today was D day

today was the day.  natty turned 16 months today.  i told myself i would nurse her for 12 months.  i went 4 more months more than that, and figured that it was finally time when she chomped down on my nipple every four sucks.  seriously.  yesterday when i started bleeding i told her to enjoy her last supper.

there was much crying today.  oh how she LOVED my boob.  but it finally sank in and she has finally fallen asleep having accepted this new development.

now what to do.  i am totally engorged and hurting.  i know about the cabbage leaf thing, but alas there is no cabbage in the house and it's nearing midnight.  i shall have to get some tomorrow.  for tonight, i guess i'll go let out the pressure a bit and then turn in for the night.

honestly, i am giddy with freedom.  BUT, when she finally closed her eyes and my ears weren't ringing from her shrill cries anymore, i kind of wondered if i'd done the right thing.  i mean, it was TIME.  but i really enjoyed being that close to her and being a source of comfort for her than no one else could be.  if you haven't had a chance to experience it, it's kind of hard to explain.

anyway, what's done is done.  hopefully she'll sleep through the night from pure exhaustion and tomorrow i won't be hurting too much.

excuses, excuses

please excuse my silence online.  i have discovered HOUSE.  and i find him oddly hot. so....that's what i've been doing.  that, and  lots of sudoku.  

i suspect i will look back on this time as the Hump.  captain j has been gone long enough for me to have really settled into my life here.  there seem to be just as many days like the one i'm living now ahead of me as behind me.  i'm not complaining.  there's lots to do and i'm definitely glad i chose to live out this year apart here.  but things are definitely set in a routine and the end seems far off.

even our skype or phone conversations are the same almost everyday.  he wants to know about what i did, i want to know how his days went, and usually the same thing happened today that happened yesterday.  

that's not bad for me.  it's just how it is.  but i think the sameness is getting hard for captain j.  they don't have weekends or days off there, so he does the same thing EVERY SINGLE DAY.  get up, work out, eat, see patients and do paperwork, lunch, see patients and do paperwork, dinner, call/skype family, sleep.

he's due for some r&r septemberish, but i think it's still far enough away that it feels like it will never get here.  and i have this real fear that saying goodbye will be doubly difficult when we say goodbye after such a short trip.  

maybe a disney trip is in order this weekend to shake off whatever this is.

not so tuff

i slept barely 3 hours last night.  this past saturday, i caught a blurb on the news about a rocket or mortar hitting some place in the green zone.  it didn't really bother me.  they didn't exactly say anyone was hurt.  and it was the weekend, meaning i had two little munchkins to entertain all day.

then he didn't call me that day.  which isn't too unusual, except-- well, it is because unless he's away he tries to touch base with me at least once a day, if not more.  on sunday, i logged on at some point after church (um, oh yeah, remember how i said i'm not going to go to church this year?  turns out the pull is amazingly hard to resist and i've found a really great place.  anyway...) and saw that he did try skyping me.  once.  i was relieved, but still this isn't standard behavior.  he usually tries several times in case i couldn't get to the computer fast enough, and then tries my cell in case i'm out.  but he'd only tried once.

i started to get a teensy bit worried.

then monday (yesterday), my phone rings during my one "me time" allotment during the week, which i was spending watching Star Trek (so good).  i hurry out of the theater and i answer.  i recognize the weird number.  it's him.  but when i answer there's only silence on the other end.  then again, he only calls that one time.  he doesn't try again, as i wait patiently with phone in hand in the theater hallway.  i eventually go back into the movie, hoping he'll try again.  there isn't a way for me to call him back. i thought we had a deal.  if i don't pick up the first time, try again.  at least that was the rule so far.

last night, i couldn't stop the anxious thoughts.  what if there's a reason why the calling pattern changed all of a sudden?  and if something happened, i realized suddenly, i wasn't too clear how i would find out.  did someone have my number somewhere?  would someone come to my house?

i tried to fall asleep by consoling myself that no news is actually good news.  i got up to shoot him an email asking him to email me back or call when he can somewhere past midnight.  i finally fell asleep for a few hours around 3.

i woke up this morning sluggish, but made my way to my computer first thing to check my email.  he'd written back.  he says he's fine, that he'll call later.  good. okay then.  

but thinking back on last night, i had to admit that maybe i'm not as strong as i thought i was.  obviously i read too much into those missed calls.

this year can't be over soon enough.

where i've been

i don't know where May or even the first week of June went.  seriously.  it's been kind of crazy around here.  there's been major family drama, each kid has been really sick--twice, we have a family wedding in the works, a family 60th birthday TRIP for my imo (maternal aunt), three different sets of out of town visitors....and other stuff i can't remember.

but i have been around, just not here.  i've been posting here.  

you'll find that it's picture heavy with lots of happy language.  captain j is always asking for pictures, so i thought it might be good to start a new place just for that.  i like to keep things sunny because although captain j does read this site, and therefor would know if things were getting difficult, i think he should feel happy and smile when he sees pictures of his babies.

i do not have plans on abandoning this site.  i did think that i would have more to write, considering that this is a special year and all.  but do you know it's already been SIX MONTHS? and surprisingly, there hasn't been a lot of deep thought about the whole thing on my part.  i'm really just chugging along day to day--once in awhile glancing up at a calendar to take note of how much time has passed.  and i'm happy to report it's passing by faster.  

