The First Day Home

So yesterday I had every intention of telling you all about Holly Elise's first day back home. She is doing well and we are glad that it is. She is happier and healthier looking.

Well other than the fact that she is back to her old self there is not much else to tell. Today she went back to school and it went a lot better than she or I expected. We were very pleased!

WELL I 'm off to bed getting terribly sleepy! Good night!

Some little changes

I'm sure you've noticed the little changes to my blog. I am hoping to help educate as well as entertain! :) Well any way I am a Christian and I am Proud of My God. If you are offended by anything on my blog then please exercise your rights and read on. I do not want to offend but I have the right to post my beliefs on my blog and that is just how I feel .

This post is not directed at those of you whom I know and love, please help your self to my blog and comment on anything you like. I love to see that you have visited me!

Have a good night!

Love, Gidgit

Praying Hard for Louisiana!

Tuba, I hope you and your new wife and dad are getting out of New Orleans! I am praying for you all!

I have a some friends I grew up with there in the Mardi Gras city and I sure am praying they all get through this hurricane safely.

Well I'm on my way out the door, to go get my Elise! I know she is as ready to come home as I am for her too!

I'll let you know how things go.

Decided to stay at home today

So today we decided to stay at home. I have been so totally drained that I haven't gotten much done here at home. We decided to stay home except for the hour and a half that I went to visit Elise. I still have a bit to do this evening before I go to bed and I don't want her to come home to an unmade bed so I'm going to get it made up and do her laundry for her.
Well not much else hope all is going well for you !

Have a good night ... Tomorrow my baby girl comes home! !!!!

One of the Longest Days ever!

It all started at about 7 o'clock this morning. I got up and was still so sleepy I could barely see straight. I waited for the girls to get here and they did about 8:03am. We watched sesame Street, and they decided to start fighting, and fussing and screaming so I decided to put them to bed. So we went to lay down about 9:30 finally dosed off about 10 then Ernie called and woke us up.
We had to get up and get ready so we could go pick him up .
After getting up we came back by the house to drop off some yogurt. Then we were off again, we paid some bills then went to "On The Border" for lunch. The kids meals there are HUGE!
baby M ate almost all of here's and ice cream.
Then off to Sam's Club, Big Kmart and then We went to visit Elise. We had a great visit and she is feeling much better. She is ready to come home but understands why she is there.
Then we came home for a bit and back out again to Super Wal-Mart.
I hate going there!
Well now I'm soaking my feet sitting at my PC and I love it.
So now I'll be off to watch a bit of TV with the hubby!
Goodnight.

Update on Elise

I wanted to pop on and post an update on my Darling Daughter.
She is doing much better today. Last night when I went to see her she was very angry and hurt. She is still having serious depression issues and I am still concerned that we have a very long road in front of us.
I met with her therapist today and we do have a positive outlook. Holly Elise litterally looked like she felt better.

Well I have to put baby M down for a nap... I'll update you again later.

Okay so I went back to visit this evening about 5:30. Holly Elise is doing so good. She participated in her group therapy and is eating more. Yesterday she wouldn't eat and she was so very angry.

I thank you for your prayers. Please keep praying for her as she has a log road.... I think I already said that.lol!

Any way I'll post again tomorrow after Ernie and I visit her. She gets to come home MONDAY! I can't wait I miss my baby girl!

Oh yeah! I almost forgot..... MY MOM IS MOVING OUT!!! YAY!
OKAY TTFN!

Elise

I need prayers! Well acutally Holly Elise does. She has been admitted to the hospital and I cannot go into detail. Just pray for her well being and for her to heal.

Thank you all for your prayers!

Adoption Poetry

THE GIFT OF LIFE

I didn't give you the gift of life,

But in my heart I know

The love I feel is deep and real,

As if it had been so.

For us to have each other

Is like a dream come true!

No, I didn't give you the gift of life,

Life gave me the gift of you.

--Author Unknown

HAND PICKED

I know that a mother's excited

when she sees her baby new and her feelings overwhelm her,

As the waiting days are through.

I had just as much excitement, as I waited patiently,

For the telephone call that would change it all,

When you'd start you life with me.

I have never been disappointed with how you came to be.

For you were specially chosen by God to be in our family.

--Anne Peterson

ADOPTION

with anxious hearts and open arms,

We sought you everywhere.

You, dear child, are a gift from God,

The answer to our prayer.

