My 8 Year Anniversary

8 years ago today, July 15th 2001, I signed over the responsibility of my life to the Army. I remember like it was yesterday sitting down in front of my recruiter (which after some time served realized was so full of shit it wasn't even funny), taking one last look at my mom (I was only 17, she had to approve of my enlistment), and signing my name as a now declared adult.

I signed only a few weeks after I graduated high school. My goal was to enlist as a military police officer and in turn get top of the line training and financial help with my college in order to one day be a DEA agent.

I was on a delayed program and wouldn't enter basic training and AIT (advanced individual training) until February 2002. In between the time I signed on the dotted line and my actual training, September 11th happened. I was so scared that I was going to be sent to war. I was still an untrained civilian only knowing that I belonged to the US government. Yet the scared girl turned into a determined pissed up soldier and when I stepped off that bus at Fort Leonardwood I was ready for whatever they could dish out at me.

Many soldiers I went to basic with had signed after Sept. 11th and that was their motivation. I remember the drill sergeants making comments about how they couldn't get troops signed and trained fast enough. The country had been so motivated to support and fight.

I graduated from basic and AIT at the end of June 2002 and reported to the head quarters of my assigned unit. My MP Company had been deployed to the defense language institute (DLI) in Monterey, CA. Being fresh out of training and in a active duty life style, I wanted to join them. I begged to go. I got the same answer over and over. They are due to come home next month, it would be a waste of time and paperwork to send you now. They didn't actually make it back until October 2002.

By then I had somewhat fitted back into the civilian lifestyle and had reconnected with my friends. I was happy being home and just in time for an upset. Orders had come down in December 2002 that we were being deployed to Iraq in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. In February 2003 we found ourselves in Fort Lewis training and certifying and by May 2003 my platoon was in the heart of Iraq.

We finally made it home the Wednesday before Thanksgiving and after a short visit home for the holiday, spent another month in Fort Lewis turning in equipment and signing more paperwork.

Since then, the Army has given me the opportunity working with the Nevada Counterdrug Taskforce teaching young kids the dangers of drugs and eventually led me to my current occupation. I absolutely love my career and wake up every day feeling blessed.

So yes the Army challenged me in ways I never thought I possible and I didn't always like it BUT I am very very thankful for my journey.

Out for a Ride

A couple of weekends ago, Chi and I were out at my mom's house. I decided to take Chi for a horse back ride. I saddled up Shane and Candy, threw Chi up on Candy and away we went. We were gone for a good hour or so before we made our way home. I forgot how relaxing and soothing a good horseback ride out in the empty desert is. Plus it was great to have Malachi by my side and have small talk with him.

Afterwards, Malachi help me dress down and brush off Ms Candy like a good lil man. We have both decided that this will have to be at least a monthly occurence from now on...

A Picture Worth a Thousand Words

Malachi's 'oranges' finally dropped.

Sorry... I couldn't resist. I was dying laughing in the grociery store and the poor lil guy had no idea why.

First Semester of Skate Class Over!

On June 22nd Malachi had his last skating lesson of the semester AND his big test. He had to pass a series of tasks in order to get his certificate to move on to the next level.

Chi had to skate across the rink, skate three strides and then hold, skate three strides and then dip down and hold, skate three strides and then stop immediately and lastly do this sort of wiggle across the rink with his feet together.

He did sooooooo well and passed everything!! He got a little certificate which he immediately brought to me. He was so proud of himself and I was just as proud too!

My little man is quite the athlete!!

The End of Soccer Season 2009

June 13th was Malachi's last soccer game for the season. He has grown so much since his first practice. He is by far the fastest kid on the team and in my opinion the most competitive. Chi usually has to sit out a few minutes of each half in order to rotate all the kids in. This drives him absolutely nuts! He wants to play every minute! Chi is definitely a offensive player though. And when his partner in crime, Ben an awesome defensive player who can get the ball away from anyone, and he get together... No one can stop them!

His last game he scored 3 goals and the game before he scored 4!!
Malachi received a trophy for his participation and I think he is starting his own kind of messed up tradition. Just like with his baseball trophy... Chi managed to drop his soccer trophy but minutes after receiving is and busted it is 3 places. It's a good thing I have a large supply of super glue and I put it back together again. Silly boy...

Who's the Boss?

Recently Malachi has decided that he likes to give you permission to do things. Usually this comes when you have already started to do something. Such as:


I'm in the middle of pouring myself a glass of juice.
Malachi says, "Mommy, you can have some juice if you want to."
or
I get into the doggy cookie jar to give Diesel a cookie and as I'm giving Diesel his treat...
Malachi says, "Mommy, you can give bubba a cookie if you want to."
I think it's very cute that he has the need to feel like he has some power over things. However I do have to remind him of the actual rank structure in the house. This is how it goes:

Mommy: "Malachi, who's the boss?"
Malachi: "You are mommy."
Mommy: "Why am I the boss?"
Malachi: "Because you're a woman."

