Was it worth it?

Yesterday, December 23, 2016 was Brandon's last day as an Active Duty Soldier.  He is officially out of the Army now.  Let's take a look back at why he joined the Army, some of the things that happened, and whether or not it was worth it.

Five years ago neither Brandon nor I had any plans for joining the military.  Though looking back I can certainly see that we were heading there.  Its like our Heavenly Father was shutting every door so that we'd eventually find the joining the Army was what we HAD to do.

Back in December of 2011 we were living in Bountiful, Utah.  The twins were just barely 1 year old.  I was in my second trimester with Derrick.  Brandon was unemployed because he quit his ramp agent job with Frontier Airlines in September when everything about that job went from mediocre to Hell. He was applying for jobs with the FAA and we were hopeful we'd hear something after the new year.  In the meantime we were paying our bills with our savings and getting out food from the LDS church's Bishops Store house. Brandon was also earning money by doing odd jobs. The only way we were able to afford to have a Christmas was when our friends hired Brandon to help re-shingle their house after a freak wind storm.  In short, it was a stressful time.

2012 did bring us news about the FAA job, but it was not news we wanted.  Brandon was told that he did not meet all the requirements for the job.  This was terrible news since that was Brandon's best career prospect. I turned to social media to vent my feelings, and received a message from my friend Nicky.  Here's some of  what she said:

Hey Val, I almost wasn't going to send you this because I don't know much about your circumstances or if it would even be right for you guys. But it sounded like it might be a good option, so I thought I should tell you anyway.

I was doing laundry tonight at my dad's place and mentioned your situation. He said that you guys might want to look into Brandon joining the Navy or Air Force with the objective of flying transports. . . . Flying transports is a land based job, so he wouldn't be gone for months at a time on an aircraft carrier. It sounds a bit more like the situation of an airline pilot. There are also submarine tracking flights with the Navy, which is supposed to be land based as well. Many, many, many airline pilots have gotten their start flying transports and it looks great on a resume. The Navy and Air Force require anyone wanting to be a pilot to have a bachelor degree before they begin training. I think you mentioned in your blog post that Brandon graduated from USU, so he'd be in a good position to start training as a pilot.

. . .

I have no idea if any of this will be useful to you guys. There are a lot of horror stories about recruiters out there, but my brother had good experiences with the ones he encountered. . . .

I almost wrote back and told her that we weren't interested in the military.  But something told me that this might be something worth looking into.  So I told her I'd talk to Brandon about it.  To my surprise he'd been considering the same thing.  

So that started the month where we talked and thought about nothing else. Brandon met with a recruiter who let him know that he was too old for the Air Force and had too many dependents for the Navy.  That left the Army as an option and Brandon started looking at that.

We also started talking to the few people we knew with military experience.  My best friend Ashley was probably the best source of information for me.  Her husband had joined the Army about 2 years earlier.  While it hadn't been easy for them she said that it was a good decision.  Brandon talked to one of his professors who had served in the Air Force.  When he asked him if it would be hard on the family the professor answered with, "There are a lot of jobs that are harder on a family than the military is."

It seemed like the military was ALL we talked about. Should he join, where would I live during basic training, how would we tell our families, etc. To distract myself from everything I started reading Work and the Glory Volume 9. Some distraction it turned out to be. A major plot point in the book revolves around the LDS Saints call to join the Mormon Battalion. EVERYBODY in the book was trying to decide whether or not to join the Army. I felt like the following quotes from Brigham Young were speaking directly to me.

"I know what many of you are thinking. You are concerned about your circumstances. Well, I am as well acquainted with the situation of every man in camp as they are themselves. But now the surrounding circumstances must recede from our minds. Let go of them. We may as well consider ourselves in good circumstances as in bad ones.

"But says one, 'I will go if my family can be made comfortable.' I told my brethren not to mention families today. I am aware it is desirable, were it our privilege, to have every man's presence in the camp to take care of his family and team and go along to the West. There are no more men here than what are badly needed. But these feelings must be dispensed with. We have to learn to control our feelings and act according to our best judgement.

"My experience has taught me that it is best to do the things that are necessary. I have learned to do the necessary thing independent of my feelings and at the expense of everything near and dear to me. May of us have been called upon to forsake the society of friends, wives and children, and you will all be brought into a situation to learn the same lesson.

"The blessings we are looking forward to receive will only be attained through sacrifice . . . If we want the privilege of going where we can worship God according to our consciences, we must raise the battalion. I say that it is right. Who cares for sacrificing our comfort for a few years?"
After probably more prayer and fasting than we'd EVER done Brandon and I decided that he should join the Army. Oddly enough flight school with the army wasn't part of the plan.  His recruiter mentioned that there were helicopter pilots in the Army, but wasn't really helpful at telling us anything about them.  (Knowing what we know now we realize that she could have helped Brandon apply for Flight School before he even signed up.  He could have been what's called a "street to seat candidate." But I'm glad we didn't do that because it would have been awful to be thrown into Army life and flight school at the same time.) Brandon was told that he'd be sworn in and go to Basic Training in September.  Thankfully at the end of January his cousin helped him get a job where he could work until September.

I'm not going to take the time to detail the twists and turns from the ensuing four years of Army life.  But I'll give you brief run down.  (And I'll link to a few old posts to make things easy for you to get more details.)

Brandon did enlist in the Army in September of 2012.  He did four months of Basic Training at Fort Benning Georgia.  I stayed in Bountiful with our three kids under the age of 2.  I had help from a small army of family, friends, and neighbors.  I was able to fly to Georgia in December for Brandon's graduation.

Brandon was assigned to Fort Hood so after Christmas we moved to Texas. The move was kind of awful, but by the time it was over we were settled in a four bedroom house on post.  Considering that we'd been living in a two bedroom apartment we were feeling pretty good about the decision to join the Army.

Things were better, but they weren't easier.  Brandon had to go away for another month of training, I found out I was pregnant AGAIN, and Brandon was told that he's be going to Korea. But we also started looking into what exactly it would take for Brandon to become a helicopter pilot in the Army.
He started the long process of putting together a packet (application) to become a Warrant Officer and go to flight school.  He worked on this for months.

Veronica was born in September of 2013 and Brandon went to Korea in January of 2014.  I stayed in our house in Fort Hood with our four children under the age of four.  Somehow this wasn't as crazy as it sounds.

Brandon finished his packet while he was in Korea.  And in July we got the wonderful news that he was accepted into Flight School and would go to Warrant Officer training the next March.  He came home from Korea in October, and we enjoyed some family time while getting ready for him to leave again.

In March of 2015 Brandon moved to Fort Rucker, Alabama and started Warrant Officer Candidate School.  The kids and I followed in May and were moved into the house right in time for his Graduation.  Brandon worked on some preliminary training during the summer and then officially started Flight School in September.  He finished primary flight training in April of 2016.

We knew flight school would be rigorous, but nothing prepared us for how difficult it really was.  Add in Brandon's sleeping problem and eventually it became apparent that he wasn't suited for being a military pilot.  And if he couldn't fly he didn't want to stay in the Army.

And suddenly we were facing the end of this crazy Army life adventure.  I'd been expected at least another 6 years so it was odd to have only a few months left.  Ironically I was more worried about getting out of the Army than I had about getting into it in the first place.  But I figured that joining the Army had seemed pretty crazy once upon a time, but it had worked out okay so getting out of the Army should work out too.

I still don't know what the next phase of our life will be like.  Things are very much in the air right now.  In some ways we are back where we were 5 years ago.  Brandon has even applied for that same position with the FAA and we are hoping to hear back in a few weeks.

But in other ways we are much better off.  I want to talk about those things.

We joined the Army mostly for financial reasons.  We aren't wealthy by any means, but we are a lot better off financially.  We have paid off quite a bit of debt, bought a second car, and have more in savings than ever before.

Career wise we are in a much better place. Brandon is considered a veteran and now has "Veterans Preference" when he applies for jobs.

Even though Brandon didn't finish flight school he did still get a lot of helicopter flight hours. Getting a commercial helicopters licence is within his reach if he decides to do a little bit more flight training.  (If we are crazy enough to do flight school for a THIRD time we are going to use veterans benefits to pay for it.)  

We've both grown a lot from the last few years.  Both of us have done things that we never thought we could do.  I like to joke that the Army has turned me into a spontaneous person.

Do you want to know what is the best thing we gained in the past 5 years?  It's been the relationships with people we've come in contact with.  We have met so many AMAZING people by being in the Army.  People that I never would have met otherwise. I'm so thankful that I was able to live and associate with such wonderful people in Texas and Alabama.  And Brandon also made some great friends in Korea.

I like to say that joining the Army was "The sacrifice that keeps on giving."  Sure we had to give up a few comforts and do hard things, but the benefits far outweighed the things we gave up.

So was it worth it?

Yes.and I would do it again.

So this is Christmas

I never feel very Christmasy, but this year I feel less Christmasy than ever.  There are about 3 reasons for this. 

1.  I'm still adjusting from the whole cross country move. It's like my internal clock stopped about the time we started loading the moving van.  If you asked me I'd tell you it's something like November 10th today. 

2. We are living with other people. None of my Christmas decorations are out.  It's all my in-laws stuff (which is lovely), but it's not my stuff. 

3. I have a job. I love it. And Christmas is just kind of secondary to how awesome it feels to get a break from being a stay at home mom.  

Even though I'm not really feeling the Christmas Love this year it still is December and we are smack dab in the middle of the Christmas Season.  So I've gone through the motions of doing Christmas stuff.  And I've even felt a little bit of Christmas Cheer.  So let's take a look back at some of the things we've done as a family.  

First up was the Christmas Party for our new ward.  Brandon and his parents took the kids and I met up with them as soon as I was done with work. They had a dinner and then the Primary kids sang songs and Santa came.  Derrick and Veronica couldn't handle the crowds so Brandon took them home pretty early.  But I stayed with Charlotte and Lydia.  They waited so patently to have a change to tell Santa what they want for Christmas.   

 On another night that week I came home from work to find the kids helping Bestemor and Bestefar decorate the tree.  (Don't worry I told them they could decorate it without me.)  The kids were so cute helping put the ornaments on.  Even Derrick liked "pun-ning non" the ornaments.

 The next day I came down the stairs and found this magical picture waiting for me.  This is one of the reasons I'm happy that we are living here right now.

 On Saturday the 10th we decided to go to a little Christmas Activity that the Ogden Valley Business Association was doing.  There is a little cluster of shops in Eden where we could visit the shops and have the clerks sign off little paper.  They we could take the paper and get free pictures with Santa.  ( I love this kind of stuff.)  One of the shops was a little bakery and they gave out samples of cookies and fudge.  We all really liked that.  

