A Military Family No Longer...

Last week, my honey retired from the United States Navy after 21 years of faithful service. He did 16 years of sea duty, 11 of them overseas, that included countless ship deployments, 2 tours to Iraq, and tons of little trips to places that I don't even know about. I can't imagine that there are too many places that he hasn't been to. He has most definitely been gone more than he's been home.

It was a tough decision for him, it's all he's known since he enlisted at 17. He debated and prayed about the pros and cons for over a year but finally he came to his decision.

In his words, "After making two deployments to Iraq, missing the birth of Kayleigh, and hearing my Mackenzie crying on the phone begging me not to reenlist again, I knew that my time was up."

Kayleigh talking to daddy for the first time

Mackenzie begging daddy not to go back on the day he left for his second Iraq tour

I imagine that you can only endure so many scenes like those above before you have to say enough, even for job security.
So on Friday, June 11th. Kevin said good bye to his military life. It was bitter-sweet. Here's some of the highlights.

Arrival of the official party



The CO, command masterchief and my honey. Notice the lack of ribbons on his uniform. He said that since everyone else would be wearing all of theirs, he was going to do the opposite. That is so Kevin. (In case you were wondering where Kayleigh gets her spunk from. LOL)




A toast with CMC after the CMC's speech. Yep, the man brought Bud Lite to the ceremony and they drank it. LOL



Awards from the CO



Receiving his shadow box from the Chief's mess


Next came the flag ceremony. That was AWESOME. If you haven't seen one you should. It is a very moving and humbling experience. Wow!

Now's where it got really good. He took that flag, walked to his mother and said...

"I've always wanted you to have one of these but only if it came from me."
Can you say hysterical sobbing? Oh yeah! His mom and step-dad totally lost it. (Okay we all did but they were the best.)


Of course Kevin had to give his speech after that. Time to compose yourself

Here's Kevin requesting permission to go "ashore" for the very last time


Look how happy Mackenzie is.

Here's a couple of shots of my adorable girls.

The best for last...I met my new BFF at the reception afterwards.

How many people can say that Rudy from Survivor came to their retirement party? I'm pretty sure it's because he was so excited to meet his new BFF, me, and not coincidence because the reception was being held at the chief's club. =o)
So basically our last two weeks of wrap-ups and tot school were a unit on civics and family. Next week we home to finish regular school and continue on with tot fun.

Tot School

Kayleigh is 27 months

Hello cyber friends! I hope that everyone had a blessed week. Ours has been crazy. Between dog sitting (ick) and family coming in for my hubby's upcoming retirement, it's been nuts. Only 2 more weeks of craziness to go. It's been so crazy I have barely had to to upload photos, let alone mess with them. (Which I love to do. LOL)

Despite the changes, we managed to fit in a few activities.

First of all, I brought my camera to Little Gym this week and got some shots. We're taking the summer off so I thought I'd better grab some.

Her favorite thing activity this week was playing with her Melissa & Doug Beginner Pattern Blocks. She played with them everyday. I made her do the butterfly first to fit in with out caterpillar and butterfly theme. LOL









We also worked on our colors by sorting red, yellow, and blue objects. She started off using her "mind games" and put the cards into the wrong bag. LOL Eventually she decided to play nice.

I used the printables over at Home Grown Hearts to make the color sorting game. I think I'm going to buy gift bags to use with this game. The lunch bags were too flimsy.

I turned the Very Hungry Caterpillar Shape book, from 1+1+1=1, into a shape matching game. That was lots of fun.

She was only willing to read two books this week. My First Jumbo Book of Shapes , of course LOL, and one her sister's old kindergarten readers, I'm Not Scared! Please note that the later is a halloween book. We read it so much that she was starting to "read along with me." That was actually very cute. She's almost got the whole thing memorized. Maybe my fears over teaching her to read won't come true. LOL

Be sure to check out the other tots over at 1+1+1=1.

Weekly Wrap-Up: Family and Dog Overload

It's time for the Weekly Wrap-Up, hosted by Kris. Or it was yesterday. LOL I'm late.

We've had a crazy week and it's going to remain that way for the next couple.

First, we were dog sitting for two weeks. We don't really enjoy pets, to put it mildly, so that was a challenge. This particular dog wasn't terribly bad, except when it was time to go for a walk. He's a runner and doesn't do well on a leash. And he wasn't the brightest. I had him for two weeks and couldn't teach him any tricks. And for someone who doesn't enjoy pets, I have a knack for teaching dogs tricks. (It's such a waste on someone who doesn't enjoy pets.) The last dog I owned could do the standards (sit, lay, shake, speak) plus dance, beg, and sing "My Country 'tis of Thee." Poor Charlie, couldn't master even shake. Bless his heart.

