Finally winter

Winter has been mild here so far.  In a lot of ways it drives me crazy when we don't have snow and it is winter.  So when we got snow last month the kids and I just had to have some fun in it.  Luckily it hit over a weekend so the kids really got to have a blast playing outside for the entire day.

Must make snowballs

Miya LOVES the snow just as much as the kids do, which is really funny since she can't stand getting wet in the rain.

Our next door neighbor's daughter came over to play and join in all of the fun.

Even Catlin got to come out and enjoy the snow fall.  She wasn't fully sure what to think about it, but loved being around everyone else.

Jay even came out and helped the kids make the snowman.  It lasted about 3 days before fully melting.

We've had a few small snow storms since this one, but this one is the only one that really gave us any of the good stuff that is great for playing in and making snowballs or even snowman.

Redecorating the living room

With Jay finally home and no longer having to deal with a ship's crazy schedule we are finally starting to tackle some of our MANY home projects.  About a month ago we decided to attack the living room and get it looking better than when we moved in.

Jay gave me a beautiful piece of artwork for our anniversary back in Jan.  It goes PERFECTLY in our living room with the color we chose.

We even moved our small collection of Jade off the mantle and put up family photos with a statue of Christ in the center.  

Overall, I love how everything turned out for the living room.  It doesn't feel so depressing in there and the issues with the sloppy painting job that was previously done (not by us) isn't there to drive me batty.  

Updates coming soon

Things have been nothing short of crazy around here of late.  There will be a lot of fun updates on life and what we've been up to since Jay got home back in December coming sometime this week.

Jay is home!!!

It has been 2 weeks now since Jay came home and we're loving every minute of it.  He flew off the ship on a Monday and landed on a small island off the coast of Greece.  The next morning around 3 am he had to get up and begin a very long day of flying.  He flew from that small island to Athens, then on to Germany, Washington DC and then finally home.  Because we knew he was getting in late that Tuesday night the kids were kept in the dark.  I put them to bed as usual and then a dear sweet friend of mine, Hannah, came over and stayed with them while I went to pick up Jay.  Catlin was on the no sleep war path of hers and so she stayed with Hannah while I went to get Jay when he called and told me to come get him.  Oh it was so wonderful to have him home and know that we no longer have deployments, underways or the stress that comes with those to worry about for at least 3.5 years.

The next morning is when the fun began.  Because we kept the kids in the dark Jay personally had to wake them up.  Kaden was first and he didn't even act surprised.  He had been guessing for over a week that Jay was coming home when he did.  But he still was very happy to see him.

 Annabelle was another matter entirely.  When Jay woke her up she took one look at who it was cried out "Daddy" and was in his arms in an instant.  She was almost in tears over seeing him again.  She missed him like crazy and is such a daddy's girl at that.

We had some great fall weather since he's been home so he and the kids finished tackling the large amount of leaves in our front yard.  They loved it.  And it was a great way to bond with Jay.

 One of the perks of our house is our fire place.  It has become a very large blessing in disguise of late.  We usually have a fire going in it every morning and some nights due to our heater being on it's very last leg of working.  But we love the fires and how warm it makes the living room.  It has added a nice touch to the Christmas decorations we have up.

It took Catlin about a week to fully warm up to Jay and now she is attached to him as often as possible.  She loves her dad so much and just gets a kick out of the simple games he'll play with her.  He teases her relentlessly and she loves it.  We've loved having Jay home and he's been here for almost all of the events we've had for this holiday season.  

Time Flies

Well it has deffinantly been a while since I last posted anything.  Summer has come and gone, stress with the navy has only increased and now my favorite time of the year is here.  So I'll just give a quick recap of what has happened over the last several months in our lives.

In August Jay was informed that the EFM stuff for Kaden needed to be updated or he wouldn't get his orders.  We've only been waiting since March for hard copy orders here, no biggie to the navy.  Oh we were given a week to do what takes MONTHS to get done in.  EFM is the program Kaden is in for his autisim diagnosis.  I got the paperwork completed at the end of Aug. and 3 weeks later is was all rejected because the family dr filled out portions of it incorrectly and the EFM board determined that we now had to get Kaden retested for autisim.

In late September I began the process to get Kaden into see the right specialists to get the EFM updated so Jay could get his orders.  Well the only appointments the specialist are months out so we were given a special EFM category just so Jay can get those orders (hardy copy ones).  And then we waited.

In October we found out that his original orders no longer could be given due to the school moving to FL and we're not allowed to move anywhere until the EFM is updated.  So the navy gave two options of orders and the ones he picked are something he can't wait to be doing: networking instructor.  Annabelle turned 5 and we had halloween.

Now here in November Catlin has turned one.  Where did the time go?  Jay's missed the last 5 months of her life already.  Jay is still waiting on hard copy of his new orders, but we do know he'll be home before Dec. 10th because his school for instructor begins Jan. 7th and he has to be home 30 days before that.  So while we are still waiting on the navy to get their act together and give us the hard copy orders we at least have a date to look forward to and know that he'll be home for Christmas.  Fall is here and it has been really quite nice.  Our trees have leaves falling all the time and I managed to get one nice photo of the kids before our weather turned too cold to do so.  Thanksgiving is just around the corner now and we have truly so much to be thankful for at this time of year.  May this holiday season be a joyous one for all of you!

Busy weekend

This weekend flew by around here.  Normally when Jay is out to sea, deployed or on duty over weekends they drag.  This one didn't.  I got together with some fellow navy wives and we hit it off fast.  It is so wonderful to have truly good friends out here.  Two of us have kids and our kids became friends instantly.  We got together every day this past weekend and even yesterday.  Last night Kaden had his new friend here for a sleepover.  The boys did great and even included Annabelle in their actvities. 

Jay is staying busy on the ship, no suprise there.  Yesterday he sent me an e-mail telling me he had been out on the flight deck for 4 hours in his dress whites.  They had been taking photos using the sailors for spelling out something really cool.  Today the photo was released and it looks amazing!

I have no idea where he is in the photo, but he is part of the white lettering.  It's things like this that really help keep us going.  Still waiting on those orders, but in the mean time we're staying busy on this end and time is starting to fly by.

Manning the Rails

With the navy as the ships deploy sailors will stand at attention around the whole of the ship, outside.  This is refered to as manning the rails.  They also do this upon returns to home port as well.  Yesterday Jay was informed that he would be Manning the Rails up on the island.  He's done this once before when the Nimitz came home from a deployment so doing it as a departure was different.  Apparently the Ike's media department got a great shot of him from the flight deck.  They (ship's media team) posted photos on the ship's FB page and this morning I got quite the suprise at being able to clearly see Jay manning the rails.

See if you can find him, I did instantly.

The deployment has begun and now it's just a matter of port visits and waiting for those orders to show up on paper so we know when his return will be.