So Dramatic

I have a couple questions. I tend to have unpopular opinions. I'm starting to think that's only because I don't understand things thoroughly.
(versus the alternative, which is that I'm just a shitty-judgemental person)
So, I'm turning a new leaf. I'll start asking more questions, hoping to to inspire more conversation; versus vomiting up my unpopular opinions.

About two weeks ago the milspouse blogosphere was all "atwitter" when we read Jessica's post, "A Final Goodbye". I have to say I was first and foremost worried for her, and also saddened to hear of her plan and the douchebaggary her husband pulled. In the days that followed I've seen a lot about support for military spouses and whining within our ranks, "what about us!" Oh, and the unforgettable "It could've been me!"
Question one: Say what??
Question two: 
I know the initial question "what about us" is more about programs and emphasis being placed on what the families go through and programs directed at our mental health stability.
What's wrong with MilitaryOneSource? Personally, I've used their services before. Simple. Easy. Effective. Call the number (1-800-342-9647), tell them (it's humbling I know) that you're in need of a counselor/ therapist for ______reason. You'll be transferred to someone who'll ask you for additional information in regards to your specific problems and information (this individual was caring and supportive to me and my situation). Eventually, they'll provide you with options of a counselor in your area, even help you to schedule your first appointment.
Additionally, you can just call TriCare directly and ask for a list of all the approved therapists/counselors in your area... you get a bunch of number and options, call them, set up an appointment and press on with business. Easy breezy!
Question three: How does being a milspouse automatically mean you'd be in her situation with a husband that cheats and treated her poorly? I don't know Jessica. Outside of all the detail she provided in that "A Final Goodbye" post I don't know any details of her life. Aside from both being married to soldiers her and I don't have anything in common (that I know of). I'm not sure how her situation automatically makes all milspouses susceptible to suicide/ mental illness. I feel like, all of the "That could be me" happening is a way for people to take away from Jessica's very real pain and for some reason (that escapes me) pull the attention from Jessica .

Let me just say for all the people out there that are enraged: I am by no means judging Jessica. I genuinely sympathize and empathize with her. I am concerned and sad for her. I'm no stranger to suicide and mental illness. I also feel that she deserves all the support and encouragement that she can find! Furthermore, I love that so many bloggers rallied around her during this very difficult time in her life.

Donald Trump.
Question one: WTF?
Question two: Why do people think the president has any control over the price of gas? The oil industry consists of private businesses. I made the comment to a friend yesterday, I'm (legitimately) shocked that such a successful man can make such stupid comments. I suppose President Obama can release the oil reserves, which would raise the supply (we all know about supply and demand), inturn lowering the cost of oil domestically. However, that doesn't really seem like such a brilliant idea to me. I think we all know from middle school that oil is a nonrenewable recourse. Once we exhaust what our planet has to offer then.... we'll be... screwed-ola. Outside of releasing the reserves the president has no control of the price of anything... I mean, maybe I'm wrong. Can we ask Mr. Obama to lower the price of DSLR camera's. Shit, I really wish they were much cheaper... just sayin'.
Question three: Why won't he just go away or at least add some mildly educated point to the political debate?

Day 36

I just wanted to share something about myself with the group:

I'm a person who likes to be honest with myself and with others around me. I tell it how it is. However, as a reasonable minded person I know that telling it, how it is, is based on my opinion, and what I know to be true. This being said, I always try to give my opinion in a sympathetic manner. I don't force my toughs upon others. Nor do I judge them for viewing the world differently than I do.

This personality trait often causes a lot of problems with people. Often because I have unpopular viewpoints; and evidently I have high expectations of myself and others. Silly me.

Now you all know.

Friday Favorite

Here's a new thing I'm going to do- starting today! Basically I'm going to share my favorite blog post from the week with you ladies. I'm going to have a McLinky up so that you can share your favorite blog post from the on your blog with your readers, come back here and link up. It's basically a weekly Blog Hop, but instead of just introducing yourself (every Friday) you'll come back and share a post and blogger with everyone else! Honestly, it's motivation for me to blog better (maybe I'll be your favorite next week?) ;)!!

