A soldier visits home

The past two weeks were very busy around here. Cassie graduated from her Army AIT (advanced training) and returned home for a two week visit. Those two weeks coincided with Jon's 40th birthday and Cassie's 19th birthday, and Cassie was home on recruitment efforts which kept us somewhat busy.

She returned home on a late night flight the same day she graduated from her AIT. Some of her high school friends met her at the airport with us for her arrival home. It was an emotional homecoming with lots of hugs and a few tears. Cassie and I had a lot of text exchanges during that day as she flew home.
She had to wear her military uniform on her flights, so she was patriotically thanked for her service every few minutes as she walked around the airports. At one point, I asked her via text if she was in her ACUs (camo uniform) or her Class A's, and she answered that she didn't know. She was trying to be evasive and said I would just have to wait and see. I responded with something along the lines of, "How do you not know what uniform you are wearing? You ARE wearing clothes right?" and she sarcastically responded that she was not. I replied, "Well that changes the meaning of all those strangers thanking you for your service". BAM!

Cassie had a long list of things she wanted to see and do and eat on her leave home. Mostly stuff that she was homesick for while spending the previous year in the military. She had missed a local sushi restaurant. We took a few trips to the book store and the mall. The weather was a bit hot and stormy, and I was feeling unenergetic, so we didn't get to accomplish everything we wanted.

For Jon's birthday, he wanted something simple that Sasha would enjoy, so we went to a local amusement park. We celebrated with go-karts, bumper boats, a game of laser tag, and some video games at the arcade.

For Cassie's birthday, we celebrated with a barbecue with her friends. I was running behind schedule on the party preparations and didn't start baking her birthday cake until her friends arrived, so we made an event of it and let her friends frost and decorate her cake for the party. It was amusing. They put the candles on the side of the cake instead of on top.

There were some major festivities around town as well. The city we live in celebrated its 100th birthday, so there was a parade and a town-wide rummage sale event. Cassie went to the parade in uniform to support her friend, who was crowned "Miss Stillwater", and Cassie was almost put in the parade on the spot. Cassie, her friend, Sasha, and I went rummage sale browsing for a bit that day. Later on in the evening, Cassie went with some friends to a local Hill Climb event, which included night fireworks.

There was a day where Cassie's friend came over and they had a water balloon fight with Sasha. Cassie was being silly and hid some water balloons in Sasha's shirt so Sasha could pretend she had 'boobs'. Then a little while later, Sasha ran up to Cassie and pointed and yelled, "I see what you have there!". Sasha grabbed Cassie's chest, thinking that Cassie had hidden some water balloons in her shirt, but no, it was just Cassie's own chest that Sasha grabbed. That was some funny comedy.

Finally, the sad day came where I had to drop Cassie off at the airport so that she could fly to her next duty station. She safely arrived at her destination and is currently in-processing at the reception of her new post assignment.