A Year in Retrospect

So, I haven't blogged in a long time. For some reason, I just don't do it much anymore. So I thought I'd take a page out of my sister's book, and talk about the past year.

In January, we were living in Oklahoma while Ben was finishing up his pilot training. The weather was nuts! One day, we had clear, beautiful spring weather, and the very next day we had our biggest snowstorm of the season. We attempted to make a snowman, but it really wasn't packing snow, so he was more of a snow blob. We loved him anyway.

Evie started dance classes, and she was loving it! We assumed we would be in Oklahoma until May, at least. We even booked a cruise based on this belief. After all, it was how things seemed to go for every other pilot graduate. They had a couple of months after graduation to get ready to move and to do some of their survival training. Why should we be any different?

The next month, we discovered that Ben's first post would be to fly C-130s in Texas! On a list of 23 possibilities, it was probably our 20th choice. Lucky us. Most people get somewhere in their top 5 choices. We were (understandably, I think) less than thrilled.

Graduation was good, though. Some of Ben's family got to come out and celebrate with us. Ben looked so handsome in his uniform, it almost made me feel better about the fact that they were shipping him off for water training immediately. And after water training, they sent him straight to Little Rock for 6 months of C-130 training. Literally right after. I think he got to come home for half a day. This meant that, not only did we have to cancel our cruise and pull Evie out of dance classes, I got to pack up our entire house completely by myself! Thanks, Air Force!

When we got to Little Rock in March, we bought a new car. Yay! We love him. Evie named him "Big Jet" after the bad guy in Little Einsteins. She'd already named our Camry "Rocket Car," after Rocket in the same show, so it seemed only fair. She did insist, however, that our Big Jet is a good guy. He's an '08 Rav4 and we love him - especially now that Rocket Car is starting to die. We went to buy Big Jet on a Monday, which meant he had to spend the whole time in his blues uniform. Poor Ben.

Also in March, Evie insisted that I take a bunch of pictures of her in her dance clothes. That girl LOVES to have her picture taken! And she's so adorable - how could I resist?

In April, of course, we had Easter. We were in a small, 2-bedroom apartment, and didn't have most of our furniture with us. Needless to say, there weren't a lot of good hiding places. But we did our best, and Evie enjoyed the Easter egg hunt, so I guess it was a success!

We went with a group of other parents and kids to watch the ducks march down the red carpet at the Peabody Hotel later in April. They come strutting down the red carpet to a John Philip Sousa marching tune, then climb the stairs into the fountain in the lobby and swim around there for a while. It was very cute, and extremely weird.

Evie participated in her first talent show in April, too! She sang "Once Upon a Dream" with her Dad. It took some work to get her started, but once she did start singing, she stole the show. At least, that's my opinion.

Ben got promoted to 2nd Lieutenant in May! Hooray for Ben! Hooray for a pay raise!

Near the end of May we had a long weekend, so the three of us and our friend Grant drove to Six Flags in Dallas. We played all that day, then stayed at a hotel that night. The next day, we went to the Ripley's Museum and the attached wax museum. We also went through a mirror maze. It was really fun, although not as fun as the cruise would have been. Yes, I'm still a little bitter.

Ben's birthday was at the very end of May, and I threw him a surprise party. Thank goodness he takes after my Dad, and is extremely easy to surprise. I love that about him. Evie asked me to get him a pinata, and helped me pick out a dinosaur for him. Besides Evie, there were no kids, only Air Force officers. So I got a soft bat, in the hopes that it would make the pinata last longer. No such luck - Katie decapitated the poor thing almost immediately. I should have seen it coming. Katie is freaking awesome.

We also went ice skating at the end of May. It was Evie's first time. She had a blast. Ben and me, not so much. You see, Evie's idea of ice skating is to dangle all of her dead weight from her parents' arms and let them slide her around the ice. It may look to the untrained eye like she's got a little of her weight on her skates, but trust me, she doesn't. It was the best workout I'd had all year!

In June, I had a birthday and Evie hit a couple of milestones. She was invited to her first birthday party. She got a big-girl bike with training wheels (it was a bike party), and ended up having her Dad push her most of the way. Still, she had fun, and she won the egg-carrying race for her team. :)

Evie also learned how to put her whole head under the water at the pool in June! I was so impressed, I don't think I ever got really comfortable with it until I was in swimming lessons. Evie is fearless. She'll even open her eyes underwater.

And, of course, in June we went to see Toy Story 3. We loved it so much that we immediately went to the store and spend about $60 on toys just like the ones in the movie. Curse you and your incredible movies, Pixar!!!

