College in the Army

Cpl D started college last month...well college in the army anyways. This version of college is nothing like what I experienced at SCU, that is for certain. At SCU our professors were responsive, our assignments were well written and well explained to us, and we actually had real lectures. Now I admit that Cpl D's class is online, but I would still expect that there would be more to the class than here's the book write 4 papers and take a 50 question multiple choice test as a final. The professor is rather unresponsive, sometimes taking upwards of a week to respond to an email, which is beyond frustrating. When you are paying money for higher education, you expect to get more out of it than here's a book, now write me a paper. Did I forget to mention, that the only comment back on his first paper, was that "this was more complete than anyone else's"? How can you learn from that? Anyone with a library card can learn for free like that. College is supposed to be about someone imparting their far superior knowledge base unto you and you taking that, doing further research and learning even more. It is supposed to be about pushing yourself, it is supposed to be an environment that promotes the exchange of ideas, but this environment, thus far, doesn't even promote furthering your knowledge outside of your textbook. I can't wait until next semester when Cpl D tries another class and a different professor and hopefully gets the college experience that he deserves.

White Sands

So Cpl D is heading to White Sands, NM at the end of March for a month, lucky him, and oh yeah, lucky me too. I get to be alone in Washington for a whole month. Now let's remember that I'm up here by myself, in a pretty unfamiliar place, with almost no friends (although the people I work with are pretty cool, so that does help a little) and I'm going to be alone. Lucky for me I have my great attack cats for protection. (Don't they look scary, intimidating and ready to fight off intruders!)


Now I know that I signed up for all the army stuff when I married Cpl D, in fact one of the many things I love about him is his commitment to his job and what he does. How can you not love that about him. But you have to remember that the past two months I have been going through some pretty horrible medical stuff and when someone asks me what is wrong and I tell them that I'm upset because Cpl D is leaving the day I have my consult for my next major test and the procedure (one which is pretty painful, and which I cannot drive to or from) is going to be while he is gone and all anyone can say in response is "Well you signed up for it." All that makes me want to do is punch you in the face. I'm not looking for sympathy, but you can be a little more understanding than that! I mean come on, my husband is going to be gone for a month, I'm going through a ton of medical issues right now, I have to have at least one pretty painful medical procedure, AND on top of that potentially surgery. Don't just say "Well you signed up for it"! Don't you think I know that!!! Or do you think I wasn't there on my wedding day when he was wearing his Class A uniform and looking so handsome I could hardly keep my hands to myself?!?


This is really our first major adventure with the Army, and one heck of an adventure it will be, we will be separated for the first time since he got home from Germany (at least this time we will only be 1 time zone apart), I will be living on my own again (the first time in over 6 months) in a very unfamiliar place, and I will have to go through medical testing without any family around which will be entirely new for me. If we survive this (and I know we will), then, as the saying goes, we will survive anything.

Newly Discovered Passion

I always knew that I enjoyed cooking. At least, I enjoyed eating, and in order to eat you had to cook, so I enjoyed cooking in that sense. However, since marrying Cpl D I have come to realize that this may truly be one of my passions. I absolutely love trying new recipes, even when they turn out awful, like last nights dinner out of my "Cooking for Today: Quick & Easy" cookbook. I tried poached salmon with penne for two reasons, one it looked like something I could do with the skills I have learned the past few months and I am trying to learn to eat fish, so it was a perfect fit. Well, the recipe can be easily described with one sentence: Can I have a little salmon with my lemon? It was all LEMON! Cpl D and I hate wasting food, and for the first time ever last night we threw out the entire dinner and we got take out. It was that bad, and I can honestly say that I followed the recipe ingredient for ingredient, step for step, and it was just awful. Oh well, not every recipe I try is going to turn out perfect I guess.

Tonight I am making a fish stew out of "Cooking for Today: Pasta". This is a tried and true recipe that I have made once before that Cpl D and I really enjoy, only what Cpl D doesn't realize is that he is coming home to a candlelit dinner for two. Tomorrow is our four month wedding anniversary and I think we just needed something a little special tonight. Our apartment smells amazing (if I do say so myself) and I think he will really like my little surprise.

I am going to continue with my cooking adventures, trying new recipes and learning new skills. This weekend I am planning on baking a pie, by myself, for the first time ever. Cookies are no big thing, brownies are a snap, but a pie...now that intimidates me, so we shall see how I do. Especially considering I have the most unreliable oven on the planet. Who knows where all this cooking will lead...probably to just a really happy family in my future, but you know, that is all anyone can really ask for.

