Katy and Cody

I feel the need to post a few things about my kids.
Cody is 4 and he is a little celebrity among all our friends' kids. Whenever they see him they yell his name and tell him hi. One of Cody's friends even tackled another of Cody's friends when he thought that Cody was being attacked by the friend. I think the reason for this is that Cody is so sweet. He is passive and kind to others, he will also play well with all types of kids. So it was no surprise when the other day I split a piece of gum in half and gave it to both my kids and Katy, of course, immediately threw a fit and said "his piece is bigger than mine!" To which Cody says, "Here. You can trade me." Maybe some moms would be proud of this but I was not. I thought, "I think I need to teach you what it means to be the little brother, Cody. When your older sister is a jerk, you punch her in the face and run and tell mom that she hurt you."
I know this because I had little brothers.
Not that I was a jerk...and I would never complain that I got the smaller piece because as the older sister you should already be aware that the short end of the stick is your lot in life.
No one has told Katy this.
So back to Cody. He happily trades with her. Later I ask him what he wants for Christmas. He thinks about it for a long time and finally says, "a motorcycle....for Daddy." And seriously, that is what he asked Santa for. He has asked for nothing else.
Tonight we had a friend invite us over for a Christmas party and they arranged for Santa to come and bring a present for each child. Cody received some matchbox cars that he liked a lot but later he said to me, "Santa didn't bring daddy a motorcycle." He is so sweet. Too bad that Santa will definitely not be delivering a motorcycle to this house on Christmas, no matter how sweet my little boy is.

So Katy has been asking for My Little Pony figures all through November and December...until we get up to Santa's lap last night when suddenly she asks for a remote control Barbie car.
Yes, I admit that I wanted to kill her. She did this to me last year...ask for something all November and 3 weeks into December and then asks for something completely different when she sees Santa. And the icing on the cake is that she had one of those cars and we agreed together that she didn't use it and we got rid of it. Katy might be learning the truth about Santa this year because there is no way that I can get a remote control barbie car here by next week and there are none in the 2 stores here. We are practicing gratitude as well so this might be a great time to learn about how to handle disappointment and still be grateful for what you have. I pretty much stink at this myself so I am glad I bought a video camera. This is going to be a Christmas to remember.

I need to complain about the mail service for a second here. We have a tiny post office on base where they decided to house all our mail rather than delivering it to our houses. Then they staff the post office with one person and are only open from 9-3. There is actually signs all over the post office that say "Please check your box 2-3 times a day if you are expecting packages." Who has that kind of time?
When you have a large package (and who doesn't this time of year?) you get a yellow note in your small PO Box. Those yellow notes are comparable to getting sick, you get one and your whole day is ruined. You have to take the yellow ticket to the one person working and pick up your package...but that means getting in the mile long line and waiting. And if you are lucky enough to be there between the hours of 11 and 1, you get to let all the military members in uniform go ahead of you even if they arrived after you. You also get to watch every person be humiliated by the postal workers as they tell you that your address on the box isn't correct or the item you are shipping has the wrong customs form, or watch people repackage their entire box while they are in line just to that it will qualify for the postal service judge and jury behind the counter. Now it is the holiday season and the lines are unreal so when I got up to the front I asked if I could volunteer there. They obviously need help and I could organize boxes and mail by their respective numbers. I could dress up like an elf and sort packages. It would be awesome. The lady told me that she asks the main post office for help everyday before she comes in to work and they always tell her no. She said that they can't accept volunteers either because they are unionized.
I just would like to know...when are we going to get to use logic in the USA again? Has that been outlawed? Am I off base here? I mean seriously. There is no other mail service to use especially on Guam so you have a monopoly that you have bankrupted and then you have people willing to volunteer but you can't because the union that bankrupted you won't allow it?
"Inconceivable!"

Okay, now I can get on with my story...so I went to the post office today and I actually had some mail (they haven't been able to get mail out over the last few days because there is only one person and they are attending to "the line.")
My mail today was actually quite special...there was a letter from Jeremy's sister and her family and it had a big #1 on it. Inside it said that they are doing the 12 days of Christmas for us...very creatively. She and her family are mailing a letter to us for all 12 days.
If I could just see through these happy tears... I feel so special by their outpouring of love and forethought into this task. This is the first year that Jeremy will not be with us and we are so far from family that it kind of makes me "seasick" to think about it but someone who hasn't seen us for many months is taking the time to make us feel special. I just hope they know the gratitude I feel for their efforts.
Also in my mailbox was a letter from a friend who told me about some difficult situation that they are dealing with at our last base and how the Lord reminded her to be grateful for the things that she does have. I also got some Christmas cards which made me happy because this year my Christmas Card tree is very empty. So despite the extreme disdain for the post office it was quite generous to me today. Especially when I went back for my second daily visit and had some packages that my mom sent.

I have a "Katy Christmas program" to post but I will have to get to it when I get my life back after Tuesday. I volunteered to coordinate a cookie drive for all the airmen here living in the dorms without their families during the holidays. We advertise all over base and hope that we get people to contribute enough cookies to deliver a dozen cookies to each of the 800 airmen here who are alone. (yes, that is 800 dozen cookies and thanks to Jen Nekl, who calculated for me that we need 9600 cookies.) I have over 1000 cookies in my freezer right now so if there are just 9 other people out there who have 1000 cookies too then we've got this! However, the chances of that are likely slim. So I am hoping that 145 people will bring at least 5 dozen. Any leftover cookies go to the 750 Marines that are living here in tents for some sort of training.

I also signed up for a fitness challenge 10 weeks ago and it ends in 2 weeks. At the beginning of this week I was 15 hours (of working out) away from my goal. I am proud to say that I am now only 8 hours away from my goal. So basically all I have been doing is baking cookies and working out. I guess those two things can work hand in hand but I am certain that there is a better life out there...it is just going to occur after Tuesday.

I am sure you are all wondering why you read this today. Who wants to hear about some spoiled girl gripe about these things? Well, I don't know but I guess it is too late for you to go back. :)