Mother's Day without a mom.

Oh Mother's Day...why do you have to come back every year? Every year I walk through the stores and see the cards and gifts being displayed for this holiday and I think "hmm, I don't have a mom". I never think of Mother's Day as a holiday to celebrate me, I always think of my mom. Don't get me wrong, I mean if my kids and husband want to do a little something for me I will be grateful and thrilled but all I can think about on Mother's Day is my mom.

It has been 3 years next week since my mom has been gone. Three years that I really needed her. A cross country move, another move after that two more states away...lots and lots of questions I have had for her. She lived with us for the last 5 years of her life. I counted on her every single day. For advice, to help with my kids, as a sounding board, as a confidante, as my best friend. She understood me and knew me better than anyone on this planet. She believed in me and supported me. I have said it before, she was my biggest fan. I have learned to live without her, I have gotten used to being a daughter without a mother. It's not easy. It really kind of sucks but I have done it.

Earlier tonight I was on Facebook and I changed my profile picture to one of my mom and me. It stirred up emotions and then when it came up in friends feed they started liking it and commenting on it. When they did I started thinking about how my mom touched so many of my friends lives. How so many of them loved her and always had a special spot in their heart for her. Those friends, the friends that knew her, that respected her and understood her are so important to me. My mom had a pretty rough life. Not as a child, but as an adult. She had a lot of heartbreak. She could be bitter, she could be rough. Sometimes it bothered me, I always felt like I had to apologize for her behavior. But my friends, they knew. They understood and they loved her. I am so grateful for that.

Speaking of grateful, I need to share something else I am grateful for. I am grateful for time, the time I got to spend with my mom. Those precious years that when I went to bed at night I knew she was right outside in the casita sleeping sound in her bed. So grateful that until the day before she died she was "present" she knew exactly what was going on and I was able to communicate with her, my kids and my husband were able to communicate with her. One of Gianna's favorite memories is that the very last thing my mom ate was mint chip ice cream that Gianna got out of the freezer and took to her. I know it sounds silly but so many people I know don't get that time.
I have a friend in California that lost her mom two years before I lost mine. I didn't know her then and I didn't know how her mom had passed. Tonight I asked her. When she texted me back and told me the tragic, heartbreaking story of how her mother was killed by a car while she was in the street my heart literally broke for her. The idea that she had to get a phone call like that, that she has had that as her final memory of her beloved mother just killed me. I cried.
A little bit later a life long friend of mine commented on the picture of my mom and me. Her mother was my moms best friend. A friend that my mom loved and cherished so much that we literally had an ongoing joke my whole life that if "Sonja says (that is her friends name) than it must be right". My mom loved Sonja so very much. Sonja is still alive. She is alive but she suffers from Alzheimer's. That? well as far as I am concerned is the most heartbreaking thing that I can ever imagine happening. It kills me that tomorrow my friend will go see her mom and even though she is "here" she isn't really here at all. That is too much for me to even wrap my head around.

I am a big believer that until you walk in someones shoes you truly don't understand what they have been through. Most of my friends still have their parents, heck some of them still have grandparents. Sometimes I feel like they don't understand me. They don't understand that even at 44 years old you can feel like an orphan. When there is no "home" to go to, it is really, really tough. When I meet new people and they ask where my family lives and I say "oh, my family is almost all gone, I only have one brother left" it kills me. It hurts my heart every.single.time. Tonight I tried to put myself in some of these other women's shoes. I thought about how strong they are and my heart hurt for them. I pray that both of them will have a peaceful Mother's Day tomorrow. I hope that they will cherish the good moments that they had with their moms and not focus on the hard stuff. I know that I will get through tomorrow. I know that I can look at my kids and realize how incredibly blessed I am. I will get through it but I can guarantee you I will be missing and thinking about my mom. I will also be thinking about all my friends who are in the same boat I am, having another Mother's Day without a mom.

That summer day

I am writing this post mostly for myself and my kids. I stopped writing on this blog a long time ago but I started it in the beginning so that my kids and family would have somewhere to go in case they wanted to know more about me or had forgotten different moments that they wanted to remember. This story isn't something we want to sit and reminisce about necessarily but it is something we never ever want to forget. It changed things. It changed perspective and it changed our lives.

August 3rd 2012-

It was an average summer morning in our house. Not a lot planned for the day and we were good with that. As she did most summer mornings (or fall, winter or spring too) Allison suggested that we go to Starbucks. We have a small addiction to Java Chip Frappucinos. Not one to ever argue with the idea to go to Starbucks I grabbed my favorite Clemson ball cap (still in my pjs, my husbands Clemson shirt and some sleep shorts) and said "lets go". Starbucks is about 5 miles from our house. A straight shot. One road. We are regulars, it's a part of our daily routine and we go all. the. time. As we sat in the drive thru I snapped this picture of myself, thinking I would post it to insta gram...you know, I figure everyone needs to know that were out and about in or pjs.

Once we got our drinks Allison wanted a breakfast sandwich from Bojangles so instead of leaving out the back entrance we went a different way. We turned right. There was no one at Bojangles so we got in and out very quickly. It literally wasn't 20 minutes from the time I snapped this picture to the moment it happened. We were probably going 35 to 40 miles an hour heading eastbound on one of our busiest streets here in Greenville. I saw the truck, he was trying to turn left into the gas station that was on my right. I didn't even give him a second thought as we approached. There was nobody coming up behind me for quite a while so he would have had plenty of time to turn (which he was doing illegally btw, that lane was the left hand lane for people traveling east bound and he was traveling west bound). Literally like a bad movie I heard it before I felt it and he had hit us. Head on. In a 3/4 ton Chevy pick up truck. He hit us so hard and with such momentum that my car went up in the air a little and flipped on it's side. It all happened in slow motion. Being in that moment, as a mother, with your kids in the car is not something I would ever wish on another mother. As the car was flipping I kept looking at Allison next to me. She was so scared. She didn't say much, none of us did. We all were in shock and maybe grunting a little but not a lot of words. When the car landed and we were hanging there and the airbags were all around us I really thought we were going to die. I didn't know that when airbags deployed they got hot and they smoked. I was scared. I thought the car was going to catch on fire. I thought we were doomed. We also had our Yorkie with us. I had no doubt he was dead, I couldn't imagine in a million years how he could survive what we just did. From the backseat Gianna kept saying "is this a dream?" "mommy, am I having a nightmare" and then as the blood started to come, "Help me, I am broken, help me mommy, I am broken". I couldn't do anything. I was hanging by my seat belt begging the people standing around my car looking in to "please help us, please help us!". They did. They weren't supposed to but they did. They all got together and they slowly, gently pushed the car back on all four wheels.