We all survived though. Although I've vacuumed, swept, swiffered, and mopped and so far all I've done with the dog hair is push/blow it around our wood floors. The only thing I hate more then wood floors are wood floors with a dog on them. Sigh...

Now we're enjoying family invasion time. It's rare that anyone actually visits us. They always expect us to do the traveling. (So much fun with a toddler who hates the car.) But a big event can sometimes get them to come.

Well to be fair, my dad and step-mom do come every year for the big Liberty Tax convention. So they're here now. Leaving tomorrow and coming back for a night next week for the Big Event.


In this case my husband is retiring after 21 years in the Navy (Woot!), so it was easy to guilt his mom into coming. If only she hadn't brought that ill-mannered puppy. LOL Yes that's right we got rid of one only to have replaced with a naughty one. It jumps, nips, chews. I'm afraid it's going to revert my toddler back in to fearing dogs. Thankfully, it's staying at Kevin's brother's for the weekend but it'll be back on Monday. On the bright side, by the time it leaves, it will be trained to stay off furniture. If I accomplish nothing else next week, I will accomplish that. =o)

Then next Thursday my mom arrives. She doesn't know my dad's going to be at the ceremony yet. She's still bitter about the divorce from 24 years ago. Pray for me!

I guess I should talk about homeschooling some. LOL

Despite the arrival of my father mid-week, school went on as scheduled. He's been at the tax convention.

Science done! Math done, except for final tests. History will be done next week. (If we actually get a chance to do school with my in-laws here.) Aside from that we have 2 read alouds and one reader to finish. Then we're totally finished hooray!!!!! Mackenzie's so excited that she's reading school books right now.

Good bye third grade!!!

Since I'm in a hurry no pictures this week. And I got a few nice ones of Charlie. For all that he's furry and smelly, he's cute. He's a Shiba Inu (spelling?) and is red like a fox with a curly tail. The tail is very cool from the side but not so much from the rear because his "third eye" is always staring you down. Ick!

Wow, this post was a lot of rambling about nothing. =o)

Tot Zone

Carisa over at 1+1+1=1 is hosting a linky asking people to share what their "Tot Zone" is like in their homes. I'm all over this one. I love seeing how other homeschools operate.

About my tot...

Kayleigh is 28 months old and she is, shall we say, very spirited and independent. That's the nice way of saying stubborn, defiant, and mischievious right? =o)

Tot School has not always gone smoothly for us. Up until the last few weeks she would categorically refuse to do any activities. And on the rare occasion that she felt like doing them she would use her baby mindgames do them incorrectly. On purpose. I still can't decide if that's what drives the most crazy about her or what I love most about her. It's a fine line. LOL

Our Set-up

We are very blessed to have a room purely dedicated to school. Our "Tot Zone" is part of our school room. And it has recently been overhauled thanks to our tax return and our friends at IKEA.


Here is some views of our room. I've only labeled the stuff that pertains to Kayleigh.


From the door....

Looking toward the door

Looking to the back of the room

I usually put out about 4 trays at a time. Mainly because that's how many trays fit best on the shelving that I have available for them. (We use Sonlight in our homeschool and it is a literature based curriculum so I need lots of shelves for books. LOL) The trays are generally a mix of of themed activities and skills, like #'s, colors, shapes, ABC's. I switch them out throughout the week. We also read tons and I try to get in a craft or two. But I'm not going to lie. I'm not very crafty.

I store learning toys in the Trofast bins in the homeschool room. Themed activities are kept in manilla envelopes, according to them of course, and stored in "Tot Pack" bin. I also have 4 "skill bins" for colors, shapes, #'s, and letters. Those house toys and games that I made specifically to aid in learning those skills. The bins are 15 qt. boxes with lids that I got at Wal-Mart. There is some craft stuff in the Trofast bins but most is on a shelf in the closet.

I allow her to play with certain tot stuff anytime, especially if I'm working with her sister. She has free reign over things like Mega Blocks, Bristle Blocks, Magneatos, Cardboard Blocks, instruments, basic puzzles, etc. The rest I keep for school time.

My Likes/Dislikes...

There's not much that I don't love about the room. I love the storage which consists of many Billy Bookcases and the Trofast Storage system. Worth every penny we spent. In fact, I'd like one more of the large Trofast units. =o) And the quality is soooo much better then the shelves we've gotten at Target or Walmart over the years.

I'd like to change the paint color. The red was here when we bought the house and it was fine until we added the brightly colored Trofast bins. It clashes now. I'd like a very pale blue I think. And I NEED a small table for Kayleigh to work at. She always wants to be up at the desk in sissy's spot and I think her own workspace will solve the problem.