 Then we went to see Santa.

 All the kids took a turn sitting with him.

 I was so surprised that Derrick wanted to sit with him.

 Here's Lydia.

 And Charlotte. No Santa will ever be as good as the one we met in Copperas Cove, Texas, but this one was pretty good.

 And amazingly we were able to take a picture without any tears.  Next year we'll work on looking at the camera.

 It was lightly snowing outside, but oddly enough the air was also warm and so the snow was melting.

 We went down to Ogden and ran a few errands.  Then we went to the Ogden Christmas Village.  We were planning on going there in the early evening, but we miss judged the time and so we were there more at like 3:00.  Even though it was still light the kids had fun looking at the little houses.

 The real problem was the RAIN.  What had been a light snow flurry up in the mountains was a drizzle of rain down in the city.

 But the kids all had great time.  Later they all said that looking at the buildings had been their favorite thing that day.

 But, boy did we end up soaked! I take back every bad thing I ever said about snow.  Rain in December is the worst. We'd dressed the kids for snow so when we got back to the car we just pulled off their soaking wet coats and snow pants.

Sunday was a bright and sunny day.  After church I told the kids that I was going to go outside and build a snowman.  They were all pretty excited about that. I forgot how much I loved this part of snow.  I'm not a fan of most of the aspects of winter, but making a snowman on a sunny day is one of the things I like.  

 I think this is Lydia pretending the snow is ice cream.

 Here's Charlotte.  Oh I need to tell you about these new coats.  The zipper on Lydia's coat broke on one of her first days of school.  Her teacher referred her to the school counselor who called me up and said that the school was willing to donate a new coat to Lydia.  And they'd give one to Charlotte too so she wouldn't feel left out.  A few days later we were given two new white coats, two new hats, and two new pairs of gloves.

Both girls are super happy with their coats.

 Our snow man turned out pretty great.  The kids had fun finding sticks for arms and rocks for eyes.

 The carrot nose was everyone's favorite part.  For days Veronica would say, "Carrot in the snow!"

 I don't have work on Monday's so Brandon went down to the Hill Airforce Base to get his ID card changed while I stayed home and took care of picking the kids up from school and playing with them all afternoon.  Here's the cool thing about having a job.  I actually enjoy the time that I spend with my kids.  I mean I've always had fun with my kids, but lets be honest, I was pretty burned out after being with them ALL THE TIME.  But now that I work four days a week I really enjoy the three days that I'm off.  We had fun making gingerbread men together.

 Here's how they turned out.

 Everybody liked eating them too.

 Here's Veronica with one of her's.

 Lydia with hers.  Oh I guess I should explain the scarves.  Except I really can't.  The girls just found them and wanted to wear them.

On of the nice things about living with family is that Brandon and I can go on a lot of dates.  Steve and Jacque were so nice and watched the kids one night while Brandon and I went Christmas shopping.  We are doing a pretty small Christmas this year so we got it mostly done in one night.  (No sense in buying a bunch of toys when we have a ton of perfectly good ones in storage in the garage.)  Then we spent the next few nights wrapping presents. 

I'm not the only one who is a little confused about what month it is.  The kids still all wear their Halloween shirts on a regular basis.  Veronica LOVES her pumpkin shirt and wants to wear it every day.  One day she picked it out and then Derrick told me he wanted his pumpkin shirt too.  What he meant was he wanted to see the little pumpkin that is where the tag is on his skeleton shirt. So I turned that shirt inside out and backwards so he could see his little pumpkin. (And I put a note in his backpack so his teachers would know it was intentional) And then Charlotte and Lydia wanted to wear their pumpkin shirts too.  So here are my little holiday confused children.  

 Last Friday we had our annual Christmas Under the Tree night.  We started it out with opening the box containing this year's hand painted ornament that Brandon's mom made us.

This year the ornament is a nutcracker and this picture does not do it justice at all. 

Then we had some cookies in the kitchen.

We read a few stories and then it was time for bed.  The kids wanted to sleep under the tree, but Brandon and I were worried about it being too cold on the floor.  Jacque suggested pushing the love seats together to make a nest.  I thought only Charlotte and Lydia would care about that.  But Derrick and Veronica climbed in too.

 We just so happened to be on the Christmas chapters in our book By the Shores of Silver Lake so I read those to all the kids.  Veronica fell asleep first followed by Derrick.  Charlotte and Lydia stayed up while I read.  But they fell asleep really fast as soon as I was done.

 I love this picture of what the "nest" looked like from up above.

 The next day we realized we didn't have much planned for the day.  I HATE sitting around the house all day on Saturdays so I started wracking my brain to come up with something to do.  I didn't want to go anywhere crowded, but I wanted to do something.  I realized that we should go to Logan and check out the Gingerbread houses there.  And I decided we needed to see my friend Amy too.

Amy and I met during out first semester of college.  We've been good friends through the ensuing 13 years and thanks to Facebook we've been able to stay in contact.  But it's been almost 2 1/2 years since we saw each other in person.

So I hurried and got ahold of her and luckily she didn't have anything planned for that day either.  So we went to her house in Logan and had a great time catching up and watching out eight children play together.  (Derrick played, like actually interacted and played, with her 5 year old boy and it was the coolest thing ever.)

