Still waiting

03.31.2006 | 6:50 pm | Daily Life, Gray Matters

They didn’t finish today!
They got everything done but the ridge vent. That has to wait till tomorrow. But it will DEFINITELY be finished tomorrow. They have to get the ridge vent put up there, and then nail shingles on top of that.

It shouldn’t take very long, and after that I’m hoping that Philip’s dad will go ahead and put up the rest of G’s swing set. G is soooo excited about the part that is put together, but he can’t really do much on it till it’s completed.
G did surprise me earlier this week (regarding the swing set). We were outside playing, and he ran up and climbed the rock wall that leads up to the platform that the slide is hooked to.

This is big news. Before this, he’d never figured out how to climb, and he’s always been too scared to even try. But on Wednesday, he just grabbed onto the plastic nubbins on the wall and pulled himself up the entire five feet of wall, and plopped down onto the platform. I about died! He did it like a pro, too…like he’s known how to do it all along. I’ve been so worried because of how behind he is (compared to other kids his age) on many of his physical abilities. But this was awesome! When I first saw the swingset, I just knew it would be months, if not years, before he’d get up enough chutzpah to climb the vertical 5-foot rock wall! But no, he just up and did it out of the blue, and did it really well. He’s been climbing it like crazy since then.

Now, if he’d just figure out how to jump! I think I have the only healthy 2-year old on earth who has never jumped, despite 10 weeks of gymnastics classes and countless attempts at trying to teach him how.

But about his new climbing skill. It created a bit of a monster. Today he wanted to get in his crib to play, and I was headed in to pick him up & put him in it. Before I got in there, he’d grabbed onto the rails at the side, stepped up onto the bottom rail, and was beginning to climb it. :shock: He’ll probably start trying to climb out of his crib now, which has never been an issue for us. But, oh well. I’ll just have to teach him not to. :)

I really hope Papa can get his swing set completely up & running tomorrow, after the roof is finished!

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Some pics from our week.

03.30.2006 | 10:58 pm | Daily Life

These two were from last Wednesday, when they began by removing our non-functioning chimney. They serve as pretty good “before” shots of the old roof and the damage from Dennis last year. (Jeepy, that’s Dennis the hurricane––not a big, tough neighbor who goes around shaking our trees and ripping off our shingles. ;) LMBO!)

This is from Monday, when they began the actual shingling process on the front slope.

This is from yesterday, showing the bare boards as they started laying the felt on the back slope. The mess on the ground is the discarded old shingles that were pulled off the roof.

And this is from today, as they nailed shingles onto the back slope.

They didn’t quite finish today, but will definitely finish tomorrow. Once it is all done, I’ll put up some finished-product photos.

I love that we get to have a green roof to match our trim, and I really love that we got the architectual shingles. I’ve always admired the way architectual shingles look, and I feel like they add some much-needed glamour to our plain-jane house.

I get to spend the weekend cleaning up all the discarded old shingles in the back yard, and crawling around on my hands and knees scouring the ground for loose nails. I did that in the front yard this past weekend, and it was great exercise, so I’m kinda looking forward to it again. I hope Kelly will be available to keep me company again, while I crawl around the yard on my nail-hunt. ;)

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A little better

03.29.2006 | 11:59 pm | Daily Life

Well, today a LOT got done.
Yesterday they finished the first half of the roof, and today they started the second half. They worked hard and ended up getting the shingles off, the roofboards replaced, and the felt paper nailed down. Woohoo! I don’t know how they did this side so fast compared to the other, but I’m not complaining, and I’m not asking any questions.
So tomorrow they start putting the shingles on that side. And they MIGHT be able to get them all laid down…assuming no problems come up. After that, I think it’s pretty much done.
I am SO ready for it to be finished. I took pictures today and I might get around to posting them here, as soon as I can get around to downloading the camera. I know I have to download the camera soon, because SPF is coming up and I’ve got to get my pictures posted anyway.
Anywho, I think our marriage is going to survive the re-roof, and yes, I’m going to be keeping my gun loaded. LOL!! That comment made me giggle.

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Roofin’ blues

03.27.2006 | 2:49 pm | Daily Life, Ranting

I’m beginning to think doing our own roof was the wrong idea, even if it does save us two grand.
Four days into it, they still haven’t gotten THE FIRST HALF of the roof finished.
There is so much I can say about that, but I ain’t gonna go there.

