Leadership

I have no idea how I do it but I somehow always manage to insert myself into leadership positions. I'm not sure if its because leadership is something that I enjoy or if it's just something that I am kinda good at and end up naturally falling into those spots.

In 2002, when my then boyfriend, Mike went off to the US Military Academy at West Point, I joined USMA Girlfriends. 6 months later, I was a moderator, and one year later I was the owner. I taught myself  HTML and learned to let people rant at me without taking it personally. We had well over 150 members when I left that group.

Then in 2005 I co-founded  Army Officer Girls. I loved that group!! It was super low key, but still allowed me to assert myself when I needed too.

When Mike graduated from college and entered the big Army, I was the treasurer for his very first unit's FRG. That FRG only consisted of myself and 2 other wives, but we were a force to be reckoned with. We made a MEAN chili dog at fund raisers.

I have always had my hand in something. So when Mike got out of the Army, I felt like I lost a little bit of myself. In the civilian world there are no FRG's. There are no websites available for wives of Mike's new company. What was I supposed to do?

Well I did what any other woman would do... I joined a playgroup and 3 months later became an assistant organizer. What?!?!?

Yep, that's right, you are looking (OK, more like reading) at the new Assistant Organizer for...

I am really excited about this position. This group has really helped me out in the friend department. I've met some awesome ladies since I joined this group and now I feel like I can somehow help the group and other moms.

Remember that post all about Friends? 

I think I got it now!! ;-)

THE NEW HOUSE!

I may have mentioned this a million few times, but we are moving into our new house in T minus 3 days!!! I am so excited and can barely contain it anymore.
  "Oh, I wanna dance with somebody, wanna feel the heat with somebody. Yeah I wanna dance with somebody, with somebody who loves me..."
While I do know that "I'm so excited" would have been the better lyrics to add right there, but I have always loved Whitney more than The Pointer Sisters. I mean really is that even a competition?

Anyway back to what I was saying...
Living in a small two bedroom apartment with an 16 month old and 2 large dogs, is just not my thang (yep, I said thang, T.H.A.N.G, Thang.). It would probably be more manageable if we had our own stuff, but this is a furnished apartment. So nothing is "comfortable". The pots and pans are not ours. They are the cheap kind that burn everything that you put in them. The cheap couch that is so stiff that you sometimes prefer to sit on the floor. The scratchy towels, the starched bed sheets, and my personal LEAST favorite is the tiny miniture 3 oz wine glasses. I, like every infertile on an off cycle, need a big gulp size wine glass. What were they thinking when they bought those?

I don't mean to sound ungrateful. We have ALOT and are VERY fortunate. But it's just not home!!!

This is home...

And this my kitchen.

The refrigerator is not in yet, but you get the idea.

 I didn't take many pictures of the rest of the house because London was acting crazy, actually HORRIBLE!!

I did manage to capture this moment of cuteness though. 

Oh and the pictures are courtesy of my NEW CAMERA...

I am still trying to learn how to use it and only had it about 45 minutes when I snapped these pictures. I am still trying to figure out this thing. There are just so many buttons! Don't worry I will get the hang of it soon. Alot more pictures to come!

One more thing before I go. This post is brought to you courtesy of MY NEW LAPTOP!! Yes, you heard me correctly, on top of getting a new house and camera I also got a new laptop. My old one was all but fried and after many visits to the shop, we decided to get a new one. We talked to all the employees at B.est B.uy and they all agreed that this was the best computer for me.

This is the company that makes the physical computer for Apple, and they finally decided to make their own. So it looks and feels just like a Mac, but it runs with the ease of a PC and has Windows 7. I LURVE IT! (No, just saying "I love it" is not enough.) 

Yes, in case you are wondering, my husband is amazing! He bought me my own camera and laptop and it is not even my birthday. I am such a lucky gal!

Goodbye House.

Last night was the last night we will ever spend as a family in this house. Moving is such a simple thing for some people, like my husband a self proclaimed Army Brat, but I am still very new to all of this. My parents have lived in the same house for 32 years now. I was born there and I grew up there. When I was of college age, I moved in with my sister. She was  living in my grandparents old house about 30 mins away. Before they passed away, they lived in that house for probably about 45 years. That is what you do in my family, you buy a house and keep it forever. The Army life is a little different.