The sun and my mood

I have never really fancied myself as a true California Girl. I don't have blonde hair, I love the sound of the ocean, but I don't like to get into it (I need a much more tropical version of the ocean, give me Hawaii or Tahiti), and tanning is out of the question. However, ever since I moved to Washington, because of the good old US Army, I am beginning to realize just how much of a California Girl I am, and more importantly, just how much of a sunchild I am. I mean the sun came out today and today was the best I felt in a week or more (which is about how long it has been since I last saw the sun). I went for a mile long walk outside and another mile inside on a treadmill, and I have to tell you, even though I was freezing during the outside walk, I enjoyed it a whole heck of a lot more!

I heard recently that Seattle has the highest suicide rate in the US, or some crazy statistic like that, I am beginning to see why, the weather up here is pretty darn depressing, and if you let it, it can really get you down. I am starting to find coping mechanisms. I started working out last week, and even more this week, and the endorfins help unbelievably. I just wish my health had been better during the first 4 months we had been here and I would be working out just to keep healthy instead of to keep healthy and to get down from a size 8 (damn near 10, I'm not to proud, I can admit it to myself and the world) back to my old size 4. Part of the problem is I got sick, the other part of the problem is that several doctors put me on medications that cause weight gain, and guess what...I GAINED. Well, Cpl D and I are supposed to be celebrating our 1-year anniversary in beautiful Oahu and I think that is one heck of a goal to work towards and I am going to keep it constantly in my sights as I work out and try to get my body back to where I was comfortable. Cpl D is wonderful and tells me I am beautiful all the time and that I should never feel like I need to lose weight for him, and I'm not, I'm doing it because I want to be healthy, stay healthy, and I want to be more comfortable in my own skin. We already eat really healthy, so now that I am off the weight gaining meds, I am pretty sure that simply adding the daily workouts will be the key to success. Feel free to encourage me, and I will update you all on my progress as I go.

If I don't write tomorrow, Happy Valentine's Day to everyone celebrating. Cpl D and I are not celebrating until Saturday, we are going to go to the Sea Grille in Tacoma, and we are very excited.

Real Life Vampires

I have become convinced, and I mean absolutely convinced, that vampires exist. I think that they live amongst us and work at hospitals in labs and they take our blood. The guise is that they are doing it for our own good, but really, they just want it all for themselves. Really, the reason I have become convinced of this is because over the course of the past six weeks I have become a veritable pin cushion for the lab techs at Madigan Army Medical Center. I mean, I think I have had every blood test known to man, and some of them more than once, and what is worse, more than once in ONE WEEK!

It didn't even cross my mind until I finished reading my the novel I was engrossed in last night "Blood Canticle" by Anne Rice, one of my favorite authors. I have read all of the Vampire Chronicles and all of the Mayfair books, and I honestly am beginning to think that maybe they aren't just books...fantasy come to life maybe?

Out of fantasy land and into reality land, tonight I am making Cpl D Turkey Paprishka over noodles with broccoli. This afternoon, after the trip to the vampire lair, I did an amazing workout on my workout ball that I know I am going to feel in the morning and I know will make me sleep through the night. However, best thing of all is that I wrote this post and I know that at least one of my readers will be shocked to see two posts in two days from me, and he knows who he is :)

Hello February

So it was pointed out to me, yet again, that I haven't posted in awhile and I am being a bad blogger. Ok, well last week was like a really really bad week. Just when I decide, on the first day of Lent, that I am going to try to give up stress (or at least deal with it better) I land myself in the emergency room, for the 9th time in 6 weeks!!! Can you believe it?!? This time for something completely unrelated to the migraines and I get to go through an entirely new set of tests starting next weekend with a CT scan of my abdomen.

Well after the horrible week that Cpl D and I had, we decided that for date night this week we would go to a great restaurant called Indochine in downtown Tacoma. The food was amazing, the atmosphere was phenomenal and the best part was that it was a truly adult restaurant and there were no screaming children there. We enjoyed a nice quiet meal on the water (they have a fountain inside), some wonderful conversation and had a truly nice time without evening thinking about the week's events.

The rest of the weekend we spent resting and relaxing. I'm not really too sure what we are going to do for Valentine's Day, my sense of it is, not too much. I'm not too big on the holiday and Cpl D just gets home from work so late that doing anything too big at night is kind of difficult. I am however looking forward to the long weekend coming up. We will need to find another new restaurant to try (comment me a suggestion!) and maybe something fun to do in the area since it is a 3-day.

