Life of an Army Wife--Artillery Museum

Once Nathan had to start going to the Base in the mornings, I started trying to find things to do with the kids that I could handle on my own. I'm not much of an adventurer and with temperatures in the 100s, I really didn't want to do anything outside.

The Base here is an artillery base. What that means other than it constantly sounds like a thunder storm is going on, I'm not sure, but there's a cool "Missile Park" where you can see different artillery from various wars and this museum. We went to the Missile Park with Nathan, but I think those pictures are on his phone. So here are the museum pictures from when I ventured out with the kids on my own

We started with stuff from the Revolutionary War

Digging for treasure. Almost every time I went to take a picture of him, this is what I saw.

Pretending to be shot by the cannon.

I had to include this one because it's a good shot of Lincoln's "Squinty Smile."

The museum covered every war we've been involved in from Revolutionary to Afghanistan, but the bulk of the artifacts came from the earlier wars. Behind the kids in the last two pictures are way old school computers used by the military--crazy, eh? The kids really liked the museum, which surprised me, but then, they are Nathan's kids, so it probably shouldn't have.

Turning Six!

Before we left Ohio we had a birthday party for Jeremy.  His real birthday wasn't until after we got to Oklahoma, but we wanted him to be able to have a party with his friends and we weren't sure if our shy Jeremy would know many people in OK in time for a real birthday party. Here's Jeremy's birthday letter, followed by pictures.

Dear Jeremy,

What can I say, kid? I love you so much. You truly have an awesome sense of humor. You make all kinds of things funny that I never would have thought of. Recently dad and I discovered that you've been hiding your top notch reading skills from us. You are such a smart kid!

Here are some things about you that I want you to know:

You are a fabulous reader and your math skills are spectacular.
You love people. Sometimes you act like you're scared of people, more often kids than adults, and get incredibly shy, but I know that you really care about people a lot by the way you act when you see someone else who is sad.
You are dang funny.
You are a very loving child.
You are a great brother to your siblings. You play so well with Megan, Emma, and Lincoln. And you play differently with each one, which tells me that not only are there many sides to you and your own imagination, but you know how to play with others without getting bossy.
You have a definite style that is your own. You prefer long sleeves to short sleeves, you like button down shirts with collars, and when you have a favorite shirt, you want to wear it a lot :)
You still like to sleep listening to my Beatles CD.
You are interested in outer space and want to be an engineer when you grow up so you can invent things.
Dad and I wish you had more confidence and understood how awesome you really are. We are working hard and praying to know what to do to help you know yourself and your major awesomeness more because we LOVE you.
Creativeness courses through you. As I look at the drawings and paintings you make I see amazing creations that I've never thought about. The machines you draw and paint, the abstract art you make with the things you collect, I think it is all wonderful.
You want a dog and I want one for you. One day, kid.
You are a Wii and computer game master.


Jeremy, we love you and want you to have a great year of being 6. It should be fun :)

love you,

Mom


The theme was Legos because this kid loves Legos. He also requested a German Chocolate Cake.

 I was informed by a couple of the mothers that a few of the little girls that were invited blushed furiously when they got his invitation. Just be warned girls, Jeremy already has a list of potential girls to marry. His list, not mine. Not to say the list can't change, though.

When we got to Oklahoma we had a quiet family party for him.

Indiana Jones hat. I saw this at a party store months and months before his birthday. My sister in-law gave Jeremy an Indiana Jones whip and satchel for Christmas, so I knew he had to have the hat, too.

Lookin' sharp, kid.

Two little greenhouse kits from Grandma Buckner and Stuart Little.

Star Wars pillow case. No matter where or how I took the picture, half of it was dark. Not sure why.

Legos!!

Happy Birthday, Jeremy! We love you!!

Before and After

 Here are a few pictures of things we did before the move to Oklahoma. I never blogged them, so I'm still playing catch up. Then after these pictures there are some of our first weeks in Oklahoma, a few fun things we've done around here.



