Ohio Trip = Katie Graduated Undergrad!!

Our most recent trip to Ohio happened a week or so ago with one goal in mind...watch Katie graduate from college. It was our (my husband was there!) longest visit to Ohio to date. (The length of our stay didn't happen entirely on purpose though...) Here is the "short," less exhausting version of our trip to Ohio.

Thursday: Arrive in Ohio about 1pm I think. We head to Easton to do some shopping...mainly to pick up Katie's graduation present from Dave and I. I had called to purchase it earlier in the week so that it would be there. Then we headed to mom's house for a bit before Maggie and I went to have our hair done. A trip to Ohio isn't complete without a trip to visit Amy, the beloved family hairstylist. I love that I can sit down in her chair and say "do what you want." She can somehow look at my hair, see what is going on with it and say let's do x,y,and z. I say "ok." An hour or so later I have a hairstyle I LOVE. (This one I truly, truly love.) I can dry it in about 5-6 minutes (drying my hair is an ordeal...I typically go through a hair dryer every 2 years or so...my nana has had the same hair dryer for like 20 year probably.) I straighten out the ends and I'm ready to go. So easy and so grown up looking. Love it.

Friday: Went to the dr so he could look at my "leg fungus." Every summer I get this stuff on the same two spots on my leg...for the past 4 yrs or so. Ugh. Good news is that the antibiotic is making the stuff go away super fast. Side effect: you burn easily in the sun. So I'm currently hiding from the sun til the fungus and meds are gone. Let's hope it doesn't come back. Doc also gave me some advice and once I have med insurance again will go further into investigating why it keeps coming back.
We also did a lot of shopping Friday. We were going to see a movie, but mom had a grad gift to make for Katie's roommate (should have taken a pic of it...but I forgot to do so...) We ended up going to bed kinda late that night if I recall.

Saturday: Graduation! We also had to pick up a Uhaul so Katie could get her bed from college to home. We were seated in the convo center about 1:30pm. We finally left there about 4pm. LOOONNGGGG ceremony. The speaker was fantastic though. The graduate's family was able to leave after their graduate's name had been called. It would have been more of a priviliege for our family if Katie's college (the College of Arts & Sciences) wasn't called dead last...and Katie was in the next to last row of graduates. Darnit! I dozed a few times while waiting for her name to be called.
Dave and I stayed in Athens that night and went to dinner with Katie's friends and then talked a lot. It was fun to talk with some of her friends.

Sunday: Drive home to mom's house. Stopped by Chantell's house to see my buddy. I miss my buddy and our long conversations in the electronics department of Sears at the crack of dawn on Sunday morning putting up sale signs. (Sears btw is not the great place it once was 8 yrs ago...looking a little run into the ground and too much like a ghosttown.) We also went to Jean's hosue for a party on the deck. Tried to go bowling (the Ohio tradition) but the bowling alley was closed by the time we got there. Which is probably why we typically bowl on Saturday nights.

Monday: Wake up. Shower. Pack. Eat lunch. Go to the airport. I try to check us in for our flight. It can't find me. Hmmm....look carefully at the flight info confirmation e-mail...leave on June #...fly back July #. What?? JULY!? Oh noooooo... So we talk to the very nice guy at the desk. He can get us back on Wed for the small fee of $150 per person. (Silently cursing myself in my head at this point, but knowing it could totally be worse. Trying to find the hidden blessing of more time with family.) I call work to see whether they can cover me til I get back. They can so we pay the $300 idiot fee and head back to Mom's house. (OSU graduation was that weekend as well which is why all of the flights were booked.)

Tuesday: Can't really remember. I think I tried to nap a bit.

Wednesday: Get up at the crack of dawn after 4 hours of sleep to fly back to AL. We get on the plane in Cbus and start to taxi down the runway and then we stop. Not cool. At all. The nice pilot says traffic is being rerouted around Atlanta and we can't leave yet due to storms in TN and NC. Ok. We pull into a runway "parking space" and they let us use electronic devices. They serve bottled water. They begin an "in flight movie." Soooo not a good sign. An hour later we fly out. This means we have missed our connecting flight, but we will automatically be booked on the next flight. Ugh. We finally land in ATL. We find that the next flight to Birmingham is still boarding. (I won't get as long of a nap before work but no biggie.) We find out that since we have checked luggage (for the nominal fee of $30) we can't board this plane and the next one leaves ATL at 1pm. (2.5 hours later more silent cursing and grumbling) That leaves no time for a nap. When it is all said and done and we are back in Alabama I have enough time to get the cats from my mil's house, go home and change, and then get to work...15 minutes late. Long day.

It took awhile to recover from this trip. We started the trip off short on sleep and even though I took a nap several days I still wound up tired. Super tired. Here are some pics from our visit.



Katie & her present...a Tiffany's crown key charm (Money is nice but this will be a lasting reminder of her accomplishment and I hope she remembers how much her hard work paid off each time she looks at it.)



The whole family.



Mom & Katie. Mom is the silent support system behind all of our accomplishments. No matter what she cheers us on, even if she knows in doing so it sometimes puts more miles between us. Yet she knows we will always find out way home to visit.



Katie & My Grandparents. (My Nana & Pap couldn't make it, but they really wanted to.)



You did it girl! Go Bobcats!



Roomies & Friends for life!



