{"id":6828,"date":"2024-09-23T02:05:00","date_gmt":"2024-09-23T02:05:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/?p=6828"},"modified":"2026-10-02T01:31:57","modified_gmt":"2026-10-02T01:31:57","slug":"our-expert-soldier-siblings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/?p=6828","title":{"rendered":"OUR EXPERT SOLDIER &#038; SIBLINGS"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I&#8217;m a few days late in posting about Caleb&#8217;s latest milestone with the Army. He&#8217;s down in El Paso now for the foreseeable future and getting along well.<\/p>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This past week he earned &#8220;Expert Soldier&#8221; status after completing a physically and mentally rigorous 3 week program. Of the 250 soldiers who started only 80 finished successfully and earned the pin.<\/p>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Melissa and I and all his siblings are incredibly proud of this and all of Caleb&#8217;s accomplishments. I can&#8217;t help but notice, too, that the photos he sent show he&#8217;s no longer a boy. He&#8217;s a man now &#8211; and a tough one at that &#8211; and it&#8217;s taking my brain a while to catch up to this reality.<\/p>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Expert Soldier status may open a door for him to finally get into Ranger School &#8211; an opportunity he missed earlier this year due to a badly sprained ankle. He really wants to become a Ranger and so we&#8217;re praying that door opens for him.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/1000017917-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"532\" height=\"532\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/1000017915-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"900\" height=\"1600\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/IMG_20240920_131556-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"480\" height=\"640\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">A quick update on the 3 siblings as well:<\/p>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Hannah is absolutely loving her new career in interior design and she enjoys living in Myrtle Beach. Her coworkers and the scope of her job seem to be a perfect match for her. We couldn&#8217;t be happier for her. Melissa, Sarah, and I\u00a0 &#8211; and hopefully Grandma Trudy &#8211; will be heading out to visit her for a week in October.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/20240831_120822-1-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2252\" height=\"4000\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Samuel is back from his summer of selling books and is now starting to give some serious thought to his career. This sort of in-between time can be a little nerve-wracking, so we would appreciate your prayers as he discerns job prospects and living arrangements for his future.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/20240911_221340-1-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"3472\" height=\"2246\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Sarah is enjoying her senior year and trying to find balance between work, dance, and school. Coming up, she has her homecoming dance and then a big senior project involving planning, promoting, and pulling off a school talent show as a fundraiser.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/20240613_205542-1-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"4000\" height=\"2252\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">We &#8211; and all 4 kids &#8211; are blessed beyond measure.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I&#8217;m a few days late in posting about Caleb&#8217;s latest milestone with the Army. He&#8217;s down in El Paso now for the foreseeable future and getting along well. This past week he earned &#8220;Expert Soldier&#8221; status after completing a physically and mentally rigorous 3 week program. Of the 250 soldiers who started only 80 finished [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":6829,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6828","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6828","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6828"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6828\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6835,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6828\/revisions\/6835"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6829"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6828"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6828"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6828"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}