a little too close

most of you have probably already read about or heard about the horrible shooting that happened at an army base in iraq that involved a mental health clinic.  kind of like the one captain j works at.  for security purposes, i don't know the actual name of the camp he is at.  i don't know if captain j doesn't want me to know, or if it's an actual military rule, but i just accept that i'm not supposed to know.  

so when i brought cnn up on tuesday and saw what happened, my heart stopped.  i shoved the fear aside and immediately logged onto skype to see if he was there.  and he was.  we talked.  i knew more than him at the time.  he was just hearing about it.  he was in another camp.  we talked about how tragic it was -- how senseless.  we talked about the kids, and what i had planned for the day while he slept over there.  and then we said goodbye, i love you and i hung up.

confident that he was ok, i went about my day.  

the next day, i received a couple of frantic phone calls from relatives who had just heard of what happened.  my phone was low on battery, so i spent the better part of the day without it because i left it charging as i went about my errands.  when i heard the fear and anxiety in their voices, i instantly felt horrible.  i should have thought beyond myself.  i should have known that people would worry.

you learn something new all the time.  and the lesson this time was this:  when i know he's safe after hearing something scary in the news, let the people who would want to know, know.

here's what i DON'T want to learn: what it's like to be the wife of one of the unfortunate ones who did die.  i saw that 3 of the coffins had come home yesterday on the news.  it gave me goosebumps to know how close to having that experience be mine was.  my thoughts are with those families as they live through something i hope i never have to.  

Lord, please give them comfort and peace.

list of care package contents thus far for deployed honey

i thought i might record the type of things i've been sending out in the flat rate military boxes provided by the US postal service. i've been averaging about one box a week. captain j has asked specifically for different things, but i've also included things that he might miss from home.

• cards, drawings my noah, messages on post its with little notes telling him we miss him (he read my blogs, and there's email so there's no need to write a whole lot of detail)
• packages of chips
• packages of trail mix
• protein and granola bars he likes
• bottles of his favorite soap and shampoo (although he's told me that he's moved to a place with a PX now so he can get these himself)
• little korean soy milk boxes (they look like kid juice boxes)
• little packets of keem 
• packages of nuts (trader joes has these individually packaged nuts that are portioned into perfect snack sizes)
• oreos
• chocolate bars and other packages of candy he likes
• an internet antenna (because although they have wireless internet, captain j doesn't seem to be able to get on without this.  i bought it off of amazon and sent it in the box along with an extra extension USB which i thought he could use to move the antenna all around the room.  of course, he has a mac and the antenna works with windows.  sigh.  i feel dumb.  but i swear i asked the best buy guy and he said that it would service both so i didn't even check.  i'm heading to the apple store sometime this week to try again.)
• instant korean noodles where he just has to add hot water.
• choco pies
• japanese rice crackers
• men's health and sports illustrated type magazines
• books (just a couple, just in case he might actually want to read one)
• rubber slippers (for the shower)
• a little album partially filled with some 4x6 pictures of us, with a promise to send more so he can fill up the album while he's there.
• binder clips of various sizes
• disinfecting wipes
• multiple gum packets
• deodorizing foot lotion (found a good one at bath and body)

that's been it, so far.  in the next package he's asked for more soy milk boxes, the correct antenna and more pictures to put in the album. whenever i'm packing one up it makes me feel good because i'm actually doing something concrete for him instead of just thinking about him or praying for him.

we've also run into our first tricky challenge during captain j's absence.  noah's school is hosting an event for dads and their children.  noah won't have his dad here to attend.  sad.  my dad is planning to attend instead, but i'm interested to see how much not having his actual dad here will affect him.  maybe he won't even notice.  maybe he will.

Day 110

oh how they grow

natalie is now walking more than crawling.  the change really came when she could finally get into the standing position without the aid of a person or furniture.  i officially have a toddler now who toddles everywhere. the quiet smiley baby is turning into a distant memory because the current natalie is a gregarious constant moving bundle of fun.  

she's especially good at getting things open (packages, ziplocs, purses, chap sticks, boxes...aiya) which helps her during her favorite activity of generally moving around the house poking here and there and exploring/finding things.  she's found candy, unwrapped it and eaten it this way.  who knows where that candy was, but i can tell you that when i finally caught up with her sucking away happily on a piece of hard candy she had utter joy written all over her face.  she was in heaven with the discovery of such a treat.  and to think that noah didn't get any until he was past the age of 2.  

and noah is now speaking korean 50% of the time in spontaneous fashion.  he's into the Konglish stage where he'll start a sentence in one language and finish off with the other.  it's actually quite cute with phrases like "mommy, the baby ohla ga (went up)." and "i don't want to dah muh guh (eat it all)."  he's so much better too, at playing with other kids than even a few months ago.  a year ago, i had to constantly hover because who knew when he'd just decide to push someone over with his massive weight to get what he wanted.  but now, he's pretty good at negotiating and can be trusted to come to me if there's a problem.  that change alone makes my life SO much easier.

and my special joy from them in recent days is the fact that they are now PLAYING together.  it's so seriously touching that it makes my heart stop when i see their heads bent together over something, or laughing together over something.  oh my goodness, it's just the best.  they don't fight too often yet.  it's mostly noah not wanting natalie to have something, or natalie wanting to have something his brother has.  but it usually ends with whatever it is in noah's hands, and natalie kind of forlornly looking on.  are the fights still yet to come?  is this the calm before the storm?  we shall see.

Day 98