I smell fall!

Yes, I do indeed smell fall! Cooler weather has finally blessed south Georgia and I could not be happier! To celebrate I've thrown all the windows open (those that will actually open...some are painted shut...), gone running at 1:30 PM and didn't die of heat exhaustion, and spend my evening hours outside! It's been a glorious week, even though Brian's in the field! This week he's gone all week-left Monday morning and back late Friday night. They have to clean weapons and turn them in before they're released...once they did this and didn't get home until 10:30 on a Friday night--hoping this time it'll be a little earlier.

So. I feel like I have a lot to recap, and I can't quite remember where I left off...Well most recently, we ventured back to Starkville this past weekend to see our Bulldogs BEAT Georgia! We really enjoyed the game, especially because our dear friend Paul let us sit with him in seats that have chairbacks, which really making sitting on bleachers waaay more comfortable. We spent the weekend hanging out with our brothers and friends and tailgating, which was a lot of fun! We stayed with the Coopers from FPC, and had so much fun--I love staying with them! Their house is on a pond and we spent a good bit of Saturday morning eating breakfast outside and enjoying the cool and peaceful morning! We headed back Sunday and it was raining-FINALLY! We were so thankful for it; I don't think it's rained here since August! Which, I love sunshine but things were starting to get pretty dry...which leads to fires. Brian and his company have started many fires while they're out in the field...some from hot weapons or ammo, sometimes flares...basically, they've put out a lot of fires recently!

Also recently I've begun teaching my own ESL class. Our beginner class got to be too big (16 people!) so we split them up. I started teaching on my own on Monday and I'm really enjoying it. In my class I have about 6 Hispanic women, a lady from the Congo (Africa!), and a sweet boy who's Clay's age from China. All in all we have a really good time! They are such an easy bunch to teach; I have to think through how to present things to them, but they are so motivated and stay on task-a teacher's dream! I think they think I'm a little crazy, but that's expected...I mean, aren't all foreign language teachers just a little crazy?...Reflect on your high school foreign language teacher and get back to me. Because I remember at least one crazy one...but it was fun!

I also got some good news last week: I have officially (after 6-7 weeks of waiting...) been offered a job as...a substitute teacher on post! Haha I know-super exciting, but hey, at least it generates some mula! Although, I would've never thought becoming a substitute teacher would be such a long process...the application was ridiculous (resume, references, transcript, among other forms...) but now I have, literally, about 50 pages of federal/state forms to fill out. Oh the joys of being employed by the government! I hooked up the laserjet printer because I realized how much ink this was going to expend! I'm about to fill out a "Questionnaire for Public Trust Positions" packet. Yes packet--it's about 12 pages long. Crazy! After I finish all the paperwork I have to have a background check done and then I should be good to go-whew! Good news is: once I'm in the system, I'm in...so I won't have to do this all again when we move! Otherwise I'd be making copies...

Other than that, class has been going really well as well as life in general. I've been hanging out with the girls quite a bit; last night we went downtown for dinner and trivia, and we won! I wasn't much help, but I'm going to blame that on the fact that the topic areas weren't my forte: alcohol was one of the themes and apparently every week there is a token Star Wars question. I knew I should've watched those when I was younger...too bad I can't phone a friend! Dad, Allen: I'd be calling you! Thankfully some of the other girls know their Star Wars trivia and we got that question correct :)

Brian is almost done with IBOLC, which I cannot believe! 3 more weeks and we're done! Also heading to Baltimore in 16 days according to the official email from the race officials for the half-marathon and to see Katie, Sarah, and Lydia...totally not ready for the half, but hey, we're just running for fun, right?