The kids all got crazy so we took them to McDonalds for lunch where we remembered we should probably take a picture to commemorate seeing each other.

 Amy and her brood had to get going so they left.  Then we drove around Logan for a while and showed they kids all the different places that we used to live.  After that it was time to go see the Gingerbread houses.

This went TERRIBLY.  It was cold.  The kids were sleepy.  And there were only about 6 houses on display.  But you know, some of it was cool.

 Charlotte liked posing with the bull statues that are on the street.

 The one bright spot was when I decided that we should go into the Blue Bird restaurant and buy a piece of chocolate for each of us.  I've always wanted to do that.

We got back to the car and were very happy to be warm again.  Even though seeing the gingerbread houses had been a bust the trip to Logan had been nice.

On Sunday things really got fun when Brandon's brother Bryan and his wife and kids showed up at the house. They came out to Utah for Kara's brother's wedding.  The wedding was over and now they are spending Christmas with our side of the family.

The past few days have been full different family activities.  Most of which I've completely forgot to take pictures of.  Okay actually let me re-phrase that.  I feel weird taking pictures of family get-to-gethers when it isn't my house.  So I thought about taking pictures, but then didn't.

So for posterity's sake I'll just give you a little run down of what we did each night.

Sunday night Brandon's sister Melanie and some of her kids came over and everyone ate sugar cookies that Brandon and his mom had made.  They'd had a "cookie war" to see who could make the best sugar cookie.  Everyone except me picked Jacque's cookie, but I liked the one that Brandon had made. Although if we are being honest here, I have to say that sugar cookies are kind of a waste of a cookie.

Monday night Brandon and Bryan's best friend Jake came up with his family from Salt Lake.  It was really fun to see all of them.  It's always fun to hear Jake, Bryan, and Brandon joking and talking.  I think it's been something like 5 years since they were all together.

Tuesday night was a bit of a problem night.  Here's the deal.  I REALLY like Star Wars, and I really like movies.  Which means I was pretty excited for the Rouge One movie.  But I didn't want to be selfish and go on a date to see the movie while so much family stuff was going on. So I decided that I'd wait to see Rouge One until after Christmas.  Well imagine how I felt when I found out the Brandon had been invited to go see Rouge One as a "guys night" with all the men and boys in the family on Tuesday.  I was TICKED.  I was probably a bigger Star Wars fan and knew more advance buzz about that movie than any of them, but I was excluded because I was a girl.  Oh I was so mad.  Yes the words "blatant sexism" crossed my lips as tried to tell Brandon how I felt about the whole situation.  

To the guy's credit they did invite me along after they found out how important it was to me, but unfortunately we couldn't make the time fit around my work schedule.  So I got left out of seeing something that I was really excited for.  That's the last time I try and be unselfish.  (Not really, but I am going to be a lot more upfront about my movie plans from now on.)

So anyway, all the men and boys went to see the movie while the girls stayed home and knitted and baked and did other things women like to do.  (I might still be a little annoyed at the sexism.)

I came home from work (because I'm liberated like that) and found that the kids had all made gingerbread houses.  They were so excited to show me.

Jacque had bought a little kit with lots of little houses, and then she helped each kid decorate their house. 

Derrick doesn't look like it here, but he was really proud of his house.  Jacque was so impressed by how attentive he was to decorating it.  Derrick pointed to everything and told me all about the trees, and the lights and the door.  He called it a "Jimmerbread house."

 And here is Veronica's.  She ate all of her candy off as soon as we told her that she could.

 Brandon and the other guys came back from the movie.  Brandon told me that we were going to go see it the next night.  Someone had suggested that maybe Brandon should buy me flowers to try to smooth things over.  Brandon knew that only one thing would make me happy - movie tickets.  Fortunately he thought the movie was good enough that he was just fine with seeing it two nights in a row.

Wednesday was the last day of school for Charlotte and Lydia (Derrick's had been Tuesday.)  They had a Christmas Sing along assembly at the school.  My boss let me come in a little late so I was able to go to the assembly.  It was so cute to see the girls sing with their kindergarten classes.  They sang Santa Claus is Coming to Town and did lots of actions.  

Poor Derrick did not like the assembly.  We got there a little early and he cried and screamed the whole time the sixth grade rehearsed their part of the program. He'd calmed down by the time the assembly started, but he still cried and screamed every time the audience clapped. I'm sure the people around us thought that they were witnessing a disaster, but really it was progress.  He stayed inside the auditorium the whole time!  I was so proud of him.  I told Brandon to buy some ice cream as a reward for Derrick doing so well and for Charlotte and Lydia singing so well.

I went to work, but the day seemed to fly by.  After work Brandon and I went down to Ogden to see Rouge One.  It was such a great movie.  I cried during the credits.  Great big happy tears and sad ones too, but mostly just tears of - I don't know how to describe then - fulfillment maybe.  I couldn't believe how perfect the movie was. It was the Star Wars movie I never knew I really wanted. Sure it has some flaws, but overall it was just amazing. I feel like watching that movie changed me in a way.  
And so that brings us to today.  December 22nd.  Two days until Christmas Eve.  And I'm still thinking is November, and I'm distracted by Rouge One, and I'm busy with work.  It's possible that in the next 48 hours I'll get hit with some Christmas Magic and start really feeling the spirit of the season.  But I'm not sure.  Even in normal years I usually have my most profound thoughts about Jesus in months like June.

But you never know.

