This, That and Another Thing

The last ten days have been busy, very busy.  My grandmother was here for a visit.  We took the time to see the sites of Alaska.  She celebrated her 70th birthday by watching the Iditarod.  We also took a trip to Seward.  We made it there through the snow storm. There was heavy blowing snow in the mountain passes. You couldn’t tell the difference between the sky, road and snow bank. With 10-15 foot high snow walls on both sides of the road through Turnagain Pass things were a little nerve wracking. We just barely missed the avalanches along the Seward highway.  We spent time at the Sea Life Center and had a relaxing time.  The road  reopened in time for us to leave however we did have a small delay while waiting for the crews to finish the avalanche cleanup.   We made it home in plenty of time to get her to the airport yesterday morning.

Iditarod fever is still running strong.  I am following the race and as of this morning the top contenders have reached the Yukon River just a little past the halfway point.  There has been some excitement along the trail this year already. Going to the ceremonial start in Anchorage was fun but being out on Willow Lake at the official re-start was the best. I am so totally hooked on the Iditarod! Last year at the Iditarod hubby left the camera battery (which had been charging) in the car. No problem, there was always next year – right? This year he left the camera at home. No problem, we had just bought my Gma a camera for her birthday and decided we would use her’s! Except the batteries died as soon as we got there. Hey, I guess there is always next year!?! I may just have to swipe some photos from friends who where there.

I am still dealing with having this cast on my hand and am sooooo ready to get it off!  Ten more days until I go back to the orthopedic doctor for another evaluation.

The bathroom remodel has been resumed and we are still waiting to get my son’s room repaired from the water damage.  This is a priority in the coming days.

Sadly, we are down to about 2 1/2 weeks until my hubby leaves.  It has been great these last couple of weeks with the distractions but now we are beginning to really prepare for his departure and the long separation.  I think the younger children are beginning to pick up on it too.  The younger ones, especially the baby, have been extra clingy when it comes to their daddy.  We  may have a very unpleasant struggle adjusting to daddy being gone but will continue to pray that the Lord will allow a smoother transition.

I am hoping to be back to more regular blogging soon but it may still be sporadic for the next few weeks.

So, if you stuck with my ramblings thus far, let me ask you, what has been happening in your life the last couple of weeks?

A Murphy Visit; Rain in the Bedroom

If you remember from the last post we are beginning the basement bathroom remodel.  We had those three leaks in the basement that are finally repaired.  All of the supplies for the remodeling job are purchased and the evening before we were to start we hear our son yell, “Dad, it is raining in my bedroom!”  Murphy decided to come back for a visit, I think.  This particular bedroom is already missing a good portion of two walls already from the previous leaks.

Let me say up front, “God has been abundantly providing for us financially lately!”  You will see that if you read the Melting Expenses post below.  We also just received our tax return and paid off a few things as well as buy the supplies for the bathroom remodel.  We know the Lord is good and not only good but abundant in his provision!  God is not surprised by what is happening now.  That being noted…….. here is the run down of the last couple of days.

Almost every towel in the house was used to try and dry the remaining water that was flowing and to sop up the once again drenched carpet.  Thankfully, we have an ugly drop down ceiling in the basement.  Hubby was able to move the ceiling tile and reach up to see if he could determine where the water was coming from.  He found a large ice-cycle in the floor/ceiling between the upstairs and downstairs. (son’s room is in the basement)  He them placed a call to our home insurer.

We soon had a couple of men shoveling the top of our house and breaking up the ice dam believed to have caused the damage.  The water damage mitigatory then came out to access the situation.  The report is this……..

Ice damming caused the water to back up between the wood siding of the house and the outer wall.  This ran along the outside until it reached the basement level and found the dryer vent where the moisture then moved inside the house.  The ice melted in the heat of the house and began pouring down the wall and dripping from the ceiling.  We have the entire outer wall in my son’s room which needs to be gutted, dried out, and replaced.  That makes wall number 3 in his room!  Not only that but it looks like our roof (only 1 1/2 years old) will need to be completely replaced.  It appears that the previous owner used a questionable company to replace the roof.  This company is no longer in business, therefore no warranty.  They used the cheap kind of ice water shield and it looks as if that was not even installed correctly.   We will know more next week when our reputable roofer comes out to take a look.

So we have all of this to take care of now, finish the bathroom remodel, and Oh Yeah, my hubby leaves in 5 weeks!!!!