Another very important part is to share WHY your favorite post was your favorite!!

My favorite post from this past week was from Melissa over at for the love. Melissa is a hilariously- clever attorney who recently announced she's expecting her first baby! My favorite post from this week was entitled "This Aint No Etch-A-Sketch" and provided loads and loads of giggles and quotes from everyone's favorite Teen Mom, Juno.

You can come back any Link-up (on the right) with your favorite post from this week.
Side note: I've used both McLinky (Linkytools) and Inlink and none of the codes I've copied and pasted work. The linky template doesn't show up, only the html code. Any thoughts on why that is?? But it obviously does work in my sidebar... what's up with this? Help!

New Stuff Happening

There's new stuff happening all over the place!

American Idol with JLo and Steven Tyler... I wish I could watch (even though I've never actually been a huge fan of the show) to see how they roll. But it'll be a day late and dollar short here on AFN, and more than likely available for viewing after we'll be out of the hotel and without TV capabilities in our house/apartment. Oh well, as I said I've never really followed the show in the past, so I guess I'm not sacrificing that much at this point. Honestly I've always felt the first two weeks (or however long it lasts) of watching horrible acts fall flat on their faces was just mean spirited. It makes people laugh and it's good entertainment but it's laughing at another person. These people are put in front of (HUGE) celebrity judges after being scanned by countless producers and other auditions, after hours of waiting and being told, "sure you can go in front of JLo, you're good enough for that." And BAM!!!! They suck. They're horrible. I just disagree with the premise. It's wrong.

Beyond that BIG NEWS PEOPLE!!! The Cupcake Club is BACK! I hope you'll all join me this month in baking the classic Yellow Cup Cakes with a super simple Vanilla frosting.

Ingredients

Makes 12

• FOR THE CUPCAKES
• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour (spooned and leveled)
• 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup milk
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 2 large eggs
• Sprinkles, for decorating
• FOR THE FROSTING
• 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
• 3 cups confectioners' sugar
• 1/2 cup milk
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

• Directions

  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.line the cups of a standard (12-cup) muffin tin with paper or foil liners. In a small bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt; set aside. In a liquid-measuring cup, mix milk and vanilla; set aside.
  2. In a large bowl, with an electric mixer, beat butter and sugar until light and fluffy, 3 to 4 minutes. Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. With mixer on low speed, add half of dry ingredients, followed by milk-vanilla mixture, then remaining dry ingredients. Do not overmix.
  3. Divide batter evenly among prepared muffin cups (a 2-ounce or 1/4-cup ice-cream scoop is good for this).
  4. Place tin on a rimmed baking sheet; bake until a toothpick inserted in center of a cupcake comes out clean, 20 to 25 minutes. Cool cupcakes 5 minutes in tin, then remove and cool completely on a rack before frosting.
  5. Prepare frosting: in a medium bowl, with an electric mixer, beat unsalted butter, confectioners' sugar, milk, and vanilla extract until smooth. Mix in up to 1/2 cup more sugar or a few more teaspoons of milk as necessary to achieve a spreadable consistency. Makes enough for 12 cupcakes.
  6. Frost cupcakes; decorate with sprinkles before frosting dries to ensure that they stick. The frosted cupcakes are best eaten within 1 day.

Click here for more info on the recipe and visit Martha Stewart.com for more recipes and tips!


Ok ladies, in case you forgot how this works (I couldn't blame you) today is the 20th, and we want you to come back and LINK UP (to the right) to tell us about your baking adventures by the 30th! You have 10 days to get out there and show us what you got! 

Sharing

...is caring!

Lola, you know her- my homie from L+S's Cupcake club!? (yea, where's that been btw... I know it'll be back in January, eeek!) Has been going through quite the rough time the last few weeks. She's such an amazing Mil-spouse blogger and someone I consider a friend! Lola was diagnosed with Aplastic Anemia and needs a bone marrow transplant. She has a tough road ahead but she's strong and surrounded by great friends and family! Please offer her your support!

While you're at it please visit BeTheMatch.org and register to become a Bone Marrow Donor. You could be a match for Lola or someone else!

