Yesterday I was chatting with a friend about an upcoming Marriage Retreat that her family is attending.  Having just passed the 3 month mark of my husbands return from Afghanistan and less than 2 months from our tentative “leaving Germany” flight time, I am both thrilled for my friend, and envious of the opportunity to [...]

After weeks of preparation and planning, the day finally arrived for our Homecoming Ball. My ‘Extreme Ballgown Makeover‘ was finished just. in time. like, the morning of, with 5 hours to spare – HA! Here are the before and after pictures! I wore my favorite Engineer Castle pin and Army Eagle earrings that were a [...]

Husband is back to work today after 30 wonderful frustrating days of post deployment leave. Ahem. Which means that all of these lovely dishes are waiting just for me… Along with a few lovely baskets of laundry… And I’ll need to start up dinner by myself this afternoon… Lovely. But to be completely honest? As [...]

Today my husband has been home with us exactly one month. Each day, our routines and relationships are feeling more and more natural instead of full of hesitation and caution. And then there are moments like today – Valentine’s Day which is also my Birthday – where I feel… guilty… This morning before breakfast, Seth [...]

As long as I can remember, I have bought my french fried onions in this can. So this past Thanksgiving, when I was checking things off my list for the fantastic feast I had planned with three other amazing women, I went up and down the aisles for a good 10 minutes LOOKING for them. [...]

For families reuniting after a long military deployment, a Welcome Home Ceremony is an entire spectrum of emotions. One of my favorite things to do, is take pictures for dear friends of mine to capture some of these moments… Waiting… Anticipation… Excitement to finally see them… Concern about how the children will react… Watching them [...]

I’m going to completely level with you. Because bluntly? It’s been really hard to let my husband back into our routine. Sounds weird right? Let me explain. The first few days are always a roller coaster ride between euphoric elation to smack in the face reality moments. The ‘Dishwasher Debacle’ post is one great example [...]

Slowly but surely things are starting to feel normal in our home. I would say the first 2 or 3 days (Day 0, 1, and 2) were the typical “honeymoon phase” where it’s almost too good to be true. Seth likens it to being in a television show – you are aware you are there, [...]

The first few days that Seth was home, were blissfully wonderful. He would roll over or shift in his sleep and I would be INSTANTLY AWAKE. Then a happy wide sleepy smile would spread over my face when I realized why. This ‘happy wide sleepy smile’ phenomena lasted all of… 3 nights. Part of the challenge is [...]

My husband has never been a man to sit still. He has to be constantly doing something. This personality trait also makes him a fantastic husband. If I cook and set everything out for dinner, he takes the lead afterwards by doing the dishes. Because we have small children, there is always a short period [...]