I think it’s actually COSTING us more, from Philip not being able to do his work all these days. It was supposed to take three days–total. He figured he could manage three days without working. But this is turning out much differently, and my fear is that it’ll drag out for weeks.

I just don’t know what we are going to do. Philip and I are barely speaking to each other at this point. But it’s probably for the best, because I just don’t have anything remotely nice to say to him lately. Ughhhhh.

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Scary moment last night!

03.21.2006 | 9:07 am | Uncategorized, Daily Life

Last night I went to bed around midnight. Philip stayed up, as usual, to work on some unfinished projects (he hasn’t gone to bed before 2am in weeks, the poor guy). Anyway, so I fell asleep pretty quickly.
At 1 AM, I was awakened by Reagan’s barking outside. This was immediately unnerving, because Reagan isn’t a dog that “just barks”. When he barks, it’s because someone or something has come onto our property–otherwise, he’s quiet ’round the clock (this is one reason of many that we own a smart breed :P ).
So, I immediately got up and went to the window to peek out. On my way there, I realized there was someone yelling, on top of Reagan’s incessant barking. When I peeked out the blind, I was startled to see someone was standing in our yard! They were standing in front of the porch, cornered by Reagan, who was in all-out protector mode, aggressively crouched between them and our front door, his barking and his stance intense and threatening.
The person cupped their hands in front of their mouth and continued yelling, “HELP! HELP!” There was no vehicle to be seen, just this person, who I now assumed was a male because the voice was deep. Since it was dark, I couldn’t tell for sure, but I knew it was no one I recognized from the neighborhood. In between yelling “HELP!”, the person interjected a few “HEY!”s as well. The Southern accent was so strong that both words sounded nearly alike. :P
Somehow, writing this out, it doesn’t sound nearly as scary as it was while it was happening. In those moments last night, it was truly frightening and very unnerving to have a strange person standing a few feet from our front door at 1AM, yelling toward our house with no explanation, the only thing stopping them at that moment being a very intimidating perfomance by our dog. It was very threatening-feeling.
At this point Philip walked in the bedroom, having already checked on the commotion from the living room window. I turned and asked if he’d called the Sheriff. He said he was about to call, but wanted to check first to make sure I was okay. I told him I was fine, and to GO NOW AND CALL. I didn’t like this one bit. There was NO WAY we were opening that door. NO. WAY. If this person truly needed help, the best thing for us to do was to call the Sheriff to come help them. And if they were up to no good, then we were the ones who needed the help.
I ran and checked on Gray, who thankfully was sleeping soundly through all the commotion. Reagan’s barking was still non-stop, and the yelling was ongoing as well, and both were echoing throughout our otherwise quiet house.
After checking on Gray, I went back in our bedroom to get my gun. I was frightened for our safety and knew that it would be a few LONG minutes before the Sheriff would arrive to help. The only problem was, I’d recently unloaded the gun for fear of Gray getting hold of it (it’s always been kept loaded up until then, but he only recently became able to reach where we keep it). BIG mistake–I learned last night how very true it is that an unloaded gun is USELESS in the middle of the night, in the dark. I was fumbling all over until I put my hand on the box of ammo, even though I knew where it was. Then I fumbled even more, blindly loading the gun with shaking hands. If someone had been IN the house, I would’ve been completely vulnerable. It felt vulnerable enough, knowing there was someone outside the house yelling their head off in an aggressive manner–someone who could easily begin trying to get in the house at any moment–and still it had taken me several minutes to arm myself. I’ll never be in that position again. Never, ever.
Just as I finished loading the gun, I heard the yelling stop, although Reagan was still barking. I peeked out the blind and to my relief, saw that the person had apparently given up and was already back up on the street, walking away. Reagan was standing at the edge of the road, giving a few final warning barks.
In the light of the streetlamps, I was able to make out that it was actually a female! She was stocky and dressed kind of masculine, but she had long hair and was definitely female. I was surprised because the voice had been gravelly and low-pitched. In hindsight, it was a typical redneck-woman voice from around here, one made masculine by years of cigarettes and too much hard living.
I watched as she walked to the house across the street from us and apparently knocked on their door. No one answered there, either, but to my knowledge she didn’t yell anymore. She walked on down the road pretty quickly.
That’s when the Sheriff’s car came speeding up, and Philip went outside to talk to him and tell him what had happened. Another officer arrived, and then they both went off down the street to find the woman, leaving one of their cruisers parked in front of our house. Philip and I waited by the window, discussing what had gone on.
A little while later, one of the officers came walking back to his cruiser, and Philip went out to see what was up. The officer said they’d found her, running up the road. She told them she’d broken down, and was trying to find help but no one would answer (GEE, I WONDER WHY?!).
The extra little tidbit was that she was DRUNK. This further explained the deep, drawled voice and all the yelling–as well as the stupidity to enter the yard of someone with a big, scary guard dog in the front yard. I had wondered WHY any sane person would choose our house to walk up to, since everyone in the neighborhood knows we have a big, intimidating dog who is very protective of his territory.
And, drunk as she was, she had been driving. And, she’d not broken down, but rather had wrecked her car into something and it was stuck. Otherwise, she’d have been out driving the roads in her condition.
So, they arrested her and took her in for whatever they do with DUI offenders.
We put away our guns (which will remain loaded from now on), and went to bed.
Ah, I love this neighborhood!