A whole bunch of firsts

I feel like I've said this at the beginning of just about every post this year, but gosh I'm behind on this blog.  We've been here in Utah for a little over two weeks, and we've done soooooooooooooo much during those two weeks.  

We've had a major holiday, a birthday, a first day of school, a first day of work, and a little bit of sight seeing.  

I'd like to give each of those things their own post, but instead in the interest of time we are just going to do a nice big run down like we've done a lot this year.  

Enjoy the catch up.  

First up we have Thanksgiving.  Long time readers of this blog know the drill.  Brandon LOVES Thanksgiving.  He happily spends hours, no days, cooking.  He's cooked Thanksgiving dinner the past three years - and only one of those times was actually at our house.  This is his favorite holiday. Meanwhile, I just kind of stay out of the way until it's time to show up for the food and then I do the dishes when its all over.  

This year Thanksgiving was extra special because we were able to spend it with Brandon's parents.  Last time we spent Thanksgiving with them was 2011.  Yeah that's 2011 as in I was pregnant with Derrick 2011.  In 2012 Brandon was at Basic Training and every year since then we haven't been able to make it back to Utah.  Brandon was hoping that he'd be out of the Army in time for Thanksgiving and his wish came true.  

Charlotte and Lydia were super happy to be at Bestemore's for such a special day.  We've been blessed to be able to spend Thanksgiving with family over the last three years, but there is something special about being at your Grandma's on Thanksgiving.  Jacque taught the girls how to make Turkey name cards out of their hand prints. 

And I LOVE this picture of three generations prepping food together.  THIS is the reason I'm happy to be living with my in-laws for the next few months. 

Like I said, I don't help with the food.  I'm in charge of helping with the kids.  This has been my job ever since I was a teenager and I was in charge of keeping my brother Billy entertained while we waited for Thanksgiving dinner to be done.  So Derrick and I hung out.  We had the Macy's Day Parade on and Derrick was so excited to see the Thomas the Train balloon.

At one point Billy and his wife Becca video called me on Google Hangouts.  They moved to New York in the fall and so they were watching the parade live - from a balcony of the skyscraper where Becca works.  That was pretty cool.

Here's Lydia modeling her fancy Thanksgiving outfit.

We set up some tables in the family room.  This was the "off" year for Brandon's family.  Most of his siblings were spending Thanksgiving with their In-laws.  So we didn't have to set up as many seats as we would have had to.

But we still had tons of pie!  Brandon and his mom had started making pie on Wednesday night.

Charlotte had insisted on making "Sun Flower Caramel" again this year.  This is something she made up last year, and since I'm a huge supporter of innovation and creativity in my kids I just went along with it.  Here's how to make sunflower caramel.

You take pretzels and place them on a plate.  Then you take caramels and put one on each pretzel.  Put them in the microwave for about 10 seconds until the caramel is soft.  Then squish the caramel into the pretzel.  Drizzle everything with honey.  And that's it.  We put everything in the freezer to try to get the honey to be less runny, but it was still runny.

Here's Charlotte showing off her tasty creation.

Since this was the "off" year I asked if my friend Melissa could join in with her kids.  Her son is probably going to be diagnosed with Autism soon and her in-laws aren't quite onboard with that yet.   I thought she might enjoy an autism friendly environment for a change.  Plus I really wanted to see her newest baby - little miracle Anastasia who was born like a hundred weeks early. It's been killing me for 9 months that I couldn't be there for Melissa to help her out with all the ups and downs of having a premie baby on top of  having two other kids.  I've been doing lots of service for the women that I have lived around in hopes that the Karma would somehow make it back to Melissa.  

So anyway, I was very happy that Melissa could come to Thanksgiving.  Here we are.  She's holding Rory who is not quite two and I'm holding Anastasia who is 9 months.  If I remember right these babies are less than a year apart.  

Anastasia has torticollis - which in extreme layman's terms means her head is misshapen. To fix it she has to wear a helmet for most of the day.  I'd given Charlotte and Lydia a heads up that Anastasia would be wearing a helmet.  When Lydia saw the baby she exclaimed, "She's cute even with the helmet." She wanted to hold her a lot.  And so did Charlotte.

And so did Derrick.  I didn't get a picture of it, (because I was too busy making sure Derrick didn't drop her) but Derrick loved sitting with Anastasia.  He wanted to look her right in the eyes.  He kept saying, "Hel-wo baby!"  He also loved Rory and followed him everywhere and wanted to help him take off his shoes.  I'm hoping those two boys can be good friends as they grow up.

Soon the food was done and it was time to EAT.

Our first course was the legendary multi-colored jello.  We've never made this on our own, but the kids have heard about it every year.  I was pretty happy when Jacque started making it.  Charlotte and Lydia watched her get everything ready, but they didn't see her make it.  They were so impressed by how it turned out.

Dinner was really good.  I sat by Melissa's 8 year old daughter Heidi who had great manners.  I couldn't help think back to when Heidi was a baby and would come to the office where Melissa and I worked together.  That made me feel kind of old.

Melissa's younger kids hit their nap time so she had to cut out soon after dinner.  Brandon and I ended up snuggling up on the couch together and taking an AMAZING nap.  The last thing I remember was Charlotte putting a blanket over me and then I was out for an hour or something. Steve and Jacque kept and eye on the kids.

After we woke up we had pie.  It was so yummy.  Veronica was so cute and would ask for "pumpkin pie" but she really meant whipped cream.

