Deployed Whitney Point Military Mom Surprise Kids at School

Service to our country is something that runs through Megan Ballard's blood. Literally. Megan's parents, Anne and Dick, both served in the United States Army, and Megan, a Whitney Point mom of two decided to follow in her parent's military footsteps ten years ago. Megan is Security Forces and her rank is SSgt/E-5 in the United States Air Force.

Megan just wrapped up her first deployment, a six-month mission in Qatar. During those six months, she was separated from her children, five-year-old Kyilena and six-year-old Braydan Singleton both of whom live with their grandparents and attend Whitney Point Elementary.

As a way to help cope with the time away from their mom, the Ballard family made the kids a deployment wall. They put up a big world map with a star on Qatar and, a star on New York with a string attached from one location to the other so the kids would always know where their mom was. They also displayed two clocks, one to show the time in Qatar, and other to show the time in New York.

Kyilena and Braydan have faithfully been counting down the days to their mom’s return and were in for the shock of their little lives as Megan surprised them in their classroom at Whitney Point Elementary today.

The staff at Whitney Point combined Kyilena and Braydan's classrooms and the students believed that they were calling Megan in Qatar on their classroom smart screen (something they'd also done around Christmastime). What they didn't know what that Megan was in the hallway, only steps away.