A&MD Ranch

Answers to the "Speechless-ness"

2011-02-22T03:01:00.001-06:00

So I just got done reading everyone's comments from my post yesterday "Even I Was Speechless", and thought I should say a couple more things. That post was SO long I didn't want these points to get lost in all of those words!

OH trust me she will NEVER get close to my child again! Me I usually have no problem telling someone off! The Hubby..well he likes to just be civil and avoid the situation in the future. As for me with this situation I cannot express enough just how shocked I was and really I didn't even know what to say. We did exchange some heated words and I do NOT have any of her things! Praise the Lord! We made sure to put it at her car while she was at the rodeo so she has no more ties to us.

I honestly just do not have an answer as to why I was kind enough to not tell her off...It really has me baffled and annoyed because I have never found myself in this situation, I have always spoke my mind but I really got a BAD vibe in the sense that it could just make things worse if I did.

Also I too was proud of my girl for standing her ground but I did not want TW to have anymore reasons to tell me why my child needs discipline.

And honestly in regard to her daughter JP I had no ill feelings towards her, DD didn't mind working with her. I felt so very sorry for her when I listened to the million other things her mother said she'd done to JP when she was *bad*. It wasn't until she made the comment about if we took this horse her mom wanted us to take and she "caught DD pulling on the horses mouth she'd yank her off that horse" that I realized she had this look in her eye that was not right and I pretty much felt like *oh great she's just like her momma, poor girl*!! It has been severely haunting me that maybe I should be alerting someone of this woman's abuse on her children.

UGHH friends I just am sick over the whole thing! But it is done, again I say she will NEVER get close to my child again. Unfortunately we will see them and probably often because they run in some of the same circuits but I fully intend on putting her in her place if she comes near us!

And DD has improved so much this rodeo season! But for all that she's improved she's kind of getting overwhelmed with all of the basic things and when she has a mess up in a run it is due to forgetting a key point in her run. So my original plan was to have Little Miss Sweetness (Bloggy friend P's daughter) work with her and I am sticking with that plan! We are hoping to get together one night this week and then hopefully at least once a week after. They live about an hour from us so with the still somewhat shorter daylight hours it'll be a challenge but we'll figure it out. DD is very excited about this as she loves both P and Little Miss Sweetness!

Thank you friends for the words of encouragement and validating that my girls reaction was spot on. Oh the wisdom of a child...Sometimes we as adults have to remember that a child can see things we may not catch right off the bat!

Even I Was Speechless!

2011-02-21T03:27:00.000-06:00

This just might be my LONGEST post EVER!! It was a BAD deal LOL!!

So I'm back...again...Rodeo season...Busy time! We just finished off finals tonight at the Winter circuit DD runs in and boy I am EXHAUSTED!! But even in my exhaustion I just have to share this with you all. As most of you know it is not typical to find me speechless or quiet about something that is bothering me and boy let me tell ya...I am speechless! Let me start from the beginning, last Wednesday.

Wednesday afternoon the Hubby calls and says our friend Cowboy S is taking his kiddo's over to a local indoor arena to practice for finals and thought we should come too. So Sis and I get the trailer hooked up and the horse loaded ready to bolt when Daddy gets home, we were running about an hour behind our friend but we had the arena for the evening so no big deal! We get to the arena and there is a lady there who is *coaching* Cowboy S's daughter on poles. I thought this to be a bit strange because lil T doesn't need any coaching, she's pretty well trained in all of her events but I just figured that Cowboy S decided to bring in another voice...So this lady (we'll call her TW) has a teenage daughter with her and I soon realize that I have seen this girl at the rodeo over the Winter. She stands out to me because she absolutely does not look like a horse person *I know I'm labeling* but she just looks like this super quiet and timid girl but having seen her rodeo I know she is not timid at all. So withing a few minutes TW starts talking to the Hubby and I while DD is doing her warm ups with Krissy. I'm not even sure how all this came about but within 5 minutes of talking to TW she starts saying she doesn't like DD's saddle. She needs to ride in this other saddle that she has in her trailer and she then basically tells DD to follow her out to her trailer so she can switch saddles?! So off we go and I was thinking to myself *well maybe she is wanting to sell this saddle and I am needing to get DD a new saddle because if she grows another inch her legs will be to long as she's already on the last hole! So TW pulls out this saddle and it's a pretty nice Billy Cook barrel saddle that has a deeper seat then DD's does. Then TW says "hey just take the saddle and have DD run the finals with it, I think she'll do better in this saddle", so we go back in and DD goes to trot the pole pattern and TW starts telling her exactly what she is going to do when she goes...Like she's never run the pattern in her life...?

