Sparkle

This past weekend my best girlfriends and I went to see the new Sex and the City 2 movie. It was really nice to go out to dinner with just the girls and talk about girl stuff. From babies, to men, to sex, to work, to families and everything in between. It is one of the things I miss the most about living on the other side of Washington State, away from all my girls. It was absolutely the perfect 'girls night'!

But while we were watching the movie, Carrie kept talking about the "sparkle" and thinking that her and Big had lost it. Starting with the staying in every night, to having a TV in the bedroom. And it all leads to Big suggesting that they take 2 days off each week. Now not 2 days to go be with other men or women, but to do what they wanted to do away from the other. Like for Big it would be lounging around and watching TV all day long. And for Carrie it might be going out to dinner and shopping with the girls, or working on her next book.

The movie made me think...What does it mean to loose your sparkle? What does it mean if you loose your sparkle? How do you keep your sparkle alive even after 5 or 10 or 20 years?

I've heard of people who feel like the sparkle is gone and their relationship with their husband or wife is more of a friendship then a romance. Should dates stop as soon as you get married? Or within the first years of marriage? Or should they continue to be as important as they were when you first meet? Should sex be looked at differently? Should it just be something to make babies or should it be something done for enjoyment and pleasure and togetherness?

I can tell you what I think about each of these questions, but I would hope those who know me already know the answer. But what do you do if your husband or wife thinks differently? Its amazing how differently two people in a relations can feel about the questions above. And I know that sometimes you might think one thing but because of schedules and routines something completely different happens.

So, to all of you out there...what do you think? How do you keep the sparkle alive? Candles and a romantic dinner? Date nights? Vacations? Love letters? Flowers on a random day? I would really love to know.

Favorite quote.

So I think I have just found a new favorite quote. A friend of mine is having a difficult time with the illness of her grandmother and someone posted the quote on her facebook page. I love it.

"Beautiful pictures are developed in a dark room...So if you see darkness in your life, know that a beautiful picture is being developed by God"

What a great way to look at things. The cup is always full, right?

To adopt or not to adopt.

Today, my best friend Ami found out she was having a little girl. I am so excited for her. And I know with all my heart she will be a great mother. I am so supper excited for her.

It does though, make me think. Makes me think if it will ever happen for us. Or how much it will take. If it will happen on our own, or if we will have to see a fertility specialist.

And then you have the commercial. Three times today when I was getting into my car I heard a commercial for fertility help and it makes me wonder if it is a sign and if I should look up the website if even just to see what they have to offer.

Jake and I did talk again about adoption tonight at dinner. It started with Jake saying something about how you can pay so much for fertility treatments, tens of thousands of dollars, and for years and years with no guaranteed results. So I mentioned that lots of couples adopt because they cant get pregnant and then end up having one of their own naturally. I'm sure stress and the pressure we put on ourselves has a lot to do with it.

I found out tonight that Jake is afraid that if we adopt and then have one or more of our own that the adopted child will not feel the same as our biological child. Almost like the didn't belong. I can totally see how this could happen (not that I feel that way at all,) but couldn't it happen if we had 2 adopted children? Or even if we had all biological children?

Food for thought I guess. I do know that I will go to the website from the commercials and see what they offer.

A little photography fun

Here are some pictures I took from our trip this past weekend. Jake and I, along with my parents went down to Canon Beach for a very short time. Drove down Saturday, and turn around and drive home Sunday afternoon. It was no where near a long enough trip but we enjoyed the whole time. And we cant wait to go back! We are going to try to make it down to Cannon Beach, stay at the Tolovana Beach Hotel again, in August around Jake's 29th birthday.

I took this on our drive down, me in my cowboy boots!

A flying kite. I love how it looks like its right by the sun!
A little bird trying to find something to eat in the rising tide.
The result of maybe 4 or 5 tries by my Dad to get a picture of Jake and I.

Poor Jake :O)

I love this picture of my Mom! Such a beautiful evening.

My mom and I got up early and went for a walk on the beach.

We got to Haystack Rock and got sidetracked. There was so much marine life!

I guess this little guy is at the bottom of the food chain so to speak.

And this guy is at the top. One of the volunteers was telling us that the greenish one is very aggressive and will attack a finger if it gets to close!

It was really really hard not to step on a living creature walking around the rocks.

They were all over the place.

So many starfish!

Its a little hard to see in this picture but there are birds, maybe 15 of them

that flew from the other side of Haystack Rock. It was really cool to see!

Tolovana Beach!

Hope to visit again, we had a lot of fun!!!

