Deuces Up 2009!

I know that I'm not the only blogger or person on the planet inspired to reflect today. Please bare with me while I take a look back at the past year:

Jan 2009: I began this year with my husband, actually! Kevin arrived home 29 Dec 2008 for R&R. This was a huge surprise for me. I made Kevin tell me when he made it to Kuwait. Beyond that I had no idea when I would hear form him again! This was a huge feet for Kevin. He kind of, basically, sucks at keeping any kind of secret. So, for him to keep such a big one filled with so much surprise and excitement was great for him! Thankfully I was able to ring in 2009 (although, in not so much style- there was a lot of sleeping going on, hahaha) with my man!

Feb 2009: I started my lovely blog! My husband was back in Iraq with a long 8 months still ahead. My neighbor deployed to Iraq. :(

"This is the nature of the "beast". This beast being of course the Army. This is my life. I married a soldier, a career soldier. I chose to be where I am. Standing strong and proud, next to, behind, and always faithful to my soldier...." 

A quote from my first ever blog- one of my favs. Check it out! 

FEATURED FAVS: My thoughts on Distance/Deployments and Fear in his eyes.

March 2009: Brought birthdays: My Hubs (on St. Patty's day) and my Ma! With some important people in my life aging one year more, March also brought about the half-way mark to a 12 month deployment! Wooop Woop. I'll take halfway over just starting anyday! 

I also took a more active role in the FRG, which brought about a new friendship. I also embraced the power of POSITIVITY! Our First Lady stepped out and announced she would be an advocate for military families everywhere, KUDOS! 

Kevin met up with our neighbor in Baghdad! Thankfully, she had her camera and snapped a picture- one of the only ones I have from my husband's deployment! We love Nikki! :) March also brought my first dose of drama in blog-land. Well, I brought it upon myself. That's ok with me though, it wasn't the first time... 

April 2009: I reached a whopping 10 followers! Woop Wooop! I watched Taking Chance for the first time with a fellow army wife. Sorta not smart- while you're soldier is deployed. My husband did the SWEETEST thing! My second dose of blogger drama ensued. OIy... Lets just say it wouldn't be wise to refer to a Marine as a "soldier". It appears Guardsmen, reservists, airmen are still on the fence. Call them soldier, Navy Seal, Marine... whatevs. They apparently have no preference. You learn something new everyday huh? GASP! The drama motivated me to lose my mind/cancel blog for a SHORT period of time! I know it's awful. All's well that ends well! I'm back and here to stay. A friend reminded me of who I am and that just because people are nasty to you, tell lies and attempt to destroy you they can go f%3k themselves because I'm here to stay! If you don't like it MOVE ON! 

Most important event of April 2009: I saw Twilight and was officially sucked into the nonsense!!! lol

May 2009: Began (literally on the 1st... pencil it in- buy me stuff) with a celebration of my birth! :) I reached a weight loss goal! Oprah looked absolutely awful on TV! Military Spouse Appreciation Day ( May 8th). Finally discussed my wedding/ honeymoon with a few pictures with my lovely followers! I complained about the chow my husband was being fed in Basra. KBR passed the buck. 

MOST IMPORTANT event of May: PINKBERRY.... Vaca to San Deigo! 

Plus my 100th Post Extravaganza. 

Man- May was a Big deal! :)

June 2009: Brought sadness with the passing of Kevin's Gramma. Unfortunately Kevin was not granted emergency leave to come home for the funeral. I discovered a VERY important reason why deployments SUCK! June also brought free tequila... "huh," you ask? Mr. Justin Timberlake has his own brand of tequila and after I left a message to their webmaster trying to find out where I could get Kevin a bottle I received this response:

Samantha, 

You tell me when and where to send it and we'll do everything possible to get him a bottle. In addition, tell him we are eternally grateful to you, your family and of course him for his service.

