Beaches of Hawaii :: Part Uno

The kids are out of school until October 12th for Fall Break and I decided to make sure it's a fun one, so we are going to explore the island of Oahu and go to a different beach every day.

Saturday, we made it down to Lanikai Beach on the leeward side, and even though we weren't there for very long, it was a nice start to our adventures. :O) The sand there is so soft and fine, that the only pain in the butt is it sticks to you majorly!! We shared the day with my friend Emily and her son Xander. The kids really do enjoy having a friend there and it makes it doubly nice for me to have another adult to share conversation with. After the beach we hit up a burger place in Kailua and ate some yummy grub.

Today we decided to try out White Sands beach on the Leeward side thanks to a friend of Emily's. It was more packed than I thought it would be but again the day turned out awesome!! We were there for about 4 hours and the kids soaked it up. I love that side of the island because you have a beautiful view of Waikiki and Diamond Head off in the distance. Not to mention Jayce loves that he can see airplanes flying over head from the airport nearby. That kid is crazy about his airplanes and helicopters. It was pretty wavy but the older kids love it for boarding, and to make it even better, they could go out 1000 feet and it was still only about 4 feet deep. I even made it out once and enjoyed the waves. The kids found shells, sea glass, and buried each other a couple times. I loved every minute. After, we went to grab subs and salads in Kapolei and then headed home. It really was an awesome weekend and I am excited for tomorrow, think we are taking the kids snorkeling at Sharks Cove. The older ones really want to snorkel :O)

The beautiful view of Waikiki. The ugly fence is to keep people from going over towards the rocks, even though some still made their way over there. Taking a break for snack. Still at snack time, but this time getting a smile from a group of 4 happy kids. Love those faces!! Jayce had his turned to be buried and they really packed him in there!! After the boys buried Bekah. It is always so great to see them play well with one another. Memories in the making. Me trying to soak up some sun.

Life's Lemons

I've been feeling very....oh what's the word? Resentful? Bitter? Angry? Annoyed?

Not quite sure but it's a negative feeling towards the sour lemons life has been tossing my way lately.
I try each day to keep walking in the positive and to see my glass half full, but I find at the end of each day I feel like, again, I have failed.
Where are we? Day 174
One Seventy Flipping Four!! In 10 days it will be 6 months down since I saw my Man In Boots and am feeling the strain of doing this alone. Trying to carry the stress of everything I keep adding to my plate has me more than overwhelmed.
Let's start with a month ago Michael came and as much as I love him, it's one of the hardest things I've ever known to be a step mom. Unless you are a step parent, with no disrespect, you can't relate. He has started acting out and showing a lot of disrespect. I can only feel like I am failing him and like I'm not a good person for him. I don't know, maybe caring for him, moving him to a new place, in the middle of a deployment with the evil step mom was not the best decision on our part. I'm not giving up though, it's just making me doubt who I am as a parent.
Then we can move on to Mike's health scare. You want to talk about a panic attack....that was a major one. For Four days I barely slept, broke down at the drop of a hat, and felt so helpless. It's almost been a week since it started and I still have an overwhelming need to cry constantly when I think of it even though he's back at work.

When I watched his plane leave until I could no longer see it, I turned and got in to my car with the constant fear I may never see him again because Afghanistan might take him from me, but I never thought about his health. So consumed with the worry of injury, you think more of that than losing him to his own body failing of sickness. Well not anymore. Another dose of reality is what I learned with that one. That man is everything that makes my heart skip. Everything that I could ever imagine true love being. To imagine life without him....is not something I can even shutter at.

On to today, carrying all the stresses of the last couple weeks on my shoulder, I woke up sick and so did Jayce. Poor little guy is miserable when the nasty Mr. Disease knocks at his door but he really does handle it well. No cleaning was done, kids didn't make it to school. Bekah missed the bus because I overslept, and I mean OVER slept. Staying up until 3am wouldn't have been bad if the sickness didn't crawl in my bed as I slept. Regardless it feels like a wasted day, and even though yesterday felt like a success, it didn't last. My question to life for myself is when will I get two days of feeling amazing....in a row?? WHAT do I need to do to make it that way? I have an amazing life, I know it, but yet can't recognize it when life throws one, or two lemon at my feet. :O/
I am a blessed girl, I just wish I could find a way to recognize that in my darkest moments, and let that carry me in to the next thought, instead of the million overwhelming emotions that flood in istead.

Here's to trying again tomorrow....

Extended Break : Over

It's been a while! Seems I start that way every few months on this thing because I fall in and out of blogging. But the Break (again) is over.
I need my OUT for this deployment. I have done well with not feeling the constant need to pound out my frustrations on the keyboard but I feel it all stacking up inside.
We have made it through the first full month of Deployment and in that month, I have had numerous break downs, numerous lift ups, Bin Laden was killed, and one of our Soldiers from 3rd BDE gave his life for the War in Afghanistan.
It's very emotional to go through the day to day, but I do it. Somehow, I do it.
I am not always at my best and too many days I feel like I am failing at keeping it together but most importantly I am still trying. God Bless my babies and brother, for they put up with all my emotions and each time I snap, yell, or lose my mind on them. Yet, half the time THEY ARE WHY I do that, it still dissapoints me that I can not keep it together 100% of the time. I won't lie or try to pretend that I can handle every second of the day with a smile, because I am human and can't. My promise to myself, Mike, and them is to try harder the next day and even when I fail early in the morning, I keep trying as the day goes on. :O)

One of my snaps was just this evening. Jayce decided to take the laundry detergent and poor it all out into my drawer below the washer. We have the front loader style with the pedastal underneath and when I saw the detergent continuing to fill up my laundry room floor, I was not happy to open the drawer and see it full of blue detergent. I got quite frustrated because it seems my 2 year old can NOT leave things alone that he has been told NO to a hundred times. He is smart and he knows better but he really is a menace. I took him straight to his room and put him to bed. He wasn't happy with me for that but sometimes a Mother knows it is just better to not "deal" with the child in the moment. If I was a cartoon character at that moment I would have had my head spinning in circles with steam coming our of my ears and nose.
Everyone knew I was not in a happy place, because when I came back downstairs to clean up the mess, both Bekah and Jonathan had quietly dissapeared to their rooms. LOL They are very smart kids at times!!
Then came the joy of cleaning that up! Now if you have ever tried to clean up laundry detergent it is quite a challenge. I decided to use hand towels to scoop it out of the drawer and rinse as much as I could in the sink. Which I need to say to housing, THANK YOU for the deep sinks in the launrdy rooms. It really is one of the only things ya'll have done right in making these homes and it has become my life saver on numerous occasions.
Back to my clean up process, it took a while and then I had to clean the floor with a seperate cleaner and paper towels because of course the detergent makes the floors slippery. *sigh* I was quite lost on what would be the best option on how to handle the towels soaked in detergent that after rinsing them as much as possible, I put them in the washer!!
Take a moment....can you imagine what happened?? SMH
Think about it....
Just another second....
Did it come to you????
Yep, SUDS!! And suds in a front loader are not like suds in a top loader. It took almost 3.5 hours to do one load becuase the machine had to keep stopping to let the suds pop and then rinse again. As I write this I am actually able to finally get that load out of the dryer. My laundry room and that load of towels really do smell good. They should, they were only treated to a full on cleaning with a WHOLE bottle of detergent.

In all of that stress and what felt like errupting emotions, I was able to realize how lucky and grateful I am that Jayce was not hurt. He didn't try to drink it or get it all over himself and is upstairs sleeping peacefully.
Tomorrow might bring even more madness but as Mommy, I am ready.