You Know You're a Military Wife When....

~You show your military ID to the greeter at Walmart
~You've ever been referred to as "Household 6"
~You've ever had a pet named Scout, Ranger or Sergeant
~It only cost you $40 to have a child
~You can't remember the last time you saw a doctor who wasn't wearing ACUs
~You know that a 3 month separation IS short, no matter what your civilian friends say, heck 9 months is a breeze!
~Your husband's work and dress clothes cost more than yours do
~You can unpack a house and have everything in place in 48 hours
~You need a translator to talk to your civilian friends, only because they have no idea what DFAS, AER, TDY, ACS, NPD, PCS, ACU's, AAR and ETS mean
~You string Constantina wire to keep the neighbor's kids out of your flower beds
~You've changed more oil and mowed more lawns than your husband because he's never there to do it himself
~You use a crook-neck flashlight with a red lens during power outages because it's the only one you can ever find in the house
~Your children say "hoo ah" or "roger that" instead of "ok"
~You know that it's normal to light shoe polish on fire and that the best way to spit-shine boots is with cotton balls
~Your husband does a route recon and takes a GPS for a trip to the mall
~You only write in pencil because EVERYTHING is subject to change
~You have a larger selection of curtains than Walmart does
~You can remember where you kept the Scotch tape in your last house, but unfortunately, not in this one
~You mark time in duty stations, not years
~You refer to friends not only by name but by the state that they live in
~You know that "back home" doesn't mean at the house you live in now
~You tear up when you hear "Proud to Be An American," even though you've heard it 50 times by now
~You ALWAYS know when payday is and get ticked off if there are more than 2 weekends during that pay period
~You know better than to go to the PX or commissary between 11:30 and 13:00 unless it's a life or death emergency
~You know that any reference to "sand" or a "box" describes NTC at Ft. Irwin, not your kid's backyard toys
~You know that "Ft. Puke" is a completely accurate description of Ft. Polk
~You find yourself explaining your husband's LES to him
~You have enough camouflage in your house to wallpaper the White House
~You don't have to think about what time 21:30 is
~You're the TC, not a backseat driver
~You start ripping open MREs and looking for the M&Ms when you run out of Halloween candy
~You stand for the National Anthem at a movie theatre
~The local dry cleaner knows you by your first name
~You find that a large number of your clothes and household items are olive drab or loam, even though you never planned it that way
~You pick apart uniforms on TV and in the movies, even though you used to yell at your husband for doing the same thing
~You have a stock in flat rate shipping boxes, in varying sizes.
~You’ve spent more time apart than you have together.
~When the cashier ask you for your zip code you just stand there and stare
~You wish you could go to CIF to DX your old stuff like your husband can
~You've learned to sleep through the sounds of tanks, planes, helicopters and artillery rounds
~You give your kids a hand receipt when they take your Tupperware to school
~You can hate military life but be terrified to leave it all in the same breath
~You defend your lifestyle no matter how bad things get because you know there's no other life for you.


MANY of these are soooo true! 

USA Bound!!

Just a quick update...we are heading to the USA next week.  So after some time to adjust to the new timezone, which is 13 hours behind our current one, we should be rip, roaring and ready to get together with all the wonderful friends and family that we have been missing these last two years living in Korea.

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More Waiting

While we received the paperwork we needed to get our orders, things were not quite right.  Someone moved the date that we can leave Korea to the day before we are suppose to report to our next duty station....which happens to be three months from now.  I am beside myself.  Things have become even more frustrating.  This extension complicates my so called life as I know it.

I have cried more in the last two days than I have in a while.  You see I have only paced myself to get to the original date we were given for leaving Korea.  An extra two and a half months is just too much for me right now.

I am really trying to trust God, knowing that He knows the bigger picture which I can't quite see.  I am so thankful for my friends who have emailed me, called me and prayed with me.  Thank you all so much! Yes, the body of Christ is at work in the lives of fellow believers.  I appreciate your encouragement!

There are people trying to help us get some things fixed but we have been told that we will not get back the original date to leave Korea BUT we might be able to leave in 1 1/2 months instead of  2 1/2 months.  So each day, I am leaning on God...trusting Him in each step of the way.  Which is not always easy!

Through the ups and downs that we have been going through lately, I have been encouraged by a few songs.  You can follow the links here to YouTube to listen to them.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KmaBhMOXXHg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=knuHDPbE5es

My Bad Attitude

Lately I have not posted anything on my blog.  Part of the reason is that I did not want to poison my blog with my bad attitude.  With our family being close to our DEROS (Date Eligible for Return from OverSeas - the date we are suppose to leave Korea) and having no orders, I have been frustrated.  I have been barely surviving as our family is so ready to be back in the United States. 

My bad attitude has flowed over into every aspect of my life and the lives of those around me.  It has not been a pretty sight.  Hopefully things will change now.

Today we received some good news and some not so great news.  We finally received our paperwork for us to move back to the United States. That's the good news.  The not so great news is that we will be here past our DEROS date.  Instead of leaving Korea in April, my husband will be here longer.  Until we submit his RFO and fill out leave forms, we are not sure how much longer, though it could be up to 2 months.

So I hope to get back to blogging with a good attitude.  There is much to look forward to as we prepare to move back to the states.

So True!!

Putting the Fun Back in Homeschooling

For the past few months, I have been in survival mode.  That's where I do what needs to get done not because I am passionate about what I am doing, but because ....it's what needs to be done.  I am in box checking mode.  Have you ever been there?  Being a first born, some what perfectionist, I tend to lean that way rather than the other.

Yes, I'd rather being lying in bed all day eating bon bons and watching NCIS, but that's not gonna happen. 

I have this pull that keeps me doing at least the minimum things for my husband and family.  I have been in survival mode not just with homemaking and my husband and children but with homeschooling.  I am at the point where I so want to NOT be in Korea, that I have only been doing what needs to be done...and I am so over it.

I'm not saying that I now have this wonderful sense of motivation, because I don't.  But what I can tell you is that my kids are bored with the mundane work that I have been giving them and they are looking for more out of their day.  The problem with that is I had hoped the paperwork we filed to return to the states early would have been approved already and we would be at my parents' house by now.  But we are not there yet, so all of my prep work for a move, which included packing up the games, paints, craft supplies and other homeschool fun things, was premature.

I am realizing that if we are here for another 10 days or another 50 days, I need to go back to adding in the fun elements of our homeschooling day that we had been doing last year.
What fun in checking boxes, just to say you did it?

So without unpacking everything that I have already packed up, how can I make our homeschooling day fun again?

Here are a few ideas that I have come up with so far:

Go back to following a schedule ( I know this sounds simple, but it made the day go smoother with everyone knowing what was going to happen, instead of just waiting until I was tired of the whining to have them do something)

Add art and craft time back into the weekly schedule.

Make time to get out of the house and do something fun.  (With the weather varying from day to day, this is not always easy.  We could at least head to the library regularly like we used to.)

Learn Spanish (my husband's first language) and hand's on fun about Puerto Rico (where my husband's parents are from)

Find topics the girls are interested in and add them to our learning each day.

Since we are limited by living in another country where we don't speak the language and there are no other local homeschool families, I am hoping the ideas I came up with will add at least some fun to our daily homeschooling routine.

What do you do to make your homeschool day fun with your children?