Officially a Deployment

It's a given the car will break down or any number of things in the house will break once they are gone. Just ask any spouse of a soldier. Every deployment we've gone through, there has been car issues and this one is no different. We had hoped we were avoiding this issue by buying a brand new car before coming over here but no such luck.

Thankfully it happened very close to post and we could still see the front gate. And we were thankful a neighbor drove by and offered us a ride so we didn't have to walk too far in upper 20's weather. We were within 2 milies of home so it wouldn't have been too far of a walk for us. The car is at a Ford dealership about 45 mins south of here now. Another neighbor looked at it before it was towed away and said it was a pretty big issue so it may take awhile to get parts shipped here from the states. We've been in a rental car for a week now and hoping it won't be too much longer.

All in all we got very lucky with the entire situation. I couldn't have asked for a better way for it to all go down.

Handing out Spurs

James handing out spurs and Order of the Spur Certificate to the Law Enforcement Professionals that helped us at the PHQ.

Road Trippin' and Tippin' Over

Joint ANP US Convoy on the way to Nawbahar district to take supplies

there. ISAF troops had not driven to Nawbahar in over 6 months, so the
SEAL team that was there was surprised that we made it without incident

Crossing a river - A Mine Resistant All Terrain Vehicle (MAT-V) crossing

a river. These trucks are really pretty good in all terrain, as
compared to the heavy MRAPs, not quite as good as an MRAP in taking a
blast but definitely better than an up armoured HMMWV

 Taliban country - driving through passes like this gives me the heebie
jeebies just waiting for the bad guys to spring an ambush on us.
Luckily that has not happened yet to any patrol that I've been on.

Barrett .50 cal. The SEALs at Nawbahar were more than willing to let us

play with some of their Gee whiz weapons, MP-5 submachine guns, SCARs,
and their Barrett .50 cal sniper rifle which you see me shooting here.

Snow in Nawbahar There was 2 inches of snow on the ground when we left

Nawbahar, a harbringer of things to come.

 Roll over - Due to the rain, the mud was very slick and the MAT-Vs are
top heavy. That equaled disaster on the minor slope we had to cross
here, the slope was bounded by a 3 ft drop off. We slid and when we
hit the drop off we tipped over. I was in the truck on its side.
Luckily no one was hurt in either vehicle and once we got my truck back
up on its wheels we drove it another 7 hours back home.

Recovery, this is how we got the truck that was on its top back up on

its wheels, a pretty good job by the wrecker crew to make this happen.
We did have to tow it all the way back home since it had leaked pretty
much all of its fluids out all over the ground.

Dab Pass - more snow. This is the Dab Pass, it's in the mountain range

that separates Qalat from the rest of Zabul to the South Southeast.
There was about 4 inches of snow as we negotiated the pass. We were
extra careful here since we'd already had a couple of incidents and were
towing the results of that incident.

Joint ANP US convoy, our truck with ANP trucks at a rest halt.

James and LTC Matin

So long 1st Trimester!

Can't say I am sorry to see it go. It's kinda crazy how something so tiny can control so much. And let me tell you that 5 oz someone is reminding me from time to time he/she is still in charge. I still have to be careful with what I eat and when I eat it.

I *think* I am over the morning sickness. Atleast I have been telling everyone that and then I had a bad bout a few days ago. I'm not spending every night on the couch anymore and I can clean more than 1 thing around the house in a day so big progress there. I finally starting gaining some weight in the last 2-3 wks. Yeah, I had a bump without weight gain for awhile. The first several weeks I knew I was pregnant it was as if I was 8-9 mos pregnant already and could hardly fit anything in my stomach. So I lost 5-6 lbs and spent the next several weeks gaining that back before finally adding onto my weight. I am still exhausted but my naps have gotten shorter so I think some of that is going away as well. This symptom took me by surprise because I didn't really have it with Macen. Thank goodness he still naps daily so I can nap at the same time.

As you can see from the updated baby pic to the left, he/she is right on track and growing well. Germans are very generous with ultrasounds and I get one at every appt. My doc was great about thoroughly going over what he was measuring and how the baby looked. We are hoping to find out what we are having at the next appt.

Macen has been really great with me being pregnant. I think he is relieved I am now a functioning pregnant mom so I can play with him again. He likes to poke at the baby from time to time. And sometimes he likes to share his food and tells me "Your baby likes (insert whatever he is eating here) ". It's pretty funny and atleast he is thinking of the baby already. He'll be a good big brother.