VA Beezy

We are back in the land where military personnel & their families outnumber locals!! Yes, yes, yes...Hampton Roads...home to 7+ military installations, including the world's largest Naval base! We are back in our old house, which is also the first home we bought back at the end of Sean's JO tour. We've had renters in here since we moved up to CT and then to FL. Needless to say, there are lots of repairs we're working on now in addition to unpacking. We were really lucky to have The Fam come down and help unpack our kitchen (a nice not-so-little birthday gift for me!!). It was crazy trying to fit three huge pantries into a pantry that is less than half the size of our coat closet. Speaking of which...we did not have a coat closet in FL...because, there isn't much need for coats! HAHAHAHA. Anyhooo....going from a huge kitchen to a big kitchen has been a challenge and we still have misc. stuff hanging out everywhere. I'm hoping that we'll be unpacked by the time we have to pack up and move again. HAHAHAHAHA.

Above is the view from our backyard. We have seriously missed these gorgeous sunsets that our backyard affords us! The lake is great too...seeing the cormorants dive and catch fish and the mean seagulls try to steal 'em away, the ducks and the geese squawking loudly, and the rumble of jet noise. Wait a minute...what does that have to do with the lake?? Anyhoo...yes, the jets from nearby NAS Oceana rumble loudly overhead (at times) and I LOVE IT. Seriously, how often do people have military jets flying overhead??

Kaia also had her first official week of kindergarten last week! I can't believe my/our baby girl is so grown up already! She adjusted PERFECTLY and had a blast! Jaron is missing his sister, but has his mommy all to himself! ;o)

Alrighty...off to open some boxes...or not. Tee hee hee.

Sa-sa-sa-SEE YA!!!

We're packing up and heading out...soon. Well, we do have packers here today and supposedly they can pack us out in one day. I'll believe it when I see it 'cause WE'VE GOT LOTS O' STUFF...or junk. Tomorrow, they'll load our junk, errr, stuff on the truck and we'll hang out during the weekend...or clean 2 years worth of dirt and also head out to Daytona USA (my treat for handling this move by myself...hehehe....that and Jaron is a total Cars boy (and Kaia got interested in pro-stock car racing after we read about it...plus, she's my other little boy. She likes Cars too.)

Anyhoo...we flew Mom in and she's been a total help...AS USUAL!!! Sean came in briefly this weekend to tie up a few loose ends before our big move. We didn't get much accomplished but he did take care of things I couldn't handle...especially since I managed to pull my shoulder-back-neck.

One thing we did do, is take our annual photo for our holiday cards. We have managed to do this every year...even though Sean hasn't been here for the winter holiday season since 2005. Unfortunately, the last time we sent out holiday cards was probably also in 2005. HAHAHAHAHA. Every year, Sean co-manages the dogs & kids while I set up the camera/shot and manage Remi and Jaron. ;o) Ever since our 3rd holiday photo in 2004, Sean has managed a pretty pained look...mainly from impatience and frustration...poor Hubs. Hopefully next year, someone else can take our photo and Sean'll go back to his fake smile! Tee hee hee. You can check out Take #1 on my other blog here. We took it at our clubhouse pool...one of the most beautiful and relaxing settings we've had (although our lake in VA was really peaceful too). Actually, we both have pretty pained looks/fake smiles here...but hey, with a setting like that, there is no complaining!!

And so starts December...

I had way better shots, but didn't want to post those for fear of the whole security thing of our guys and stuff.

So, we said goodbye to Sean this morning. Found out late last night that we had to take him to the base (as we've always done anyway) reeeeeeeeeeallllly early in the morning. It was days like today that I really wish we had lived closer so Sean could get some more rest in. The kids and I came back home and snoozed for a bit and I had planned on taking us to the Island (Amelia Island) to the state park (Ft. Clinch) to say our goodbyes again. We got to hang out with the uber-cool Ms. Lynsey Hickman and watched the boat go by from atop the fort. Like I mentioned before, I got some really good shots from that fort of the sub, but don't want to post them and have NCIS breathing down my back. ;o) It was also fun having random people pass us by and ask if the sub came or is coming and I was like "WTF?" The spouses are sworn to this Don't Tell Don't Tell policy and yet the three times I've gone, other civilians have known that a sub was coming through. So much for security and confidentiality of our sub's movements. Anyway, I digress...living in FL has made me a cold-weather wimp. It was 50 degrees and a wee bit chilly. I guess it's difficult after it was upper 60s-70 degree weather just a few days ago.

But, during our snooze, Sean called to let us know that AGAIN our move dates needed to be rescheduled...the day AFTER we had just confirmed dates with the moving company. Of course, I can't find out anything else about our schedule until I hear from Sean next...I love being in limbo. Fun stuff. But in actuality, there isn't too much stress here, but just hoping that we'll make it home with The Fam to celebrate (and all of our other various fams/friend-fams to visit). Just stressing to get our place rented out. We haven't locked in a property manager (although we did interviews this past weekend) so I wanted to give MilitaryByOwner.com a chance and see how that works out. I still need to clean some more and upload more photos.

Anyhoo...our weekend was crazy busy and stressful, but we managed to head down to downtown JAX and catch the Light Parade & Fireworks. It was extra great since we got to hit my favorite downtown Jax soft taco goodness Burrito Gallery. The Light Parade was actually on water...people would deck out their boats in all sorts of decorations. There were some mad cool decorations and others that were like "ooooookaaaaaaay". Case in point of a mad cool one was the Santa Riding the Alligator down the St. John's River.

I also got to play around with my new cool toy the Gorillapod, which is a tripod for cameras that you can wrap around various things. I used it to get some clearer nightshots (man, am I reaaaaaaally wanting an SLR for some seriously crisp and no-noise photos...one day...*sigh*) by wrapping it around the railing and just snapping away (and playing w/various settings to finally settle on something I was satisfied with). At the end of the night, since we barely have photos of the 4 of us...I wrapped the Gorillapod around the stroller and this was one of the shots I got:

The fireworks were great since they were launched off of three barges and we could see all three...and were next to one of the two bridges that displayed the famous "waterfall" display of fireworks:

Anyway, what a long day it has been and I'm interested in seeing how the next few weeks pan out. I leave y'all with this photo of the kiddies as we were leaving the fort after saying goodbye to Sean:

A Dozen

So, Kaia & I were discussing the quantity a dozen and right after I thought we had it pretty cemented, I asked her "If Mama had a dozen kids, how many would I have?"

She promptly replied "A LOT". ;o)

Mind you, this is the same child that wants me to have 100 babies.

Just a quick update since the next month and a half is going to be a fun one...we'll be packing up, renting this house (HOPEFULLY), and moving from here to our old stomping grounds in the Hampton Roads, VA area.

Anyhoo....lots to do and plenty o'coffee to drink! ;o)