And he's gone...again

We had a wonderful long weekend with Seth and Katie and the boys, camping and floating the river...steaks cooked over an open wood fire are unbelievably incredible. We returned to Fort Hood Sunday, just early enough to get ready for a bunch of Seth's buddies to come over for a cookout. It was a "BYOB/BYOM (bring your own meat)" thing, and boy was there a variety of meat. We had fajita meat, steaks, chicken, hamburgers, hot dogs, and even stew meat (?). Everyone was cleaning out their freezers prior to the deployment. We met so many people that I'll never be able to remember all their names, but it was great fun. Several asked to store a few things at Seth and Katie's place...guitars, tough boxes, bags, etc...these were, of course, the single guys who didn't want to mess with sending stuff home and didn't want to have to pay for a storage unit to store just a few things. It's a good thing Seth and Katie have a huge basement..... :)

It was a great weekend...even though I knew it would be the last time I'd see Seth for a while. I wasn't there when he left this time...we said our goodbyes and I got "one more hug" Monday night before we headed home. But my heart and mind were there when he left. I watched the clock all day, thinking about what he was doing at that moment. 0630...the bag drop; next...back to battalian to draw weapons; then...formation and loading onto buses to be whisked away to the airport. Katie took some wonderful pictures, though, and sent some to me. So now I can look at my baby boy's smiling face any time I want to...thanks, Katie..... :) There are some other great pictures over at Katie's blog.

Well, looks like it's back to sleeping with the old cell phone again..... :)