Shadows of the Neanderthal

I received my books yesterday for my first graduates class. I was really excited when I learned that my books were in because I wasn't sure what to expect. Since I was very curious to see what I was getting into, I opened the box immediately and the first book that I pulled out is called Shadows of the Neanderthal with cavemen shown on the front cover.


Wondering what kind of class I got myself into, I opened to the first page. This is what I found....

Once upon a time, there were five cave people.
Their names were Unga, Bunga, Oogie, Boogie, and Trevor.
They lived together in a cave.

I can only imagine what else I am going to find in this awesome book. I am really starting to question what exactly I am studying. =)

For those of you who do not know what I am supposed to be studying, I guess I should enlighten you. I am going back to school to get my Master's in Reading and Literacy. I chose an online school called Capella University so I could participate in my classes no matter where I am. This was the best choice for me due to the travelling that I will be doing in a couple of months. I'm excited to get started and a little nervous at the same time. I'm sure, however, that I will make out just fine!

On the move again

Paul is situated back in Bagram and quickly fell back into the routine of things. He says that he is pretty tired and has been going to bed earlier to try to get rested up. I guess the newest news is that his unit is moving again. No worries - He is staying in Bagram and his address will not change! In order to make room for new units to come in, they are moving Paul's unit closer to where they work. His living quarters are currently located on the other side of the base and they have to ride a bus to work. The Army has decided to move them when they only have 4 months left. Makes sense, huh? The huts that they are moving to aren't built up as well as the huts they are living in now. His unit will have to build the walls on the inside to divide the rooms. This will all need to be done in their spare time after their 12 hour shifts at work. Clearly the soldiers are not very happy about this move. Another downfall to this move is the fact that these huts do not have internet connection and will not have it while Paul is staying in them. He will have to take his computer to the MWR to check his email and keep in contact with everyone. I'm sure that he will find some spare time when he isn't working or building his new room to make it there occasionally. Poor thing!
On a positive note... He only has 4 months left! Hopefully it will fly by for him and everyone here at home. Thanks again for your support and prayers!

We're buying a house!!

Paul and I have decided to go ahead with buying a house! We met with Carol Smith while he was home to discuss our finances and what we could afford as a house payment. She made us feel so much more at ease than what we were before meeting with her. I would strongly recommend her to anyone who is looking into buying a house. We realized that we could easily afford an extra $10,000 house than what we were originally looking at.
The first thing we did after our meeting was start looking online at houses and we have found quite a few that are in the right location and that are the right size. We were still planning on waiting until Paul gets home but before he left he told me to go ahead with it. He claims that he wants to come home to our first home, but I think he is just trying to get out of the moving process. Such a smart one!
We have made a list of the houses we are interested in and have been talking over the internet about the pros and cons of each house. It has been great to still work on this together. It is proof that long distance can work. We are just as strong half a world away as we are sitting next to each other. It makes it easy when you get to work with your best friend on something like this!
The next step is contacting a realtor and making the trip out to Tennessee to find the perfect house to turn into our first home. I am planning on taking our realtor (my mom) for professional and personal opinions. We are planning on driving out on August 2nd and hopefully by the end of that week we will have signed a contract. This is alll sooooo crazy! I never thought that we would be in the position to buy a house but I am soo happy that we are.

News with Paul - He went back to work today (well, actually last night our time). He got a day off and was able to pretty much catch up on his sleep. Nothing else that I have heard of. Just trying to stay busy so the next couple of months fly by.

Sgt. Evans is in Bagram

Paul called me around 1 a.m. to let me know that he made it back in Bagram, Afghanistan. It was a relief to know, even though I was sound asleep. He is currently online and said that everything went smoothly and that he was happy to finally be back. The best part of his day was getting a shower, which he really hasn't had since he left on Tuesday. He is getting everything organized and caught up to return to day work tomorrow. Just a brief update so everyone knows that he is doing fine!

Back to the Real World

So here it goes...

I have been looking at the blogs that many of my friends have started and it dawned on me that it might be a good idea. First off - it will be a great way for everyone to follow Paul's and my crazy life and second off - it will be a way for our family and friends to stay updated on what is going on with Paul. I am not going to make any promises, but I will try to be better at this than my sweet, loving husband is.

Paul left Tuesday to head back to the lovely land of Afghanistan. It was hard to let him go, but I know that he will be home soon. We stayed up as long as we could on Monday night after a great night with family and got up very early on Tuesday to get on the road to BWI. We stopped at Everything Bagel in Milford for breakfast before leaving town. We had no problem getting to the airport and arrived around 9 a.m. Paul checked into his flight and we headed to Starbucks to get me some coffee to keep me alert for my trip home. When it was time for him to go through security we made a deal to just hug eachother and then walk away without looking back. This, of course, made it much harder to let go. He made it through security and to Atlanta with no problem. Once he got to Atlanta, he discovered that there were only 2 flights leaving on Tuesday; one left as he was checking in and one was leaving around 2 p.m. The plane could only hold 700 people, and apparently there were way more than 700 soldiers waiting for a flight out. The soldiers arriving around the time of Paul were told that they were trying to arrange another flight but if they couldn't they would have to wait until Wednesday and stay at a hotel for the night. Unfortunately for Paul, they arranged another flight and Paul flew out at 10:45 p.m. Tuesday night. He landed in Ireland for a couple of hours and then landed in Kuwait late last night. I got a phone earlier today to let me know that he thought he was going to be in Kuwait until tomorrow, but then I got a brief call a little later saying that he was catching a flight out today. I expect that he will arrive in Bagram sometime tonight, but I will let everyone know when he definitely does.

We had a GREAT couple of weeks for his R&R. First stop was a romantic getaway to the OBX. We rented a nice house that was 3 lots back from the beach. It was a beautiful week and we had a great time. After a week there we headed home and spent a lot of time with family, enjoying every second of it. Both of us would have liked to see more people but with such a short amount of time, it was hard to see everyone without stretching our time short. Rumor has it that he will be home before Thanksgiving, so there will be plenty of time to see all of the family and friends that we missed.

Thanks to everyone for showing your love and support to Paul and our family. We feel so blessed to have such great people in our lives.

As for me, I am getting adjusted to the real world again. Everything got put on hold for the last couple of weeks, so now I have a list of things that need to be done. Bills, cleaning, shopping... the grand things in life!

<3