Home Sweet Home

After 7 looooooooong weeks of increasing tedium, Cam finally finished BOLC II at Ft. Sill, OK on Friday, August 21st. Since I already knew how the drive home could get a little boring by oneself, I decided that it would be best if we made the trip together. So, as a "surprise", I flew up to Lawton, OK that morning in order to make the 9+ hour drive home to El Paso, TX with him. My sweet hubby was waiting patiently at the airport when I arrived with some beautiful flowers (in my favorite color!). After stopping for a little lunch and one last good-bye to Oklahoma, we headed out on our road trip!

We really enjoyed our drive home as it gave us the opportunity to reconnect, share stories of our activities for the last 4 weeks and verbally abuse the terrible New Mexican and Mexican drivers we passed along the way!!!

While BOLC II wasn't exactly what Cam had hoped for, it did make him appreciate the El Paso area and the time he spent in Officer Candidate School. He begins BOLC III (Air Defense job training) Monday, August 31st at Ft. Bliss and is looking forward to all the new stuff he gets to learn! He is scheduled to remain at Ft. Bliss throughout this training (August through December) and doesn't expect to leave again until his new unit deploys ... whenever that may be.

Eyes on the road

Not quite home, but at least the right state!

Road Trip to OK

This past weekend, I made the 9+ hour drive from El Paso to Lawton, OK to visit Cam. He's halfway through BOLC II training (Officers' Basic Training) at Ft. Sill and needed to get away for a while. We decided that we would head the 90 miles north to Oklahoma City for the weekend.

On my long drive, I noted a few interesting things...

1)El Paso and the surrounding areas are desolate and not very beautiful. However, drive 45 minutes to the east and you begin to see trees, crops, pecan fields, and green grass! I'm glad to know that all of west Texas is not as bad as El Paso. In fact, much of west Texas reminded me of eastern Washington minus the irrigation sprinklers and BIG rolling hills (Texas has very small hills - that are called mountains.)

2)Driving Habits: I now know why El Paso drivers are sooooooooooo terrible! It's the bad influence of the Mexican drivers! I passed 5 cars with Mexican plates on my drive ... all of them going AT LEAST 15 miles under the speed limit and in the left lane! Argh!

3)Mother Nature in Action: As I was driving along, I noticed some type of bird of prey swoop down along side the road and take off again with a snake in it's clutches. As it flew over the car, the snake was writhing around. Very cool to see in person!

4)More Local Wildlife: The only armadillo I saw was some road kill, but I'm going to count it as seeing a real-life armadillo.

5) Nerd Alert: How big of nerd am I that I was excited to see the fields and fields of oil rigs and was seriously tempted to stop at the Petroleum Museum in Odessa, TX and the meteor crater outside of Abilene, TX???

And now some photos of the drive:

I was most excited to see that in parts of Texas, the speed limit is 80 mph. Now, if only Washington would do this on many of its eastern highways! (I-90, Hwy 26, Hwy 395 ... to name a few!)

In the town of Anson, the highway curves around the city hall, planted right in the middle of town.

Do you think that Pecos Bill and his tornado are near by?

Nerd shot, but I had to as the car rolling over the 3000 mile point.

Long Time, No Blog...

Shame on me!!! It's been far TOO long since I've updated this blog and I have no real excuse for not doing so. It's not like I've been overly busy these last few weeks...

Cam has been away at Ft. Sill, OK for the last 2 1/2 weeks, participating in BOLC II (Basic Officers' Learning Course - AKA Officers' Basic Training). So far he's VERY unimpressed with Ft. Sill and Lawton, OK area and said, "I never thought I'd say this, but I miss Ft. Bliss and El Paso!" (Guess the grass isn't always greener, huh?)

Compounding this new-found "homesickness", he's rather frustrated with the BOLC II training as it's all a repeat of stuff he did in Basic Training and OCS. It's mainly geared toward those soldiers coming out of ROTC and the Academy programs (who don't have to attend Basic Training OR OCS). He's also frustrated that he is one of the last classes that must complete this training as the Army is doing away with the course next year.

On a happier note, I'm going to OK to visit Cam this upcoming weekend! We've got a full schedule of things to do and see while we visit Oklahoma City and I'll post pictures as soon as I'm back. I've never been to OK, so I'm also excited to get it crossed off my list of visited states!

As for me, I've been keeping myself busy in El Paso by searching for a new job (STILL!). However, I'm finding that I like the freedom and free time I have as a housewife! I've almost completed my next Project Linus quilt and am eager to start on the next! I've also found that there are several activities that I would like to participate in, including a weekly Army wives Bible study on base and a "Sit & Sew" group that meets at a local fabric store! Plus, if I continue my daily work-out routine, I just might find that I have NO TIME whatsoever to waste on a job! Ha!

My make-shift sewing table in the middle of the living room

Boy Project Linus Quilt - Stage#1