Homeward bound

It's our last week here in Alabama before Kyle's graduation from SOS training. I can't believe we have made it 5 long weeks here. I decided it was now or never to finish off our Alabama bucket list before we head west to Phoenix. One of the stops I wanted to take was the LDS Birmingham temple. I like taking my kids to various temples around the world because it provides an opportunity for us to talk about temples and their significance and importance, It brings a sort of peace and spirit into our day, and I enjoy having all these pictures of my kids with so many temples. How cool would it be to have a scrapbook with just pictures of them in front of all the different temples?! 

Luckily it has been warming up to the high 80s and 90s so that only means one thing...swimming! Our apartment complex has a pool, so we have become frequent visitors to the pool this week. The water is still freezing and I wouldn't be caught dead in it,  but the kids enjoy splashing around and playing outside. This is only the beginning of our pool time as once we get to Phoenix we will practically live by a pool I am sure to just beat the heat. Not to mention we will be starting the construction in our backyard to put a pool in (I am soooo excited!).

Well, graduation day finally came! Hallelujah! It was a simple ceremony with a couple distinguished visitors that gave speeches and passed out certificates. SOS training, check! Thankfully the kids were decent during the ceremony. I was able to give Abby and Connor my phone so they watched a little movie which kept them quiet. Brayden on the other hand, well let's just say we had one embarrassing moment. As at all Air Force functions they start by playing the National Anthem. The entire assemble stood at attention and right then Brayden decides he really just needs to scream and cry out of nowhere. The place was silent, you could hear a pin drop, and then Brayden took it upon himself to break that respectful silence. Here I was in a pickle... I was wrestling a screaming Brayden all while trying to cover his mouth to muffle his screams, and standing right behind me were all the instructors from the SOS course, who are higher ranking officers, watching it happen. I was starting to sweat it out. Do I just run out the door? No I couldn't do that, the National Anthem was playing and I had to stand still and show respect. Should I let Brayden Scream? No I couldn't do that cause it would have disrupted everyone. So what did I do? I squeezed him in my arms, covered his mouth as tightly as possible and prayed that this embarrassing moment would end soon. Luckily it did and the National Anthem ended and so did Brayden's time in the auditorium. I quickly rushed him out and stayed out in the hallway for almost the rest of the ceremony while my friend, Brittany, sat by Abby and Connor who were complete vegetables watching their movie. Why oh why do you have to take the joy out of everything Brayden? This age is the hardest for me to enjoy! He can't talk yet so in order to communicate he just screams, grunts, and yells, and he doesn't understand so you can't really punish him or reason with him. Heaven have mercy on me and give me patience with this almost 18 month old boy!

After the ceremony we bumped into one of our dear friends from Misawa. Apollo was in our squadron, and we were actually his sponsors when he first come out to Misawa. He is now on his way to Holloman AFB in New Mexico to become an instructor pilot for the F-16. So many of our friends are moving out to New Mexico, I have a feeling we will be out for a visit or two in the next couple of years. After all it's not that far from Phoenix.

Right after the graduation ceremony we went back to our apartment and immediately began to pack up the car and clean the place. That took the rest of the day and after an early park play date to say goodbye to one of our favorite parks we all went to bed early since we had intentions of waking up early to hit the road and start our adventure back to Phoenix. When I say we packed up the car I literally mean every nook and cranny. We have really taken advantage of our new Honda Pilot and boy would you be amazed at how much stuff you can cram into the trunk space of that car.

Our game plan was to drive all the way to San Antonio, Texas today, spend the night and rest the next day there while sight seeing, then the following day leave and drive all the way to Phoenix. We were definitely nervous as that meant 12 hour drives on both the driving days. We have never driven that long in one day with the kids. We thought we would give it a try cause we were just ready to get home to Phoenix and get settled in. We woke up at 3:30 in the morning hoping the kids would transfer to the car and continue to sleep for the first couple hours of the ride. We were sorely mistaken. They woke up and stayed awake. For the rest of the day they were cranky and such little pills. We had to make lots of stops due to their meltdowns and bathroom breaks, and to make things worse there was a huge accident at the border of Louisiana and Texas that caused a lot of traffic. We were at a standstill for 40 minutes. After much frustration we decided to get off that freeway and go on another one that would add an additional hour or so to our commute, but at least we would be moving. We had no idea how long the stand sill traffic would be. So off we went on some crazy trail that was a "wildlife sightseeing road." What does that even mean you ask? Well we didn't know either till we were on it. We basically drove over swamps and got to see tons of alligators, and other swamp creatures. It was kind of fun and we almost turned it into an I spy game.

The time came for us to cross the river and we automatically thought we would be going over a bridge. Wrong. We had to wait 30 minutes for a ferry to take us across. It was quit the experience, and if it didn't make our drive longer than it should have it would have been quite the fun drive. By this point though we were all done. Our last stretch from the east boarder of Texas to San Antonio was the worst. When we arrived to the AFB we were staying at we immediately crashed at the TLF we reserved. Thankfully we did not have to hit the road tomorrow and had a day in between to recuperate. I tell ya, a road trip with three little kids and a dog is not my idea of a walk in the park. My car is a disaster zone. Let's just say we will be needing to do some MAJOR cleaning once we make it to Arizona.

For our one sight seeing day in San Antonio we decided to check out the Alamo and the River Walk. Both were beautiful for different reasons. The Alamo is so old, and has such rich history for our nation. It's neat to walk around the compound grounds and to see these buildings still erected, and learning about what too place there and what each building was for. The River walk, which is right next to the Alamo, on the other hand is new and filled with fun lights, restaurants and stores. There are little boat tours that passed us as we walked around and the kids enjoyed waving to all the passengers. We decided to take it a little easy that day since we knew that the next day would be a long driving day so we only spent half a day out exploring and the other half of the day relaxing and letting the kids play at a playground on base.

I really enjoyed San Antonio and could definitely see myself living there. There is a lot of stuff to do, and the weather is nice, warm, and humid. I know the humidity bugs a lot of people, but I actually quite enjoy it. It helps my eyes not feel so dry, my skin feels more hydrated, and as for hair, well let's just say my hair is so straight and thin that it doesn't really get affected by humidity like curly hair people do.

The next day it was back to the open road for us. This time we decided to not wake up quite as early, but were still on the road by 5:00 in the morning. The kids were much better I think due to the fact that they had a break the day before. We stopped in El Paso for some yummy Mexican food for lunch and continued to push it all the way to Phoenix. By the time we arrived to our house we were exhausted, smelly, but oh so relieved! We made it! Now excuse me while I go and crash. I have zero intentions of taking another long road trip with my kids anytime soon. I am so grateful that we made it safely. Now we get to officially start our lives in our new home.