As of Monday morning, we are just “10 days and a wakeup” away from my husband coming home. I am so excited! I can’t wait to wrap my arms around him and keep around for a while. It’s been a long 5 months without him and I’m looking forward to telling him good morning and good night every day.
Now that his training is over, we will soon be on our way to our new duty station. 2 weeks from now we will be leaving Texas and saying hello to our new state.
Wherever that may be.
That’s right, we still don’t know where we are going. We’ve been told that it’s one place, but there are 2 other very strong possibilities that could happen that would change that to one of 2 other locations. So, we have 3 possible states we could be going to. Hopefully we’ll find out this week. At the very least, we’ll know the following week because Hubby is coming home!
We still don’t have the official “in writing” orders, so I can’t schedule the movers either, but we have to be our of our rental house by the end of the month. This, my friends, is the “Hurry up and wait!” that every military member and their families warned me about.
It’s odd that this isn’t bothering me. Not one bit. I’m normally a bit of a control freak, but over this last year I have really let a lot of that go. Not all of it was by choice, but I’m learning to let the chips fall where they may.
I’m eager to have my husband home and to find out where we are going, but I’m O.K. with wherever the Army sends us. I’m just looking forward to getting started. A good friend of mine that is an Army wife once told me that “it is what you make of it”. I guess that applies to life in general, doesn’t it? I’m taking that as my motto this year.
This next year is going to be full of ups and downs, of first experiences and new memories. I want to embrace it and make the best out of each and every day. Now before you think my head is stuck in the clouds, I AM realistic and I know that there will be trying times as well. I can’t stop those from happening, but I can choose not to dwell on the negative.
This is a huge life change for my husband and daughter as well. The ol’ saying, “If Momma ain’t happy, ain’t nobody happy” has a lot of truth to it. It’s my duty to my family to choose to have a happy heart. Otherwise, I bring down the whole team.
Thankfully, my daughter is taking this in stride and I can’t help but think that my attitude is helping with that since she responds directly to my emotions. It also helps that she’s always wanted to travel. She wants to visit every place she can find on a map.
With daily things, she normally has a hard time with change and often says “But this isn’t the way it’s supposed to be!” when we do something different. With this change, she can look forward to it as long as she has some information. Unfortunately, I can only prepare her so much.
When we moved into this house, I printed off a picture of the front of the house and gave it to her in a frame a couple weeks before we moved. She was able to look at it and get familiar with it. I can’t do that this time. I can’t even tell her what state we are going to, let alone what house. We’ll be choosing a house after we move. Instead, I focus on talking to her about what I do know. Her bedroom will have a window. We will have a bathroom. Her toys, her blankie, her nighttime music – are all going with us. There will be a playground (somewhere!), and new places to explore.
So far, it’s working. She’s actually excited about the move. We are also doing a lot of planning for the road trip itself and making sure her sensory needs are met while doing two days of driving, and living in a hotel for a week or so.
I’ll talk more about that in another post, and maybe by then, I can even let you know where I’ll be heading!