I knew I was injured but I didn't know how bad. My wrist was very obviously broken but that was all I could see. I unlocked my door and jumped (well I say jump but it was more like a stagger) out of my car. By the time I got out of the car the ambulance was pulling up and there were three people at Allison's side and three people at Gianna's side and a woman was holding my dog. My dog that was alive. I was shocked. He was scared but he was alive. Gianna was bleeding from her mouth and in a lot of pain. Allison was yelling at the people asking her questions. She was frustrated because she couldn't see them. She had no center vision. She was scared. When I realized that they (my girls) were getting care from the EMS people I started trying to get a hold of my husband. He never answers his phone at work. Never. I had to call a friend who's wife is my friend that works with Chris. I was shaking and I was hurt but I was pretty calm. I was in shock. Calling Chris was awful. Saying to my husband that the girls and I were in an accident and I didn't know how bad the injuries were was so hard. My next phone call was not easy either. I had to call my in laws to come get my dog. Can you imagine? "Umm, Hi, both of your grandchildren were just in a horrible car accident, our car is totaled and it flipped on it's side, but what I need from you is to come to the accident site and get my dog from this sweet lady who has offered to stay here until you get here, because the girls and I are being rushed to the trauma center" and honestly, that is pretty much how it went. I felt awful but I was so glad they were here to call. So grateful that 3,000 miles from "home" we had family.

As I hung up the phone one of the EMS ladies came to me and said "your younger daughter is doing okay, we are worried about your older daughter. We are taking her priority one to the hospital and you and your other daughter will follow in the next ambulance". Holy cow. This was serious and scary. As I stood there holding my extremely broken, crooked wrist I realized that I couldn't stand on one of  my feet. I was balancing on my right foot. I was starting to feel my injuries. I was scared. The crowd that had gathered around was amazing. They were doing everything and anything to make me feel better. Southern people rock. They aren't rubber-neckers who drive by an accident to see the gore, they get out of their cars and help. They don't ask if they can help. They just do it. They all started to pray with me. That is what we do in the south, we pray. It touched my heart and changed my life in that moment. I have known from the day that we moved here that this was the place we were supposed to be. That morning standing there broken and scared to death I was so certain that God himself had put us there that I could feel him. I felt him all around us.

After they loaded Allison into the first ambulance and took her away a very rotund EMS man came to me and said (and I quote) "ma'am, we are taking your daughter to the hospital, are you going with us or are you getting a ride with someone else" uhh...what in the world was he talking about? so I said, "I AM BROKEN' and then, "I was driving that car, of course I am going with you". It was then that I realized that the whole time I was standing there on the side of the street not one paramedic or EMS had tended to me. Not a heart rate, not a 'here ma'am, sit down so we can check you'. I was irritated and offended by this guy. He told me to come on then, cause they were leaving. A paramedic looked at me and said "her wrist is broken, you need to splint that" Finally, someone noticed. They splint my arm an I climbed into the ambulance unassisted with a broken foot.
The drive to the hospital was long. It is about 20 minutes from where we were. Twenty minutes of me not knowing what was wrong with my kids. Twenty minutes of Gianna saying things like "mommy, I promise I am going to be ok" and "please help me, I am broken, it hurts". Oh my heart. It was breaking. My mind was racing. Where was Allison? Was she ok? Was she going to have brain damage?. The longest twenty minutes of my life.
We pulled up to the hospital (oh btw the guy in the back of the ambulance never checked me. not once.) They rushed Gianna off to pediatrics and put me in a wheel chair and took me to the ER. Waiting room. Like the same place you go if you have an ear ache or if you cut your finger real bad. I had just been in a head on collision with a giant pick up truck and my car flipped and they said "ok ma'am, I gave them your name, they will call you in a while" I am not kidding. The shock was wearing off, my adrenaline was slowing down and I knew I was hurt. I kept thinking 'huh, I don't think this is right, I might be bleeding internally' 'There could be so many things wrong with me and they might call that woman sitting across from me with a bandage wrapped around her finger first'. When they finally did call my name they took my heart rate and luckily for me it was so high that they rushed me back to a 'room' and had me hooked up to a heart monitor and an iv so fast your head would spin. Nothing like a heart attack looming to get you quick service.
I won't get into all the details as this story is going on and on and on. Chris got there and I sent him to pediatrics to find the kids. When he came back he told me that Gianna's intestine had been severed by the seat belt and she was going into emergency surgery. Allison was having a number of tests and being checked.

After several hours it was determined that I had a broken wrist, foot and fractured sternum. Gianna was in recovery and Allison was in her own room being observed at least overnight. I was taken to the heart floor in the ICU as my hear rate continued to climb and in spite of all the meds I was on and all the care that was being taken it wouldn't go down. My left wrist was broken and my right arm had two IVs in it. I had a catheter because I couldn't walk. How in the world was I going to text my kids or get to them. I didn't realize at the time but the girls and I were in different buildings completely. Poor Chris was running back and forth between the three of us. The staff at the hospital was amazing. They put my girls in rooms right next to each other. I found out later that Allison could hear Gianna crying and screaming in pain and was heartbroken and crying 'that's my sister, that's my sister!'. Ugh. I hate that. The fact that they had just been through something so scary and I couldn't be there and Chris was torn between all three of us. I didn't see them until 36 hours after the accident. Here is Gianna when her nurse wheeled her to me. Oh my baby...

Seeing this picture always makes me choke up. Oh she was so brave. All alone in her room. Scared to death. Wanting her mom. The nurses were amazing. They took such good care of my girl. Of both my girls. Oh, Allison stayed overnight for observation and tons of tests and then was released. Oddly enough, the one of us who was rushed priority one to the hospital was the first one out.

I stayed in ICU for 4 days and Gianna stayed in pediatrics recovering from her surgery for four days also. During that time we texted and talked on the phone and saw each other 3 times. Our nurses were won.der.ful.

My first trip out to the doctors. During this time I was reading the Hunger Games and I felt like Katniss Everdeen...it took 3 people to get me ready

Our recovery at home was difficult. I felt that we weren't ready to be home. My bruises were so severe. So bad that I couldn't lift either of my arms. I couldn't move well. Gianna couldn't stand up straight because of her incisions in her belly. She wanted to go back to the hospital. She wanted those nurses to take care of her. I couldn't help her. I couldn't even pull up my own underwear. I was helpless. Chris had to shower me and Allison did everything else. I mean everything. This girl who was so sore and moving so slow herself was the nurse to her sister that I couldn't be...and she was caring for her mom too. Doing things that I had to do for my mom when she was sick (and dying). It was humbling. It was heartbreaking and heartwarming at the same time. There are so many moments from those first few weeks that are forever etched in my brain. The way people just showed up at night with dinner for us. Nobody said "if there is anything we can do let us know". They just did it. They fed us. They ordered housecleaning services (sweetest friend in California, did that one) for us. They were amazing. I was far from the place that I called home for 41 years but I was home. I was in a place that I never want to leave.

We are now 3 months out. The kids are doing great and for the most part have been released from their doctors. Gianna still has some physical therapy and Allison would like to see a counselor. She is traumatized a little and has a hard time driving. Loud noises scare her and she is very jumpy when she drives or actually when anyone drives. I am doing okay. I am older, my wounds were deeper and it will take me longer to heal. My fractured sternum is the worst. I also have so much scar tissue from the seat belt wounds. That hurts often. I am sore most of the time and at night or when it's cold I walk with a limp. It's okay though. I am alive. My kids are alive. My dog is alive. From the moment we checked out of the hospital, maybe even before that I have felt so lucky. So incredibly blessed. This could have been so much worse. We have talked to strangers (it's kind of a small town) who saw the accident and they assume someone died. It was bad y'all. It was not a fender bender. It was one of those accidents you see and immediately start praying for the people. We walked away from it (well kind of ). Not only could we have died but our injuries could have been so much worse.

