September has brought us such good memories so far! I am a little behind on keeping my blog up to date...I haven't been into it as much lately for some reason. So here is a little update:
September 7th was Family Day at Fort Jackson in South Carolina. It was a chilly day in Georgia when we left, and when we arrived in South Carolina it was stifling hot! It was tough for me knowing that somewhere on post was my husband and I wouldn't be able to see him for another 18 hours or so. What made it worse was that I ended up driving around and found where he lives and saw all the soldiers outside! Aaaah, so tempting to just be the crazy wife that runs down there and starts searching around for her hubs. But I had self control, people!
I couldn't sleep at ALL that night because I was out-of-my-mind excited to see my love. I would wake up at midnight, 2:20 am, 3:15 am, 4:05 am, 5:59 am and finally at the 5:59 I said, "Forget it! I'm gettin up!" So I got ready to go and it was so exciting. We left the hotel almost an hour early and the field was within walking distance (ha ha). Once 9 am approached and the ceremony began, we saw this:
Apparently all the soldiers were hiding in the forest behind the field, and they threw out a bunch of smoke grenades and slowly but surely you could see a TON of people running through the smoke in their ACU's (Army Combat Uniform) and holding flags and stuff. It was so cool! I wanted to get ahead of the game and not get stuck in traffic so I left the bleachers just before they released us to find our soldiers and I RAN LIKE THE WIND to find Derek. I searched and searched and finally saw him as he was about to turn the other way. I could tell he was searching for me too. I yelled, "DEEERRREEEEK!!!" and I saw him turn towards me. He has never booked it faster through a crowd than he did then. He came to me and hugged me so tight and started to cry and then saw Titan. Titan reached his arms up for him like Derek had never left. He laid his head on his shoulder and wouldn't let him go to save his life!
We met Derek's buddies and they were all very nice! Derek was such an exceptional leader during his time at Basic Training. People older than him, younger than him and even his drill sergeants really respected him.
We went back to the car, drove to his barracks to pick up his stuff and took a tour. Then we ate at the DFAC (Dining Facility) and it was tasty! Later we fed the turtles at the pond and let Titan play all over the playgrounds. He had a blast and I think we wore him out. Come 8:30 PM, Titan had no problems falling asleep. But just as the night before, I was still so ecstatic to get back to my husband the next morning that I couldn't sleep too well. They held a great graduation ceremony and then we were able to take off back home to Georgia!
Derek got to spend the night at home and he was so happy about it! We thawed out our frozen Dion's pizza that I put in a check-in bag and flew here from El Paso in July. It was DELICIOUS- just like it was fresh! We got ice cream, did laundry and tried preparing him for the next day when he would have to report for his next phase of training. I told him he wasn't allowed to do anything but relax, so I went down and got the laundry and then I made him lay down so I could give him a back and foot massage. He asked if I'd scratch his back and about 2 minutes later he was out like a light. I woke up all night just to be sure it was real that my sweet husband was actually sleeping in my bed again. I loved to just look at him and feel so grateful we were together, even if it was just a short while.
The next day he reported for Officer Candidate School and he was so nervous! The competition is tough there, but he is tougher! We have been able to talk every single night, and we even Skype some nights. It's great to be able to see his face every day instead of wonder if the mail will come every 3 days like it used to while he was at Basic Training. His free time starts from 6:30 to 7:30 and goes until 10 pm and there are nights when we talk for almost that entire amount of time like it was nothing. Sometimes I can't even believe it's almost 10 pm and we've been on the phone for hours. In a month and a half we'll have been married for 3 years and I'm not sure how I can fall deeper in love with someone every single day. At this rate, I'll die of a heart attack at 30 because my heart will be too full of love!
Something I want to mention about Derek that makes him such a sweet husband is this: For Family Day I got all gussied up with extra eye make-up and tried to look my absolute prettiest for him. The whole day, he hardly mentioned my looks so I was a little down about it! The next day, I had my hair down and had hardly any make-up on...he couldn't get over how "pretty I look". Last night he stopped me mid-sentence on Skype to tell me how nice I looked and I was sporting a pony tail, a t-shirt and some sweat pants. I love that about him. He told me that the prettiest I ever look to him is when I wear a pony tail and exercise clothes. Ha ha ha. Yesssss. He is such a sweet heart and I'm not sure how I got so lucky but he and I both know our relationship began way before our time on Earth and for that we are so grateful.
