23 years

I cleaned out Big Momma today and gave her a bath. When I wrestled the shop vac out of the tool shed, finally found an extension cord and turned it on a bunch of stuff flew out the back of it. I turned it right back off and a mouse came running out of it. Zoiks! I don't like mice. They give me the creeps. When T got home and took a look at it he discovered a mouse nest inside the vacuum, with babies in it. Ewww. I used the house vac to clean the car.

We had our 23rd wedding anniversary on Monday. I started writing a couple highlights from each year so far. Let's see.

Year One; we rented a duplex in a not so nice area of town and dealt with weird neighbors including one that a bounty hunter was after. The house number was 1012 and T, being dyslexic, sent the water company to 1210 and the electric company to 1120. It's quite funny now but we were getting upset with the utility companies at the time. They kept saying the power is turned on at that address. I also remember playing a lot of games until we got our first used tv that we had to turn the channels with a pliers.

Year Two; we moved out of the duplex and into a small two bedroom house that we rented for $160 a month. Ah, those were the days. Our nephew was born and we bought a blue Toyota pick up truck.

Year Three; for some reason we bought a Pontiac Sunbird turbo. What were we thinking? It had one problem after another and we didn't own it long. We also found out during this year that we were expecting R.

Year Four; we bought our first house and spent a lot of time at the lake with dad's boat. I changed jobs because the day care that I was working at closed up and I went to another day care. I worked up until two days before R was born. I remember putting up the Christmas tree that year while she was taking a nap and the look on her 4 month old face when she saw it. Precious.

Year Five; R was sick a lot, probably because I was still working at the day care and she went with me. She was a good baby anyway.

Year Six; R had tubes put in her ears and I quit working at day care. I got pregnant with A and had blood clots and spent time in the hospital. I learned to give myself shots and A was born a couple months before our 7th anniversary.

Year Seven; A was a beautiful brown-eyed baby whose thick dark baby hair fell out and came back in blond. She was a sweet baby most of the time. R was a precocious three year old. She loved to jump on her bed and I let her because I thought it was funny. I started working three days a week at the day care again and A was sick all the time now.

Year Eight; we sold our house in town and moved into a brand new double wide in the country. We both feel like the years in the double wide were some of our best. We had more discretionary money at that time and we liked the age that our kids were at. I stopped working at the day care and started keeping the baby of a friend of mine. R started taking dance classes and her love for all things Lion King began.

Year Nine; R started kindergarten and A got potty trained so that she could take dance classes too. I told her that I couldn't afford diapers and dance class and she went home and put panties on and that was that. Because I was still keeping my friend's baby A developed a few middle child tendencies. We also took our first trip with the girls to Haiti that year. A was only 2.75 and R was 5. They did fine but we knew we had to stop A's habits of eating off the floor before we went.

Year Ten; the thing I remember most about our 10th anniversary is that I had written a song and sang it at the Bluebird on an open mic night. T wasn't even in town as he was traveling quite a bit on business.

Year Eleven; J was born but we knew nothing about him until several years later. The girls and I took a trip to Haiti with our friend J. M. My cat of 10 1/2 years died while T was on a trip. About a month after a phone conversation with A where she asked T when he was going to come visit us at our house, he got a job where he didn't have to travel.

Year Twelve; A started kindergarten and I stopped keeping my friend's child. During this year I started playing guitar and singing on the praise team at church.

Year Thirteen; we were just enjoying life this year. I was working for friend J. M. making puppets. T and I went to the Bahamas with friends M and D. Loved it!

Year Fourteen; I remember all the hype about Y2K and that it was nothing. That's about all I really remember from this year. Oh wait. We made another trip to Haiti with all four of us, friend J. M., and friend R. C. There's an Immodium AD story that goes with that trip.

Year Fifteen; this year we finally succumbed and bought a mini van. I never wanted one but I loved it so much. This is the one that A ended up calling it "Herbie" because of all it's quirks. But the first trip we took in it was awesome. We went camping with my parents near Gatlinburg and stayed with them in their camper.

Year Sixteen; T changed jobs, we bought some land, sold the double wide and started building. T lost his job just before Christmas that year and we just kept working on the house. We did a lot of the work by ourselves and were thinking that we were working so hard on a house that we wouldn't even be able to keep. Those were hard times but God provided.

Year Seventeen; T got a job, changed jobs and lost the job again, just before Christmas. Two years in a row. This time we knew we could make it and we made a lot of gifts that year. The girls look back at that Christmas as one of their favorites. In Jan. T got a job teaching diversified technology at a high school. The dyslexic, teaching school. His teachers would have flipped out if they'd known he was teaching school. I love it.

Year Eighteen; T got his current job but the thing I remember most from this year was making a trip to WI for Christmas. It was fine while we were there but coming home southern IL and all of KY had a HUGE snow. We struggled through it on horrible roads and then just north of the TN border we came to a standstill. TN was covered in ice. Apparently two semis were trying to get up a hill side by side and they both got stuck. It was about 9 or 10 at night and people started falling asleep while waiting. The girls got down in their sleeping bags and went to sleep, one on each bench seat of the van and T and I had our coats on and their coats on our legs. Neither one of us slept at all. We spent 5 hours like that and vowed never to go to WI in the winter again. We had left from his cousin's house and a trip that should have taken about 6 hours took 15+. When we finally got moving again the road was like a washboard.

Year Nineteen; this was the year that we decided to adopt. Just before Christmas we got matched with J. We got the dossier ready and started THE WAIT.

Year Twenty; R and I along with our friend J. M. made a trip to Haiti and met J in person for the first time. Lots of waiting during this year.

Year Twenty-one; A started high school. Zoiks! The adoption was finalized, T and I made a trip to Haiti and spent Father's Day with J at T's parents. How cool was that? All we had to do was clear MOI, get a passport and a visa. Yeah, right. Our file was eventually declared lost and we began the year long "reconstitution" of the file. Sigh...

Year Twenty-two; R graduated from high school and started college. I spent a month in Haiti with J. Things were difficult here when I got home for several different reasons. J finally came home, R got engaged, JT went to boot camp, R and JT got married just after Christmas (lots of things seem to happen at Christmas, hmm) and that brings us to the present. We're still struggling with some things but the Bible says we are not to be surprised at the trials that we are suffering. We're working on some things and looking forward to see what this year brings.

Thanks for coming along for the look back at time.