One of my favorite things to have come from all of this is something Gianna said to me a few weeks ago. She is twelve years old. She has decided what she wants to be when she grows up. On our way home from school she said to me "mom, I know what I want to be when I grow up. I want to be a nurse who takes care of kids in the hospital. I want to make kids feel the way those nurses made me feel". Oh my gosh. I cry just typing that. Her heart. Her life was changed. I love that.

Happy Birthday Mike

When I was a young girl growing up in the 70's I knew a few things for certain. I knew that I was going to marry this guy-

I knew that no matter how hard I tried I was never going to be as good a roller skater as my friend Maren. I knew that the best jeans were Jordache and I knew how to tell the real ones from the fakes.
I also knew that my brother Mike Sabella was the coolest guy around.
I think I started idolizing him from the time I was very small. He was six years older than me and seemed to be all knowing all the time. I trusted him and believed in him like every good little sister does with their older brother.

Because of the age difference we never really argued, there wasn't a sibling rivalry between us. I mean don't get me wrong, he teased me for sure. He started calling me 'chubby' when I was a kid, I don't mean like "Nina, you shouldn't eat that you are getting chubby" I mean like "hey Chubby can you hand me the phone?". It was my name. I didn't like it, it drove me crazy but at the same time it was kind of endearing.

As the years went on and Mike moved out (I have written about that devastating event before, it was awful) he became more and more protective of me. He started to worry that I might make the wrong choices in middle school and high school. He was always sure to give me pep talks and was constantly telling me to 'stay sweet and innocent' those were the words he would write to me all the time on birthday cards and notes.

Here is a card he got me for my birthday one year and inside it says- Nina, Make these high school years pass the way they're supposed to, fun and exciting, But please stay as sweet and innocent as you are. Love, Mike.

He was 21 or 22 years old when he wrote that. I love that at age he was worried about me.

I love this picture. My hair is horrible, my dress is silly and Mike's chest hair is out of control but the picture is awesome. We look alike, and that always makes me smile.

When I was a Junior in High School I had an accident on Mike's scooter. I flew off the scooter while I was riding it and went over the handle bars, I broke the fall with my face. It was ugly. I broke my nose and my eye socket. I was in bad shape. That was the card that Mike had written and put on the flowers he brought me. I am not one that saved things like this, but when it was from him I did.

These pictures were from my high school graduation. The roses were from Mike. I lost that card. I wish I could remember what it said.
Mike was the kind of brother that when he got his license and I was 10 years old he would let me go places with him. Not always, but sometimes I was able to go to the beach with him, go to the store. Those were my favorite times when it was just the two of us. He taught me how to drive when I turned 15. He let me take my driver's test in his BMW. After I had my license sometimes we would trade cars. I drove a 66 Mustang. I would make sure that my car was always clean and full of gas for him, he would hand over his car filthy dirty and on empty. I would get mad and tell him that it wasn't fair. He would say "Nina, just because it says empty doesn't mean it really is empty, you have miles and miles to go" that little piece of advice got me into trouble several times...

One time in late 1988 he had been living in Hollywood and he wanted to show me around. We went to the movies at The Beverly Center and then we went to dinner at Ed Debevic's. I remeber that night like it was yesterday. In December of 1988 on his birthday he and I went and picked out the family Christmas tree together, it was awesome. I didn't have any idea at the time that it would be his last birthday, his last Christmas. I didn't know how heartbroken I would be the following year. I had no idea that I could ever feel that much pain.
Mike has been gone for 23 years. For the first five years after he died I had a dream about him every single night. Every night. Sometimes they were sad, sometimes they were happy. But every night when I went to sleep I knew I would have a dream about him. He truly was the best brother any girl could ever ask for. He loved me so much and he made sure I knew it. It breaks my heart to think that he never got a chance to be a dad, to be a husband, to see the success that I was sure would one day be his. He had many friends and there are so many others that miss him as I do. None as much as my parents did of course. After Mike died both my parents walked around with a little piece of their hearts gone forever. They were never the same. My dad became more sentimental, more emotional. My mom became harder, more abbrasive and more distant. She didn't want to let anyone too close. I can't imagine what it was like for them. I am just so glad that now they are all together. Sometimes I resent the fact that they all left. Sometimes I hate that I feel like my Dad gave up. I want to scream 'WHAT ABOUT ME!' but I know in my heart that everything happens for a reason and there is a plan for me.

This is Mike and his best friend Kevin a few weeks before Mike passed away.

My kids and my niece and nephew never got to meet Mike. It is so important to me that they get to know him through me and through our brother Danny. I want them to know how funny Mike was, how he loved Danny and I both so much. His famiy was very important to him. He was good to his mother and respected his father. He liked the ladies and he had tons of friends. He partied a little too much but he worked very hard. He was talented and loved music more than anything.

I have no idea what he would be like now at 49 years old. I imagine he would mostly be the same. I guess he would probably still be calling me Chubby. I do know that if he was here we would be celebrating his birthday together.

I miss you Mike Sabella. Happy Birthday.

Love,

Chubby

home.

I have been thinking about posting on here lately. I just haven't known where to start or what to write. Then about 10 minutes ago one of my lifelong best friends and her sister drove by my childhood home and snapped a picture and posted it to my facebook wall. It rocked my world. It instantly had me sobbing.

It's not as if I haven't seen it or driven by it myself since we moved out 22 years ago, but now it's different. I live 3,000 miles away. I have no idea when I will ever see it again.
The memories in this home are countless. It is the very last place that my family was whole. It is the last place I saw my brother Mike. It is the last place I lived before we moved to the desert, 110 miles away. I lived here from the time I was five years old until I was 21. It's not a fancy home, it's not bad either. It's a simple home that a wonderful family lived in.

I learned how to ride my bike right there on that sidewalk. I sat in the living room looking out that front window waiting for my friends to pick me up as a teenager. That window is also where our Christmas tree sat year after year. Those high tension wires behind the house were where my brother, his friends and sometimes my cousin would climb. My girlfriend, (the one who took the picture) and I would sit in that front yard and wait for pizza to be delivered from the cute pizza delivery boys.

I could go on and on, the memories are countless. I love that I lived in the same house for so long. I love that so many of my friends can still drive by that house and remember being there with me. It was the only home they only knew for me. Moving to the other side of the country has made me appreciate the familiarity of home. It has made me realize what I had. I had a comfort zone. Sometimes it makes me sad that my kids won't have that. That we have owned and lived in so many different homes. Now we are renting and we know this more than likely won't be home forever. I hope that my kids remember all the places we have lived. The heart and soul that were in those houses. I hope that they can look at pictures of those homes and get the same feeling I get when I look at this one.
Home. It's a wonderful place, isn't it?

Catching Up

So, wow it's been a while. Over a month since I wrote anything on here or anywhere else really. I think it's just been a really busy month!

