We are still alive in the land of Aloha..

And Just so everyone knows I never was good at keeping a diary!

So Cami and Addi are in ALLSTAR CHEERLEADING with Cheer808 Allstars and for those who are interested we are heading to Vegas for competition in February! Ernie put on E6 the beginning of May and there is nothing exciting going on with me just playing house and chauffeur! I really need to find something for me just not sure what yet! So here are some updated pics of the girls...

Emmi and her friend playing with bubbles

Addi running "boxcar" races at boot camp childcare.

Cami and her friend posing at putt putt!

Addi facetiming her bestfriend (or boyfriend as she calls him)!

Me relaxing at the pool!! Loving Hawaiian life!!

E sleeping so peacefully!! (Probably gonna kick my butt for posting this LOL)

Until next time...

Oops I did it again...

and that is not a reference to a rather infamous pop princess!

But rather the beginning of an apology to my bloggy world friends! It has been almost a year since my last post and I feel incredibly awful about it!! So I am going to try and be a bit better about these things! Like I have said in the past though I suck at follow through! LMAO!!

So crazy it has almost been a year!!! I left off in May 2010! We had just moved into a bigger (4bedroom) house for our expanding family! Now it is March 2011 and i am having a hard time remembering the events of the last 10months! Actually now that i think about it life was pretty mundane! I had lots of Dr appointments, Ernie worked alot!

Cami Started gymnastics at last march at Island Tumblers in Waipio! Cami and I absolutely LOVED her class there! But sadly a mere 7months after starting, her skill out grew the way they instruct and advance! When they made the decision to not move her forward because of her age (despite that she had the skill level to move forward) we decided that maybe she would be better suited for a different gym! We found a new Gym home at Hawaiian Island Twisters!! We made the transfer November 1st and have not regretted a moment! Cami since joining has advanced 2 levels and starts testing again starting Monday :)

Addi has had a lot of therapy!! As of mid May we added a Behavioral therapist, a Skills trainer, and speech therapy! Though we kinda furloughed for a while after Emmi was born! Trying to find a routine that worked for us was a bit difficult! We restarted our 1hour a week therapy in January and have been maintaining that pretty well. Next week we meet again with everyone and will be adding the behavioral therapy and skills trainer! I will also be scheduling her speech therapy again! The only areas she is behind in at the moment that I know of (unofficially) are social and speech! I will update on that after our meeting on Tuesday and let everyone know where her official standings are! :)

On November 16th we added a beautiful 7lb. 18in. baby girl to our family! Emmilee Ariana (Emmi) was born via cesarean at 0600!! A week earlier than planned but that is ok! She has been such a wonderful blessing in our household and her older sisters love her soooo much!! Now she is almost 16 weeks (she will be Mar. 8th) and is doing amazing things! She sleeps through the night she has just started laughing and she smiles so much!

As for the four legged furry members of our family! The move was ROUGH!!! The new house was a hard adjustment for them! The backyard had/ has many flaws and we had a lot of "repairs" to do (which really sucked cause we live in Military housing and that is supposed to be their job! But they didn't deem my dogs escaping the fence was an issue they needed to fix!) So after having to hunt Rambo (our Shi Tzu) down numerous times and him even having an overnight jaunt in Doggy Jail (aka the Humane Society!) The day Rambo had his overnight stay Princess (our Black Lab mix) also flew the coup!! Rambo was picked up in Pearl City (which is about a 10- 15min drive from the house) and Princess was never found! :( She was never reported to the Humane society or to Animal control, so our hopes are that someone found her and took her in and loves her as much as we did/ do! A few months later when we gave up the hope of Princess coming home we decided to make another trip to the Humane Society! We just wanted to go take a look around, we had no intention of adopting that day! Well... we met Rocco! We adopted him that day :) He is a Corgi Terrier mix (he looks like a goofy bat dog LOL)

I recently have joined the Pampered Chef bandwagon! LOL Well I have been on board for a while but I finally decided to take a leap of faith in the company, the product, and most of all myself! I became an Independent Sales Consultant! I love pampered Chef products!! I am extremely excited for this journey! And amazingly E was on board and all for me signing up! For him to have the faith in me that I don't always have in myself means so much to me!! Such an amazing and wonderful husband I have!!

Which leads me to the last of this EXTRA long post!

6YEARS!!! Ernie and I have been Married for 6YEARS!!! Wooo hooo! To the naysayers who said we would never make it here is my big fat rude gesture!! These years have been trying, with less than stellar commands, pointless separations (military kind not marriage,) deployments, 3 pregnancies (and child births,) 2PCS moves and all the little in and out work ups! We still have each other and I look forward to so many more wonderful years to come! It can and will only get better!!!

