On the Lighter Side

One more resolution that I find equally important.

I am going to stop buying groceries from Wal-mart and start going to United. The amount of sanity I will gain from this switch I think will be well worth the money I could potentially lose on groceries.

I will just have to re-train my car to drive to United. It is in auto pilot for Wal-mart.

Happy New Year!

A Dash Between Two Dates

You may wonder what my title means...I'll get to that.

Well happy last day of the year to everyone! I am actually really glad to be entering a new year. I always love the first of the year, because that means spring is around the corner, and that is my favorite season. I love the symbolism of new growth and new things that the season brings. And while we just barely started winter, those new things are just around the corner, and will be here before we all know it.

I am doing good. I still have my moments, and lots of them, but I am finding myself becoming familiar with him gone. Which honestly sucks, but like I said before, and like we all know, life isn't always fair. I can't stay in a self-pity frame of mind, because it does no one any good, and does a lot of damage to me.

A lot of people have been concerned about my self-esteem. I appreciate that, and thank you all who have had concerns for whatever reason. But believe me, I know that this is not about me. I am a good person, who deserves much more than I've gotten, and I have to separate myself from the issues that HE has. Because they are HIS problems, not mine. My kids and I have just happen to be the ones who are affected by HIS selfishness and problems. And yes, once again that sucks, but we now have a very good opportunity to change the course of our lives and focus on what God wants us to see and be a part of. And I firmly believe that God does have a plan for us.

I do not want my blog to become a venting place for a bitter and scorned ex-wife. As mad and as hurt as I may be at times, I still care for Nathan and want him so desperately to come to know Christ and the way I can be a part of that is by showing him the love that Christ has shown me. And guys, seriously I have learned so well in the last 2 weeks that love is what this world is all about. Corny as that may sound, it's true. It is what makes the world go round. God has asked us to love him and love others. That seems easy enough, but we all know that sometimes it's very hard to love others. Especially when they seem unlovable.

This morning at church the lesson was on Moses and the struggle in the dessert. The passage of scriptures that were read were from Deuteronomy and talked about how we should always remember our struggle, and how God got us through those tough times. This life is so short in the bigger picture, and ultimately all our lives are is a "dash between two dates" like on a headstone. Life seems rather cold when thought of that way, but it's true. Our time here is so little and it is of no use to treat others with hatred, when sometimes we may think it is justified.

I can not control the actions of others. But I am in control of my own thoughts and actions. My resolution this year is to love God and love others to the best of my ability. I don't think I can go wrong with that. I look at 2007 with lots of hope. I see it as a year that will have it's challenges for me, but God is with me and will get me through those difficult times.

I wish everyone a happy new year filled with lots of blessings!

Broken...but fixable

I have really wondered how and when to post this. I considered giving up blogging all together, but I don't want to. I enjoy blogging, and it's done a lot for me. It's kind of like journaling for me. And I shouldn't have to give it up, but I find myself in a very difficult position.

There are things in life that happen that are not fair, that we can not explain and just don't make any sense. This is where I find my life right now. My life has taken a shocking turn for what I would say is the worse, but I also know that God is in control, so although I am experiencing the deepest pain I've ever known...I will be okay.

A week ago Nathan made the decision that he did not want to be a part of this family anymore. He has come to the conclusion that he does not believe in God, and that we would be better off if he left. He has told some people that this was mutual, and this is no way shape or form is mutual. He is abandoning us. He has promised complete financial security, and he wants to see the kids, but he has told me that he is not in love with me any more and does not want to be here.

Now as you can imagine I have been in complete and total shock. The holidays have been very difficult. I have so many mixed emotions ranging from complete depression, anger, sadness, and denial. The reality for me is that this is happening. This has happened. He is gone.

You probably all have lots of questions, and while I do have lots of answers, I still don't understand. Many of the answers that I do have don't make sense. Is he cheating on me? I really don't think so. Did you see this coming? Not in the slightest. Does he feel guilty? Doesn't seem to. Do the kids know? Yes, and they (mostly Madi) seem to be doing okay. In fact, she knows he's gone and living somewhere else, and doesn't even seem to care. That shows you how disconnected he's been for sometime.

I have a great support system. I feel the prayers of everyone around me working. My family has helped me so much. One of them, if not more comes over everyday. Do I have hope that he will get his personal issues (he's got a lot of them!) worked out and return? No, I just can't have false hope. I have to see this for what it is right now, and move one and take care of myself and my precious children. I have to take care of myself, and the baby I'm carrying.