In July we decided that we might try looking into adoption. We saw, though, that we couldn't start the process until we moved to Texas, so it got put off for a while. We did take some nice adoption portfolio pictures, though, thanks to my beautiful and talented aunt, Kristi. Of course, those weren't actually taken until October. Still, July is when we got the ball rolling.

At the end of July, Evie and I left Ben in Little Rock and went to visit our family in Idaho. We went to the Hirschi reunion, and Evie won the "Miss America" contest with a monologue from Lilo and Stitch. Isn't she lovely? Isn't she a pearl?

We also attended Ben's family's reunion up in Island Park. It was right on the river, which made me a little nervous, but there were plenty of aunts and uncles helping to keep the little ones out of the river. And the kids loved it! They even caught a frog!

August was eventful because, first off, Big Jet got rear-ended by a drunk driver while my mom and I were in the car, on our way to get ice cream for my mom's birthday. Yes, it was her birthday. The driver hit us while we were stopped at a red light, then backed up and hit us again, in order to push us far enough into the intersection that he could drive away. Happy Birthday, Mom! Some nice girls chased him down for us and the police caught him. Thank goodness! The repairs were pretty expensive. The whole back of the car had to be replaced.

We went down to Utah to visit my siblings there (and because my mom had an eye appointment). While we were in Salt Lake, we visited Temple Square and went on a horse-drawn carriage ride. Evie was so excited about the horse. And it was just after dark, so the weather was cool and gorgeous.

At the end of August, my mom, brother, Evie, and I all went to Disneyland - another first for Evie. We got to California on a Thursday afternoon, so we decided to go to Santa Monica Pier for a while. It was beautiful!

We spent two days in the park. It was crowded and hot, but it was so fun! It's really all about atmosphere, is what we decided. On the first day, Evie got to meet Tinkerbell and Minnie Mouse. She was in heaven!

On the second day, Evie and I had a lunch with the Disney princesses planned. We dressed Evie up in her Belle costume. She looked so beautiful. It was fun, but she was less than impressed with the princesses - probably because none of them really look anything like the cartoons. The real highlight of the day for Evie was when Sully (from Monsters, Inc.) bowed to her and kissed her hand. She curtsied back (!!!so cute!!!), then ran up and gave him a hug. It was so. Freaking. Adorable. Anyway, Disneyland was a great success.September was fairly uneventful, because Mom and Joseph started school again. Evie and I got to visit with my dad, who was home for a vacation from Iraq, so that was great. Aside from that, all was pretty quiet. Ben was in survival training, and we got to see him for Labor Day weekend, but the rest of the time he was basically cut off from us. Stressful. On the up side, Evie wrote a letter to Santa Claus, her first letter that she actually wrote herself. I had to show her how to shape some of the letters, and help with the spelling, but she wrote it herself!
In October, Evie and Alyssa celebrated their birthdays together in Utah, and back in Idaho I took Evie's annual birthday pictures.

The next weekend, because Ben had finally finished survival training and was in Idaho with us (yay!) we had Evie's birthday party. Since she's an October baby, it was a costume party. Everyone dressed up - I was so impressed!

A couple of weeks later, we officially moved to Texas. We got to go to a couple of different Halloween parties, so Evie took the opportunity to wear different costumes to each one.

In November, we adopted a dog! We named him Bones McCoy. "Dammit, Jim, I'm a dauschund, not a scientist!" It took some work to get him housetrained, and he needs a bath every week or he gets really stinky, but we love him. For Thanksgiving, we made our own "Thankful Turkey," something we got from Ben's family. Isn't he cute??Thanksgiving was fun. It was just the three of us and Bones McCoy. We kept it simple, but it was really special all the same. We played games, ate good food, and the very next day we put up the Christmas decorations!

In December, Evie danced in The Nutcracker with her dance school (we enrolled her at the beginning of November). It was so cute. She looked completely comfortable on the stage - I was so proud!

After her show was done, we went back to Idaho to have Christmas with our families! We haven't had a chance to see both of our families for Christmas at the same time since... well, ever. My family is usually overseas. It was a great stroke of luck that both of our families were in the same city this year. It was a short vacation, but we loved seeing them. :) Did I mention that Evie got that dollhouse for Christmas? And that Ben made it with his own hands? Well, she did, and he did. And that's 2010 in a huge nutshell. Lots of milestones reached, lots of things going on, lots of laughter and joy. Let's hope that 2011 turns out so well!