A Moment...

As I walked back to my housing unit from my office tonight, I noticed something...something I hadn't noticed before. The night sky is beautiful here. We're out in the country, and Iraqis don't have much electricity, so there's no beaming lights to wash out the view. Imagine sitting in a field, miles away from any city, and just looking up at the stars. That's what I saw. I saw stars dancing in the atmosphere, shining down on us reminding me that we're all just a small piece of the universe pie. I saw planets bright as the moon stitched across a canvas of black. And I heard....

...the loud hum of the generators that give my office power. Totally ruined the thought and the brief moment of peace that came of being able to look up and see something beautiful.

Then I hurried to my CHU just in case tonight was the night the terrorists decided to drop a mortar round on us.

Ah What A Relief

Thought you might be interested in seeing one aspect of how we live. Its a topic most people don't talk about b/c we as people in American society find it uncouth to talk about. Y'know, they say war is hell, but no one said that peacekeeping was just as bad.

The picture above is a pic of what we have to doo-doo in. We don't have portalets that get serviced daily like on the big FOBs. Instead, we poo in gigantic ziploc bags, which are remarkably sanitary and easy to use. We whiz in tubes planted into the ground b/c otherwise, we'd just be peeing in the ground anyways. See the photo below.

Lazy Day In The Rain

We had a LOT of rain in May!! One of those days we were having a jammie day- meaning we spent the entire day in our jammies. Well the boys were at the glass sliding door begging to go outside. I opened up the door and it was so cute they squinted their eyes from the splattering rain and informed me that they needed their boots and umbrella's. (Thankfully Jamie had just sent us an extra pair of boots so they both had a pair.) They ran the entire yard up and down quite a few times just having a ball with their umbrellas! No puddles here but they made do.

Nap Update

Not sure who Bear thought he was fooling all the times he's told me he's not tired and then falls asleep sitting up! He had given up his nap for a little while but he's now pretty content to take a nap most days. On the rare day he doesn't take a nap he is pretty much nothing but a fussy boy so we don't do that often.

One day last week on the way home from school he told me he wanted to eat. I told him that we would take a nap first and then when he woke up he could eat. So he closed his eyes let out 2 fake snores and said, "Ok I'm awake now let's eat!"

Bear's 3rd Birthday

May 27th was Bear's 3rd Birthday!!!! This is the first "real" birthday cake we attempted!!! The crust is pecans & raisins. The icing is fresh dates and lemon blended till creamy and then topped with fresh raspberries! It took the boys a full week to recover from eating this cake :-)



Bear really enjoyed eating all of the raspberries off the cake first! I think if I had it all to do over again I would have just given him a huge bowl of berries!

The present aftermath......



While Bear took his nap Cooper was such the helper as we put together a little party for Bear. We went into the crawl space and pulled out all of the decorations and blew up balloons together. I tell this story because now EVERY time we are near the crawl space door Coop wants to put together a birthday party! This video is when Bear has just woken up from his nap and we are surprising him with his party.




This video is me horribly singing Happy Birthday BUT I posted it because it's of Bear making a wish and blowing out his candle!



This video is of Jim calling in to sing happy birthday to Bear!

I think all in all it was a great day for Bear and now they want to have birthday's pretty often. We took our leftover cake to the neighbors across the street (Jim & Kelly) and they gave the boys some more. Then we took it to Edna & Doug's and they gave the boys some more. Needless to say the boys ask for "birfday" cake often!!

What Has The Security Agreement Done To Us

On July 1st, the Security Agreement, colloquially referred as a SOFA (Status of Forces Agreement) agreement, went into effect here in Iraq. The Security Agreement specified that Coalition Forces (specifically combat units) were to move out of the cities and would only be able to conduct combat patrols in combination with Iraqi Army. This meant that any patrols, with certain exceptions, had to be invited by the Iraqi Army or at the request of the GoI. In the country, where we are, the Security Agreement is a lot more flexible...or so we thought.

I don't know what's being reported, but here's some reality on the ground. Since 01JUL09, there have been several of our patrols that have either been stopped by Iraqi Security Forces, or have been turned around, or have been told to stop whatever mission they were doing, or even had weapons pointed at them. This has the makings of a future incident between CF and ISF.

We've talked at length on this, and no one knows what may happen. Our speculation hinges on the reaction of our well disciplined soldiers and that's where I'll leave that. Everyone keep your fingers crossed as we move forward with this deployment.

More Fallen Heroes of the 30th

We’ve just come out of an Internet blackout due to the death of some soldiers in one of our sister battalions. They were hit with an IED en route to a cache site. The pictures of the site were absolutely devastating to see, but we all have the comfort of knowing that those in the vehicle died instantly. I didn’t know any of them, but I feel their loss. It goes through everything we do, especially going outside the wire. It reiterates the danger in this country to us. Their souls are in a better place, and that is a solace. Keep all of us in your prayers for a safe deployment and a safe return to home.

01JUL09

So today was our normal, regularly scheduled meeting with the District (Nahia) council except for one thing....today was the first day of the implementation of the Security Agreement. The agreement moves all combat troops out of the cities as well as requires that all combat patrols must be done with the Iraqi Army. My team is exempt though since we’re a civil military operations team and are conducting patrols to look at projects.

The meeting was interesting in that they dissolved a local council underneath them. Just like that. With the swipe of a pen. It’s a complete power play of which we’re not used to in the U.S. The local councils are voluntary councils that the local shaykhs form to help their people as well as maintain their power in the communities. These two levels of government are both very power oriented with the people’s needs second. It’s a shame. They have the ability to really make a difference, but instead, they do things just for their own power. Makes working here quite frustrating b/c we’re doing what we can to help the people. The dissolving of the local council, which will be soon followed by other dissolutions, puts the control of the local councils under people that are “friends”. Almost kitchen cabinet-like, if you ask me.

This is, of course, just my opinion.

Our Pretend Pool

Summer is upon us and the heat and humidity are enough to make anyone wish for a pool! I also really want to start teaching the boys how to swim and make sure they aren't afraid of water. With all of our allergies chlorine is just not our friend so trips to the local pools are few and far in between. So I blew up the pool and the boys thought it was the greatest thing. I put it under our big oak tree so while it was hot out we weren't in the direct sun and I wouldn't have to worry about sunblock. The boys got a few swims in it until we had a week and half of nothing but rain. I put a tarp over it but that blew away. After me training I came back to a moldy disgusting pool that the boys really wanted to swim in. So I deflated it and pulled out the gloves and cleaner and got to work. For all of 5 minutes!! I realized quickly that I would be scrubbing for probably most of the day and even then who knew if I would feel like I got all of the mold off. I calculated the $30 I paid for the thing and decided it was worth it to just get another one :-) I've hesitated though because I'm not sure how to not let that happen again- so if anyone has any ideas let me know!

Boo-Boo's

Sorry these are kind of long videos but they crack me up! If the boys so much as trip or graze themselves they need a "fandage" aka a bandage on it. I ran through 3 boxes of band aids in just a few months. (And yes these are two different "spider man's".)