Oh my goodness I almost forgot something! Last week the other IBOLC wives and I hosted a coffee, which is like a small social. Our theme was "tailgate", so we all wore our team colors! Except I was the referee :) I was the designated "speaker" for our group, so I thanked the hostess (a general's wife--she let us use her house since it's so much bigger (and nicer) than any of ours!) and the other wives, so I thought I'd be "non-partisan" in my attire...haha! But my cowbells were decorations, so the MSU presence was known. Some of the senior officer wives thought they were hilarious and kept ringing them throughout the night-it was funny! We got to socialize with the senior wives and we got a lot of advice from them. We were supposed to be done around 8....well, all of the senior wives left except the general's wife (whose house we were in) and the two wives of our battalion and company....we ended up staying over there until 10 PM! The general even came in and let us rack his brain with questions about how to deal with our soldier-husbands concerning deployments, change, and other Army-related issues. They were so incredible and such an amazing couple-a wonderful role model for all of us! I could not believe they let us stay so late! They gave us a lot of great ideas about how be a supportive spouse as well as a list of books that they've found helpful over the years--I could've stayed for another 2 hours! We finally decided it was time for us to leave, and as we were cleaning up, their daughter and I went to dump out a bucketful of ice and their dog got out! Annnd it did not come back before we left...we even shook the treat box! Their daughter assured me that the dog did this all the time, but I hope he finally made it back...Way to go Rebecca--lose the general's dog...I've been keeping my eye out for him, just in case...

Well I think that's all for now! Hope everyone is doing great!

A Day in the Life of a Dawg

Whew! It's been a long time since an update...very sorry! Life has been sort of crazy these past few weeks. Let's see...started my class at Auburn (it's going well), Brian was in garrison for 2 weeks (hooray!), my "job" started, we went to a Braves game again and to Starkville, among various other outings! So yes, life's been pretty good here at Benning! To begin...Brian was in garrison the past two weeks, which means he went to class for the day, and then came home every night! Super exciting. They got off pretty early some of the days too so Brian and I took advantage of having more time together. We mostly lazed around, but at least he was home! But this week we're back to normal...after our lovely holiday weekend, Brian went to PT Tuesday morning, which went late, rushed home, showered, changed clothes, and was out the door and won't see him again til Friday night. This week their learning about Urban Ops, setting up a patrol base at night, and doing a live fire. Urban Ops: Not totally sure, but pretty confident it has to do with urban warfare. Patrol base: Brian explained this one to me. It's a base you set up when you're out on patrol and cannot make it back to the FOB (forward operating base). It's got a pretty rigid schedule of what has to be done, and someone has to be up at all times pulling security...AKA, making sure the bad guys don't find them/overrun their camp for the night. It's a lot of rotations through weapons cleaning/maitenance, eating, "hygiene" (which equals changing your socks and "taking a shower" with a baby wipe or two...), and sleeping--well, in 1 hour increments. No thanks. So I'm betting on him being pretty tired when he gets home tomorrow!



Brian and I trekked to Atlanta two weeks ago to go to another Braves game, but this time with his parents and grandparents! Sorry, I managed to not take any pictures somehow...but we had fun! Brian and I were a little more saavy this time and packed a cooler with our own food. And of course, the Braves won!



Next on the list was another Ranger graduation, except this time I took pictures! If you ever come on a day when they're having one of these, we'll go--they're fun, and educational too!

To begin, you get a little background on the Rangers, where they were formed, and some of the major battles they've led (Normandy, for example). Then we go onto a rappeling demonstration. Brian will learn a lot of these tactics when he's in Ranger School!





This guy is hauling himself up the wall...wanted you to see how tall it was!

Next, we get a demo of C-4, which is an explosive! They blow up a building back here.

This is some type of rigging system that's used to haul things up a wall/rockface. They pulled some people up while we were there. (Soldiers, no civilians...ha!)

Ok, this is called an Australian, or Aussie, rappel, and it is TERRIFYING! I should've taken a video of it, but this man comes flying, face forward, off the top of the platform and starts to fly/run down the wall. It is so scary! Then he "shoots" at us with a gun. You know, gotta make it realistic...

Up you go!

So this is pretty awesome. They demonstrate how they can drop in/pick up soldiers into a combat zone. So first, the soldiers rappel out of this Blackhawk (thank you, Allen :) helicopter.