Kevin Ruder

President 901 Tequila

By June 16th I'd finished reading the entire Twilight series. I told you I was sucked into the nonsense in May. lol

MOST IMPORTANT EVENT: Levi, my brother-in-law deployed on his 4th deployment, this one to A-stan. :( 

FEATURED FAV:  The Low Down. Confidence. 

July 2009: Found out my sister's round of IVF was successful and I was going to be an Aunt again!!! Woo HOO! I reminded the world I wasn't put on the planet for you to judge. Went to 2 concerts in 2 days and somehow managed to lose a friend. :( Some of you may remember this. While I still can't quite wrap my mind around why this happened I can't fix or change it. I wish her well still, and at times miss her and her family. While I wish it could be different it's not up to me to mend. With that July came and went. 

August 2009: Only thing that matters: MY HUSBAND CAME HOME!!!!!!!

While the return of my husband was definitely most important, I can't look back at August without mentioning the birth of "I WANT IT WEDNESDAY". 

Sept 2009: Brought on many travels for us! Portland, Jersey and Vegas! We also celebrated our 2 year anniversary! This was our first anniversary together, as Kevin deployed only 13 days before our first anniversary. 

I love him. 

The fall of 2009: We discovered my sister was having a baby girl. Then we discovered during a 3d ultrasound my sister wasn't having a girl but baby boy #2! I made peace with the name Caden. Spent a holiday season with my Husband. I'm a lucky girl. 

I have to highlight these two blogs, I'd love it if you checked them out: ME. I Believe.

OK- I know that was a long post readers. Please check out some of links. Especially some of my newer followers. These posts will give you some insight as to what I'm all about as a person and blogger. 

May you all have a happy, healthy and safe New Year! 

I Want it Wednesday....

I want... my lower back to stop screaming!

I want... two of my favorite bloggers to come back. :(

Hilary where you be??? I. miss. you.

Lola, I. will. miss. you. I'm so glad Matt is home and you're off to Fort Drum.

I'm pissed that Ft. Drum seems to be swallowing all of my favorite bloggers.

DAMN YOU FORT DRUM!

I want... to stop nesting on my sister's behalf! My sis is due in just 11 short weeks and the past 4 days we've been preparing the nursery. By "preparing" I mean painting. By "we" I mean, she's made me choose the colors, help tape and paint. I'm pooped people! I'll post pictures of our masterpiece once my sis uploads them. :)

I want... to give two shits about getting boozed up on New Years Eve. I wish I was a person who got all festive and excited for New Years. In truth, I'm not much of a drinker. What else do people do in order to ring in the new year in style? Anything that doesn't involve booze?

I'm being sincere... what do you do on New Years.... BESIDES party??!

*~~~*

PS: I hope everyone had a very blessed holiday and I hope you were all surrounded by loved ones and family.

Stay tuned for tomorrow's NEW YEARS EVE post! I'll be highlighting some of my favorite posts from the past year. :)

Counting My Blessings x2; I'm a VERY lucky girl

First, anyone else sad that Christmas has officially came and went? I do really love this time of year and it just really flew by for me! :( Which makes me sad. All the same it comes once a year so the only good thing is that it will come around again in another year... I guess that's the silver-lining but it is entire year away!

Second, back to my being a VERY lucky girl: I know how lucky I am to have family around who love and care for me and with whom to share the Holiday season with. Additionally, I'm hugely blessed to have my husband home for Christmas this year. Last year I wasn't so lucky. 

Third, I was lucky enough to get everything I asked for this year! I guess I've been a very good girl all year! :) Yes, my lovely readers I get my MacBook, InStyler (which works perfectly!), slippers, and a Fabulous new robe (from Target). PS: For all my children of the 80's and Wii owners you MUST go out immediately and get:

This was another gift from my Husband... but he appears to like it more than Call of Duty I picked up for him. That's ok it's something we can play together :)

My hubby also got me PS: I Love You. awwww :) It was perfect for my stocking.

What great gifts did you get? Anything you're super excited about??

I hope you all had a fantastic Christmas and were good the past year (like I was) because, you know it really pays to be good!