I posted here, about registration and some specifics pertaining to military and their dependents. While my life has been turned up-side-down with this PCS, this is still a cause I feel just as strongly about and will be registering upon our arrival to Baumholder. Which will be (surprisingly) much easier than if I had done it from Colorado (since they're set up at the medical facility to do the testing).

---

Logan
Last night in Colorado



Nathan

I'm missing these boys! Such handsome fella's in their own ways, aren't they?

Xanax

(source)

I'm not opposed to pills. Some people I know avoid them like the plague (haaaha), just generally don't like to be chemically dependent for whatever reason. Fair enough. And just for the record I don't suffer from Anxiety and don't have a permanent prescription for Xanax. With my upcoming journey across the Atlantic, which requires my happy ass to be on an airplane in excess of 9 HOURS (!!!) I decided I was in need of some chemical altering of my person, to survive the trip. I have a history of not flying well. I'm not good at it and I've never been on a flight lasting longer than 3 hours. Now, I am not one of those paranoid people who flip out because they think the plane is going to fall out of the sky, nor do I suffer from claustrophobia. Here's what usually happens: I can't sleep, I'm light-headed and nauseous (but have avoided tossing my cookies to this point). That's a typical flight, and I tend have an extreme case of jet lag- which I alway attributed to my poor flying skills. My bud, Brandi, recently told me I probably just need some oxygen... novel idea... just simply never occurred to me. But I'll experiment with that suggestion on the 30th when we fly to Portland.

Previously I mentioned how I don't FREAK OUT on the plane... but I have to admit the idea of being trapped on the plane for 9+ hours has kept me up at night and caused some anxiety. So I went to the doc and explained my situation he gave me 5 Xanax. Thank you! My sis (being brilliant) suggested that I try it before getting on the plane Never know how it'll effect a person right? So I did, last night. Honestly I wanted something to completely knock me on my ass (like, not know my own name style). Xanax didn't do that. When I fell asleep I slept soundly but the pill itself didn't knock me out. Bummer. I did only take one (figured I'd start slow right?)  so I think for the flight I'll take 1.5 (prescription says 1 or 2 every 6 hours). 

In all fairness Xanax is an anti-anxiety medication.. it did relax the hell out of me. So that's good! I'm thinking 1.5 Xanax and a Dramomine should do the trick. 

Why am I tell you this? Because well, I woke up cloudy, drowsy and with one hell of a headache. Has this happened to you before? Is it normal? Should I worry it's a sign of things to come...? My sole purpose of experimenting with it last night was in case I was allergic or anything I didn't want to be going into Anaphylactic shock over the vast ocean somewhere! 

BREAKING NEWS!

BIG HUGE News coming your way people!

So remember wayyy back in the 8th when I first told you all about the possibility of going to Germany?

And I teased on Wednesday about off-post housing in Germany. Well its official we're headed here:

 Baumholder, Germany!

Wait... that's not ALL the news. Some of my long-time followers know that my sister, Katie also married a soldier (her high school sweetheart actually) and they are currently stationed at Fort Carson. Well yesterday she calls me on my cell, while I'm at work. I text her back because I can't be on my cell phone at work and ask her what's up? She replies "CALL ASAP." Ummm ok... My first thought was what about the kids? eeek!

So I call IMEDIATELY.

She says, "So we're going to Germany too."

I said, "SHUT UP. No you're not."

You see my sis and her family have/had no desire to go to Europe. She was excited for us to have the opportunity to travel and see more of the world but please believe she laid the guilt trip on THICK when I told her we had orders (but at the time didn't know to which post in Germany).

She says, "No, seriously we do have orders. Levi called branch to see what his options were and they told him he has to report February 2011.

She also was able to tell me which post they were going to.

I was puzzled, as Kevin and I actually tried and pursued our orders and were told they didn't know specifically, to which post we were headed.

Well, as I'm on the phone with my sister and Levi is on the phone with Kevin, telling him the exciting news!

Kevin found out at that same time that we were headed to Baumholder!

Oh did I forget to mention where my sister and her family are going?

Yes, you probably guessed it: BAUMHOLDER!

Kevin and I were looking forward to being just "Samantha and Kevin" for a while but I know that my sister and my nephews and even Levi being there will make the transition a 1000 times easer.