Jacque's brother Ward had also come to Thanksgiving.  Jacque and Steve went to take Ward home.  While they were gone I did the dishes while Brandon dried them and put them away.  Jacque was so surprised when she came home.  I was happy that I'd been able to contribute. 

The next day was Black Friday of course.  We aren't big shoppers in our family so we weren't planning on going out.  But I realized that I needed to buy Brandon a birthday gift so I took Charlotte with me to Smith's Marketplace so we could find one for him.  We went in the afternoon and the crowds weren't that bad.  We even found a Christmas Present for a pretty good deal.

I feel like I need to pause and explain to you the geography of where we are living right now.  We are in what's known as Ogden Valley, but that's not where the city of Ogden is located.  

Ogden city is about 15 miles west of us and located on the other side of a mountain.  There are basically two options for how to get to Ogden from where we live.  One is to go down Ogden Canyon.  It's a decent road though there are lots of twists and turns and sheer canyon walls to watch out for.  The other option is to go over a higher mountain pass known as the North Ogden divide.  This is the quickest way to get to Smith's Market Place.  

And it's my favorite way because of views like this when you come back over the mountain.  This valley really is like a slice of paradise.  After living in the middle of a never ending pine tree forest for 18 months it's kind of nice to have actual scenery to look at again.   

 

The valley is pretty rural and so we see all sorts of wildlife outside.  I think there are something like three deer in this picture.

They kids get really excited whenever they see animals right outside the back door. 

Anyway, back to the stuff we've been doing.  Brandon put this railroad track together for Derrick.  These train tracks are some of the kids only toys that we unpacked.  Everything else is stuff that Brandon played with as a kid.  He told the girls that the plastic blocks that he made the tunnels out of are probably older than he is. 

On Saturday we decided to go to the Ogden Train museum.  We've been here before, but it's always fun.  And we discovered that they've changed a few things.  This dinning car set is new - it used to be a set up of a regular passenger car.

The girls remembered this museum from when we were here last summer, and the summer before that, and the winter before that - we come here a lot. 

We've been to a lot of train museums all over the country, but this one is still my favorite.  It has a little bit of something for everyone.  The kids especially like the childrens room where they can play with everything.

We ended up running into Brandon's friend Jake and his family completely by random in this room.  They live in Salt Lake so it was a really big coincidence that we were all at the museum together.  (and of course I completely forgot to document it with a picture.)

Here's Veronica showing me how a train works.

And Charlotte and Lydia pretending to be engineers.

But everyone's favorite part was the model train of course.  Derrick had such a fun time watching it.  (You can see he still hasn't let go of those train brochures he picked up in Green River.)

We went to check out the model car exhibit, but got no farther than the cute dog that the volunteer had at the entrance.  The volunteer guide told us that he likes to bring his dog, Spice, because then kids will play with his dog instead of trying to touch the cars.  It certainly worked on my kids.  Veronica sat with that dog for a long time and kept saying, "Hi Spice." over an over again.

After we were done with the museum we decided to walk up 25th Street to the Ogden Christmas Village.  There was going to be a big parade that night and the Christmas Village would official be open.  We kind of wanted to go to the parade, but it was scheduled to start right around bed time.  Plus it would be cold.  And I didn't know how Derrick and Veronica would handle the crowds.  So we just went to get a sneak peek in the day time.

I was having a great time.  I'd completely forgotten how much I love Ogden city.  Way back when Brandon and I first met we'd come to Ogden on a date and fallen in love with the city - and that was back before it was all restored and cool like it is now.  We'd had a semi official plan to one day live in Ogden.  As we walked around the city on this trip I started talking to Brandon about how maybe we should revisit that plan.  Or that we should at least enjoy the fact that we get to live this close to Ogden right now.

Brandon was right there with me on that plan.  He was pretty happy to be back here too.

The kids liked peeking in the windows and they definitely wanted to come back to see everything when it was officially open.  We'll definitely have to do that this month.

On Sunday we went to a mission farewell for one of Brandon's cousins.  Several of his other cousins were there so it was really fun for Brandon to see all of them. 

That evening Brandon's sister's came over to the house with their families for pie.  Suprisingly this was the first family get together I've ever been to in this house.  It was fun to see all the cousins playing together.  Derrick followed Weston around and copied his every move.  It was really funny. 

On Sunday it was time for the kids to go to their new school.  I'd been in contact with the Special Needs Pre-K teacher as far back as May to make sure that there would be a program in place for Derrick if we did end up moving in with Brandon's parents.  I was very happy to find out that last year they started a little pilot pre-k program for special needs kids and regular kids.  This is very similar to the program that Derrick already was in. While we were in Alabama I'd made sure that we updated his IEP (Individual Education Plan) and got it sent over to the new school.  That way they can pick up right where the last school left off.

Charlotte and Lydia actually had to deal with more changes to their routine than Derrick.  They have been going to all dayKindergarten but it would only be a half day here in Utah.  They were okay with that.  But they were not okay with the fact that they would now be in completely separate classrooms.  In Fort Rucker they had separeate teachers who shared  large room called a pod.  They had separate teaching areas, but they classes could usually see each other.  At the new school the girls would be in completely separate rooms.  They were sad about that.

