Well, it's been a LONG time since I wrote anything on this blog!  Wow.  We've been busy and having fun in our new city, New Orleans.  Technically, we live in Belle Chasse on the Navy base but we are only 20 minutes from NOLA so it's just as accurate. 

We have visited a lot of the city, not nearly half of it but we've been to the Zoo a few times, the Aquarium a few times, walked downtown during the day and afternoon and just shopped.  It's really nice to shop any store we want, even if we don't buy anything since living in Paris means you have to travel at least an hour to get to the bigger stores. 

Emma has a babysitter, Marica, who is a Corpsman at the clinic Byron works at.  She is really sweet and loves spending time with Emma.  Having her allows Byron and I to go out on dates and just spend time together.  We've been to the movies, out to dinner, we've gone downtown and rode in horse drawn carriages and eaten at Cafe Du Monde.  It's so nice to experience this city with him.  I really love the area, for the most part.  The ONLY thing I don't like about NOLA and surrounding areas is the drivers.  I have NEVER seen drivers like the people in NOLA.  I literally got run off the road yesterday with my rims hitting the sidewalk because people here just cut you off and keep on going.  Speeding here is crazy and nobody seems to care if they run up on your bumper.  Think of the worst driving experience you've had in a city and double it.  The roads aren't very good either, with lots of bumps and hills right in the roads and Byron says all I do is complain about the roads.  It's true!

We've traveled some for Byron's career, to Denver CO and to Pensacola FL.  It's been fun to be able to go with him while he has things to complete and we know we are lucky to be able to do that.  I'm glad Emma is getting to experience things that she might not have if we hadn't come back into the military.  I say we a lot when I talk about the military because really, he's the one with the career here but we are in it with him.  There are so many resources for military spouses and I've really invested in them.  I'm reading books and learning I'm not alone in some of my feelings.  When Byron was in the Navy before, we lived off base so I really didn't get the military wife experience.  I'm getting it now! 

Most of you know that Byron will be deploying next year.  I can't say where or when but if you'd like to know, text me and I'll let you know!  It's not exactly safe to send this info over the internet. Byron will be gone for a few months and we are as prepared for this as we can be.  I've learned things I need to know and activities that will be good for Emma and I to do when he's gone.  He will be participating in a medical/humanitarian mission and I'm so proud of him.  He really is amazing.  I'm proud to be a part of this Navy and his career.  IA (individual augmentees or deployments) is part of what Byron needs to do in the Navy and we were prepared for this before he signed his contracts.  I didn't think it would be so soon but we are doing well so far.  I know it will be an adjustment and we will all struggle sometimes but we all have such wonderful support, I know we'll be fine! 

We have a wonderful church family and they are all really sweet to us.  We've jumped in with both feet and will be helping with activities as much as we can.  The preacher and his wife, Scott and Melissa Cain, have 3 boys and Emma calls them "my boys".  One of them is my youngest nephew's age and is Emma's buddy.  They "run" together at church and since Emma is the only girl there all the time, it's fun to see her interact with the boys.  She, at this point, only has boy cousins  that she's been around most of the time so  she tries to tackle the boys at church like she does with her BB and Cameron but sometimes it's not as successful and I have to remind her that not all boys like to be tackled.  Melissa teaches her boys that girls are "delicate" which I think is precious but we all know Emma isn't delicate all the time :)  The eldership at this church is very supportive and involved and I appreciate them so much.  It almost makes me sad to know that we will be only be here 3 years because of the relationship we are forming with the church folks here. 

Ok, I've rambled enough and I know I need to add pictures but honestly, most of you are facebook friends and I add pictures there all the time :)

Stuff

Tomorrow, finally, we will have all our "stuff"!  I cannot explain how wonderful it will be to have plates and silverware.  :)

Here's a little thing though:  We have "stuff" in our house here in LA that we needed.  We have exactly what we need (except for laundry machines) but we have clothes, food and shelter.  Isn't that what anyone truly needs on this earth?  We have found a place to worship and we meet with the elders on Sunday.  We are thrilled about that so our earthly life is covered and our spiritual life has found a home as well.  Emma loves it and we are excited to begin working there!

I just erased a little message that was in this spot and I'm glad I did.  I was about to defend my parenting decisions but you know what?  I don't have to defend what I do or don't do for my child.  She is healthy and active and beautiful.  End of rant.

