Monday, October 11, 2010
Sunday, October 10, 2010
MAJOR PRAYER REQUEST!
My father went in for a regular physical a couple of weeks ago. When they checked his heart there was a "tiny" blip on the monitor or whatever you call it. I am not a doctor so I am talking "elizabeth physician talk". It was so minor that the doctor and my father were debating on whether or not he should explore it further. Well they opted better to be safe than sorry.
From what I understand this past Friday my dad went in to have a procedure done that puts dye or something like that into his heart to see if there is anything wrong. It could have been another procedure but this is what I understand. Well - long story short - 1 artery is 90% clogged and the other 3 are clogged too.
SO - tomorrow my father is going to have QUADRUPLE bypass surgery. Oh how my heart hurts right now (no pun intended). I was anxious about life being so uncertain anyways and now that this is going on I feel like I cannot breathe.
My father is precious. I have my own little jokes with him and he has been one of the biggest encouragements in my life. He always compliments and pushes me along in the right direction. I am blessed to have him as my daddy. This is not something I want him to go through. I don't want him to hurt. When he hurts I seriously will be hurting.
Please pray for Ernie. And please pray that our house sells so we can get up there. We have a contract with a contingency but their house has not sold either. Randy is going to St. Louis in 2 weeks so the girls can start school and Randy starts work on the 29th. Again we will have to be apart until the house sells. On a side note - if anyone knows of a place that Randy and the kids can stay near U City or Clayton for about a month - please let me know.
But most importantly PLEASE pray tomorrow morning for my dad. Pray for the doctors and that they can manage his pain. Pray for my mom because she will be the main caregiver. And it is not like she hasn't had a hard year either (loosing both of her parents, helping me while Randy was gone, etc.).
Thank you my dear prayer warriors!!
Monday, September 20, 2010
don't worry little ones...
I will continue posting...but the Scholma family is in the state of figuring out when we will be moving back to good ole STL...We are thinking 4 weeks....phew! That is gonna go by so fast...
I have so many stories and I promise when I get some time I will blog about them ; )
Thursday, September 9, 2010
home sweet home...
I am actually surprised how fast our family has gotten back into our little groove. I must say I have forgotten how messy a man can be - haha! But I will take that any time over him being gone.
I can tell Randy is exhausted and it is going to take some time for him to get his energy back. It has taken him a couple of days of signing in at the Air Force Base. He finally completed it today so now he is so ready to relax!
On labor day we had a showing so it took us by surprise. Our current contract on our house has a contingency with the buyer so we will still have showings. We are confident and have faith that the Lord will take care of her house selling and that everything will work out.
Today we have the inspector at 1pm to look over the house. I am dreading the "to do" list. But at least I won't have to do the things by myself ; )
On another note our 2 year old cracks us up - Whenever John gets in trouble with Randy he comes to me and then when I scold him he goes to Daddy - what a little player!
I still have to write the story about the week before Randy got home but I have to clean up and get this crew out of the house so the inspector dude can find everything nothing wrong with our house.
Thanks again for all your love and support! He is just so faithful!
Monday, September 6, 2010
Homecoming....
Saturday, September 4, 2010
details
Okay! He has landed in Maryland!! I just talked to him at his hotel and he texted me this photo:
He is thrilled to take a shower in his bare feet. I guess they wore flip flops in the showers overseas.
He is flying American Airlines from Dallas and will arrive in San Antonio at 11:40 am. We are all meeting by the security section. Be sure to wear red white and blue. And PLEASE don't feel awkward if you want to come. There are going to be several people there and I know Randy will appreciate you being there and showing your support. But either text me or email me if you want to go to lunch. I made reservations already but I might need to up the number ; )
And again - anyone is welcome and so are your kiddos.
I am just so thankful and praising my sweet Jesus tonight for bringing my baby back to the states.
Photos and hopefully a video will come probably tomorrow night ; )
The day has arrived!
Okay we are all just giddy with excitement! Randy called me in the middle of the night from Germany and then this morning from England. He is on the plane right now from England to Baltimore. Tomorrow morning he flies from Maryland to Dallas to San Antonio. He will be arriving at 11:40 am but I will know all the details tonight when he calls.
Anyone is welcome to come to the airport to greet him. There are already about 20 people coming : )
Send me an email at elizabeth@madlucy.com so I know to email or text you with all the final info.
And on another note - our house has a contract on it! Praise Jesus! He is more than faithful. I have a super story about all of this but it is long and we have been crazy busy getting ready for Dr. Scholma to arrive so I haven't had the time ; ) But I will post it in a couple of days because it is a testament of the Lord's faithfulness.
Randy had quite a list of food that he wanted in the fridge - very specific beers that I didn't know anything about so I just went to World Market and got an assortment - I can't go wrong with that, right?!
Say a prayer Randy doesn't get delayed especially in Dallas. At least they have a playground that he can play on ; )
Thursday, September 2, 2010
absent
I know I have been absent for a while. There are so many reasons why...but you will just have to wait until tomorrow because it is 1:35 am and I have to go bed. My mom is back in town. So I know everyone is going to wake up bright and early ; )
Praying that Randy arrives in San Antonio at 11:40 am this Sunday morning. The anticipation is like Christmas here at the Scholma household ; )
Tuesday, August 31, 2010
Hurry up and wait!