I was having my own adjustments to everything.  For the past year and a half we've been spoiled with a bus that takes the kids to school.  But now we live within the "walking/car rider zone" so that meant we'd have to take the kids.  Technically Derrick could have had a bus ride, but it seemed ridiculous to put him on the bus at the same time we were putting the other kids in the car.

So right there we already had to deal with the whole-get-in-the-car-and-buckle-seat-belts-routine.  And on top of that it was snowing - HARD!

 Needles to say we were all a little traumatized as we walked into the school.  One of the office ladies helped us find the classrooms for the girls. (Derrick and I had already seen his classroom when we dropped off everyones registration paperwork.) We found out that Charlotte is in the same class as her cousin Oakley.  (We knew one of them would be, but we didn't know which twin had which teacher.) All three kids have their classrooms in a row which is fun.

Derrick cried when I took him in his class.  He was overwhelmed with how new it all was.  I ended up just leaving him with the teachers.  They told me later that he calmed down when he played with a sensory table.  And they said he had a great day after that.  They were so impressed by how well he knows his letters and numbers.

Charlotte and Lydia had good days as well.  They'd been worried they'd have mean teachers, but both their teachers were very nice.

While the kids were in school I hoped on the computer and applied for some jobs at the three ski resorts up in this valley, Nordic Valley, Powder Mountain, and Snow Basin. The day's snow storm was reminding me how much I didn't want to have to commute down to Ogden every day.  I was hoping to get a job within the valley and working for a ski resort seemed like a good plan.  I was thinking of just getting a job in tickets sales or something like that.  Well when I got on the Snow Basin job site I happened to see a posting for an Accounting Clerk.  I fit the qualifications.  I was also happy to see that it was a seasonal job.  I'd been worried that I wouldn't be able to get a good job because I'm only planning on being in the area for a few months. This job seemed perfect so I applied for it and hoped for the best.

After I picked the kids up from school we had lunch and then we all went down to Ogden to run some errands.  The first errand was a job interview for me.  I'd applied for an office job with a fencing company and they'd called me about an interview right before Thanksgiving.  They said I could come in the next week and talk about the job.

Brandon dropped me off and then drove around with the kids while I interviewed.  The interview went okay, but the job wouldn't really start until the spring and that wouldn't work for my schedule.  So I said I wasn't interested in being considered for the position, but thanks anyway.  (Plus I was still hoping something might come from the snow basin job.)

Our other errands in Ogden were buy snow gear for the kids. Getting out to the car that morning had been a big reminder that tennis shoes are not good in the winter.  First we went to Savers and found a pair of snow pants.  We already had two pairs that Melanie gave us so that meant we only needed one more pair.  Then we went to K-Mart and bought new boots for the kids and for me.  I had a big pair from the last time we were in Utah, but they were more hiking boots.  I needed cute go to church and job interview boots.  (I'd been borrowing Jacques.)

We also found one more pair of snow pants.  Our checkout price at K-mart was pretty expensive, but considering we haven't had to buy snow stuff for over 3 years it made a lot of sense.

When we got back home the girls put on their boots, their snow pants, their scarves their coats, and their gloves.  Charlotte said, "I feel like I'm going to space."

Then they went outside to fulfull all their playing in the snow fantasies.  

They had fun, but they were pretty cold when they came back in. 

Veronica and I stayed inside and made pizza.

The next day was Tuesday and I felt like a much better mom as we got the kids ready for school in all their weather appropriate gear.  While the kids were in school Brandon attempted to get the jeep fixed.  He was hoping to get it started enough so he could drive it to Autozone to get in diagnosed and then buy what ever he needed.  Instead he got it started enough to drive it to the middle of the driveway where it promptly died. I laughed really hard at that.

We pushed it to the side and Brandon set to work seeing what he could do.  Veronica and I went to the library to get a card.  I love libraries and I've had a card just everywhere we've lived. On our way back I was worrying about money.  Brandon still has a few more Army paychecks coming, we are getting reimbursed for our moving expenses, and we have a decent savings account, but still I was worried. Who knew what was wrong with the jeep.  Would fixing it completely kill our finances?  I said a little prayer asking for help with finding the right job for me so that we could continue to have income while Brandon transitions to a new career.

Well that prayer was answered pretty quickly.  Not 20 minutes later I got a call from a lady in the Accounting Office at Snow Basin.  I was in the pick up line for the kids at school so I couldn't talk very long with her, but I told her I'd call her back at noon.

So right at noon I locked myself in my bedroom and Brandon kept and eye on the kids while I had a phone interview.  It went great and she invited me up to Snowbasin so I could see what the job would be like.  I knew Brandon needed the Honda to fix the Jeep that day so I told her I could come up on Wednesday and 9:00.  She said that would be fine.

So I skipped down stairs and told Brandon the good news.  Both of us were super optimistic.  He told me that he was pretty certain that the jeep just needed a new battery.  So he took the Honda down to Ogden to get a new one.  While he was there he also went to the DMV to get a new license.  (His expired years ago, but it's still be considered valid since Utah allows that for Active Duty Military.)

The day was fairly warm and sunshiny so the kids and I put on all our winter clothes and went outside to explore the snow.

They had a great time running around the front yard.

Lydia got to make a real snow angel.

Charlotte was so happy she didn't have to make one in sand anymore.

Veronica was super ticked about the snow and kept screaming about how it was on her hands, but she did okay for a while.  Derrick liked throwing snow onto the road.

After about 20 minutes I took Derrick and Veronica inside, but Charlotte and Lydia stayed out for a while.

