Visit to Washington!

Now that it has been, ahem..., almost 3 months since I have updated my blog, I figured I better get on that. Especially since I referenced it in my Christmas card and now all the people who visited my blog probably think I was lying and I don't really post on here. Sooo, I am jumping back on the wagon and vowing to post every day (or maybe every other day) until I get caught up. Starting with....

Our trip to Washington!

We went back to Washington in November to visit family, and it was especially fun for Joe because he had not been back for over 2 and a half years. Needless to say, we did a ton of running around as usual to fit in all kinds of family and friends.

The biggest reason we made the trip was because my grandma was going to the temple for the first time! She joined the church while I was staying with her when Joe was deployed, and I was honored to be her escort through the temple. It was fabulous, and she was lucky enough to even have a couple missionaries who had taught her attend the session as well. My grandma is so dear to me and I love being able to share this part of my life with her, as I know how my life has been blessed and the joy I have experienced since joining the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. Thanks to Joe's mom for hanging out at the temple with Amelia so I could go in!



Joe's mom hosted a huge Thanksgiving dinner for all of Joe's extended family while we were there. I think about 75 people showed up, and it was terrific to be able to visit with so many people we probably wouldn't have seen otherwise. We decided to do Amelia's baby blessing while we were there so that Joe's family could participate. Being able to have Amelia's father, grandfather, and great-grandfather, as well as uncles and great-uncles share in giving that blessing made the experience that much more meaningful.



We decided we better get all kinds of pictures of the girls with their grandparents and great-grandparents since we aren't sure when we will get to see them again.

The girls with Joe's maternal grandparents.

The girls with Joe's mom.

Joe with his parents.

Joe with his grandparents.

Amelia with Joe's dad.

Amelia with grandma and cousin Aiden.

The girls with my parents.

Madeline had tons of fun with my brothers kids, Ethan and Gavin, and she even spent the night there, but we all forgot to take any pictures until right before we left. Of course the kids weren't feeling very cooperative, so this is the best I got.

We had such a great time, and were able to see so many people, it made me miss Washington. But we do love it out here in New York too, so I guess for now we will just settle for visiting whenever we can.

Family Pictures

Our friend, Misti Hymas, took family pictures of us recently. We went up to a park near our home to get some outside pictures and capture some of the gorgeous fall colors. We had lots of fun, and she was very patient with Madeline, who thought the nearby playgroud looked like a lot more fun than posing for pictures. I think we got some great shots!

Unfortunately, Blogger is not letting me paste anything here, so if you want to see the slide show, click here!

Happy Halloween!

In addition to Madeline's painted pumpkin, we had one other pumpkin to carve. Good thing it was only one. Madeline picked the most detailed pattern of all the choices, and then was bored by the time the pumpkin guts were all scooped out.


Joe persevered and finished the haunted house, and I think it turned out great! I couldn't get a good picture with it lit, but it looks spooky.

The girls got to wear their costumes 3 times this year - once to a friend's birthday party, once to the church Halloween party, and once to trick-or-treat. I like that because it makes me feel a little better about the money spent on costumes (I am not crafty enough to come up with an idea and do a homemade costume).

Madeline was Little Bo Peep.

Amelia was her sheep.


Joe was a pirate. He scrounged up these accessories from friends at church so he could dress up for a battalion run they did at work. He also got a lot of wear out of his costume, because he dressed up for the party and trick-or-treating too.

Fall Fun

Our library had a Fall Festival last weekend with all kinds of fun crafts, games, and treats. Madeline had a friend over so we decided to take all the girls down to enjoy the festivities.

They had paper apples that you could scratch and different colors would show up underneath to create a cool design.

Madeline drew a sun and a face on her apple.

Both the girls wanted to get their faces painted. Madeline chose an apple with a worm and Tessa got a pumpkin. She really liked the purple face paint so the lady drew a purple vine coming off it.

There were foam leaves with jewels and letter stickers for decorating.

The girls each got to choose a pumpkin and paint it. Of course this was their favorite because it was so messy - luckily it was washable paint!

They also had balloon animals, coloring pages, story time, and scarecrows to dress, along with apple cider and treats. I love the free activities the library does, and I especially love how much Madeline likes to go to the library thanks to all the fun things she can do there!

