May 2nd

Today is my oldest daughter's 27th birthday. I was thinking of her first thing this morning when I heard the headline news Osama Bin Laden is dead. This news has overwhelmed the media today. On the internet there are many rejoicing. A military facebook friend asked for flags to be put as profile pictures. I was disturbed by what many people had written on their facebook pages.
this was the first one I could feel myself recoil as I read this it seems wrong:

Osama bin Laden was shot in the head.. by US military! We have the body..
USA USA USA USA USA USA USA USA USA USA USA USA!!!!!! Oohrah We got him!!!!

Before I left for work I found a picture in my photos of white headstones from a small old National cemetery that our family stopped at years ago. I posted that as my profile picture. The thought of the number of deaths that have occurred since 9/11 here in the US and in the Mid East had me questioning the celebration of a mans death.

I fear for the safety of people around the world and for our military men and women.
I fear there will be an escalation to terrorist attacks.
I am saddened and afraid for all of us.

Dear Jesus be with us

The times they are a changin

Yesterday was a day of changes for our family.

Our Marine graduated from his combat training course and has moved on to his advanced school. He will be in Monterey California for about 18 months. I hope we can go visit him while he is there.

Our daughter has a job starting 2 weeks after her college graduation. The job will be demanding.... at least 2 weeks of every month will be on the road. Of course we do not know specifics at this time. She will be looking for a place to live in the Madison area. Hopefully with a a roommate and she knows of several others interviewing for jobs in the area.

My DH has a new title with increased responsibilities including a lager territory which means more time on the road.

With life comes changes.
I welcome these changes !

Time passing

It has been almost 3 weeks since my last post. Our birthdays are this coming week mine and DH's -we celebrate 2 days apart. I will be 48... I can't believe that. Where has time gone? Birthday's have never bothered me. A lot of people tell me they find it hard getting older. I guess I've always thought the alternative to a birthday is being dead - so birthday's are a good thing!!
DH is celebrating his 50th birthday - a 1/2 century old. That's almost dead right?
I found a card that tells him to avoid going toward the bright light -I laughed and bought it. I also found one that talked about bacon.... He'll get it ( the card and the part about bacon :) .

The kids came up with something special for their dad's 50th since none of them can be here to celebrate. They have been busy planning this for a few months since with Chris gone it has been hard to make sure he gets his part done. Of course the procrastinators are Nick who lives in our house and Brittany who came up with the idea and planned it.

Speaking of Chris have not heard from him since April 3rd. He has been in the field without liberty for the last 2 weeks. Hopefully he will have liberty and time to call us this weekend. He will have another field exercise similar to the crucible next week. It will be a 4 day exercise after which he will graduate and move on to his advance schooling. He will be stationed at the Presidio in Monterey, California for about a year and a half or 580 days they really gave him the time in days! He will be at the DLI - Defense language Institute. After 580 days at DLI he will have more schooling somewhere in Texas for another 3-5 months before he will be deploy-able. So we have about 2 years of knowing he will be safe state side and then all bets are off. Since the mid East languages have the longest schooling we believe that is what he is learning and he will be somewhere in Afghanistan after his schooling is complete.

And speaking of completing schooling Kelsey will graduate on May 15th and if all goes well we will move her into an apartment in Madison. She has been interviewing and things look promising for a job there. I feel emotional knowing both of my girls will be settling so far away from us but we knew when they went to school there this was a possibility. I also know she can stand on her own 2 feet since she has done such an awesome job of this over the past 5 years. During these years we have usually seen her 4-5 times a school year.

Nick is holding steady - he is waiting for the day he leaves for basic training and in the mean time keeps busy. He will be a semester short of graduation when he leaves for basic training.

Which brings me to Brittany and Ken.... I can't even imagine how busy their lives continue to be. Brittany works 2 weeks of day shifts and then a week of evenings. She works every 3rd weekend. Kens new job is going well. The boys continue to grow and are both over 14 pounds at just about 4 months. I can't wait to see them next weekend and again at Easter.

Just a quick pic of Chris with his nephews - notice the hair is the same!!

TSA and other events

Our son was home for his 10 day leave and left this morning for further training.

He has had some awesome experiences.

On our flight home from graduation the pilot announced that there was a special guest on board - a newly minted Marine - and asked the passengers to give him a hand. He said "Welcome to the family -Semper Fi". There was a lot of applause and several passengers thanked him for his service. Our son was was very embarrassed and said I haven't done anything yet.