Poor Jake, he gets his picture taken A LOT :O)

Just a random tulip I found while walking around town.

All in all we had a GREAT weekend! It was nice to get away from town, even if it was for only one night. I really hope that we will be able to go back and visit in August.

My own reminder

Love is patient and kind, it is never jealous, love is never boastful or conceited, it is never rude or selfish, it does not take offence, nor is it resentful. Love takes no pleasure in others’ sins but delights in the truth; it is always ready to excuse, to trust, to hope and to endure whatever comes. ~Corinthians 13: 4-8

So here is my newest tattoo, courtesy of Skinny Boy Tattoo in Post Falls, and my every day reminder that Love is patient. And Love is kind.

Photos as promised

My husband Jake and I have been very busy over the last few weeks. We got our first BBQ, a Wii and Wii fit, started removing rocks from the front yard, and I planted my garden. Here are some pictures from our last few weeks...

We were both very excited have a BBQ of our very own and we use it ALL the time now.

Jake taking the Wii our of the box. We had talked about getting a Wii of and on for a long time now. I was tanning one day, just down the mall from Target and said "What the heck, we deserve it!" Walked into Target and bought a Wii and Wii fit. Rather then just walking in the door with it I put it on the floor on the passenger side of my car, and put a card on the seat thanking Jake for being such a great husband and telling him that I loved him. A little later, when Jake was in the kitchen, I asked him to get my purse out of the car. It was on the floor of the passenger side :O) ... He was excited!

I have wanted to take all these rocks out of the area in front of our house so we can re-landscape it for a really long time. Last Friday I got home and Jake had started it.

The before, or well after the first day of Jake working on it by himself.

Ok, so for the record...Jake got a shovel and I got my hands. After working for two days my bum and legs were VERE sore. I swear that the person who decided putting rocks in with plants either wasn't very smart, or knew they were not going to be the ones to remove them. What a pain this has been!!

Jake proving he can win a fight with a root. There are some big, long roots from all the shrubs and bushes in this little area.

Our progress for Day 2. There have been a lot of rocks moved so far...but we still have a lot to go.

Day 3: Cutting down shrub number one. Until Jake cut into it we were feeling really bad we were cutting down a healthy tree. But, as you can tell, the tree is sick and probably dying.

Jake got the tree down, I moved some more rocks and talked to our neighbor. Good work babe!

Garden update: I had to buy all new plants because the seedlings all died. I planted these on Monday.

There are all kinds of plans in here, probably too many but I'm sure some will not make it. We have raspberries, tomatos, corn, peas, strawberries, cabbage, lettuce, carrots, cucumber, squash, and I'm sure more things I can't remember right now.

Fingers crossed they live!!

Well...told you we have been busy lately. We wont get to do any work in the yard this weekend as we are going to a cousin of mine's 40th Birthday Bash and then to the Oregon Beach for a day. I'm sure I will have more pictures to post after the weekend. Oooooh, and I still have to post a picture of my newest tattoo. Maybe a later post.

What a beautiful day!

I am so glad spring is actually decided to show up, at the right time, and hang out. Today started with a bang...not enough sleep, the cats being poops (for lack of a better word) and needing to clean the house.

I was woken up at a little after 7am by Miss Bella who thought it was fun to play in the blinds and when I couldn't go back to sleep I went to the living room to watch some TV. Usually Bella would calm down and I would be able to fall back to sleep...not today. Every time my eyes would get heavy she would start to cry. Now those of you with no cats, cats can cry. And oh man does Bella do a good one! Anyway, about 9:30 or so Jake woke up and the day had to start.

A little later Jake and I got in a STUPID fight about cleaning and hung out at separate ends of the house for a little while to cool off. After the fight, and scrubbing the kitchen floor on my hands and knees, I decided it was way to nice to be inside. Being that I had just thrown a fit that the house was so dirty and I wanted a GOOD clean, not a 'boy' clean, it was a little hard to tell Jake I wanted to go out side and stop cleaning. But I did and I'm sure he thought I was crazy, or just PMSing :O)

After checking the weather, figuring out tomorrow would be a better day to be inside we got dressed and left the house. We went to lunch, talked about our 10 year high school reunions that are this summer...I know, 10 years already? How? Where did time go? After lunch we went on a little bit of a shopping spree to Fred Meyer, Ross, Kohl's and last but not least Home Depot. We got a lot of really good deals and some great things for the house. We got towel hangers for the bathroom doors so we can take the racks off the walls and put in some cabinets. I'll post some pictures when Jake gets it put together and on the wall. I'm very excited to have some place to keep all of my make-up so it doesn't have to sit on the counter!