We went to Byron's office yesterday.  Emma was flirted with by some of the medical staff and I told her we'd have to find her a good Navy man.  She just smiled but played shy.  Shy is fine with me until she's 35.  Seriously.

NOLA...so far

Well, we've been here officially about a month!  It's been hot but you know what, I'm pretty used to it.  I never thought I would say that but the heat doesn't really bother me anymore.  I don't stay out in it for hours or anything but at least I have a tan and that hasn't happened in several years!

We have a daily occurrence of jets flying over and afternoon rainshowers.  I love the smell of the rain.

We have a really nice neighbor who brought me some red potatoes yesterday and she and I got to chat some yesterday.  It was nice to talk to an adult!!! Once school gets started, the base will have more programs and things going on for us to do.  We've been to NOLA a few times, the aquarium, the zoo and shopping in Metarie.  Metarie has a wonderful mall and I told Byron if he ever wants to do something really nice for me, he just needs to give me some money and send me to Metarie for the day!

If you read my facebook, you've already seen this pictures but I thought I'd add some just for fun.  :)

Thoughts on moving and LA

Every time I type "LA", I think someone will mistake it for Los Angeles and think we've moved to crazyland.  Anywho, I've been putting off writing anything until I could come up with something other than "we moved and have very little of our belongings thanks to the military movers". 

So here's what I've got:  We moved and I wish we had just moved ALL our stuff ourselves. By this point, I would probably feel a little more settled.  At least we brought some things to make it feel homey.  Don't get me wrong, this house is home but having our stuff would make it even better.  :)  At least Byron gets to come home at lunch and anytime from 4-5.

Speaking of Byron, he's doing well.  They aren't letting him do much at work!  They said they would work him up to see 20 patients a day.   HA! Little do they know he was seeing 40 a day at the clinic and 50 a day (sometimes) at the ER!  He has an office he will share with another PA, who is a civilian.  Here's a little sidebar:  This clinic is in need of Doctors and PAs as they are understaffed.  If anyone feels like they need a change or frizzy hair, come on down!

Our families are adjusting to the move.  They were really sad and still may be but at least they aren't crying every time I talk to them :)  Emma is adjusting, has adjusted.  She always says she wants to go to the new house and rarely asks about the other house.  I've been keeping her busy.  We've gone shopping to all the stores and as a family, we've gone swimming and gone to the Aquarium.  We bought a pass that covers the Zoo and Aquarium but it's too hot for the zoo right now.  Emma can open the doors here so we've bought door knob covers and alarms for the doors.  We also bought a gate for the top of the stairs and she is trying her best to shake the thing off the wall.  It's pretty funny.  She's also learned to throw major fits at the grocery store so that's fun.

Things I miss about Paris:  Close proximity and decent drivers.  Everything is pretty spread out, not like Paris or even Jackson.  Most of the stores and restaurants are spread out pretty far.  The Outback here wasn't very good and that made me sad.  There are so many Subways, Popeyes chickens and drive thru Daiquiri places that we never drive too far before we see another one.  There are also a lot of stop lights so there are lots of stop and gos and people cutting you off.  I do not enjoy driving in this area.  

I do love having a NEX (Navy Exchange) and Commissary (grocery store).  They are both tax free and accept coupons!  The funny thing to me is the Commissary is only open from 10-6 and the NEX not much later than that.  There are some things that neither have that I have to venture into town for :).  

Hopefully within a few days, a moving company will have an open date to be able to move the rest of our stuff here.  I also hope someone will buy our house...I hope it gets shown or something!  We'd like to not have to pay that mortgage for much longer.  :)

Update!!!

Byron graduates from Officer Development School on Friday!!  Mom, Emma and I are flying out to Rhode Island Thursday and Byron and I will get to have a nice dinner with his class that night and then Mom, Emma, Byron's parents, Jimmy and Brandon will all get to watch him graduate! Long time coming!!! 

We've had some difficulty with getting movers to have an open date to pick up our stuff anytime soon, Byron and I will plan to take beds and other necessities on down to Belle Chasse on the 29th and Emma will join us by the weekend.  Hopefully, the transportation office will be able to nail down a moving company soon!

We had someone look at our house this past Friday and they seemed interested so hopefully we might have a sale soon!  It's gonna be a busy busy month ahead but I'll be so glad for us all to be together and get back to normal!  Whew!!! 

