"Just change..."

...that's what Mark says about how much time is left to come home. "A month/two months/three months, and ...some change." but now, it's just "some change..."
He just got back from a mission, but does have another one coming up. I don't like when he goes on them, but for every one he goes on, it's one less that he has to do in the future. One month seems like a looooonnng time, but we're 12/13 of the way done! One month out of thirteen is like one hour out of 24, just a moment in time...this wait will all be over soon.

Today Trooper and I did a 5 mile walk for the Humane Society...there were hundreds of people there, therefore hundreds of DOGS, as well as ferrets, cats, and rabbits. I understand the dog thing, but the rest of those animals were pretty entertaining to see being pushed around in strollers. It ended up being him walking me, and me fighting him the entire way. We went with one of his girlfriends, Abbey.

I came home and dug up some energy to do yard work...it seems to be never-ending! I mowed the yard, dug up weeds, and gave myself more work to do by cutting down an overgrown bush. This thing was so ugly, looked like an overgrown weed and blocked my window. I cut it down, then cut most of the branches up. I must say, it is nice to have the sun shine through now! My body feels like i'm about 80 right now. I'll be regretting doing that by morning!
This picture pretty much sums up Trooper.

Trying to sleep while I bug him. He's getting better about sleeping, but still wakes up twice or so to g out. He's a whopping 50 lbs now...double from what he was when I got him. Labs average 60-80 lbs.

He is so modest

Before long, Mark will be updating!

H

1 year

All because we gave love a chance...



** If your going to send Mark a pkg, do it before May 1st...after that, they don't guarantee that they will get them.

40

40 days until Mark leaves, at least I think it's 40.

We're at the antsy point...as if we weren't before. He is really anxious to get out of there. If you call what they had before, freedom; the Army has taken it away. They aren't getting days off anymore (they worked 6, got one off), and are working 12 hour days. At least the end is in sight.

We are going to plan a welcome home party/housewarming party for Mark sometime in July/early Aug so i'll keep people in the loop for that...he is excited to see everyone again!

It was proposed to have a surprise party for him when he got back, but as it is, he will be overwhelmed with his "new" life (house, dog, etc.). It's a good idea, but don't want to overload the poor guy.

Trooper is good, still wiggly! He wiggles when he walks or when he's excited, it's really cute. I gave him a bath two days ago, and boy was he filthy! He was so good in the bath though. The other times i've given them to him, he will back his hind legs up the shower wall, so they are on the sides of of wall, and his front legs are on the bottom of the tub, it's so funny to watch. This time, he just stood there, gave me the "look," and sucked it up. When he got out, he ran laps for at least 5 minutes around the house. He was wet though, so instead of just running, he slid on his belly across the wood/kitchen floor. Who needs TV when you have this kind of entertainment. If I can figure out how to get a video on here, i'll put it up!

I'm trying to teach him how to run, that's an interesting task. He likes to sit down randomly, while i'm still running. He also doesn't run very fast. It's a learning experience.

Well, lets hope these next 40 days go fast! I don't count the travel time home, because i'm just excited that he's on his way...those are exciting days too!

Thanks for the prayers, and care packages everyone has been sending...it is all very appreciated!

Gettin' old!

Although it doesn't look like he enjoys being held, he really does...he's good at faking it.

Does it mean that I'm getting old because I get excited about appliances? We had a new fridge and dryer come today. The delivery guys came around 12:30pm, and Lyle and I thought that we were set to get the old ones out and the new ones in. Wrong. We had measured the area where the new fridge was going, but not all of the doorways in the house to get it to the place it was going, and fit. The delivery people came and the guy said, "looks like you'll have to buy a new fridge." Lyle and I looked at each other, thinking, "no,...we will not!" Lyle gets crafty with things like this, and had the guys leave it in the dining room. He took the whole door frame off so we could get another inch to get the fridge through. I say "we," but I was really only moral support :) Jake came over to help too. It took until 4pm to get everything in and back in it's place. Things don't ever go as planned in an antique house. We had to take the couch apart to get that in the house too. I asked the sellers how they got theirs in, they said through the window!