Alumni!!! Woooohoooo!

My Life in Pictures

I've taken many, many, many pictures over the past few weeks that I keep meaning to add to my blog...but never seem to have time. I'm forcing myself to add some pics today.



Zeke & Zeus staring out at a neighbor child staring in.




Meet Bagheera (Or Diana if its a girl)...but during its time in our house it was called "Baggy" from Baloo's line "C'mon Baggy get with the beat" in the movie The Jungle Book.




Baggy learning how to play with USMC gear. (Kittens love boot bands too.)




Words of wisdom for Baggy from Zeke.




My favorite pic of Baggy.






Zeke's new favorite place to sleep.







Zeus loves to sit on tables and counters. It means I frequently clean them with clorox and other cleaners to keep them fur/germ free.




This is Zeke's face after he learns he won't be going to visit "Grandma Frantz" (poor little guy)




This is my "Librarian Chair" a fab find at only $15. I love it...Dave hates it.






My new trench coat originally priced at $79.95 (New York & Co.) and I paid $7.99 + tax. I sort of lusted after it when I first saw it, but put it out of my mind once seeing the price tag. (A retail girl never pays full price for something unless she has a darn good reason.)




A recent visit with our niece Zoi. I frequently give Dave the same look Zoi is giving him. Shortly after this she started crying and wanted to go back to her momma, lol.




My newest addition to the doo-dads. It says (for those of you who maybe can't read it)

"It is not the length of life, but the depth of life." ~Ralph Waldo Emerson. Yes, it is.


I'll have more pics to put up in about a week or so. Only 6 days until I am in Ohio. I can hardly wait. We're going to have so much fun.

A Year Later

Dave kindly reminded me today that it is his 1 yr anniversary of being out of the Marine Corps. We celebrated it much like we did on the official separation day...with pizza and beer. It seems like a good night to reflect on the things we have learned and experienced in the last year during "life after the Corps." Many things are still the same and many things will never be the same again. I'm happy knowing I don't have to worry about him being gone for months on end in a war zone. I'm sad that he no longer gets to do what he loves. I'm hopeful he will find something new that he loves, but am not holding my breath at this point and am anticipating a long hard road ahead while he figures it out.

In the months following his EAS we discussed his going back so many times I told him we had to stop talking about it because the anxiety of indecision was driving me nuts. Finally in November we started the process of trying to go back to the Corps. Fast forward several months and we discover that it will be a no go. Headquarters Marine Corps decided he had too many tattoos for the Corps. (At first we thought it was a different reason, but last week we found out that was the real reason.) Wow. I find that a little crazy if you ask me, but I understand "uniform standards...blah blah blah." I still think it sucks, especially since almost half his tattoos are USMC related. The man tattoed an EGA (Eagle Globe and Anchor...or as Brody calls it the eagle and the world), Semper Fi, Fortitudine (the original USMC motto), a spartan punisher (the India Co mascot from 3/8 - woohoo welcome home 3/8), a ship to represent the 22 MEU, and a Marine pin up girl (very tastefully done btw). I think I may be forgetting one. Do you think he loves the Corps? Yeah, me too. I hate he can't go back. Some days I pray that God might see fit to have the USMC recall him. Forget the bonus money, just give him the active duty life back. I could go on a whole big long rant about my thoughts on the USMC tattoo policy...or rather the Commandant's policy...but I probably should just keep that to myself. It saddens me that I have a Marine ready and willing to go back to the Corps (and potential warzones) but the Marine Corps persona will not allow it...anyone who looks at him (or anyone who looks at him and knows Marines) knows that he is a Marine-a Marine without a Corps.

So a year later...

We are in Alabama and no longer NC. (Some days it is good and other days I long for NC or DC again.)

I am working at Ann Taylor Loft and wondering if I should head back to the classroom, just stay put, or try a new career altogether.

Dave is going to school. He is doing pretty well. Some days he even likes his classes. Other days he'd rather be sitting in the rain in the middle of the woods surrounded by a platoon of Marines in the middle of February.

We're living on our own again and all of our boxes have moved out of storage. I'm delaying on unpacking all of them...possibly subconsciously I am trying not to get too settled so this isn't permanent. I haven't figured out what happens if I totally unpack every box. (I've never done it in any place we have lived. Not since that first move from the farmhouse I grew up in. Commitment issues? Definitely about certain things.)

We have a few select friends we hang out with on a very irregular basis. I miss "my boys" all the time. I miss the days that I would come home from a long day/week at JCMS to find one of my boys staying with us for the weekend. Hilarity always ensued at some point during the weekend.

Sometimes I even think I miss payday weekends. (Surely someone needs to save me from the monotany of AL life if I am longing for a payday wknd in J-ville. I think I've lost my mind.)

{Gasp} I think I even miss listening to the boots in line behind me talk. Why yes I have certainly lost my mind for sure. (Not boots like you wear, boots like newbie Marines.)

In Alabama we have a whole church family that loves us, just the way we are.

In NC we had a whole USMC family that loved us the same way. (Granted they still love us...just from afar now.)

In summary, I know life always changes. Even life back in the USMC would be different than it was when we left it last June. I'm hoping we don't always look back on this day with such a mixture of emotions and sometimes even dissapointment over what could have been..."if only." I'm hoping and praying we figure out what our purpose is at this point in time and where we should be headed.