At the end of June we went to California (notice that I didn't way we went 'home' even though I still tend to call CA home sometimes I am working on letting go). Chris and I had to go tie up some loose ends and take care of a few things. Allison went with us. Gianna decided she wanted to stay in North Carolina with her cousins since she doesn't like to fly. Leaving her was excruciating, I felt so bad. She cried the morning we flew out and I cried all the way to California basically. By the second day things were much better and we were all good. We were very generously loaned a car by a friend for the week and we stayed with our friends that have also been storing half of our stuff for 7 months... that was one of the 'loose ends' we had to tie up, go through our stuff that was left there and decide what would eventually come to South Carolina, what could be sold and what could be tossed. It was a daunting task but we did it and we both feel so much better now that we have seen our stuff, know whats coming and were able to get rid of ALOT of it!

I had mixed feelings about going. I for sure wasn't ready. For one, we are loving it here so much and I have so been looking forward to summer here that I didn't want to miss any of it. I certainly didn't want to miss any of it to go spend time in the hot desert of Southern California. I hate the heat of the desert. I lived there for the better part of 20 years and never got used to it, never enjoyed it.
I also didn't know how I felt about going back to the place that I couldn't wait to get out of. Not California, but the desert. As we flew over the desert I could look out the window and see everything, I saw Allison's high school (man, that kid loves and misses that school soo much), I could see the streets, the country clubs, all the familiar things that were part of my life for so very long. I knew how happy Allison was to be going there, how she couldn't wait to see Blake, her friends and to go to all of her favorite places. I got it, until almost 8 months ago this was all my kids had ever known. It was their world. I took them from it. We made them give it all up and move all the way across the country to start all over. That's hard. I did my best to keep a stiff upper lip and not think about all the awful things that make me hate the desert so much and to concentrate on the things that happened there that were good. It's hard, I won't lie. I am still resentful and emotional, still not ready to say 'oh man I miss this place'.
The trip ended up going very well. My brother Danny and my niece Sarah picked us up from the airport. That was perfect. We are all very close and being away from them for this long has been hard. Danny and I usually talk at least weekly, sometimes two or three times a week but to see him, to hang out with him and Sarah was so much better than just being on the phone with them.
We spent time with people that we missed so much. Oh, I forgot! One of the highlights of the trip was surprising Chris's parents by having Allison with us! My mother in law's face when she saw her oldest granddaughter get out of the car with me was priceless! I love that she got to see them, but we were all a little sad that Gianna wasn't there too for the surprise.

Allison has had the same two best friends for almost her whole life. Chandler and Miranda. She got to see both of them and Chandler actually flew home with us. It was perfect. She has now been here two weeks and they have had so much fun together.

Aren't they cute? They have been line dancin, gone to our little water park a couple times, been to downtown Greenville a couple times, been to the movies a couple times, church, the Waffle House, they have been knitting things, well shoot I reckon they have just had all sorts of southern fun! Allison has been dying to show her friends her new home, not just the house but the area and Chandler has loved every minute of it.

A week after Chandler got here Gianna's best friend Ashton came with her big sister! It was perfect, both my girls getting to spend time in South Carolina with their two best friends!

They are so cute together too! These two have been friends literally since the day Gianna was born. Ashton is 5 months older and when I was still in the hospital after giving birth to Gianna, Ashton and her parents (who happen to be our really good friends) came to see us. We have a picture of them together in Gianna's little hospital crib. Love that they are still so close.

We had a really good time with the girls. They played games, crafted, baked, we went to a baseball game, drove around and looked at all the beautiful sights of Greenville (oh and there are so many!).

The week flew by and then on Friday the rest of the Mudry family joined the party. We had 12 people staying at our house!! It was like a giant slumber party. It was so unbelievably fun to show them around this town that we have fallen so in love with. We have been waiting to share it with some of our friends and it was just perfect. They loved it, they appreciated it and we all had a great time. 

There we all are, in Downtown Greenville at Falls Park on the Reedy River. Beautiful place, perfect weather, perfect company. What a great day.

In a few days we will have to drive Chandler back to the airport so she can fly back home to her mom and dad who were so awesome and generous to send her to us for two and a half weeks. It will be sad, and I am sure there will be some tears shed. We are all so grateful for the time we have had this summer with people that we have missed so much. The good thing is summer isn't over yet and round two of visitors begins 5 days after Chandler leaves. Allison's other best friend Miranda is coming!! We can't wait to show her around and make her a bonafide southerner!

Have I mentioned how much I love living here? :) Shoot, well just in case you haven't heard... I sure do!

For the love of facebook.

As most people know I am a big fan of facebook. I have gone through periods of being just short of obsessed. Looking back I can honestly say that during the periods of obsession it has mostly been because those were times in my life when I was looking for a distraction and facebook provided it. I don't play computer games, I don't watch much tv, and I certainly don't watch movies... so facebook was where I turned.
Facebook has been good to me. Not facebook itself but my friends on facebook. What an amazing thing that these young guys came up with. The whole social networking idea is genius. The idea that we can become 'friends' with people that we haven't seen or spoken to in ages is wonderful. Or become 'friends' with people you have never even met in person but maybe meet through a friend of a friend or a blog or whatever the case may be... Some people aren't into it, I personally know people that want none of it, they do not want to be in touch with those people. They can't figure out what the big deal is. Why would you want to re-connect with people you obviously didn't find important enough to stay connected with. You know why? Because people change, we grow up. We end up going through similar life journey's and find support in one another along the way.
During the last two years my family has been on a tremendous journey. We have had some major struggles and some serious life changing situations... through it all I had the support of so many. So many amazing friends. I can't even tell you how many people along the way have said to me 'wow, I really wish I would have gotten to know you better in high school, I think we could have been great friends'. In high school we are kids. We are judgemental, we stick with what we know. We don't venture outside our comfort zone. As adults we open ourselves up to 'different' we let our guards down and we hopefully let our insecurities go by the wayside. People that may have intimidated us at 16 are no longer quite as intimidating.
I have a friend on facebook who is going through a very stressful breakup of an abusive relationship. I can imagine she is stressed, sad and lonely. But every day she has been able to log on, post a status and get immediate response/support/love from her 'friends'. People have reached out to her and want to help. How awesome is that?
I know for me personally when things were bad, real bad some of the people that I really thought I could count on, the support that I always thought for sure I would have, it was gone. Several people in my circle didn't get what we were going through. Didn't understand that just getting out of bed in the morning was hard for me most days. Knowing that every day was going to suck was so hard to take. I have never ever said this on here or out loud to anyone but my husband and a couple of really close friends but there were times when I was on the verge of a breakdown and would consider taking my own life. It was bad. It was really bad. I shut down. I lost it. But at the end of the day I would sit down in front of my computer and see all the support and love from these people and things would be a little better. I saw that other people were going through similar situations and I was able to talk to people who didn't judge, who just seemed to 'get' me.
I didn't mean for this post to get so deep, my intentions were to keep it light and upbeat, just make it about sharing the facebook love... but sometimes I start writing and my emotions get the best of me.
I have to also mention how awesome facebook is for business networking. For spreading the word when you are trying to promote something. If it wasn't for facebook I would have only had two sales on etsy! lol. My friends support me and I so appreciate it. I hope that they think the same thing about me. I really hope that I have provided some of the same love and support to some of these people that they have to me.
The bottom line, the moral to this story is.. facebook rocks.