Well...at least I've made it this far.
I have finally made it out of Afghanistan. It ended up being 1 day short of 2 weeks. The bulk of the last 3 days were spent in and around the terminal getting bumped off flights. We had 3 flights canceled in 3 days and finally took off on the 4th try.
Our baggage was locked up on pallets all that time, so I was living out of my backpack. We were supposed to pack a "72 hour bag" for our time here at Manas, Kyrgystan, but I had to wash it all the day before we left because it was all dirty. I spent 3 hours in the laundry tent to do one load of laundry. But then, what else did I have to do?
One of the hardest parts was sleep. Our first three canceled flights were in the middle of the night and everyone reports about 6-8 hours before the flight to go through customs and processing (but mostly just to wait). We were usually told the flight was canceled around the flight time. I was talking to another member who was in my group and we figured we spent about 30 hours in "lock down" waiting for flights over 3 days. This is when we are not allowed to leave the terminal, even for meals. We did have some porta-johns to use, though.
Now I'm at Manas AFB in Kyrgystan. Don't worry, I'm here and I don't know where Kyrgystan is either. We stopped here on the way in to theater as well. It's pretty nice - certainly better than Bagram. We sleep in a huge "clamshell" tent with close to 100 bunk beds in it. I slept hard last night - I had some catching up to do.
I should spend a few days here and head home. Right now the plan is to leave on the 4th. The original plan was the 2nd - but we all know how that works. There's wireless internet here, so I'll be busy today putting 8 months worth of updates on my computer and phone. I have to catch up with the rest of the world again. Otherwise, its back to eating, sleeping, the gym, and...well...that's about it.
My hope is to celebrate Labor Day at home with my family. Now wouldn't that be nice? After a little more than 8 months away (I left on 2 Jan).
One step closer. I'll catch that guy with the light at the end of the tunnel yet.
I have finally made it out of Afghanistan. It ended up being 1 day short of 2 weeks. The bulk of the last 3 days were spent in and around the terminal getting bumped off flights. We had 3 flights canceled in 3 days and finally took off on the 4th try.
Our baggage was locked up on pallets all that time, so I was living out of my backpack. We were supposed to pack a "72 hour bag" for our time here at Manas, Kyrgystan, but I had to wash it all the day before we left because it was all dirty. I spent 3 hours in the laundry tent to do one load of laundry. But then, what else did I have to do?
One of the hardest parts was sleep. Our first three canceled flights were in the middle of the night and everyone reports about 6-8 hours before the flight to go through customs and processing (but mostly just to wait). We were usually told the flight was canceled around the flight time. I was talking to another member who was in my group and we figured we spent about 30 hours in "lock down" waiting for flights over 3 days. This is when we are not allowed to leave the terminal, even for meals. We did have some porta-johns to use, though.
Now I'm at Manas AFB in Kyrgystan. Don't worry, I'm here and I don't know where Kyrgystan is either. We stopped here on the way in to theater as well. It's pretty nice - certainly better than Bagram. We sleep in a huge "clamshell" tent with close to 100 bunk beds in it. I slept hard last night - I had some catching up to do.
I should spend a few days here and head home. Right now the plan is to leave on the 4th. The original plan was the 2nd - but we all know how that works. There's wireless internet here, so I'll be busy today putting 8 months worth of updates on my computer and phone. I have to catch up with the rest of the world again. Otherwise, its back to eating, sleeping, the gym, and...well...that's about it.
My hope is to celebrate Labor Day at home with my family. Now wouldn't that be nice? After a little more than 8 months away (I left on 2 Jan).
One step closer. I'll catch that guy with the light at the end of the tunnel yet.
Sunday, August 29, 2010
Just when I thought...
The short of it is that I'm still at Bagram AF in Afghanistan. The same place I've been for 11 days now. Here's how yesterday into today went down:
I had a show time for my flight at 1530. I showed a little early, was confirmed for the flight, and the easy part was done. We were told to wait until 1800 to drag our bags over to Customs. I've waited this long, what's another few hours. I read my book and watched TV mostly.
At 1800 we hauled our bags the 100m or so to the Customs building. We were briefed on what we could and could not take out of the country. No contraband for me except for some insect repellant...which I was issued...and its contraband...but I was forced to take it...exactly.
I volunteered for bag detail to pass the time quicker. This also meant that we had our bags inspected first. Now, with all the time I had, I packed and repacked my bags about 3 times. Everything had its place. Dad, you would be proud. What I thought was that the customs people would paw through my bag a bit. What I soon learned was that we had to unload every single little item out of every single one of our bags onto the tables. Mind you, I have 4 large bags, a backpack, and my weapons case. And this is what most people have. They pawed through our stuff until it was all nice and disheveled and then instructed us to throw it back in our bags as quickly as we could so we could keep the line moving. We did have over 100 people to process after all. Just amazing.
