Mish Mash of thoughts...

Well I just realized that it has been so very long since I have posted, and I'm sorry for that. There has been a lot going on over here. The biggest is us just trying to hang on by our fingernail tips to passing and graduating. This rotation Will is on right now could make us or break us. The instructor is notorious for being a real hard.....you know what, and has had numerous complaints lodged against him this year, but being a tenured professor it seems that no one can touch him, and the students just have to "deal with it" as we were told. Will is doing so much right now. He takes the bus so he can get there at 6am (he isn't even supposed to be there till 8:30am) and he has me pick him up at 6:30 pm, and then he is constantly doing homework till around 11:30 at night. He has never had this much homework on a rotation before. We are constantly praying for him to pass. We would hate to loose his good job, and such because of one guy. So we are HIGHLY stressed out with that.

On other accounts, I have constantly found myself thinking this week about how much I have turned into my mother. Not that its a bad thing, but you know how when you were little and your mom would punish you, or say something to you that you didn't like, you would think to yourself, or at least I did, I'm never going to do that to my kids. Well this week, I have said a myriad of phrases I knew I hated when I was a child. Such as "Don't make me turn this car around" or Don't make me come back there..." or my favorite apparently this week is "so help me...." After I would say those phrases, I would catch myself thinking about how holy cow Ive turned into an adult. Yikes!!

We also had to have a huge discussion today in fact with the girls as we were grocery shopping. I was talking about what made each of them special and unique. They were asking me what made them special, and I was telling them. All of a sudden Sabrina asked where my real parents were at. I said "You know that Grandma and Grandpa are in Utah." She looked at me, and in all seriousness said "No mom, your "real" parents." I then figured out she was talking about wanting to know about my birth parents. But I have to admit, I hated hearing that Ugly phrase every time someone would say it to me when I was younger and growing up, and even when my kids asked the question, and being completely innocent, it still stirred up hateful and ugly emotions. I get this defensive attitude right away, and think to myself...are you nuts, or just plain stupid, I have real parents idiot. But I quickly turned that into a teaching moment, and tried to push those hateful and defensive feelings away. I NEVER let my girls see how much I hated those words. I kept the mood high, and explained to them that I have real parents and that Grandma and Grandpa are mommy's real parents. I explained that mommy just has a "birth" mother. And the easy way to remember what she is called is that she was the one who gave birth to mommy, but to be a "real" parent as the girls put it was to be there every night and day and to love me, and care for me, and feed me, and buy me things, just like I do for them. I asked them if I was their real mom, and both chimed in saying yes. I then asked them who mommy's real parents were and they both chimed in "grandma and grandpa". I was satisfied with it, and we moved onto something else, but to still feel those defensive feelings really shocked me that after years of growing up I hadn't been able to get over the feelings like that. I gess when someone thinks that my parents aren't my real parents, especially after all they have done for me, and continue to do, it just makes me infuriated. I guess that will never quite go away. I wasn't expecting to have to have that discussion with my kids, and have it be such a hard discussion to deal with. I thought the "sex" discussion would be hard, but this was just as hard I think. But we got through it, and they totally understood, and I think we can all move on.

Anyway, we also put our foster dog on an airplane today so he could go to his forever home. I hope they enjoy him as much as we enjoyed him. He was a sweet dog. Good Luck Emmett.

I then started a job this week as a cashier at the local grocery store. Some easy work to get us by this last semester so we can stay on top of our bills. So Ive been training for that, and Ive been training to do the phone work in the evenings after everyone has gone to bed.

I have also started school, and I am WAY excited for my class. I am taking theater makeup design. And I am so excited we get to learn professional makeup tips, and I get to use it all for Halloween. We also get to learn how to do prosthetic pieces to totally change the face. Isaac will be helping me as my model, and we are going to turn him into a tiger with prosthetics and all. SO I will post pics as the semester goes on.

Well I think I'm all caught up for now. Now all I need to do is download all my photos and post them too. Man I feel like I'm falling behind.

Our New Home in AZ

Well everyone, I hope you all had a great time ringing in the NEW YEAR! I know we did. All three kids made it to Midnight. Just barely though. Then they rang their pots and pans, and then collapsed into their beds. It was a great evening spending time with them watching movies and having popcorn and playing games.

We have also come to some agreements with a gal in AZ for rental of her home. If we really like it, after two years may even buy it from her. It was built in 2004. It has 4 bedrooms and 2 baths. It has an ionic filtration system in the house, so that's good for Isaac's asthma. The entire house is the 12 inch ceramic tiles on the floor, except for in the bedrooms and that is light beige colored Berber. So even better for cleaning, and allergy sufferers. It has a water softener, and filtration system in the house. It also has a stereo system wired throughout the entire house. Outside it has two big patios. One on one side of the fence that doesn't have the pool, and the other side that does have the pool. They are wired with water misters and ceiling fans (it gets super hot outside) over each patio. Then there is a salt water pool (for those of you who don't know much about this apparently the salt water is better for you than chlorine, and is easier on the surrounding plants, and the hair doesn't turn green). And there is an attached hot tub. All of which is surrounded by an internal fence with a combo lock on the gate, so the kids are safe and can't get to the water without supervision. Then there are already Lemon trees, pink grapefruit trees, and Navel orange trees already planted, and should put on fruit next year. Plus we have permission to plant some Date Palms, and a garden and an avocado bush. I'm really excited for each kid to have their own room, and to be able to live in such a nice house. Please when any of you are on your way to California, or want to come down and warm up during the winters, please stop by. You will always be welcome. We are so excited to be starting this new chapter in our lives. We just have to make it through the next 15 weeks, and we will be on our way to our new start of the new road we will be going down.