I promise to do better this week with posts.

Good-bye snow, hello slushy rain

My snow day is over and with the exception of some very dirty snow and slush left behind, you would never know it was even here. It is currently raining an interesting combination of snow and rain, it rains for 20 or 30 minutes, then it snows for maybe 5. It is super cold outside and has made me cancel my planned workout for the day, the last thing I want to do is get out of my clothes, even if it is to simply put other clothes on. I am just too cold for any amount of undressing.

I am slowly beginning to realize that I am probably never going to adjust to the weather up here and I'm not going to adjust to the lack of light during the winter, so I have to find different ways to cope with my new surroundings in order to not be miserable for the next 22 months. For starters I am trying to focus on all the positives in my life and there really are so many to focus on, as I am a very lucky and blessed person. Secondly I am learning to do something I have always wanted to do, cook. I try new recipes every week, and some weeks, almost every other day, and for the most part they have all been very successful. The other thing I am doing is fixing things that remind me of home, like chicken stir fry and the baked biscuits and beans casserole dish my mom used to make. They are awesome comfort foods that really make me happy. Lastly I am trying to work on my overall health. The doctors want me to learn to control things like my posture and my heart rate, so I'm working on that as well. We'll see how it all goes.

I'm outta here, I have to go make dinner for Cpl D, tonight we are having Scallops based on a recipe out of my favorite cookbook, Better Homes & Gardens, Cooking for Two, copyright 1968.

Snow Day!

For the last three days I have been watching the weather for Lakewood on my Google homepage and it kept saying that it would snow. We got a little slushy rain, we got a little sunshine and we got a few clouds, but no snow. This morning CPL D (he got a promotion last Tuesday, we are totally stoked for him) and I were getting ready for work as usual, and he came into the bathroom where I was doing my hair and informed me that everything was covered in snow. The truck looked really pretty actually. I have never had a snow day in my whole life being a born and raised SF Bay Area girl, so this is all very new to me. I took my little cat Paws outside in the snow and he walked around for a little bit, then promptly ran back into the apartment, apparently it wasn't up to his spoiled house cat standards.

My boss told me to stay home this morning, I work about 20 miles from my house, and usually my commute is absolutely cake. It takes me 25 minutes, door to door, to get to my office. However, I work in Bonney Lake, at the top of the hill on highway 410 and they get the snow even worse than we get it where Cpl D and I live, so there was no way that my boss wanted me driving into the office.

I don't know what to do with myself this morning. I am guessing there will be some knitting, and some yummy breakfast making, and possibly some reading too. I'm reading "Blood Canticle" by Anne Rice (one of the only Vampire Chronicle books that I haven't read). It should be a nice morning, and if I get really bored, I can always play with the Wii.

I am really hoping though that Cpl D's unit is also released for the day. I don't like the idea of him out there driving in this stuff and I really don't like the idea of him running around in snow when he is sick. Did I mention that he was sick? He came down with something over the weekend, I am just hoping he doesn't share.

Well I'm off to have a little fun on my snow day :)

Life

One of my readers asked me today when I was going to start blogging again (ok, really it was my dad, but he reads my blog, so he counts as one of my readers!), and I told him maybe tomorrow. A lot of things lately keep getting that answer because I have been so busy trying to maintain. With all the health issues going on, I was thinking to myself last week that things couldn't get much worse...then my mom called my husband to find out if I was home from work, turns out I was home and she was calling to tell me my Papa died. This isn't the first time I have had a grandparent pass away, in fact, my Papa was my last living grandparent, but this is the first time I have been away from my family and the vast majority of my support structure. I think I have dealt with all of this pretty well, I've cried a few times, baked a whole lot of cookies and started a new knitting project in the effort of keeping myself busy. This is also the first funeral I am going to miss. Everyone feels that in light of my new job and my current health concerns that getting on an airplane and dealing with altitude changes is probably not the best idea ever. I'm very sad I will not be there with my family.

I love my family and I really wish I could do more, other than be a shoulder over the phone. I also promise to be a better blogger and to start blogging about the fun adventures Aaron and I have been having. Starting with the fact that we have had two dinners made with...wait for it...FISH! Even more shocking than that is the fact that I actually liked it. I may yet survive the latest diet imposed on me by the medical world.