And what would Fall be without an enormous pile of leaves to romp around in? Good thing there is an endless supply around here.

Amelia - 1 Month

Waiting at the doctor's office.

Amelia is already a month old! She is up to 10 pounds, 15 ounces and 21 3/4 inches. She is doing really well, and her sleeping habits are actually better than Madeline's were at this age. She will often give me a solid 5 hours of sleep at night, and a few times she has gone 6-7 hours. I am so glad for those nights, because she does have her days when she is fussy and just wants to be held all day, and the nights when I am super tired and she just won't go to sleep until some time after midnight.

We did discover that she broke her collarbone when she was born. It is healing fine and doesn't bother her much because she doesn't have to raise her arms above her head. Joe broke his collarbone when he was born too, and then he broke it again later, so I am just hoping this doesn't mean she has a greater chance of breaking it again later.

Although being a mother of 2 is easier than I imagined, I will say I find it exhausting to take 2 kids out to run errands. Even if Amelia is sleeping the whole time, just hauling her around and trying to keep track of Madeline while still keeping an eye on Amelia wears me out. I feel for you moms trying to take 3 and 4 kids out.

First Haircut

I know, Madeline is over 3 years old. The thing is, it took her such a long time to really grow hair, and even now it is extremely fine hair so it still doesn't seem like she has much. But it was definitely out of hand, looking so scraggly, that she finally got her first hair cut. She was really excited to get it cut, and she was pretty good for the girl cutting it. We didn't get anything fancy, just straight across at her shoulders, but it looks a thousand time better, and she looks so much older to me now.

BEFORE:

See the excitement? She is loving this.

AFTER: I didn't get a shot from the back, where the change is most drastic, but it's cute and she likes it. Plus now I can actually let her leave her hair down sometimes without her looking so unkempt.

EFMB

Joe was able to take 10 days off from work when Amelia was born, which was so nice because he was able to be off work the whole time my parents were in town, and for a few more days after they left. It was great to have him around to take care of Madeline while I was taking care of the baby.

The day he had to go back to work he started working towards getting his Expert Field Medical Badge. This is a very prestigious badge for soldiers in the medical community of the Army. Basically, it gives soldiers more credibility as a medical soldier because only a small percentage of medical soldiers have this badge. It required him to stay on post for the duration of the exams, which took 2 weeks. I think it was actually a good thing that he stayed out there because he was only getting a few hours of sleep a night anyway, and he was spending hours and hours a day studying. We probably would have just distracted him.

In order to qualify for the EFMB, he had to successfully complete the following:

• Day land navigation
• Night land navigation
• Written Exam
• 3 Medical Lanes requiring him to demonstrate his abilities to treat patients in a combat zone
• 12 mile ruck march with roughly 50 pounds of gear in 3 hours or less

I knew the land navigation would be no problem for him because they practiced that a ton in college, and the ruck march would be hard but there was no doubt he could do it. The written exam and the lanes were extremely difficult though. One of the lanes had over 200 steps to memorize and perform in order. You get 2 chances for the written exam, but only one shot at everything else.

The pass rate for the EFMB is about 15%. Some people don't pass until they have gone through 5-7 attempts. Out of this group of 150+ soldiers, only 16 were awarded the EFMB, and Joe was one of them. At the award ceremony the Commanding General of Ft. Drum gave a speech in which he said he believes the EFMB is the most difficult of all the badges to earn in the Army. Needless to say, we are so proud of him for working so hard and passing on his first try. He is great at his job, and truly can do anything he sets his mind to.

Here are the group of soldiers who earned their EFMB. Soldiers are sent from posts all over the country to try to earn the badge, so some of these soldiers are not from Ft. Drum. Joe is the second one from left in the second row.

They came to the award ceremony directly after the ruck march, so Joe's face was all dirty. Madeline refused to give him a hug and kiss because she kept saying he needed a bath. She was excited to see him though. As they were standing on the stage and it was silent, she started waving to him. He smiled at her, but obviously couldn't wave back so she thought she would further try to get his attention by shouting out "Hi, Daddy!" Luckily she is still young enough that everyone thought it was cute and not annoying.


These are some of Joe's good friends from work. The guy on the far right was Joe's roommate during the course and they really worked together studying and encouraging each other - and they both passed! Congratulations to both of them.