That evening my sister Lindsey texted all my siblings and said that they were having a gender reveal for her new baby and we should all jump on a google hang out so we could see. Lindsey had gone to the doctor that day for an ultra sound.  The doctor had written the gender in a sealed envelope that Lindsey had taken to HEB where they filled a box with either pink or blue balloons.  Lindsey and her family were going to open the box and we'd all find out the gender together.

So of course we all got on Google hang outs.  Billy and Becca were watching from New York, Emily was watching from North Carolina, Hillary was watching from Salt Lake, I was watching from Eden, and Lindsey was in Houston.  My parents would probably have been on as well, but they were probably asleep because Brazil is like 5 hours ahead of us right now because they are on daylight savings time and we are off.  Anyway, technology is great.

It was dinner time so I just jumped on the hang out on my phone and propped it up on a shelf while we ate.  Lindsey took some time getting everything ready so my siblings chatted about random stuff while we waited.  Finally it was time for Lindsey to open that box, and PINK balloons came out.  We were all so happy for her.  She has two older boys and so we were all hoping she'd get a girl.

In other good news, Brandon replaced the jeep's battery at it worked again. So crisis averted there.  Whew.  

That meant that on Wednesday I was able to take the jeep up to my job interview at Snow Basin.  Derrick doesn't have school on Wednesdays to I just took Charlotte and Lydia in the jeep and dropped them off at school.  Then I drove the 20 or so minutes up to Snow Basin.  That mountain is amazing by the way.  

I met with the lady in charge of Accounting.  Her name is Cynthia.  She showed me everything about the office.  She wanted me to know exactly what I was getting into.  She was like, "you'll spend a lot of time in this room.  You'll do a lot of routine work and data entry.  It's very repetitive, and not very exciting. Does this sound like something you want." And I replied with, "Well, I have four little kids, what you just described sounds wonderful to me."

She laughed at that.

She also told me that there was one other person interested in the job, but that they hadn't interviewed yet.  She'd promised them an interview so that still had to happen before she made a decision.  She said she'd get back to me by 4:00 that day.  And if I did have the job I'd start the next day because that's when Snow Basin opened for the season.

Thank goodness I had something big to distract myself with that day or I might have been a mess all day.

It was Brandon's Birthday.  And for once he wasn't a super grumpy goose about it.  That's because he already had what he wanted for his birthday.  Months ago he'd wished he could be out of the Army and in Utah by his birthday.  And he got it!

But to be on the safe side I'd also bought him tangible presents and put them in plain sight.

Charlotte and Lydia had helped me make and frost his cake too.

We did the cake when the kids were home from school.  We couldn't find any candles so we didn't have those, but like I said, Brandon had already used his birthday wish.

And then he opened his presents.  I'd bought him more "civilian clothes" (a Jurassic Park T-shirt and nice jeans) and a beard trimmer so he could take care of the facial hair that he was happily sporting.

He had a fun time trying everything out.  

His sister Melanie came over to drop a present off around 4:00.  While she was there I got the important phone call from Cynthia.  I HAD THE JOB!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  I was so very excited.

Brandon's parents came home from work.  They'd agreed to watch the kids for us that night so we headed out on date to celebrate Brandon's birthday and my new job.

We went to Zucca's on Ogden's 25th street.  The food was so yummy.  Then we went for a walk down the street and went to the Ogden Christmas Village.  It was so fun to be there again as just the two of us.  Gosh I love Ogden, and Gosh I love Brandon.

My favorite display this year was this one with all these ginger bread houses.

Then we continued the romance with a grocery shopping trip to Smiths Market Place.  (Actually we are still so happy to be living near a Smiths Market Place again that this really felt special.)

We were both pretty tired when we made it home, but that wasn't a problem because the kids were already in bed and fast asleep.  Living with your babysitters is pretty awesome.

Thursday was my first day of work.  Let's recap really fast.  I applied for the job on Monday, had a phone interview on Tuesday, had an in person interview on Wednesday, and started work on Thursday.  That's the power of prayer (and a really good resume).

As with any new job I was pretty overwhelmed that day.  But it's gradually started making sense.  I've been there a week now and I'm LOVING it.  I'm the cash clerk and so I'm in charge of the cash that comes into the office.  I work with the cashiers to help them with their money when they are starting and ending their shifts. I also account for the cash revenue.

Months ago I described my dream job to Brandon.  I wanted to work in an office all by myself sorting papers and typing things on spreadsheets.  I wanted to be able to come out of my office and interact with people occasionally, but I didn't want to have to work with lots of different people or have to be on the phone all the time.

Throw in currency and coins and that basically describes my job right now.  It's heaven.

The schedule is pretty great too.  I work from 10:00 to about 6:00.  That means I can help get the kids off to school in the morning.  And I work Tuesday through Friday so I'm home on the weekends.

And the pay, well I'm happy to say that I make slightly more an hour than I did when I left Conservice 6 1/2 years ago.  It's not enough to live on if we had our own home, but it's definitely going to keep us from eating up our savings during this whole transition.

And how does Brandon like being a stay at home dad?  Well he loves it too. This change has been great for both of us. I don't know if this is something we'll do forever.  But for now we are loving the role reversal.

That seems like a pretty good note to end this post on.  Basically we are happy to be here in Utah and so far things are working out for us.  This isn't how things are going to be forever, but it's a pretty great temporary situation.