After we got home Jake went to the gym and I decided to move some of the rocks in our front yard being that it was so nice and sunny outside. Whoever thought it was a good idea to put rocks in a garden area was just CRAZY! And they are not even pretty rocks to boot. They are plain ol' river rock. And let me tell you, it is a pain in the a$$ to get them out of the dirt! Jake got home and some how I convinced him to help me. So he used the shovel and I continued filling the 5 gallon bucket. We actually made a lot of progress, I'm actually surprised how much we got done. I can not wait to get the top soil, the extra from the raised garden bed, down so we can start planting some flowers and making the area look really nice! I will post some pictures of this later too.

So all in all it was a good day! I hope we have more days like this.

Hurt feelers!

In the last post I mentioned that both my brother and I were adopted, right? Well our adoptions couldn't have turned out more different. Mine was completely closed and my brother's, Stephen, was a little more open. My parents (Madora and Jerry) only knew that there were no complications during the pregnancy and my birth. But other then that, nothing.And to this day I have no idea, nor do I have any desire to, know their names. Now Stephen's on the other hand, my parents were picked by his biological parents and even meet them I think.

Over the years his bio's sent a Christmas card each year but otherwise had no contact. Apparently when my brother was younger he asked my mom what his bio parents names were and he remembered their name for probably 15 years. After his 18th birthday he looked up their name in the phonebook...and they were still together and the actually still lived in the area. Now most people go through the adoption agency but not my brother. He picked up the phone and called them. When his bio father picked up the phone he said "Dad? This is your son."

They are amazing people and have a great family to boot. But...sometimes it feels like they are more important to him then we are. He always spends time with us for holidays but I sometimes feel like we are 2nd on the totem pole. Like we can't get our family holiday time done fast enough. When my husband and I go back to our home town for a visit, unless its a holiday, it seems like we never get to see him. He is always doing something with them.

And I do realize that this all sounds kind of self centered but this really hurts my feelings. I feel left out of his life all the time. And I know every relationship is a two way street and I'm sure I don't do everything I can to keep the lines of communication open. Most of the time I, when I think about calling him, I don't because my feelings are hurt for one reason or another.

Both of us look at our parents differently, or so it seems. I feel that my parents are my parents. Anyone can create life but it takes a whole lot of love, work, and faith to raise a family. My parents are my REAL parents. They might not be biological but they are my parents and I would not change anything about that. I love them very much and I believe they gave me the best childhood any one could ask for.

Mom and Dad...thank you for all you have done for me. I am very thankful for all you have sacrificed. And to my brother...remember that we are still part of your family. And we like spending time with you!

Wonders.

I've been doing a lot of thinking lately. From what to do about work, going back to school, to our garden and landscaping, to starting a family.

As I've said in previous posts, we were not trying to get pregnant during the 2009-10 basketball season. It seemed like the perfect time for a 'break' and so we didn't try from November to March. I thought it would be hard to not think about getting pregnant. That it would be hard not to automatically count the days in my cycle. To not freak out if I was late a day or two. But, to be completely honest, it was easy. Well, as easy as it could be. There was a month that I was sure it had happened. Being 13 days late would do that to even the sanest person. But alas we still are not.

This month is our first month trying again, and thus in turn makes it 26 months that we have been trying to conceive. I'm not getting my hopes up because as history has shown, the odds are against us. So only time will tell. My fingers are still crossed that this will be the month and we will not have to wait any longer. I can not wait to count down the weeks and days that our baby would arrive. And, despite Jake's wishes, post those adorable pictures of the ever growing baby belly each week!

One of the things I have also been thinking about is adoption. I was adopted, along with my little brother and a cousin of mine. And actually, another cousin of mine is in the process of adopting a little girl from Rwanda. I am very open to adoption and would love to give a little boy or girl a happy, loving home where they could learn and grow into amazing people.

I have also done a lot of blog reading of families who have made the decision to adopt and brought their new little one home in just a little over a year. I know that is not always the case, and sometimes it takes a really long time to make a match. But when I look back at all the months we have tried I wonder if we should find an agency, get the paperwork filled out and see what happens. And you know, they say that couples who can't get pregnant adopt and then get pregnant with their own :O)

Now, here is the hard part...getting my husband to be okay with starting the process. I completely understand wanting to have our first child be our own, but it would not makes us love the children any less no matter what order they were born. And having our own has proven to be a little difficult.

I pray each and every night for the strength to understand and accept what happens. And I hope we are able to start a family soon. I might go crazy if we can't.