Valuing relationships

Lately I have really been feeling like I put more value in certain relationships than the other parties do, and it sucks.  There are a few friendships I’ve really been feeling like I put much more value on the friendship than the other people do, and it’s a tough pill to swallow.  More often than not, I feel like I’m the one asking people to do things, or I’m the one keeping in touch with people.  The transient lifestyle of a military spouse really plays in to this.  I know most of the people in this small town have been here for years.  They all know each other and I am the outsider.  Some of them have been very accepting and welcome me in to their already well established circles, but most of them don’t.  And then there’s some that you think welcome you in but really aren’t.  Those ones hurt.  I am hoping and praying that we can grow much deeper roots in NY and that we won’t be the “outsiders” there in a few years.  That we can grow lasting friendships with people that put as much value into the relationship as we do.

(My aunt and uncle did make the trip to CO to see us and it was great to see them.  And my dad was cut off in the group picture.. He was next to Mark.)

But what sucks even more than friendships, is when you feel this vast divide with family.  We recently drove to CO to give my parents our dogs during our move.  We drove 12 hours (not including stops) with 4 kids and 3 dogs.  I asked one of my extended family to drive 4 hrs to see us so they could meet some of our kids and we could meet theirs, but they couldn’t be bothered to drive that far.  That hurts.  I would LOVE for my kids to have cousins that they could play with or see once a year or so, but we’ve never lived near anyone of our relatives that have kids.  We’ll be within driving distance of some of Mark’s cousins once we move so hopefully we can plan some meet ups with them when we live on the other side of the country.  Mark’s family seems to just plan their trips with just them.  They go to Europe together and rent lake houses together and never once suggest that we all meet in the middle to include us, or even invite us to join them in their trips.  Of course we couldn’t go to Europe with them, and we wouldn’t go all the way to where they live with 4 kids, but I feel bad that Mark’s pretty much been ostracized from his own family.  He says it doesn’t bother him and that he has his own family now, but it’s got to be a little weird for him to see them all getting together and going on trips together when he’s never even invited.

My hope is that my kids will try to keep in touch with each other when they are older – that their kids will all be friends and that they’ll be able to see each other more than once or twice a year, if that.  I am thankful for all the opportunities the military has afforded us, and all the friends we have all over the place, but it is hard to not have people physically close to you to develop deep relationships with.  And as soon as you do develop a deep relationship with someone, either you move or they move.  We are looking forward to the guard side of the military for sure.

Thanksgiving 2013

For Thanksgiving we had a couple of our friends from here over for dinner.  Jessica and I prepared all of the food, except for the turkey, and Chris and Mark took care of that.  It was fun to spend time with some friends and have them over to our house, and actually have enough space to have people over to our house!

 

It was nice to finally be back in the States to celebrate Thanksgiving and it was fun to spend it with some good friends.

The day after Thanksgiving we went to get our Christmas tree.  We chose to get a real one (our first real one in a long time!!).  Back in IL we would go to the Christmas tree farms and cut our tree down ourselves, but they don’t have any of those around here because apparently Christmas trees don’t grow well in the desert…  So they ship them in from the NW and you go pick them out.  Not many people were at the Christmas tree lot when we were there, so we had a pretty good

 

We had an Elf on the Shelf this year that the kids (Abbie) named Jingle.  Both of the kids LOVED coming downstairs and looking for Jingle every morning.  And Mark had fun finding places to put him every night.  Ben would come downstairs and say “OHHHH!!!!  Dere’s Jingle!!!  Daddy MEER!!  See Jingle!”  Definitely glad we got him.  Now if I can just remember where we hid him when he flew away to be with Santa for the rest of the year next year….  That’s the problem with hiding things from kids is that I usually end up hiding them from myself also…

In a good place

 

I say this every time, but I have a ton of blogs to catch up on (read: photos to edit), and I’m in the process of doing that.  But I really wanted to write about what I’ve been thinking about lately, and that is, how VERY lucky we are to be stationed at Luke right now.

There have been times in our past where neither one of us has liked the military lifestyle much.  It’s hard to pick up and move a lot and not be able to plant deep roots anywhere, although I have grown to love this more transient lifestyle.  I thought that during our time here at Luke, I’d kind of be on my own, as far as friends go.  Being stationed overseas, you have this built in support system and an immediate group of friends since everyone is “stuck” overseas together.  I thought when we moved here, everyone would kind of being doing their own thing.  More people have jobs, we live in different cities around base, everything here isn’t completely tied to the base as people have their own lives and don’t really need the base for anything.

I have been very pleasantly surprised though, about how close I feel to some of my friends here.  We were stationed in OK a few years ago with some good friends.  We lived a few doors down from them there, and now we live in the same neighborhood as them here, and we go to the same church.  So we see them at least once a week, if not more, and they are truly great people and we love spending time with them.  Another couple that we were friends with in OK just moved here also, and they have introduced us to a bunch of their friends from SC that are now here also.  I’ve met 4-5 girls in the squadron that I REALLY like, and one in particular, I feel like I have a special connection with.  Not to get all “kindred spirits-ish” on you, but she was one of those people where the first time I met her, I just instantly liked her and felt very comfortable around her, and my admiration of her has only grown stronger as we spend more time together.  And we have a few similar interests, so it’s fun to be able to talk about that stuff with her too.