No matter whether birth or choice,

A home is blessed from above,

When caring parents claim their child,

A family is formed by love.

--Author Unknown

BEFORE YOU MEET THE FAMILY

I've got something yet to say,

I have prayed for you each and every day.

I have prayed for your safety, your happiness and your health.

I've prayed for your blessings, your future and your wealth.

I thank God for your Foster Parents, for loving you as they do.

For keeping you safe and warm, until we come for you.

God has given us a blessing in the form of adoption.

We are just so glad for such a loving option.

--Gidgit Graham

quick note .....

I'll be posting some adoption poetry in the morning!

FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL!

Well it is finally here! The day parents all over the world look forward to after a long hot summer! Today is my daughters first day of 11th grade. A kind of bitter-sweet moment for us here. She is looking forward to it just because this year she gets to tour colleges for the first time, and she will get her class ring this year and in October she will turn 18. I am excited for her and I know that God will use her as a light in the darkness at Street School . She goes to an alternative school that only accepts 90 kids a year and they have a teacher ratio of about 10:1.

Well any way I have a little request for you....Pray for the moms who will be taking a little one to their first day of Kindergarten! Today will be rough on the child as well as the Mommy!
I haven't gotten to experience that first yet but God willing I will be getting to next fall! May God be with you on your first day's of school and if yours has already came and gone I hope it was a good one!
I guess I should go prepare myself for the girls to get here and I have to take Elise to school in a bit. So bible study must be done!
God Bless you all!

Good times!

Today was great! First of all Ernie took me to play minature golf, we played 18 holes and had the best time! We really hadn't done anything like that since after we were first married. Then we went to Olive Garden for lunch and to the dollar movie to watch "Monster-in-law". That was a funny movie!
Then tonight our sunday school class had a gathering and Elise and I went to it. We really had fun. It is always fun for me to get to spend time with other women that are not my mom or aunt. I love getting to know them on a better level.
OH yeah! I almost forgot! We put bunk beds on layaway today! They are solid oak and I am feeling now that things are becoming more real! I am going to have more children. God willing sons. We would like to have two boys at most. I don't have anything against girls but I already have one 17 year old girl and I keep two girls. Ernie really wants a son and I would love to have two little ones.
Well it is beginning to storm and I need to shut down the pc. So I'll be back soon!

God Bless and Keep praying.... .. Oh bye the way please pray for my friend S. She is pregnant and due in 6 weeks i think ... But having contractions and really feeling like she might have the baby sometime soon!

Sometime things get crazy!

Sometimes things get a little crazy in life and we often neglect to see the real value in the people in our lives. For example when a husband feels that his wife never backs him up in an argument with HER mother. You know that If you would just butt out and leave us alone things would be okay fight. He says I feel like you always take her side! The wife cries and says " I'm sorry I didn't realize I did that, I don't know why I do I just do! I can't seem to help myself. All my life I have been watching out for mom!"

You see I too feel this woman's pain for I to am the oldest child of a single mother who desperately did NOT want to be single. So for years she chose men over her children and put them all in danger. I too felt like I had to take up for and protect mom from fates worse than death. And I too find myself having a hard time telling my mother how I feel. I don't know why but for some reason I can't talk to my mother about how I feel toward her butting into my relationship. I know she says that she isn't trying to interfere but somehow it never fails she has gotten right into the middle of it all.
The party I am trying to plan with my daughter..... She just waltzed right in and started telling Elise how important the Commitment Ceremony is and that she needs to just get over her fear of standing in front of people.. And it didn't stop there! She tried to analyze my child and tell her that she just needed to be more mature and get over it because this is a family and they want to be there. Half of them don't even Know we are doing this yet!
Anyway I did have a talk with my daughter about the ceremony and discovered the issue and we decided that we are going to have it just in a different context.

So I've made arraignments for the place (we're having it at our church).
I've discovered a place to buy the things for the Luau, like decorations and now all I have to do is call and talk to the woman who is going to make her cake and we will have it made!

Party Planning

I am in the process of planning a party for Elise's 18th birthday /adoption. We are excited because we are going to have a commitment ceremony to commit ourselves as parents . We have been looking at party stuff for a Luau! I think it will be so much fun! Elise is totally excited. I am going to love planning and decorating for it. We decided to have it the Saturday after her birthday so that if we get a good court date we will be truly getting to celebrate her adoption.