Next, they are picked up by a helicopter and they attach themselves to a rope. Then, the helicopter flies away, carrying their bodies hanging from a rope outside of the 'bird! It's insane! I have a picture but it won't cooperate, so I'll upload it later!

Next Demo: Squad Tactics

This is what a squad looks like; when Brian takes command over a platoon (~30-40 people) at Fort Bliss, it'll be comprised of two squads-A and B.

Next, a Ranger climbs up to this platform, which is about 1 ft. wide. He must run/walk over it, jump over that yellow Ranger block in the middle, then jump onto a rope, shimmy across, touch a Ranger tab, and then ask for permission to drop into the water. This is something Brian will have to do one of the first days he's in Ranger school!

So here's this boy running. Yep, he almost fell after he tried to be macho and jump over the yellow blocks. I think I would have great success with this...hurdle form :)

Shimmying across the rope...Once they touch the Ranger tab, they have to drop their legs and hang, and say "Permission to drop sir!"

Once permission has been granted (and they usually let him hang for a few seconds, for our enjoyment...), he drops into the water!

While dropping, he screams "Rangers lead the way!"

We had a few other demos, such as combatives and various weapons. This one is a wire that is made for decapitating someone, such as this lovely watermelon.

Whoops forgot the combatives pictures. Well, they weren't too interesting-just guys beating up on each other. Usually the loser (pictured below), gets dumped into the water. May I remind you that they do these demonstrations year-round....can you imagine being dropped into that water in January?!

Well that's all for Ranger Graduation...onto Starkville! One thing I love about the Army...on national holidays, we get not only the holiday off, but we also get a "training holiday", so we get a 4 day weekend! I'd say it's usually well deserved! So we headed to Starkville Thursday afternoon and we stayed with AC in her adorable new house! Brian wore his uniform so AC was trying parts of it on...ha!

Second Lieutenant English:

Ok, so my weekend was full of 'dawgs and real DOGS! AC and Jesse got a yellow lab...meet Maggie! She's so fun!

Friday Brian and I spent the day visiting friends and eating our favorite Starkville cuisine (Mexican food...delicious). I had breakfast with Erin at City Bagel, of course, and then AC and I went over to the Sherrards for some good quality playtime with the boys! Thankfully, Joseph still remembers who I am and we had a blast playing sports, trains, and reading--I miss them so much! And baby James is growing so much! Joseph had lots of play-plans for us, so I didn't get to see baby James too much...was too busy chasing a 2 year old around! I don't know how they do it full-time!

Friday night we went to dinner at Old Waverly (a fancy golf course in West Point) with Lindsay, Clay, and Lindsay's family. We had such a wonderful meal and it was great to catch up with her family!

Here we are again at City Bagel Saturday morning! Ha I love this place!

The girls at Anna CLEMMER'S tailgate! Yes, I know I'm not wearing white, and it was a white-out game. Here's why: A) I thought a white-out was stupid for the first game. I wanted to wear school colors! B) I really wanted a new MSU t-shirt (haven't bought one since freshman year!), and I wanted it to be charcoal gray. So yes, I rebelled. But so did Brian. He wore maroon...

Brother!

Showing off their sweet tats...

Me and Linds!...and John :)

We found Stacey!

Ok, so the white out did look pretty cool. Whoops. We had tickets for the upper deck on the west side (where this picture is taken from), but some of Stacey's family friends had 50 yd. line tickets that they didn't need, and gave them to us! How awesome is that?! We sat about 30 rows up from the field-amazing! Erin sat with me and Brian and we even had chairbacks so we were super comfortable...thank you to the Brown family!

All the white you see to the left side of the stadium is the student section...AKA, the last part of the stadium to get any shade!

I've been trying to get a good picture of this for years...guess it takes sitting on the opposite side!

Ah how cute is this?! Leigh's sister got a baby bulldog! Her name is Izzy and she's 8 weeks old. Isn't she precious?!

Proof: Brian can hold a "baby".

Out on the town!

Friends! Leigh don't hate me...it's your husband's fault!