Christmas Eve

So I've been complaining for at least a week about the lack of snow around these parts. However I failed to report we did get some decent snow Monday Night! Awww isn't it pretty??? Sadly the forecast doesn't call for any more snow today for the Eve but we should get some more flakes falling come the evening of Christmas (no pun intended- lol Evening of versus Eve. Please disregard I'm sure I'm the only one who was amused by that). 

Whether you are having a White Christmas (which I'm watching as we speak) where you are or not I'm wishing you and yours a very Merry Christmas and hoping that you are with loved ones. Also, reminding all my readers Milspouses and civilians alike to keep our military in your prayers and thoughts today. They, and the families left behind sacrifice so much, especially this time of year. 

Merry Christmas!

I Want it Wednesday....

I want... to remind everyone Santa that I still want the following for Christmas:

As previously discussed:

NEW Slippers

NEW Robe

Diamond Earrings

The Instyler

However, I no longer want for:

Yup, that's right SANTA brought me an early xmas present in the form of a MacBook! Isn't it pretty?

So.... if you're out and about (which I'd highly discourage) and happen to stumble across one of the first items from above please feel free to pick up on my behalf and email me for my home address.

Thanks and good lookin' out!

I hope you all have a very MERRY CHRISTMAS EVE, tomorrow!

Etiquette

 Etiquette; noun-

1. conventional requirements as to social behavior; proprieties of conduct as established in any class or community or for any occasion.

2. a prescribed or accepted code of usage in matters of ceremony, as at a court or in official or other formal observances.

For now I'd like to share a lesson in Etiquette with my readers. For those of you who often enjoy going to your local cinema every now and again to watch the newest flick here's a tip:

If the movie you are seeing has less than 10 people in the theater and you show up 5 minutes prior to show-time please do not sit right in front of someone (me) who has their feet on the chair in front of them. If you wanted to sit directly in the center of the theater you should have arrived earlier.

Has this happened to you? Does it tweak your melon (as Hilary says)? Because I can tell you it sure does  tweak my melon! Don't get me wrong I enjoy sitting in the center of the theater as much as the next girl, and I obviously enjoy resting my tootsies on the seat-back of the chair in front of me, as many other movie-goers do. But when I have, in the past walked into a theater with all of 8 people in it the one place I didn't sit was directly in front of anyone else. It's just RUDE.

So please do me a favor the next time you hit up the local cinema:

A) don't sit in front of me.

B) and refrain from sitting in front of others when there are SOOOO many other options.

C) and as ALWAYS keep your mouth shut. I have no desire to listen to your ridiculous ramblings throughout my movie- that I've actually paid to see. I realize this is probably the second or third movie you've seen today and you're more than likely uninterested in the movie's premise but I am. So hush it! Again, it's just RUDE.

Just as a side note: I think unclassy people should not reproduce. I think it shows a lack of concern for others when unclassy people choose to reproduce. Hate me for saying it, if you must but at the end of the day it's how I feel.

'Tis the season huh? 

lol

Ugh... WOW!

Some of you know that I am a huge fan of Winter and the colder things in life. So I'm always hoping for a White Christmas. Some of you may think, "you live in Colorado; white Christmas's are just a given." Nope! I live in Colorado Springs, people! The High Country gets snow, and it lingers. Down here in the foothills/plains. NOT SO MUCH THE CASE. Up until about 3 or 5 years ago it would snow without fail on Halloween but Christmas would be in the 50's. It was pretty ass-backwards if you ask me.

Either way... I still always hope for that White Christmas. Which brings me to this:

Possible snow Tuesday night into Wednesday. I'll take it, don't get me wrong but I would prefer the East Coast share some of this:

C'mon folks. That's too much for one state.... This is from my Aunt in Jersey. I also have peoples in Wash DC that tell me they are also getting their fair share.. So as I said, SHARE THE WEALTH!

Hopefully the above forecast will be enough to satisfy my craving for snow!

Time will tell!

What's going on in your neck of the woods?