Plan of Action

Wow, I totally can't believe that we have been in Kansas for almost 2 months now. The time has surely flown by so far. Disclaimer: my tone might very well change after winter arrives and I'm stuck inside from all the snow. They said last winter was really LONG! If there's only one good thing I could say (which there are many) about this area is they sure do a great job at welcoming the military to town. I guess when you have such a huge turnover both in August and December (the school starts twice a year) you really benefit by reaching out to the families who are here. I've never experienced such a welcome like this before or an appreciation for what we, as the spouses, endure for our husbands career...which sends me off on a tangent.

I was reading the article about closing Joint Forces back in Norfolk and one persons comment about healthcare angered me slightly. She said why should military spouses get to keep their health insurance through the military when their spouse dies, she says she doesn't get to keep her spouses insurance (civilian) if he dies. Well, hmm, have you had to live without your spouse for 6 months to often a year, repeatedly. And not just lived without them, but sent them into a warzone? Have you moved all over God's green earth for your husbands career and sacrificed your own career to advance his? Sure there are many other things that could be said as to why we get to keep the insurance benefits, but really spouses tend to be very under rated sometimes. Sorry for that little rant.

So I digress, we had this wonderful thing here on Saturday called PAIR Day. It was an opportunity for new families to see all the programs/services that are offered on post as well as in the community. We got lots of info, free stuff and they even had bounce houses, face painting, etc for the kids. It was super hot, but wow, we've got tons of things we want to do now. Which leads me to the title of this entry, Plan of Action. I've written this post nearly 50 times in my head, but haven't taken the time to sit down and write it out until now and there's a reason. I have 1 short year here in Kansas to achieve many things and I believe we were sent here to accomplish many of them. So in no certain order, here is what I feel the Lord brought us here for and an idea of what I'd like to do in this year, well now 10 months that we have left.

~Spend more time playing and interacting with my kids and husband and LESS time on the computer.
I have allowed myself to become addicted to this world of instant access to email, facebook, friends blogs, etc. This has deterred from my time with my family and it's something I can't sacrifice any longer so...I am forcing myself to stay away from the computer and not be on it as much and therefore doing more with my family. I'll still be on it, maybe first thing in the morning and at naptime and maybe before bed to check in with everyone, but the time will be kept to a minimum.

~Calm down! As any parent of toddlers knows it's easy to get overwhelmed and frustrated. I know I'm predisposed to get anxious and stressed therefore leading to unnecessary yelling at my kids, something I've been very convicted of lately. So I'm taking time outs for me, deep breathing, counting to 10 and it's working. Not only those things, but having cut out a lot of my time filler just by moving here has brought my stress level down considerably and I'm finding myself to be a much nicer mommy in the process.

~Spend more time ENJOYING Caleigh. I so longed to have a girl and figured it was never in the cards for us since Jaret comes from such a long line of boys, but we were blessed, thank God quickly with the way my pregnancies go, with our little girl. Unfortunately we got off to such a rocky start with the colic and you all know she's our spirited child, so that has caused us to butt heads a lot. I have to start learning her personality better and spend more time with her. Which we've had lots of fun lately with her girly antics of tea parties, baby doll playing, kitchen playing, dress up, etc. I'm looking forward to our mornings together while Jonas is at school.

~2 of the first 3 had 'Spend' in them, which brings me to #4, SPEND less.
Most of you who know me know that I have a serious shopping addiction, but it's fueled by not being able to stay in the house for an entire day...it drives me batty. The easiest thing I turn to is going shopping. Thus God's humor in bringing us to Kansas. Not only is Target 30 minutes away, but so are most other places I enjoy shopping. Now, don't get me wrong, Leavenworth has got a lot of great little quaint shops that I am enjoying visiting, and Walmart is less than 5 minutes away...we had been averaging 2 trips a week just getting our house in order. However, life (rental properties, misc. expenses, etc) gets the best of us and we need to cut back and live more simply...so my mission is to find and create fun things to do at home so I can be content in WHERE I am (should have a point all of it's own) and for those times we need to get out of the house, find free/cheap things to do with the kiddos.