We bought this house about 3 and a half years ago. We didn't know much about buying a house back then, but I we learned ALOT. When you are buying your first house, you don't know what you really need in a house. For example, this house has very few closets. There is one in each bedroom, but that is about it. We now know that is important to us in our next house. This house also has no garbage disposable, and while I know one of those are pretty simple to install we just never got around to it. The next house better have one of those, because I am so sick of scooping bits of food out of the drain. There are alot of great things about this house, but I am pretty sure the most important thing we have learned is what we DON'T like in a home.

The one thing I will always LOVE about this house are the memories.

This is where we became a family. 

This is where the laughing, smiling, fighting, and crying all happened.

This is where we found out we were infertile.

This is where we did all of our infertility treatments. 

This is where I got my BFP and then took all of those weekly belly shots in the mirror.

This is where I went into labor. 

And

This is where we brought London home from the hospital. 

This was my little boys first HOME.

This is our first house taken the day that we moved in. Alot has changed since then, but this was it on February 14, 2007. 

I am not going to lie, I got pretty sentimental last night looking at London sleeping in his room for the last time. Thinking about all the firsts that happened in this house. When I finally realized, it is not this HOUSE that I will miss so much, it is all of those moments that I will probably forget when we walk out of the front door for the last time. Right now I am reminded of some of the silly little memories that happened in this house just because I live here. I remember London spilling my nail polish on the carpet because I look at that stain every morning. Will I remember that when we leave? What about remembering when the dogs were puppies? I can't help but be reminded of them when I see the base board that they chewed in the bathroom. Will I forget that when I leave? I know this is all silly little stuff, and I know there are a million more memories to be made along the way. It's just so hard to let go. Have I mentioned that I don't do change very well? Well I need to go pack the stuff that I am going to take with us. We won't see our household goods until July 1, when we finally close on our house. So it is important that I take everything I will need in the next month with me now. At this rate, the movers might come on Friday to an empty house. I am pretty sure I need all of this stuff. I am going to try to take just the bare essentials though. So my list will probably look something like this: clean panties, Toothbrush, straightening iron, diapers, and most importantly my TIVO.  

So to the house that has been a HOME to my little family for the last 3 years, I have just one thing left to say...in the words of the greatest pop band to every grace the stage "Bye Bye Bye!" *Nsync (yes, you read that right. *Nsync will always be #1 in my book haha).

We Have Renters So We're Going To VEGAS!

I am so excited right now, allow me to give you a little background in to why. When we found out about our upcoming move, we quickly made the decision to rent our house out instead of trying to sell it. Mike and I bought this house just before the market collapsed in 2007. We got a great deal on it, or so we thought at the time. If we bought this house now, we could probably get it for about ten thousand less than what we paid with an interest rate of about 2% lower as well.  With all of that said, I will get to why I am so excited. We found renters! Last night we got the word from one of the couples that we showed the house to on Saturday, that they definitely want the house. We did a credit check and called references, and everything came back great. They are going to be signing the lease and paying the deposit in the next few days to make it official.

Can I just tell you what a HUGE relief this is. It is feels like a million pounds have been lifted off of my shoulders. I was scared that we were going to have trouble renting it out and get stuck with two mortgage payments. We could have done it financially, but we really would have started pinching pennies. We all know that moving is not a time to start pinching pennies. Decorating a new house is expensive. :)

The new renters will be moving in on June 7th, and we don't close on our new house until July 1. So in the mean time, we won't have a housing cost. You may be wondering what we are planning to do with that month of mortgage free living. Putting money away for the new house? Building our savings account a little more? Padding our budget for the next few months? NOPE!!! We are going to Vegas! Mike has some leave before he has to report to his new job, so we are planning a little impromptu trip to Sin City. I have never been, so I am ecstatic. We are dropping London off with the Grandparents and heading to Vegas for 5 days. The plan right now (although nothing has been booked) is to stay at the Luxor for 4 nights. Any suggestions of things that I MUST DO while I am there? Shows to see or Restaurant  recommendations?  I am planning to do alot of gambling and see two shows, at least one being Cirque Du Soleil. The rest of the time will be spent just shopping and wandering around.

Who knows this could just be our last trip before go back through infertility treatments, pregnancy, and having baby. **Fingers Crossed** We better enjoy it while we can.

Help Me Decorate!!!

O.K. I need help. You may not know this about me, but I am a FAILURE in the decorating department. I have no idea what I am doing. Thankfully my husband is VERY opinionated about decorating, but I DON'T want to end up living in a bachelor pad. So here are my choices for granite in our new house. Unfortunately I don't get to choose the cabinet colors, because they were already ordered when we bought the house. I much prefer a darker wood like cherry, but this is what I got. It's not horrible, and it's definitely a huge step up from the white that I have in my kitchen now. (I hate them because they show every little speck of dirt.)

