Arkansas Airman Home for Thanksgiving Meets Baby Daughter

Reaching out for his infant daughter, the face of Tech Sgt. Ivin Bueso is overcome with emotion.

"Words cannot describe how I'm feeling right now. I'm back home," he said with baby Isabella in his arms.

Before today, Bueso had only seen his daughter on a screen.

"It's not the same as holding my daughter, kissing her, and hugging her," he said. "There are no words."

Bueso was deployed to the Middle East six weeks before Isabella was born. He saw her birth thanks to the Internet and a handy application known as Skype. But he's never held her in the five months since.

"I'm overjoyed," Bueso's wife Jessica said as she wiped away tears and shined a smile our way.

At Clinton National Airport's arrival gate, her family is finally reunited.

"I've just been imagining what it would be like to have him home," she said. "He's missed a lot with the kids. Luca has turned four and become a big brother. When they're this age they grow so fast."

Service members are usually hailed as brave for heading into a war zone, but sometimes the biggest battle is being apart.

"We get to appreciate each other more now," Bueso said. "In the military, sure we make sacrifices for duty. But your family makes those sacrifices with you. It's hard."

"His deployment has brought everything into perspective in regards to how precious family is," Jessica added. "I'm just so happy to have him home.

It's a luxury not every military wife will have, because there are others in uniform this Thanksgiving who won't be rushing into loved ones' arms.

"I think about people who their husbands aren't even coming home -- or they're coming home in caskets," Jessica said wiping away tears. "That's really heavy on my heart."

Knowing there are sons and daughters still separated from their fathers, inspires the Bueso family to never take a minute's happiness for granted and hold on tight to the precious moments yet to come.