The Jesse Tree Devotions

I participate in the Protestant Women of the Chapel or PWC through the Chapel here on post. We get together every Wednesday morning for a couple of hours and enjoy fellowship, songs, worship, bible study and lunch. Last Wednesday we were given a devotional book and 25 ornaments for our Christmas trees at home. Each evening through Christmas we will read scriptures, have a memory verse and hang an ornament on the tree that symbolizes what we read. The girls are taking turns reading the different scriptures. Not only are they learning about God's Word, they are also learning how to look up scriptures in the bible! Is so exciting!

The Life of an Army Wife

Well Philip left for Iraq a couple days ago. This is his 3rd year fighting in Operation Iraqi Freedom. Another wedding anniversary apart from one another, birthdays,holidays and other special days will be spent away from one another again this year. We hope Philip will be able to make it home for the birth of his first baby in April. He will be allowed to come home for 2 weeks and then have to go back to Iraq to finish up the year deployment. Philip has been able to call home and I am so thankful for each and every phone call I get! You may find this weird, but I feel some comfort in seeing his dirty clothes in his basket. Those are the clothes he wore before he left. I know eventually I will have to wash them and put the clothes away. I also find some comfort in seeing his shoes next to the door. I know I will have to move those back to the closet too. As I run errands around the post I see other women who have husbands down range also. My friends are all going through the same emotions and have the same feelings I have. It makes it a little easier knowing that so many other women around me know EXCATLY how I feel. What other neighborhood would I be able to get this kind of support? Even at the girls school, more than half the students' father's (and few mother's) are deployed. Even the school mascot, Wilbur the pig, deployed to Iraq with the soldier's and will send pictures back to the students of his adventures in Iraq. This community has really pulled together and has so many support programs for all of the soldiers' family member's here in Schweinfurt! This will be a long year for me. I just need to focus on staying busy, taking care of myself, the girls and this house! Please keep our family in your prayers!

Feeling more like home

We recieved all our household goods last Monday. We are almost completely done unpacking all the boxes (I think we only have 1 or 2 more boxes and we will be completely done!) Allison's bed has some screws that are missing, but Philip was able to improvise and her bed is up. As we began unpacking Joslyn asked,"where's our couch"! I called the moving company and they told me to get a hold of the packing company in the states. Well low and behold our couch is still in storage at Ft. Hood in Texas. I have no clue how a huge couch was missed. WE should receive it sometime in November I hope!One of my favorite lamps is broken, Joslyn's raido is broken as well as the steam cleaner I have to clean my floors, so I'm back to using a mop and bucket again! It could have been worse. We will get reimbursed for all our losses.
Well I'm off to do more laundry! Have a good day!