We went to a place called Party America ( which used to be Paper Warehouse), they had like 2 and a half isle's of Luau supplies! I orderd some stuff online and got a better deal, and found some stuff at The Oriental Trading company that we will order to make our party complete.
If anyone has any suggestions on the commitment ceremony please bounce that off me! I need something special for my daughters special day!

Rain Rain.....

The wind started blowing last night about 6pm. It was about 50 miles per hour. Then came the rain. We so needed the rain. My yard was turning brown and the state of Oklahoma had been declared a disaster area due to drought conditions. So we are welcoming the rain and the cloudy day with out 99 degree weather.

We are still preparing for our homestudy to be reviewed by 3 states now. We have about 6 requests for it so I am praying that one of the 6 will be the one God has picked out for us. We are getting prepared for our home to accept up to 2 little boys. I am really hoping to get boys I have always wanted a son and Ernie needs someone to play football with and someone to take fishing and all that guy stuff!

Keep praying for our son(s) as we are praying that God will prepare them and their foster parents, to meet us.Then ultimately for seperation and the journey to us their Forever Family.

You can get an Idea of the children we are looking at by going to
www.adoptuskids.com

go to meet the children and do a critera search for boys 1 year to 10 years . in Lousianna, Kansas & Texas.

Okay well off to church!

Going to Grandms's....

We are going to go to my Grandparents tonight and spend the night. This isn't something we do on a regular basis but I get to missing my Grandmother sometimes and want to go visit. Anyway we used to live about a mile from them and now we live like 50 miles away, and since we don't have to work tomorrow we dicided to spend the night and enjoy our visit. So today Elise and I have to get the house in order and a change of clothes packed and I have to make sure the Rabbit is taken care of so that my mom doesn't feel like she has bother with her.

Speaking of the rabbit... her name is Lilo and she is an American Short haired Black rabbit. Ernie got outside yesterday and built an addition to her already custom made cage. He added a third story and it had solid wood sides. Lilo seems to really like it because she is laying in the middle level ( that is where he added the wood) just chillin'! Well kind of ,,, it is hot outside and I have a fan pointed at her cage because she was used to being in the house.

I decided that she couldn't live in the house anymore because there just wasn't room in the living room for the rabbit and my desk. Since we moved we lost one room on the house and with my mom living here it has been a bit crowded. But Lord willing she will be moving before October 1st. and we won't have to worry about it. So anyway I called the Adoption agency today and my Case worker is swamped, today is her first day back after a 10 day vacation, so I was asked to call her back. So I guess I can do that..

Well I guess my brian is finished so I'll be back sometime tomorrow and let you know how the visit went!

Bye Bye Birdie

I have been sitting here surfing the net and my mother is watching an old movie called Bye Bye Birdie. I have only seen it once and it is a little cheesy. There are classic teenage dramas as well as single life, with the occasional musical score.

So anyway I decided that since no one contacted us from our Sunday School Class after a 3 week absence,that I would go to our church's outreach program. I enjoy writing cards to people so it is going to be fun for me. I hope to encourage others in my class to join me so we can go visiting prospects and people who haven't been in a while...
Well this is a short one!!

TTFN!:)

We went to church today, and I have a friend in my sunday school class who is a Creative Memories Consultant. She and I were talking about me making a book to send to our child when we find out who he or she is. So tonight she brought me a book that gives you ideas on how to create this book and albums for Elise and the other new addition to our family. So I have been looking at these books and deciding what I want and how much I can spend. I have to be careful on what I buy right now because I have to paint the bedroom and the bathroom so I can really use the extra cash.

So there is the poem in the book i wanted to share..

Our Family Tree

We've added to our family tree

A stronger one to make, A child

from another plant has

Become our new namesake.

Just as a limb is grafted from one

tree onto another,

It alters and improves the plant

Making it unique and like no other.

Our family tree has been improved,

Adoption made this so. For love,

much more thatn bloodlines,

Is what makes us thrive and grow.

We chose to share our life and

love and all the joys to come.

Our "family tree" has blossomed

With the arrival of our sherished one.

--Author Unknown

HOT!

Man is it hot here in Oklahoma! I got up at 6am and opened the garage up to move things out to the yard to get ready for the yard sale. Elise and I worked for 45 minutes straight getting things out of boxes and setting up tables to put items on. We did pretty well I sold some of the big items I needed to get rid of and well I was glad to get rid of them because I need the space in the garage. So about 2:15 I decided to pack it up because it is now about 100 outside and I HATE being hot . It took 3 of us to put it all back in the garage!

