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I haven't had a chance to go on any off base trips lately, so I thought I'd give a mini tour of the base.  I'll start out with my living quarters, building B-10.

Yep, it looks like a prison but as you'll see in later videos, it is unquestionably better than living in trailers with no bathrooms

This is what the dorm complex looks like.  Pretty much everyone who is here for 6 months or longer gets to live in them.  The enlisted ranks usually have to share a room, RHIP I guess.

It's about a ten minute walk from my dorm to the main part of the base, called the Coalition Compound (CC).  Along the way there is a ton of construction going on. 

Getting in to the CC, you start seeing rows and rows of trailers and missile shelters.  You also see "Cadillacs", which are the bathrooms.  People that live in the trailers have to walk to a separate building to shower or use the bathroom.  That would be awful for me, considering I sleep during the day and it's so bright outside, there's no way I could fall back asleep if I had to go outside.

 

 

Another video of the trailers

Walking toward the main meeting area of the CC.

Center of the CC

There are two food courts on base.  This is the one in CC and there's another one next to my dorm.  I can't believe I see people buying Subway when you can make your own sandwiches in the chow hall for free.  However, last night I broke down and bought a personal pan pizza from Pizza Hut.  After 10 weeks of zero fast food, my digestive system immediately regretted it.

 

                                  Well, that's a brief peek at my home for the next 10 months.  Compared to the rat's nest I lived in over in Afghanistan, this place is like a five star resort.  If I could just have my three girls with me, life would be great.

Meema's Camera

Meema gave me some pictures off her camera from her day with the girls last Friday.  The girls love to play in Meema and Grandad's backyard.  Allison always puts rocks in the dogs' water bowl but she is thoughtful enough to give them little cups of water from the her pool to make up for it.

 Allison gave Oprah water and Jessica gave Scrub water.  Jessica used to called them the momma and the baby dog.

 One of Meema's plants has been watered to death.

 Jessica is showing off a bug she found.

Pool Party

Apparently, Summer begins in early Spring in California.  Especially when you live right next to a pool and when your Grandpa has a heated pool!  People are always shocked at how much Jess and Alli love the water.  They didn't care that the water was freezing and their lips started turning purple, they would swim all day if it were up to them.  Allison thinks she's invincible in her floatie, she will walk right into the water and do it over and over again coughing, gagging and laughing the whole time.  Jessica doesn't swallow quite as much pool water as her little sister but I usually have to drag her kicking and screaming when its time to go.  Allison stands by our front door now pleading, "Poooool!"

Here's a video of Allison impatiently waiting her turn to go in the baby floating.  It is only about 82 degress outside and I swear that the pool was barley above 50, that's why I look so uncomfortable.  You can hear Allison saying, "In there", because she wants in there (where sissy is).

In There

And here is a video of Allison in the baby floating:

Allison Floating

We found a neat park in Paradise called Bille Park last week.  It has a couple playgrounds and some hiking trails.  Jessica loves dandelions, they are her latest passion, she found this lone dandelion in Bille Park and she took a very long time to blow/pick the seeds off because she knew there weren't any more around.

Here is a video of us hiking on a trail in the park:

Trail Hiking

 This daddy book is the most read, most kissed, book in our apartment:
Daddy Book

We took a field trip to the Chico Creek Nature Center last week.  The girls met John the 64 year old turtle and Jessica got to pet a king snake.  She begged to hold the snake but the ladies were smart enough not to let her; she has been talking about that king snake all week.

 Here is a funny video of Allison throwing a fit because she wants bubbles, watch how easily she is distracted by the cute baby in the mirror:
Mirror Baby

Here's another video of Allison, she is evolving daily.  I just wish she was actually cleaning, but you can hear her say, "cleaning".
Cleaning

We drove down to see Grandpa last weekend.  He took us to the zoo and the girls got to ride on the carousel a few times.

The girls enjoyed the zoo a lot but Grandpa's heated pool and hot tub was the highlight of their visit.  They played in the pool for 2 hours.  Allison called the hot tub "bubbles".  That night Allison had a dream about swimming at Grandpa's pool, she sat up clapping her hands saying, "Grandpa, bubbles!"

 Here are a couple videos in the hot tub:
Bubbles 1

Bubbles 2

I made the girls get out and eat a snack midway through the pool fun.

Here are some pictures that Meema took with her phone.  She usually watches the girls one day a week so I can clean our apartment, run errands, have a pleasant skype with Joe, and take some me time.  I love my days off.  This is my brother's new puppy, Porter.

 This is why I want to get Jessica a smart tablet for her 3rd birthday.  She is playing with my iPhone, she knows how to get around on it but she has deleted some of my apps and I don't know which ones.

Allison likes to play dress up at Meema's house.  Here she is in full play mode while Jessica is napping on the couch.
Allison's puppies

Wildflower Festival

Well, it was another fun-filled weekend in California.  I signed up for a 10K trail run in Oroville and got a cool T-shirt for doing it.  Meema and Grandad watched the girls for me while I ran and they greeted me at the finish line.  I was pretty sore because I am used to flat terrain while I run.  The girls helped me eat the free snacks that they provide when you finish.  Jessica took it a step further, she decided she didn't like the blueberry bagel and spat it out onto the tray with the fresh ones. The people volunteering acted like they didn't see it while Meema quickly scooped it off.  I don't know if that was the most embarrassed Jessica has made me but it was up there.  

It was sure fun being greeted at the finish line by my adorable little babies.

Jessica and Allison got to ride ponies again. The annual Wildflower Festival in Oroville had pony rides for three dollars.  Jessica got to ride three different horses (or, "my little ponies").  Allison rode the same pony twice.

