HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO MOM!

I just want to say Happy Birthday to my mom! Thanks mom for everything you do!

This Unconventional Life

Holly started a new blog and closed her old one. Here is the link to "This Unconventional Life".

Enjoy

HATS OFF!

Hats Off by Henry Holcomb Bennett

Hats Off!
Along the street there comes
A blare of bugles, a ruffle of drums,
A flash of color beneath the sky:
Hats off!
The colors before us fly....
But more than the flag is passing by....
Days of plenty and years of peace;
March of a strong land's swift increase;
Equal justice, right, and law,
Stately honor and reverend awe;
Sign of a nation, great and strong
To ward her people from foreign wrong:
Pride and glory and honor,-all
Live in the colors to stand or fall.
Hats off!
Along the street there comes
A blare of bugles, a ruffle of drums;
And loyal hearts are beating high:
Hats off!
THE FLAG IS PASSING BY!

In honor of the men that gave their lives like men 68 years ago on the beaches of Normandy.........

Randomness at its best......

Here is a link to the best blog in the world, that's right, The Pocket Knife Press!
Click here to see the blog that you are looking at right now, again!
I thought i would share this just caues I could, and cause it's me, and me is weird!

Yours,
Matt 

D-Day- June 6, 1944

"You are about to embark upon the great crusade toward which we have striven these many months. The eyes of the world are upon you...I have full confidence in your courage, devotion to duty and skill in battle."

~ General Dwight D. Eisenhower



Tomorrow at 2:00 am is the 68th anniversary of D-Day, the first of the many hard, bloody, sweaty, unforgettable days to take France back from the Nazi army.

The battle started a few months before for the American, British and Canadian soldiers, in England, with brutally realistic training in preparation for Operation Overlord. Some of the training included: crawling under 200 yards of barbed wire that was draped with pig innards, running across an open beach while being shot at with a machine gun (yes a real machine gun with real ammo), swimming 100 yards in full uniform with a helmet and rifle, jumping out of a plane at 13,000 feet, climbing 100 foot tall nets, running two miles in 15 minutes, uphill in full uniform with helmet, gun, ammo, grenades, a 100 lbs. backpack and water that they were not allowed to drink.



June 5, 1944 was a day of prayer, briefing, loading up, and leaving.

At 2:00 am the next day, the 2,000 ships off the coast of France opened fire on the shore, hoping to clear the shore of mines, barbed wire, beach hedge-hogs, and hopefully, the Atlantic Wall, a wall of underground tunnels, cement bunkers, howitzers, pill boxes, machine gun outposts, barbed wire, land mines, cement walls, trenches, and other deadly obstacles. The wall stretched along the whole coast of France.



The night before, the paratroopers landed behind the German lines and made their way across the country side. Many of them died from either Anti-Aircraft Gun Flack, machine gun fire or some of them drowned in water that was not more than six inches deep. Some drifted miles away from their landing zone. Others were hung up in trees, on roofs and one on a church steeple.



The infantry loaded into LCVPs (Landing Craft Vehicle/Personal) and headed to shore around 4:00 am. One infantry man said this: "It sounded, from the landing boats, that the ships were blowing the wall apart and we didn't have much to do." But when the infantry hit the beach, they found out differently. The cannons on the ships had only destroyed about 1/10 of the wall.



Coming ashore, the troops were instantly under machine gun fire, if they even made it to the shore. Lots of the LCVPs were blown up before they were able to get to shore. The LCVPs had to stay out from shore about 200 feet so they wouldn't get caught on the sand. Once to their position, they would drop the ramp in the landing craft which protected the men inside from machine gun fire. When the ramp was down, the infantry had to wade through 4 feet deep, mine infested waters, to the shore. That was if they didn't get shot or pulled under the water by their equipment. Pushing ashore, the American, British and Canadian troops had to cross about 200 yards of beach that was riddled with mines, blown-up trucks and their dead comrades.



I could go on forever about the history behind D-Day, but I won't. The Allies blew through the German line and freed France from the Nazi powers. Was it worth it? Loosing almost 75% of the air born units, a quarter of the infantry and many vehicles? Was France really worth it? Yes, it was! The men that died on D-Day died for freedom. If we had not beat the Germans, the world might have been under Nazi oppression, we might have lost our religious freedom, our right to free speech, our right to bear arms, our families, our country. The men of D-Day died to protect those things, the things that the founding fathers fought so hard to give to our country. The soldiers in World War Two fought to preserve.

In our nation today, our military men and women are fighting in the Middle East to give to other countries these same rights that we take for granted. We need to thank those men that died for our freedoms.

We need to thank God for His provision of willing men and women who give up their lives for our rights. We must praise the Creator, because He is the One that gives freedom. He is the One that grants rights. It's not the government, it's not us, it's not even the soldiers, it's God and ONLY God!