Thursday, February 10, 2011

Long Time

It has been a shamefully long time since I have blogged. I admit that facebook has been taking my computer time and sucking it into a vortex... the ease of a quick update is just too tempting! A lot has happened in the AdventureFamily since my last post. So, in chronological order: AdventureDad is now "safely" in Afghanistan. He is on FOB Todd, which is a very remote, very rough outpost in the north-western mountains. He lives in a tent, gets water in tanks (they can only shower 3 times a week on a good week), and the only access is by air. It will be a long deployment for him, but he is doing well. Just after AdventureDad left (in fact while he was still in Kuwait), we also discovered that we had another AdventureBaby on the way. We had not planned on this one, but after the initial shock we were both thrilled with the idea. Sadly, I had a miscarriage at 11 weeks. We are both OK now, although still sad when thoughts of the family that was going to be cross our minds, but we both take comfort in our beautiful daughters and the joy and challenges that they bring into our lives every day. If there was no other Purpose to our sadness, the strength it brought to our family is a lesson in itself.
I spent an extended holiday month in MT with my parents. It was wonderful to enjoy our first white Christmas in awhile, and the girls really enjoyed having free access to snow. Grandpa got a radio flyer sled for Christmas, which he graciously shared, and AdventureGirl decided that it was the most fun ever. The driveway has a good 1/8 of a mile downhill run, and we wooshed down it endlessly... or at least until AdventureMom decided we had enough. M would have worn the runners off of the sled before she voluntarily quit!
AdventureBaby is a baby no longer, and is going to need a new nickname. She is walking and running, and trying so hard to talk! She has a few words now, like kitty, stop, etc., and she can mimic almost anything I say. It is so fun to hear the two girls playing together, which is becoming more fun for both of them as O gets a bit bigger and more able. We found a preschool for M to start this coming fall. She is anxious, and so am I! I know she's going to take to it like a fish to water, and I feel really good about the school we found. It was love at first sight as soon as I talked to the first teacher there.
We are settling in nicely on our little rental farm in Gig Harbor... the horse shelter is up and they have a couple nice pastures. There is endless work to do on the old fences, and a lot of patches of man-eating blackberries to keep trimmed back, but that is the kind of stuff that I enjoy, and the girls like the outdoor time while I work. My next project is establishing a garden plot. I have spring fever very badly thanks to a rash of good weather and sunshine (my bulbs are all up and the trees are budding), but the good old northwest freezing wind and rain are due to return any day now, so those thoughts will be put on hold for a little while.
We have big plans for our farm in Walla Walla (now called Nine Trees ... the first things planted on the farm were our 9 fruit trees put in last fall), with hopes for our first crop of hay this year. I am planning on heading out this spring to do some seeding and weed control, then hopefully we'll get things underway when AdventureDad returns from his travels.
So in a nutshell that has been the last 3 months in the AdventureFamily. Busy as usual, but in a good way!