Ernie if you read this! I want you to know and never forget that I Love you beyond any and every distance we have ever conquered! You are an amazing father, a wonderful friend and some other things that shouldn't be mentioned on a PG rated blog! You are my one and only true love! Lets knock out the next 100+ years together!

And we are in

It has been 2 weeks since the move was accomplished! Aside from the frustration of my husband and family friend putting everything except for large furniture pieces in the garage it went well LOL! I have SLOWLY been unpacking and organizing things and am in the process of making a freecycle/ CL/ Goodwill pile in the garage (that might I add is not growing in the desired way I had hoped!) The girls are adjusting as well as can be expected! Cami is missing her friends from the loop something terrible and that makes me super sad and wonder if me choosing the housing with more sq footage and carpet was the right choice. I miss my friends too but I have the luxury of having a drivers license and the ability and knowledge of how to properly use a telephone! I guess we will just have to make more playdates! After I get the house more organized and cleaned! Thanks everyone for bearing with me while I get all of this stuff completed and finally have a decent looking house LOL

I have not abandoned everyone...

All is ok! Just been a bit CRAZY around this house!!

We found out back at the end of March that we are going to be blessed with another munchkin sometime in Nov! So now we are preparing to move to a larger house at the beginning of next month! Cami has started at a new Gymnastics program and she LOVES it! She has balance and coordination like no other 4yo I know! She is also starting T-ball in June! She is super excited about getting a new brother or sister! and She loves to tell everyone that Addi gets to be a big sister now too (it is like there is some secret society for big sisters!!)

Addi is doing ok we are making some progress in her developmental delays (not nearly as fast as I would like it to be but that is life!) She is now signing a little she does all done, more, and sometimes she says please! She is mimicking the sound of the word Hi which is a good step in the right direction for working towards the goal of her talking! We recently added new team members to Team Addi (as I like to refer to them LOL) with the addition of an Autism Diagnosis they were needed! Our team now consists of a Pediatrician, a Pediatric Neurologist, a Pediatric Psychiatrist, an Audiologist, OT/ PT therapist, Early education specialist, ABA therapist, a Student Skills trainer,and like 3 coordinators LOL! I am starting to lose my mind LOL!!! But things are slightly on the upswing! Addi has not had a seizure since the beginning of January! and we are completly weaned off of the seizure meds! Other than a few check ups and lots of therapy the biggest thing going on with her anytime soon is she is going to have to have a sedated ABR (Auditory Brainstem Response testing) the sometime in May! I will Keep you posted on when that is going to happen though!!

This past few weeks have been a somewhat whirlwind but in such a good way! We have really had a chance to bond as a family and enjoy our time together! We made a trip to the beach with Chrissi and the kids a couple of Saturdays ago! It was such a good day at the beach! We are moving a week from Thursday! So if I am pretty non existent (like that would be a new thing) at least you know I am not ignoring the blog I am just a bit busy LOL!

Tuesday at the Table

I was born in Louisville, Kentucky almost 28 years ago, though I don't remember living there too much! We moved away to Ohio when I was about 4yrs old and we lived there for like a month before my father’s job decided it would rather open a new shop in the Reading, PA area. So there we go off and moving to Reading, PA (well the surrounding boroughs of.) A great deal of my childhood was spent there and I have many, many fond memories of our time there. When I was about 11yrs old my father’s company (the same that moved us to PA) decided that they were going to expand and that the man for the job was none other than my old man! So we once again packed up shop and moved where they told us too! Where to you are asking huh?!

THE CAROLINA’s

Charlotte, NC to be exact…I was in love with our new home as much as my 11yrs allowed me to love it! I loved everything about our new home! The neighborhood was full of children my age and younger…that meant lots of babysitting opportunities. The elementary school was bike riding distance (I thought that was the best thing ever…but now that I think back I don’t think I ever actually rode my bike to school!) and even better I was going to be in the 5^th grade! That excitement lasted all of about 2 min LOL!

About 2 years later my parents made the decision to buy a home in Rock Hill, SC (it was only an extra 30min to the commute for them but it destroyed my world LOL! As anything severe like that happening in a 14yr olds life does! This move was a wonderful decision that to be honest at the time I couldn’t see! But now that we move every couple of years for my husband’s job I can totally see it from both points of view! I do think I may do things a little differently when it comes to explaining to my children the ins and outs of moving! I think Moving so much as a child prepared me for the moving as an adult though now the question I ask my parents is why did you never use moving companies?!?!? Especially for the big state to state moves! Ugh they make life so much easier LOL! Now that we live the Nomadic Military life people are constantly asking where are you from and when they do my response is always… South Carolina! I may not have been born there but that place for me is Home! It holds the best and the worst memories! But I wouldn’t change a one of them!

