It's a bird! It's a plane! It's a...

Gopher?

I have a story for you my friends, quiet an interesting one if I do say so myself. Before I actually start with the story I feel as though I need to give you a bit of background. First of all: it's summer. And I'm a teacher. Need I say more?

No, really I've been blessed with what, so far at least, has been a nice, relaxing summer. Sure I'm gathering paperwork for the adoption, attending a few trainings, and writing an autobiography, but really? In the scheme of things? This summer has been sooooooooo nice. And relaxing.

Most of this relaxing has to do with the fact that I have time (ahhh, time!) to read. I love to read. In fact, when I was little I would check out stacks of books at a time. And read them within a week. But, back to this summer. Last year I started taking my books outside to read. I make my cup of coffee, get my granola bar, set up my Adirondack chair under my tree, place my footstool nearby and plop down with whatever book I happen to be reading. (The fact that I'm under a tree is important! Take note.)

Now, if you know me you will realize K and I live out in the country. Surrounded by fields. Way far away from any type of forested area. And also? We don't have much in the way of trees on our property. So I take advantage of the one we have in our backyard.

Earlier this week I was reading as described above and hear a "thud" behind me. Naturally I turn around (thinking is was a cat of course) and what do I see? A gopher running away from me towards the garden! Do you know the "thud" means? The gopher had to have been SITTING IN THE TREE the whole time! Yikes! I don't know about you my friends, but that was a bit spooky. Moral of my story? Check all trees for gophers. Because you know what? They can climb.

A Turn of Events

In my head I've been keeping this blog current; writing about important life decisions, recording funny anecdotes, and just keeping up with life in general. But, as is evidenced by the date of my last post, this logging of events is decisively all in my head! Although there is a lot I could write about, I'll try to keep this post based on one topic: children. Or, more specifically, decisions we have made in regards to children.

As you know, K and I have been trying to expand our family for several years now. Last year at this time we moved to Dr. Delightful who prescribed a more "natural" way to conceive. We also had agreed that IUI and IVF procedures were not for us for both personal feelings and money issues. Quite frankly, at the end of April we were done with keeping track of temperatures, timing everything, and shooting me up with drugs. The whole process was getting old and every month brought a new heartache. And actually, a year earlier we said we would try the whole Creighton method for a year and then reevaluate everything.

These feelings led us to be more open with each other about the idea of adoption. We had been adamantly sure that this wasn't the direction for us, but with month after month filled with disappointments we began talking about it again. It turns out that we were both more open to the idea and felt perhaps that this was a path we should further explore. After doing some research and spending time in thought and prayer, we made inquiries to several agencies. We picked one of the agencies, submitted our application and began taking the necessary classes in June.

We are still deep within the initial steps on the path toward adoption and I would be lying if I said we didn't have any doubts. However, I will say that we feel called to be parents and feel this is the path God has chosen for us to expand our family. It is awesome to be able to forget about taking my temperature at 6am, forgo with the whole charting of cervical mucus, and answering "no" when dr's ask me if I'm taking any prescriptions. It is daunting to imagine that our future children are potentially living somewhere within the U.S. right now. What do they look like? What do they like to eat? Will they like living with us? Will we be good parents? How will we work through any past issues?

These questions (and more) and the topic of adoption in general are at the forefront of my thinking over the summer months. I'm using my time this summer to continue doing research, filling out all sorts of paperwork, and getting the house in order for our expanding family. (It's during times like this that I feel fortunate beyond belief to have summers off..sigh, gotta love that!)

Happy Easter!

Happy Easter my friends! What a busy week it has been. As I mentioned in my last post, I made the decision to become Catholic and entered into the church yesterday. This was a decision that took me a while to come to, but one I do not regret making. When K and I got married we both stayed with the religions we were raised with. And, both being determined to make something work, went to both of our churches on most weekends. This became a lot of work and I began feeling that I felt more connected with the Catholic church we attended. This past fall, I inquired about becoming Catholic and have been taking classes since September.

What an interesting journey! I learned some things about myself and, most importantly, have felt closer to God during the journey. Yesterday was our Easter Vigil which is the time when new members are welcomed in the church. The ceremony was like nothing I had seen before and lasted for quite a long time! It was good though. This morning, K and I hosted a Easter Brunch to celebrate both Easter and my coming into the church.

Mom and Dad came to visit and yesterday Momma and I spent pretty much the whole day cooking! We made homemade blueberry muffins, fruit salad, brunch enchiladas, and egg and Hungarian sausage. It was my first time making the enchilada and, thankfully, everyone said they tasted yummy. Whew! I have found that I really like finding new recipes (All Recipes.com is my friend) and trying them...but it's tricky b/c there's typically only K and I eating! Thankfully all 14 of us this morning ate well and had a good time with each other's company.

Right now I'm staring at my Easter basket and watching The 10 Commandments...what lovely things to do on Easter! Easter isn't quite Easter without seeing either The 10 Commandments or The Sound of Music. Both of these movies were always on every Easter growing up and now it doesn't quite seem like right if I don't see one! (This is why I've kept The 10 Commandments on our DVR for, oh... a year now ;) )

Happy Easter!

Random Post, But Hey! It's a post!