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Not the iPod!

03.20.2006 | 2:16 pm | Uncategorized, Daily Life

AAAAAARGH. So I curl up in bed last night with my iPod, for that much-needed therapy session. I kept thinking my right ear was stopped up because I didn’t hear the music as well in that ear. But then I heard an annoying scratching sound, and upon closer inspection, I realized that one of my earpieces is going out!
I wonder if they’re covered under the 1-year warranty. Need to check on that. I cannot live without my iPod in perfect working order. I NEED it.
I was right about the swingset. They got MAYBE half of it put together before it got completely dark. The rest has to be done later in the week, whenever his dad can make it back over this way. The swingset is Gray’s birthday/Christmas gift from Nana & Papa. Yes, it’s been three months since both those events. Things happen slowly in our family. :P
I need to go work out.

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Crabby post

03.18.2006 | 7:38 pm | Uncategorized, Daily Life, Ranting

Today the neighbors came out and helped Philip cut down their tree that was leaning over onto our fence. Our fence was built right up against the tree, and between Ivan and Dennis, the tree ended up leaning at a 45-degree angle over into our yard–and caused our fence to lean with it. So they took apart several sections of the fence, and then cut the tree down. After it was cut up & removed, they re-set the fence posts (fixed the lean) and put the fence slats back up. It looks as good as new. At least that section does. They have one more tree to remove, which also put a lean on our fence while Ivan/Dennis whipped it around. The fact that a tree with a nearly a 2-foot circumference was whipping back and forth enough to cause a fence to lean, is pretty darn unnerving. I hate these storms, and I hope we’ve seen the last of the monsters for a LONG while.
Philip’s dad is supposed to come tomorrow to help put up Gray’s new swingset. We’ll see if that actually comes to pass. Well, I know for sure he’s coming, but I have my doubts as to whether or not they’ll get the swingset up completely.
His dad’s also going to (along with Philip) re-roof our house, hopefully later this week, if we can get three days of no rain in the forecast. Them doing the roof themselves is going to save us 2000 dollars.
The tree company is coming on Monday to take care of all the broken parts of our trees that are STILL dangling, 8 months after Dennis tore them to pieces.
Once they come and remove the huge chunk o’tree that’s dangling over our blown-down section of fence, we’ve scheduled a handyman to come & re-do that entire section of fence. He’s the guy we bought the house from, and he’s the one who put the fence up in the first place, so he’s the perfect person to help us out–for a $300 price, of course.
And, if we have ANY money left from our insurance settlement after we pay for all this (doubtful), we’re going to replace our shed. Ever since Ivan, it’s had a huge leak where water just pours inside. Philip’s tried to fix it, but the damage was too extensive in that one section. I hope we have enough left to get a new shed because we need a dry place to keep our stuff! I have to remember next time we buy a house, to insist on a garage!
Money, money…it’s always something with us. We found out last week the engine on our car blew a gasket and between that and all the 125k maintenance items, it’s going to cost a bit. I can’t complain too much. The car’s 10 years old and even with 125k miles, this is the first “problem” it’s ever had. It’s a Subaru, of course, built to go to 200k or more miles, easily. If it were an American car, it would be in its grave already, by far.
I suppose I’ve bitched enough for one post. I’m not feeling like a happy camper lately- too much crap going on and not enough time or money. I’m stressed and pissed and just tired of all the crap! I’m also tired of people and how they always let you down. Tired of having a bad attitude, tired of wishing I had a flame thrower that I could use to just “zap” people whenever they get in my way or piss me off!
I need a good therapy session with my iPod. I’m way overdue. :P

