Dora the Explorer

So all of our kids have loved watching Dora the Explorer. I have to say none of them have loved watching it as much as Abriana.  She will not sit and watch anything as diligently as she does Dora.  

She already sings part of the song.  It is only the D-D-D-D-Dora part. It is funny how she gets the biggest grin when you mention Dora.

Here she is zoned out watching Dora.

Again very enthralled watching Dora.

Let it grow, let it grow, let it grow

So we have tried to garden for the past couple of years and have had little or no success.  This year we decided that we were going to garden with another family in hopes that our gardening skills along with theirs will hopefully yield us a fairly good crop.

So now the reason for my post.  The kids have been wanting to garden for a while and we have let them help here and there but we haven't really had much for them to do.  Well they decided that they were going to go out and spread some beans in the driveway.  The driveway has tons of sand and of  course is being driven on all the time.

Well somehow our children have managed to plant beans in the driveway.  Here is their first sprout.

Doesn't it look great.  So now what do I do with it?  Do I leave it and hope it doesn't get run over? (which is more than likly going to happen since it is in the middle of everything) Do I try and move it to a better location?  If I move it, how do I go about that. 

I find it very funny that with no effort at all they have managed to get a bean plant.  Me and Chris try as hard as we can to grow a garden and we get almost nothing.  Guess our kids have a green thumb.

So today Chris had his medical exam and fitness test.  Well his exam came back as all is fine except for the TB shot he got and he will have to go back in on Friday so that they can check the injection site.  

He also passed the fitness test.  We were pretty confident that he would.  So now we are waiting until he goes in for the oral interview which is June 11th.  Once he gets the "thumbs up" as far as if he is going to academy, then we will be planning a farewell party and all are invited.

Wish us luck.

Phase 4

So I started thinking as I was posting this, "I wonder how many different border patrol pictures I could find for all the post I am making?"

So the reason for this post was that on Wednesday the 13th (I believe) the Department of Homeland Security called and wanted to talk to Chris. 

Well they called so that they could schedule his fitness test and medical exam.  We were pretty shocked because we thought that he would have more time to prepare.  From the information that they give you, it sounded as though he would have the fitness test 6 weeks from the oral interview which isn't until June 11th.  Well that is not the case and he goes in this Wednesday to take the fitness test and to have the medical exam done.  

We are pretty confident that he will pass the fitness test but they did send a sheet that said as of January 1, 2009 those that do not pass the fitness test will be called back if they wish 30 days from the first time it was taken and asked if they want to retake the test without having to apply for the job again.  This is good just incase he doesn't pass since at home it is hard to know if you are doing the sit-ups and push-ups to their standards. 

So once he passes the fitness test and medical exam, then he will go to the oral interview and there they will go over the entire background information packet that he had to fill out and have in by the 11th of this month. If they feel he is qualified to continue on then from our understanding they will tell him that day if he is going to academy or not.  

Now  because this process is moving faster than we thought it would, Chris is thinking that if he passes everything that he will be called to go to academy either at the end of June or begining of July. If that is the case then I will have 4-5 months from then before I will be leaving with the kids to go down to meet him. Also he is apparently picking his top 3 choices of where he would like to go at the oral interview. 

So that is an update as far as what is going on with this job.  I will update once he goes to the fitness test and medical exam and we find out how he did.

Phase 3

So Chris got his letter today telling when he had to go to Fort Snelling for this oral interview.  We are half way there.  If he passes the oral interview then he is pretty sure he will get called to go to academy.  If he gets called for academy then he will be leaving in either September or October.  Once he leaves he will have 55 days of training and then he has a spanish class he has to take which from my understanding is about a month long.  Once he finishes all of that then we will being coming down with all of our stuff.  

If he get to the academy then we will be packing up everything while he is in academy. I will then have to try driving a HUGE u-haul down there and I still have to figure out how we are getting both vehicles down there since we can only hook one vehicle up to the u-haul.

Wish us luck that he passes the oral interview and fitness test.