Here we come, Locks of Love

Well I did it!

I cut Princess’ hair once in her 5 years on this earth. She had VERY long hair. I could just never bring myself to cut it because it was so beautiful.  Along with being beautiful it was hard to manage and it was getting to the point we both dreaded sitting down to do it.

In March of 2008 my Granny was diagnosed with stage 4 small cell lung cancer, a very bad thing. She would need chemo to hopefully get rid of it. During that chemo she lost her hair.  Well we went down to see Granny that summer and Princess was taken off with the fact Granny had no hair. So we explained the situation to her. Princess then decided that she wanted to donate her hair to sick little girls. She said, after all, She doesn’t NEED all this hair.

I then decided that we would do it right after our wedding, then decided after this summer’s Texas trip we would chop it. I could never bring myself to do it! As the end of summer got closer I mentally prepared myself to chop off her hair.

August 22^nd when she went to get ready for school, I chopped it! I was in such shock. I cried for a bit and quickly got over it when she looked in the mirror and said “ I love it, Mom!”

Now she is able to do her own hair and she loves that. It will grow back… One day, but the curls are gone.

In Summer of ’06 when I was pregnant with Ethan I was puking up a storm and that is when I decided to chop off all my hair. It was down to my bum. I went into several places before I found one that would cut it.  I also kept it. I will be sending them both off to LOL. My hair was highlighted but they can send that off for other things and help off set the costs of the wigs.

It feels good to teach the kids that no matter how you help others it can always bring a smile to their face. I hope whom ever gets our hair has fun with it. We are blessed to be able to do such a wonderful thing 

Menu Planning Monday- Asian food!

If I have a menu planned you should know what that means... Hubby will be home for the entire week. That is a big thing to this Navy family :) We are happy campers!

This week will be Asian food, that is mostly all we eat in the house. Hope you enjoy our menu


Monday

• Pork patty with shrimp balls, rice and cabbage

Tuesday

• Mandarin Chicken, rice and veggies

Wednesday

• Chow mein with Shrimp and veggies

Thursday

• Family fun night, My brother gets his pinning for Chief! 

Friday

• Korean BBQ, garlic shrimp, corn  and green beans with rice

Saturday

• Duty day... not really sure yet

Sunday

• Pho, from a restaurant because it take a long time to make :) 

Hope everyone has a happy week! 

FML Shocker, Every American Should See

Every night before I fall asleep I look at two apps on my iphone- FML (F@#! My Life) and Texts From Last Night. Why? I m not sure they amuse me and make me tired. They are usually pretty funny and make me chuckle. Until I read this one:

Are you kidding me?

I have no way of finding out how true this is. I am going off the fact that this is true. That this actually happened to a group of soldiers that just doing a job they were told to do.

WOW! Really? This is 2010. This war has been going on since 2001, it has sadly become a way of life and a standard news line for the world.

While I have no family currently serving in this war I have dear friends my friends have husbands over there. Seriously folks, this is no game. This is life. This is what they are told to do. If they do not get out there and fight as they are told, will you?

I am not one for war, not at the cost of life. I am for supporting our troops though.

As someone who comes from a strong military background this saddens me. I remember during the Gulf War my uncle was serving in the Army and we tied yellow ribbons on every tree in front of my Granny’s yard until she had him back in her arms.

This is not meant to be a political post, I am not a very political person but this really saddens me.

Most soldiers that fly home from Afghanistan fly through Maine, at least most of them.  I just recently saw a news story how men and women get word of troops coming home and go greet them so they have a homecoming to America.  I think this is awesome. Homecomings are always a happy thing.

No one is asking you to believe in this war, we are asking you to stand by our men and women who put their life on the line to serve our country.

After all, if you can not stand behind or troops, there is plenty of room in front of them! 

My State Preschool story

In case you have not noticed we are a military family.  Two years ago when I first started looking into preschool for Princess I was blind-sided by information that I did not meet income guidelines.  I had two children and lived in military housing.

For those civilian readers military gets a housing allowance that is based off of the installation where you are living. San Diego is rather high, so is the cost of living. IF you live in housing you do not get that money. If you live out in town you get in along with your paycheck. Military folks call it BHA, in translation Basic Housing ALLOWANCE. Allowance, which is just what it is. It has gone up and it has gone down over the years.

I believe during that time my husbands base pay was around two thousand dollars a month. Granted we did not have to pay rent.

Looking back we made 2238 a month.  Lets just say my husband works a 40 hour work week with 4 weeks a month. That is $13.98 per hour. Not bad right?

Well Let me break this down for you…

At the VERY least he has duty every 6 days. He goes in at 645 say on Thursday (duty day) he does not get off until MAYBE 430 Friday to come home. While on that duty he has watch which is anywhere from 4 hours to 10 hours. Depending on his watch station.

So lets just say he works 7-4 daily that is 9 hours, we will say a 6-day work week (since he has duty every 6 days and is at the ship working a double) that is about $10 an hour. Which from what I believe would put us in the line for State Funded Preschool.

All of this is of course for MY family.  During that year my husband was never home, and I was doing my single mom thing.

Get a job you say? Yes get a job to pay for daycare for the other child and to pay for preschool. It really makes no sense. It is not financially possible.

So that following year I put Princess into a wonderful private preschool and we managed our money rather well and did okay.  Not everyone is able to do that.

This year Prince was up for preschool. He has an IEP and I was told that because he has an IEP that he would be able to go to preschool no matter what.

WRONG.

Once again we will be putting him in private school. We make to much money. Which I knew, my husband made rank since dealing with the situation with Princess.

The thing that upsets me about this situation is that IF I had lived IN housing I could have her in a state preschool if there was one there. If not, I was out of luck. Not if I live out in town though.

What about the families who have someone on deployment, who have someone in a war zone?

We can get WIC and we can get daycare though CDC but we cannot have our children start school at an earlier age to get them started on their education.

I am willing to say that 90% of military kids move at least once in their parent’s careers. I know plenty that move more.  This brings children behind in their education. (I am not saying that ALL military kids are behind in their education)  California has one of, if not the largest Naval Base in California, on the west coast even, why can’t they get funding for military children to start their education at a preschool level? After all hasn’t their been studies to prove that children that start preschool do better in school then those children who do not?

I guess you could say I am sore on the subject. My husband works his butt off for this country, misses so much of my children’s lives and the state is counting EVERY allowance that he gets.

These allowances are just that, an allowance. They can be taken at any time and reduced at any time.  We provide money to this state as well as the economy of the school district because we spend our paychecks here. It saddens me to think that those parents who can not afford a preschool have to wait until kindergarten so their babies can get the education and interaction that they deserve.

Maybe one-day things will change. For now we write our Congressmen and Congresswomen about this issue.