Monday, February 24, 2014


You've seen these Around the Clock bridal showers right? Or bachelorette parties? But have you seen this? Not until now. 

This was the invite. If you'd like to throw an around the clock shower and want to use this invite, please tell me. I'll send it to you! Fa Free! I handwrote different times. Secretly, I did a little more of one or two (like mommy and eating time) based on moms needs.  



 The thing about my showers is they are always really cheap. And always really fun! Just kidding. I don't make them fun. It's the people. Secretly I try to center a theme around things that are already in season. With it being almost Valentines day at the time of the shower, I went with a purple and pink color scheme.








I searched far and wide for candy watches. These are from my childhood and pretty difficult to find. I found them at a candy store in Phoenix for really cheap. I found them here. They were $18 for 48 of them. That's a good price!



That's pretty much all! It was fun to do. Like I've said before, I can't wait until I can do this for a living and get paid to do it instead of PAYING to do it. :-) It'll be a different world. It's good practice for now, coming up with decos/favors on a budget!



Wednesday, February 19, 2014

 
This super happened to me today. I spent about an hour going through all the feeds of Facebook life to find this foto. And then I edited it. Because if you are new to reading my life, I spell things differently than others. Rood is one of those words. So don't be rood about my spelling.

Not only did this happen, it happened as I was pulling up to the gate at Fort Huachuca. Not only did it happen as I was pulling up to the gate at Fort Huachuca, it happened as I was blasting Missed Calls by Mac Miller. Edited of course. Boo. I had to turn it down at the very best part.

Guess what else? I got picked for a random car inspection!!! Yay! Wait, what? No. They totally segregated me and had me pull into the lane that was next to the long line of other cars so easily going through the gate after their ID check. Smooth sailing for them. I hope they enjoyed gawking at my beautiful red hair because I was totally trying to hide my face.

If we think about the details of what happened in the picture above, and if they were counting cars, then technically that rood person in front of me would have been picked for the selection instead of me. And the funny thing is I was totally going to be the person that sped up and didn't let them in. Because 2 stoplights back from where the line is for the gate, you can see which lanes are open. So I'm a freak and get in the right lane WAY back so as not to avoid the awkwardness that happens when people don't. pay. attention and they're stuck begging for mercy at the very last freakin second.

So I was just stopped. By myself. They checked my license, my military ID, my insurance, my registration and checked for drugs and other paraphernalia. They also patted me down. Just kidding. About the pat down anyway.

I'm exhausted from all of that hard work. I made it up to myself and listened to this song on the Eminem CD I own. This song actually made me cry. I couldn't find a good version to share. So I guess you'll be left wondering. Sorry about your life. If I can find it, I'll share it on the Facebook of life. In the meantime, don't be a lame driver please? Me and your fellow drivers will appreciate it so much!

Saturday, February 1, 2014

EFMP stands for "Exceptional Family Member Program". It's a program designed to assist family members of soldiers who may have special needs. It is a mandatory enrollment program. Not optional. The thing is, special needs is not really an adequate word. It covers some of the following diagnoses:
  • Asthma
  • Autism
  • ADHD/ADD
  • Diabetes
  • Thyroid problems
  • Cancer
  • diagnoses requiring equipment (Oxygen, wheelchair, orthotics, hearing aids, etc...)
  • Premie babies
  • Vision issues
  • And more!
There are many conditions not mentioned here. I am NOT an EFMP specialist. These are just a few of the things I found while researching this post. I was trying to get cleared at Fort Huachuca, AZ specifically.

"The Army designed the EFMP to be a comprehensive, coordinated, multi-agency program that provides community support, housing, medical, educational, and personnel services to military Families with an EFM." I got a lot of information here.

When PCSing overseas each member of the family has to be cleared. I believe each process is different because that's how the Army rolls. I'll tell you how mine went so you can get the general idea.

So after David went to the levy brief he was given a lot of forms and a lot of information. I'm going to give you a numbered list because that's what I wish someone would have done for me. These are the steps I would take (in order of importance)

1) Make sure everyone has had a physical in the last 12 months.
2) If you have already had those appointments and they were NOT done at an Army-approved medical center, request copies from the place they were completed. Have them sent to the EFMP coordinator at your local installation (that sounds fancy the way I said it huh?).
3) Complete the following forms:
  1. The one that sticks out to me is this one: DA FORM 5888. (Family Member Deployment Screening Sheet) This is the one that gave us the most grief (surprising).
  2. DA FORM 2792 (EFMP Medical Summary). It's long.
  3. DA FORM 7246 (EFMP Screening Questionnaire).
Seriously. Do them all of them at the same time. Easier. Then when you go into talk to someone, you'll be armed and ready.

I found this picture on the Army website. This is NOT how we did it.



MPD = Military personnel Division

MTF = Military Treatment Facility

EFMP Practitioner at Fort Huachuca = Mrs. Register. Her phone number is 520-533-9035. The frustrating part is there is a sucky phone system at Fort Huachuca. Apparently they are a little behind the times because I have yet to come in contact with an answering machine system.
Let me tell you about this. It sucks. Lezbehonest.

So after he went to the levy brief, we attempted to schedule a physical for me since I was the only one out of the 4 of us (me and the kids) who hadn't had one recently. Because we were recently enrolled in TRICARE, the insurance didn't start until February. This was back in January. So when I called the appointment line at Fort Huachuca ((520)533-9200 / 1-877-856-2821 ), I was told I couldn't. I just couldn't. I wasn't in the system, blah blah. So David had to call the Patient Advocate line (520-533-2313) just to get an appointment. Apparently It was a big deal. Whatever. 

I had my appointment, also had to have blood drawn before any paperwork could be submitted. You see how this is a little bit of an annoyance here?

Not the EFMP program itself, it acutally is a really great program. But figuring it out can be really difficult confusing.

The first thing David did to get informed was to go to a levy brief.

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