that had traveled so far and found two extremely crushed lamp shades, too far gone to try and salvage. For any of you that have ever shopped at a base exchange of any kind you know that when it comes to things like this it's slim pickins. It also turns out that most of the lamp shades I found out in town weren't conducive to my lovely American lamp (thank you Target). Thus began my journey to create the perfect lampshade.

At first I went ahead and bought a lamp shade at the local base exchange. That was a mistake. I got it home and ran to my little lamp posts and turns out the American lamp shade from the base exchange wasn't conducive with my American lamp (thank you Target). Also, I didn't realize that my lamp was a little smaller than most, so my lamp looked like it was playing "dress up" with it's mom's lamp shade, ridiculous! So I had no choice...I pulled out my exacto knife (that's my newest solution to the world's problems...we'll see if it overtakes spray paint). I cut away at the huge, oversized and quite ugly lamp shade and made some a bit smaller and much more fitting to my little lamp stand. The material is actually an old skirt that I retired a few years back. It's just glued to the old lamp shade. I cut up an old white tshirt into circles to create the floral embellishments. You just fold the circles in half and then in half again and arrange as you want.

Last but not least I found this great button. I think it came from the huge collection that my mother-in-law gave me for Christmas. I offset it and added some more floral embellishments around it too. I'll be honest, I was shocked with the finish product. It wasn't looking good for 3/4 of the project and I almost aborted the mission several times and wrote it off as a lost cause. I'm glad I stuck it out and am pleased with what now sits on my nightside shelf (I found that on etsy)! Enjoy!