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Faith

03.11.2006 | 7:33 pm | Uncategorized, Infertility/Miscarriage

See, I am doing a new thing!
Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?
I am making a way in the desert
and streams in the wasteland.
——Isaiah 43:19

3 years ago today, I was more discouraged than usual in my desire for a child. It had been nearly two months since the miscarriage, and the loss was still so painful. I had lost much of my faith in the promise God had made me the previous fall; yet I still clung to a little thread of hope that had somehow survived. I had made my ammends with God in the weeks after the miscarriage, something that—at the time of the miscarriage—had seemed impossible. But thanks to his loving comfort via a special message just for me that he gave our pastor the weekend after I lost our baby, coupled with days of heartwrenching prayer and seeking, I had been able to once again bring myself to believe that God was going to make me a mother. I just didn’t know when.
The promise from the previous fall had been that I would “have a child next year”. It was now March, and I knew it was getting a little late for a child to be born by the end of the year.
So here I was on March 11, 2003. I was on day 4 of my cycle, and it hit me that if I were to become pregnant during this cycle, I would be due in December. All I had to do was manage to ovulate, something my body isn’t very good at; and have a decent luteal phase, something my body is terrible at! But after all the healing and changes I’d seen God bring within my body since the past August (I had stage 4 endometriosis that had disappeared within a month—no treatment—and for the record, to this day it’s never returned), I knew that with his help, it could happen. No question there.
My problem on this particular afternoon, however, was that I felt too overwhelmed to pray. I tried, but couldn’t get past frantic repetitions of “please God, let me ovulate…let me ovulate…let me ovulate…”
I hate it when I end up praying like that. So I decided to break. What should I do instead? I had no idea. I stared at the walls for a while, and then a particular book caught my eye over on the bookshelf. It’s a book of spiritual vignettes for women. I got it out, hoping to see something about childbearing, but when I opened it, I looked down and saw this verse at the very top of the page in front of me:

See, I am doing a new thing!
Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?
I am making a way in the desert
and streams in the wasteland.
——Isaiah 43:19

I recognized it immediately, because I had read the exact same scripture earlier that morning, when I was reading my Bible. And now, here it was again, staring me in the face for the second time that day. Totally random. Or was it? I mulled over the words for a few minutes, feeling like it wasn’t a coincidence, my getting that book down and opening up to that page. It seemed to speak directly into my heart, whispering words of hope. A new thing about to happen? Could it be this was going to be the month I would actually ovulate, manage to catch the egg, and it somehow survive long enough to stick?
Or was I reading too much into stumbling onto this verse again…was it truly just a coincidence?
I suddenly felt compelled to pray, and this time I prayed more hopefully and less repetitively. I prayed that this would indeed be the month. I told God that I still believed that he could–and hoped that he would–make good on that word that I’d have a child that year.
After I prayed, I went about the day doing normal stuff. Later in the afternoon, I had some free time and sat down with another book, one that my best friend and I had been studying together. It, too, was a spiritual book; this one was about the marriage relationship. I was reading the next chapter, which was about being forgiven. Halfway down the page, the author had included a scripture to back up her point:

See, I am doing a new thing!
Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?
I am making a way in the desert
and streams in the wasteland.
——Isaiah 43:19

I got chills! There was that verse again, for the third time that day. I knew then that it was most definitely NOT a coincidence. My gracious Lord was trying to tell me something, and he wasn’t giving up too easily. I read the words again, taking them in carefully, and I suddenly understood.
He was about to do a new thing! He was about to make a way in the desert…a steam in the wasteland…in other words, he was about to do the impossible. Was I going to sit here and “not perceive it”? Or was I going to take a step of faith and believe that he was going to give me that child he’d promised? The moment was fiercely emotional for me. It’s one of the rare times I’ve felt like I could reach out and touch God; for he was so close by. His presence was overwhelming, yet so subtle. I could hear him speaking quietly into my heart, that it was about to happen. It was a moment I’ll always remember.
I decided to take that first shaky step of faith. From that moment on, I KNEW. I KNEW that I was going to conceive that month, no matter how futile it looked physically. And I knew that this time, it was going to work out. I was going to have a baby by the end of the year. For the first time since the miscarriage, I believed that with all my heart.
The rest? It’s history, baby!
Grayson was conceived exactly a week from that day (a total miracle, because I had absolutely no signs of ovulation that month), and I did indeed become a mother on December 10th of that year. Just as promised.
Thank you, Lord, for the amazing gift of my son. He will always be enough for me. Daily, I feel like I can never say “thank you” enough…but today I’m in awe once again of the way you came to me and announced that something big was about to happen. I don’t know why you chose to do that…maybe you knew I needed a little nudge to help me step out again after all that had happened before.
Speaking of what happened before (the miscarriage), I’m going to post that scripture once more, but this time I’m going to add the verse just before that one.