This is so hard on so many levels and I have so many details to work out. I wouldn't wish this experience on anyone. And as I close I want to say, although this is the by far the worst pain of my life, I know that God is working. There have literally been minutes that I haven't felt that I can't get through. And God gets me through. He puts it on someone's heart to call and give a voice of cheer and encouragment. He speaks to my heart and calms me. He helps me sleep at night. And he uses my children to be beems of hope for me, through their sweet, sweet spirits. I so worry about them. I worry about what this will do to them, and how they will be affected. I worry about this baby. But through all my worry, I hear God say, "Do not worry." And I put it aside. I have so many questions, but thankfully my wonderul Lord has all the answers.

I have complete faith that God will use this situation to help others, and He will bless me and my children beyond our dreams. He's never let me down before, and I know that he will carry us through. I continue to ask for prayers. And on somedays, it's hard for me to want to pray for Nathan. But he needs lots of prayers too. Regardless of how this works out in the end for us, he is a hurting soul who needs a lot of healing.

Thanks to you all who have helped in the way you have. I am so blessed to have the friends and family I have.

I love you all...

Prayer

Well this may be a two parter. It may take me all day to write. I am not ready to give details for many reasons, but my family needs prayers. I have come to learn yet again in my life the wonderful power of prayer. The huge power of prayer. To some it may seems small and insignificant, but to me and many others it is the most powerful tool in the universe given by God. Sometimes we are not sure of what to pray for. And sometimes we think we know what prayers need to be answered and exactly at what moment. But I think we all at some point in our lives find out that God actually knows what already needs to be done, and in what fashion and in what time frame. And doesn't His timing and answer end up being better than what we initially think it should be? Yes!!! Yes, every time!!!

I am so appreciative of the outpooring of love and compassion from everyone. People who really don't even know me, or at least know me very well. I think we all understand hurt and pain though even though it may be in a different form for each of us, and we have a common bond in Christ, and that is where this love comes from.

I am so in the spirit right now, that I am seeing love in the strangest places. Love that is genuine, from a checker at Wal-mart!!! I could see Christ in her eyes. And guys I promise I have not gone off the deep end.

I do ask that for those of you reading this, if you know me if you don't, if you knew me long ago or are a friend of mine now, I ask for this: please pray for me and my family. Please tell everyone you know to pray for me and my family. Satan cringes at this, and the prayers of a righteous man are POWERFUL and most importantly EFFECTIVE. I honestly care about every one of you, and I am so overcome by other's love for me and Christ's unending, full of grace love for me and my family, that I just have to tell you all that. I love you!!! And I thank you. I hope to be able to return the favor someday.

I wish you all a very happy Christmas, and I hope you don't take what you have for granted. Enjoy every moment, and thank God for every moment. We all have so much to be thankful for!

The realization that we have only 10 days before Christmas has now set in. I have so much to do!!! I am going to try to make a dent tomorrow and get a lot done. It's very nice to have children at the age ours are, b/c they are not into wanting really expensive gifts. Madi has asked for a Barbie, a prince, a snow globe, and a bell. That's easy!! We can do that. It's when they start asking for I-Pod's and Gaming systems that I'm like, "are you kidding me?" And every year it gets worse and worse with kids...so I hear anyways. And I pray that we can instill something in our kids that Christmas will not just be about the biggest and best gift they can get.

Madi and I are going to try to go see "Charlotte's Web" this weekend. If not one afternoon, then we'll go one evening next week. She is fun to take to the movies. Even though you get up like 5 times for potty breaks, it's still a lot of fun. She gets so excited about going to the movies.

I called my OBGYN on monday and got some medicine to help with my stomach. They gave me what I thought they would, but I was at the point where I didn't care anymore. I had to have some relief. Fortunately, Tuesday and Wednesday were good days and I didn't need it. I took some last night, b/c I started feeling sick. I was laying on the couch watching Seinfeld and celebrating Festivus and the next thing I know I was out. I didn't wake up all night. It's certainly a good sleeping pill. But if it keeps me feeling okay, I don't care.

Everything else is good. We closed our first two loans with our new company this week. Things are working out well. They put an add in the paper to hire a full time processor, so that I can just work when I need to. I just can't do it all myself and work part time. And I'm not doing it full time...no way. So hopefully we'll have someone in there soon.

That's about it. I hope you all have a good weekend!!!

My new piano...it's actually not new. It's about 30 years old. My aunt gave it to me. Her parents bought it for her for graduation. She doesn't have room for it anymore, so we hope to put it to use with Madi. She's very musical.
All done...minus the Christmas tree skirt that I have yet to locate.
Madi could have posed for a thousand pics. She is such a camera ham.