But anyways moving south developed my taste buds into new and exciting things!!! There are so many things that I miss about the South and the culinary genius that is SOUTHERN cooking!! Now don’t get me wrong the Northern region had some wonderful food as well but IMHO nothing compares to a good down home cooked southern style comfort dinner!!! So a couple of things I miss the most are Sweet Tea (everywhere there…3places here!!), and REAL Carolina style BBQ Pulled Pork Sandwiches!!! YUMMY!!!! I have found a recipe that is AMAZING...and the best part about it is …a Crockpot Recipe!!! I found this while perusing the wonderful Recipe Applications on my iPhone technology is wonderful!!!

Ok so these are the ingredients you are going to need:

2md-lg onions, quartered

2tbls brown sugar (I used Dark Brown)

1tbls paprika

2 teaspoons of salt (I used Hawaiian Sea Salt)

½teaspoon Pepper

4-6lb boneless Pork Butt or Shoulder Roast (I use bone in)

2/3 cup Vinegar

4Tsp Worstershire Sauce

1Tsp Red Pepper Flakes

1 ½ tsp Sugar

½ tsp Dry Mustard

½ tsp Garlic Salt

¼ tsp cayenne pepper

Hamburger Buns

Cole Slaw (Optional)

Directions

1. Place quartered onions in the Crockpot

2. Combine brown sugar, paprika, salt, and pepper. Rub entire surface area of the roast. Place Roast fat side up on top of the Onions.

.

3. Combine red pepper flakes, sugar, mustard, garlic salt, cayenne, cider vinegar, and worstershire sauce. Stir to mix well. Drizzle ¼ of the mixture over Roast Cover and Refrigerate remaining vinegar mixture.

4. Cover roast and cook on Low for 10-12 hours or on high for 5-6hours. Remove meat and chop or shred. Chop onions.

5. Serve meat and onions on Hamburger buns, if desired top meat with coleslaw. Pass the remaining vinegar mixture to drizzle over sandwiches!

ENJOY!!!!!

(P.S. I forgot to take finished pictures!! I promise it was delicious and beautiful LOL)

I Heart Faces: Week 13- Dramatic B&W

Every week over at I Heart Faces they do a weekly photo challenge of some sort! These challenges encourage the individual as a photographer to seek out new techniques to broaden the individual's horizons so to speak! You may have gathered from the name of their blog Amy and Angie (the owners of iheartfaces) like to see...FACES...Baby faces, kid faces, grown up faces and I have even known them to look for animal faces LOL!! I love entering these challenges not because there is some wonderful prize in store but because I like to showcase what I have done! It isn't always the best (I am SOOOO far from it LOL) but I like to think that some of it is good! I know I said this in last week’s post but I am still so proud (even a year later!!) My very first entry ever took 6th place in the Week 8 Challenge-Messy Faces last year! My friend Matt had just gotten done doing Swamp Romp (it is a Race they hold for Active Duty over on the Marine Corp base) and boy was he a mess! You can kind of get the idea from the mess on his face but that was HEAD TO TOE!!! He got back to my house so energized (well until we started spraying him with the cold water from the water hose! It was great!

Ok so anyway back on subject now that I have done a little reminiscing!! This week’s challenge is Dramatic Black and White!! First let me just tell you that this challenge by far was the most difficult for me cause I 1) don't have a wonderful bells and whistles type photo-editing program and am simply using the Picasa that came on my computer (which isn't horrible might I add I have learned to do some fun stuff the last couple of days!!) and 2) dramatic to me means some type of moody! I just can't seem to bring myself to use a picture of a smiling person (mainly children in my world) convert it to B&W and call it a Dramatic B&W! For me the expression has to describe the emotion in the picture and then the conversion just highlighting that expression! (This honestly is why I think most “sad” pictures you find are in B&W Color just makes things happier!!!) So honestly it is nothing short of spectacular that I found this photo in my plethora of shots! As I was concerned that I wouldn't have anything ready on hand for me to toy with! Not that I am not willing to go out and set the shot for what I am looking for I just like to utilize the abundance of shots I already have (I typically take A LOT of pictures of my children and their friends.) before I go out and try to manipulate the general public into a shot that is worthy of the challenge!!

Again with my Ramblings (Please excuse them as I do have a picture to showcase for you!) This is my friend (and fellow Sub Wife) K's DD (dear daughter) L! She is a wonderful girl (growing just a little too quickly into a young lady) and such a good kid (when she wants to be as most are!!) So anyway this shot was taken (pure luck) at my daughter Cami's 4th birthday party it was a tad bit windy and I couldn't tell you why she doesn't look happy and excited (all of the children were playing on Slip n slides, and in the sprinklers!) But lucky for me she wasn't cause I think her expression makes this picture! Even without the B&W conversion it was a moody and interesting shot!! This is by far one of my favorite pictures I have ever taken on L!!!