The last week of school I took pictures of the kids at the school playground. I wanted to get pictures specifically of Megan and her friends, but of course I took pictures of the other kids, too. Although for some reason, Lincoln wasn't in any of these. It's possible he was in a stroller or at home with Nathan when I was doing these.

Such a cutie

Emma and her friend, Sammy.

Eliza, Gabby, Megan, Josie. BFFs.

Stuntman Jeremy

Having Fun

Ok. This isn't the best picture of this strange phenomenon that occurred nearly every day in our house in Ohio, but here you go. This is the entryway of our Ohio house and the kids liked to stack up all the couch cushions and pillows. Then they'd climb to the top and crawl around in the tiny pillow-filled space. They called this, "playing Tiny Toons". I have no idea what this has to do with the cartoon Tiny Toons, but they would pretend to be different characters and  jump all over my couch cushions.

 Megan won many different art contests this year and last year, but here is her most recent art award. We are very proud of her. Unfortunately, one of her art pieces that I thought was just awesome was lost by an employee of our pediatrician in Ohio. They held an art contest there and she was one of the winners, but the woman who ran it tossed some of the pictures before the parents or art teachers could come get them--idiot. Then she lied about it. And lucky me, I was the one to catch her in her lies. Anyway, our pediatrician felt so bad about it he sent Megan $100 to buy art supplies. Pretty sweet, but we still wish we had her picture.

 Here's the After portion of the pictures. We'd heard there was a lake near us so we went to find it and check it out. Turns out the lake we went to is the nasty one where you aren't actually supposed to go. We have yet to bother finding the good one. Maybe next summer.

 This is Prairie Dog Town. Nathan felt like exploring and Emma was the only one who wanted to go, too. The rest of us felt like falling on the floor and sleeping for the next 10 years. Oh, I'm sorry, that was me. Megan and Jeremy wanted to play the Wii. Anyway, a week or so later we all went so we could see the cool stuff that Nathan and Emma had found.

And here are two of the prairie dogs. They were everywhere, so it was pretty cool.

 Um, yeah. I don't remember what this was. Nathan is so much better about remembering every detail of what we do. I just remember that we do it and it's fun.

(Update, Nathan informed me that this is the highest point in the Wichita Mountains.

Thanks, Nathan!)

And here we are at Grandma and Grandpa Gunn's house in Austin. The kids spent so much time in the pool while we were there that Nathan and I decided we needed to get one. Yeah, the spent about 1/4 of the time in the one we bought.

So there are our adventures from part of May to part of July. More to come.

Just Wait Till You Have Children of Your Own

I've been thinking about this for a couple days now and I'm positive I'm right. 

Kidnappers are the stupidest people on earth. 

Why do they think kidnapping small children is a good idea? They poop and pee all over the place, they are always hungry but refuse to eat anything you offer, they won't go to bed and let you have alone time, they scream and hit when they are upset, they take all the canned food out of the pantry and throw it around the living room making you worry for the tiny old school TV with the screen smaller than your laptop.

Seriously, the stupidest people ever. 

They yell at you and tell you that they hate you. Then they yell at you and tell you that you hate them and everything is your fault. They grab at you when they are crying, refusing to let go and then the next moment insist that you get out of their room. They make demand after demand, never giving anything but a headache and the occasional sticky hand print on your shirt sleeve in return. 

Of course this is all assuming you love your children and therefore discipline them. You rarely get this last paragraph of rotten behaviors if you don't care about your children. Interesting, eh? The first paragraph though, I think is pretty generic.

Any kidnappers out there reading this, I'd love to have your feedback. Thanks.

The After-Graduation Trip

 Since The Buckners were with us it was travel-and-see-stuff time.  And of course, what Buckner trip is complete without a trip to a. . .cemetery!

Weird door and weird cemetery. It belonged to a religious group that didn't believe in putting headstones on graves, so there's a bunch of dead people buried there, but you can't know who.

And of course we took one last trip to Kirtland.

And Nelson Ledges State Park. We love this place.

And a bog. Please ignore Emma the Plumber.

Aw, sweetness.

And bridges!

And flowers :)