Thanksgiving

We had a great Thanksgiving feast! I'm sorry I don't have any pictures of it but I wanted to enjoy my time instead of miss out. Trey and I drove up to Monterrey to visit with my aunt Trisha and uncle Tony, they have an amazing house out there. My cousins Henry and Daisy were fun to hang out with I haven't seen them in years and boy have they grown up! We also got to spend time with my other cousins Emily and Carlos and their little girl Zoe, she was precious. I did take a few pictures of the beautiful arrangements that Trisha just threw together, they were perfect.

I love that my family is creative and artistic.

OH MY GOSH!

Is he not the cutest thing ever!

Rub a dub dub, what's that?!

That's our boy!

Happy Halloween!

I know its a bit early but I just wanted to share with everyone Charlie's costume! Plus, I got to play around with my green screen.

Granma's visit

My mom just went home after staying with us for a week. We had a nice time.

Charlie and Granma at the San Diego Zoo.

The Fam.
Just a quick shot in front of the house. HAHA!

We were at the beach and the wind was terrible so we had to make a string out of a trash bag so his hat would stay on, needless to say he didn't like it.

CRY BABY! And Charlie wasn't very pleasant either.

Bath time! Mmmm, clean baby smell.

This was just too cute! We were eating dinner and Trey was talking to Charlie.... (if you look close you can see his two little teeth!)

The Weekly Charlie

We went to a picnic

We're starting early with football. Well, he at least liked watching it. But when he was mad Trey took him for a ride around the field. He said it was like cutting the grass but the lawn-mower keeps crying.

The Chronicles of a Military Move

WARNING! THIS EDITION IS LONG AND LENGTHY BUT I’LL TRY TO MAKE IT WORTH THE TIME.


Before I get started let me say that we made it ok and are settling in nicely to our little apartment here in San Diego.

JUNE 18th
The packing company showed up at our house two hours late. They seemed to be nice and all together but by the end of the day we realized that out of the three of them they all lacked common sense. Things that we needed packed (i.e.: junk drawer items and pictures on the walls) were not packed and useless things (i.e.: South Carolina yellow pages and a bag of trash) were quickly boxed up.

Let me say this there are many upsides to a move in the Navy. For example, all you have to do pretty much is sit back and relax while some else does all the packing, although very stressful for someone with OCD. Another great thing is you don’t pay a thing! But is putting the fate of your belongings in the incapable hands of Larry, Curly, and Moe worth it? Details to come.

JUNE 19th
The moving company shows up bright and early. Three new guys come in and hit the ground running… or so we thought. The ring leader (Mr. Clean) gets right down to business taking inventory of everything while his two clowns, lets just call them Twiddle-Dee and Twiddle-Dumb, start moving boxes out.

Just a quick side note, for those who might be curious, inventory is very tedious. First a sticker is placed on a box or a piece of furniture. If it’s a box a general description is written down on the paper work. Furniture receives a sticker and then a VERY detailed description, every nik and scratch is catalogued so much that when I was reading through what they wrote down I found they were claiming damage that didn’t exist, at least not yet! Once an item is inventoried it can be loaded onto the truck.

Back to the show, Mr. Clean worked for a company in California and his two doofi worked here locally in Charleston. Instead of making sense and having a “plan of attack” our three-ring circus decided to wing it. Like I said earlier Mr. Clean started the inventory while Dee and Dumb started moving boxes out. Did I mention that they had NOT been inventoried! So to waste their time all the boxes had to come back in. If it had been up to me each person would get a stack of paper work and a roll of stickers and sent to different rooms. Then once everything is inventoried start moving thing out and onto the truck. Unfortunately, Mr. Clean didn’t trust Twiddle-Dee and Twiddle-Dumb so they ended up sitting around twiddling their thumbs! Then one by one boxes went out and were put in the street! THE STREET! Not the truck but the street! Because Mr. Clean wanted to be in charge of everything nothing could go on the truck just in the street. Mr. Clean was also very unprofessional when things started clearing out I grabbed my camera so I could document all of our big items (i.e.: our B.A. tv, furniture and any damage that already existed). When I went over to Trey’s golf clubs I climbed up on a chair to get a good angle Mr. Clean came in, looked right at me and said and I quote “What you think I’m gonna steal your golf clubs?” How am I supposed to respond to that! After that I was so uncomfortable for the rest of the day. Luckily my wonderful neighbor Tomiko was there while Trey was at work. If she hadn’t been around I would have lost my mind. I wish I could tell you everything that went on but it would take too long I’ll just let the pictures do all the talking.