It was really just crazy how the whole thing worked out! But I couldn't be more excited.

Wait... I have approximately a million things to accomplish before 10 December:

SELL HOUSE

SELL a car (can't decide which one)

SHIP a Car

PACK and SHIP our household possesions

Get Brody Squared away to take him with us

Germany drivers license

Living on or off-post???

(kevin insists that we have to live off-post... because on-post they have apartments. Evidently he's beneath apartment living at this stage of his life. I tried to remind him that it's Europe and it's not like we'll find a single-family home with a huge yard. But what do I know?!)

That's just to name a few.

I have to get everything organized and ready to roll in a mere 5 months. I'll be contacting a real estate agent this weekend! Hopefully we can get the ball rolling on that FIRST!

So that's the BIGGEST news. But I also VERY excited to announce I won a bloggy make-over from Mrs. Muffins, via Shepdogg: One P, Double G!

It will probably be a week or two in the making.. since I'm fickle and indecisive.

Stay tuned for all the exciting changes to come...!

HAPPY FRIDAY Readers!

Cookies n' such!

My buddy Jen hosts a weekly recipe blog hop. This week she is featuring Cookies!!

Who doesn't like cookies?

If you do (don't like cookies) than you can just stop being my friend.... NOW!

Here's one of my fav recipes:

Cheesecake Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars

Ingredients:

1/2 c Sugar

8 oz Cream Cheese

1 egg

1 Package rolled Chocolate Chip Cookie dough.

Directions:

Spray Pam in the bottom of a 9x13" baking pan. Press about half of the cookie dough into the bottom of the pan. In a small bowl mix together the other ingredients and pour over the first layer of cookie dough. Then add the remaining cough on top of the cream cheese mixture. Bake for 18 mins at 350 degrees or until golden brown on top.

And ENJOY!

It's a fav. I've also tried this once with brownies and cream cheese.... YUmmmmm!!

*~*

I love that my last post encouraged a few new followers and that you all felt as strongly about it as I did.

*~*

A big-warm 235th HAPPY BIRTHDAY to the US Army!

Hooah. 

*~*

In other exciting news the hubs and I got iPhones this weekend.

Do you have an iPhone? 

What accessories must we pick up?

Do you know of any cheap places to pick up accessories? 

I couldn't find a Blogger App. Have you found one??

The one where I land a J.O.B!!

Yes, you heard me right! After almost two years and countless companies toying with my emotions I officially have a job! I start on MONDAY!!!! I think this job is really perfect for where I'm at right now. Being in school and pursuing my degree is my main priority so this Receptionist job will go a long way to ensure our bills are paid (important) and allow me the flexibility to study and successfully complete my classes! It may not be filled with glory or loads of fun, but for now it's absolutely PERFECT!

I gotta say I'm going to really miss Thursday morning coffee with my girls! 

{major sad face}

=(

I've been spending a lot of time thinking about friends (both past and present) lately. I find myself beginning stories with "this girl I used to be friends with..." a lot. So I started reminiscing about friends I've loved and lost. There are a few. I can't possibly imagine why someone wouldn't want to be friends with me until the end of time. But evidently I manage to turn people off (you know, from time to time). 

To those that I've lost:

I do miss you. I do think of you often. 

I was just at a friends house the other night and we got to talking about how great it is to have milspouse friends close by (that completely friggin ROCK). I went on to say how losing friends, is a lot like a romantic breakup, at least for me. That I do personally have to mourn those relationships. Especially of the people that I've let into my heart and life. I believe that good friends become family. Truly family. So when I've made up my mind and set certain expectations of friends and they "breakup" with me, it's truly heartbreaking. 

Do you feel this way?

To those that I've found:

I love you!!!!! 

Thanks for putting up with me and loving me in return. Thanks for being there for me and accepting me into your world, as I have shared and embraced you (and yours) into my mine. 

Here's to the future and many, many fits of laughter and bottles of wine!

~

PS: I simply adore Brandi @Excess Baggage! 

please, check her out, BE NICE, and ENTER her giveaway for a free copy of DEAR JOHN!