~Get into a cleaning routine...hahaha. I've tried this before and I'm trying it again, but here I sit during naptime, when I should be cleaning the bathrooms typing this post...hmm refer back to numero uno, less time on the computer. Seriously though, each day gets a simple chore, cleaning bathrooms, vaccuming, laundry, etc. I'm loving laundry with my new steam washer and dryer that comes complete with a delay start. I put a load in before bed, time it to start at about 6ish a.m. and by the time I get up and have coffee, my first load is ready for the dryer. I'm usually done all laundry in the house by lunchtime.

~A rather selfish one, get caught up on our scrapbooks. You see it's selfish because it requires ME time and it's my creative outlet/what I do for fun/my break. I haven't even gotten halfway through Caleigh's first year, Jonas' second (who incidentally turns 4 in 2 weeks), our third anniversary, etc. I mean, our wedding album isn't even done, but that's taken the back burner for now. The difficulty in doing this is the downsizing of our house here...we have to share a small room for our office since Jaret is in school and needs studying space, a guest room and my craft/sewing room. I don't have a big flat surface to scrap on or room to spread out my things. So, I took a few nights and preplanned pages, from the paper down to the embellishments. That way, when I have a chunk of time I can just grab a bag and get to work.

~Along the creative lines are to sew more things for the kids. Right now I'm sewing Jonas a Toy Story shirt. I so wished I would've paid more attention to my Granny while she was still with us. Following a pattern when you don't know what the heck they're talking about isn't easy. I saved a bunch of my favorite shirts from the kids first years to make a quilt for each of them and have patterns ranging from pants for Caleigh and dresses with a stack of fabrics to keep her clothed in them for 2 weeks straight, to an American flag quilt pattern that I bought at this super cool quilt shop here in Leavenworth. Here's to a long winter I guess...

~Lastly is all about being local. I want to indulge in all this delicious KC BBQ that is around us and visit all the local attractions and others within a reasonable driving distance that we can take advantage of being in the Midwest. Here's a few for you...
*Deanna Rose Children's Farmstead-Planning on crossing this one off when family comes for Jonas' birthday. In fact, we're spending the next week or so doing all things farm. We are having a good ole fashioned barn raising Rhinehart style today. We're making a barn out of cardboard boxes, an idea I got from a book I have on using boxes for imaginary play and all the boxes we have from our move. We have some farm animal crafts to make and some farm books to read.

*Crown Center-We've already been here for the Clifford exhibit, but there is a restaurant called Fritiz's that has trains that deliver your food to your table, the Hallmark visitors center, with great activities for the kids, a dinosaur exhibit, etc, etc. Did you know KC has the most fountains second to Rome?

*Explore some of the local towns like Weston, Atchison, Overland Park, etc.

*See the Great Midwest Balloon Fest in September when we have some of our visitors.

*Go to Abilene when my parents visit to learn about the history of the old west and see where President Eisenhower spent his boyhood years and visit his burial place. For those of you who don't know, my Grandfather worked for the President on his farm in Gettysburg and my Mom and her siblings grew up playing with his grandchildren. I'd love to see more of his life, already having some of his post-presidency years as a part of our family and knowing how much my Grandfather respected him.

*I'd love to take trips to the Lake of the Ozarks and Mount Rushmore, which I visited in sixth grade, but Jaret's never been and obviously neither have the kids.

So, that's my POA for the time being...it may change as other things come to mind. I plan on being involved in things here, like I was back home, but with more of an emphasis on my family and what I need to do for them.

Funny little thing to leave you with...we went to a neighborhood (meaning everyone lives in our subdivision) bible study associated with our chapel on post last week. I tell you, these funny ways God works, 2 of the other families just came from VA Beach too!!! Huh?!

We're looking forward to the month ahead full of visitors. Jaret's parents and aunt arrive in a week and a half to help us celebrate Jonas' 4th birthday, a week and a half after that a girlfriend from work, Allison and her daughter Layla come for a few days and then a week later, my parents. Whew, makes me tired just thinking about it, but a happy tired!

Until next time!