Charlie sure does miss Tomiko

All the lovely scratches they left for the new tennant

After a whopping SEVEN HOURS LATER! All of our belongings were loaded onto two trucks. Apparently the moving company wasn’t prepared for the amount of stuff that we had, even after we filled out a form and declared somewhere around 6 to 7 thousand pounds. Mr. Clean’s explanation for the two trucks “ If the family before you didn’t have that picnic table I would’ve been able to get all of your things onto one truck.”

June 20th
We camped out at the house for the last time, which was pretty sad for me but we had a great time over at our other neighbors (Ginny and Bubba) house. We all, including Tomiko, went over and played their Wii. It was great! I had so much fun playing tennis and bowling that I want to get one.

Anyways the next morning we got up, packed up and headed off to Helen, GA for a short two-day detour. We met up with Trey’s parents and their motorcycle group. Yup, that’s right my in-laws hang with a tough crowd, a bunch of good ol’ folks loving life and huggin’ the road. Almost every weekend without fail there is a ride going on somewhere and most likely Joy and Stan are there. I tell you what I’ve only been on the bike with Stan in Alabama so my opinion doesn’t mean much but that is the best state to ride a motorcycle. That’s if you like goin’ up hills and takin’ curves so tight that you can smell the pavement. I love riding and I can’t wait til I have a bike of my own. Anyways, Helen was nice if you ever get the chance to go it’s worth it. They have it set up like a quaint little German village, cute shops and an awesome lazy river. Charlie wasn’t big enough for all of us to go but next time we’ll all go.

Then it was on to Birmingham, AL for a week and a half. We visited with all of our family and really just took it easy while we were home. Stan took me out on the bike so I had a great time. Joy took us to her new office downtown and introduced Charlie to all her co-workers; they just eat him up. Since we took Charlie to Joy’s office we had to stop by to see Stan. While Trey and I visited with everyone, Charlie sat with Jo-Jo and helped her enter in some numbers. Charlie loves his Jo-Jo.

Out cold

Some old Guy that showed up

I cut my hair, its cute

One day!
Stop your killing me!




I got bored one night
My all time favorite picture

July 5th
We loaded up both our cars and started our cross country drive. Joy came along to help out. By the time we entered Mississippi we all were pretty bored so we started “Name that sound!” that only lasted for about thirty minutes. After that all I could do is what I know best take pictures.

Somewhere in Mississippi

We deceided to play chicken

Texas

We ended the day in Weatherford, TX.

July 6th

Our goal today is to make it to make it to Deming, NM.

"Energy. Past, present, and future"

"Strange how clouds that look like mountains in the sky are next to mountains anyway."

John Mayer

Border Patrol

We made it just in time to relax in the hot tub. Then Charlie went swimming for the first time. Now I admit that it was done in the wrong order because the pool was freezing!

July 7th

We get a good start to the day because it’s the last day of driving!

"Day Break"

Arizona

We made it by about 4 in the afternoon. We went to check out the apartment and were pleased so we called our agent but we couldn’t sign the papers until the next day. So we checked in to Mission Valley Resort it was awesome it looked like you stepped back in time to 1930 or 1940. All I could think about was “I wonder if any one famous ever stayed here?” Once again we went to the hot tub to relax this time Charlie hung out in his car seat and slept. There were two other couples there and I really think that they got the biggest kick out of listening to the three of us talk. One guy from Washington state was blown away by all of Joy’s motorcycle stories, especially by the fact that she still rides as much as she does after her wreck.

The next day after we signed the papers we went and set up camp at the apartment. It was very interesting finding ways to entertain ourselves. After three games of rummy we were bored.

Thursday we got all or our belongings delivered to us. Now the continuation of our Three Ring Circus! The two guys that came were soooo nice I wish that they could have helped us the whole time.

Only a few boxes looked like that

Most of our things made it but there are still quite a few things we’re going to have to file a claim on.
Well I hope that I didn’t drive you crazy with my EXTREMELY long entry. We now are pretty settled in we still just a few boxes left to unpack but once we get the boxes we’ve set aside for Goodwill out of the garage we’ll be in good shape. I have pictures of the apartment once we get in all nice and cleaned up.