2nd Lieutenant Mom

 Welcome back! I think my last post was easily more than 7 years ago? And of course the entire world has changed, between living through a global pandemic, returning to graduate school, accepting a position as a Department Chair at a Tribal College, raising teenagers, my spouse works on the other side of the country....and most recently one of my children is battling bone cancer.  My, my, there is so much to talk about, where do I even begin? Thankfully for most, if you've followed me on other social media outlets, this won't be so much "news". But I think for me, the most important thing I wanted to accomplish with this blog was to share all the "humanities" of being me.  What I would like to do is use this space to honor those questions that are sometimes too  "random" to just post on social media, but as they happen...that's kind of how I will talk about them. I , of course, still hold the word of God very near and dear to my heart. So I wou...

Happy New Year! This year, I am committing to saving money, paying off debts, having a better prayer life, being my faithful to blogging :) LOL Just a little bit of everything, but nothing so ambitious that I set myself up to fail. I feel like I am moving into another season in my life where my expectations of where I want to be are not only reasonable, but totally attainable. My children are getting older....which means so am I. But that also means that my priorities and concerns are shifting too. My husband and I are both doing the YOU Bible reading program. The program we selected was the Bible in 90 days. I love it! I started mine on my Kindle Fire and he started his on his tablet because they have and YOU BIBLE App. However, you can follow the program online too. It is so simple and enjoyable to do. I usually listen to the audio version during quiet time at my house, which is only for about 30 min. - 1 hour , but it's enough to finish my focused reading without interrupt...

So I promised to share with you my "Twin" story! So here it is. Last fall when my husband and I found out we were pregnant, we promised we would let everyone know if we were having another boy or another girl. Little did we realize that by Christmas time we would be telling everyone, "We're having both! One boy AND one girl! LOL So that was the beginning of this twin journey for us. Our ultrasound was the day before my doctor's appointment. So naturally when I went into the office, I completely expected everyone to be elated! However, when the doctor came and we went through our usual "check-up" questions, I finally asked, "Did you know we are having twins?" And to her surprise, she didn't! So, after rushing around for some information from diagnostics from the day before, "Yes" we had the paperwork from the radiologist that confirmed "Twins". At my local hospital, in the case of twins, you are labeled, High risk. As ...

I was one of those very blessed individuals who was able to actually DELIVER a set of full term , fraternal twins without a caesarean. It was definitely one of the most rewarding experiences ever! And in a later post, I will explain the delivery and hospital visit, but for now I want to share with you some things I wish I had known, hehehe… Your feet will Swell… This pregnancy was my fifth pregnancy that actually lasted longer than 10 weeks. I only say that to validate that I knew what pregnancy did to My body! However, during my second trimester, I woke up one day with the Elephant feet! This was horrible. It just kind of happened. I was walking around doing my own thing, went to bed and BOOM it happens, you get up to dress yourself in the morning, which is a chore anyway being prego with twins, and now ALL of your shoes are too tight. And if you CAN get them on, they aren’t coming off until the end of the day when you can get someone to pry them off with a crow-bar...

  So it has come to my attention that the reason I spend so much time running back to the grocery store is because I failed to realize one basic concept.... Ten is NOT enough to share . This "epiphany" , if you will, occurred to me yesterday. With the beginning of the school year quickly approaching, I diligently explained to my husband, the Dr. , that we needed to make a menu for the week to eliminate the almost daily trips to the grocery store. I mean, let's face it, life is only getting more expensive with the price of  one gallon of milk exceeding the price of one gallon of gasoline. You have to cut costs where you can. So, my plan to combat the high cost of food was to PLAN our meals and snacks for each week. And that's just what I did. I wrote what we would eat and drink each day, even down to the snacks in-between meals. What I failed to note, however, was that the quantity of each of these items needed to increase, since our children are rapidly growing,...

Hey there! So apparently I took a two year hiatus from blogging. Which I find interesting because, I haven't taken a "hiatus" from life! In these short two years, I have managed to have three more children...a set of twins and a singleton, help my husband finish his PhD (yes, by the way, I am now officially married to a Dr. and we now have more band-Aids in our house than I think any individual will EVER use! LOL ), become a free lance copywriter for a Malaysian company, perform the national anthem in our community parade of nation twice (oh , and I was officially asked to do it again this year! So excited!), and in between all that I managed to take care of my family. Anyway, just wanted let you know that I am BACK! And there is so much to catch up on ! So Follow Me... the day in the life of 2LT Mom :) Ciao!  2LT Mom This is a picture from a recent wedding we attended ... that's all six of my kiddos and our little friend, Red :)

Praise the Lord! Okay, so to make a long story short, I need a new hood hair dryer. The one I had, my parents bought me 11 years ago as a gift. Two days ago, I was sitting under the dryer reading a book and I knocked it off the table while using it! This resulted in the dryer falling on the floor and breaking in two. :( Well, I figured, "it's just a dryer. I'll just hop online and buy a new one..." I never thought that it would be SOOO deep to purchase a new hair dryer! Wow, technology has apparently come a long way in the last 11 years. Then I thought, "well, I'll just go on Ebay and buy the same one that I had...." Can you say SHOCK! When every dryer that looked like mine was prefaced with the words... VINTAGE! LOL All I could do was laugh! Am I vintage now? LOL You Be the Judge! "Thus saith the LORD, Stand ye in the ways, and see, and ask for the old paths, where is the good way, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your souls. But they...

