Well, Tim has been gone for three and a half weeks so far. Communication has been scarce to say the least. I’ve received two missed calls, and one ten-mintues-turned-to-two call, and two very short letters.

But last night we got to speak for ten whole minutes – even with a bad phone connection and two screaming kids it was wonderful! He said a lot of things, most of which I can’t even begin to remember. But since I know you guys are curious, some of the things he did say were:

-He is doing very well. He is a little worried about the pushup part of his PT test, but he still had 10 more days to improve before the test.

-He had been given a Training Instructor that had a reputation of being a hardass. It seems that reputation caught up with him as he was removed from his position for inappropriate behavior regarding trainees. Tim’s flight welcomed their new TI yesterday. 

-He was told that they were going to go in to get fitted for their blues in the next two weeks.

-Tim has made a good number of friends with the other trainees. As a bonus, he has three other guys in his flight that will be going to the same Tech School as he.

-Tech School runs 12 weeks + 3 days. That means that as long as he starts Tech School right on time as planned he will be graduating on the 23rd of October. That is the week before Garret’s First Birthday, our 4th Wedding Anniversary, and of course, Halloween.

-That Lackland is on high alert as far as security goes. Tim didn’t have a lot of details, just that he had been told that there had been some sort of threat made against “The Gateway”. Needless to say, we have been warned that for graduation anyone who does not have a military ID will have a background check run on them, and that they are wanting the information for that now. So if you are even thinking about coming to Tim’s BMT graduation, please let me know so I can get that info to him asap.

-He should be able to call a little more often, as they are past the major crack-down phase. Now, I’m not counting on it, but I admit that it would be wonderful!

 Since curiosity killed the cat, and satifaction brought him back, here are some links for those of you wondering what BMT is like:

http://www.lackland.af.mil/units/737trg.asp

http://usmilitary.about.com/cs/airforcejoin/a/afbmt1.htm

http://www.airforce.com/opportunities/enlisted/basic-training/

–Edited to add–

I just got another call from Tim. Two calls in two days – I’ve got a good luck streak going here

We didn’t really talk about much mainly just chitchat. He was able to call to go over the Dream Sheet with me. No Brittish Bases are available   but the bases in Germany and Italy are.

He said that it has been very high stress, but that they were given the privilege of listening to music today while they were doing their various details.

And he asked me to send more “sappy romantic poems and stuff” so that his friends can copy them to woo their girls back home. I should note that this all came about because I had sent him Pablo Neruda’s Sonnet xvii, which was a poem we used in our wedding.  ::cracks up::  I can totally see where this is going!

Sunday (May 24th) we went and had family photos done – unfortunately we got a photographer that wasn’t terribly skilled and a toddler that wanted nothing to do with taking photos, so we didn’t get a good “family” photo, but there were some other gems in there.

On Monday, as a farewell outing for Tim we joing my mother and Marlys down at the Garden of the Godsin Colorado Springs, CO. There was some rain at the beginning of our walk, but it didn’t last long and soon it was just cool and overcast.

We walked around the large paved loop just off of the main parking lot. It was a nice jont and the air smelled so good after the rain!

Then we headed over to Balanced Rock and Eliza had a great time climbing running and scaling (much to her poor mother’s horror) the rocks.

Tim and Eliza posing under Balanced Rock

after a second try, it looks like we finally got a pretty good family photo

After we left the Garden of the Gods, we had a nice dinner and headed back to Denver to drop Tim off at the MEPS hotel. We took advantage of the indor pool and took the kids swimming as our last family outing for a while. Then we said our goodbyes and the kids and I headed back home.

I ended up having to go back the next day because we forgot Tim’s packet of documents in the car, so I spent a couple of hours with him in the relative privacy of the family lounge. I stayed until they loaded all they guys up into vans and took them off to the airport.

He gave me a very brief phone call that night, consisting mainly of “I just wanted to let you know that I got here safe, love you, bye!”

