More Deaths

Well, there have been a total of 6 Illinois National Guard deaths in just the past 3 weeks. That's 2 per week.... not statistics that I'm comfortable with. And the 4 that were killed just a few days ago died in the very same location that Joe is at. I am so worried. I pray at least twice a day for his safety, but the fact remains that not even prayer can guarantee his safety over there. I try so hard not to focus on the negative, but how can you not when you're getting an e-mail every couple of weeks telling you about another injury or death that we've had! And then our FRG leader had the nerve to say in the e-mail, "We just need to focus on the fact that our soldiers will be home soon." In what twisted sense of reality is 7 months "soon"?! I am so tired of being worried sick every second of every day and not being able to do a thing about it. I just want him home.

Tyler read me a book!!

Tyler picked out Hop on Pop by Dr. Suess this afternoon and read it to me!! The video file is too big to upload on here, but if you go to http://www.vimeo.com/3367798 you can view the video. :)

Tyler's Awesome Math Skills........

For quite awhile now Tyler has been able to add numbers. We'll be driving down the road and he'll be in the back seat saying, "Two plus two is four.... three plus one is four...." etc., etc. So a few days ago, out of curiousity, I wrote down 2+2 on a piece of paper and showed him how you line the columns up and add it. So then I gave him double and triple digit equations and he added them without ANY hesitation!! So today I took a video of him adding and I thought I would share it with you. :)

Lonely

Well, my mom & brothers just left. They came up Saturday morning and were able to stay until 4:00 pm today. It was so good to have the company. But now that they're gone, I realize how horribly lonely my reality is. The most contact I have with people over the age of 5 is through the internet & phone calls.... how sad is that? My life sucks.... I guess that's the moral of my story.

Roses from Afghanistan

Joe sent me roses today!!! I don't know how he managed to order them without me noticing the charge on his account, but he did somehow! I was SO surprised! And then when I read the note, I couldn't stop crying. The note read, "With Love from Afghanistan. I miss you and the kids. Love, Joe." Yup.... I think I found a keeper. ;)

Crazy Tuesday.....

Well, this past Tuesday was quite interesting. I was on my afternoon route and I almost hit a kid with my bus! I was driving down this main road, and right as the car coming from the other direction passed me, I saw 3 kids on scooters. Two of them saw me and stopped... the other one ran right out in front of me! I honked my horn, slammed on my brakes, and swerved. I felt something hit my bus and then I couldn't see the kid anymore. I really & truely thought I had ran him over! I was freaking out! Then the monitor that was on my bus saw him get up, grab his scooter, and walk out of the road. The stupid kid then proceeded to give ME a dirty look!! I am SO glad that I had a mouthy monitor on my bus that day! She got off the bus and went over and CHEWED that kid out!! My monitor called my boss to report the incident and he was asking if I needed to have someone take over my route... I thought I was fine. I drove a couple of blocks and had to pull over. My face and hands were numb, I was shaking, I had trouble breathing.... I think I was basically going through shock. So my monitor called my boss back and had another driver take over my route. It scared the living daylights out of me!! Then yesterday my boss pulled me into his office. He told me that my monitor had said that the kid had landed right beside my driver's side wheel. My boss told me that had I simply slammed on my brakes and not swerved, that kid would have been UNDER my wheel... not beside it. The crazy thing is that it all happened so fast that I don't even remember swerving! God was really looking out for both of us that day!

Plumber problems...

I am SO aggrivated! I was having problems with the faucet in our front bathroom... neither the hot nor the cold side were working. I sent Joe's brother a text message asking him who he would recommend and he gave me a phone number, he said, "Call this guy and let him know that you know me and that Joe is deployed... he is a GREAT guy!" So the plumber stopped by this morning to look at the faucet. Dumb me.... it was just a clogged filter. He unscrewed it, tapped it on the counter to clean it, and screwed it back on. THEN he saw my leaky tub faucet. This thing has had a slight drip ever since we bought the house, but it's not a big deal and it doesn't even effect our water bill. Joe and I really had NO intention to mess with it until he got home. But he looked at it and said, "Well, while I'm here...." and just started messing with it!! Two hours, a hole in our wall (for an access panel), and a whole new faucet later, he hands me a $509 bill!!!! HOLY COW!!!! He didn't give me an estimate, NOTHING to prepare me for $509!! Had I known that it was going to cost over $200, I would have told him not to even mess with it! I am SOOO frustrated! And then I was stuck because since Joe's brother had recommended him, I didn't want to show my frustration, so I just paid him. Then I called Jay, Joe's brother. He was FURIOUS! He said that there is NO way that it should have cost THAT much money!!! He appologized several times for recommending him and he even said that he would have fixed it himself if he had known it would be that much. I just told Jay, "Hell... I wouldn't have even had HIM fix it if I knew it was going to be that much!!" So then Joe called and about had a heart attack when I told him about it. So Joe called Jay and now Jay is in the process of talking to the guy to try to get things worked out. I just hope that he's able to return the check that I wrote and lower the price. It's just rediculous! My parents had the EXACT same work done last year (access panel cut out and ALL) and their bill was only $210 plus the cost of the faucet. I told Jay that and said that it shouldn't have cost us THAT much of a difference! So now I'm just praying that Jay will be able to knock some sense into him. Stupid plumber.