Getting caught up again

Joshua and I are fine. Since returning from vacation and camp, Joshua has participated in a week-long Spanish Tae Kwon Do Camp where only Spanish was spoken by teacher and students. Hopefully it will be enough to keep him bilingual until school starts up again. We have also been on some "field trips" to the San Diego Zoo, the beach, the Hollywood Bowl and the Natural History Museum in LA.

I have been back to work on PTA planning for the new year culminating in a 2-hour meeting today with about 24 board members. We still have work to do, but it looks like we have a basic plan for the new year and a budget that we might be able to afford. :)

Last week I shared "my story" as a 40 minute talk to a group of women at my church. It was quite a challenging experience to go through the process of preparing for the talk and after writing for weeks, I have to admit I didn't have any desire to "blog." Sorry about that for those of you wondering what happened to us.

I am trying to get all of the PTA planning done in the next week before Jon arrives home for R&R. Yes, he will be here soon, sorry can't tell you when. Once he is here we'll post something on the blog. I do have reservations for us to spend 5 nights in the Navy Lodge on North Island, which is located on Coronado Island in the San Diego harbour. It is a beautiful place and will be a great way for our family to get away and reconnect a bit. We plan to spend our days being tourists at Sea World, the San Diego Zoo and Wild Animal Park, Balboa Park and who knows what else. We will also be home for a little over a week and may see some friends and family during that time.

Thank you all for your prayers and encouragement. When Jon heads back, we'll have reached the half-way mark of the deployment.

Sheryl

We're Home

Joshua and I arrived home this evening to some friends who were fixing the ceiling fan Jon had installed only to discover that Jon had done it right (he thought he had done something wrong) we just have to use a remote to make the fan work and not a wall switch. Very cool now that summer has arrived. Thanks, Victor and Karen!

Our drive home from Porterville included a stop in LA at the La Brea Tar Pits. In all my years living in the LA area I have never been to the Tar Pits but my friend Valerie mentioned it while I was in Durango and today I realized that Joshua and I would be driving through LA on our way home and there was no rush so we decided to stop. We got in for free due to our military dependents status, which was nice, but the cost was not bad for others who are interested. We spent more than 2 hours in the museum and walking around the grounds looking at the pits and lake of tar. Very weird to think of the thousands of animals that were trapped and fossilized in those pits 12,000 to 40,000 years ago.

This evening we got the car unloaded, started a load of laundry and got unpacked only to discover that something is wrong with the washing machine. We had a flood in the utility room about 20 minutes into the washing cycle. UGH! After taking 30 minutes to clean up the mess it was 9:00 pm so I got Joshua to bed and sent Jon an e-mail asking for advice. I will plan to call the plumber in the morning. What a bummer. There is never a good time for an appliance to go out but with all our dirty clothes from the trip and having been gone for 2 weeks it would have been nice if it didn't go out tonight. Oh, well, an opportunity to trust the Lord to get us through this little inconvenience without my usual anxious fretting.

I'll try to post more tomorrow or later in the week about my time in the Bay Area with my aunt and cousin as well as an update from Joshua about his two great weeks at camp.

Sheryl

Almost half way there

This just in from Jon. FYI from me -- I made it to San Francisco via Denver and Las Vegas, but made it none the less. I'm having a great time with Judy and Tim (aunt and cousin respectively) and will be heading to pick up Joshua early Friday morning. Then we'll be headed home. Okay, now on to Jon's message...

I am nearing the theoretical (military plans are always subject to change due to emerging circumstances, which is why many Marines have modified their famous motto to "Semper Gumby") half-way point in my thirteen month deployment, and though this is really more of a shifting line in the sand (as opposed to writing on the wall in a Biblical sense) and for most folks in my unit may not herald any changes, the next couple of months WILL result in some changes for ME.

The first thing is that I qualify for and have accepted a fifteen day rest and recuperation (R&R) period (chargeable as leave, or if applicable, PDMRA--which acronym I can explain more fully if anyone is interested) that I will be able to spend with my family shortly (needless to say, I'm looking forward to this).

The second thing is that I will be posted to a different base when I return from R&R, that will mess up my mailing address--my parent command and it's mailing address and post office will not change it's location, so any mail I receive will go to one location, but I'll go to another, and this area does not have a robust mail-forwarding service... As a result (and I never thought I'd ever say this...), please STOP SENDING ME MAIL, Motomail, letters or packages, starting immediately, until I can coordinate with the command mail section at my new location how I can receive mail without it stacking up somewhere and/or being destroyed as "undeliverable." Though this second event is some distance in the future, I'd like to implement this change early enough to prevent any piece of mail from ending up in a "black hole."

Otherwise, things are generally going as well as can be expected; however, some things are much better than can be expected--a recent performance evaluation I received from my chain of command was the most superlative evaluation of my career. I know that of my own strength and will, my accomplishments are wood, hay, and trash--but because of God's mercy and grace, and your prayers and support, His endstate will prevail (as we so often pray, "His Kingdom come!").

Semper Fi, JarHedJon

PS: If you're bored and have nothing to do, try diagramming the first sentence/paragraph of this post. Absent the parenthetical inclusions, it should not be that difficult...