VACATION!!!!! WHOO HOO!!!

Justin, Malachi, and I headed to San Diego Thursday morning for our mini vacation. We arrived at our hotel around noon and headed straight for the beach. The weather wasn't all that great, but I promised Malachi that he would get to see the ocean and build a sand castle.

Malachi's beautiful sand castle:

On Friday, we got up and headed to Sea World. Our first stop was the Shamu show of course.

Then after the Shamu show, we walked through the carnival area. Justin decided that he wanted to play a few games. The first he picked was where you toss a little ring at several bottles and try to get it around the neck of the bottle. An entire bucket of rings was $5 and believe it or not, Justin landed one on his fourth try!!! And the prize......

Justin won a enormous Shamu for Chi. Now of course he had to do this at the beginning of the day. We were stuck carrying this thing around for the remainder of the day, which was not an easy task. We definitely got a lot of attention and even got cash offers for the Shamu.

After Shamu, we found ourselves at the sea lions and seals. I found this to be the most entertaining of the whole day. You were allowed to buy fish and hand feed them. They would bark and beg to you for the fish.

This little guy was smart. He perched himself up on this rock and screamed at you as he waved his flipper to get your attention. I think he figured out that the most loud and annoying one would get the most fish. He was definitely well fed.

We caught a glimpse of a few sea turtles. It would have been nice if we could have got a little closer though.

Then we made our way to the dolphins. Chi was trying really hard to get them to swim close enough so that he could touch them. Unfortunately, he was unsuccessful.

But he did get pretty close as they swam by the tank. He loved it.

Then we saw the flamingos. There were hundreds of them. They had a jar you could buy flamingo food from for 50cents. I think it was dog food, it sure smelt like it.

After a wonderful fun day at Sea World, we headed about a hour north to my father's house. Chi got some good quality time in with his uncle Alex.

Saturday morning was the oldest of my three brothers, Jack's graduation from High School. His next journey... UC Davis.

This morning we packed up and got ready for our drive home. My father took us out to breakfast before we took off. Chi and he enjoyed making silly faces and playing with each other in their last minutes until next time.

We all had an absolute wonderful time. I was great to get away for a few days. Although, I am happy to be back home and I can't wait to sleep in my bed tonight.

A Little Locked Up

I do believe this is Malachi's ultimate moment since his existence thus far.

Sunday morning Justin, Chi and I made our way down stairs to get some breakfast and watch some TV.
As most of you know by now, Chi has expressed very strongly that he wants to become a police officer. He tells Justin just about every chance he gets of how he wants to go to work with him and get the bad guys.
So just before Justin made his way to work that morning, he gave Malachi a set of his very own real handcuffs. My thoughts were immediately bad ones. Great, he's going to handcuff Diesel to a chair or something.
Justin said that he needed to get an additional key to give to him and would do it that day. So, YES!, I had NO key!! I of course told Justin this was not a good idea and he replied with, well he can't handcuff himself, his wrists are too small and don't let him handcuff you and you guys should be alright.
Alright?!?! Alright we were absolutely NOT.
Not even 2 hours later, Chi came around the corner from the kitchen, "Mommy, I need help." As he proceeded towards me I saw him taking itty bitty steps. When I looked even further I saw shinny metal cuffs hobbling my son's feet together. "Oh, No! What did you do???!!"
I didn't know whether to laugh or kill Justin. Since Justin wasn't present, I decided to laugh and placed Chi on the couch and asked him not to move to avoid banging his ankles up.
I called Justin in hopes to catch him before briefing. His response was, Oh NO! and then he couldn't stop laughing. He instructed me to try and call a couple of our friends to see if they were in the neighborhood.
No luck.
So I decided to take Chi down to the Enterprise Area Command. I knew that swing shift was getting ready to go on, so someone had to be there. I walked in, showed the girls my badge and then asked if they could check to see if any of the guys were there. I also explained what happened so they didn't make assumptions of bad parenting.
Out walked 2 cops, I'm assuming they both just had to see this, and one of them kindly freed my kiddo. He asked me what happened and I explained. They asked for Justin's call sign, I didn't know it. I'm sure they found another way to give him hell that night.
So Malachi is free, Justin has been given lots of Hell, and the cuffs have been temporarily removed from the situation until further notice.

NO....WHY...& BUT!

Lately Malachi has 3 NEW favorite words.

I hear them WAY more than I'd like to.

I will ask him to do something (usually sooo simple) and then I will get the following typical responses:

"NO"... proceeded by "I don't want to".