So I just kind of let her talk to DD and thought well maybe she can help her in some areas that we've been having some troubles with. TW comes back over to me and proceeds to tell me that her daughter (we'll call her JP) has run a 19 second poles at the rodeo we've been running in and I'm thinking in my mind I don't ever remember her running this 19 seconds but whatever. She then goes on to tell DD that she IS NOT to be loping her horse when she is warming up, she's to ONLY do that at home when she is practicing so the Hubby pipes in and says "this is HOME practice for her" but again whatever...Then we get into talking about all the WRONG things DD is doing...And according to TW pretty much everything she does in wrong...She is NOT to kick her horse when she's running home, she's NOT to use her reins when weaving the poles; legs only hands still...My thought is she needs to be lifting inside hand slightly to her pocket...But no that's wrong! OH and we'll be taking her spurs away soon!! Oh and our saddle pad, all wrong! We need to go to this certain store and buy this certain saddle pad that they sell...HMMM...Well that is exactly the pad she had on her horse FROM that store LOL! So when we say that she says "OH well get a thicker one then"! "And um why are we running her in the bit we are"?! And on and on!

We then decided to put the barrels out and immediately TW starts bossing DD around about what she's to be doing during the barrels and how to do this and that! OMG lady! DD has a very short tolerance for people who are overbearing, dominating, bossy, loud...But JP (the daughter) went out to the barrels with her and DD didn't mind that so much so they worked for a few minutes and then they start talking about how they want to help DD and "train" her. Mind you she doesn't really give you the option to say no she just pretty much tells you what you are doing?! I was so baffled! But even I was speechless! SO the Hubby said well we'd be back to the arena Thursday night and they said "oh they would love to come back and work with her". We left shortly after that and asked DD what she thought of the lady and she basically said she did kind of like the daughter JP but wasn't so sure about the mom.

I then had the Hubby call our friend Cowboy S and find out if he'd asked her to come and he says "NO she just showed up there and started bossing lil T around" LOL!! He didn't know her from Adam! OH crap is what we were thinking! But we went back on Thursday and they were there waiting on us. JP takes DD and shows her a "proper warm up" as her mom views...No 10 minutes walking, 10 minutes trotting, and *if* in an arena with soft footing then a few minutes of loping. NOPE she has to walk her around for a couple of minutes and get right into work. (Of course before all of this we agree on stretching the horse and flexing).

Basically TW then starts barking orders at DD and she isn't liking this lady's mannerism's at ALL! I could tell that she was getting very annoyed but again thought maybe just maybe she'd have something of value to offer. But basically she just wants to stand there and tell us that she "knows everything about training people to run barrels and poles but she will NOT get on a horse"...Say what?! You know everything but you won't ride?! She stated to me something about an accident she'd had decades ago and she is forever never riding a speed horse again, she will only get on a grandpa styled horse. But back to her MASSIVE amounts of knowledge, all gained from the multiple barrel clinics she has taken her daughter to, probably "$10,000 worth of clinics"... Oh and by the way sometime in here she has mentioned that there are a lot of people who "dislike her" because she will tell them what they are doing wrong on their horses...Even the fastest runners there...UM OK...She also told me if I was friends with this one certain lady then SHE could not be my friend! If only I'd known how bad this was going to get I would have pretended to know the lady she was speaking of LOL!!! So they move onto working poles and she starts again talking like DD has never run them in her life, I can't tell you how many times we told her that DD's been rodeo'n for years! And yes still *learning* to ride this horse that we bought last April.