Updates and news from our new home in Germany

Okay, I'm back in my "blogging mood".
We arrived in Germany on the 4th of August. About 2 weeks after we arrived into the country I found out I was pregnant. Philip and I had been trying to get pregnant since May of this year, so we were both excited about the positive results on the home pregnancy test!
We are living on post and have a 4 bedroom apartment. Philip originally had plans of using the 4th bedroom as his office. Yet I had plans of turning the 4th bedroom into a guest bedroom however that problem was quickly solved. Its going to be a nursery.
The girls started school on the 25th of August at Schweinfurt Elementary. Allison began 2nd grade and Joslyn is now in 4th grade. They love it! Well Joslyn isn't to fond of her teacher, but has made many new friends and is in the Gifted and Talented program. Allison simply adores her teacher and has made fast friends as well! Joslyn is playing soccer again and is having a blast! She has practices on Wednesday's and games on Fridays. I'm still thinking about whether or not I want the girls to play winter soccer. I'm not sure if I really want to sit out in the freezing cold and watch the girls play soccer. I still have time before I need to make this decision. Both Joslyn and Allison love it here. They walk to school every morning and hook-up with Joslyn's best friend at the corner of our street and all 3 girls walk together to school. Every afternoon they meet up with their friends and play outside. As a matter of fact the girls are outside with their friends right now "Sweeping" up leaves into a huge pile so they can jump in it. We don't have a rake so they improvise with what they have.
Philip is getting ready to go back to Iraq for another year. We are hoping of course that he will be able to come home for 2 weeks for the birth of the baby, so keep your fingers crossed and pray for us too. Almost every wife in his Company is pregnant so we will see who's solider makes it home in time for their baby's birth. This will be my first year ever spending the holidays alone with only the girls. I just have to keep reminding myself, only 3 years and I will be back in the states!! Its not forever! I wish Philip and I were able to accomplish more before he leaves.
I have my European Drivers licence and I'm am waiting for my GPS system to arrive in the mail. Once I have the GPS system in my car I will feel more comfortable driving around. I have learned how to park downtown, I know where to park and how to get from the parking garage to my Dr's office. I know how to get to the Wildlife Park and finally found a store downtown that sells maternity clothes albeit they don't have a very big selection, but I can always order online. It all may sound like such small achievements but when so many road signs are in a different language- I pat myself on the back!
I am still adjusting to not being able to jump in the car and go to Target, Kohl's, Payless, Wal-mart, Dillard's and Old Navy. Our dollar is very weak over here. To eat at McDonald's, just the 4 of us we can expect to pay $40. If I pull out 100 euros from the ATM, I can translate that to $150 dollars actually coming out of my bank account.
I just applied to for a job as a substitute teacher again this school year. I should start sometime this coming week. There were so many hoops I felt I had to jump through just to get this job.
I am attending the chapel here on post. The Army Chaplains are the preachers and the service is alot different from what I am use to, but the message is the same!!The girls and I go to church every Sunday and are praying one day soon Philip will join us.
Well I think I have touched up on everything that has been going on with us. I will update you with all our adventures as they unfold.

Girlie Time

Yesterday Joslyn, Allison and I went to get a manicure and pedicure. The girls picked out the color nail polish they wanted painted on their toes and finger nails. We had a great time!

Vacation Bible School Power Lab!

The girls and I enjoyed an awesome full week of Vacation Bible School at our home church, St. Paul. We made the most of our week at VBS. The next time the girls and I will be able to attend another VBS at St. Paul will be in 2011. We all had so much fun learning about God this past week. The Church was transformed into a Power Lab. Each night we learned about different "Powers" God gives us. On Monday night we learned that... ...God gives us the power to be Thankful! (Colossians 3:15) The bible story for the night was about the 10 lepers and only one came back to thank Jesus. Tuesday night we learned that... ...God gives us the power to Help Others! (Romans 12:13) The Bible story was about the blind man that Jesus healed. Wednesday night we learned that... ...God gives us the power to be Brave! (Psalm 23:4) Tonight we heard the bible story about Jesus walking on water, and Peter who needed more faith to walk on water Thursday we learned that... ...God gives us the power to Live Forever in Eternity! (John 14:19) Tonight our leader in the "Bible Blast" classroom handed out stickers to all of us. The stickers had sad faces on them. We talked about sin and how we are all sinners. Sue, The Bible Blast leader told us about the sinners that were nailed to the cross and how one of the sinners asked Jesus to remember him when he went to paradise. We confessed our sins and placed them at the cross (in this case we placed them on the cross) We took our sad face stickers and stuck the to the cross. This was my favorite Bible Blast night! And on Friday night we learned that... ...God gives us the power to Share His Love with Everyone!(Mark 16:15) We heard the story of the first Pentecost This morning at Church we had our closing service for Vacation Bible School and the service was so awesome! The message that Pastor Carlos preached to us was the story of Jesus and His disciples on the lake of Galilee in their boat during a huge thunderstorm. No matter what storms we encounter in our lives we know that Jesus is right there with us and He will never let go of us. That is one of my favorite songs from VBS "He Never Lets Go"

Pennsylvania

On Sunday night I returned from a 4 day "vacation" in Pennsylvania. My brother and his wife had their wedding celebration in the small town of Lebanon, PA where his wife Brenda grew up. Philip was unable to go with me because of his school and the girls were spending time with their Daddy. So I joined my parents, Aunt Janet, my cousins Sera and Sen representing my brother's side of the family. I also spent a lot of time with my precious niece Geneve! The wedding was nice and I had a great time with my family.