So Sweet

Wow, what a day... really, what a day... I let Tom sleep in my room with me last night, and yeah, not gonna do that again. Nothing against Tom. I'm just not used to having someone else in the bed with me. It's definitely gonna be a transition when Captain America gets back home...

I tossed and turned and didn't sleep well, but I eventually fell asleep. Around 12:30. I woke up, got kids ready for school, Jake on the bus at 7am, Eme and Joe on the bus at 7:30am. Tom and Jim and I lounged around until 8am, then got busy. We cleaned the house and packed. Oh yeah. Tons of fun. hehe. But was got it done. At 9am, we headed out for errands.

First stop, Ft Bliss Auto Crafts. Captain America, my dear, you'd be SO proud of me! I had them change my oil and check my fluids and tire pressure and such before the trip! Yeah for me!

I filled out the kids' registration packet for Operation Purple Camp (they'd mailed me the info this week), and I was planning on turning it in after the oil change. Soon, it was done, we paid, and were on our way.

Next stop, the main CYS office. In the Welcome Center building place. She showed me what papers I had done, and which ones I needed, and was able to access my kids' physicals and shot records from the computer, so I didn't have to go home and get them. Yes!

I paid my $25 deposit per kid (refundable), and she gave me some info on upcoming Autism stuff on post. And the Military Liaison was in the same office, so I went and chatted with her a bit about Jake and the upcoming ARD and the situation. She said to keep her posted, not to sign anything that I don't agree with, and good luck.

We'd missed the bus, so we dropped Jim off directly at school. And went in, and turn in the registration packets for Jim and Joe and Eme. And were told that we needed to go to Ross to get a registration packet for Tom. Sounds good.

Tom and I headed back home, and we got more packing and loading done. And the snacks gathered, and he and I had lunch, and we got the house secured for Boxer.

And then it was time to go! At 12:45pm, we headed up to the school to get the kids. First stop, Ross to get Jake. And I ended up talking with the Ross Military Liaison for a long time. She was aware of Eme's bruise, and said that CPS had been called. But she said to use it for my advantage. Get whatever help I can for Jake out of this situation.

Also, she said that I should request that she sit in on the ARD meeting. Thank goodness! I'm SO glad that she said that. Apparently, the school doesn't offer, and the parent needs to request the liaison to be there. Tricky... So, she'll be there in my court on Monday.

We got Jake, and next stop, Hughey Elementary school. And it took FOREVER to get the kids, because the CPS lady was there interviewing them. Sigh. You know, it's strange to be "investigated" for neglect. And I know that the lady interviewing us understood the situation. And it's this kind of process that, I'm sure, helps protect kids against real child abuse. It's just kinda scary when you're stuck on the other side of it...

Anyway, after Eme got done being interviewed, she talked with me for a few minutes. She'd already talked with Jim earlier in the day. I told her that Tom and Jake were in the truck, and that I'd go get them to expedite the process. She seemed grateful for that.

She talked with Tom next, then Joe, and then Jake. I signed a paper so that she could get the results of Jakes Autism testing, I got Jim from preschool, and we were out of there. 45 minutes later than I'd planned. Sigh.

Here's a picture of Eme that I snapped at the school. She's SO cute! And OUCH, that bruise looks bad...

We got home, the kids dropped off their backpacks, grabbed a few things to entertain themselves in the truck, and we were off. But needed gas. Crap...

So we got gas, and I brought my Howdys cup into the Shoppette to get some Diet Coke (lowering my standards and all), and they were OUT of soda. Seriously? What kind of gas station is OUT of all of it's soda? Sigh.

But I was still doing pretty good. Through it all, I was calm, not upset, and doing pretty good. Until the kids started fighting while I was pumping gas. OMHeavens, it was about all that I could take. They were SOOOOOO annoying. Fighting about the stupidest stuff.