Dietary Restrictions

As most of you all know, I suffer from migraines, occasionally, very severe migraines, like the type I have been suffering from the past three weeks that landed in me in the hospital. My new doctor over at Madigan, has put me on a new diet, with all kinds of new dietary restrictions. Get ready for this: no aspartame, MSG, Aged Cheeses (not too schocking), pork (in all forms), yogurt, sour cream, bananas, nuts and peanut butter (which could quite possibly kill me), and of course chocolate. Most of these restrictions I can live with 100%, but taking away yogurt and OMG peanut butter really could be the end of me.

I am going to try to follow the diet for at least a month and see what happens, my hope is that some things I will be able to re-introduce and others I can learn to live without, I'm just hoping that peanut butter is not one of the things I have to learn to live without :(

Bad Blogger

So I know I have been a bad blogger, it has been 3 weeks exactly since I last posted something, but I have a lot of good reasons for not having written. In the last 3 weeks I have been in the hospital for a total of seven days, not to mention we were traveling for 2 of the last three weeks and we didn't exactly have reliable Internet access the whole time. I'm sorry for not being a better blogger, but that is just how it is right now.

I have been struggling with a horrible migraine the past three weeks, thus the hospital stays, and I have discovered that while all hospitals have their issues I would pick a military hospital over a civilian one any day. The care is incredibly complete, and they believe you when you say you are still having pain. The civilian hospital couldn't solve the problem I was having, so when I went in for my second (and final visit there, on Christmas morning), they decided to accuse me of being a drug addict. MAN WERE THEY WRONG!!! I guess that is the problem I have with medicine, if you don't get the right doctor, who is going to be your advocate, then you really can be treated very poorly. I learned that the hard way.

We spent Christmas, once I was out of the hospital with Spc D's family, they are absolutely wonderful. They said that they would have me eating like a cholita in no time, if that means eating spicy foods, I'm not too sure about that, but I can proudly say that I did try everything that was given too me, even though the Chili was so hot, I thought my tongue was going to sue me for separation. While we were in New Mexico we visited with some of Spc D's friends, and we did something especially exciting for me, we went to the place that my Papa was born at, which was so amazing for me to see. We took tons of pictures, all of which are viewable on my picasa page.

When we left New Mexico, we split the driving in Spc D's old Dodge Dakota, not the most comfortable car ever, but definitely a point A to point B vehicle. Shortly after arriving in California, we bought a new car, a 2008 Toyota Tacoma, PreRunner SR5. It is silver, and currently named "The Bad Ass Truck", who knows how long that name will stick.

We made it home and have been struggling with my health issues ever since, but I am going with the notion that things cal only get better. Oh yeah, we also picked up two more members of the family while we were in California...Patches and Paws and live with us, though there are some nights when I would dearly love to kill Patches for all his crying at 2 in the morning. We are happy they are here, it gives the apartment a much homier feelings.

That is all for me, more details and everything soon, when I have a little more energy.

Happy Christmas!

This is probably going to be my last post until 2008 as Spc D (soon to be Cpl D) and I are headed to New Mexico today for Christmas and then to California for New Years. We have had a rough couple of days this past week, and have gotten to know the emergency staff pretty well at Madigan Army Medical Center. On Thursday night I ended up with the worst migraine of my life, so we went to the hospital, and out of concern for infection or an abrasion on my brain, they did a spinal tap. Well one of the side effects of a spinal tap is a spinal headache, on Saturday morning we went back to the hospital with one of those. I am feeling much better now. I only have a slight, manageable, headache and I no longer feel like (or look) like walking death. The best part is that we are still going to make our trip to New Mexico. Yippee!!

I may write more when we get to California, but most likely the next update on our newlywed adventures will recommence after January 4, 2008 when we are scheduled to be back in Lakewood.

Long week...

Wow, it has been a full week since I blogged last. Sorry for the silence. I started my new job this week and it has been go go go since I hit the door. My day starts at 4:45am when Spc D wakes me up with his obnoxious cell phone ring. I hop in the shower and he gets ready for PT, then he makes a sandwich for both our lunches. After I drop him off on post, I head up to Bonney Lake, about a 30 min drive from Fort Lewis. I work until about 3pm then I head back to post to pick up Spc D. We have had some pretty long days this past week, but they have been pretty good ones too.

Last night we headed over to the bowling alley on post, where I managed to bowl a 155, with a bum finger and all. I pinched a nerve on my first frame of the night.