The background is the cabinet color. I am picking the granite first and then picking floors to go with it, so no worries about that.

Leave me a comment with your vote. I seriously need all the help I can get.

A

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E

We found a house!!

Sorry I have not posted in a while. My computer crapped out on me. Right now as I type, it is in surgery. I found a highly qualified computer Dr who was willing to work on my beloved laptop for the low low price of...$50. I mean really you can't beat that. The only thing that was wrong with it was that the power cord no longer connected inside. So basically he is just replacing a tiny little prong on the inside of the computer. Hummm, when I think about it that way, $50 doesn't seem like such a great deal anymore.

OK back to the house. So in case you missed it. We are moving!! I am super stoked. This past weekend we went house hunting. It was so much fun. We only went to two neighborhoods before we found "THE HOUSE". Here it is!!

As you can tell this is not an actual picture. Our house is not finished being built yet, so this is just the mock up version of it.

We put in an offer on Tuesday, offering them full asking price (which they had already reduced) but we were asking for alot of upgrades. The house comes with all stainless appliances except the fridge, so we asked for that. They also don't sod the back yard, they just throw grass seed. So we asked for sod. We asked for them to pay closing costs. Most importantly we asked for a privacy fence. We were all very sure that were going to send us a counter offer, which they did. However the counter offer was really great. They were going to give us all of the upgrades we wanted, except for the fence. Since the fence was the most important part to us, we offered to up our asking price to cover half of the fence if they covered the other half. DEAL!! They accepted and we are now officially UNDER CONTRACT! I am so excited for this move now.

The new house is 4 bedrooms 2.5baths and 2,400sqft. Oh and the best part. It has a fenced in back yard for both the dogs and London. Right now we have 3 bedrooms 2 bath and 1600 sq ft, so this is definitely an upgrade for us. I will be honest, I am not sure how I feel about the house being 2 story. I just have this fear of London falling down the stairs, but that is why they make baby gates I guess. The master bedroom is on the first floor, so it will be nice to have some privacy. Right now London's room is off the kitchen, but in the new house he will be upstairs. Yay! Now I won't have to cook in silence anymore. Another great thing about the new house is that, since it is still being built we get to pick out the colors for everything. Although, trying to pick out that stuff with my husband might just start WWIII. Who knows my next post might be entitled "DIVORCE". Only kidding, I love you honey! (I know he secretly reads this.)

OK well that is all from me for now. I need to go get packing!

This post is brought to you by the letter "A"

Well first off, apparently today at 12 dpo AF decided to come make a little visit. Today on the magical day of testing, the day where I was really expecting hoping to see those magical two pink lines. Instead I just saw, RED! I am not going to lie, I really didn't think this was going to work. We tried on our own for over a year and then did another year of if treatments before having London. That included 3 IUI's, numerous timed intercourse cycles, and then lastly IVF. As much as I don't want to admit it, IVF might be the only chance we have of getting pregnant. At least we have IVF though. At least we have that option, and we know that it can (and hopefully will again) work for us. That is more than alot of other infertile's have. I have to be thankful for that.  I have decided that I don't want to try more fertility treatments next month. We just have way too much going on. What you ask?
The Army  is moving us!! Yep that is right, we are finally headed out of Fort Benning. We have been here FOREVER. Ok, so maybe it has only been 4 years but in the Army that is forever. Due to my husbands job, I can't tell you where we are going. I can however tell you that we are going to staying in the south. This southern girl, couldn't be more happy about that. I mean seriously, you can not put a price tag on being about to order sweet tea at a restaurant, and it not coming out of a fountain or can. Here is the kicker, we knew these orders were going to be coming. When they came though we were a little shocked. Report date: JUNE 1. Are you kidding me. In one month I have to pack a house, find renters, find a new house, close on the new house, move into the new house. I have to do all of this with a baby, 3 pups, and husband in tow. :)
As you can see, we have a BUSY month ahead of us, so this cycle we are going to try the old fashioned way. I have heard this is very sucessfull. It consists of getting drunk and making out in the back of a car on prom night. Ok so maybe we will have to modify that method since we won't have a prom, but I am sure we can figure something out. HAHAHA!


Don't forget my giveaway ends on Sunday. Go ENTER! I was thinking the other night. This would also make a GREAT deployment necklace for all of my army wife readers! You could get your anniversary date on it or something like that!