July 4th Celebration in Durango

What a party! Valerie, Bill, Alexa and I had quite a time in Durango last night. After the 20 minute Durango parade, we headed to the stage where we enjoyed an energetic and quite talented country band. They played plenty of country music but also some rock-n-roll -- great songs to dance to. The four of us stomped our feet, clapped our hands and watched for a while. Then Bill took Valerie out on the "floor" (we were in the middle of Main Street) followed by a whirl with Alexa. When a rousing rock-n-roll song started Bill, Valerie and I all danced together, until Jim, a friendly older gentleman stepped in and offered to make it a foursome and off I went with him. He was a fairly good dancer and I am not, but we had a great time. We danced about 4 or 5 songs and I was twirled around until my head spun. It was great fun and good exercise.

A little before 8:00 pm we took a break from dancing and picked up the biggest slices of pizza I've ever had and drank 3 or 4 glasses of water before settling on a bench to watch the folks gather for the fireworks display. We joined the throng standing in the middle of the road to see 30 minutes of fireworks. It was spectacular and just kept going and going.

I have to say that I slept well last night. What a great way to celebrate our country's birth. I only wish Jon and I could have been the ones whirling around in the throng.

I did check on Joshua via pictures from the camp web site and it looks like they all got to enjoy some sparklers after dark. I'm sure he's having a great time.

Sheryl

4th of July

I hope many of you are enjoying a restful time with family and friends on this 4th of July -- US Independence Day. But not everyone has that opportunity today. Jon writes, "Well, I'm doing OK, I made it up in time for a 0830 show time to work, only to find out that the CG [Commanding General] had declared the 4th a light day and folks didn't have to be in until noon... By the time I found that out, it was already 0940 and the meeting was in swing (albeit with only 50% attendance--I wasn't the only one who didn't get the word). I went out with another Marine to take care of some more outside more physical stuff, so that's got my adrenaline going--I'll be OK, I think. I'm going to treat myself to a cheeseburger and fries, I think, at the chow hall tonight, I usually stick with the "good" main line chow, but to celebrate the 4th, a burger sounds like it'd be a good thing."

Although in another note Jon commented, "As long as people know that ALL Marines weren't given a half day, just the staff and HQ Marines -- everyone else was still on post."

I'm enjoying the day with my good friends and based on the pictures I have seen of Joshua he is having a blast at camp.

Sheryl

News from the Marine

This just in from Jon,

"Obviously, we are currently experiencing beautiful, clear weather right now -- this picture was taken this morning. OK, so it's a little bit hotter than most people like (about 105 when the picture was taken, by noon it will be around 115), but once acclimatized, pretty nice.

Work is keeping me more than busy, but I suppose I'm keeping my chin above water (being amphibious, I figured a hydrological analogy was appropriate), as no one is suggesting early rotation back to the States (more's the pity) due to sub-standard performance or anything (not a good reason to head back, but it has occurred to me a time or two :)

I'm really enjoying participation in a Bible discussion group that meets twice a week. We've been working our way through the early chapters of Matthew, specifically the Sermon on the Mount, and it has been challenging to consider living out the radical social and cultural paradigms represented by the Beatitudes, etc.

Thanks for your prayers and support. As I get closer to a short R&R period, please pray that I'll cover all the bases in preparation for the period I'll be gone. Thanks.

Semper Fi,
Jon G."

Silverton

Today Valerie and I drove to Silverton, a small tourist town set at 9,000 feet between 13,000 foot peaks. You can learn about the Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad by going to http://www.durangotrain.com/. Maybe when our whole family comes back to visit, we'll take the train to Silverton.

Today Valerie and I enjoyed great conversation while we made the drive, had lunch, walked around the stores and then headed home. In the middle of our strolling my cell phone rang and it was Jon. He had gotten e-mails from me earlier in the day indicating that I was not feeling well (I'm fine now) and he decided to call instead of sending another e-mail. It was great to talk to him, but a bit strange to sit on a bench with tourists strolling by. Oh, well, it was the thought and the connection that counts. He will try to write something tomorrow that I can share with you all.

Sheryl

Camp and My Vacation

Joshua was very excited to be at camp especially after his friend Jake arrived. Here are the boys with their counselor "Chip." The camp staff have already started posting pictures on their secure web site so I was able to see half-a-dozen shots of Joshua having a great time (of course they might not post pictures of him looking miserable). :)

I'm doing alright. After leaving Joshua at Bass Lake and heading to the Bay Area on Sunday I spent some time thinking about this next step of independence in Joshua's life. Being a mother is all about loving, caring, protecting, teaching your child to leave you. What a tough job we have. But what an honor and privilege to be able to be a part of this young man's life.

But I am not just sitting around meditating on motherhood. I enjoyed a Robert Ludlum book on tape for 3 hours of the drive to Foster City where I spent the night with my aunt Judy and cousin Tim. Monday morning I flew from San Fransisco to Denver and then on to Durango, Colorado, where I am enjoying a fabulous time with my dear friends Bill, Valerie and Alexa. Here they are last night at Bill's birthday dinner celebration. I lived in community with Bill and Valerie for four years just prior to marrying Jon so we have a lot of history and they are very special folks. It doesn't hurt that they live in a beautiful part of this country. Here is one view from their porch.

Hope you are having a wonderful summer wherever you are.

Sheryl