The process takes about 20-30 minutes per person, including the full body scan, and there were about 8-10 stations going at a time. We started a little after 1800 and finished about 3.5 hours later. My hands were a little raw from carrying bags out through the back door for that time. One more step in the right direction, though, right?
We waited upstairs where they had dinner for us...Pop-tarts, cereal, beef jerky, and cookies. Yum. We waiting while watching movies on a DVD player that would glitch every 10 seconds or so. I reverted back to reading my book again.
So, a little after midnight, about 9 hours after I had arrived, a nice little Airman came over to tell us that our flight was...wait for it...CANCELLED! That's right, the rumor was that the plane we were supposed to get on was not even at Bagram. In fact, it wasn't even in Afghanistan.
Were they making arrangements for us to get on another flight? - No.
When were the next flights going out? - 0600, 0730, and 1900 show-times tomorrow.
Could we all get on those flights? - only those who were Space-Available on this flight (not me)
Could we keep our bags in customs so we didn't have to go through the process again? - No
Will our customs stickers count so we don't have to unpack our bags again? - No
Can the people who were manifested for this flight go Space-A on the next one? - Ask PERSCO.
So off I went at 1AM to ask PERSCO if I could change my status from "manifested" to "Space-A" so that I could get on the next available flight with an open seat. The nice SGT said "sure, that shouldn't be a problem. Just be there for role call at 0600". Sounds like a plan, Afghanistan.
But what do I do for the next 5 hours in the middle of the night? I have more bags than I can carry in 2 trips and everyone I know is sleeping. So I stacked up my bags in the corner of the baggage lot outside of the terminal, put my earplugs in, curled up on top of them, and covered myself completely with a blanket. Between the frequent PA announcements and the tarmac being a hundred yards away or so, I think I got about an hour or two of broken sleep. And I was surprised how cold it got.
I got up at 0530 and went to the roll call to be told that I can't Space-A and I have to wait to be manifested again. I went to the Log Plans people and they told me I was manifested for the...wait for it...1900 flight. The last one. Awesome.
So the adventure continues. Maybe I'll write a book.
I had a show time for my flight at 1530. I showed a little early, was confirmed for the flight, and the easy part was done. We were told to wait until 1800 to drag our bags over to Customs. I've waited this long, what's another few hours. I read my book and watched TV mostly.
At 1800 we hauled our bags the 100m or so to the Customs building. We were briefed on what we could and could not take out of the country. No contraband for me except for some insect repellant...which I was issued...and its contraband...but I was forced to take it...exactly.
I volunteered for bag detail to pass the time quicker. This also meant that we had our bags inspected first. Now, with all the time I had, I packed and repacked my bags about 3 times. Everything had its place. Dad, you would be proud. What I thought was that the customs people would paw through my bag a bit. What I soon learned was that we had to unload every single little item out of every single one of our bags onto the tables. Mind you, I have 4 large bags, a backpack, and my weapons case. And this is what most people have. They pawed through our stuff until it was all nice and disheveled and then instructed us to throw it back in our bags as quickly as we could so we could keep the line moving. We did have over 100 people to process after all. Just amazing.
The process takes about 20-30 minutes per person, including the full body scan, and there were about 8-10 stations going at a time. We started a little after 1800 and finished about 3.5 hours later. My hands were a little raw from carrying bags out through the back door for that time. One more step in the right direction, though, right?
We waited upstairs where they had dinner for us...Pop-tarts, cereal, beef jerky, and cookies. Yum. We waiting while watching movies on a DVD player that would glitch every 10 seconds or so. I reverted back to reading my book again.
So, a little after midnight, about 9 hours after I had arrived, a nice little Airman came over to tell us that our flight was...wait for it...CANCELLED! That's right, the rumor was that the plane we were supposed to get on was not even at Bagram. In fact, it wasn't even in Afghanistan.
Were they making arrangements for us to get on another flight? - No.
When were the next flights going out? - 0600, 0730, and 1900 show-times tomorrow.
Could we all get on those flights? - only those who were Space-Available on this flight (not me)
Could we keep our bags in customs so we didn't have to go through the process again? - No
Will our customs stickers count so we don't have to unpack our bags again? - No
Can the people who were manifested for this flight go Space-A on the next one? - Ask PERSCO.
So off I went at 1AM to ask PERSCO if I could change my status from "manifested" to "Space-A" so that I could get on the next available flight with an open seat. The nice SGT said "sure, that shouldn't be a problem. Just be there for role call at 0600". Sounds like a plan, Afghanistan.
But what do I do for the next 5 hours in the middle of the night? I have more bags than I can carry in 2 trips and everyone I know is sleeping. So I stacked up my bags in the corner of the baggage lot outside of the terminal, put my earplugs in, curled up on top of them, and covered myself completely with a blanket. Between the frequent PA announcements and the tarmac being a hundred yards away or so, I think I got about an hour or two of broken sleep. And I was surprised how cold it got.
I got up at 0530 and went to the roll call to be told that I can't Space-A and I have to wait to be manifested again. I went to the Log Plans people and they told me I was manifested for the...wait for it...1900 flight. The last one. Awesome.
So the adventure continues. Maybe I'll write a book.
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