Sunday, Jon (our first college minister) got ordained at First Pres! It was a crazy fun weekend in Starkville! I was so glad we were able to be there for it! This is some of the old FPC crew!

They had a lunch honoring Jon and Bib after church--it was so fun to see all these people I've been missing!

Whew! All in all a wonderful weekend, although I now have a cold due to staying up waaay too late with friends and getting no sleep while going 90 miles an hour all weekend! It was pretty sad leaving Starkville; I think Brian and I have been in denial about our new life...ha! We both keep thinking we're going back to State for classes "in the fall" (I know, classes have already started...), but this weekend was a sore reminder that A) we aren't students there any more, and B) that we don't even LIVE there any more. So yes, I cried. Of course. But it was a very happy reunion of friends and I can't wait to do it again in a few weeks for the Georgia game.

Hannah and I started our "job" as ESL teachers today! We gave the diagnostic test of several of our Hispanic friends/students, and we start teaching on Monday-we're excited! I've also been going to a Bible study with them on Wednesdays which has been a lot of fun...lots of talking and fellowship plus Spanish practice!

Well that's all for now...thanks for sticking through this epically long post! Just for you Em :)

So long, Starkville...

Well, it's here-the big move! I can't believe it. Today is my last day at work, and tomorrow is my last day in Starkville. I don't actually think it's hit me yet--believe I'm in a stage of denial. Hope it doesn't have too many levels...

To begin with, I can't believe I've already worked a year at my job-that seems crazy to me! And I really can't believe how fast 5 years has gone by here at State. It's all a blur of football games, fun nights at the boys (now my...) house, Chi O functions, sweet memories with the girls, and a lot of time at First Pres, in addition to eating numerous restaurants that I will miss dearly...ha! And so many more memories that I can't start to reflect on otherwise it'll make it even harder to leave! Better to leave it as a blur for at least the next week or so-then I'll start to decompress all the stories, memories, and life experiences that Starkville has shared with me.

Quite possibly the scariest thing to me is not being in school once I get to Benning...Yes, I realize this makes me sound like a complete nerd (which I proudly accept), but all I've done for the last twenty years or so is go to school--what do I do now?! Oh wait, I get to take a class in the fall...life in academia isn't over yet for me! Long story on that one. Let's leave it at the Foreign Language Dept. of MSU sort of messed me up and I will now be taking my last class at Auburn, but my degree will be from State. The end.

Onto the moving saga! If any of you have been to my house in Madison, you will remember how large our front living room is. It's pretty big. Now imagine this: the entire room (and into the dining room...) is completely FULL of furniture and boxes, stacked so high that's it's taller than me! I tried to get a picture, but I just couldn't capture the scope of the madness. My wonderful grandparents/relatives/parents are showering us with furniture--the benefits of everyone being a woodworker in the family! Must...take...up...the...family...trade...I don't want the tradition to end! This past weekend the Pages came down and helped me move everything out of the Starkville house; I ended up having to make an impromptu trip home Saturday afternoon to take a load home, but it was good to see the family and appreciate the furniture store that is our living room. Brian and I are doing what's called a "DITY move" which stands for do-it-yourself. ("Yourself" in our case includes a little help from some family and friends...thank you in advance!)

Brian got to 'move in' to our house yesterday. By 'move in', I mean he's sleeping there...in a sleeping bag! What a trooper. And with no air conditioning...Really hoping that gets fixed before move-in day on Saturday, otherwise we are going to be some really hot and exhausted people! Southern Georgia in July...not really an ideal time for the AC to be broken. Especially when you live on the second floor. My goal this weekend is to get moved in and hopefully share some pictures of the outside of the house with you! I doubt I'll be done unpacking before I want to write another post.

In honor of my dear husband (still weird to think he's actually my husband now, after all these years!), I also decided to be blog-patriotic for the 4th. Happy 4th of July! Hooray for freedom. So thankful for those who provide freedom and protect us. A special thanks to all the armed servicemen/women.

Well that's about all I have time for today--onto writing a final, packing, cleaning, and spending my last precious hours in Starkville with friends!