Santillan Adventures!!: God really loves US!

So, we've been getting a lot of good news lately. The kind of good news that makes me hysterically sob with happiness. The kind that gives me uncontrollable heart palpitations of excitement. The kind that causes us to praise God and realize once again, how much He really loves us. I can hardly sleep at night from being to excited.

Good news #1:

This darling girl (who just ate a lemon apparently) is coming to visit us for 10 days in January!!! Oh my goodness. This was completely all God's doing. It was all meant to be! Let me start from the beginning.

As you probably know, we have been working to get our lovely Jack Russell, Ariel here. We had everything all set up for Ariel to get here. We hadn't bought the plane tickets yet, when Dustin found out about one piece of paperwork that he had overlooked. Apparently, he needed to inform the Tokyo airport of Ariel's arrival at least 40 days prior to her getting there. So we were super bummed out obviously. Dustin probably more so than me because he promised me that Ariel would be here by Christmas. He felt really bad about it and like he failed. I, on the other hand, felt strangely (Celexa) optimistic about the situation and told Dustin that it would be OK. I knew that we would still get her here soon.

The next day Dustin came home for lunch with a fantastical idea. He was still feeling pretty crappy and had been thinking about Ariel all day. His marvelous idea was for my darling sister, Brittany to fly to Arizona to pick up Ariel and then fly with her here.

See, the original plan involved Ariel flying by herself from Phoenix to Tokyo, then I would fly to Tokyo and pick her up and bring her home. The more we looked into this idea though, the more complicated it became. I would be landing in a totally different terminal than Ariel. And her terminal would be so far away that I would have to take a 30 minute bus ride there and back and try to make it back on my plane in time because I wasn't going to spend the night there. We also had no idea how long going through customs would take. Talk about stressful. No amount of pills could keep me from freaking out had I done this.

But, if Brittany took Ariel, they'd be together the whole time and she wouldn't have to go looking for her. Plus, it would cost the same amount for them to fly together. AND, it would only cost about $100 more to get Brittany from New York to Arizona.

I called Brittany as soon as Dustin told me his plan. Since we're paying for everything and it would totally be helping us out, Brittany, of course, was all in. And her boss said she could even take 2 weeks off!

So, we didn't get Ariel here for Christmas but now we get Ariel AND my sister! Hooray! I'm sooooo excited. She will be our first visitor here! We can have many adventures, even better than the ones we used to have!

Like this adventure that I like to call, "Very Pretty Girls Get Drunk off Their Asses and Still Manage to Look Beautiful While "Step-brother", Miguel, Takes a Picture". I think we're 14 and 19 here. Oooh, rambunctious youth.

I still like her even though she's taller than me and has bigger boobs.

I'm just so excited to see this lovely shinning face again! Except she doesn't exactly look like this anymore. Her head is a LOT bigger now.

On to Good News #2:

Remember when I told you all how I was beyond excited that our good friend Matt was getting stationed here in 2011?? Well, double that excitement by about 2,000, because now the Zimmerlys are getting stationed here as well!

Do you remember them?? They're the ones with the pug named Pugsy who is Ariel's BFF.

Beth Zimmerly is also the one that made our first wedding cake! It was delicious and had boob cupcakes on it!

But here's how we found out they were coming. Beth sent me a facebook message about 3 weeks ago. In the subject she wrote, "We can't visit you guys in March". I was like, "oh shit. Why?????" because they had been planning to come see us since before we even moved. They'd been saving up their money hardcore and everything. That's why they weren't able to make it to our wedding. But then I opened the message and it said, "Because we will be moving there in August!!!". I screamed with excitement and then ran into our bedroom where Dustin was still sleeping. I jumped on him and started blabbing loudly. He was extremely confused and probably a little startled as well.

I was finally able to spit the great news out to him, and even though he was still half asleep, he was able to show how happy and excited he was. That's when I started bawling. Geez, I must have looked like a close family member had just died or something. But I was just so overwhelmed with joy that I just couldn't contain it. God really really loves us.

We got exactly what we had been wishing for since we got here. We wanted our friends here more than anything and it's so amazing to me that now it's happening. The Zimms' "report no later than" date is August 20th, which means they'll be here a few days before that at least. And that ALSO means that they'll be here for my birthday (the 19th)!! Best birthday present ever!

It's going to be so beautiful, us being all together again. It'll be almost like old times. Beth and I get to be cooking buddies again! Ariel and Pugz will be reunited! We'll have food competitions and wonderful parties once again! It's going to be so amazing.

Since the Zimms will be here from 2010-2014, and Matt will be here from 2011-2014, we may have to extend our time here. Actually, we're really thinking that we will now. Beth and Matt were the people I cried over the most when we left Idaho. That last day at the lab was torture. Ugh. We don't want to go through that awfulness again. If we extend for 2 more years, we could leave the same year as them. Even though they would leave 9 and 4 months before us which will still suck but not as much, I think. And who knows? Maybe we'll get stationed with them again!

I cannot wait for Sammee to visit us here!

I just love Beth. She's so much fun to be around.

And I'm clearly adoring her in this picture.

I love how they're our oldest friends but look younger than any of us. I'm pretty sure they're actually only 16 years old.

Once upon a time, I worked at a magical place called Mrs Field's Cookies, where I make a giant cookie cake for Beth on her birthday.

OK. I have no idea what what we're looking at here. But I know this wasn't planned. Except for Matt's face. He's always and forever ready for any camera anywhere. That's Kati on the far left there. She's in Korea right now where Matt will soon join her.

I do indeed miss this face.

Oh, Mountain Home PMEL. I really hope Pete (middle) comes to visit real soon.

Going away party. Before all the crying started.

You can tell they're best friends because they both have blue shirts on and they both have fucked up faces. Pardon my french but come on. Look at those faces! What the hell is going on??