Praise the Lord ! Just wanted to show everyone a new hairstyle. My mother-in-law sent me some flowers and headbands from E-bay and I have been experimenting with them and different hairstyles. Tell me what you think! I love how the girl's hair turned out! This was a "curler" week. That means that I not only did a two-strand twist style, but I also put rollers on the ends of the hair to give them added body and curl. My product of choice for these styles is Twist and Loc gel on very wet, freshly shampooed hair. After styling, the ends were curled with rollers and then the style was set using a hood hair dryer. My girls were so excited and so was I! To maintain this style, simply tie a silk scarf over the hair at night and remove in the morning :) Easy! Total styling time ranged from 45 mins ~ 90 mins including washing, (deep) conditioning, detangling, and styling. Then dryer time was approximately 20 minutes. Just FYI for those who were wondering. I surveyed my neighbor,...

Praise the Lord All! I just want to give honor where honor is due. The Best Grandparents Award goes to my parents: Grammy and Papa, for making this year the BEST birthday surprise Ever for my children. They flew many miles to our house to "surprise" the kids for their birthday this year. Every day was fun filled and power packed. It was so refreshing to visit with my parents. I love them so much. My husband and I were just about to start our first home remodel project, and thanks to my dear parents it went from just a kitchen remodel to A full Kitchen Facelift and a New Bedroom :) Gotta Love parents :) The kids had such a great time visiting with them too. Our two sons and our two daughters all had their fair share of attention from Grammy and Papa. They played in the ball pit, went swimming, spent the night in a hotel, enjoyed a surprise birthday party, and much, much more. So this post is a tribute to the greatest family visit of the year ( so far) . God Bless my lovely p...

Praise the Lord! After a little time off, I am officially BACK! What have I been up to lately you ask? Well, lots! But for now here is a preview of Her Hair, His Glory. I hope you enjoy! Updates coming VERY Soon! Ciao! 2LT Mom

Praise the Lord All! The time of year is quickly approaching when we all begin to focus on the most important Birthday Party of all time! The Birth of Christ! This year, I have the pleasure of being the director for our church Christmas Play. It will be great! The scrips are copied and distributed, the set is being designed, and the kids are all extremely excited about it. The theme is the Christmas Story from the perspective of the animals in the stable on the night Christ was born. After rehearsals, I will give updates on progress and pictures! Our last rehearsal was "to die for" literally, I couldn't stop laughing. I don't know how we kept the rehearsal to 90 mins. That was a miracle in itself! Stay encouraged! Because he lives, I can face tomorrow and so can You! -Ciao, 2LT Mom

Praise the Lord! I just wanted to share my notes on restoration from church last week. Sis Griffin taught about the steps of spiritual and physical restoration: 1) Cleansing - Psalm 51:2 "Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin." 2) Strip away old layers, don't just paint over them. Over time that paint will just chip away. 3) Make the necessary repairs. Remove broken pieces and replace them with new pieces - Psalms 51:11 "Cast me not away from thy presence; and take not thy holy spirit from me." 4) Sand to make smooth in order to remove all the inconsistencies- James 1:8 "A double minded man is unstable in all his ways." 5) Apply a coat of wax to protect *What are some things in your life that need to be restored? When you allow God to restore your soul, people WILL take notice! Be encouraged today, that God wants to restore your broken and wounded soul to it's full potential! God Bless! Ciao! 2LT Mom

Praise the Lord! Over the last few years, it has come to my attention that there is a lot more awareness and support for ladies transitioning and encouraging the curliness of their daughter's hair. When I first began my hair journey, I found very little to keep me encouraged. Now, I have found so many blogs and websites, I can't follow them All and they are all great! So I began to wonder, if I am so excited about hair and so many others are excited about hair, is this love something God given that over the years we have allowed society to suppress? I distinctly remember my days of relaxers where my goal in life was to spend as little time on my hair as possible, the ponytail was my staple hairstyle even in elementary school (with the exception of picture day, of course). It was "cool" to be fed up with your own hair and insist on only having it styled at a salon. A brief study of the Bible has already shown me that those feelings of being "fed up" are soci...

Matthew 19:14 But Jesus said, Suffer little children, and forbid them not, to come unto me: for of such is the kingdom of heaven. Praise the Lord! Here is my next introductory feature for Her Hair, His Glory! My little Ladies and their beautiful glory! I get a lot of my style ideas from two other blogs, KJBraids.blogspot.com and BeadsBraidsandbeyond.blogspot.com . Either I do some kind of variation or just get inspiration from them. My daughters, ages 3 and 5, are very excited about their curly hair. Which makes mom utterly thrilled. My goal is to instill this love in them now, so that they will not have the internal struggle that I had growing up. In general, I have no product of choice, which I hate by the way ! I am using what I have and evaluating the lasting effects on the styles i do for my girls. As a routine: 1) We generally wash hair every 7-10 days , sometimes more often depending on circumstances 2) Deep conditioning every two or three weeks, it's something fun we do tog...

Praise the Lord ! I have been praying for a long time about how to incorporate my passion and revelation about my hair with this blog, so God , in only His infinite wisdom, gave me this idea. I will have a feature segment called "Her Hair, His Glory". This section with document my personal testimony along with things I have learned and what I am currently doing with my hair and my children's hair. For those who don't know my little story. I am a long time transitioner. I got my first relaxer as a teenager. However, I liked wearing my hair curly, so I fought for those next few years with rollersets to keep a curl in my hair... Never questioning that if I like it curly why am I straightening it? During my 1st year of college, straight hair maintenance was very expensive. So I didn't do it often at all. Maybe twice a year. I had tried to give myself relaxers, but I had a childhood friend whose hair literally fell out after doing one at home.... so that was not an opt...