Put a Big Texas Smile on Your Face...

And the baby's name is....

Tim and I finally decided on a name for our little girl. We really struggled with this, but in the end I strong-armed him into settling on a name. I found myself calling her "Emma" to myself and wanted to give her a unique name to help with moving on with this pregnancy. Lydia's full name will be Lydia Alyse Decker. Alyse is pronounced ah-lees, which is a french pronunciation. (Can anyone guess which portion of her name Tim picked?)

I would have preferred to wait on setting up the nursery, but Timmy and Lydia will be sharing a room and I needed to start coordinating their bedding so Timmy would have some blankets. Timmy's side of the room will have blue and brown turtles and Lydia's side will have pink and brown ladybugs. The turtles and the ladybugs are made by the same bedding company and sort of match (more or less). So, we have started buying some things for Lydia, which makes me nervous and happy at the same time. I have been fortunate that Lydia has been so active lately. She reminds me that she's in there and that things are going well with her when she kicks and moves.

I guess it is a good thing that I am feeling so much baby movement. My prenatal care is on hold for a long while, thanks to the most inefficient maternity care program in the country--Brook Army Medical Center. I really try not to complain about the care I receive and I am genuinely appreciative of the outstanding care I have received from the Army in the past. However, upon coming to Fort Sam Houston, I have discovered that I was pretty much spoiled before. Due to the numerous appointments I have to get complete before getting a prenatal appointment, it will probably be about July before I can get seen again. Geez, I hope nothing goes wrong between now and then.

Being in Texas has been both a blessing and a challenge. We have had a LOT of things to do in the last few weeks, but I have been fortunate enough to have the help of my parents and Tim. We finished moving everything in the house in about a week. I really love the new house, despite a few issues with the landlord (welcome to renting). Now I am working on things like a driver's license, voter registration and other really fun tasks.

Our good news for the week is that Cansu has arrived! Cansu arrived late in the evening on Thursday. We had dinner at the Cheesecake Factory (my weakness since arriving in San Antonio) and then pretty much went to bed. Tim arrived from Kansas for Memorial Day weekend on Friday, so we put chores on hold for a few days and had some fun. On Saturday we went tubing on the Comal River. For those who have not visited Texas, "tubing" refers to jumping in an inner tube and floating down a river for a few hours. We all really enjoyed the relaxation, although the trip a pretty crowded with college students home for Memorial Day weekend. On Sunday we went to the San Antonio Zoo. Despite the intense heat, we all had a really great time. Cansu has graced us with her cooking and has shared some great Turkish traditions with us. Tim and I have a new addiction to overcome-Turkish coffee. Turkish coffee is thick and potent. Cansu makes it using a copper pot she brought me as a gift and serves it in a really cute coffee set she brought. We love it! (yeah, yeah, I know. Coffee is a no-go with pregnancy, but I limit how much I drink).

I am enclosing a few pictures of our adventure at the Action Figure Museum and our trip to the zoo.

Blessings in Pink

This has been a really exciting week for all of us. Last week we were swamped with work in preparation for the move. We are happy to announce that after a few late nights and exhausting days, we finally got everything packed and prepared to move. On Friday, we successfully closed on our house. We felt like a weight had been lifted from our shoulders. We were VERY thankful to have dodged an entire week of severe storms and tornado threats. It would have put a damper on our closing date to have had our house relocated by a tornado.

Our really, really exciting news is that we got a free and clear ultrasound complete on Friday. They looked at all the major organ systems and everything seems to be "unremarkable." We also found out that our little baby is going to be a GIRL!!! Bring on the pink, I'm so excited! We have agreed that regardless of the outcome, this is going to be our last pregnancy. I have always dreamed of raising a little girl, so this was my last chance. I almost cried when the tech told us that she saw a little girl. Tim is a little less than thrilled (he is not sure how he is going to cope with raising a little girl) but he was very happy that the baby is healthy. That is the important thing to both of us.