"WHY?"... usually followed by a strung out "mmoommmmyy"!

and then there's my new favorite...
"BUT"... also usually followed by a strung out "mmoommmmyy"!
These responses are KILLING me!!! I have told him, "Mommy doesn't like nos, whys, and butts, they give her headaches."
He has started to back away here and there when he thinks about what he is going to say. But when there is no thinking envolved, it's "no, why, and but" all day long.
All I can think of is.... my poor mother! She must have wanted to just pull out all of her hair at times with my sister and I. So... to my mom... 'I know I've said it before and I'm sure I'll say it several more times, I'm soooooooo sooooorrrrrryyyyyy!!'
I love you mama!!!

A New Addiction

Chi has been in a learn how to skate class now for 3 weeks. Tonight after class, I asked what Chi would like for dinner. He turned with a big grin and replied, Joe's Crab Shack! I had to laugh. He had mentioned it on Saturday but we had other plans and couldn't go, so he must have been fiening it. I took him after skate class his first week (I was gone during his second, or we might have ended up there then too) since it's right down the street from the ice center. I figured, why not and away we went.
Wow this boy can chow down on some crab. It's amazing! There's not much Chi won't eat and I'm so blessed for that.

I Finally Won!!

This was the second year I was able to attend the i2 conference in Washington DC. (i2 is a program we use at work) First of all, I LOVE DC and will jump at any opertunity to go there!!! Secondly, i2 puts on a hell of a conference and even hosts a casino night the second night of the conference. They give you $300 in fake money and then for every $100 you have left at the end of the night, you get a raffle ticket. They raffle off some really cool prizes. Last year a friend taught me how to play craps and we did very well but unfortunately we won nothing.

This year was a different story. I just needed a quick refresher course at the craps table and then it was all down hill from there. The table was HOT! and we were raking in the doe!! After 3 hours, a friend and I managed to turn $300 into about $8,000! (Now if only I could do that with real money here in Vegas!) So needless to say, I had a lot of raffle tickets!!! The prizes they were giving away this year were: 3 apple ipods, 3 apple itouches and 1 Wii (the grand prize). Now I have been thinking about getting a Wii for a while now. I was considering just caving and getting it for Chi's big Christmas present. However, this would be just too good. I honestly began to pray. PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE let me win the Wii!!!
Well the ipods and itouches came and went and it was down to the grand prize. They pulled the ticket out of the bucket and called the number. Four of us frantically searched through all of my tickets to see if I had that number. One of the girls looks at me with complete disappointment and said, 'Nope Dallas, your tickets don't go that high.' Being the sore loser I am, I threw the remaining ones down. Then Perry says to me, 'No Dallas you have it!' and before I knew it I was being tossed on stage.
Now please keep in mind that the last paragraph happened in a matter of about 45 seconds. At this point all that was running through my mind was, 'Perry, you better not be making a complete ass of me by throwing me on stage and not having the ticket.' and then he gave me a ticket and I thought for sure it wasn't the one.
BUT BY GOLLY! IT WAS! I WON THE WII!!!!!
I was soooooo excited. I jumped up and down and even screamed! I looked like one of those annoying game show contestants that just won a new car on the price is right!! I was and still am sooooo HAPPY!!! Whoooo Hoooooo!!!!

Learning to Skate

Malachi has taken on a rather difficult task as far as I am concerned. He wants to play hockey so I enrolled him in skate class. I think he thought it was going to be a piece of cake. Knowing that he would probably end up a little more challenged then before, I gave him a big pep talk before he got on the ice.

At first he went right out and was all for it. But after he fell on his bum pretty hard twice, he was a little discouraged. But my talk helped, and he kept on trying and was doing it by himself by the end of his first lesson.

I am sooo proud of him! Is there anything this child can't do??? I'm starting to wonder....

Walk for a Cure 2009

May 2nd was the Walk for a Cure. Chi and I met the rest of the team at the office at 630am for coffee, juice, and bagels before we headed out on our 3k walk. Malachi was so excited to "race" and to be a "winner". We explained to him that everyone is a winner in this race.

First the timed runners started. It seemed as if they never ended. They kept going and going and going. There were so many of them. It was really emotional to see all the people come out and support such a hard topic of discussion. PLUS, everyone that was wearing a pink t-shirt was a cancer survivor, and seeing them brought a tear and a smile to your face. I felt honored to participate in such an event.

Some of our team.... "TEAM LINDA"

Chi and I on the go...

Theresa and Erin!

Linda's daughters, Shawnte and Dee, Theresa, Erin, Jane, and half of Bob (sorry).

Just when we thought we had ran out of motivation, the firemen ran by. Some of us joined them for a little bit.

Strutting his stuff!

One hour, eleven minutes, and forty eight seconds for 3K! Not bad not bad!