Revelations... and no, not like the book in the Bible, just things I have been thinking about.

************Disclaimer************
To all my friends/family in Southern California please do not take anything in this post personally. Do NOT assume that I am ever speaking of you. This is a post about ME and the way I see things and the way they relate to me. I love each and every one of you and am so unbelievably grateful you are in my life. I do NOT want another situation like I had when I wrote the post 'unsolicited advice' in other words... I don't want to piss you people off. Thanks

I am so happy here. Like stupid happy. Like even if something kind of bad happens I am smiling and happy anyway. I have been trying to put my finger on it. Trying to figure out how one state can be that different from the last and change my whole way of thinking and make me feel so incredibly happy. I think I finally got it.

OK, so this is going to sound crazy but today when I was thinking about all of this Chastity Bono jumped in my head... bear with me here... So you know how Chastity Chaz Bono is all "I was totally born in the wrong body, I was meant to be a man" Well today I related to that. NO, I DO NOT WANT TO BE A MAN. I do, however relate to the whole 'born wrong' situation. See I was born in Southern California. Born, raised and never exposed to anything else. Every single one of my relatives had been from So. Cal so I was never even exposed to other lifestyles/ways of life. All I knew was the way we did things in So. Cal.

Ever since I was a young girl I have never felt like I fit in. When I was in elementary school my friends were all super athletic and active, while I was super uncoordinated and kind of well.. lazy. In middle school my specific group of friends began rebelling a big and doing things that I wasn't interested in. Not to mention the fact that middle school just basically sucks anyway. Then in High School I found a new group of friends and they were all in student council, cheer, or took all honors classes... oh boy NONE of those were me. I loved these girls, I loved all my friends from elementary school and middle school too. No matter how much I loved them or how much time we spent together I never felt like I 'belonged'.

Fast forward to when I was 22 and moved to the desert. I never, ever felt like I belonged there. It was a whole different world. Especially when I first moved there and it was a total retirement community and everyone I met that was my age was a recovering alcoholic/addict. They were all super nice people and I enjoyed hanging out with them, however we didn't have a ton in common.

It's no secret that the last couple years have been hard for me. I have been nothing but candid and honest when telling about our struggles. Not just financial but also how alone I felt and how hard it was to lose my mom. After my mom died last year I really couldn't get out of the desert fast enough. When I look back now I realize that so many bad things happened to me while I lived in the desert that no matter how many great friends I made that the place was always and forever going to hold sad memories for me. Both my parents died there, my dad's twin brother died there and loads of other family things that I choose not to talk about on here happened while I lived there. It really is just a depressing place for me. As a matter of fact when my mom was dying, during her last couple of weeks we talked about where we were going to bury her. She said she wanted to be buried in the desert, I told her absolutely not. I had no intentions of staying there and I didn't want her somewhere I didn't want to be. Unfortunately hind sight is 20/20 because if I would have know then what I know now I would have gone the creepy route and brought her ashes with me across the country. You know why? Because I have decided that I don't think I ever want to go back to California. I have decided that I was born on the wrong coast. I really, truly should have always been a country girl. Not a horse riding/mud slinging/chicken feeding country girl. But a Carolina girl. I was meant to be here. There is not a doubt in my mind that we have ended up exactly where we belong. I am NOT a California girl. I just happened to be born to two people who lived in California. This kind of hit me yesterday when I was on the phone with my nephew (who is the most amazing 17 year old boy I know, just sayin) and I told him that I was trying to win the lottery so I could buy them all plane tickets to come out to visit and he said "well if you won the lottery you could just come home" and in the beginning I would have said the same thing but now, now I say "I AM HOME". My heart belongs here. My family belongs here. I want my brother and his family to move here too... I think this is where they belong too!

The reason I wrote the disclaimer at the beginning of the post is because I don't want anyone to ever feel like I am bad mouthing California... it's a great place, it really is. Ninety five percent of the people I know and love happen to live there and are very happy there. I just wasn't. Either was my husband. My kids were, but I think that is because that was all they knew. The other night we were with our friends at their pool and when we were leaving we got in the truck and Gianna said "this is it, this is home" she went on to tell us that she had just had the best night in her life, that for the first time she felt like she belonged. She was the happiest I have ever seen her. That? well that right there is what I call stupid happy. Even Allison has said to me "mama, well shoot I think I was just born to be a country girl". She has been planning her wedding... yes you read that correct,  my 15 year old daughter who doesn't even have a boyfriend has been planning her wedding... anyway, the whole thing is going to be a regular old country shin dig. She wants it to be in a barn and she wants to wear cowboy boots. Shoot. Y'all have no idea how happy that makes me (not the planning the wedding part, I mean honestly the kid needs to get a life, who plans their wedding at 15).

I just wanted to share my revelation with y'all and explain why I now have a kinship with Chaz Bono... the good news is, I don't have to have any kind of surgery to make my wrong right, I just had to move to South Carolina.

For my Dad.

Over the last year I have written so much about my mom, I have written her letters on here. Talked about her death. Written posts about how much I miss her. Somebody reading might think I didn't have a dad. Oh I did have a dad. The BEST dad in the whole world. A dad who called me 'baby' until he died when I was 23 years old. A dad who loved his kids so much. He was an awesome man who loved his family and his culture with a passion. To look at him one would think he was a 'made' man in some east coast Italian mafia. He wasn't, he just liked to look the part. He had a temper, don't get me wrong but mostly he was a pushover who just wanted things around him to be peaceful. He hated confrontation but admired people who could say something when they felt they had been wronged. He also loved music. Oh how he loved jazz music imparticular. He would listen to a song that he really liked with his eyes closed. He would just get lost in the saxaphone. He could put headphones on and tune the rest of the world out. He passed on his love of music to all of his kids. Mike was the only one that played an instrument but our love of music is still a huge part of our lives. I am so glad that he taught me to appreciate music. I love listening to music that reminds me of my dad. There are so many songs that make me think of him.

Here are some interesting facts about my dad: He was an identical twin and although both his parents came from really big families (20 siblings between them) they only had the twins, some speculate because those two were enough for anyone. I guess they were a handful when they were young. I mean I know my dad was, he himself became a father at 16... yes at the tender age of 16 he and his girlfriend had a baby... my brother Danny.
Have you ever seen the movie 'Hope Floats'? You know the part when Sandra Bullock says 'the daddy did all the hugging' when she is talking about her childhood... well that is my story too. My dad was the nurturer. He was the one who held my hair back when I was getting sick. He rubbed Vick's vapor rub on my chest when I had a cold and couldn't breathe. He was the one I went to when my boyfriend and I broke up and I was heartbroken. My mom wasn't that person at that time in my life, she wanted me to 'get over' things. My dad understood. He took care of me. He was the taxi for me and my friends, driving us to Disneyland, Knotts Berry Farm, the mall... where ever. I was his youngest, his baby.

 By the time he had died he had buried four of his own children and both his parents, his heart was broken and no matter how much he loved me, Danny and my mom he couldn't be here with us anymore. He had to go be with those he lost. The children he lost and missed so much. The parents that were his world for so long. It was a difficult time for so many of us. It hadn't been that long since we had lost my brother Mike and we were all still reeling from that pain. Looking back I wonder if that took some of the focus off of losing my dad. It was still part of our every day conversation, we were still mourning the tragic, sudden loss of my 26 year old brother. We weren't ready to start mourning somebody else... not even my dad.

