loved and lost

We live too far away to visit the the resting places of those we've loved and lost along the way. I bought some flowers for them anyway. Tomorrow I'm excited to tell Rhone about his great-great grandma and grandpa. We sure are grateful for our family and those who have sacrificed for us and our country.

We are keeping busy while Ben is way. Everyday we manage to come up with a few fun things to do and to get us outta the house. Here's a few of them.

How does your garden grow? Mine grows despite all of Rhone's attention and help. We are excited for our 1st tomatoes of the season.

A walk to the pond to feed the geese. After we ran out of bread to toss their way, we gathered rocks to throw in just for fun. I love the delight Rhone gets out of the simplest things.

I have to admit seeing this cute little family of geese makes me happy too.

Friday night I had some gals from base over whose husbands are gone too. There were 5 moms an 6 kids all under the age of 18 mo. Considering that, it was pretty mellow and fun. A girls gotta make it feel like Friday one way or another.

European Vacation C-5 Style

Our plane decided to have a major fuel leak in Spain. A 17 hour stay in Spain turned into a 3 day stay. This is my first summer trip to Spain so I finally got to spend a day on the beach there. The water was still cold but the beaches are very nice. The Spanish base had no success in fixing the plane, so we got sent to Germany to have them fix our plane. Our second day here we decided to go to Heidelberg. It was a 2 hour train ride to Heidelberg. Once there we headed up to the castle to look around.

This is the tram to the castle.
(It was a little unnerving going up such a steep incline.)

This is the view from the castle
(I am impressed how well the camera did the panorama shot)
Me at the top of the castle
One of the guys with a huge keg of beer

After the castle tour we headed down to the town square to eat and hang out. I had a doner kebab for the first time. It is like a gyro. Same type of meat and sauce, but on a bun. Later in the day it started to rain pretty hard, so we called it a day hoped on the train back.

a little of this and that

It seems like we don't go more than 2 weeks without some change in our lives. We hadn't been back from vacation for 2 weeks and Ben left on a mission. It sure does keep us on our toes. We've managed to go to a Mennonite fundraiser, a strawberry festival, and church activities. Ben and Rhone went to the father and sons camp out.

I think Rhone might have been the youngest in attendance, but they weren't able to spend the night since Ben had to be ready to leave for Europe by 6 the next morning. While Ben and Rhone were gone, I had the young women (girls 12-16) from our church over for a late night party. We made pizza, played water balloon volleyball, the tell all "chair" game, ate dessert and popcorn while watching a movie. The only bad part, was that I didn't get to spend any time with Ben the right before he left. But we can't plan our lives around Ben's schedule or we'd never do anything.

We had the most amazing bbq chicken at the Mennonite fundraiser. Rhone also got his first taste of cotton candy. Contrary to this picture, he really wasn't that impressed with it.

This is the only picture Ben took at the father and son camp out. I didn't get to hear much about it from Ben, but Sunday at church a few guys told me that Rhone looked like he was having a great time.

Saturday Rhone and I went to the Fifer Orchard Strawberry Festival. There was live music, a petting zoo, pony rides, face painting, and of course strawberries. We didn't brave the strawberry picking crowd on Saturday. Instead we went today and we had the whole patch to ourselves.

This was as close as Rhone was gonna get to that cute little calf munching on grass.

If only he were anywhere near that clean when we where done picking (and throwing) strawberries.

He brought along a shovel, which was fun until he wanted to shovel soil into the strawberry bucket.


As soon as we got home, we ate lunch followed by strawberry short cake. You can't go wrong when you go from vine to plate in less than an hour. Too bad Rhone's eyes are closed here.

Mom's Day and Ben's Day

For Mother's day I got to sleep in while Ben and Rhone made breakfast (Rhone loves to push the button on the blender when making smoothies). They also got me some beautiful roses and a volleyball net for the backyard. I got ready for church with no chaos and no help from Rhone. It was nice. We spent the day relaxing since we had just gotten back late the night before from our NC vacation.

Opening up my gift bright and early. Mom's are so lucky to get so much help from little ones.

Just being silly with my little guy. He sure does make being a mom lots of fun.

Trying out the net.

Ben's birthday was on the Thursday after Mother's Day. He took it and Friday off work so we could spend some time together. My amazing friend Amy watched Rhone for us, so we could go see Iron Man 2 in the theater. We ate good food, shared delicious cake with friends, played volleyball, and went biking. It was nice and relaxing. I hope Ben had a happy birthday weekend!

Ben and Rhone with the gifts and the sign Rhone made for his dad.

Look how happy Ben is about the beans he got for his birthday! I just put them in the box, so he couldn't guess what was in there. He got a gift certificate to get remote start and keyless entry on the truck. He has been planning to get it since the day he bought his truck in 2004. I decided 6 years was long enough to wait.


Ben with his birthday dinner at Texas Roadhouse.

Like father like son, Rhone at Texas Roadhouse.

4 layers of delicious chocolate decadence from the German bakery.

Burning off some of those calories biking.