We are at a loss for picking a girl's name. This is a little task we have been working on since we were married, but we figure we will need to accelerate our efforts if we are to decide before October. So, we are taking name nominations. If you have any good suggestions, please send them my way. I am looking for something that is not completely common but a little bit of a "classic." Good start, huh?

I will provide more updates and pictures as I get time. For right now, it's back to unpacking!

Farewell to the Medical Company

My tummy-17 weeks!
Our little heart-breaker

Change of Command ceremony

My company (well, about 1/4 of it)

Passing the guidon

This has been a bittersweet week. For twenty two months I have commanded a company, a responsibility that has resulted in midnight phone calls, after hours duties, long hours at work and a great burden of caring for over three hundred Soldiers in my command. However, it has also been a great honor and on most days, a lot of fun. Preparing for the change of command this week has been a lot more hectic than I had anticipated, so it went by extremely quickly and kept me from having much time to sit back and dwell on the changes that were about to take place.

We finally got to Friday and the Change of Command Ceremony was a success. After the longest receiving line I have ever stood in, I picked up the last of my things and quietly relinquished my parking spot to the new commander. My command was yesterday's news and everyone else in the company was out celebrating with the new commander. Despite being accompanied by Tim and Timmy Ryan, it was a very lonely moment. I had an hour until I had to be back for an awards ceremony I was expected to attend, and it occurred to me that for the first time in 22 months, I really had no where to go and nothing to do. This was a very foreign feeling to me. I was deeply relieved to have completed every task that was required to change command and felt that a huge burden was lifted off my shoulders now that I was no longer responsible for over 300 people. At the same time, I felt a little lost as well. I have gotten accustomed to the pace of life of a commander and was suddenly hit head-on with an open space in my calendar. What an odd feeling.

Tim, Timmy and I walked away from the ceremony to the daycare next door to drop Timmy back off. As I shared that quiet moment with my family, it occurred to me that that particular moment was ever so typical of the military experience. We enter a new job, go 100 miles an hour for the duration of the assignment, crank up the heat at the end as we close out that assignment, and then we walk away slowly...alone but together with our family. At the end of every military assignment, when we feel the sense of loneliness that accompanies the goodbyes that we say to our friends, we still get the privilege of walking away with our families. At the end of each assignment, the loved ones at our side will have grown, developed and changed over the course of that assignment. Hopefully we were responsible enough as service members to take the time to notice and take part in that change an development, because at the end of the day, the one stable thing we take on with us from each assignment is our family.

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On another note, this weekend has been much more relxed, but also very exciting. Earlier in the week there was a "tasking" (military order) that went out calling for spouses of Soldiers from all over post to participate in a town hall meeting. Tim's battalion was responsible for providing a spouse of a company commander for this tasking. I volunteered, since I figured I no longer had any excuses about being too busy commaning a company of my own. so, on Saturday I showed up to this meeting and was surprised to find that the "special guest" was the Robert Gates, the Secretary of Defense. He met with the spouses of Fort Riley to get a better idea of what types of things can be done to improve the life of military families. There were a lot of concerns and ideas raised in the meeting, and in the end we all got a chance to do a quick photo session and received a Secretary of Defense coin and a rose. It was quite a treat to be able to attend this special event. For military special occasions, it is customary to carry around the coin from the highest ranking person who has "coined" you. I doubt this one is going to get trumped any time soon. What an honor!

Mother's Day has been a sleepy event in our household, which I must admit has been completely appropriate. I think the one thing I wanted most for Mother's Day was a little rest. We went to church and then out to eat with our special friends Corey and Kelly. After lunch we took a much-needed family nap.

I can also officially say that I received the classiest Mother's Day gift of all--a six pack and a box of chocolates. Since I have been pregnant, obviously I have not been drinking. There has been a running joke for the last few months of command that I just need a drink some nights. For Mother's Day, Tim got me a six-pack of O'Doul's (non-alcoholic beer) to celebrate the day.

On Friday Tim got me necklace and a set of matching earrings to commemorate the Change of Command. This was more of a Mother's Day/ Change of Command combo gift, so I guess I can't exactly be putat the butt of too many jokes, but it makes a good story nonetheless.