April showers bring May flowers...or one can only hope! It's been raining here on and off for like the entire month of April. And the forecast? More rain. It's awesome, my phone gives me the option to look up the weather. Along with the actual forecast it gives little pictures of what the day is supposed to be like. The pictures for the next 4 days? Rain. Cars in the rain. Storm clouds and rain. Rain, rain, and more rain. I'm going to embrace it though because all that rain? Means I don't have to water the plants! Woot.

April has been a super busy month for me. For the past two weeks at school we had been working towards getting the school ready to celebrate the 50th anniversary. And last weekend one of my bestest friends had her bridal shower so K and I traveled home for that. And this weekend is an awesome combination of Easter and writing conference reports (that wasn't meant to sound sarcastic!).

Easter has a bit of a different meaning for me this year since, for the past 8 months, I have been taking classes to become a Catholic. This Holy Week marks the time when I will finally enter the church. The week is filled with preparations and visits to church and tomorrow at Easter Vigil is the culminating event. Mom and Dad are coming down to celebrate and on Easter Sunday K and I are hosting a brunch at our house.

So, I'm not real sure if there's a 'theme' to this post other than small random updates about life right now. I guess I felt it was better to get some thoughts out there than none at all!

Coming out of hibernation

Hi y'all! Long time no type! I've got no real excuse for the long hiatus except perhaps that I wasn't inspired to write? Anyway, inspiration struck a few minutes ago when I was reading over the newsletter the school passes out to parents. What could be so interesting that I needed to blog about in a school newsletter? You're asking this to yourself, I just know it. Well my friends, let me tell you a little about said newsletter. It has a section from the director, handouts and such for parents to fill out and return, and a page with the current songs for the month. It's the song page that I'm taking an interest in at the present time. Lovely songs were selected for the current delightful month of April, such as "Goin' on a Picnic," "Spring is Here," and "Golden Crocus." However! "You are my sunshine" was thrown into the mix. Quite frankly, this song has brought the sting of tears to my eyes whenever we sing it with the kiddos. Except, until tonight, I couldn't pinpoint why. And then I read the second verse to myself in the comfort of my living room. And had to throw the paper across the room because I finally realized why I had such a hard time with the song. Buckle up my dears because I'm going to type out the second verse. Ready? The other night dear, as I lay sleeping, I dreamed I held you in my arms, When I awoke dear, I was mistaken, So I hung my head and I cried. Umm hmmm, great song. Please note the sarcasm because when this is your reality month after month, year after year it really tends to hit home. Please excuse the long paragraph, blogger seems to have blended my thoughts all together.

Fortune Cookies

Yesterday we celebrated the Chinese New Year at school since we have a little girl originally from China in our class. All that talk about China got this girl in the mood for Chinese food! K and I headed to our local buffet and loaded up on General Tso Chicken, bacon wrapped crab, and pepper steak. Towards the end of our meal we received our fortune cookies.

I'm sure you're familiar with fortune cookies: they have a fortune, some lucky numbers, and sometimes, if you're lucky, Chinese words you can learn. Our fortune cookies were of the variety that had the fortune and lucky numbers (this is important information my dear friends!). When I opened my fortune imagine how delighted when I read "Your dearest wish will come true." Woot, woot!

K opened his a minute or two later and quietly read over his fortune. And then asked me to read my lucky numbers to him. Why did he want to hear my lucky numbers? Because his fortune was exactly the same as mine but with different lucky numbers. Woah there Chinese fortune cookies! What are the odds that we would get the same fortune? And that they could so obviously be pointed towards our shared dream? Sigh, only time will tell if our dearest wish will come true!

Disclaimer: I totally realize that everyone in the restaurant could have received the same wish...I just choose to believe we were the only two!

Ice, ice everywhere

So maybe you heard about the winter storm that swept across half the country? You know, the one that stranded cars in Chicago? Collapsed buildings? Caused wide-spread power outages? Yeah, that's the one.

Well my friends, we didn't get the waist high snow, we got ice. And lots of it. I didn't have school for three glorious days and didn't leave the house two out of three of those days. And not only was my school closed, but, according to one local news channel, there were over 776 closings at one time! (Not all of them school mind you)

Perhaps from the title of my blog you might have realized that we live on a hill. A windy hill at that. So we got ice, right? And we live on a hill, right? Imagine how tricky it is to walk anywhere on the property! There was literally no good way to get from the house to the barn. (And quite frankly? There still isn't unless you are lucky enough to be in a car)

On Wednesday afternoon I decided to be a good horsey parent and check on the horses since they hadn't been fed since K had left at 3:15am. I was riddled with choices how I could get from my house, down the hill, to the barn. I could a.) skate across the deck and make my way down the ice covered, hand rail-less steps (mind you, K had fallen down these already) or b.) walk through the grass down the hill. I chose the grass but stayed near the steps. And fell. Hard. On my wrist. Ouch!

Gosh darn it did that hurt! I went to the house (because who in their right mind would continue on to the barn?!?) and nearly fainted. I took it easy for the rest of the day but then on Thursday the wrist was still hurting a bit. I went to an urgent care place and they took x-rays...it doesn't look like I broke anything but I was given a brace-type thing to wear.

Let's just say I'll be ready for spring!