Paradise Found

Last Saturday was Alpha Company's redeployment party down in Waikiki. It was held at the Hale Koa hotel, where C and I got a room for the night so we didn't have to worry about driving back home.

I didn't take any pictures of the actual party... too busy partying myself I guess. LOL But here's a few from the day.

C at the Barefoot Bar getting another Guinness:

The beach that day... this is Waikiki

The view from our hotel room

The Boy medic'ing dad... determining if he has a fever or not

This was Sunday... the kids had spent the night at friends houses while we were at the beach party, and then we spent Sunday walking around malls and Sams Club. I felt like they did!

Hi all,

Today (12/15/06) was the day that C had a bronze star pinned on him! It was during the batallion award ceremony that was held in their new company building on base. I had originally thought that I would be up there pinning the star on him myself, but it didn't work out that way.

He was the only soldier of his rank to earn this award... all of the others were higher ups; mostly officers. I was so proud!! But here is the important part... the pictures!

The actual pinning on of the star:

Alpha Company after their own award ceremony... at their Engineer's castle on base:

Tomorrow is Alpha Co's post-deployment beach party down in Waikiki. They're supplying the food and adult beverages and C and I are staying the night in a hotel down there. It promises to be a great time. =o) I'm sure more pictures will follow... ones much less formal and stern. hehehe

Our year-long deployment is OVER! C's back from Iraq, safe and sound. The unit arrived home late last Saturday night, early Sunday morning. The ceremony began at 1:00am and it was nice... short and sweet. A good friend of mine came with the kids and I and took pictures for us... so I have several to share.

These are the banners I hung outside of our house here. I later found out that other people took pictures of them, too! LOL

Here's the dress I chose to wear for the ceremony. E took this of me before we left the house that night. It was really strange to be getting all dressed up and hair done and everything at 1am. LOL! But it was WORTH IT and I'm so glad I did... not very many other wives did.

I know this is dark... all of the shots of the unit in formation were too far away for the flash to work. But here's just one so you can get an idea, maybe, of what it was like. We were in a gymnasium, spread across two basketball courts.

The first big hug

E getting her first hug

And N getting his

Here you can sort of see the posters that we made

Today's Thursday and it's C's first day back to work. The unit will spend the next 5 days or so in-processing and "reintegrating". LOL

December 15th is a big batallion award ceremony and C will be given a Bronze Star!! He was the only non-officer soldier to receive one during the whole year. And the Lt. Col. said he "would be honored" if I would be up on the stage to pin it on C myself. So that will be an exciting day. I got a new dress for that occasion too. =o)

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I mentioned it a long time ago in one of these blog posts, but don't forget that I changed my email address!! It is no longer bikergirl_brazen........... if you don't have the new one and want it... leave a comment here! =o)

Here is the first installation of pictures from our summer. Just a scattering of shots... I have to comb thru the pictures and these are the first I came across. Elizabeth's best friend from SC, Mackie, came to visit for a month, and we have lots of beautiful pics from that... that will be a Summer Update post all to itself later on.

Both kids played baseball... here are two of E:

And two of N:

On Mackie's last day here, we went up the North Shore to Turtle Bay Resort and went horseback riding. It was a gorgeous trip, and even The Boy did really well. It was WEIRD seeing him riding a horse without any help!

That's E w/ her hair dyed brown

The 4 of us... Mackie, Me, N and E

Also while Mackie was here, Staind came in concert at Bayfest, and it actually fell right on her birthday! So I took both the girls to the show. The pictures are not great, but we were right by the mosh pit and I could hardly get my camera up, let alone held still... so I took about 50 pics, and they mostly look like these:

Two random shots of N one morning before school:

Back in April or May I posted up some progress shots of my fitness transformation... so here's a few more from August:

That's it for now... I need to get changed and ready to go to the gym! Don't forget you can leave a comment here if we haven't talked in a while... I don't use the bikergirl_brazen Yahoo email address anymore... had to change that several months ago. So if you've been writing to that, I'm not getting it!

Hi all! I know I haven't written in months... hopefully you guys are still out there. =o) It's been a long time... since April I guess. Can't really catch up on all of that time... but I can start with recent news.

C was just home on his 2 week R&R from Iraq. We're home now from taking him to the airport for the return trip. It was a fantastic 2 weeks... and the pictures I'm sharing tonight are from that time. Maybe tomorrow I'll post some that are a bit older... from the summer months.

So C's been gone for over 9 months now, and unless there's a last minute extension, the unit will be home before Christmas. It's strange to see how much the kids have changed in 9 months' time... stranger even for C, I'm sure.

To start out the pictures......

I was able to get an oceanfront beach cabin for 3 days/2 nights of child-free time! This was our cabin:

And looking up the beach at more cabins:

C standing on the seawall off of our porch:

We made sure to be outdoors for the sunsets both nights, so here are some pics of them:

This guy was really cool! He paddled all over the bay (Pokai Bay)... and spent hours going thru the surf along with the surfers!

E received an early Christmas present; it was a huge surprise to her, but something she's been asking for:

His name is Bruiser and was almost or right at 2 pounds in these pictures when we got him. LOL!! He's 2.5 pounds now, and 9 weeks old. He's 3/4 Chihuahua, 1/4 fox terrier. His mom was 7 pounds, and dad was 4 pounds.

While C was gone for the first 9 months, I worked on designing my next tattoo... and once I was done, C really liked it and decided to get it done too! So I got mine done first, and two days later he went and got his.

The pictures aren't that great yet, because the flash made too much glare on mine, especially. The ointment made it all shiny. When it's all healed up, I'll get new pics taken.

These 3 were taken earlier today, before we left for the airport: