Welcome to Our New Guest Bloggers

As you may know, we're adding guest bloggers each quarter at SpouseBUZZ. These spouses will guest blog on the weekends during their assigned quarter. Our first set of "weekend warriors" started in July and they have been fantastic! They were a great addition to the SpouseBUZZ roster. So great, in fact, that we've asked them to stay on. A very special thanks to seasoned-air-force-spouse, Heidi, Heather and Mollie. Ladies, you ROCK!

Now it's time to introduce you to our Q4 team. We're thrilled to have the following ladies join us. 

Damsel:

I am a thirty-something former high school science teacher turned freelance writer. I’m also an Army wife, married for ten years to my Knight in Shining Armor. He joined the Army just a few years ago, somewhat later in life than most service members. Our whole family is fascinated by this crazy-wonderful roller-coaster ride, and we can’t imagine life any other way. Our seven-year-old son, Jet, loves to read and be The Best Big Brother Ever to our two-year-old daughter, Songbird. My favorite hobbies are reading, usually on my beloved Kindle, and trying new recipes. We are currently stationed in Italy, and, in between chasing a toddler, folding laundry, helping with homework and (perhaps most importantly) slurping coffee, I write about our adventures at my personal blog, Damsel and Family.

Shari is the wife of a career Air Force man and mama to a beautiful teen daughter. Though she describes home as "where the Air Force sends us", she remains devoted to her southern roots.

After spending twenty years in the corporate world, both in the legal/financial fields as well as more recently in online media specializing in women's interests, Shari's professional life took an unexpected turn when an injury paralyzed her left leg. As a direct result of her injury, Shari was diagnosed with Complex Regional Pain Syndrome.

Through her darkest days, Shari has found her faith renewed and strengthened. Not content to merely accept such a diagnosis and determined that something positive would come from the negative, Shari launched Rain into Rainbows. Rain into Rainbows serves both as an outlet for Shari's thoughts and emotions regarding her life-changing injury and chronic illness, as well as a resource for other women with similar experiences. Her hope is that by sharing her story with others, she might begin to turn the page into the next chapter of her life as well.

Kris, writing as The New Normal, married her Soldier ten years ago, before the Army became part of their lives. After six years of marriage and feeling the strong call to serve, her husband decided to join the National Guard, throwing them into a whole new world! When asked his reasons for joining at the old age of 28, he simply stated, "How could I tell my children that during the war I sat back and let other people fight for my freedom? I wanted to do my part...for them." He is currently serving his first deployment.

In addition to proudly supporting her husband while he serves, Kris is a first grade teacher and is currently working on a Master's Degree in Educational Psychology. On the homefront, she stays busy raising their two amazing kids, ages seven and five, and taking care of the family zoo - one neurotic dog, two cranky cats, a blue fish and three friendly hermit crabs that were the result of her husband's shopping excursion at the beach during R&R. Between working, taming the zoo, and herding the cats...I mean kids, she networks on the Internet with other MilSpouses to stay in touch with others who are living a similar crazy life. With her husband's unit hours away and no other military families nearby, these online connections have helped her to realize she's not alone during this deployment and has found a wonderful and supportive community. She has grown to love being a MilSpouse and couldn't be prouder of her the service of her husband and her family!

Currently, you can find Kris documenting the family's experiences dealing with their first deployment on her personal blog, The New "Normal".

Now would be a great time to thank all of our SpouseBUZZ bloggers and contributors. They volunteer their time to entertain, engage, inform and empower milspouses each and every day. Thanks to all of you for all you do on behalf of the milspouse community.

Thanks to everyone who responded to our request for guest bloggers. If you responded and haven't been contacted yet, we're still working our way through all of the entries. We picked Q3 and Q4 bloggers, but have yet to pick Q1 and Q2, so we'll be in touch with some of you in the coming weeks.