It's been ages

Family and friends,

I know it has been AGES since I've posted anything. I'm sorry for the delay; I'm a terrible blogger. Life marches on for our household. Alyssa is now walking, talking (about a dozen words), and throwing temper tantrums. I have entered my final semester of school for my master's degree. I cannot wait for it to be over, I am counting down the days in fact. LeMar is working days now, which is wonderful. I enjoy the fact that he is on the same schedule as the rest of the world. When we have weekends together, we've been going camping and rock climbing in Sandrock, Alabama. It is this great venue about 6 hours north of here. Although it is quite a drive, it is a great experience. Not much new other than that, life marches on. Drop us a line sometime; how are you?

Let's Catch Up

May 18-21 Our Family Trip Around Florida

It all started when we said, "We want Chipotle for our anniversary." So, the nearest Chipotle is in Gainsville, about 4 hours away. Then we decided, since we're going to Gainsville, we might as well go on to Orlando and take advantage of the "Here's to the Heros" free day at Sea World. Then we decided we might as well drive on to the Everglades and even the Keys! That is how our plan was formed. We would spend about 1.5 days in Orlando and 1.5 days around the Everglades with 1 or 2 stops at the Chipotle in Gainsville.

As it turned out, Blue Man Group was performing at Universal City Walk in Orlando, so we bought tickets over the phone on our drive down and saw them our first night (after hitting Chiptole for lunch of course). Alyssa loved the show right up until she fell asleep in her Dad's arms. LeMar and I of course loved the show even though it was very similar to the BMG show we saw in NYC a few years back. Day 2 of our trip was at Sea World. Of course we went to Sea World on the rainy-est day of the whole week, but we stuck it out for quite a while. Alyssa was quite a trooper through the rain and enjoyed seeing the animals. Day 3 was a lot of driving; we stayed in the VOQ at Homestead ARB just outside of the 'glades, but we also drove on further to Key Largo. Now we can say we've been to the Florida Keys! Day 4 we visited Everglades National Park and walked a few of the trails. We saw a lot of gators and quite a bit of other wild life. Then we got on the road again to reach a hotel outside of Tampa. On our final day we drove home, but not without another stop at Chipotle for lunch. It was amazing both times!











May 29th & 30th - AF things

On May 29th, I took a flight in an F-15. It was AMAZING! Before hand, I was most nervous that the pilot would be a jerk/snob and would spend our time making me feel sick or unimportant, but oh contrare! It turns out the pilot I flew with was in our first Sunday School class at HPBC! He was awesome. We did a max performance take off, some rolls and loops (I got to fly some of those), went supersonic, pulled 8.3 Gs, took a tour of the local area, buzzed our house, and finally landed. The whole flight was about an hour long, and if you must know, I did puke once. All things considered though, I felt great during and after the flight. Apparently a lot of people go home and rest for the remainder of the day, but I went to help build a playground at a local elementary school.

May 30th was my official promotion date to 1st Lt. All that really means is that I lived and breathed in the AF for two years, but the pay raise sure is nice. There were about 6 of us in my unit promoting at the same time, so we all chipped in money and through a big bash that night.




June 6th & 7th - AIRBORNE Training

My cousin Chris, aka Alyssa's Godfather, was down from UW to Ft. Benning for AIRBORNE training. We travelled up and his parents (and most of his siblings) travelled down to Columbous, GA for a short but great time together. We forgot our camera, so I don't have any pictures. Kat, SEND ME THE PICTURES YOU TOOK, thank you! It was great to catch up with everyone and for Alyssa and Chris to finally meet. Alyssa took two unassisted steps for the first time in Chris and Angie's hotel room, it is then that we knew the end was in sight.

(to be continued; in the next episode: birthday/father's day, walking, camping and rock climbing)

Spring Recap & May's Remaining Line-up

Alyssa continues to grow and change on a daily basis. She is crawling all over everywhere, cruising (walking with the assistance of furniture or people), standing independently, showing off all 6 of her teeth, and eating "adult" meals with us most nights depending on the entrée. It is hard to believe how fast she is changing. She is 10.5 months old now, not much longer 'til her first birthday! Here are some recent pictures of Alyssa. I will also see if LeMar can upload some to Picassa soon, so look for a new link to your right in the coming weeks.

