Day One

Okay, so Adam is officially in Stuttgart, Germany. I posted his time zone in my gadgets on the blogger site. It seems he is 8 hours ahead of PST. I am missing him today - the little things the kids did, the report on his family after he left, you know all those things you talk about! The pillow talk.

He officially left Friday night if you are in the PST. Nothing is ever simple here, Friday, was the date of Russell's school's Fall Festival. This is the PTSO's biggest fundraiser of the year. And I am on the board and it is the ONE day I am fully committed to. Which just figures, since these things can never be simple!!! One thing that made life much easier was Adam's mom, stepdad and 1/2 bro, Morgan came for the weekend. They left Sunday morning.

Let me say that my new friends on the Board of the PTSIO have been incredibly supportive. Women I don't really know all that well being generous with their offers of babysitting, thoughts and prayers, and helpfulness. All this time I have dedicated thus far to PTSO has earned me some points!! Ha! Seriously, most of these gals, whom I didn't know until August, have been so good to me; it warms my heart and makes Vegas more fun.

At Fall Festival, I intro'ed the Co-Pres of the PTSO to Adam and she was so sweet. She just basically told him how honored she was to meet him and thanked him for his service and then told him she was keeping her eye on me and told him to email her via the school website if he felt like I needed a break b/c she knows our kids and is happy to babysit anytime. Her husband told Adam the same thing separately. How nice is that? I am really flattered. When I first met her, Faith, I really misjudged her. It just goes to show you can't judge a book by the cover - that is a good lesson for me.

So, Fall Festival... I sort of put myself in charge of the Silent Auction and Raffle. I won't go into details, but I have experience with silent auctions when I lived in OK and worked with Big Brothers Big Sisters. Those were BIG auctions, like $60k auctions. I feel like when we are in a duty station and I can help community, it is my duty to help in areas in which I can help. So, I took over the the auction and raffe and we made over $3k, which is great when you think we had a total of 58 items. That's like $55 per item. In this economy, that's decent. I worked my tail off on it and told people to help or get lost if they were going to try to tell me what to do!!! Ha! I do feel like it is my responsibilty to pass on knowledge to groups before we move on to a new duty station and when I leave, I hope that I left making them better. And I think that I will make Russell's school's PTSO a better fundraising organization than before I was on the Board.

Okay, so Day One without Adam. His fam left about 10:30am. After they left we had a good day. I made Russ a list of all of the things he needed to do today and then at the end of the list wrote his reward for his accomplishments. He got it all done with pride. Note to self, make Russell a list every Sunday!! We actually have had a good day today. The kids were helpful, Rachel wanted to go to bed early, Row went right to bed, so far, so good. I am sure it won't be this good every weekend!!

I do want to note that Morgan, Adam's bipolar 16 yr old brother, was so much better this weekend than I have experienced in a long time. He helped with the kids, he took out he trash when I asked him to, he played with the kids too; all of which are improvements and I am sure added to the ease of the transition of Adam leaving.

Sooooooooooooooooo.... Day one of Adam being deployed has been a good one. Day two may not be so great, but Day One was good.

Oh, don't worry, I won't report every day!!!