I'm back....

Hey..... Just wanted to say that I've been locked out of my blog for a few weeks!!! Anyway, I'll try to get a new one on here soon.
I did need to tell you that Steve will be home Saturday!! He graduates today and passed his last test with a 90. He said it should've been a 100 but he just over thought it.
Ok... I will write more later. :)

Ok.. finally... graduation and the future....

Ok sorry for the huge gap here. I'll try to just be brief in the wrap up of Steve's graduation and his future. I did have to include this though and mention that Steven was a part of designing the Tshirt for his squadron. His name is at the top of the shirt but you can't really read it. He drew the skull in the middle. So just wanted to share...




His graduation day.... out on the parade field:


Last day we were with him.... awww......


and this is the last time I saw my baby. That's him on the right walking back to his dorm. I've never seen him look so handsome!!!! Killed me letting him go that day......


So anyway, we had to leave Steven at Lackland. We went through a worldwind drive through Austin on the way back (bc I've always wanted to go there) and ate at a restaurant that will live on in my SOUL... Threadgill's. Oh my gosh... the food... but I definitely want to go back to Austin to soak some of it up. Didn't even skim the surface.
Steven was at Lackland until the next day.. then he left for Wichita Falls, Texas to Tech school. I wish I could tell you the big long name of his job, but I can't. He works on jet engines... and other plane engines as well. He says that he works in a building and they bring him the engines to work on. He has done OUTSTANDING in Tech School. His grades are fabulous, he loves it, he's doing great. Steven has always been good with that kind of stuff. He graduates July 16 (we have a big countdown chalkboard at our house. it's 36 days from today!!) and he will be able to come home for about 12 days. Then....
Steven got his assignment about 2 weeks into tech shool. Wow what a rough day. For us and for him.... poor thing. He will be going to Rapid City, SD at the end of July. For possibly 2 years. My poor, southern, homesick baby is going just about as far away as he can!!!! We have researched the town and the base though... It really does sound great. And we've told him that. It's a beautiful place. He will be approximately 20 hours from home. yep. breaks my heart. And he's gonna wind up finding some girl up there.... you watch. Crap. But anyway, that's what happens next for him.
We got this picture from him about a week ago... he'll probably kill me for putting it on here. He's been working out all the time. He's kept his weight down and is starting to build up muscle. This is the first time we've "seen" him since we left him. He looks good!!!!



So, that pretty much finishes up his graduation, our trip to Texas, and his future plans. The next post will be Josh's "resume." Been working on it for a couple of weeks with some help.... it ought to be pretty good!

Our Texas Hotel Experience..... and it was an interesting one.....

Well I've mentioned that our hotel was in the ghetto. That's because it was. It was on the same exit as the AT&T center in San Antonio (for any of you people out there that know anything about the area). In front of our nice shiny new hotel sat this old hotel.... I'm not sure if it was still in business now or abandoned. Needless to say, it had really creative graffiti all over it. There was some kind of HeadStart like daycare behind the privacy fence in the back and then houses all around. I have a picture out of the back window:
But seriously, you can't really grasp the ghetto-ness of it from this. But let me say this... the hotel was great. The staff was wonderful, and we never felt unsafe. I would stay there again. Really. Ok, maybe.
So just a neighborhood story though... One morning we got up (we had to get up early in the mornings. The military has this whole thing where they like to start events at like 8 and 9 am. I don't really get it but whatever.) and Emily and I were just looking at the weather out the back window. Well lo and behold I catch a glimpse of this come walking out of a house and taking off down the street:
Yep. Just struttin it right on back home at like 7 am on a Saturday morning. Emily, of course, says, " where is she going all dressed up like that this early??" I said, "Well, I don't know," thinking in my head "She's going home honey... she worked hard for the money last night.. so hard for it honey... " Yep. Loved our hotel.

Ok so these two pics are on here because my kids could have just done this the whole trip and been fine. They love hotels. Jay asks me constantly if we can go stay hotels. It probably has something to do with the fact that I'm not a great housekeeper (btw... i'm getting much better. seriously. i'm glad my mother can't read this.) but it also has to do with we let him jump on the bed... and the ice machines.... and the snack machines...the pools.... etc etc. So anyway, at nite the children did this dash down the hallway (sure the other guests loved that) to our room with Kirkland remarkably fast on the crutches. And everytime we left the room they drug this ziploc bag of change with them to the snack machines and would swarm all over them like a bunch of little maggots. I mean that affectionately... i got it from my friend Shelly. She meant it affectionately too. So yep, these were the kids favorite pasttimes at the hotel. Along with pitching a fit EVERYDAY that we didn't take them to the pool while NOT understanding that Steven couldn't go swimming and we were here for Steven. OH!! And I ran out of room for pics but I have a picture of these giant Texas shaped waffles that they had for breakfast every morning.... cool! Well, Josh was a very important figure at the hotel so I have to feature him. He made friends with the staff and took off a few years of William's life... or maybe just added some more gray since I'm convinced William will live forver. This pic is of Josh with the toilet paper he got from the front desk.... because we needed it but also because the front desk people would give Josh whatever he wanted because they all knew him by name. Now how did the whole staff know Josh by name?? Well let me tell you a story to wrap up this post.......