Murphy, thank you for stopping by, thank you for giving us another opportunity to trust in my Lord, now please go bother someone else! LOL

Wednesday Hero — Helping Haiti

Airmen from the Kentucky National Guard’s 123rd Contingency Response Group help to offload wounded Haitian refugees and medics from Puerto Rico National Guard UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters at the air hub Jan. 25, 2010, in Barahona, Dominican Republic.

Photo Courtesy U.S Air Force Taken By Tech. Sgt. Dennis Flora

These brave men and women sacrifice so much in their lives so that others may enjoy the freedoms we get to enjoy everyday. For that, I am proud to call them Hero.
We Should Not Only Mourn These Men And Women Who Died, We Should Also Thank God That Such People Lived

This post is part of the Wednesday Hero Blogroll. For more information about Wednesday Hero, or if you would like to post it on your site, you can go here.

Reality Check

It is still somewhat early this morning.  I was up much earlier than I like today.  It is still dark, of course.  The children are all in bed and my house is understandably very quiet.  I took my husband to the airport this morning.  He is off to San Antonio, where we lived before moving to Alaska, for some pre-deployment training.

He will be able to stop in and spend a day with his brother and family and enjoy some good TexMex at Taco Cabana.  I think Taco Cabana is one of the few things I miss about Texas.  He will probably pick up a cherry lime aid from Sonic too!

He will then spend a week out in the field eating MREs and doing whatever they do out there for training.  He will only be gone a week so that is not too bad.  But as I drove away from the airport this morning I came face to face with a reality check.    We have known for a while that he was set to deploy.  As the time gets closer and closer it seems less and less likely that he will be pulled from this one.  I have been preparing for him to go but somehow actually sending him off for training shook me a little.  This is really going to happen. The time is quickly approaching when we will be living  this and not just thinking about living it.

There have been several deployments that he has been tasked for and then pulled from.  We have been through one short deployment before though and it was to a safe place.  This will be by far our longest separation and our first to the front lines in the war zone.

My concern is not for us here at home.  I know I will have a task ahead of me.  The older children can at least understand what is going on.  The younger ones will be more of a challenge.  In fact, one just came upstairs crying because he has already left.  I am more concerned, however, for my hubby and his safety.

I am so thankful for a God who is sovereign.  As our family moves forward, I ask that you keep us in prayer.  Pray for hubby and his safety, pray for our children who will be missing their daddy, and pray for me that I would trust in the Lord all the more.

Reality checks are good, not always fun, but good.  Thank you Lord that you are the one who decrees all things.  Thank you Lord Jesus for being my Savior, my Rock, my Strength, and my Refuge.

Operation Denali

Saturday night my hubby and I attended the annual banquet for the Society of American Military Engineers.  It was a good evening out.  Hubby and I were all dressed up and had an evening out together.  The key note speaker at the banquet was the best speaker we have ever heard at one of these events.  I want to share a bit with you.

The speaker was Marc Hoffmeister. Marc is an US Army officer and 1992 West Point graduate currently stationed at Elmendorf AFB, AK.  Marc was wounded by a roadside bomb while serving on a Military Transition Team as an embedded trainer with the Iraqi Army.   He shared with us a bit about trying to deal with the devastation of his injuries and how his wife Gayle challenged him to overcome.  He told us that she announced one day that she was going to climb Denali!  Realizing that she was determined and he could not let her go alone, he determined to take up the challenge and Operation Denali was born.

Operation Denali Mission Statement:

Enable four Warriors wounded in the Global War on Terrorism to overcome devastating combat injuries and successfully summit 20,320 ft Denali, the highest mountain in North America, symbolizing the strength of our Nation and those who defend it.

He shared with us a very inspiring story. He spoke of not only the challenges of the climb in which only 40-60% of those who attempt actually summit. Denali is a dangerous mountain in which people loose their lives each year attempting to summit.  Imagining the challenges of attempting such a big climb is intimidating but image doing so without all of your limbs.  Yes, these wounded warriors climbed and summitted the mountain with prosthetic limbs.  He told stories of how they even passed other teams on the mountain.  That was rather encouraging for them, not so much so for the other fully bodied teams.  Why even try to attempt such a feat?  Reaching the summit was the goal but more importantly than actually reaching the summit were the following objectives.  Even for the few who did not actually summit, their objectives were reached.

