Well now, where was I ? On the last episode, Slack was demonstrating the hectic schedule that we have just officially wound up. It has been quite a month and I can truly say, I'm not sad that we are about to open a new chapter in these days of our lives. Goddard High School has graduated the last rebellious, nonconformist child of this somewhat normal family and I'm sure they can't be as happy with that fact as we are. We have endured years and years of parent - teacher conferences, parties, awards assemblies, "come to Jesus meetings", and sporting events. The tears we have cried, both good and bad would water this ranch till Jesus comes back. Katie has a whole two weeks off before she starts beauty school. And believe me when I say this......she best study hard - because the older I get and the more of life I endure, the harder it's gonna be to make me beautiful! Plus....she just owes me bigtime and I plan on collecting!
We did celebrate in true Carpenter tradition for about a week off and on. Of course we had alot to celebrate. Karli turned the big 1 on Mother's Day, and Ben boarded a big military plane the next day with 180 other guys of the 920th Engineering Company heading to Wisconsin for another 4 weeks. They will officially leave for Afghanistan on June 9th and that will be that till next July. I was too tired for three parties so I just combined them all and had a birthday, deployment, graduation party. Entangled with all the festivities, we've had to haul several hundred loads of hay and oats...literally. The first cutting came off with a bang and with the slight promise of rain in the forecast, everybody was scrambling to get all the hay out of the field. We are now in a holding pattern for a short while. That dear friends will give me a chance to clean up my yard, and catch up on all my "woman's work". I am just throwing some random pictures of the past several weeks, at ya. Just try and sort through them. 
Ben and Claire. A budding war romance!
NCO's in the parade during the Yellow Ribbon Ceremony.
A tired little birthday girl not sure what she's supposed to do with that!
One last kiss goodbye.Till next time, adios.