A little of God's Blessings

I was thinking today about God's blessings.  I've always been able to look back over my life and my families' lives and could see where God blessed us.  I can clearly see where He placed things in our path or took things out of our path and helped us make decisions.  It's amazing to me. 

This week, some thoughts really played loudly in my head.  I can see those blessings happening again.  I can look back over several months and see where our direction changed and we headed where God decided we would fit best. 

I used to pray to God for my husband.  Now, this was when I was in high school and college.  I prayed that God would take care of him (since He already knew it would be Byron and I didn't) and keep him safe.  I now know how safe God kept Byron.  You see, Byron was a bit "rowdy" as a teenager and young adult.  I remember one particular time in high school that Byron was letting me drive his Monte Carlo and I thought it was so cool to drive his awesome car.  He told me he needed to stop at the bathroom so we turned into the local park and he ran into the bathroom.  A few seconds later, he came running out and told me to go and as I got ready to pull out of the parking spot, I heard a big boom!  Byron had thrown a cherry bomb in the toilet!  That was a small thing for him.  There were people back in those days that didn't think Byron would make it doing anything important.  They figured he would always be in trouble and never really make much out of himself.  Little did they know about his work ethic and his wonderful family who supported him and kept encouraging him.  He started as a Vet Tech, then began working at the hospital as a Phlebotomist and eventually joined the Navy as a US Navy Corpsman ( or Doc to the Marines and Sailors).  Now, he's a Physician Assistant joining the Navy again as Lieutenant Byron Breeding!

While he was in the Navy, I was at school at Freed Hardeman.  I never really got into any major trouble in high school.  I was a "good girl".  Something happened when I got to FHU and I don't know if it was the freedom I had or what but I went a little CRAZY.  I won't go into detail but I dated some boys that I shouldn't have, I went places I shouldn't have and I did things I will NEVER tell my child about.  What is interesting about that time is I'm glad that everything that happened, happened for me and to me.  I learned so much about life and how to react to those things.  I learned who I was and who I didn't need to be.  Now, here's where Byron comes in.  I "met" Byron again at a place in Jackson that I did not to be.  If FHU had found out I was there, I would have been kicked out of school.  Now, how does a person find God's blessings in a club?  I'm not sure about that but ever since that night, my life changed.  I believe we were supposed to meet again and we quickly fell in love.  Right after we met again, Byron shipped off on  the USS Shreveport for a 6 month float around places like Egypt and Israel.  My love only got stronger while he was gone and we were engaged about a month after he returned and married 8 months later in January 2001.

I KNOW that God blessed my life with Byron and I think what if the things in my life never happened?  What if I missed the opportunity to see Byron again and missed out on this wonderful life we have?  You see, we probably weren't supposed to make anything significant out of our lives because at some point, we were both into things we shouldn't have been into.  I made lots of mistakes, acting a fool to a lot of people and I just hope that I can take those mistakes and teach Emma how NOT to do things.   Would I change anything?  Absolutely not.  I had a lot of fun growing up and made some of the best friends of my life.  It's amazing how God blesses me and how he continues to do so.  Just look at Emma!  What a little blessing...she's so much like me and Byron it's scary but I can't wait to see what she makes of herself!

"Did y'all know it was the beginning of Hurricane Season?"

Some of the first words we heard as we (Mom and I) came to Belle Chasse Naval Air Station Joint Reserve Base.  My response was about Tornado Season and I'd much rather be in Hurricane Country because you have time to run.

Our time in New Orleans was fun.  The day trip down was easy once we got past Memphis and all it's confusion.  Straight 9 hour trip from Paris, TN to New Orleans LA.  We stayed at a Hampton Inn and Mom likes to say we got propositioned as we pulled into the hotel.  It was more like creepy guys (one young and one old) walking up to the car asking we wanted some Smirnoff from their cooler.  "No thank you" and go away.  They were still outside of the hotel hours later.

These pictures were as we drove over the causeway or whatever it's called....lots of rushing water, I'm assuming from spillways being open.  It was interesting to see anyway.







The Superdome!
 

The Tallest Bridge I have ever driven over and I didn't like it one bit.  I slide down in the seat like a crazy woman driving across this bridge.  After 4-5 times, I got used to it. Ugh.

















Above is something outside of all Navy Bases I've ever seen...a Blue Angels Plane.  Most of them have some type of Navy plane outside.



RiverWalk.  One of the neatest shopping centers and since it was 102 degrees outside, we decided to walk around in here!  Fun!!