1.  To raise awareness for the needs of severely injured service men and women
2.  To  work together to overcome our physical limitations and achieve a common goal made to seem insurmountable by the impact of our injuries on our lives.
3.  To demonstrate by performance and example that no obstacle is so great that the human spirit cannot overcome it

Let me give you a little bit of perspective on this challenge.  A little lesson on Denali.  Denali meaning the High One or the Great One is the Native word for the mountain that outsiders refer to as Mount McKinley. Denali, being North America’s highest peak, rises to an elevation of 20,320 feet amidst a sea of glaciers and other peaks that compose the Alaska Range.  Here is a photo I took from Anchorage, several hundred miles away.

For a closer look and updated photos check out the webcam from Denali National Park & Preserve. Their view is from Wonder Lake.

Please make sure to do your part in supporting our veterans.  They give up so much for the freedoms we all enjoy!  I ask that you share this story and encourage others!

To read more on this inspiring story visit Operation Denali! You can also see a slide show of the expedition. You can read their expedition journal too!

Take some time to learn more about Operation Denali and be sure to leave me a comment too!

Hug From A Stranger

As you may have noticed I haven’t posted in several days.  It has been a bit of a tough week for me.  I was having one of those weeks where my strong, hold it together personality started to unravel.  Sometimes things need to be dealt with without simply trying to cover it with a smile.  Anticipation can be a wonderful thing if what you are anticipating is a welcome thing.  Anticipation can also be a terrible thing that turns into dread.  The latter is what I was dealing with this past week.

My hubby has been tasked to deploy several times and it has been pulled.  He has a new tasking now that looks as if it will definitely  happen.  The thing is that each time it gets changed the deployment becomes less palatable.  He is set to deploy in late spring and will begin all of the required trainings in preparation after the first of the new year.

With all of the trainings and other things involved he will be gone about a total of 7 months or a little more this coming year.  He will miss the entire summer, leaving with snow on the ground and returning to snow on the ground.  He will miss the bear hunt and caribou hunt we had planned.  He will miss the big fishing trip.  He will miss our summer jaunts around this great land.  He will also miss the Iditarod, Furrondy, Ice Festivals, and visiting company.  What breaks my heart is that he will miss our 20th anniversary. (We had always been planning on having a wedding to renew vows –since we eloped years ago)  I will also be missing my 20 year high school reunion because I am not willing to be that far away and leave the children here alone.

But you know, even though this is all sad and something I really do not want to do, it is ok.  That is part of the military life.  We sacrifice for the freedoms we still have.  This is not what is really bothering me.

As time gets closer we hear more and more details.  This past week some of those details have unnerved me.  We have found out the location. ( well, as exact as we are allowed to know in that region)  With my hubby being a chaplain he is not authorized to carry a weapon.  He is dependent on others for his protection. People in the office are not very tactful or sensitive when it comes to talking about it with me around.

This deployment is such that it has me very concerned about whether or not my hubby will return.  I find that I am asking myself such questions as, “Is this going to be our last Christmas?”  You may think this is the case with every deployment.  It is not.  We have been in this situation before and I have never even felt the need to contemplate this.

I find it very hard to share this because I often have the burden of people thinking I need to just put up a strong front and let everything roll off my back like water on a duck.  I may be a strong person but that doesn’t mean that I do not struggle.  I just often struggle without others really knowing about it or I end up receiving lectures from others rather than them really being willing to be a comfort to me.

Before anyone decides to slap me with scripture let me assure you I am doing the same thing to myself.  I was sharing with a lady at my daughters’ ballet class the other day.  I was sharing and telling her that I am so thankful that the Lord is our strong tower.  That even though hubby cannot carry a weapon and is going to one of the most dangerous places, I know it is the Lord who is his protector.  I know that the Lord has not given us a spirit of fear and I know that worrying does not change a thing.  I have confidence in my Lord.  This does not mean that emotions always fall in line the way I want them to.

This sweet lady with tears in her eyes gave me a big hug and said she would be praying for our family.  I barely know this woman.  Her hug though meant so much especially then.    It made me think—–how many others are there in this world that need a hug from a stranger–how many people just need to know that someone cares?

Once again, in ministering to me through this other Christian lady the Lord revealed to me the need to minister to others.

Lord, calm my fears.  Protect my family.  Help me to focus on you, rest in you, rely and depend upon you.  Let me see the needs of others and offer the needed hug of a stranger to another.  Amen

Also Check out this posting I saw today. Connecting Through Power of a Hug.