This weekend we are going to play it pretty easy. We are going to head up to Renton to go to the Fry's in the hopes of buying a Nintendo Wii, we'll see if we actually find one. Spc D is starting WLC (Warrior Leader Course) in January so we are also going to go buy all of his supplies this weekend.

We hope everyone is doing well, and we miss our families so much and can't wait to see everyone in the next couple of weeks.

Bye Mom, Bye Dad

Well, my parents have come and gone, it feels like they were only here for a second. Even though their flight was delayed well over two hours (thank you United, the most unscheduled airline in the skies), we still managed to cram a whole lot of into two very short days. We started with a great dinner at Johnny's Dock, right on the Puget Sound in Tacoma. We were all tired so we called it a night right after dinner.



Saturday morning my parents came over to see our apartment, and they said they really liked it, especially mom. They like us though, were not overly impressed with our neighbors. We spent the morning in Seattle at Pike's Place Market, and had fun strolling around. We were hoping to see them throwing the fish, but little did we know that you have to pay them money to see them throw, so we decided that little part of the adventure was just not worth it. Saturday afternoon we showed my parents Fort Lewis, and we ended the day with an amazing dinner at the Sea Grill in Tacoma with a colleague of my father's.


Sunday we had another early breakfast at our apartment, where it began to snow (two weekends in a row!) and then headed back into Tacoma to see the Glass Museum. Spc D really loved watching them blow and shape the glass in the hot room.

After we left my parents at the airport (yes there were a few tears), Spc D and I headed back home to Lakewood. Tomorrow I start my new job, so we figured we would have a relaxing evening at home. We cooked a wonderful dinner together, Pork Tenderloin with Bulgar Wheat from my Every Day Beef, Pork and Lamb recipe book, and are now doing laundry and getting things ready for work tomorrow. Later we have great plans to roast marshmallows on the wonderful fire that Spc D got going.

Guess who's coming for dinner?

My PARENTS!!! I am so excited to see them, it feels like it has been years, when it really hasn't even been two months. This is the longest in my entire life that I have gone without seeing my parents, and considering how close I am with them, that is a really long time.

We are going to have so much fun, I have a great weekend planned for them. Today when they get here we are going to go on post, mainly because my mom has never seen a military post before, but also because we plan to do a little x-mas shopping at the PX while we are there. Then tonight we are going to have dinner in Tacoma at a restaurant called Johnny's Dock. I am pretty excited as the restaurant comes highly recommended.

Tomorrow we are going to get up early (much to the chagrin of Spc D), and head into Seattle. We are going to visit the Space Needle, and hopefully mom's fear of heights won't kick in, then we are going to head to Pike's Place for lunch, followed up with a visit to the REI flagship store in Seattle for my dad. For dinner we are going to head back into Tacoma for dinner at the Sea Grill, also highly recommended.

On Sunday, they are leaving on a 4pm flight, so I was thinking it might be fun to actually get a look at Tacoma and visit the Glass Museum there. It looks pretty awesome with live glass blowing, which has always fascinated me, every day. I can't wait to see them, and in the meantime, I better get myself in gear, I need to vacuum (again) and mop my floors before they get here. I want everything to be perfect for their visit!

Something to Celebrate!

I got a job! Woohoo!!! I start on Monday, and I will be the marketing department for a small international software company. Sorry no names allowed... I am really excited as this is an amazing opportunity for professional growth and development for me, especially considering the company is planning on training me in the technology behind the software as well as paying for me to take some graphic design classes. This is huge for me, and for Spc D too.

This opportunity is going to allow us to start saving and it will also allow us to do a few more things than we thought would be possible in the coming years. So we are really excited about it. Last night Spc D took me out to celebrate at our favorite Mexican restaurant up here, Azteca. Even Spc D likes it, and seeing as he is from New Mexico, I think that speaks rather highly for the restaurant.

I am going to enjoy my last 5 days of not working by knitting, reading my latest Clive Custler novel, cooking some delicious meals for my hubby and hanging out with my parents this weekend when they come up for their visit.

First Snow, First Fire

When we moved up to Lakewood we asked everyone what the weather was like up here. We were told that it snows a couple of times a year and gets unbearably hot for a couple of weeks in the summer. Seeing as we are at sea level, I really wasn't sure when we would see snow...well it snowed this weekend. In fact for a couple of hours there, it was snowing bloody well hard! Spc D was surprised that it snowed long enough and got cold enough that the snow stuck, I was just in awe the entire time, having grown up in the Bay Area I have only seen snow maybe a dozen times in my life. To be perfectly honest, I never imagined myself living in a place where it was expected to snow...ever, but here I am.