I’m on a crud team now, and there are quite a few people on the team that I really enjoy being around and we have a lot of fun getting together for practices.  A couple of the people I mentioned above and I have decided to get together a book club every other month so we’re going to start off by reading “The Book Thief”.  I’m having one of those girls over for dinner two nights this week since her husband is TDY and then a group of us are going out on Friday night for dinner and a movie.  I’m hosting a squadron coffee here in a week and a half and so far there are about 15 people signed up to do that.  Another friend and I are going to join a bible study group at our church and a few friends and I are going to an OSC event later this month too.  And that’s just in the next few weeks!  At the last minute, I asked a few friends if they wanted to come over to celebrate New Years Eve with us and we had 4 other couples over for dinner and to play games.  I love to entertain and it was a lot of fun to get to know people in a more “intimate” setting.

There are a few couples in the squadron that Mark and I really like and we’re hoping to get to spend some more time with them.  We went to dinner with one of them Saturday night and we had a really great time.  I think both Mark and I feel like we’re really lucky to be surrounded by such great people and to have so many nice friends.

The military definitely has it’s disadvantages at times, but I am so, so thankful for the people we’ve met during Mark’s time in the military.  We’re at the point in his career where you almost always know at least one person when you move to a new place, and there are always friends of friends nearby.  I’m really looking forward to getting to know some of these people better!

Let us be grateful to people who make us happy, they are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom. – Marcel Proust

Vertuccio Farms

The 2nd week in October we took a trip to Vertuccio farms, which is about an hour from our house.  We met a friend of mine that I’ve known since elementary school and her family there.  She has a kiddo that’s just a little older than Abbie and one that’s just a little older than Ben, so it worked out great!

They had lots of fun little things for the kids to do.  It was a pretty hot day though - in the 90’s still (in early OCTOBER…  living in Phoenix is great…).  Once Abbie and Ellie got together, it was friendship at first sight.  Ellie sent Abbie a cute drawing before they arrived and Abbie asked NON-STOP about when Ellie was going to visit and where she was from.  It was cute.

Ben wasn’t a big fan of the big bouncy pillow until Mark joined him on it.  And then he loved it!  I think Mark did too.

Next was the big slides.  Abbie was afraid to go down them, but after some coaxing, she did.  Mark took Ben down once and he LOVED it and then went down both of them by himself more than once.  He’s a brave little boy!

Abbie and Ellie had lots of fun and it was so fun to watch them interact.  They’re pretty much two peas in a pod.  Four and five year old girls are so cute and these two are very much alike!

We took a short ride around the property in these things.  It was fun too and I think the kids enjoyed it.

Ben really wanted to take a ride on these things so Mark took him around the loop a few times.

We picked out some pumpkins before we headed home to beat the traffic and make dinner.

Liz and her family brought us gifts (so sweet!!) and their gift to Abbie was her own make-up kit, so I’m sure you can imagine the fun that Ellie and Abbie had playing with it.  And if you can’t imagine it, here are some pictures to help!

Ben and Zoe even played with his gift a little bit too!

I wish that Liz and her family lived closer.  And I wish the visit could have been longer, but we had fun with them during their short stay with us.  Hopefully we can go visit them in TN some and get the kiddos together again!

Jenn’s baby quilt

One of my best friends, Jennifer, is due with her 2nd baby in the middle of September.  Another friend of ours and I hosted a baby shower for Jennifer and I started this quilt WAY late.  I really need to make a bunch of quilt tops for boys and girls and then just finish them when I need them done, instead of waiting until a week before the shower and then rushing to get the quilt done.  Either way, I think it turned out pretty well, despite a few of the mistakes I made.

 

I always love when quilts have the contrast strips in the back and this is the first time I did this with one of my quilts.  I like the way it turned out.

For the quilting I did a really big stipple pattern on the main part of the top and then a loop pattern on the border.  I used pink thread so you could see it a little better, although my free motion quilting still leaves MUCH to be desired.

I love doing baby quilts.  They come together relatively quickly and I don’t have to fight them as much to get them through my little sewing machine when I quilt them myself.  I think if I did a full sized bed quilt I would probably send it off to be quilted since my machine is really little and I’m just not good at maneuvering that much material around.

I think Jenn liked it and I hope that she and baby girl will get lots of use out of it.  Her cousin (pictured in the blue dress) surprised me by crying when Jenn opened the gift.  I guess their grandma had always made quilts for new babies in the family and Jenn’s baby girl was the first one that wasn’t going to get a handmade quilt, so she was really happy that she did get one after all.

I have a BUNCH of friends that are pregnant right now, so I’d better get working on my quilts!  I love putting them together and seeing the finished products!