Some Divine Intervention

Well, it finally happened, the third time really is the charm!  We made it through a whole mass!!  There were a few hairy moments, but I had 2 saving graces...one was the family sitting directly behind us who had a little girl who was rather high spirited and drowned out any outburst from our pew.  Also, Rory's swim lesson instructor sat in front of us and asked me "which baby would you like me to hold?"  Yeah!!!  Now, we have something to build on for next week....fingers crossed!

Dear God, are you there? Sorry about this morning!

Well, we attempted Church this morning.  As you can tell from the title of this post, it wasn't the best experience.  I will start by saying that I had very realistic expectations of how this was going to go, and I was prepared.  The boys have their own church bags now, and I had them stocked with things to keep them happy,  including books, a sippy cup, a snack and the binky.  Rory doesn't get to bring her church bag anymore since she will be going to Kindergarten at a Catholic school and they have mass once a week, so we have been working on getting her ready to sit thru mass like a big kid. 

We made it through the readings and the homily, and then the wheels came off!  Jack was channeling his inner Uncle Biz (my brother Christopher) and was attempting to climb under the pew, and then when that didn't work, he tried going over the top.  Yeah, that was enough for me, so we grabbed the bags and out we went.  Better luck next week!

We did end the morning on a very high note, as we got to Skype with Bryan.  I put the monitor on the floor so they could all see Daddy, and they could see him.  Jack has been the one who has missed Daddy alot, so being able to see him made him so happy!  At one point he walked behind the monitor to see where the rest of Daddy was, we all got a good laugh out of that one! 

We had nothing but smiles and laughs in this house, and I know it did Bryan a lot of good too!  He saw Brendan walking, had a nice chat with Rory about how excited she is for school, and Jack just kept getting up close to the monitor and saying, "Da Da".

Here's to a nice rest of the day and we'll top it off with a Brand new Dora movie on TV tonight.  Ah, the joys of being a mom, I wouldn't change it for the world!

Start the clock on the next 365

Well, Deployment Day arrived and no one in this house was happy about it.  I admit that in the 2 weeks leading up to August 10 I would look at Bryan and start crying...I'm such a wuss!  It kills me to think of him gone for a year, we've been through it before and let me tell you it never gets easier.  I am convinced that it just gets harder and harder to say goodbye. 

The morning he left our neighbor Molly and her son Ben came over to hang out with the kids so I could take Bryan to the airport.  We had planned to be in the garage by the time they came over, so all the goodbyes would be done, no more tears.  Well, that didn't work, go figure!  Molly and Ben came over, and I looked at Molly and we both started crying...goodbyes suck.  For me the worst part of the goodbyes is watching Bryan say goodbye to the kids.  I had to wait in the garage because that just breaks my heart to hear him say "Bye buddy, I'm really going to miss you" and to have the boys just look at him with their big blue eyes...

Now the clock starts to get this year over....

Taking things down and packing things up

A lot of things have been happening in the Kilbride household this summer...We took our first family vacation, Brendan is making great strides in becoming a walker, the boys moved into Big Boy beds, Rory went to Kindergarten camp to get ready for her first day of Big Kid school and Bryan started the task of packing up his gear for yet another tour to the sandbox.

Taking the boys cribs down was a bittersweet moment.  It was so exciting to have them graduate of the baby cribs and move into big boy beds, but as we looked at the dismantled crib it was an incredible reminder of how quickly time passes.  I remember Bryan putting the crib together in Rory's room in Colorado, I remember putting her in it for the first time.  I remember taking it apart for the move to Texas, and then having a fit when all of the screws were not with it when it got to Texas!!!  I remember taking it apart and putting it in the attic of our Texas house when Rory moved into her big girl bed, and I remember taking it out again and assembling it for Brendan's arrival.  I remember putting Brendan in it for the first time, and how special that was because we didn't think he would ever make it into that crib.  I remember when we added a crib to the room, officially making it "The boys room". I remember moving them from Texas to Kansas, and then again in Kansas.  I remember walking into Brendan's room to get him from a nap and seeing him standing there in his crib for the first time.  I remember every morning walking in to get them and seeing the smiles on both of their faces, so happy to see each other again!

Now, there they were....

...and all I can think about it how incredibly fast 5 years has gone by.

Now, looking at this...

...all I can think about is, how fast is this deployment going to go by?

No, this is not our first deployment, yes his last deployment wasn't that long, but it was by far more stressful than any other deployment.  This one just needs to get started.  We are both dreading it, far more than any other one.  The last one we both knew that he needed to go, Brendan was home and doing well, Bryan needed to go and be with his troops.  There had been casualties of his own men and of his friends, and Iraq is where is head was and now the rest of him had to be there. 

This time is just different, we have 3 kids now (just in case you didn't know that!) and for the first time Bryan was home for the first 18 months of one of kids lives, and now he knows what he missed and he knows some of what he is going to miss, and still more of what is going to go on without him physically being here for it.  Yes, this happens all the time with military families, I am not whining or complaining about it, we just need to get day 1 of this thing under our belts so we can all get to our new "normal" for the next year.

All I ask is that you keep Bryan, and all military personnel and their families in your thoughts and prayers....