Come Home Day

Come Home Day...

By far the best day of any week!

It does not matter if he is home for 1/2 a day, a day, 2 days, or more, no matter what come home day is ALWAYS exciting and ALWAYS leaves my heart complete.

I told you the relationship with an airline pilot was unique, this is because every week he is my hardest goodbye and every week he is also my sweetest hello.

Hence the walkway you see when you first walk into our home. Proud of this wall, found the picture and the sign at hobby lobby and my awesome sister gave us that cute owl switch plate for christmas, this is just so us...

Nothing STINGS quite as much as watching him walk out that door or hearing his car start and then hearing it (and watching it out my window) slowly disappear down the street as he leaves for his trip. Sigh, it is the worst!

On the contrary, NOTHING feels quite as AMAZING as receiving the "just landed, on my way home to you" text message. (Side Note: The sweet "home to you" part gets me every time, knowing that he can not wait to get home to me makes my heart that much more joyful, I must be doing something right!)

AND...

Nothing feels quite as amazing as come home butterflies; when the garage door opens and I hear his car door shut I know that in the next second he will walk through our door, smile at me with his sweet 'hello baby smile' and take me into his arms leaving me breathlessly thinking "finally, all is right in my world!".

Every come home day is different. When he works mornings his arrival on come home day varies between 10am and 5pm. Obviously my favorite type of come home day (if I had to pick a favorite) would be the days he has morning arrivals back to base. This month however he is working nights therefore his ETA home is normally always past 9pm.

In the aviation world no week is 'typical' because every week his schedule changes. For example these past 3 weeks he has worked three 4 day trips with very few days spent at home in between. At one point I remember looking at the calendar and getting excited when I saw 2 full days that said "off" because I was getting so use to him only having 1 and 1/2 day breaks.

I am sure now you can imagine my EXCITEMENT this week when I noticed a 5 day stretch on the calendar with him home and only a out-and-back (meaning he flys in the morning but ends up back at home that night with me) scheduled in between.

In other words that means 7 whole nights in a row together, starting TONIGHT which is pretty much unheard of...

When things like this happen I say the aviation Gods are on our side because it is very rare we spend 4 nights together total at home in one week let alone 7 in a row. :)

A lot of people ask me how I do it, and I try not to focus on how because there are a TON of reasons that I could list which get me through all the ups and downs of this life but instead I like to answer that question by saying it is not a matter of how I do it but instead WHY I do it that matters.

Ultimately the answer to "how?"  and "why?" is LOVE....

Love is what makes every single bitter goodbye worth the pain. After all, every sad see ya soon day is followed by a happy joyful come home day that never disappoints...

SO that my friends is what keeps me going and that is "how" and "why" I do it...

Until next time...

<3, Heather

FLY HOME SAFE HANDSOME, SEE YOU SOON 

Two Plane & Simple Souls

I am not sure most really understand the life that comes along with being a pilots girlfriend. Many of you may be laughing thinking what in the world is she talking about but honestly trust me you do not get it because lets be for real I do not even understand this life I live. You see it is not something that ever once crossed my mind prior to meeting his sweet aviation loving soul. I never once boarded an airplane, sat in my seat and thought to myself hmm I wonder what life is like at home for the man sitting in the cockpit flying my airplane. It just is not something normal people think about when they fly. I did however use to wonder the obvious like how in the world did one operate this machine to fly and go up, and I also wondered if pilots got that feeling in their stomach when the airplane drops a little like I always got or were they use to it and did their tummy not drop, and of course my curious mind always wanted to know what the world looked like from a cockpit; these all seemed like normal thoughts a passenger would have right? Or did my heart secretly wonder because my future was sitting up front and because my future could answer those questions? Who knows.

Prior to dating this incredible man that comes and goes every week and keeps me on my feet and incredibly happy at my new destination I was just a girl stuck in a comfortable relationship that became routine and extremely toxic by the end. I am a firm believer that everyone who comes into your life comes into it for a reason and therefore I have no regrets in regards to the 5 years I spent with my ex nor do I regret any of the years I spent with other guys. The way I see it, people spend their time with others for weeks, months, or maybe years to live, learn and grow. In the midst of that time one finds out if they are or are not meant to be with one another. And then if you are lucky enough in middle of ordinary life you are given a fairytale and you find the person you are meant to spend forever with and suddenly everything else in your past, well it all made perfect sense...this is where my 31 year old handsome pilot comes into play . . .

This quote really does remind me of our story and today is one of our favorite quotes. In our grown-up dollhouse that we are creating as a couple I plan to start making canvas art (saving this topic for another post) and this quote is actually one of the first ones I want to make! It is just so US. You see I am not the only one in this relationship who has a past, it goes both ways for us which is why our story is so special and unique (at least to me).

At 27 and 31 years of age we are not young kids who have just started dating other of the opposite sex but instead we both have had pasts, we have both been in love before and we both have had our hearts broken by others. Because of this I truly feel that the two of us have a better idea of exactly what we want in the opposite sex and because of this I think we are better for one another then we would be without our pasts.

