Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving from Fort McCoy, Wisconsin. We just got out of the field, where I got 4 hours of sleep for the entire 36 hour excercise. My body hates me right now for that. Go figure. The training was actually very good other then the temperature. It was freezing!!! We learned how to do things we could do in Iraq like secure and defend entry control points to bases and react to mortar attacks. They hired civilians to play Iraqi citizens, some of them being former Iraqi citizens, which helped out a lot. It added realism to the experience. They pretended to not know english, protested our presence in "Iraq:" and of course attacked us. All and all it was a great experience.. sleep or no sleep. Everything here has being as well as it can be, being away from home and all. That is the worst part, but the people around here are supportive and help you through tough times, as does prayer and the Lord. We have a pretty good group of people, we all work as a team and put the welfare of everybody before our own. I think the deployment over to the sandbox will be okay. Well I am going to get going now. Thanks for reading!!

Hey guys

Things are moving slow so far. The unit's morale is pretty high though as the Sr. leaders are trying to keep it that way. Last night a few of us had a wonderful night of fellowship, sharing verses, talking and praying. Hopefully by the time we leave the group will ourgrow the room we have for it. That would be great. It sounds as though we will be in country in a few months rather then weeks, but of course that is subject to change. I think today we are getting are DCU's which is pretty cool. Instead of green I will be what carmel?? in color. I think carmel is flattering on my figure though, or at least I hope. Hopefully they will be striped to add 15 lbs to my frame!! Oh well, it's still an Army uniform hey. Oh yeah and the best part of the desert uniform.. no more boot shining. I cannot wait. I am sick of shining my boots only to wake up and step and them and leave a nice scuff on the toe. As I was proof reading, I've noticed that my grammar is rather poor, so I will apologize. I have to go now though, I think there is work to do. Thank you for your thoughts and prayers.. keep it up because God is faithful and just in answering prayers.. although the answers may come on his timing, they will come. Oh yeah.. just a sidenote; Army food really gives everybody severe gas... which is humorous, at least to a juvenile delinquent such as myself.

Active Duty

I have been on active duty now since Friday Nov 5th. Sunday was the hardest I have ever experienced and I will not put myself or my family through this again. So far things have been going as well as expected. We've had shots and all the good stuff, so I suppose it is downhill from here now. We have a lot of training in front of us, but I think this unit is ready, for the training. I've been able to pray a lot lately as I've been sitting and waiting a lot, the praying has given me a lot of strength. Well I don't have much time left on this computer, you know how the Army is.. Love yas and praying for yas.

The day is here

Today is the day I leave for my deployment. I have to report tomorrow. We are going to spend some time training, then on our way to the "sandbox." Right now I am feeling so many emotions. Most of the are sad, but with a lot of optimism. I never thought this day would come. I hoped it wouldn't, but I knew better. It had too. Tomorrow I have to say bye to my wife and kids, and the rest of the family that will be with us. I've been dreading it. Words cannot describe the emotions. I know that they will be taken care of back here. We've been blessed with a wonderful family and a wonderful church family that will take care of them. I know I will be taken care of. I've been blessed with a good unit, with great people. Well I am going to go now... please keep the prayer for me going. I know the Lord answers prayers. I know the Lord will take care of me. I am walking the path that He has laid out for me. Although it may not seem perfect to humans, we have to know that it is His path and it is perfect.