So I think I have Rambled enough for one posting LOL! Please feel free to leave me some comments and Constructive Criticism! If anyone knows of an AWESOME Photography course on the Island of Oahu please feel free to let me know as I have decided to go back to school for Photography!!!

Check back for a TatT tomorrow!!! BBQ Pork Carolina Style!!! YUMMY!!!!

A couple new adventures and a Picture Show

My first adventure may very well turn out to be a flop as I am going to try to teach myself

how-to make Bows! And yes I did say bows as in little cutesy keep my daughter little as long as

possible Bows! I am thinking some of it is going to be VERY easy But I do foresee a bit of an issue

when it comes to making the Traditional style double loop boutique style Bow! But I think I will get it eventually!

I actually found a REALLY cheap Ribbon store online and am currently waiting on my first of two

orders! I am currently just going to make them for my girls and maybe a few of the neighbor girls!

Time will tell and if it is meant to be an adventure I am supposed to take! Please just pray that

the right path reveals itself soon!!

So my second Adventure is my Camera! My Loving DH purchased my first DSLR for me and

I am in love!!! I feel inspired to seek out new pictures daily so I think that it is time for some

formal education on the subject! I have decided that I need to Look into going back to school and I think I wanna go for Photography! Learning the ins and out of my camera and how to edit photo's is something I feel I could do and enjoy for a long time! Like everyone who turns a hobby into a job I am afraid I will lose the love for it but only time will tell!!!

So it has been a while since I posted any new pics and with the permission of some of my friends and neighbors there may be few children who don't belong to me LOL!

My oldest... She Turned 4 the end of last month!

She is a spirited little girl with all the umph and gusto of a Sumo Wrestler!!!

Oh and She has Daddy WRAPPED!!!! LOL

~Camille Sierra~

My Beautiful 17month old Daughter

A seizure disorder diagnosis in August has not slowed her down and I think she is out to set some Medical record or something!

A new Diagnosis of Mild Autism won't get her either!!

She is currently Seizure free since the beginning of January!!!!!!

Currently weaning off of Toprimate suspension!!

~Addisyn Makaia~

His Mother (Kissy) and I have been friends since we met when Ernie and I married! Her Husband and Ernie were in Sub School together and then parted ways as "Sprocket" went to his "A" School and Ernie went straight to the boat! Long story short after Sprocket was done with "A" School he wound up on the same boat as Ernie! Kissy and Sprocket were married a mere 6months prior! Kissy and I became pregnant at just about the same time (about a month apart) and Cami and The Boy were born 39 days apart! So we were stationed on the first boat together and then we parted ways (a little prematurely) and went to VA while they finished their time in Hawaii (that go around LOL) a little over a year later they were in VA with us though Ernie was just on a different boat and Sprocket had managed to make it to Shore Duty! It was great being able to be somewhat close again! On Superbowl Sunday we went to their house to watch the game and enjoy some friend time when Kissy and I told each other we were pregnant again LOL! But Sadly Ernie and I were moving again!! Back to Hawaii! Even though we were apart we still stayed in touch LOL! Good thing to because less than a year after we parted with them in VA Spocket decided it would be a wise decision for them to cancel their shore duty billet and head to back to a sea command! (It just happened to be the boat we left LOL) Well the cool thing about the new command for them was it was due for a homeport relocation....but where?? You guessed it right back her to Hawaii! We were blessed that they were able to move in not directly next door but a couple of houses down! These people have become our family and I would have been lost without them while Ernie was gone to Afghanistan!!! Sprocket fed me and Kissy kept my chin up and a smile on my face as much as possible!!! These people are AMAZING!!! We couldn't ask for better friends!!

So this is the Boy!!!

Isn't he a cutie!!

I love him!!!

And he is smart as smart can be!!!

He is Cami's Best Friend!!!

This is Menace!!

(That is said with all the love and heart an Auntie can give!!)

Don't let her cute facade fool you she is T_R_O_U_B_L_E!!! She very much reminds me of Cami when she was this age!!

And because I have just been messing around on Picasa lately (hence why everything is in Collage form today!) One more Collage for the road!

These are from our most recent trip to the Zoo!!

Honolulu Zoo

March 2010!!!!

Ok so that is it for tonight folks I am going to head to bed because unfortunately I am feeling a bit under the weather as I feel a Sore throat coming on!!

God Bless