Happy Birthday Gunner!

It's already September 18th in Afghanistan.....

When Gunner was born, he was a little guy, tipping the scales at just over 3 pounds.  He was 6 weeks early I think.  In this picture I believe he was a few months old.  When he was first born, his dad was able to hold him in the palm of his hand.


Gunner with his 3 brothers.  He's the cutie on the far left.


A shot of when Gunner was home on R&R, just in time to meet his son.  (His son, who outweighed him by 7 pounds at birth, yikes!)

He's no longer that little kid.

He's a wonderful father, husband, and Soldier...and no longer the little guy.

Happy 40th Birthday Sweetie!  We love you and miss you!

P.S.  Thanks for all the great suggestions, but as luck would have it, he got this....or he will when he gets home.  It was a moment of weakness on my part....

How in the world?

I look back when I blogged last deployment, and I had a full time job, worked out like a wild woman, three kids, and was going to graduate school.  How did I have time to blog?  I never slept.  I could function on 5 or less hours of sleep, and now I am two years older, and that just isn't happening.

I could easily be happy with 8 hours of sleep a night, and that isn't happening either.

Abs is killing me.  She's up all night, and for some reason after all this time, it dawned on me.....she doesn't know how to go back to sleep.  All that self soothing as babies is useless when they are older, and she for the life of her can't figure it out.  

This should have been totally obvious to me, but it hasn't been, and I blame it on the lack of sleep.

We had a long talk about it, and I explained some things to her, and talked about relaxation techniques, and then did what I always do.

I went to Amazon.

I found a few very highly rated relaxation cd's, that tell stories, and get the child to calm down.

I'm hoping it works.

I let her listen to the clips on amazon, and she said she preferred her current cd.

Can you guess what it is?  It's a CD made from an old record, that I absolutely loved--the story of Jean Lafeyette.  I memorized it as a kid, and Abs has memorized it now.

She thinks that is relaxing.  Somehow I don't think the songs and story behind their battle of the British is relaxing, so she said she'd try things my way.

I hope it works.

I have pictures to post from all our fun this past weekend, but while at a festival, we met a Holistic Clinical Nutritionist.  After I gave her the 3rd degree on the phone today about credentials, I am taking Abs for an appointment this Friday.

Maybe this will give us some guidance.....some help....some sleep?