Luckily, it got better as we left Ft Bliss and headed across El Paso to New Mexico. Of course, it could be that the windows were rolled down, and that I couldn't hear what was going on. We'll just pretend that they were good :)

Jim slept most of the way to Alamorgordo, and Tom and Eme played on their laptops. We listened to music until my phone died. Crap. And since the fuse went out again on the charger thingy, no charger... Oh well. We turned on the radio, and found a non-spanish station to listen to. Ha! Used to bed, we'd look through the stations to find one we liked. Now, we just look for English speaking ones. ROFL!

We managed to get to Cloudcroft by 4:15pm. Sweet! 4:30 was the latest we could get there. Or so I thought. 4:30 was check in, and dinner wasn't until 5:00pm. Even better! We got signed in, and found out that we got the SAME room we'd got back in December with Captain America! Awesome!

We unloaded the truck, unpacked, and got ready for dinner. Not in the dining room this time, but buffet style in a conference room. That works for us :)




We had baked beans, corn, chicken enchaladas, BBQ beef, cornbread, hot dogs, chips, potato salad, and macaroni salad. And everything was SO tasty! A little spicy, but divine! I loved it all :) And ate WAY too much. I thought that the reason my belly hurt SO bad was all the food, but I'm thinking that it was probably all the sugar free mints I age on the way up. Crap. ha!

After we ate, the big kids went back to the room, and the little kids and I hung out in the Lodge for a bit. They thought this statue was SO freaky. hehe. They wanted pictures with them picking his nose. ROFL!

Jim wanted a picture with the SCARY bear. hehe

And here's Joe and Jim playing chess. I went to ask about Wi-Fi, and they played a game. Kind of. hehe :)


We checked out the room where the daycare was gonna be, and the boys were SO excited about the trains! We headed back to our room to get ready for the first class.

Jim LOVES the pond on the way to our room.

When we got to the room, the maintenance guy was there, fixing the router. Yeah! Eme and Tom and I were SO happy that the Wi-Fi was working again :)

Jake brought the Game Cube and the race car game, and was content to play that. We have 3 TV's in our room, so he took over this one.

I dropped Jim and Joe off at Daycare, and went to my first class. We learned about communication styles. It was mostly a big group discussion. All of us ladies were pretty chatty. ha! I wasn't even the most chatty one there. I'd say I was about 4th out of 6. Crazy, huh?

Super nice girls. We also learned that 8 others had signed up to come, and never showed. What the heck? Who does that??? The chaplin said that IF they don't show up by 10pm, then the hotel will take the money that was paid for their rooms, and let us 6 who did show up use that amount at the SPA. OMHeck, girls, I'm SO excited! I wanna massage!!!

After our session (mostly we just chatted. Really. We did talk about introverts and extroverts, but that's about it - ha!), we picked up our kids, and another mom and I decided to take our kids to the outdoor pool. Yeah, it's in the 50's. SUPER cold! hehe. But the pool was heated. So it's all good.

We had 4 nice robes in the rooms, Tom, Eme, Jake, and I threw them on over our suits. Joe and Jim put on their hoodies, and off we went, with our friends. (yeah, CAN'T remember their names... they had an 11 yr old girl, a 5 year old girl, and a baby)

Me? Yeah, I went in the hot tub the whole time. hehe.

It really was a good time. The kids had fun going back and forth between the pool and the hot tub. My favorite was when Jake did a MAJOR belly flop into the pool, and asked me how his dive was. Yeah, couldn't convince the kids that what he did was a belly flop. He was SUPER proud of his dive.... ha!

Here's me, trying to dry off and stay warm. Yeah, it was COLD. hehe.

We headed back to our room, and I let the kids watch some TV after they got their jammies on. One room had Joe/Tom and Eme/Jim in 2 queen beds, watching Harry Potter. Jake was on the pull out sofa, and he was watching Star Trek. Our suite had a private room, and I'm in here, blogging, and watching Law and Order. I've finally warmed up, too. I was SUPER chilly when we got back :)

We have breakfast at 8:30am tomorrow. Should be a good time! It's been a nice break so far :)


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Sharon, this is SO precious!!!