About Me

I am a 34-year-old Amerasian army wife currently serving time in Fredneck (oops, I mean Frederick) Maryland with my husband, Mike; my two amazing kids, Trevor and Ally; and my wonderdog, Bud. Mike is a Nurse Anesthetist in the United States Army who has been sent back to school to obtain his Ph.D in Neuroscience at the Uniformed University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, MD. We have a little less than two years left here, having just passed the halfway point this past July. We are all (even Bud) looking forward to the conclusion of this academic adventure and the reestablishment of a somewhat normal existence, which will hopefully be back in San Antonio, TX. However, as all of you out there who are familiar with the military are aware, nothing is ever really up to us, so we're not holding our breath when it comes to getting the duty station we want. It is pretty likely we will end up back there (please, knock on wood NOW), as that is where the army's Nursing Anesthesia program is based and the most likely job for Mike after school would be teaching in this program. Trevor is my first born, a beautiful and bright 7-year-old boy who currently loves Spiderman, Matchbox cars, any kind of sports (you should see him hit a golf ball or a baseball!), Ben 10 and the computer. He is also autistic, with significant speech/language delays. This hasn't slowed down his academic progress. He is quite the whiz on the computer, which has both good and bad sides - the other day, we watched him find Beavis and Butthead through Google Videos. Yikes! I am blessed by his sweet and affectionate nature every day. Most importantly, he is my reason for striving every day to think beyond myself and to focus on what matters. As is his sister, Ally, my 5-year-old daughter. Like her brother, she's inherited her father's fair hair and skin. She has also inherited his never ending need for knowledge and interest in all things scientific. I say this not just to brag, but also to warn those of you who will view my pictures about the ones of her with her dad performing surgeries on rat brains in his lab. Ewwww. This is not an interest she got from me - I majored in English/Communication. Along with her geeky side, she's become quite the athlete - she participates in soccer and gymnastics, and taught herself (I swear!) last summer to flip off the ladder into our pool and swim underwater (at the age of 4!) across it. Her favorite things are dinosaurs, bugs, and pretty much anything pink, purple, or princess-themed. Thankfully, she has shown an interest in fashion, handbags, and heels, or I'd start to wonder if there had been a baby mix up in good ol' El Paso. And then there's Bud Bentley, my faithful two-year-old chocolate lab companion. When Trevor was four, Mike and I decided we'd adopt a pet to help Trev with his fears of animals. I had also heard much talk about how some autistic children are drawn to animals after conquering these fears, so we did some research into which types of dogs tend to be good with kids like Trev. We learned that there is actually an agency that trains dogs for autistic people, just as other dogs are trained for blind people. Unfortunately, these special dogs cost around $12,000.00. That's right, $12,000.00 - just a wee bit more than we could afford on army pay. However, a breeder who provides dogs to this school lives not too far from us and was willing to sell us a puppy from one of these litters for substantially less than that price. We went to see the pups, and Trevor picked out Bud right away and even named him on the way home, calling him, "my Buddy". He was the runt of the litter - though you wouldn't know it now. Currently, he more closely resembles a 90 lb. canine tank. Anyway, it was a great investment - he has an awesome disposition - very calm and not at all hyper. Altogether, given his lack of hyperactivity, he's been extremely un-stereotypically lab-like in many ways: he's chewed maybe two or three things (Ally's pink pony was a favorite) and only piddled in the house twice. His only drawback thus far has been his routinely stinky ears - thank God for Mike and his medical experience; I'll clean almost anything but Bud's ears gross me out! Which brings us back to me: Elana, a 34-year-old college-educated (Go Irish!), caffeine-addicted, COACH bag-loving wife living in the middle of all of this chaos and mayhem. Once upon a time I was an officer in the army. After that, I worked for a few years writing ads and client marketing materials on Wall Street at Prudential Securities. Now I spend my days watching little people, doing home improvements and housework, and fighting the injustices of the Frederick County Public School system. Sound interesting? If so, feel free to check in every now and then to see what I've posted about my life as an army wife fighting legal battles with my son's school system and trying to stay both current with four-year-old interests and sane while living in Fredneck, MD.