Cup of coffee. Quiet morning.

Leave has begun!

I cannot even begin to articulate how wonderful it has been to stay up late, laze around, and wake up in the mornings next to him. And it seems that, for the time being, the stress, anxiety.. the heavy weight of deployment and work that has been weighing down upon us both has been lifted. Granted, it's only temporary, but this is all worth it.

As I've mentioned, we have a few special days/nights planned. Tonight, we're going to see Mirah! This weekend, we're going to Fredericksburg - an older, German Texas town with alot of history, B&Bs, breweries and German restaurants. On Sunday, we're going to The Melting Pot for the whole 4-course dining experience. Tuesday, I'm taking the rest of my GED exams (I aced the first two, by the by), and we're seeing mewithoutYou that night. After Tuesday, we're probably just doing a few days in Austin. Some hiking, maybe. Aside from that, we'll just be stuck at the hip. I'm appreciating this time for what it really is - our last quality time off together before the deployment.

Sean hates surprises, which is unfortunate because I love to surprise him. Tool is playing in Cedar Park on the 22nd, and Tool happens to be his favorite band. The tickets we looked at when we had originally found out we're way beyond our price range. He was disappointed. He'd even said something akin to 'I feel like we need to do this.' I gave him enough time to accept that we couldn't go, and even almost forget about it. Then I watched him open his laptop one morning to find the tickets I'd found on Craigslist. Needless to say, I've made my husband very, very happy. And we're going to see Tool!

In other news, we are now in season 5 of LOST. And I am rereading the entire Harry Potter series. And one of my best friends from my adolescence has moved to Houston, and I am truly looking forward to giving her a giant hug and spending an entire day catching up over coffee.