18 “Forget the former things;
do not dwell on the past.
19 See, I am doing a new thing!
Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?
I am making a way in the desert
and streams in the wasteland.
——Isaiah 43:18-19

Whenever I started to question, “B-b-but, I believed before, and I ended up losing that baby…and I’ve never understood why!”, I would read that preceeding verse and know that, while I might never understand “why” it happened (I still don’t), I needed to just give all my questions up to him. I needed to forget what happened before, at least when it came to believing that things would be different this time. Can’t say I was always successful at that, but I always managed to fall back on it and somehow just believe——blindly, at times——but then again, isn’t that what faith is all about?

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Mama, holdit?

03.8.2006 | 7:36 pm | Uncategorized, Daily Life, Gray Matters, Infertility/Miscarriage

Today’s March 8th. A special day in my memory. I just wanted to say that because I’ve been thinking about it all day. :)
Didn’t think I could fall more in love with my baby, but he’s given me another reason. When we all take a walk together, Philip pushes the stroller and I walk next to it. Yesterday, while walking in the usual “formation”, Gray reached out his hand and took mine. I looked down and he was looking up at me with a loving smile. I melted! Whenever a car would approach, I had to let go because I always move in front of the stroller when a car is coming (so I’m out of the road!). But once it passed and I moved back to beside the stroller, he would hold his hand out again and say, “Mama, holdit? Hand.” :)
Today we all walked together again, and he held out his hand right at the start and again said, “Mama, holdit? Hand.” Other than when cars passed, we held hands the entire 3 miles, by his request! Sooooo sweeeeet. I love him to pieces and can’t imagine anything better than him. Wow, that gives me another con to add to my “con” list of having another child. (I have a “pro” and “con” list that I’m constantly building, trying to decide if I want to attempt to have one more kid or not.) Admittedly, there’re only a couple of things on the “pro” list…I just don’t want another kid…actually I don’t want another BABY. Yet, there are about a hundred (or more) things on the “con” list.
Sweet little things like these would get lost in the shuffle if there were another baby around to bother with. I want all my attention on him, because first of all, I think at this age, he deserves a mother’s undivided attention; but secondly, I cherish him deeply (because he didn’t come easily), and don’t want to miss a single moment with him. I guess I’m just satisfied with what I’ve been given. But, he’s growing so fast now that I find each day to be a bit painful, knowing that soon he’ll be a boy with other things to do besides finding joy in holding his mommy’s hand.
Sooo…how is it that a sweet moment turns into my brooding over to have another, or not to? I have NO idea!
It’s torture being a mother! It really is!

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So F’ing Mad!

03.4.2006 | 11:37 pm | Uncategorized, Daily Life, Ranting

Aerosmith CANCELLED the show. When did they decide to do this? A mere THREE HOURS before the show was to begin. There was a near-riot downtown at the civic center…it would’ve been a well-deserved riot in my opinion. Thanks for the notice, Aerosmith.

I have a living room in complete disarray because of the ongoing paint job, which was put on hold today for said concert. Had I known even this morning that there’d be no concert, I would’ve spent the day painting. But, no. How sweet to have made plans for a babysitter, and to have spent the afternoon packing Gray’s stuff to stay overnight with Aunt Leslie, as well as getting myself and him ready, only to find out at the final moment that there would be no concert.

It turned out to be a nice night even though it wasn’t what I’d hoped we’d be doing. Gray still got to go hang out with aunt Leslie, and Philip and I got to go out & eat by ourselves for once: quiet, leisurely, and relaxed. It was kind of nice.

But I’m still mad because I was really looking forward to the concert. Not even Aerosmith as much as Cheap Trick. The concert isn’t going to be rescheduled, so I guess it just wasn’t meant to be for me to see them live. It figures. Things like this are the story of my life. :(

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