Tis the season

Today we received our first christmas box. It was from my grandma and grandpa Robinson. Reading her note to each of us made all of us laugh and smile. We actually miss missouri and living so close to them. We made some wonderful memories. I've enclosed some pictures of her homemade gifts,a check, and cards. She also enclosed the soldiers christmas story card. I have attached it as well. It goes as follows: 'Twas The Night Before Christmas, He Lived All Alone, In A One Bedroom House Made Of Plaster And Stone. I Had Come Down The Chimney with Presents To Give, And To See Just Who In This Home Did Live. I Looked All About, A Strange Sight I Did See, No Tinsel, No Presents, Not Even A Tree. No Stocking By Mantle, Just Boots Filled With Sand, On The Wall Hung Pictures Of Far Distant Lands. With Medals And Badges, Awards Of All Kinds, A Sober Thought Came Through My Mind. For This House Was Different, It Was Dark And Dreary, I Found The Home Of A Soldier, Once I Could See Clearly. The Soldier Lay Sleeping, Silent, Alone, Curled Up On The Floor In This One Bedroom Home. The Face Was So Gentle, The Room In Such Disorder, Not How I Pictured A United States Soldier. Was This The Hero Of Whom I'd Just Read? Curled Up On A Poncho, The Floor For A Bed? I Realized The Families That I Saw This Night, Owed Their Lives To These Soldiers Who Were Willing To Fight. Soon Round The World, The Children Would Play, And Grownups Would Celebrate A Bright Christmas Day. They All Enjoyed Freedom each Month Of The Year, Because Of The Soldiers, Like The One Lying Here. I Couldn't Help Wonder How Many Lay Alone, On A Cold Christmas Eve In A Land Far From Home. The Very Thought Brought A Tear To My Eye, I Dropped To My Knees And Started To Cry. The Soldier Awakened And I Heard A Rough Voice, "Santa Don't Cry, This Life Is My Choice; I Fight For Freedom, I Don't Ask For More, My Life Is My God, My Country, My Corps." The Soldier Rolled Over and Drifted To Sleep, I Couldn't Control It, I Continued To Weep. I Kept Watch For Hours, so Silent And Still And We Both Shivered From The Cold Night's Chill. I Didn't Want To Leave On That Cold, Dark, Night, This Guardian Of Honor So Willing To Fight. Then The Soldier Rolled Over, With A Voice Soft And Pure, Whispered, "Carry On Santa, It's Christmas Day, All Is Secure." One Look At My Watch, And I Knew He Was Right. "Merry Christmas My Friend, And To All A Good Night." Written by Lance Corporal James M. Schmidt in 1986. Printed in Leatherneck (The Magazines for the Marines) in December 1991. We are thankful for our grandparents. The time we spent with them and the memories made and still to be made. Every day Kaydence slides down the hallway because she says shes ive skating in her new slippers we will think of the ducks and the pond in missouri and a wonderful couple in the sticks lol. Sean says he misses the beer and talks in the quiet out there and fishing.. i miss getting to be closer to them and the wine and the peanut clusters and fresh meat lol. we love you guys so much!

Pictures

We have added most of our pictures to the site photobucket. you can follow them by going to http://s1242.beta.photobucket.com/user/robinobrien88/profile/ Most of these pictures are also on facebook. :)

December Adventures

Today we had so much fun traveling and seeing christmas markets. Our first destination was Rothenburg. It is a beautiful older village. We went to kath Wahlfarht or what ever lol. I felt like i was a movie star or i guess Kay was. Their crew kept filming her every move. I didnt know to be mean or just let them film the kids in their store. She was so excited to see santa there but every santa she has seen the rest of the day she has informed me they are FAKE!Thanks to the movie ELF. lol. I had to explain to her that santa sends his helpers because he cant be everywhere at the same time. i was then asked if it was santa or his helpers that will come on christmas eve. BECAUSE!!.. if it was his helpers then she is not leaving him the Santa KEY. lol. She is just fine with him leaving the gifts at the door she said. lol. We also went to Nuremburg. We ended up lost but found our way and are way too exhausted! goodnight. enjoy the pictures

O christmas tree o christmas tree...

Tonight we put up Kaydence's tree. While we were back in the states she picked one out at hobby lobby and ornaments. It has all her special ornaments and Aubries ornaments on it. She did a great job decorating it. Also a picture of our bigger family tree.

Family time with my brother and trey

While in Kansas robert and trey came to visit. We miss them already.