OBX, NC

We took a family vacation to the Outer Banks (OBX) of North Carolina. I have to admit that until we started looking at places to visit I wasn't really sure what they were. They are a series of small islands off the coast of NC. We drove over a crazy long bridge (and under the water) to get there. It was a $12 toll each way- that's steep even for the east coast. We got our condo for a great deal through the Armed Forces Vacation Club. The drive wasn't too bad, we were able to make it each way with just 1 stop. There was so much that we didn't fit in in our week there, so we just might have to go back.

We learned that vacationing with a 1 year old sure is fun, but it sure isn't relaxing. We hadn't been in the condo for an hour before Rhone locked himself into the bedroom with Ben's shoes, wallet and keys. After 30 minutes of trying to get the door open (and "borrowing" a hanger from another condo), Ben finally popped the lock by sliding my old Block Buster card between the door and the door frame. We found Rhone sobbing and covered in deodorant that he got out of the suitcase and had a free-for-all with. He sure does keep us on out toes :)

On a rainy day we took a road trip down the length of the Outer Banks and took the ferry to Ocacroke Island. It was such a quaint little island. We didn't spend much time there, but it was still worth the trip. We couldn't believe how many shipwrecks there were around the area (it is called the graveyard of the Atlantic). So in order to reduce wrecks, there are quite a few lighthouses on the islands.

We could still get a little smile even after being in the carseat for more than 4 hours. Riding the ferry to Ocracoke Island. Wild horses roamed free on Ocracoke Island until 1959. We stopped to see a few of them in their pen. The lighthouse at Ocracoke is NC's oldest. Cape Hatteras light house is the tallest in America. It is 12 stories high. I climbed to the top, while Ben and Rhone played at the bottom (Rhone was too small to go up). The views were beautiful. The stairs in the light house. I couldn't believe how much detail they put into the lighthouse (see the marble checkerboard floors at the landing).

First Flights

Kitty Hawk, North Carolina is the famous location of the Wright brothers first successful flight. There is a huge Wright Brothers National Memorial there ran by the National Park Service. The actual points of take off and landing are marked from the first flights. Ben and I also took our first hang gliding flights in North Carolina. We flew on the same sandy dunes that appealed to the Wright Brothers in Jockey Ridge State Park. We both had a great time- actually I had an amazing time. I had to come back a second day for better wind conditions and I had one on one lessons with my instructors and great winds.

Rhone flying with one of the Wright brothers on the replica statue. It was quite a walk to get to the monument. A gust of wind came along and Rhone almost headed down the stairs in his stroller. Thankfully 2 stairs and he stopped- good thing he was strapped in! The markers of the 1st 4 flights all taken the same day. The 4th was definitely the longest. Hiking on the sand dunes in Jockey Ridge. The first trip out I carried Rhone hoping he would stay a sleep. We wised up and put him in the backpack the next 2 trips out to the dunes. Ben getting ready for take-off.

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Ben's 1st flight and a great landing.
You run down a super steep sand dune to take off. My instructor is on the slope. The person just behind him is on the ground. I was pretty high. Seriously this was so much fun!

Thought you might get a kick outta my landing. It definitely isn't my best, but I did manage to land on my feet a few times.

Enjoying the sand and water.

We did 2 big water activities. Ben took surfing lessons and the whole family went on a kayaking trip. We did it with a company called Kitty Hawk Kayak and Surf School, they were great. Both the tour and lesson were private (for a group price). Of course we also enjoyed the comfy temperatures, the beautiful views and the dolphin sightings.

On Kitty Hawk Beach.

Right after breakfast at Nags Head Beach.

Ben's surf lesson looked like it went really well (since I was only watching, that's about all I can say). Rhone and I just played on the beach and watch. There were also dolphins swimming in the area. They were beautiful.

Paddling hard. Catching a wave.

All tuckered out while Dad is surfing.

On our kayak trip we paddled through a Maritime forest. It was beautiful, we saw snakes, turtles, fish, and birds. We were a little worried about Rhone but he did great. He had his own little seat which he sat in until he got tired and restless. He put his hands in the water, straddled the seat to get a leg in the water, and paddled a little.

Getting ready to push off. Checking out the water. We were grateful for the strap on the back of his life jacket.

Ben's 1st try at surfing. You might wanna turn down the volume (I'm pretty loud).

Roanoke Island

The name should sound familiar- after all Roanoke was the home of the 1st English colony in America. Nearly 80 settlers who were left behind had simply vanished when the supply ships came back for them, giving it the name of the lost colony. We went to the original fort site. However it they were doing some major repairs, so we weren't able to see much of Fort Raleigh. We did walk along the trails though. We also stopped at Roanoke Island Festival Park. It was full of exciting hands on things including a Indian artifacts, a working replica of 16th century ship, a working blacksmith and a children's museum. We went back to Roanoke island to enjoy a little street festival in the old downtown area where we heard live music and scored delicious $2 fish tacos. If you are in the Outer Banks a trip to this Island is a must.

At Fort Raleigh, Roanoke, NC.

Our little confederate at the children's museum.


Aboard Elizabeth II. This ship was really, really interesting. The guides were in character too.

Swobbing the deck.
Ben in colonial armor. Can't you just picture him protecting the colony. It was amazing how heavy that gear was. I couldn't believe how many things there were that you could touch. There were leather cups and tanned skins- it was really interesting.




Ben and Rhone in a sink box while duck hunting. It was one of the activities once prevalent on the island.