The first snow brought with it our first fire. Let me tell you, we have tried to make a fire on three other occasions, but this time, like the snow, it stuck! Our apartment is warm and cozy right now, and we have my wonderful husbands made fire making skills to thank for that.

We had a lot of fun this weekend. We did the vast majority of our Christmas shopping, and what we didn't finish, we know what we are getting for those people. We also went bowling last night, we bowled a total of 8 games and with the exception of one we scored over 100 each time, we are going to aim for 150 next time. I have a feeling the bowling is going to become a regular thing for us. I have to say though, I have never seen so many guys in a bowling alley trip oer their tongues all at the same time, as I did last night. The Atlanta Falcons Cheerleaders showed up to bowl a few games and sign autographs, even Spc D forgot for a few moments who he was with and ogled over them. All in all we had a great weekend, and are really looking forward to next weekend when my parents come up for the weekend.

Silence is Deadly

Or is it Golden? I can't decide. The apartment complex that we live in here in Lakewood, is a really beautiful place, set right on Seeley Lake. We have a really nice first floor, 2-bedroom apartment with a little patio, and an extra storage room. I love our apartment, especially since we finally have it all set up with all of our furniture, although I would dearly love to get a few things hung on the walls...but I can wait for that. The only thing I do not love is all the noise here. We can hear everything that goes on in the apartments that surround us, so it is never really "silent"around here. I find myself listening to my iPod a lot lately, or just my playlist from my computer. I miss silence, and it is quite an adjustment for me not to have any.

As some of you know, I had a job interview yesterday, well...it must of have gone well, because I have a second interview with the same company on Tuesday next week! I am really excited about this position and feel that I am qualified for the job. It is the first time that this company will have a dedicated marketing department, and I would be running the show, actually I would be a one-woman show, but it would be a lot of fun, if nothing else. Keep your fingers crossed!

This weekend, Spc D and I are planning on heading down to Washington's state capitol, Olympia, to have a look around and to see what there is to see, but I'll tell you, I am really looking forward to next weekend, when my parents are coming up for a visit. I miss them. Actually I miss everything in California. I'm getting used to Washington, I just can't get used to the cold. Knowing my luck, by the time I adjust to the cold, the army will station us somewhere tropical!

Sweet Dreams!

I am finally going to have sweet dreams tonight! After 3.5 weeks of sleeping on air mattresses and couches, our bed arrived today. It is gorgeous, my dream bed!

Our apartment is finally complete, and for the first time ever I am using a very special quilt on my bed. A quilt I will only get to use until my cats arrive. It is the quilt that my incredibly talented mom made for me. Isn't it gorgeous!!!???!!!

I am looking forward to the next time I go to California, as I really want to complete the quilt that I am making for Spc D and myself. It is an "Around the World" pattern, and in the most beautiful shades of blue, purple and green.

Well I should get back to applying for jobs and knitting for the newest addition to our family that is arriving a few days before Christmas.

Optical Illusion...Mt. Rainier

Yesterday Spc D and I finally made the drive to Mount Rainier, and can I just tell you, from post it looks like it is only 20 miles away, when in fact it is a 2 hour drive (mainly because all the roads have a speed limit of 50 miles per hour or less). We got up around 9 in the morning (later than we intended, but we didn't bother to set an alarm...oh well), and started our day by layering on the clothes. We got in the car, plugged in the iPod and started our journey. When we finally got to the park entrance we were already seeing the tiniest sprinkling of snow on the ground, and for this California girl that is always a treat. It was at least another half hour of driving before we got our first glimpse of the peak itself.


It was a bit covered in clouds when we first got there, but we decided to keep driving up to the Paradise visitors center and observatory. By the time we finished our lunch, the sun came out and we had an amazing view of not only the peak itself, but a second mountain range that we had never seen from post.

The coolest part of the day though, had to be on our drive out of the park when I actually had Spc D turn around on the road because I saw this amazing view of the Mt. Rainier at sunset. What made this especially cool is that on our way up we passed the same spot and didn't even know you could see the mountain from there. We stopped and took a few final pictures.

Today though...Spc D made me the happiest woman in the world, he let me buy a new bed! It is being delivered on Tuesday, and I cannot wait for it's arrival as I am sick and tired of our couches as beds!

PS. After three games of bowling today, I finally managed to beat the socks off him in our final game today!!! I actually broke 120 points (which is a first for me!).