I had a pretty exciting morning however... We were sitting out there and this truck speeds up and stops in front of our neighbors house. The driver he jumps out and starts Cursing and screaming at the two women who live there. A young woman under 25 I would say and her mother and two small children. The mother screamed for someone to call the cops so I did! The 911 operator could hear the man screaming and it still took the cops almost 10 minutes to get there. It was rather stupid... The first cop that shows up was a woman and she cuffed the guy and stood him against a tree and then proceeded to talk to the women.... Well it ended up having 3 cops and the guy still didn't go to jail!

Well that was my drama for the day .... There was a little bit more but I probably shouldn't share it at this point.....

Good day!

This is a really bad pic of me! but what the hay... here it is anyway! 

Today

Today I visited a site that really touched my heart...... it was called Emty Arms... It told of one couples journey through the life of infertility. I cried as I watched the presentation. It was very moving.

I have been trying to keep an adoption journal and well from looking at my blog you can tell i'm a lousy journaler! In 2003 when we first started the adoption process I journaled all the time. I wrote letters to my child(ren) and I kept it put away because I really don't want anyone reading it. I feel like the only person who will really understand it is me. I mean It is my heart and soul on paper. I want to be able to someday allow my children to read it and some day I pray that they won't think i was crazy when i did write it. There were day's when I was writing that I look back on now and feel like maybe deep down i was writing to keep from going crazy.
Now I am still on the verge of a major breakdown someday's but not as much ... I think I had resolved myself to the fact that I was never going to be a mother and that because we kept running against obstacles that God was telling us we were going in the wrong way... I still am not sure that we are completely going the right way but I have been praying daily that God will allow it to continue if this is his will...
OKAY THIS IS SO COOL!!!!!!!
I JUST CALLED THE PLACE WHERE ERNIE GOT HIS PHYSICAL FOR WORK .... THEY ARE ONLY GOING TO CHARGE $33.00 FOR A PHYSICAL FOR ME! THAT IS AN ANSWER TO PRAYER!

Well I have to go the oldest little girl I keep is having really bad muscle spasms in her leg and I need to find something to take care of it.

And the World Did Not Come To an End!

I felt so utterly miserable on Monday.... I really tried to get depressed! I don't know why but I guess I wanted to feel that way.... I was sad but by yesterday morning I was feeling much better..

I Guess that was God's way of letting me know that He is truly in control. I amended my child search list and chatted with my best friend S.

When S came over yesterday evening I was feeling so much better and I was totally happy to get to spend time with her! We have known each other since we were 13 and we were born 9 hours apart.

Anyway she took Elise home with her for the night and that gave Ernie and I time to just hang out and talk and be alone for a bit. I'm always glad for that..

And the world did not come to an end! Even though I tried to make it seem that way to myself it did not! I Know that God has the perfect child out there for us and hopefully soon He will send him/her.

So today Ernie is getting his physical,and is going to find out how much it will cost for mine. Monday Elise gets hers and we will be finished with the on paper stuff that needed to be updated for our homestudy.

Then all we have to do is install smoke detectors, a CO2 detector and hang the fire extinguisher.

I have to paint the bathroom and fix the window in the bathroom but that is just something cosmetic not on the list for the adoption. I just have to do it for me!

well enough rambling, God bless and keep us in your prayers!

Love, Me!

NO MATCH

No match..... I never thought I'd say those words.
I received notice that another family accepted the little boy we got the call about last week before they even called us! Human error... The secretary who called us didn't know he had a successful match with another family.
I feel that God allowed that call to come to us for a reason ... I think it was to tell us to get things in gear and get this house ready for a child. We are going on with it and not delaying any longer! I am going to get the physicals taken care of and we are going to adopt! I want another child. Elise is getting older and I really want a younger sibling for her--- mostly for me:)LOL...
I do pray that God will bless the family that was matched with him. I am always wondering what our child will be like... I know God's will is perfect and God's timing is perfect, I just am so ready for my family to grow. !

I am going to start reading the book of Proverbs.... 1 chapter a day for 31 days. It will be a great start to parent hood!

Also I have got to start my journal all over again but it will be worth it!
Please keep us in your prayers.. even though we have had this disappointment in the long run I will be a mother and God will bless my home with all the kids I can handle!