Thanksgiving...the true meaning

This thanksgiving i was acting like the grinch of the season. I was not looking forward to a long day of cooking or two. I was not into the daily thankful blogs on facebook. I didnt care for the holiday at all. I was missing family and ready to put up my christmas tree ans slimmer waist line. A few days before thanksgiving i was the smallest i had been in a few years and decorating my tree dancing to santa baby. All was right in my world. God knew what i was thankful for so why did everyone else need to know. I couldnt skip thanksgiving though and take that away from my husband so i did a small piece of thanksgiving. As i started cooking on thanksgiving eve and trying to be cheerful i got a message. There was an emergency and my husband needed to call home. He came home from work and all the while all i could think of was thanksgiving 2006. Everything seemed normal as we got ready for our small family thanksgiving and the phone rang. My grandma was needing surgery. A million tears fell as i remembered that thanksgiving and losing my grandmother. My mama. It felt like i was standing back in time again waiting to see what the call was about. I knew...after reading his families' fb statuses. I knew..it was his grandfather. Such an amazing man. What i didnt know is if we had time. Sean got off of the phone and came into the kitchen where i had previous,y been cooking and dancing with my girls to find me in shock in tears. I asked if it was him..he said yes. I cried more remembering how i felt wondering if he felt that way. I apologized for being weak in a moment i was suppose to be strong for him.sean laughed as if it was okay. We did have time. Sean said we didnt need to rush it. Hours later i convinced him to call and make sure we didnt need to come home and ofcourse we did. I packed immediately forgetting we were no longer a short drive away. I kept praying for his grandma. Yes i wrote that right. I prayed for her to have the strength to bare this pain. I prayed for her health through this. I prayed for her sanity. After what felt like eternity we were home in kansas the day after thanksgiving. We were rushed through the elevator into his room to say our goodbyes. We waited for his last breath. All i could think about was what wonderful people his grandfather and grandmother were. I kept looking at her and him. Inlove through the pain. You see up until the oast two years i never had a grandmother or grandfather i was close to. I could talk to and go see and felt a part of. My mom's parents didnt speak english; my real fathers parents were mot around; my dad's parents lived too far. Over the past two 1/2 years i grew closer to my grandma and grandpa robinson and seans grandparents. I only recently had that love of a grandparent. Losing one was heart breaking. I regreted not saying my thankful comments,not appreciating the holiday, not being closer to home. Well Through the process we were able to spend time with Seans great uncle and aunt. We feel like we gained another set of grandparents and so do our kids. Grandpa pulled through and is the miracle man. He is such a strong man. Its unbelieveable. We were given a million and one reasons to be thankful on thanksgiving and every day. We felt closer and more inlove watching his grandmothers love and commitment to his grandfather. We felt a million things through the emotional roller coaster. Most of all coming home we felt love. We were able to see all of his family, my mom, sister, nephew, and brother. We are blessed.

Germany..we made it!

Hello friends and family. I apologize for not writing in awhile. We havent had internet in quite some time. We are in Germany and love it.We went to an Irish pub our first night in Germany. The people are so friendly. They said if ever we wanted to see a friendly face to go to an irish pub lol.

We moved into our house two weeks ago and received our house hold goods last week. Our house is nice. It is a town home. Kaydence calls it home sweet home. It is...We love it here. Since we have been in Germany Sean has stopped sleep talking; Aubrie is walking everywhere; and Kay seems happy with all of her new friends. Our neighbors are pretty great so far. We are all new. Our traveling has yet to begin but we will start soon! We apply for passports next week so we can see other countries. Yesterday we went to our first Bazaar. Wow, in our heads we spent thousands of dollars lol. We wanted everything. Cant wait until the next one. Sean bought a $25 bottle of beer hhaha. I told him it better have gold in it. I bought two wine bottles and Kay left with lots of chocolate and a little wooden doll. I will be updating this more now that we have the internet. We love you all.

Today we checked out of hotel and signed out of Fort leonard wood forever well for atleast a few years. Sean and I struggled to fit everything in the car so we left our luggage at a good friends house until we drive through in a few days. We are finally on the road to Kansas. It seems like time has flown by but only days ago ot felt like this day would never come. Why is it the days seem like forever but months and weeks fly ny?!. So here we are driving to Kansas. I have my coffee and Sean has his monster to keep is awake during the boring drive. Kay and Aubrie are sound asleep and its finally quiet! Ive been making a list if what we will need for Germany before leaving and was just made aware that this is suppose to be the worst winter in Germany fml. Winter boots and snow suits will be on the list of things to buy in saint louis. O winter...what happened to enjoying fall? Ive been pretty upset to miss pumpkin patch season, football season, osu game days, family, weekend trips to oklahoma, and my sweet little nephew. Fall won't be the same for awhile. We had buffalo wild wings before we left. Had to have the wings before we left haha. So glad we were able to spend time with friends. With as often as military families move around leaving somewhere with atleast two ling lasting friendships is doing pretty good. We will miss you all!.

