Healing just isn't the same this time around!

I have been really homesick since I have been on con leave. The last time I had surgery we were lucky enough to be able to go home and spend most of the time in Kansas with my in-laws and even have Christmas with Handsome, it made the healing process a lot easier and my in-law truly know and understand me down to the need of coffee so that I may join the living on a daily basis. This time we were unable to go home, J had school I only had two weeks off and the money just wasn't there.

This surgery has caught me off guard, the pain; the physical limitations; the mental impact; the whole nine yards. We have been blessed with an amazing group of friends who through all of this have become like family to us. Neighbors who watched Moo during the surgery, made us dinner so I wouldn't have to cook on the night that J had school, a battle buddy who came over to watch Moo because of the limitations that were placed upon me made it physically impossible to care for her myself. More and more people were willing to step in and help us without us even having to ask. I am truly grateful for my military family, but they can never replace my family or shall I say the wonderful family that I was so blessed to have married into.

I am one of the lucky ones who can honestly say that I have the world best mother in law. She has become so much more than just my mother in law, she is my friend, cheer leader, role model and shoulder whenever I need her. I have come to value her so much over the years and truth be told I don't' know how I would have survived some of the difficulty that has been thrown at me if she hadn't been on by my side. I truly love that woman for all that she is and all the love that she shares!!

So while I am nursed back to health by my husband and friends, I can't help but to miss Kansas and my family there....oh how I love 125 S. Georgie and those that live there!!

Losing a part of me....

So this has been a long time in the making, but it finally starting to happen. Since I entered adulthood I have always struggled with problems what most people who are uncomfortable with the topic call "female problems". But they have made my adult life a living hell once a month. I suffer a great deal and at times can barley get out of bed. Safe to say, my life is put on hold when "its that time of the month". These past few months it's ALWAYS that time of the month!

On Tuesday I go in for my first of 2 surgeries. I am scared. Scared because its all about to come to an end. While that is an amazing thing, at the same time, what is going to happen to who I am? I am losing the main thing that makes me a woman. And while J and I decided while I was pregnant with our Moo that she would be our only child we would have together, and he got fixed, to me it was always something that could be undone if we wanted it and I was really okay with that.

So now that its me getting this done I am really wrestling with the emotions that it is bringing up. While I am going to rejoice in the fact that I am going to save money on not having to buy Midol, tampons and pads along with pull ups...I am sad, I will no longer get to have my PMS comfort food...lay around in sweats crying and watching chick flicks or even bitching about the cramps....

But this is what I wanted right?

Potty Training.....

So we have been working on potty training for almost a year. Its been hit and miss. We have weeks where we go on the potty then there is a full moon, the wind changes or Madi is just Madi and decides that she is NOT going to have a thing to do with potty training so its back to the pull-ups we go. It never fails, I get super excited about the progress, I start talking about it and then bam....she is back to not doing it.

So this week started like any other...when the mood struck or the tingles happened she would run for the potty and go....early on we went out and bought her a princess potty chair, she decided that she didn't want to go on it, and feed the foam insert part to the dogs, and since then she has used the big potty.

So Madi being a normal two year old, she had a fear of going poo in the potty, nothing would work, and I tried it all, stickers, candy, movies, promises of a easy teen years nothing.

So today a neighbor of ours gave us a potty chair, when you go potty the chair lights up and sings, it has a handle to flush and even a spot for the tp....well ITS A HIT!!

We have had dry panties ALL day and have even gone poo in the potty!!

FORGET WINNING THE LOTTERY, I AM WELL ON MY WAY TO NOT HAVING TO BUY PULL UPS ANYMORE!!

I LOVE BEING A MOM!!

I love being married

My intent with this post is not to offend. This is simply how I feel and live.....we each live our lives as we see fit and I am not one to EVER judge.

Being in the Army I have seen how lightly people take the union of marriage. I have always considered myself to be an old fashion kind of gal. You know the one who believes that marriage is forever, you should marry Mr. Forever not Mr. Right Now, with that being said, I am in an environment where marriage is anything but that. You see people all the time finding someone who they get along with as friends and "agree" to get married, the money is more, you don't have to live in the barracks, whatever the reason maybe, but few times its because they truly love each other.

We all know that this is not my first marriage and that I have gone through the divorce, got the tee shirt and wore it for a short amount of time, but my first marriage lasted 9 years and leaving was not something that I had decided to do over night, I tried everything I could and my last resort was divorce.

Another small known fact, I remarried.....this marriage was NOT entered into lightly and it was for no other reason that we were both adults who loved each other and truly wanted to be together for the rest of our lives. I took my time, got to know my husband, his family, his son and even his friends. We had the difficult conversations about the what ifs, we were tried and tested and we made it through.

My marriage is one of the most important and valued things in my life. I have stumbled along the way and not always been the wife I should have been...but through it all, we have kept the vows we made to each other in the back of our minds. Sure, at times we have both lead the other to want to walk away and throw in the towel, but we stayed and worked through it. Isn't this what we were taught growing up?

My husband's family is an amazing loving midwest kind of family, his grandparents were married for over 60 years. 60 YEARS!!!!! That is longer than most of us will be. I am sure at times they were both faced with the I can't stand you's, I don't like you, but at the end they always had the I love you. My husband was raised with these same belief's and values and that gives him the strength to stay and be the man he is. He also teaches me every day the importance of staying not only for the good but through the bad as well, because if we don't learn something new each day, then are we truly living?

Nothing makes me happier than being married to my husband and calling myself his wife. I am a lucky girl. But I can't be the only one who feels this way!! There has to be others that feel the same way I do about marriage!!

At the end of the day I want my kids growing up and seeing their parents being happy, healthy and in love and saying to there future mate, I want to have a marriage like my parents, because through it all they are still together.

At the end of the day, I look at Grandma and Grandpa Sargeant's marriage and I say to myself, I want the kind of marriage they have. And I know that being married J that we will work every day to have just that.

I love my husband!!

Mommy, can I call grandma and papa?

There is a few things that I have learned to truly enjoy this past year, one of them....sleeping in. I get up before the sun everyday during the week, I am up and out of the door before most people even begin to surface from the sweet coma sleep we all love, so I REALLY look forward to my two mornings that I get to sleep in. This morning, I woke up at 0615 to my beautiful Moo asking me if she could call her grandparents, this really means "mom, sucks to be you because I have lost your phone and in my two year old mind, I am not going to ever tell you where I put and oh good luck finding it." Oh and the kicker, my phone has died so its going straight to voice mail. Yes I have already borrowed the neighbor's phone and tried calling it.

So I got up with her, because well she is two and there really was no point in trying to go back to sleep...but the kicker...my princess NEVER wakes before 0900...NEVER....until today.