Our story to me is special (duh!). You always hear about the girl who falls in love with her friend but you never really imagine it will be you; it is so hollywood. With me, it was real life! I became good friends with this man who also happened to be a airline pilot during one of the hardest transitions of my life and in the midst of ending a 5 year relationship which came with a lot of heart break and ache. During this time I was hurting very badly but I was also experiencing a great deal of happiness and joy while getting to know this person. He looked at life in a different light, and everyday I was friends with him I grew more joyful and I realized I smiled a whole lot more then I ever remembered smiling in the past. He turned my tears into smiles and I remember thinking it took a real man, a man that I was suppose to be with who could make me laugh through the most painful times. It was last April when I had a deep gut feeling that this guy was something special and against most peoples opinions of the situation I went with my gut and I let my heart fall in love all over again.

Thank GOD I did because the days and months have passed and we are now living together in our own place and we are approaching our one year anniversary together as a couple. I am not only the happiest I have ever been in my entire life but I have grown as a person and a human being. This man makes me want to be a better person; because of him I wake up every morning wanting to do better in this life. He makes life easy and he gives me purpose; we are beating the odds that were against us as a couple in the beginning and I love every second of it! It has become evident to family and friends that I made the best decision of my life when I went with my gut last April and without a doubt him and I were meant for each other.

So welcome to our journey. Prepare yourself for many more mushy love stories (hey, don't blame me when he is only home half of the week you gotta make every second count and this includes sharing lots of little moments that lead to mushy stories), expect posts on yummy recipes I dig into while he is flying, and maybe if I start getting real creative I will also start on the many house projects I have pinned to make our grown up dollhouse a home. . . and lord knows what else? This whole blog thing is new to me. All I do know is that anything is fair game here...with a love as special and unique and different as ours everyday day gets better and our love story continues to grow. I never imagined I would be one to love like this or brag (I mean blog) about a love like this however I just feel like there is  way too much to say because there is ALOT that goes on behind the scenes, our life in the aviation world is one big fun, exciting, crazy, adventure and I'd love for you to tag along.

Until next time...

<3 Heather

She Always Knew She Could Fly

I have always been a story teller. A good story teller is questionable but a story teller nonetheless. Just recently my Mom gave me an old box with "Heather" written on the outside of it which she found while cleaning out the basement. To my surprise when I opened the box I realized it was filled with things she had saved over the years that belonged to me. All sorts of things were in this box. Pictures, journals, diaries, old letters and notes, cards, my college essay, you name it and it was in this box. I got a big kick out of going through these old things that belonged to me but what I enjoyed the most was reading old stories I wrote as a child. There were stories about everything, and I mean EVERYTHING. There was The Frankenstein Story staring my Grandpa, the story about a missing cookie who ran away because he(or she) whichever you wish did not want to be eaten by my older sister, and The Lost Pumpkin (written and illustrated by me in 3rd grade and even has a hard book cover) that was dedicated to my sister. I had (have) quite the imagination. As I was rereading my childhood writing and sharing some with Michael I could not help but laugh and cry at the same time. Happy tears of course. I was thinking about the past and I realized that nothing really changed about me besides the obvious, I  (kinda) grew up.

I say "kinda" because I do not consider myself a grown up and I never will. You see my Grandma always told me not to grow up. She told me that when people grew up they lost their inner child. She said that in the hustle and bustle of life and responsibility some people just had to grow up because they knew no other way. She also said that these same people did not live their life to the fullest but instead they woke up every morning and just went through the motions. At that time I was only a child myself and I remember thinking this conversation is quite silly because everyone had to grow up right? Wrong. My Grandmother knew something about my heart back then that I did not; she told me one day it would all make sense. During the same conversation we had she also told me that I had a gift inside my heart (the same gift as my Daddy) and it was something very few had. She said my heart was filled with the spirit of a child and that although she had no doubts that I myself would become an adult I would never really grow up.

As the years passed on I remember realizing that my Grandmother also had this special gift she spoke of to me. Looking back she was the biggest kid of us all. Raising two boys with my Grandfather she was also a house wife and a career women, none of which stopped her from letting her heart shine like a child, and that I admired the most about her.

I was already in college and on my way to growing up when I went to Florida during spring break to visit her and Grandpa; I remember this visit like it was yesterday. It was just the three of us for an entire week and although at the time I may not have known it this was a very special visit that I would forever cherish. One night at dinner she told me something I will never forget. "Heather" she said, "You will go extremely far in life if you continue to let the inner child inside of your heart shine"...I do not recall what I said back to her that night but I know to this day I still hold onto that special conversation we had very close to my heart. Because of that I do just as she asked, I continue to let my heart glow like a child something she did until the day she died.

I guess my Grandmother knew my heart pretty well because boy was she right. To this day what I love most about myself is that I still have this sweet inner child in me.

The idea about starting a blog has been running around in my head for awhile now but in the past it never amounted to anything; to be honest I really do not know where this is going yet. I do know one thing and that is I have a lot more to say then ever before. Maybe it is because there is a lot more going on in my life or maybe it is because I am surrounded by so much more joy then ever before but whatever the reasoning may be, who cares? All that matters is my life has taken a whole new flight and I am a better person because of it.

So,  come fly with me. Follow my story and see what I have been up to and where my dreams are leading me. Although it has been a bumpy ride with plenty of turbulence across the map I have finally reached a destination, a very happy destination may I add and I don't plan on leaving, nor do I ever plan on letting the child in my heart burn out.

Until Next Time...

<3, Heather