Playing peek-a-boo








With our Sunday school classmate's children, as you can see, these four are all about the same age


Easter egg "hunt"



Easter Dress




I'm finishing up this hellacious spring semester this week. I took three courses, and it just about killed me. Poor LeMar was probably worse off for having to put up with me. He has been a tremendous help taking care of Alyssa and keeping up around the house while I've been holed up in the office slaving away in front of the computer or a tower of textbooks. After Thursday, I will have about 2.5 weeks off until my one summer class starts up. With the semester finishing up this week, I have quite a few weekend plans: hair cut, Target trip, beach outing, PCS/bon voyage party, and a shopping trip, most of which with a baby in tow!

LeMar is on midnights now. He works 8 pm to 7 am, which is a pretty rough shift as you can imagine. There are only two good things about this shift: we still see each other in passing around dinner time every day, and LeMar is working at coolest part of the day during the hottest time of the year.

Next week LeMar and I celebrate our two year anniversary. It is hard to believe that so much time has already past. In honor of our anniversary and the end of my semester, we are taking a five day trip around Florida! Highlights of the trip are: lunch at Chipotle (closest one to our house is 4 hrs away), Seaworld (free thanks to the "Here's to the Heros" program), and Everglades National Park.

As soon as we get back from our trip, my cousin Chris who is in the vicinity for summer AIRBORNE training, will be coming down for Memorial day weekend. We are all excited about it especially because he is Alyssa's Godfather but the two have never met. I'm predicting another trip to the beach!

On Friday the 29th, I'm scheduled for an F-15 incentive flight! It is sure to be amazing, and I'm sure that I will puke. Who cares!?!?! I'm super excited. I also promote that weekend (woohoo), and there are actually half-a-dozen of us all promoting at the same time, so we are throwing a huge party on the 30th. This too should be amazing.

After that, it's time to buckle down again, the summer semester starts on June first. TTFN!

Updates

I apologize for going so long between posts. School has been a bit overwhelming this semester on top of everything else that I have going on. Please keep me in your prayers as I plug away at the rest of the semester. Here is the chronological run down of our happenings since my last posting.

Valentine's Day was nothing exciting for us. LeMar had to work, so I only saw him for about 5 groggy hours in the middle of the day. I took some obligatory "Alyssa's 1st Valentine's Day" pictures. She did get some Valentines from 2 of the boys she's at day care with. We are happily still using home care at April's house. It is cheaper for us, she is a friend of ours, and she provides professional but still personalized child care in a home with Christian values. Up through this week, Alyssa has been the only girl with three little boys, but a 2 month old little girl starts there next week. Anywho, here are pictures of Alyssa on Valentine's Day:



The weather gets nice pretty early here in the Florida panhandle. Don't hate us too much for it, we would gladly trade with you for some snow and a sense of the seasons, but since we are here we feel obligated to take advantage of it. Here are a couple of pictures from a trip to the park.



LeMar's birthday was March 7th. I surprised him with a mountain bike and a baby sitter so that the two of us could break in his new bike right away. No, there are no mountains here, but there are some decent single-track trails at a state forest near by. After breaking in his bike, we came back to the house, picked up Alyssa and went to lunch. Then the three of us went down to the AF base where it is a bit safer for cyclists to share the road. We took Alyssa for her first bike ride in a child seat on the back of my bike. Here are pictures from LeMar's birthday. He is a bit camera shy, so you won't actually see this strapping 24 year old, just his bike, his wife, and his daughter. It looks like Alyssa will have to do a bit of growing for her helmet to fit properly, it is adjusted as small as it can go, and I don't know of any smaller helmets out there.





Now for the most recent news. Alyssa has begun a period of rapid changes. Sometime in February, she honed her self-feeding skills and is now quite proficient at feeding herself Puffs or Kix bits of cereal. The other day I found here sleeping with her butt up in the air, and snapped a picture.

Then, Sunday the 8th she took her first steps while holding Dad's hands. Then today she started crawling AND cut her first tooth! No pictures or videos of any of this yet, but that is the project for this weekend. Praise the LORD I'm on spring break; I'm in need of a reprieve. I won't be taking advantage of the ladies' nights at La Vela in PCB, however; I have 2 exams and a group paper (with crap-tastic teammates) due the week we come back from break.