Old fridge...

TaDa! New fridge. Isn't she a beaut??
It matches my sweet new dishwasher.

In other news...less than 2 months until Mark is back!! Woot!
H

57

The next 57 days are probably going to go by very slow. Counting days as it is, makes it seem like time has stopped.

Mark is doing well, working 12 hour days for the next couple of days (starting at 5:30am- ick!) because they had a couple of vehicle roll-overs. Everyone is ok, but it's a lot of work on the trucks from here on out, especially since they are short staffed.

Thanks to everyone who has sent out packages since the care package party. They love getting the packages, and really, who doesn't love mail (of the non-junk sort).

Keep them in your prayers for a safe return and rest of the deployment...it's about the time that everyone is getting antsy.

-H

64 and counting

Trooper and his girlfriend, Bella (my sister's dog)...clearly distracted. They wrestled like crazy and had to be held for a photo op. Mark is really excited to meet Trooper, so I try to take as many pictures as possible to send him.

Trooper being a spaz, while Bella watches.

I love these moments...they don't happen often.

Our unorganized "office." I still have boxes in here that need unpacking, clearly.

The upstairs. I love this space, but don't get to use it much. We made the room in the back, a "guest room." There is a newly renovated bathroom back there as well. We plan to make this space a living room type of area.

Our guest room. We got the bed from a friend, and had to make-do with our own sheets...don't make fun. :)

Not too much going on over here. Counting down the days until Mark comes home...64 days until he leaves, he should be home around the end of June.

I'm feeling quite old over here. We recently bought a fridge and dryer, as well as getting a dishwasher and new disposal. I love having a house. It's a lot of work, but I have quite the family who have been helping me and the doggie get along quite well.

Not too much else going on, i'm too tired to piece together thoughts, so enjoy the randomness!

Mark's words...

Mark went on a mission with another guy to recover some vehicles, below is what he said about it...


...we are back. we woke up on Thursday at like 6 in the morning, Schienbein and I worked on trucks most of the day, then we rolled out back to leatherneck at like 7 PM. It took like almost 3 hours to get out of the kandahar base, because we had a new unit with us. They did not PMCS their trucks (look them over and make sure they are good to go.) so as soon as we started rolling they called out over the radio that 2 of their tires were flat on their trailer. They were driving HETTS, huge trucks and their trailer has 48 tires on it! so it took them like a hour and a half to fix it. then as soon as we were rolling again another one of them hit a concrete barrier and blew another tire!!! the convoy commander told them to just roll with it(they had another 47 tires =))

So we finally got rolling(I was pulling the same truck that I brought up) one of the bridges we had to go over the taliban tried to blow up a week or two ago, so the army built another temp bridge thing over the hole in it. It could only hold so much weight so the HETTS had to go through the river below and the rest of us went over the bridge. One of the HETTS got stuck in the river so that took awhile to get them out.

After that we went through Kandahar city, they enacted a curfew on the city because of recent attacks so no civilians were outside at all. There were Afghan police everywhere in the city, at every intersection and in their little outposts all over the city, and we were the only vehicles on the roads. It was kinda creepy, but we had the roads all to our self, which made it easy and quick to get around. Oh on a side note, on the way up to Kandahar on the other side of the road we say a little boy get hit by a Afghani truck =( we stopped about a block up and our interpreter jumped out at a police check point and told them about it. We were not allowed to call for a medivac(helicopter) for him since we did not cause the accident. but the police took him to a hospital like a bat out of hell.

Well after many rips it(kind of like a red bull energy drink we get for free over here) and packets of beef jerky we got back to leatherneck at like 5 in the morning on friday after 10 hours of sitting in the truck. It was kinda peaceful out there being the only people on the road all night, and the country did not look like such a dump in the dark. lucky for us nothing else broke down on the way back and I am writing this to you after getting back to the hooch and crashing for like 6 hours of sleep....