 I was told to expect another brief phone call from him this past weekend to give me his address. It never came, and in all honesty I’m not surprised – just a little frustrated that I arranged my weekend around a non-existent phone call. C’est La Vie.

I did call down yesterday to get his address (so did Marguerite – thanks!), and he is evidently in the 324th Training Squadron – which my google-fu tells me are The Knights (So now you’ve figured out what my title means! Kept you hanging, didn’t I?). Seems to be a pretty appropriate mascot for him, don’t you think?

Of course, the token photo of Eliza at the post office showing off the nice fat stack of mail we sent Tim – that is 9 letters in 7 days – there is NO way Tim can claim that we don’t love him

And for posterity sake, here is our count-down ticker:

So, well, there we are – the kids and I are now trying to just get back into the daily grind, and Tim, well I suppose right now he is probably mainly trying to adjust to being always wrong

The kids don’t seem to be very phased that he is gone, and I think I am adjusting pretty well. I miss him very much, but I’m trying my best to pick up the slack left in his place. I just can’t wait for graduation weekend (July 24th) – I am finding myself really antsy for that date to roll around.

We were given the go ahead today from the MEPS doctor, so our plans are as concrete as we can ever expect. Tim will be shipping out to Air Force Basic Training at next Tuesday, May 26th. Basic is held at Lackland AFB  in San Antonio, TX, and if everything goes as planned Tim should graduate BMT on the 24th of July.

After that the plans get a bit hazy, but we do know that he will be heading out to Keesler AFB in Biloxi, Mississippi for Tech School and that we expect his graduation to be sometime around November.

And some more slightly related photos from my arsenal:

This is a photo of Tim taking his enlistment oath on June 13th, 2008 (We haven’t decided if it is an omen that Tim signed his enlistment contract on Friday the 13th…. though it wouldent suprise me!) The officers working at the MEPSstation were very nice and let me sneak into the room for the oath to take pictures

And this is the Naval Officer who lead the enlistment ceremony. I could kick myself for not writing down his name at the time. He was fascinating to talk to, and gave a very heartfelt inspiring speech.

Please excuse the quality of these photos – the camera I was using had recently had a near death experience in the Pacific Ocean, needless to say it was just barely hobbling on.

Well, to be honest, the countdown started a looooooooong time ago, its just recently that I started ticking off the days.

So, most of our friends and family probably know that Tim has signed a six year enlistment contract with the Air Force.  His contract is for Computer Systems Operations, which was his first choice of jobs.

Well, after a year of red tape, begging for waivers, a truckload of (probably silly) questions for our recruiter, having to endure a poorly timed surgery, and more false starts than I would like to acknowledge – We are finally approaching a date that actually looks like it might be serious for Tim to ship out to his Basic Training.

Of course, we won’t know that for sure until tomorrow morning. Tim is right now down at a fancy-shmancy hotel in Denver so that tomorrow  he can have his feet inspected at MEPS(I have to sit here and laugh at the fact that we’ve jumped through so many hoops the last few months for a silly little toe. Ah Murphy, I gotta give you credit for that lovely irony!)  I have to admit that I’ve been fighting a slight battle of nerves all day as it was this step back in February that set us back so far. But Tim has been as cool and suave about it as he can muster - I do admire him for it, though I don’t have any clue how he managed that.

I’ve been getting a lot of questions about how I am feeling about all of this, and as to be expected my feelings are very mixed. But long story short, I am excited for our new adventure – even with all of the growing pains I know we will have to endure. I am confident that we will get through this just fine, and that we will be stronger and better people for it.

What I do know, is that I am really proud of Tim.

And to make this post a little less than boring – here is a photo Marguerite sent me of Tim in his dress uniform back when he was in Army ROTC at K-State.

So anyway, here we are :::throws confetti::: Happy Blog Warming to me! lol. We will definitely see where this goes.

Oh, by the way, here is the link to the mysterious typepad blog of yesteryear: http://brightmorning.typepad.com/