Today at the airport he and several other young Marines were upgraded to first class -they did not ask for an upgrade. There was an airport official who was watching for these Marines and moving them to the front of the queue. Another official asked us if we knew we could get gate passes to go with him to his gate. We did not know this and with her telling us we were able to be with him for another hour before his flight. He called us during his layover to tell us that the pilot had acknowledged the Marines on his flight thanking them for their service. And in the airport waiting for their connecting flight an unknown benefactor bought lunch for about 30 Marines.

We hear so many negative things I want to remember these positives

A newly minted Marine

This was our Marine on family day He had On Base Liberty to be with us for about 5 hours. Chris is front and center.


This is Private Warren and Private Lodin both from Minnesota immediately after Graduation and leaving the Parade Deck!!

Time for a trip

We have been waiting since last April when Chris enlisted to go to San Diego for his graduation from Boot camp. That day is finally coming fast. A week from today we will be on our way. We will see him on Thursday for On Base liberty and he will leave base with us on Friday after graduation ceremonies.
This past week we saw a picture of his platoon Here is the most recent picture of my son.


At 2 AM on Tuesday (California time) he began the Crucible -a 54 hour test of all he has learned. He is going without much sleep and without much food (they get the equivalent of 2.5 meals). At 8 AM (California time) on Thursday he will hike back to base with his squad and the entire company to be pinned with the Eagle Globe and Anchor and he will be a MARINE !! I can't wait to give my son a hug <3.

As the world turns..

The past week has been blur. Filled with craziness. I have had indescribable emotions.
I worked last weekend (so I started the week tired) due to a schedule change I had 2 days off IN A ROW in the middle of the week. This NEVER happens. I decided to go see my grandsons. Oh, have they grown in the 4 weeks since I saw them last.


But before I left my husband and I started to talk about church, the diaconate and the need for us to come to terms with some things that are going on. With as crazy as the last year has been for us -this next year is looking to be as busy. So Todd will be looking to take a sabbatical from his church duties until things at work and home calm down. I really thought as our kids moved on after high school and college things would free us up to have more time for extra things rather then less time.
DH has always put God first, me second, the kids 3rd, his job 4th and the Diaconate last. There have been times (with need) this order has been out of step for a while but over the years he has managed to keep things in check. My job at the church? I have none. Of choice my role at church has been to support my husband. I was not ordained and I did not need to search for my role, many deacons wives search for their place in their husbands Deacon ministry. I have never needed to. I firmly see my role as one of love and support. This has always felt right for me. But it is hard to pull back. The only other time he has had to do this was the year our oldest son was dealing with cancer treatment.
So I went to our daughter's to see the grandbabies with my thoughts on many things. The drive allowed me to find a peace with the decision we have wrestled with - prayer and music helped!
And time with babies is always life nurturing and filled with blessing.
Arriving home I was met with some not totally unexpected news but news that reassured me that the past 2 days had been well worth my time for prayer, and that our plan is a good one. Now we need prayers that the Diocesan offices will see our need and grant the sabbatical.
I called in sick the day after I got home. My ears have been so plugged with occasional pain over the past 2 months and has gotten to the point that I went to the doctor. He does not think I have an ear infection but the amount of fluid behind my eardrum needs to be taken care of. So prednisone to help decrease the fluid and if this doesn't work I will likely need tubes to help equalize the pressure. The prednisone after 2 days seems to be helpng very little but I have 4 days left of the medicine... I really don't want tubes.

However I ended the week on a good note.
We celebrated my dad's 86th birthday on Friday evening.
My mom is recovering very well from her double knee surgery/
Saturday I was up early to go to the cities to meet with my brothers family to do the Cystic Fibrosis Climb for a Cure -IDS center 1028 steps, 50 stories. The team raised over 6000 dollars for CF. I have a niece and a nephew with CF -my niece has spent a lot of time in the hospital this past year and my nephew is hospitalized now and could not be at the climb. There is not much we can do for them but pray and support. And it felt good to be there to climb. I did not raise money this year other then what we donated ourselves. And my brother gave me the additional amount I needed to get a t-shirt. Funny guy ...I had donated on his goal and he handed off half of that for a t shirt. Next time I will do better. And I made it the entire way!!


I ended my week going to mass with my sister and her husband and then meeting up with another brother and sister-in-law for supper and then 7 out of nine of my sibs (and spouses) went to Church Basement Ladies A 2nd helping. It was a good time -we laughed we cried!! My sister Brenda laughed so hard we thought she laid an egg!!