Tomorrow would be his birthday. He and my Uncle Don would be 76 tomorrow. It's hard to believe. Hard to imagine what they would even look like at that age. My dad died young, we lost him when he was just 57 years old. He only ever met two of his grandchildren, their are three more now. Three more grandchildren that are being taught about their grandpa through pictures and memories. My brother and I are both so good about telling our kids about our father. We both miss him and we both have great memories of him. We are so far apart in age that our own memories of him are so different, he was a different dad to me than he was to Danny, and in a way it's kind of a good thing because we each learn something different about him when we share our stories.

I miss my dad every single day. I think about him every day and sometimes can hear his voice. I look in the mirror and I see him. I look at my brother, and my nephew and I see him. I hope that I do him justice when I tell my kids about him, I hope that they get it, that they know what a truly amazing man he was. I know my two oldest nieces get it, they have memories of him and pictures of him with them when they were young. Those are precious memories that those girls are so glad to have. I can only hope that the rest of the kids get it. Ron Sabella was an awesome father, grandfather, brother, friend, son and husband. Those who knew him loved him.

Happy Birthday Dad. I love you and miss you very much.
Love,
Nina

Dear Mom

Dear Mom,

I can't believe it's been one year since you have been gone. One year ago today you took your last breath. After struggling to breathe for so long. There are so many images from the last couple weeks of your life that will forever be embedded in my brain. I spent the last several weeks that you were alive sleeping on the couch in your room. Those nights are precious memories to me that I will never forget. Time that I will always cherish that we spent together. We laughed, we cried, we bonded. I got the chance to say things to you that I had never said before. I am so glad that the end of your life was spent with me and my family in my home and not in some hospital, you know how much I hate hospitals.

My whole family misses you so much Mom. There is not a day that we don't all make some 'grandma' reference. It is like you are with us all the time. Sometimes I am convinced that you are. Even now, since we moved 3,000 miles away from home and all the sights and sounds are unfamiliar to us we still see, feel and hear you every day. The girls miss their grandma so much. Allison has taken so many of your things and put them in your room. She loves to have your stuff with her, it gives her comfort. Gianna wears your nightgown to bed and talks about you every day. She has also made friends with the 'grandma' that lives behind us, I know she likes to spend time with her because it reminds her of all the time she spent with you alone in your little house. She misses you so much.

The only people in the world that will ever understand what our relationship was like are the four people in my house. The times we had together as a family, as an extended family were/are so precious to me and I will cherish them always.

I don't think I ever said it to you mom, but you were a great mother. You and I had our differences but at the end of the day we always had each other. We went through so much together and lost so many we loved and through it all we were a strong mother/daughter team with a strong bond.

I love you mom and I sure hope that you, Dad and Mike are all together somewhere and enjoying being back together.  (I am almost sure you are and the three of you played a key role in getting my family to this new wonderful place we call home)

Love,
Nina

Couldn't ask for a better situation.

Tomorrow will be one week since we moved to South Carolina. It has been the best week I have had in at least 2, if not 3 years. I have not smiled this much in ages. This is it. This is where we were meant to be.





 When we moved to Virginia 6 months ago we thought we were doing the right thing, we thought it was the right move, we realized fairly early on that it wasn't, but we tried to make the best of it. Little did we know that things could be so much better for us. We struggled making friends and finding our "place" in Virginia. Here, we are already well on our way. We have met so many of our neighbors, I had coffee with my new friend (who also happens to be our awesome real estate agent), we went to dinner with three other couples/families last night... we didn't even do ONE of those things in 5 months in Warrenton.



The girls have started school. That was the only part that hasn't gone as well as we hoped. For Gianna, it wasn't bad but Allison had a little bit of a bumpy start but we are going to see what we can do to make that a better situation.

I have spent the better part of the last week unpacking and getting settled in this house that we are really liking ALOT. We never felt comfortable in the house in Virginia, again we just did we could to make it work. Here are stuff is fitting better and it just feels like home. I took a few pictures, nothing is 100% done but I was too excited so I went ahead and took pictures anyway. I want all of our friends and family in other places (mostly California) to see the place.
Before I post the pictures I have to say that we had no idea that we signed the lease on this house before we ever saw it, we had only seen the pictures that were online, which of course there are never that many. When we got here last Sunday night we were surprised to find so many rooms and closets upstairs. It's great! I didn't take a picture of the living room yet or the master bedroom.... they aren't as finished as I would like, although none of the rooms are!

Oh well here it goes, the 'virtual tour' of our new home...

 


kitchen looking toward the front of the house

 


 


Gianna's room (she just got all of Allison's old bedding and decor, she's thrilled!)

Allison's ridiculously large room... we will be adding wall art and knick knacks soon.





What will be my scrapbook room (very soon)







Office upstairs, it's a mess but you will notice that Chris does have his computer hooked up!

I have been trying to add more photos, but it isn't working so well... so I will leave it at that for now and will add more in my next post. The next time I post pictures I will be sure that things are a little tidier around here!

I really just want to say that change is indeed good. We needed this. Our lives in California were not good. We miss our family and friends so very much but this is going to be a much better place for us. Our time in Virginia was tough at best and I am pretty sure there were a few times where I was on the verge of a nervous breakdown but while we were there we did meet some really great teenagers that were so wonderful to my girl and some great 5th graders that made Gianna feel so welcome. For those things I will always be grateful. Chris and I also each had the opportunity to live closer to one of our best friends from high school. Each of our friends lived about an hour away from us but we still got to see them and got the chance to get to know their families better and spend some much needed time with old friends. Those are the things I will always be grateful for when I think back of our time in Virginia. I will also be thankful for how close it brought our little family. Moving that far and not knowing anyone definitely made for lots of 'family' nights for the Brittons and we are closer than ever.

For those of you who follow/read my other blog (Laughter at the end of the tunnel) I will be updating it soon with pictures of my new scrapbook room and I will share my plans of expanding my little etsy business to selling stuff here in South Carolina.

Thanks for reading!






This time we are really going country!

I don't have a lot of time to write a long post... mostly because I am tired and also because I have so many things going through my mind that I can't possibly get them all out.

Yesterday morning movers showed up at our house in Virginia. Four men got out of one truck and at 9 am they got to work on those boxes and that furniture as if it was nothing. They loaded and got out of there so fast I couldn't believe it. When we moved to VA from California it took 6 guys 11 hours to pack the same amount of stuff so we were expecting a similar experience... not so much. They were done by 3 pm. Leaving us with all the dust, trash and the extra 'where do I pack this?' stuff and an empty house. We finished cleaning the house and we stuffed and shoved all of that extra stuff into Chris's truck and my 4 Runner and we headed out.

I wanted to write this tonight before my memory of the whole experience isn't as clear as it is right now. The feeling of 'it's over' was overwhelming. Knowing that we were moving on and really moving further south, which was what we had hoped for in he first place, felt so awesome. We looked like what my mom liked to call the "Farkle Family". Two cars packed with so much random stuff it was hysterical. I had a shoe rack, clean laundry, dog pillows, about 7 pieces of luggage... the list goes on and on. Oh and a dog and a kid. Chris had Lucky and Gianna and I had Allison and Patches.