I love Christmas lights!!! I could stare at them all day!

We had a good day. I've managed to keep down all meals! At church they talked about the birth of Jesus in Madi's class. She told us all about it. By the end it sounded more like a "Dateline Murder Mystery Special." She was getting a little confused and thought the wisemen were in on trying to kill Jesus too. It was really cute.

I love the holidays!!!

Finally...it's done!

Well the tree is up. The Christmas decor is out for display. I love Christmas, it's my favorite holiday, but when you're not feeling so hot, it's not so easy. I've had a rough week pregnancy wise. I've lost my lunch 3 different times. So all the moving around isn't helpful when trying not to throw up. I'm 13 1/2 weeks pregnant. That ticker up there is a little off. They moved my due date to June 16th. Not that is actually matters. I think the statistic is like only 4% of babies are actually born on their due dates. But I'll take what I can get to make that ticker tick a little faster. 192 days just left just does not sound very encouraging to me! I am ready to start showing. I am a little bit, but I'm still in that stage where people are like, "is she fat, or is she pregnant?" Come on, you know we've all said it when we've seen someone we know, who may or may not have gained a little weight...or been pregnant. I can't wait until this one is born though, I so want to get my body back and I mean back as in I want to lose a lot of weight. I'm only 28...I should be HOT! I don't want to be a mom who when faced with two different options choses to let herself go as opposed to getting into shape. It's kind of like chosing to drive a mini-van. I just don't think I could do it. I may be stubborn, but I don't want to drive a mini-van. I know they have so much room inside them, and they probably get a lot better gas mileage, but no thank you. And I apologize if you drive a mini-van and I offended you. It's just my opinion. I happen to know several women that drive them and they are wonderful people. In fact a very good friend of mine called me one day, and said (with a very serious tone) that she needed to tell me something. She paused and said, "well we bought something." They had just bought a house, so I was sure what it was. She literally busts out with, "well we broke down and bought a mini-van." She was acting so serious, I thought she was going to tell me she was dying or something.

Anyways, I don't know how I got off on that tangent. That was so random. That was all to say, "Merry Christmas" and I'll post some pics later!

Well I have been pretty wordless lately. I haven't really known what to write about, and sometimes I wonder if people even care. You know what I mean??? Surely some of you other bloggers out there, have felt that way before. Oh well, I do it more for myself and the fun of it, than anything else.

I have left Coldwell Banker for the most part. I still go back every once in a while. We still have two loans that have to close. As I mentioned before about things going wrong when you don't want them to, here is a prime example. The buyer lives in California. I sent all the final docs to the title company and they overnighted them. FedEx delivered them and left them on his front porch. Well someone stole them, we think. They are no where to be found. So we have to re-send everything. I just love things like that. And so of course this happening prolongs my stay yet a little bit longer.

I got my hair cut and highlighted yesterday. I love it!!! I feel like a new woman. It was long overdue!!!

I have been so thrilled to cut back on work. I just feel free. We made the decision to put the kids in at Greenlawn as well as Sunset until we get all of our ducks in a row. It's slowly and surely starting to fall in place. But I'm still working so much less than I was, and getting to spend more time with the kids. Kyle kind of had a rough day at Greenlawn today. He wouldn't take a nap, which is so not like him, and he just wasn't real happy. Hopefully it was just a bad first day for him. He did great at Sunset on Tuesday. And Madi has a field trip tomorrow. They are going to the library and then to Mr. Gatti's. Groups of "little people" (pre-k kids, not midgets...I thought I'd better clarify) in public are so funny to me. They are such little charachters, and especially in groups.

I STILL do not have my tree up. It has been sitting in it's box by the front door for two weeks now. I just have no motivation. I am one of those people that it needs to get done in the morning. That includes any sort of cleaning, decorating, shopping...anything. If it doesn't get done before 8p.m. it's not getting done. I am just so exhausted. And Nathan decorating a tree isn't something I'd like to see. It would be a little scary. And I'm kind of paticular. We do have our Christmas lights up. They were actually up before Thanksgiving. But that's only b/c we have someone do it for us. I don't trust anyone in this family up on the roof, myself included...pregnant or not. That's just an unnecessary trip to the E.R. AND I still need to take down my Halloween stuff. It's still sitting on the shelves in the living room. I'm not working on Friday or the weekend, so that is my goal. Nevermind the fact that it's been my goal for 2 weeks now. IT WILL GET DONE!

Well that's about it for now. I hope you all have a great rest of the week!!