One morning while we were there William and Emily got up to go get breakfast like normal. I was still sleeping in the bed... and William knew this. Just sayin. Josh and Jay and Kirkland were watching cartoons. So the next thing I knew I awoke to Emily waking me up and saying "mama!!! do you even know what just happened????"
"no... what?" as I look up and see william carrying in Josh and the breakfast plates with this look of rage...horror... and a feeling MY life is somehow shortened....
So I get a recounting of the story as Josh happily sits down to his Texas waffles and cartoons.
William and Emily get the breakfast. William and Emily get in elevator to come back up to the room. There are a couple of hotel staff... a manager, etc.. on the elevator as well. William, being Mr. Friendly as always, speaks to them.
"How are y'all today? Been busy?"
them: "We have. Have a lost kid upstairs."
William: "oh really?"
them "we do.... on the 3rd floor. What floor are y'all on?"
William: "um, third."
Well, about this time the elevator opens to the 3rd floor. They walk out and at the end of the hall is this big bunch of people with little Joshy standing in the middle.
all the staff and people who found him wandering the hall: "what's your name?"
josh: "I joshy"
All the people: "what's your mommy's name?"
josh: " mommy"
All the stupid people: "what's your daddy's name?"
josh: "daddy"
all the stupid but trying to be helpful people: "what does your daddy call your mommy?"
josh: "mommy" (and he does not... bc that is one of my biggest pet peeves is husband and wives calling each other mama and daddy... wth??)

so anyway, william finds out they've been knocking on doors, etc.... so he rescues little josh who is completely unaffected by the whole thing but enjoyed the fame and brings him in to wake me up. Somehow it was all my fault but I'm still trying to figure that one out......
Ok I'll do a final blog on Steven's actual graduation, where he is now, and what comes next and then we'll get the heck out of Texas. Sorry we've been here so long. Seemed that way to us too!!!! :)

Sightseeing in Texas (part of a series.....)

We honestly didn't do a whole lot of sight seeing while in San Antonio. San Antonio has always been way up there on my places to go list.... and basically, it still is. Steve just wasn't in mindset to go wandering all around the city looking at stuff. And we wanted to do what Steven wanted to do. We sat in the hotel a lot so he could get on the computer and put on comfortable clothes. We went out to eat some. But we did do a little sight seeing. So here are a few pics: Yes, we went to the Alamo. That is it. Yes, we were very aware BEFORE we went that 1, it was small and 2, it was in the middle of the city. (this is what everyone wanted to tell us before we went. this and oh! are you going to see the Alamo??) So yes, we went to see the Alamo. NO, we did not go in. Do you see all those people to the right of my miserably hot little kids? that's just part of the line. So yeah, we didn't go in. But we have a picture. That counts, right??
And we did go through a courtyard at the Alamo. This is some well there. Everyone else was taking pictures at the thing, so we did. I'm sure it holds some sort of significance.... wish i could tell you what it was!!!! :) I do know that that is one old A tree..... And it was moved there. We like, read a board about it. Hey come on... this is site seeing with 5 kids. Give me a break. We did walk about 30 yards down the Riverwalk to our restaurant. We saw some baby ducks. Couple of things about the Riverwalk: doesn't work real well with wheelchair. people on it love to talk to airmen. i would have liked to have seen a LOT more of it. there are a LOT of people on it. it's not good for people like me that are ADD and like to look at everything and there's stuff everywhere and you have a 5 year old who is close to water and you're paying attention to everything else. There are no rails. I would like to go with no children because they have great drink specials. Ok.

The mall at the end of the Riverwalk. Very impressive. Not fun though. Why, you might ask?? Well, I was there with men and children. And it was crowded. And we were broke. That makes for not a fun time at the mall. Dang it. But it was pretty.
View of Riverwalk from our restaurant. The restaurant was good. Steven bought our lunch. Awww. He wanted a steak and he got one.... it looked good. I can't even remember what I ate. Steve said he had a hard time even enjoying it in some ways though because he was scared of dripping something and because he is so used to gobbling his food down so fast!!!! ha!!!
Ok, so that's all the sightseeing pics. Let's see..... I think I'll do one on the hotel next.