We had Kid Rock playing in the cd player in my car and Chris had Garth Brooks playing in his truck. Our caravan began.

We drove and we drove and we drove... from 5:30 to midnight. We didn't stop until we got to Mooresville NC. We found a pet friendly hotel and crashed. I have never been so happy to stay in a cheap hotel in my life. It was great. The beds were comfortable and for the first time in a long time I didn't even worry about hotel cooties or bed bugs. I didn't care. I was moving to South Carolina.

Today we spent the day with Chris's cousin and her family. We are only going to live 107 miles from them when we move. The 6 months we lived in Virginia we didn't have any family nearby. We are so excited to live close to them.

Tomorrow we will drive to our new home in Simpsonville. We haven't seen it yet. Only pictures on the real estate web sites. I have found a real estate agent sent down from the heavens above. She has been so helpful. She has gone above and beyond. We are meeting her tomorrow to get the keys and see the house. I am so excited. I can't stand it. The last two years have been a crazy, stressful time in our lives. It's over, I know it is. I have said it before, but I didn't feel it. This time I feel it. I know it's going to work this tme. I am ready to get my drawl on and become a bonafide southerner.

I will take pictures tomorrow and post them soon.

whirlwind.

I said not too long ago that I didn't plan on blogging here until I had something exciting to write about.

I do!

We are moving.... (I know we just moved 3,000 miles from CA to VA and it sounds crazy but I will explain)

We moved here with every hope and expectation for it to work. We knew that we had to make it work. We did everything we could to make it work.... but sometimes that just isn't enough. I am not going into details... it isn't my place, and after writing this blog for a year I have learned that it isn't always my story to tell and sometimes ALL the details don't need to be shared. All I can say is I am happy, relieved and completely certain that THIS move that we are about to make is a much, much better plan and definitely what we need to be doing.

We found out for sure the move was going to happen on Thursday so we decided on Friday we would take a road trip to South Carolina so that we could see this new area we were going to call home and get an idea of what kind of neighborhood we wanted to be in and check out the area in general. It was a long trip so we made a stop in Mooresville NC to visit Chris's family. He has two Uncles, a cousin (and her big family of 5 kids, herself and her husband) that live there. I have been married for 17 years and I had never met his two cousins in person. It was great. It was all we could have ever hoped for. The kids all hit it off. We were so happy to see them all together finally after all these years. They have all been on facebook together and they have had some communication but this was the first face to face meeting. Boy do my kids love family. They are always so happy to meet any new relatives and when those relatives are close to their age... well then even better!

We stayed the night in NC on Friday night in a hotel... with the dogs. Shut the front door what is this world coming to when the Britton family starts traveling like Paris Hilton. It was all good and with enough doggie xanax they were just wonderful.

Saturday morning we woke up and drove to Greenville, South Carolina. It is only a 2 hour drive from Mooresville NC, which is just a hop skip and jump and it made us all so happy because that means that we can spend holidays and weekends once in a while with Chris's family! I swear my girls were so happy about this part of it that it will make the entire move worth it!

When we pulled into South Carolina our expectations were high, it was almost like we sighed a collective sigh once we crossed over the state line. We loved everything we saw. It felt so different than Virginia and even so different from California. I think it felt exactly like what we were hoping this would feel like when we pulled into Warrenton and it just never has.

After spending the day driving around Greenville, meeting some really nice people, checking out houses and schools we knew for sure that we loved it. So we decided to drive back to Mooresville so that we would be there in the morning to get ready for Easter with the family!

It was a great day. We had so much fun. The dogs even really enjoyed it! The kids had an Easter egg hunt with their cousins, they tossed around a football and spent the day getting to know each other.

Today was also my birthday. A day I always look forward to and always make way too big of a deal out of and then am disappointed when it doesn't turn out great. Their was none of that today. It was a day filled with family, love, hope and excitement.

I look forward to once again sharing my journey. I just know that this time I won't have to hope, pray, and wish at 11:11. This is GOING to be the right move for the Britton family. We are going to make friends, love our jobs and have a great new life!

Missing my mom.

The plan was that I was going to start this new blog and it was going to be happy and we weren't going to talk about death and we weren't going to talk about financial meltdowns... that plan is good, but it's just not realistic all the time. Death is part of life, it's a huge part of my life unfortunately and a very obvious reality. This blog is for those of us who know that as much as I like to have fun, cook, and make things my reality is still here. Every single day (more than ever lately) I wake up and think 'holy crap why is my whole family gone?'. I didn't know it was going to be like this. My dad and my brother have been gone for years. More than enough time for me to come to terms with it and to get used to living without them. Losing my mom has brought it all back. I know right now it's harder because I am so far from "home" so far from where they all were the last time I saw them, the last time we were all together. It's also harder right now because Gianna has been missing her grandma so much.She has come to me almost every day and said something or asked me something about her grandma. I am very lucky that my girls were so close to my mom. So glad that she lived with us for 5 years so she was such an important part of our family. They will both have such great memories of her because of it.
My birthday is in a few weeks and last year on my birthday is when my mom got sick. I wrote about it here. That weekend was the beginning of the end. The end of everything we knew as normal. I spent the next 5 weeks taking care of my mom and healing our relationship too. My mom and I always struggled with our relationship. Now looking back I regret not trying harder. I talked to her best friend the other night and she told me that I have nothing to regret, she tells me that my mom always talked about how good I was to her and how much she loved me. She did, she really did. When I walked into her casita and she saw me she lit up. She was so happy to see me. Nobody will ever love me like that, Nobody will ever light up like that again. My kids and Chris love me but as us mothers know there truly is nothing like the love we have for our children. I was all my mom had. She had buried 3 children and given another one up. I was it. Sometimes the pressure of that was too much for me. Knowing that she depended on me so much for everything was difficult. Trying to raise my children, take care of the house, work full time and be a good wife was more than I could handle. Being there for my mom sometimes took it over the top. I hated the pressure. I resented it. I didn't understand (still don't) why I was the one that was left. How come they all died and I didn't? I will never know. I should be grateful, I know but sometimes it's hard to be grateful without feeling a little guilt too.
It's been almost a year since we lost her and in that year my entire life was turned upside down, It has been the absolute hardest time of my life. The enormity of it all sometimes gets to be too much. Sometimes I want to crawl in a hole and shut everyone out... sometimes I do. The rest of the time I spend with my girls and my husband. I try to enjoy every minute I have with them. Try to make sure that my kids know how much I love them so that when the day comes that I am not here they can look back and know that nobody loves them like their mom.

come on over to my new place...

I have started writing a new blog... I still will update this one occasionally (but only when I have something really exciting to talk about) but the new blog is for sharing recipes, ideas, and if I am being honest to generate some interest in my new etsy store! Hope to see you over there soon.. and while your there, why not become a follower?
Thanks!
Nina

Thank you.