I think Jessica is more afraid of the fake carousel horses than the real thing.

Allsion kept tugging on the horses mane and Jessica was obsessed with the fact that the saddle was "broken".

Here are some videos of the pony rides:

pony ride 1

pony ride 2

pony ride 3

pony ride 4

pony ride 5

pony ride 6

pony ride 7

Allison was pretty exhausted after my trail run, she managed to sleep through our celebration meal at Denny's.

Grandpa came up to Chico to spend the day with us on Monday.  The girls decided that they wanted to finger paint with Grandpa.

Here are some videos of them finger painting:

finger painting with grandpa

finger painting with grandpa 2

After the finger paints the girls always need to go directly into the bathtub.  Jessica enjoyed washing her ponies while Grandpa gave both the girls bubble beards.

Here's a video:

bubble beards

Grandpa took the girls shopping for summer clothes while he was here.  He found them some really cute outfits despite their best efforts to run amok.  The girls like to run in opposite directions when we get in public.  Allison headed strait for the escalator and Jessica found this adorable training bra with monkeys on it (she put it on herself, obviously), I thought it was hilarious so I snapped a quick picture.

Here are some other videos I took throughout the week:

Allison will stare at her daddy book for a long time and she hugs it and kisses the pictures of daddy, this is a daily thing. She will point to the spot I keep the book and say "daddy!"  Joe got mixed up with the time difference the other day and missed one of our scheduled skypes, it wouldn't have been a big deal but Allison was not happy about it.  It was a meltdown and I told Joe that he can never do that again because Allison was so upset that she had me in tears.

daddy book 1

daddy book 2

Allison playing

Lost Videos

Welcome to the land of the lost videos.  I am posting this blog because there were some cute videos in some of the more recent blogs that wouldn't load and I now have a way to share them.  These first two videos are from the "Flying Kites" blog.  The hissing geese is funny because Allison throws her hands up over her head when the geese hiss as if she just got caught red handed in a bank robbery.

bucket head

hissing geese

These next videos are from the "Turtle Bay" blog.  Joe if you don't already have these pictures that the girls are painting for you in this first video then you should be getting them really soon.

finger painting for daddy

Jessica and Allison's First Pony Ride

skype with daddy

skype with daddy two

weed thief

splashing Meema

These videos are from our Easter Party at Meema and Grandad's.

bounce house one

bounce house two

bounce house three

coloring eggs

Thanks for showing Allison your juggling skills Grandpa, I can't juggle and that makes her angry with me at least ten times a day.
grandpa juggling

hamper

hunting eggs two

hunting eggs three

In this "push a button" video, Allison falls.  Don't worry, it looks harsh but she didn't even cry.
push a button

red rabbit climbing park

slide

another slide

slide two

watering scrub

More Easter Stuff

Here's our Easter bunny picture.  Allison was not amiable to posing with the bunny by herself.

Jessica wasn't afraid but she was curious and there was a few moments of detailed inspection.

There were a ton of people at Bidwell Park for the annual Easter Egg hunt.  I took this video of the line to get into the hunt.  Keep in mind that this line is just for children 5 years old and younger!

long line

The girls got to hunt Easter eggs three times this year.  First at Meema and Grandad's, then the apartments threw an Easter party and finally at Bidwell Park the day before Easter.  They didn't actually hunt eggs on Easter though.  We tried to go to a big egg hunt on Easter but the girls weren't feeling well so I figured it wasn't necessary to hang around for another egg hunt at that point (plus it was raining on Easter this year).

Here are some videos to the egg hunt at Bidwell Park:

Allison hunting eggs

Jessica Hunting eggs

Jessica being an egg hog

egg hunting

Towards the end of the egg hunt Jessica's basket started overflowing and Allison stopped collecting eggs and instead started re-hiding them.  All the eggs were empty, you turned them in as you were leaving to collect your prize.

They had other activities at the Bidwell Park Easter Party besides the egg hunt, one of them was bowling, here's a video:

Jessica bowling

Easter was a pretty snuggly day for the girls.  Here they are snuggling with Grandad.  Well, Jessica is snuggling and Allison is forcing him to suck on her paci (if you don't open you'll regret it, believe me).

Here's a video of the girls snuggling with Grandad

snuggling with Grandad

Here's another video of us Skyping with Joe on Easter morning.

skying with daddy

Here are a couple pictures of the girls digging in the dirt, one of their favorite activites.

We were at the park the other day and this little boy wouldn't go down the slide because it was dirty.  Jessica and Allison pushed passed the little guy and cleaned it right off for him, then they headed over to a nearby mud puddle to stomp in it. (I was a little jealous of that other kids mom, I wouldn't mind it if one of my girls decided that they didn't feel like getting dirty every once in a while.)

As I mentioned before, there was an Easter party at our apartments.  Here is a picture of the girls enjoying the party.

Jessica got to swing at a pinata for the first time (I don't see a career as a baseball player in her future), here's a video:

pinata

After the pinata fun, Jessica entertained herself with a worm and a stick.
crazy worm

Jessica and Allison got some really special Easter bags in the mail from Lady and Paw Paw too.  Here are some videos of them opening them.

Easter present from Lady and Paw Paw

Easter present from Lady and Paw Paw part two

Thank You Lady and Paw Paw

The girls on Easter morning.

Here's a cute video of Jessica and Allison being sisters:

combing hair

This video is sad.  Allison never gets enough of skyping with daddy.  She sometimes will cry and point to the computer saying "daddy!"  In this video she was desperate.

wanting daddy