Our last day's

The last few day's in our Cola house looked like this…..filled with boxes upon boxes. 

Sleeping on a air mattress in our living room floor, living out of our upstairs bathroom because that's were all our stuff was we didn't want the movers to pack.

Eating off of paper plates because our dishes were packed away. Shredding cheese with a potato peeler because I forgot to leave out our cheese grater. 

Watching movies or TV shows on our laptops because we had no TV. 

Using Commissary bags as trash bag's because we threw out our trash can so the movers wouldn't pack it. 

Life in the mist of PCSing oh the joys!!! I can't wait to get settled at our new place and have everything back to normal again. 

 Wednesday morning I woke up early went and picked up donuts for our movers and came back to finish up a few things before they arrived. Their ETA was between 8:00am and 8:30am I figure closer to 8:30 so I had a little time to spare. NOPE, they arrived promptly at 8:10am just shortly after I got home. The moment I saw the moving truck pull up in front of my drive way my heart sank. Not that everything leading up to today wasn't a sign of hello we're moving but I guess it really hadn't hit me yet. Well it did today. I kept reminding myself of all that we have ahead of us and this is not the end of my time in the South but only the beginning. We will be back! (just not to be stationed at Ft. J)

It only took them a matter of 3.5 hours to wrap up all the furniture and load everything up. They left our couch and hutch for last because they are two of the biggest and heaviest pieces of furniture we have. Cleaning up the upstairs while they finished packing the down stairs reminded me of the way the house looked when we moved in. EMPTY! Life as a Milispouse and the joys' of PCSing. 

Wednesday night was last time I cooked dinner in our Cola house. I made Chicken Fried Rice, one of our favorites. It was easy, quick and we had everything there to make it.  We sat there on our air mattress eating off paper plates enjoy our last moments in our 2nd home together. 

Thursday night our last night in the house we decided to go out to eat. I didn't want to make a mess in the kitchen. The stove, oven, counters, and everything else was already clean and I'd like to keep it that way. We decided to ask our neighbors Mr. Larry and Nita to go with us. And thankfully they took us up on our offer. I was a bit nervous about how the dinner would go but it was great, there was never a dull moment and I'm so glad we asked them to go with us. They are the sweetest elderly couple in the world. Mr. Larry retired from the Army in 1985, he and his wife live on post one door down from us. Mr. Larry pulls the trash can's and recycling bins out to the curb for the entire neighborhood every morning and takes then back up after trash runs. They hand write Christmas cards for everyone in the neighborhood and always have a little something to go with it. A couple days before the movers came they brought over this beautiful cross-stitch that she had done. This way we would always remember them and have a piece of the beach every were we went. 

I'll truly miss them and their sweet hearts. I'm sure the pups will to because they always came over to say hi and give them loves. 

 Friday morning at 10am we finaled out of our house and officially were done with cleaning, packing and stressing over this house. We've heard mixed reviews on how the housing clearing process goes. I've heard that it's similar to a white glove test and then I've heard its really not that bad. I didn't want to chance anything so we made sure that everything was spic and span clean. I'm happy to say we didn't have to pay for anything extra other than the carpet cleaning which we new we were going to have to pay for. We opted to have them do it vs. us paying for someone to come in and do it and it still not be up to their standards. 

When one door closes there's another waiting to be opened, when one chapter ends there's another one to start. 

Goodbye Cola house! 

Life on the Trail…..

Were do even start….It started out ruff….we got used to it….got into a routine….I got used to the hours…him being gone all day and night….never home on the weekends…but then I hit a wall…and I hit it hard. Him being deployed sucked to no end I'm not gonna lie, It was the worst time of our relationship so far. Although sometimes I almost think this is WORSE than a deployment. Yup I really just went there. Of course you don't have the constant worry, stress and "what if" moments that you do with a deployment but I really think Life on the Trail puts more strain on your relationship. We've been through more together in the past almost 8 years that we've been together than any average couple has been through in a life time. I wouldn't wish it on any one and I sure as hell don't want to live another day through it sometimes but I suck it up and put a smile on my face because I love that man with all my heart. And I do anything and go any were for him. It doesn't mean I'm not melting inside because I haven't spent more than 24 hours with my husband awake in the past week. I know I should be grateful that he is home and trust me I am but when he's home you expect him to be home. Yes there is extremely late hours and countless CQ days when it comes to being a Drill SGT. But when the BN says they are pushing for more family time and more time away from work during reset, yet you schedule countless training and regrouping exercises during every day of cycle break you are going back on every word you've just said. When you make a event mandatory to attend and spouses are invited yet we have to pay for tickets to go, doesn't help your plea any more.

Now don't get me wrong my hubbs is quick to offer a hand and stay late to help out his fellow battles when he see's they are needing help with one thing or the other. The only thing that kills me with that is they do NOT do the same for him. When their work day is over they are out and don't think twice about making sure everything is covered. I guess that is were my husband values his job and the people he works with more than others do. I just hate how he always goes above and beyond for others only for it to be over shadowed or gone unrecognized. I absolutely HATED the brown round when he first got it, I though it was the ugliest thing ever known to mankind. Over time my thoughts on it have changed and I think it quite attractive and will be so sad to see it go.

Him on the other hand not so much. He's amazing at his job and I'm not saying that just because I'm married to him but I've had countless Drill SGT's, PVT's CO's and Spouses come to me and tell me that. Hands down he's an amazing Drill SGT and makes a world of a difference in the lives of these young kids. But there's no doubt that he's ready to get back to a line unit. He's so tired of "training joe" aka Privates "America's Future". He wants to be trained, he wants to do field problems were he does the work and not direct what needs to be done. He wants to go to schools, he wants to go back to a line unit, he wants his squad leader time. He wants to deploy again. This is what he joined the army to do and he's not done doing that. Life on the Trail isn't for everyone that's for sure. Its been a experience that we can say we've been through but I wouldn't wish it on any one. People come here to go through the Trail to get some down time and let me tell you its so far from it. 

I miss my husband more than ever, we can never plan anything because thing are always changing around here with work. When he does have a day off here or there he's so tired the last thing he wants to do is go out. When he comes home from work at a decent time I get excited then remember he's been up since 3 or 4am and next thing you know we've had dinner and he's fast asleep on the couch. The only guaranteed time off is VBL- Victory Block Leave which is over Christmas. Don't bother making family vacations because your not gonna get the time off. He gets one 4 day weekend a cycle. That's every 10 weeks. Sometimes we plan something to do then but most of the time we just stay here local because he's so tired from work he just wants to hang out at home and relax. Of course I don't blame him one bit, I'd be doing the same thing if I worked his hours.

 Can you imagine the pay check if they got paid over time. HAHAHA Wishful thinking. Speaking of Pay did you know that a Recruiter gets paid more special duty pay than a Drill SGT does. Tell me how that makes any sense. February 13th he graduates his last cycle and we couldn't be more excited. Although we still have a few months left here after that he is most certainly counting/ Our upcoming move (more on that later) is definitely bitter sweet for many reasons. I go back and forth multiple times a day on my feelings about our move. Sometimes I'm ready for it and other times I'm hoping time creeps by. Its a daily struggle, but at the end of the night I CAN NOT wait for our next adventure and were its taking us. 

Life as a Army Wife Married to a US Soldier, current Drill Sergeant.