I have done some major self reflection lately. Mostly because I spend 90 % of my time alone so it gives me a lot of time to reflect. When I started this blog I had no idea that I had another brother, I didn't know that within months of starting the blog my mom would die or that in the following months we would lose everything we owned. I have written about all of it. I have shared and aired most of our dirty laundry on here. We have made a very stressful cross country move and I brought anyone reading my blog right along with us. Now I am done. I have come to a decision that I need to start keeping some of the private stuff private and maybe better things will happen for us if I keep my big mouth shut and just let it happen and stop writing/worrying/talking about it.
So many people have been so supportive and have said so many incredible things to me after reading my story, and for that I am forever grateful. Thank you for reading/following/commenting.
I hope that next time I am blogging it will be because we have had some wonderful, major life change and things have completely turned around for us. Until then these lips are sealed.
Thanks again.
xoxo
Nina

Not much going on...

So I felt like I should write a post but I don't really have a whole lot to say! Umm.. Oh, I know! I only have one more class until I am done and am able to test to get my real estate license. That is kind of exciting. Kind of nerve wracking at the same time. The whole test thing totally freaks me out but I am trying to get through it.

Things have been much better for me in Virginia lately. I am appreciating our little town much more. Enjoying the quaint, hill-y roads, the beautiful scenery as the weather has been nicer. It is not nearly as bad as I thought it was when we first got here. I still have yet to make any friends. I swear, I am not kidding not one neighbor has introduced themselves STILL and it has been over 4 months. Whatever. They are dumb. I really do wish I could make friends with some stay at home mom that I could meet at Starbucks and sit and talk to. Oh what I would give to say "hey, what are you guys doing tonight, do you want to come over and have dinner?" I love to entertain and I have been trying so many great new recipes since we have been here and I can't wait for the opportunity to have friends over to try them out. Although, I still hate this house. This house is dumb like the neighbors. That's OK though, it's short term and the term is getting shorter every day! Only 14 months left!

The kids are both doing well in school. I went to Gianna's parent/teacher conference the other day and all of her teachers (except social studies) say she is excelling and doing very well. She has made lots of friends and is really involved. Allison had an awesome report card and has been spending more and more time with friends. All of that makes me happy and so proud of how unbelievably well my girls have adjusted to this whole situation.

None of us feel like we will be here forever or even for too terribly long. Maybe that is what has made it so much more tolerable lately. Knowing that someday we will be somewhere else. I do miss my friends and family from home but we know that we will be visiting in the next month or so and that has helped make it easier too.
My girls and I are renting a booth at the Warrenton Spring Festival. It is a food/crafts/music festival here on our Main St. I am really looking forward to it. All 3 of us have been busy making things to sell. It should be fun. I will post pictures soon of some of the things we have made.
I am also considering posting a few step by step recipes of some of the new things I have been making. I love sharing recipes!

Warrenton Courthouse... where btw Clint Eastwood will be directing a movie this month, starring... Leonardo DiCaprio!

Oh my gosh, I went to court for the two speeding tickets that I got on the same day! Holy cow court here in Warrenton is quite an event. I swear I thought their were hidden cameras somewhere. The people were killing me, the police officers with their super strong southern accent were killing me and the way that they handled things was absolutely hysterical. I wanted to take pictures so bad but any kind of electronic device was strictly prohibited. The funniest part was when the court guy (swear, he didn't have a title... he wasn't a judge, he just kind of decided what you were going to be "charged" with) called a name of some guy that wasn't there and some girl who was waiting to see the "real" judge says out loud and I quote "Oh my gosh, is that Tyler?" to which the non judge guy says "Yep, Jessica, your brother had two tickets and didn't show up today" (mind you this is all going on in a court room filled with about 200 people) and she says "well what should I do?" and he says "well come on down and I will give you his paperwork, I will go ahead and lessen his charges." Hello Mayberry. How unofficial is that? Turns out that the non-judge dude was her daddy's best friend and he is real used to her and her brother coming in the courthouse with traffic issues. The non-judge guy ended up being named Wit. Seriously. Wit. the good news is that Wit was totally cool and knocked my ticket down from going 53 in a 35 to going 43 in a 35. That was nice. Southern charm.

So I think that's about it. Oh Allison is over at a friends house tonight. I think tomorrow they are going mud sledding and fishing. Shut up. For those of you who know Allison you know how funny that is. She is not a tomboy but she is super excited about the whole situation. I am super excited because she does her own laundry... bring on the mud!!

The Crew.

When I was a sophmore in high school I was lost. I was kind of a mess. I had struggled through my freshman year significantly and was trying my best to maintain a passing GPA in 10th grade. The summer before my sophmore year I started dating a boy that I had met in school in 9th grade. He had gone to a different middle school than me and had a whole different group of friends than I did. My friends that I had come to high school with from middle school were starting to veer off in different groups, some had dropped out, some were partying a lot and others had just made new friends. I needed a new group. Dating this boy was the best thing that could have happened to me because it introduced me to a whole new group of people. I don't remember how or when it happened but out of the new people that he introduced me to seven of us girls were drawn together. I think in the beginning it was just two or three of us and then as the school year went on it grew into the seven of us. These girls were my saving grace. They were exactly what I needed. They all knew each other from middle school. I was the only one that went to another middle school. I was kind of the out cast but they never made me feel that way. I connected with these girls immediately. All six of them in different ways.

Over the next 2 years of high school we became even closer. We got our drivers licenses, spent our weekends at the beach and drove inconspicuosly by boys homes. We were coming of age together. We went to our first concerts together, we had sleep over at each others houses and got to know each others families. Our junior year was so much fun and they made me want to be at school. Our senior year was everything high school should be. We went to Palm Springs together for spring break, we double/triple dated at dances, we celebrated holidays together and for graduation we went to Hawaii together. All seven of us in Hawaii. It was great.

When high school ended some of us went our seperate ways. Some of us have stayed in touch the entire time, never letting go of what we had 25 years ago. For whatever reason I am the only one that has stayed in touch with all of the rest of them. There have been hard feelings for various reason within the group over the years, I think that might be inevitable when you have seven girls all together. It makes me sad that some of the girls haven't spoken in so many years.

Yesterday I was chatting with one of them on facebook and she is in a similar situation to mine. She lives out of state, has lost most of her family since high school, married someone not connected in any way to our hometown. She and I have always been very close. I love her like nobody's business and would do anything for her. We were talking about how awesome what we had was. How when you move away and make new friends it is nice, but it's never the same. No matter how many friends I made in the desert, or how many friends I will eventually make here it will never be the same as the friends that knew you when you were young. I can talk about my parents, my brother, my family dynamics all day long but nobody will ever know but those girls that I grew up with. They were there. They loved my parents, they knew my brother and some of them had a crush on him, they were there for me when I broke my face on Mike's scooter. They remember what it was like to walk into my house and see my dad on the loveseat and my mom on the couch watching tv. They were there when Mike died. They saw the heartbreak on my parents faces. They knew how big of a loss it was. There is nothing like that.
Many of us went on to be bridesmaids in each others weddings. Our kids have met or if they haven't met they know about each other. They see pictures and hear the stories. Some of us are growing old together as old friends do.
I don't know how they all feel now, if they share my sentiments and if they realize how special what we had was but I know that even if I don't speak to each of them all the time each and every one of them has a special place in my heart. I will never forget my time with them. I will always be forever grateful for how they helped change my path.