Hmm..karma?? When we switched rooms I set the alarm for midnight and loud!! Before leaving though my conscience set in...I turned it off. Just now ours and the empty room next to us alarms went off and loud!! Guess what time?? Midnight!!!!! God forgive me for even thinking of doing that

So today something spectacular happened. I've been debating if this deserved to be in "The Little Things.." blog or this one. As you see, I am writing it here. We are currently staying in a hotel for 3 weeks awaiting our departure to Germany. When we initially made reservations I wanted a first floor room but they were more pricey. They ended up putting us in a nice room upstairs with full beds instead of queen and older furniture but still not bad.When we checked in this little cocky drill sgt talked and talked (more like flirted). I couldnt stress enough that my husband and i and kids were staying there. For some reason we were put above him in this empty hotel. Well apparently Aubrie's teething cries at 9,10,11,12,1,2,3am were a disturbance to this man. Well I guess I have to admit it wasnt just her. Kaydence has decided it is fun to jump from bed to bed and well be a rabbit. Who am I to stop a fun imaginative child from having fun? We are in a hotel room all day long without a car so she has to get rid of energy somehow. I can't really be mad because I myself wish i could jump from bed to bed but you see I have this fear that the bed would come crashing through the floor when I landed. So I just watch and nicely say to stop. Bed time has been rough with everyone in the same room. That is no surprise. A toddler, a baby, and two adults in the same room all day??!! what were we thinking?? We are making it work. Anyways, I went to pay for this weeks stay and to my surprise (not) I was asked if I wanted an upgrade. Who wouldnt?! I know who..sean. Poor hubby had to carry 8 large suitcases, 4 small suitcases, a play pen, food, and laundry bags and toys down the stairs and to the new room. haha. So I just wanted to thank the douche for all his complaints. I am enjoying the bigger bed. I think sean will too once he gets over the baggage. lol.

My thoughts so late at night

It is 12 am and I am still up. We had a fun night watching movies with the girls in our little hotel room. I am so blessed to have them in my life. My husband brought home popcorn for a fun night treat and now everyone is sleeping peacefully. I ask myself why am I the only one still up?? Ive been spending time on pinterest and reading about where we will be moving. I am so excited. I know it will be a huge change but none the less..i am thrilled. There is just the one thing, I wish my family was supportive and here to be excited with me. I dont get it and I can barely sleep at night thinking about it. I guess we cant always have our way. When i was in Oklahoma I had sleepless nights missing my husband. Now I have sleepless nights missing my family. Thinking if I will ever see them again and what i did to deserve this ban. This punishment. I won't let it get me down though. At times I feel like I am mourning a death. I guess that feeling should make me reach out to them but I have tried. Maybe I didnt reach out to the right person but either way the doors were closing one by one. Missing them is all I can really do now. I thank God for them and for my O'Brien family. They really are amazing and great supporters. The hardest thing in this world is to be the bigger person. To reach out to someone who has hurt you. There is so much going on in our lives, this pain was the last thing i thought i would have to worry about. Between the fear of moving, grandpa being sick, this, and now dad obrien is in the hospital. I always have to remind myself someone else has it worse and I should be thankful for what I have and that God has a plan bigger then what I could ever expect. While this blog is suppose to be about our journey as a family I apologize for writing about my journey in myself. This is all sounding like a bunch of rambling but thats what my brain feels like. Rambled up words and emotions. So let me talk about something else going on in my mind. I hope my house once we move is great. I look forward to painting and making the girls' rooms special. We went shopping before the movers took our stuff. Kaydence picked out flower themed decor for Aubrie's room and decided she wanted to have a room filled with butterflies! Purple to be precise. We look forward to making each one feel like individuals and special. Also, they have preballet that starts in November for Kaydence. I look forward to getting her in. We were hoping for gymnastics but they do not have a childrens coach yet. Cheerleading starts again after the holidays. She told me she wanted to be just like the cheerleaders cheering on her cousin Trey at his football game. "Go team go", she says. Kindergarten should start soon as well. Sean is excited to start a new job. He looks pretty good looking in his polos and kahkis he gets to wear to work now. It feels good to see him excited and happy to get up and go to work. I hope that feeling continues when he gets to his next job. With his surgeries the past few years have been rough on him. It has set him back from promoting to sgt and training like he wanted to. He seems so happy when he talks about how fast or far he ran this time or that time. I love to see him happy and smiling. Makes me feel happy. Aubrie is still being stubborn. I think this moving around from family to hotels is having a bigger affect on her then I thought it would. Kaydence handled moving around so well. Aubrie still hasnt started walking. She can stand for minutes at a time until she realizes she is doing it. I don't know if its the feel of losing us if she doesnt need us to get from place to place or what. She walks while holding her hand but the moment you let go its game over. We are still working with her though and encouraging every step and every time she stands without anything or anyone. I think we will be putting her in daycare a few hours a week. She needs the time with other children. It will help her improve in all aspects. I hope once we have a home she starts sleeping alone again. It is hard to explain to one child that she cant sleep with mommy and daddy and expect her to understand when the other needs to or none of us sleep. As for me..well I think I explained my excitment and worries already. I hope to find a job once we gotten settled. I want a good one though with the housing office or school so I get off when the kids and husband do. I've been thinking of trips to take etc. There is a frankensteins castle halloween kids day on kaydence's birthday. PRaying we can make it to that. I think it will be a wonderful first trip. Sean wants to go to Ireland sometime as well for St. pattys day. I think that will be a blast. So many places to see and things to do. We are blessed. Goodnight :)