Papi's Boys

I know, I know. It has been a long time since we posted. Life gets busy. The boys have been growing a little day by day. Each days brings a new first and reveals a little bit about their futures. Jacob is athletic and Joaquin is quite the free thinker. I love them both so much!
We recently bought the boys an indoor gym. Spent a lot more than I thought we would. But, it's hard not to when you know how much they are going to like it. So, we set it up in the garage and lately the weather has been perfect for the garage. So, now I don't have to worry about getting them out to the park as often. We also treated our lawn, so we feel more comfortable about letting them play in the grass. And to spend more time with them, I hired a lawn service to cut our monster lawn twice a month. It is worth it knowing that I don't have to spend 3 hours mowing the grass as Latrice tries to keep the boys busy. Also, the boys really want to go outside when they see me through the window cutting the grass in the rider mower. They scream and kick and cry and look at me with tear filled eyes through the windows as I go in circles for 3 hours mowing the grass. It makes me want to stop, but I can't. So, I hired a lawn service and we spend those 3 hours doing something together as a family.
Every weekend we make an effort to get out of the house and do something with the boys. We go to breakfast and then off to the park or some other activity. The pictures are actually of the 2 weekend events we did this weekend. Yesterday, we took them to Emerald Isle to a kids fair. It was a really good time. The weather was perfect and the event was free. They set up a lot of bouncy houses and stuff for the kids. It was also at a park with swings, slides, etc. It worked out great. Today we took them to the park. Spent some time on the gym but they were more interested in running around in the large grass field. So, off they went. They just run and look back to see who is chasing them. It's one of their favorite games- run away from papi and mommy.
I recently changed jobs. I am still in the same unit, but I took the billet of a Major. No, I have not been promoted yet (still waiting for my number), but the Major that was in the job is getting deployed to Afghanistan in 2 weeks. So, the Commanding Officer asked me to take the job. I am the senior Captain and he trusts that I can get it done. He said he wasn't worried about the rank since I had 18 years of service in the Corps. I agree.
There is still no decision on whether I will be deployed next year. My name was submitted to go, but the final decision has not been made. I expect that this week the decision will be made and I will know. I am excited to go. I was nominated to go as the Operations Officer for the MALS. It is a Major's billet and I anticipate that I will be promoted by the time it is my time to go.
We are really looking forward to the birth of our 3rd boy. We never thought that we would be the parents of 3 boys. This house is going to stink! But, we are excited. So, we finally picked a name. Latrice had a huge part in it. She needed to call the baby something every time he moved, so she calls him Sebbi. Sebbi is short for Sebastian. We like it. We are still debating over a middle name. We don't know what it is yet, but I would like to honor his and Latrice's Korean heritage and give him a Korean middle name.
Latrice is doing well with the pregnancy. Her sickness has been mild. She is actually doing a lot of cooking and she is taking care of the boys well. We adjusted really well to the absence of her mother. We now only hire help twice a week for 3 to 4 hours max. We are able to put the boys down with the use of 1 parent now instead of 2. Yes, we still have to get up in the middle of night to take care of them, but it is a 1 person job instead of 2 since they are now in the same room. I stay home on the weekends while Latrice goes out and does the shopping etc. I have also been able to sneak out to the golf course on the weekends during the boys nap times. I have been out enough now that my golf game is improving. Yes, I am really happy about that. I missed golf.
That is all for now. We hope everyone is doing well.

~Javier