Are We There Yet?

Just for the sake of it, I should keep track of how many times I hear this phrase uttered tomorrow. I anticipate it'll be repeated many times between 4 kids and a very pregnant woman trapped in a car for 9 hours. That's right. Me and the sis are taking her pack of T's to visit our grandparents. Well, when we planned this trip it was supposed to be a fun, very short flight to Wisconsin. But remember this? Yeah... we got a really great price on the tickets. Before they went bankrupt. So now we're making it a road trip.

Her husband is smart enough to stay home this time. He'll be enjoying a few days of very rare peace and quiet. Me, on the other hand, well I just hope I survive to tell the tales.

See ya Tuesday. If I make it.....

It's a Girl !!!!!!!

That's right... finally another girl! Woo Hoo!! Can I get an AMEN?!
Now don't get me wrong. This family loves our boys. But ever since my sister announced she was expecting another little T...... I've been praying for a girl. We all have.

Of course my sister wanted another daughter to round out her 3 boys and 1 girl. And Tatum has been dreaming and wishing for a little sister ever since Teagan turned out to be a boy.

But I'm also very excited for my own daughter. She'll have a girl cousin very close in age. I know one can never say never. But I'm 99% sure Mia will be an only child. So I'm beyond thrilled that this newest little one will be more like a sister to her than a cousin.

Carla's due August 19. Her newest little T's name won't be revealed until then. Because she wanted to keep the gender a secret but the temptation got to be too much and she caved. So she's trying to keep this one thing a surprise.

I just hope we can get to the hospital in time when this baby girl decides she's ready to make her grand entrance into the world. I'm not sure I want a repeat of this. LOL!

Pressing On

Now that I have this new, beautiful blog I need to make myself get back to posting, right? Well, I'm trying. But life sometimes gets in the way.

I've been very productive the last several days. Which is so unlike me. LOL! I don't know what happened but I've had this energy and drive I haven't felt for awhile.

Well, I know what's happened. I'm coming out of my funk.

My yard looks great because of it. Flowers blooming beautifully, deck and furniture cleaned up, lawn nicely manicured. I love it when the hard work is done and I can enjoy it.

I'm so in love with my yard that I invited a friend over on Tuesday for a cook out. The weather was perfect. Sunny and not too hot. We actually had to put sweatshirts on when the sun went down.

We made a fire in the fire pit and invited my awesome neighbors over for s'mores. My friend's daughter played with the neighbor's kids and they taught her how to catch lightning bugs.

As I sat in my beautiful yard, on a gorgeous sunny day, in my comfy chair, drinking my ice cold beer, listening to the kids laugh and play,
I looked at my friend and said "Life is good".

And it is again.

I just hope I can stay here in my happy, zen place this time. Right now I'm remembering how to live in the moment. And enjoy those moments. Instead of wishing the days away. Dreaming of what someday will be.

But it's hard. This wait is rough. I don't have to explain that to those of you living it, too. I also don't think I have to explain what it can do to alter your emotional well being.

The last couple of months have been especially difficult for me. I fell into a really dark place. Now that I'm getting past it and have some perspective, I can see some of the things that triggered it.

But the biggest influence was that I somehow let myself start to lose hope. For the first time since I signed that contract to start this adoption, I lost faith that the journey would end with my daughter.

I started to feel uneasy. I got scared. I started to doubt that I'd ever be a mother. And those thoughts knocked me on my ass. It wasn't pretty.

During this, I've had some wake up calls about who I can count on and who I can not. It was a hard lesson and not without hurt and disappointment.

But for those who stood in my corner the last month or so (and you know who you are), I thank you. Had it not been for that I may have ended up in a straight jacket by now.

The waiting and the not knowing is a struggle. And I'll be so glad when it's over. For the record, those who say "once she's in your arms you'll forget all about the wait"... they're wrong. I'll never forget this. Or how it has broken me more than once along the way.

But it's taught me a lot of lessons about myself, about strength, about patience. And I think it'll make me love and appreciate my daughter in a way even I didn't think was possible.