Texas Trip

Ok, yes, this post is about our trip to Texas. And yes, this post is about Steven graduating from the Air Force BMT. So if you're tired of hearing about it, I promise that today or tonight I will also post the one I have been saying I was going to do about all the stuff Josh does too. So you can read this or not!!! :) But I will try to make this one entertaining as well.... that's one of the reasons I've had to wait so long to write it. If I had tried to write it as soon as we got back it would not have been entertaining, it would have been sad.... but since we are removed from the trip and Steven has started Tech school and is doing well, I am doing better. So I can approach this differently.
I am still not understanding how to do blogs with more than 5 pictures... So this might have to be more than one post which, I know... will get all confusing like the Cardy Awards post. Try to follow along. Y'all should be used to me by now. :)
We drove to San Antonio for the graduation. Yes, most of you laughed, told me where the liquor stores were along the way... asked who was taking dramamine (me or kids)....But it really went great. We got there in 13 hours I think? We wanted to leave about 2 or 3 in the morning (yeah right... didn't happen.) But it still went fine. We fixed sandwiches so minimal stopping... We were very impressed with ourselves. I can't remember for sure, but don't think we did much the first nite. Our hotel was in the ghetto, but was brand new. I will probably just do a separate post about the hotel, because it deserves its own... y'all just don't know. So let's go to day two.
This was the day we were going to get to see our baby!!!!!!! And for all of you people that are just now jumping on board and trying to figure out how in the world I have a son that will be 20 in July... just go read the old posts (John Matthews, among others. No, I didn't have a baby when I was in 9th grade and we hid him away and now I've reconnected.)
Anyway, we go to the coin ceremony (don't ask me) and they march all these boys on the little field thingy.... The third picture above is what we KNEW was Steve's squadron. But all of these boys looked alike!!! We took ten pictures of this group of boys but never saw Steve!!!! I told William..."ok, well... we know he lost weight bc those are a bunch of skinny face boys out there!!!" We seriously couldn't tell which was him. Miss Know it All Emily swears she knew... she didn't. Whatever.
Finally, they finished and said the boys could be released when their parents got to them.... I took off!!! I wasn't even sure where he was, but I knew in general what block he was in. I finally saw my son standing there.... I've never seen him look so handsome or broken or... I don't know. I still can't tell you what I saw in those eyes at that moment. Just tears and I saw he was different. Not different bad... just different. I launched into him and just sobbed... I didn't really mean to. I was just so happy!!!! I had been so ready to see my boy. Anyway the rest of the family I left behind caught up with us..... the top two pictures were taken that day.
OK, so top things we noticed about Steven:
1.) He dropped over 20 lbs. in boot camp. He gained muscle.... which he was proud of. (but not as much as he thinks he did!) He does look great though.
2.) the tan line. They have to wear hats every single time they are outside. so he has this sexy tan line which the kids found hilarious:
3.) he was no longer ADD. The boy could sit!!! It was very nice. Matter of a fact, he was very content just to sit with us. He was just about as happy just riding in the truck with us listening to the radio as he was doing anything.
4.) he was aware of EVERYTHING around him. Jay threw a fork or something...I don't know because it was in a busy food court and we missed it and Steven jumped up and ran and picked it up. Someone knocked something over in a store and Steven fixed it. There was a man sitting way back off of where we were walking with a sergeant stripe or something on and Steve stopped and saluted. I was just amazed at how much he NOTICED.
5.) My son has made the decision to grow up at 19. He had to realize that weekend that his life, for the most part, in Starkville, is over. He had to realize that this is his career path. This is life now, not college and a stepping stone. This is it. The real thing. And while I know that Steve doesn't regret a thing, that weekend was hard for all of us. That's a big realization he had to come to that weekend. He's still a baby... or was. My son grew up.... almost all that weekend and those weeks in BMT. I love him so much... No, I didn't birth him. Instead, I earned the right to be his mother. And I love him in some ways even more fiercely because of that. And to watch him go through the things I watched him go through emotionally that weekend almost did me in. I shed way more tears than he did.... but I tried to do them after he would go back to the dorm. When he would talk to us about them, I felt so privileged to share that with him. It was so hard for me to let him go back to the hard, unfeeling, no-mama land of the Air Force every night. Everything I suffered through too.... feeling like we were abandoning him. Wondering if he thought we thought we were just "done" in our raising of him. Realizing I would have Easter without one of my "chicks" in the nest.
Ok I'm getting too sappy. I'm sorry. Ick. Said I would try not to do that!!! Ok I'm going to just do another post of sightseeing with Steven and the kids. Get off of this emotional crap! :)

Slacking....

