He’s Gone
Left earlier than originally planned. No surprise there, eh?!
A few new pictures
Deployment is this week. I’ll try to update over the weekend or early next week. In the meantime, a few pictures of my adorable children. 
E on her first day of preschool
What it means to parent a boy, I guess!
Ben climbing the stairs while Jim vacuums
Playing in the playroom with the party hat E insisted Ben wear. She always picks out pink things for Ben, usually pink sparkly items or pink skirts/dresses. Jim doesn’t care for her choices!!
8/17 Update
Jim should be home in about 10 days! This “trial deployment” has gone very smoothly. I hoped it would go well so I’d have that confidence boost going into the deployment. Jim has enjoyed the training. He said its been good training and his soldiers have done well with it.
Elizabeth starts back at Awanas this week. She’s very excited.
Ben’s two bottom teeth are fully in and he’s working on the top two now. As you can see in the pictures below, he’s pulling up now. Elizabeth gets so excited when he does and says “Good job, Buddy Brother!!”
I’ve uploaded some new pictures & videos.
Look at me! My boy is pulling up & standing!!
Jim’s Kids Elizabeth has a couple old Nintendo controls that she likes to play. She decided to get one out for each of them. It kept them occupied for a good ten minutes.
I’ve moved the videos again. :) Just from one Google location to another, so there shouldn’t be any problems viewing. If there are, please let me know! I don’t remember which ones I’ve already posted, so here’s the link to the folder of videos.
I booked our trip for December. We come in on the 22nd (hopefully to snow!) and leave on January 13. I’m really hoping for a big snow during the trip! I don’t need two feet like we got back in 2004 when I was home for Christmas but I’d take one foot!
One More Thing…
I forgot to add one more big thing to the post below….Jim got his orders for his promotion! Come July 25, he’s getting promoted to First LT (1LT)! Yea!! In the short term, it won’t change his job. While they are in Iraq, there’s a chance he’ll get moved up but he’s hoping to stay the platoon leader throughout their tour.
VBS, Videos, Milestones & Home
Elizabeth had her first day of VBS today. She was so excited to go. We assume she had a good time. She’s back to not talking about it, like she wouldn’t talk about school when we were at Benning. I asked her no less than five times and each time she’d just act as if I hadn’t said anything!
We (almost) have a tooth! F-I-N-A-L-L-Y! I was finally able to see at least one *just* beneath the surface. I couldn’t get a good look to see if there was one or two lurking. I’m really hoping the rest of the teeth come in more quickly and/or he handles them better!!
And the other big milestone…he’s sitting! He started sitting, rather than just getting lucky with balancing, on Friday. He also got to sit in the shopping cart for the first time on Friday. Elizabeth was beyond thrilled. It was at Sam’s, so she got to sit next to him. She has BIG plans for him riding next to her in the drive carts at the commissary. She can’t wait to teach him how to steer and push the fake buttons. Ben, on the other hand, mostly just wants to munch on the cart. Ick! (Don’t worry, Mom, I’m ordering a cart cover for him!!)
I will continue to use the video hosting I used on the last post, as I’ve not had anyone who couldn’t see it that way.
We’ve booked our trip home in September. We love here on September 4 at 4:15 pm, travel through O’Hare and arrive in Indy at 8:05 am. We come back on September 12 at 6 am and arrive back here at 2pm.