Paradise for another 3 years!

Chief and I have been praying about where we want to go next, and we really thought Germany was going to be our next duty station.  His branch had already said that it could happen but something just didn't feel completely right. During the holidays, Chief and I put a list together on what we wanted to do next that consisted of 5 different situations.

    1)      Germany USAREUR Staff or 21st TSC

    2)      Hawaii for 3 more years, would prefer to move into the USARPAC G4 job in Aug 2012 if current   CW5 does PCS.

   3)    1st SFG or 10th SFG 

4)      DC metro area. IE: Corps of Engineers, Belvoir, Pentagon, or Caisson Platoon

5)      Oregon, Washington State, or Colorado AC/RC

We reviewed it together and decided to sleep on it before he sent it out.  That next morning, we both told each other that we feel Hawaii for 3 more years is what felt right and to move it to #1.  It still amazes me to this day on how our hearts and brains work so in tuned with each others.  We both prayed about it and got our answer.  He sent the email off, and he got a response very quickly stating that Hawaii should work for 3 more years!  Choosing Hawaii does have some risks of another deployment, but it is a risk we are willing to take right now.  He emailed the other CW5 that is in the job that he would like to move to, and he emailed back stating that he did not plan on staying longer!  It looks like it will be a perfect transition in to that other job that does NOT deploy!  We will have to move on to Ft Shafter that is in the middle of the island, but we are ok with that.  The move would take place in Jun 2012, so the kids could finish the school year on Schofield Barracks, and they would start on Ft Shafter in August.  The school on Shafter is ranked much higher, so it is a good move for them.  Ft Shafter also has brand new housing that just opened 1 year ago, so we would move in to that.  We love our house on Schofield and hate to leave it, but the commute would not be fun for Chief at all.  It would be nothing like his commute in the DC area, but why commute if he doesn't have to.

So, I guess we are staying in Paradise until 2015!!!  We really do love it here, and the extra money that we receive is nice too.  This keeps the kids in a more stable environment, just a plane ride away from our families, beautiful weather ALL of the time, and us together as a family.  The nice thing is that the Army will pay to fly Mookie here once a year too for free since she is in college.....one more reason  to add to the list on why we should stay here!  We are hoping our best friends, The Jones Family blog , that are stationed in Georgia will decide to PCS here too, so we can all be together again.  I despise not being able to see them much, and we miss them constantly.  We are very lucky to have amazing friends here too that are trying to stay here for another 3 years too, but I wish we could all hang out together.  We already lost another set of BFF's, The McKinley Family blog this past summer when they moved to Ft Bragg, and we wish they would come back to Hawaii as well.  We really get used to losing friends to PCSing, but it is never fun and does not get any easier over the years.