I hate the sad, depressed, hopeless feelings that have bulldozed me a few times already these last 2 years. I'm not the type of person who draws the blinds and pulls the covers over my head when things get rough. Normally.

But this process isn't like anything I've ever dealt with before and it's made me respond in ways I'm not used to. I think the biggest reason for that is the lack of control. It can make you crazy.

While I'm on the subject of this excruciating wait, why is it that I've hit the 2 year mark and so many people are trying to offer me alternate solutions? I know they're only trying to help, but I'm getting tired of the questions about why I'm not trying to "just get pregnant" or switching countries or adopting domestically.

I thought I answered all of those questions in the beginning of this process. But somehow the 2 year mark has caused them to resurface. Just frustrating.

Anyway....

Now I'm pressing on. Again. Hoping for my happy ending. Finding my faith. And trying hard to avoid that bulldozer as I continue to wait for my daughter.

Because she is coming. I believe it.

My 2 Year LID-versary Present

So how do you like it? After 2 years I was ready for something different. I love it. It's so...... well, me.

Danielle is fabulous! She did an amazing job. She listened to everything I wanted and made my vision a reality. And she's a sweetheart to boot. I highly recommend her. Thanks Danielle! Did I tell you how much I love it? LOL!

So today marks 2 years that my dossier has been sitting on a shelf in China. 2 years of dreaming, hoping, wishing, praying. 2 years of loving a little girl that I've never even met.

I've had some highs and lows these past 2 years. Unfortunately, the lows get pretty low. Which is why I had to take a little bloggy break. But I'm pulling myself out of that deep, dark, desperate place and moving forward. Yet again.

This beautiful new place is just the pick me up I needed to inspire me to get back to blogging. Have I said how much I love it yet? :)

Just Another Day At The Office

Okay... I'm just kidding. Not by any stretch of the imagination was this just an ordinary Monday. We've all agreed that this will go down in our department's most awesome police pursuit hall of fame. Check out the pictures. It was like something you'd see in the movies.

The bad guy attempted to abduct an ex-girlfriend in the wee hours of the morning. As she was standing talking to police, he drove back by and fired several shots at all of them. No one was hit.
Later he robbed a store, fought with the owner who tried to stop him and almost backed over him as he drove away.

Shortly thereafter, plainclothes detectives spotted him in his vehicle. He pulled to the curb, opened his car door and fired upon them. They took cover behind their vehicle and were not hit but he killed their radiator. He got away at that point.

A couple hours later, he was spotted by a plainclothes lieutenant driving an unmarked car. The bad guy immediately realized he was the police. As they passed each other in traffic, the bad guy looked straight into the eyes of the Lt, made a gun sign with his hand and pretended to shoot the Lt. He then turned around and started chasing him.

No... I mean the bad guy started chasing. You heard that right. It was a backwards pursuit. The bad guy was chasing the good guy. This is a first for me. I've never seen anything like that before.

Because his earlier actions certainly indicated he was trying to kill a cop, the Lt fled from him until back up could get in the area. It was an incredibly scary 30 seconds listening to that on the radio. Once marked cruisers started flooding the area, the bad guy turned around and the chase was on for the next hour or so.

He drove so recklessly that officers lost him on more than one occasion. But so many people were involved in this crazy chase that he was always picked right back up again. During one of the moments that we'd lost him, he bailed out of his vehicle and carjacked another. Then the chase was on again.

Somehow only by the grace of God, no one was seriously injured during this thing. In spite of several cruiser accidents including one flipped on it's top, several civilian accidents including a car forced into a school bus by the bad guy, shots fired at police during the chase and him driving through a school zone as kids were loading up on their school buses at the end of the day.

We didn't expect a good outcome for this. All in all, we got very very lucky.

The pathetic thing is that he was out on bond because of an incident he was expected to go to trial on this week.

An incident in which he shot a guy and........

wait for it.................

wait for it.................


Fled from police in a high speed pursuit. Surprised? That says something about our criminal justice system, now doesn't it?