Welcome Home Daddy

The plane has landed, the countdown clock is complete, and Daddy is safe at HOME in our arms again. Reunited as a family, the moment will forever be etched in my mind. We've waited so long for this day. And now it is finally here. Words cannot describe the outpouring of emotions we feel. After 15 months Daddy is finally home!


The outcome...priceless. What happened before hand, not so much how I pictured it. As I look back at it now I'm starting to see the humor in it. Hopefully I'll find it even more humorous as time goes by because in the moment it was kind of frustrating. Let me just fill you in on some of the details. Darryls return date has always been somewhat of a mystery to us, so I figured we wouldn't find out the official time he would arrive until right before the big event. This did seem to be the case as we were finding out the day before his arrival, that the plane would be landing at 6am on June 10th. Hmmm I'm not so much of a morning person so I figured setting the alarm clock would be easy enough. Evidently it wasn't, luckily I woke up on my own at 5:30am, not usually what happens. I knew I wouldn't have time to take a shower and get the girls ready so I figured I'd better get a move on. I must have been still half asleep and frustrated at my shower dilema because as I was running out of my bedroom to wake the girls I slammed my little toe into the wall. I thought it would be just a stubbed toe but the pain ended up not going away and I couldn't put an ounce of weight on it. So here I am no shower, broken toe, trying to get the girls ready, sounds like a fun morning.


We drive up to the gym where Darryl's Brigade will be reunited w/ their families, and there was not a parking space to be had. So I just decided to park across the street. Let me just say that was the longest hop of my life (but definitely worth it). We didn't make it to see the live video footage of Darryl's plane landing and the soldiers getting off the plane Top Gun style, but we did make it in time to get a seat and wait for about an hour for him to be bused from McChord to Fort Lewis. Cora was getting so impatient. As they lined up in formation the band played a few songs, a few words were said and they were released to their families. I decided to stay put in one place w/ my toe the way it was and let him find us. Meanwhile Cora was sobbing holding onto my leg because so many other families had already found their soldiers. It seemed like an eternity before Darryl found us. My dear friend who took these wonderful pictures finally saw him and waved him over to us.
As soon as Cora saw him she took off in a full sprint wrapped her arms around his neck and I can't remember when she finally let go. All my worries melted away at this point..my toe, no shower, missing the plane touchdown, he was in our arms, finally here, nothing else mattered and that's how it should be. I can't thank my friend enough for being there with me, finding Darryl amongst the 315 other soldiers who all looked very similar, and taking such precious photos of a special time for our family.
That night I got on my knees and prayed with many thanks to Him for bringing us together again. My heart is so full.