Hi.

The End of an Era

Well, Anders, considering the precedent your big brother set, you lasted a lot longer in your crib than I would have thought. Congratulations. Imagine my surprise when I was mowing the lawn during "naptime" only to see you standing outside with a pleased-as-punch expression as I rounded the corner. Your brother was not far behind you with a wide smile on face, flapping his arms in excitement: "Guess what I taught Anders to do!" 

And like that, the front rail is gone. 

Happy to help Mommy dismantle a piece of the crib. 

The Last Deployment Video

Throughout this deployment, I wasn't that great about sending boxes to Erik filled with snacks and love notes with cute themes and such, but I always did try to mail a little USB drive which housed a video compilation of two month chunks of time. The collective snippets of things like Landon learning to ride a bike without training wheels, Anders enjoying an afternoon with bubbles, the boys enjoying hikes, etc. You know, the everyday stuff that just happens when it happens, with no agenda. Those are the things I wanted to capture most for Erik this past year. I guess, in a way, the videos were my love notes.

I'm happy to say I've made the last video for this deployment. My iMac has just about hit the end of its lifespan in terms of ability to pull together videos, so it is good timing. [PS: Honey, I need a new computer.]

For comparison's sake, below is the first video I put together for Erik at the end of last summer. Landon has grown 2.5 inches and Anders has grown almost 4 inches! I feed and water them daily.

Quotes

[Scene: Driving in the car this morning.]

Landon: Hey Anders, do you wanna' play "booger catch" again?

Me: Wait, what?! What is that game? And what do you mean "AGAIN?!"

[Just so you know, it's a game where one brother picks a booger and (yes, you guessed it) throws it at the other brother.]

Mother's Day 2015

Dear Boys,

We made it another year. This one was a little bit of a solo ride with Daddy gone and I didn't know how it was going to go, but you made it simple, fun and humbling. 

Landon, your obsession with Legos this past year could have been predicted by your founding passion of jigsaw puzzles. Your "creations" and imagination have been an absolute joy to watch. And the fact that you let your little brother play with those creations demonstrates what a special big brother heart you have. Whenever I am laying down for a moment with my eyes closed, you come up to steal a light kiss on my cheek; you make me feel so very loved. 

Anders, your confidence and personality came out of left field this year, especially after Christmastime. For someone who wasn't a particularly smiley baby, you certainly are a funny guy and your laugh just lights up my world. You smile with your whole face - I love it. At the time of this writing, you are delighted by anything Rescue Bots or Transformers or Super Heroes. You love wearing a cape and slipping into your "Super Anders" persona; it involves a lot of running around and yelling "Pshooo!" with your arm extended. You give grade A hugs with your whole body and it reminds me of my mom's genuine hugs; thank you for continuing the legacy.

Together, you guys are one big, goofy energy ball. Whether its playing "goo" (in which you pretend to be stuck in blankets - aka goo - and let the other super hero brother rescue you) or "fight dome" (rough housing under the geo dome in the backyard - not mommy's favorite, but surprisingly a game that hasn't resulted in any injuries...yet), I see brothers. As your daddy likes to say, "Thick as thieves." 

I became more confident as a mom this year, for sure. I finally see the hard work starting to pay off when you stop and hug each other while reading a book (just because), when you express your feelings with words, when you demonstrate good table manners or when you utter "Thank you, Earth and animals, for this lovely food" before you dig into a snack. These snippets are a delight to see and rather incongruent to the constant feeling that no one is listening to me at all on most days. Thanks for planting some seeds of hope this year.

Love you with all my heart,

Mom

Mother's Day 2015

Guemes with Grandma

As posted before, an easy afternoon activity in these parts is to hop on a ferry ride. We particularly enjoy the Guemes Island Ferry because it's a 5 minute drive from our house, you park the car, walk on and enjoy a 5 minute hop across the Guemes channel. And at the end? You are rewarded with collecting driftwood and stop to enjoy ice cream or beer at the island's general store - pick your pleasure. On this particular day, there was wind coming from all angles, but nothing too cold a hat couldn't fix.

We were so lucky to have Grandma visit us over spring break this year; we had fun tromping through muddy tulip fields, playing at parks, doing Legos and, of course, taking a ferry ride. The boys are founding members of her fan club. And I, too, am a member.

Beach Day

The weather may still call for boots at the beach, but its all good. Plenty of fun to be had with driftwood and shell collecting.

"The birds are singing. The sky is bright. The sun is shining and I'm feeling alright." - Pete the Cat

Eyes

Landon spontaneously brought up the topic of eye color tonight at dinner. He looked at me and declared that I have green eyes. We chatted about they were more like a grey color and his were similar. "I guess like a dark blue. And Anders has light blue. Correct, Mom?" Yeah, buddy. "And Daddy has blue eyes, right?" Yeah, buddy. At least that was my automatic response - my mind knows my husband's eyes are blue. But as I looked at Landon's eyes and Anders' eyes, I panicked for a hot second: what shade are Erik's eyes? It was one of those crazy moments where I was, like, Uuuuh I haven't looked into my husband's eyes since last summer. And then it hit me again: I haven't looked into my husband's eyes SINCE LAST SUMMER. Even during the few times we've Skyped, it's been more about the call/connection breaking up or trying to wrangle the kids to say hi - it wasn't an exercise in looking at each other's proverbial windows to the soul. 

No worries, though. It turns out I do know. I scurried to look at a picture and it was a pleasant feeling to focus and recognize his eyes immediately; a medium blue shade resting between Anders' and Landon's on the color scale. The eyes are still familiar, still special, even in a photo stored on my phone. They're the ones that belong to the boy I met in college. They're the ones that echoed his words "I do" on our wedding day. They're the ones that cried when our sons were born. They'll be the ones that shine with more tears at homecoming. I'll be sure to focus on them a little more in the coming year. So, Honey, be warned that I may come across creepy at times - my heart's in the right place. 

There's more cheese if you, dear reader, can handle it. As that panic moment receded, Landon continued with the questions. What color are Uncle James' eyes? Uncle Bobo's? And then Anders asks about Aunt Jill's. It was kind of fascinating, really. They seemed legitimately interested as they picked random names from their minds' hats. And then Landon asked about Nana Lolly - my mom. I replied that she had the most beautiful bright chocolate brown eyes and Landon says - I shit you not - verbatim: "Well I haven't seen them in my dream before, but maybe tonight when I close my eyes."

Well, folks, that's just when you take an extra long drink from your beer and officially use your kid's leftover gross dinner napkin to catch tears from the corner of your own damn eyes. The grey ones. 

Happy Valentine's Day

And Just Like That. Poof! Five months.

We hit the halfway mark of deployment a couple weeks ago. People like to use it like a psychological tool to make the passage of time seem quicker, but it really is just a singular point in time - a blip on the radar of time separated as a family. The reality is we still have five more months to go. Lest I seem drab about things, I should say that I do, indeed, feel a shift towards excitement in recent days. I've started thinking about homecoming banners and family vacations and eating meals as a family and time spent drinking a relaxing beer with my hubby and... well, you get the idea. There are many things to look forward to. 

But even the most newbiest of Navy spouses know to keep the excitement in check. Because perhaps one of the most horrible parts of deployment is actually the return and the reintegration. But! I am jumping ahead.

In the meantime, please enjoy this video our friends Chris and Laura made of the spouse's evening night out in celebration of the half way mark. We rented out a local B&B and they hosted a murder mystery night for us. So if you see gals acting extra precocious, we were all merely being thespians.