Commander Quack and a Fun Week

Last week was a great week. Grandma Meier came to get some more dental work done. It wasn't so much of an "arts and crafts" week like it was last time she was here because of the amount of time spent in Cameron's dental chair. But we still managed to make two more pairs of PJ bottoms, some bracelets, and Landon's "Commander Quack" costume for his 1st grade play.

This is the best picture I got of Landon during his play. This was the opening song. After that he had to stand on the risers and ended up behind the curtain for the rest of the play. If we tilted our heads we could catch glimpses of him during some of the songs. Too bad. Finally, Cameron stood on the side and could see him well. Each set of "animals" had there own song so I just sat there waiting for the "ducks" to do their song. Apparently, though, the ducks were the only "animals" that didn't get to do their own song. Landon, did a great job, though - at least the few times I caught glimpses of him - he was smiling and singing and doing the actions!

Landon named himself "Comander Quack". I got a picture of him with his "feather gun" in his class room after the play.

He LOVED wearing his costume. It even had duck feet that he wore over his shoes. The costume turned out great.

After a great week with Grandma I promised the kids I'd do something fun with them after we dropped her off at the airport. Since we were in Denver I couldn't resist a quick trip to Nordstrom. After walking around the mall, playing at the play place, and lunch. We were all too tired for the museum we had talked about going to. So we decided to stop at Build-A-Bear instead. After Austin chose his stuffed puppy (he named him Land-o) he said, "that was WAY better than I thought it would be!" Landon was excited that his "High School Musical" bear (he named him "Fire Fox") came with a necklace. And since the HSM shirts were on sale for a dollar they both got a T-shirt for their new stuffed friends. Okay, so it wasn't intellectually stimulating like the museum would've been but who cares? We had fun stuffing, dressing, and naming bears and dogs. Can't beat that, right?!

St. Patty's day was fun too. Cameron was leaving for Atlanta so I wanted to have a fun dinner before he left. Green Fruit salad, green "leprechaun bread sticks" and Cheddar Broccoli soup is what was on the menu. The kids loved the green bread sticks. Austin was sad in this picture because I told him to move the bread stick away from his face. He wanted it in the picture. I guess I should have let him - it would have been better than the frown!

One Project Down...

{... About a Million To GO}

Is it a journal? Is it a photo album? No it's both - via BLURB

If you want to give you and yours a great little present make your blog into a book. It really is a treasure. You will love to see your families name in print! I especially love the hardback covered with a dust jacket. It's just so... cute! The print quality of the photos isn't the best and there are still lots of pictures to document, so I will have to do some scrapbooking for last year still. But, if I never get around to it, oh well becasue I, at least, have this!

This is my book from 2008. All our memories poured out into 78 pages. For this year I may have my kids and Cameron write down some of what they're thinking and incorporate that too. It'd be nice to have some more perspectives. But for now I love looking at my little book and the rest of the family does too.

And checking off one more thing off my to-do list feels WONDERFUL!

P.S. We find out where our new home will be on April 10. So stay tuned!

The *LIST*

Yes, I realize my husband is in the AirForce and I'm fully aware of all the "possibilities" that entails. That knowledge still didn't prepare me for the LIST Cameron brought home on Friday. We were prepared to have a list of choices, yes. But we weren't prepared to have a list of the LAST choices available to dentists. That's how they do it around here folks - the guys with the least seniority get to be the "fill-ins" so to speak.

So, 46 dentists are graduating from the AEGD program and there are 46 slots available for them. That means we rank our choices 1-46 and hope for the best. These maps don't show 46 bases because some of the bases need more than one dentist, for example Japan needs 5 dentists. So, the next few days will find us researching surrounding areas and elementary schools and praying and praying to figure out how the heck we are going to rank this list 1-46.

A friend said to me today, "You're in the Air Force - you knew you'd have to move {I could tell she wanted to add, "duh!" after that}. I did know I'd have to move but I didn't know how much I would love it here in Colorado Springs. It is a wonderful place to live. I feel happy and content and... settled. I got my hopes up on staying, especially because we know that three dentists are leaving Peterson Air Force Base (2o minutes from our house) this year.
Everyone says what great "opportunities" our family has. Well, ya know what? I don't really want them. I want to be comfortable and live in a house I don't have to move out of in 2-4 years. And not have to keep starting over. And be able to buy furniture instead of making our stuff "last through one more move." Uh, I'm sick of that!!

Don't worry I am getting a grip and I know my family will be taken care of and provided for and happy. But this is HARD. I knew it was coming but I had no idea how hard it would be. Oh well, Cest La Vie, or something.
So far, our top three choices are Mountain Home (near Boise Idaho - 3 1/2 hours from Ogden so really that would be great!), Fairchild (near Spokane, WA) and Beale (Northern CA near Chico). Other than those three I have NO idea where else on our list I'd like to live. Nowhere, really. So I'm wrapping my head around this and I'm going to make the best of it.
We'll find out in 3-4 weeks where we will be going in August. It's going to be a LONG month!!