Ok I know I have seriously been slacking on my blog. And it's not from lack of material because I have tons. I have the "Things Josh has Done to our House" blog.... the "Durrs go to Texas" blog..... "Easter with the Durrs" blog.... there are lots I can do. It's just that it takes me a good 30 mins or more to write them and you see, my house is a wreck. It stays a wreck. Because I'm never in it. I am always running, running, running. I am following kids here and there or doing stuff at church. But don't get me wrong, I LOVE it. Working at church makes me so happy. I love that God has brought my family and I to Calvary. The people there mean so much to us.... and I adore them and what their visions are and how much everyone there loves God and loves others.... and I love being a part of it. I love that God knew that I needed them when they needed me.
Grant preached yesterday about knowing that because God was over his life he knew that even though there would be uncertainity that there was always a plan bigger than ours. And he is so right!!!! In all of the times in my life where I was like, "what in the crap??" at some point later I was like, "ok!!! so that's what was going on!!" So right now I will confess I'm not sure what the plan is. Algebra has really thrown a kink in my whole college career. And I don't really want to be a teacher anyway. I don't know what I want to be when I grow up. Well, actually I have a few ideas, but have no idea if any of them will ever come to fruition. But I know that no matter what, God's looking out for me and that He has a plan. So I'm holding out, doing what I KNOW He wants me to be doing now because He keeps showing me and that eventually, it'll all work out. I've just never worried that much and I guess it's just that.... My faith in God has never really waivered, no matter what some might think. That part of me has always been strong even when the rest of me has been weak. He keeps me strong no matter what. Even when I don't do the best job of showing it, He's been my best friend since I was 9 years old in my training union class because He loves me JUST LIKE I AM. He knows that I have flaws and I'm kinda crazy sometimes but he also knows how much I love Him!
So I appreciate Grant reminding me that I can relax.... keep up the pace... keep doing what I'm in place and have been called to do (using my gifts for Him) and he will work out the rest.
Ok... I'll do one of those good funny blogs soon. The other thing I meant to say before I started preaching was that William says I'm online too much and don't clean enough so I have to figure out when I can take that 30 - 45 mins to write one of those blogs with pictures and everything!!! ha!!!!

Coffee Queen

In the past couple of years or so I have built what I call my "corner." It has my coffee pot, my coffee canisters my mom gave me, my very first (years ago, and ONLY) oil pastel canvas, and a couple of other things that make me very happy in it. It has the Starbucks French press Uncle Steve bought me in Oxford that has saved me so many times. It has a couple of things that Tamar has given me that are very "me" so had to be in the "me" corner... a canvas that says "Be careful or you will end up in my novel." and a little plaque that has various little cute things on it but also a quote she found by Dave Matthews (HELLO!) that says "you lean on me and i'll lean on you and we'll be ok" which is very true for me and Mar. And also in my corner is a funny canvas that Emily painted me that says "mama mama mama" she said she painted because that's all I hear! I also have a hilarious piece of "Delta art" that is a cross made out of beer caps bought at Cat Head studios (is that right Tamar or Anna??) I had to have it... A recent inclusion is the monstrosity of a bread box that had awful avocados all over it I found at Bits and Pieces for a steal that William spray painted black and now its fabulous. I keep extra coffee in there, biscotti, creamer, splenda, etc, etc.
Well, fast forward to Valentine's Day and William gives me the MackDaddy of all coffee pots as a gift. So I have to figure out how to fit this bad boy into my lovely coffee corner. I think I'm gonna have to put it by the wall. I really need to find a place for my atrociously large bread box since my kitchen is the size of one in a pop up camper. But man, this coffee pot is AMAZING. I can keep 1/2 lb. of fresh beans in the top. Then I can push buttons to say how many cups I want to make, how strong I want it, etc, etc. IT CAME WITH AN INSTRUCTIONAL DVD. Yeah right. As William and Joshy are showing, we didn't watch some dvd. I feel like I live in a shack and have a Hummer parked out front with this coffee maker in my kitchen!! HA!!! But it has seriously been an adventure getting it figured out. I think I about have it all straightened out, and my morning coffee has just been luscious. :)
Now get out of my tiny kitchen and you get to all the recent talk of me being the "Coffee Queen" for those of you that heard it. Our church just finshed some major renovations and they are awesome. Part of the renovation is a welcome center and coffee bar. I was named "Minister of Coffee" by Grant which Jay Burrell turned around and decided should actually be "Coffee Queen." I got to 'decorate' and get the coffee makers, coffee, organize, etc ...everything to go with the coffee bar. It was like a dream come true! Still waiting on my crown... :) kidding. I love the smell when I walk in the door now. I know it's not the Taj Mahal, and now that I look at the pictures I think, "well, it's not nearly as cute as I thought it was..." but it is still a really nice hang out on Sunday mornings. I need to get some artwork up. So anyway I took some pics of Calvary's new coffee bar! I noticed today we added several coffee cups to our rack this morning... looks so cute. Tamar and I are currently working with a couple of other ladies to finish off decorating the rest of the Welcome Center... I'm so ready to get it finished!!!