I could tell within a few minutes in that DD was getting frustrated but daddy and I just kept telling her to push on. Finally TW tells her to walk around the arena with her hands on her saddle and she's NOT allowed to touch the reins, she must use only her legs. Which I thought was a good lesson, DD definitely needs lighter hands so this exercise I thought could help. DD was doing fairly well with this until Krissy walked up to the gate and wouldn't respond to leg to move out so DD reached down and grabbed her reins and pulled Krissy to the side with a little more than light hands. It was more like an instinctive act to back her quickly out of the bind but she did pull a bit to hard and TW looks at me and says "do you hit her", I say "HUH"?! She says "smack her for her attitude, cause if that was my daughter I'd of yanked her off that horse by her hair and thrown her on the ground and ask her if she liked that"! Then she proceeds to tell me that she's done just that to JP when she was 4 years old the first time! I just looked at her and said "I'm not afraid to discipline my daughter when she does something wrong, she knows"! So then she turns to my Hubby and says "I expect you to pull her hair tonight and if you don't the next time I see you I'm going to kick you in the balls"!!! DD comes up then and TW says to her "Do you ride bareback"? DD says "no not with Krissy, I did with my old horse though" TW says "well your going to, that's going to be one of the things you will be doing" DD says "I do NOT and I will NOT ride her bareback"!!! Mind you this statement was made simply because DD was feeling railroaded by TW, we have talked about riding bareback and we quite frankly haven't had the time!! And yes I did tell her she must not speak like that to an adult or *else*! Finally I just told DD lets load up, and of course TW wanted us to borrow this saddle for the weekend and we MUST have the matching bridle because she CANNOT stand mismatched things. "So can one of us stop by Friday to get it"?! Hubby says sure he can do it.

After we loaded up in the truck DD starts SOBBING and I'm like "Child what is your deal"!! She then goes on to tell us that TW had told her when she was over talking to her at one point that she had to give up EVERYTHING else that she loves like dance, cheerleading, soccer, because there is NO room for anything else! Which is exactly what she told me she made her daughter do, she had to give up track because she has to ride 5 horses a day!

Then Friday afternoon Hubby calls me after he leaves their house and says "oh boy, I walked into a war path"! When he got there JP was zooming off on her horse and calls her mom and "F...ing B"! Then TW and her husband are screaming at one another! My honey was FREAKED out! He said "I think they might all be crazy"!! Well lo and behold the bridle doesn't even fit Krissy *giggles* so DD was going unmatching LOL!! And TW informed the Hubby they'd be out Sunday to watch DD...

Saturday morning DD rode in their saddle for poles and decided she just did not feel comfortable in it and wanted hers back on so her and her cousin go switch saddles and all is right with the world! While we were at the rodeo on Saturday I asked a couple of friends if they knew who this lady was and they were like "she is CRAZY! Get rid of her as fast as possible"!! I find out from this one friend she is banned from one arena for some trouble she caused then another friend tells me of another arena she is banned from! HOLY COW!!! I did get some giggles cause my sweet friend who is here in bloggyland with us AND our kiddo's rodeo together tells her daughter "who is wanting to work with DD" and her daughter looks at me ever so slowly and says "NO! She will ruin your child, she does NOT know what she's doing"!! She said "tell DD to stick close to me if they show up cause they hate me"! So I'm beyond freaking out now because I know they are coming on Sunday and I really DO NOT want to see this lady! I literally could not fall asleep Saturday night cause I was worried about what I'd say to her!

Sunday afternoon she comes walking up and the Hubby see's her so he high tails it outta there! JERK! LOL!! But within 30 seconds of him being gone P's sweet daughter comes buzzing up and plops down next to me with this sweet grin on her face HAHA LOL!! (the Hubby ran to her and told her t rescue me)! It was so hard not to burst out laughing! So TW starts asking how DD did Saturday and I told her no time in poles (broken pattern, DD blames the saddle of course) and got her personal best time in barrels of 15.6! I told her that DD's pole run was better today but DD is not using her saddle and she's like "WHAT?! WHY?! She needs to be in that saddle"!! I just said well she's a creature of habit and she didn't feel comfortable in it. So then somehow we get on the topic of DD's horse not being a "trained barrel horse" that she has been used all around and P's sweet daughter was explaining that Krissy is broke as broke but is still green on the patterns so that makes it a bit more difficult for DD and then TW just goes off! She starts spouting about a "good rider doesn't need a patterned horse! They need to learn how to ride and that horse will do whatever you tell it to"!! Little miss sweetness just smiles at her and says "well I disagree with you because I want my horse to know he has a job and I know my job" So then JP (TW's daughter) pipes in and says "what's your fastest pole time"?! Little miss sweetness says "20 seconds yesterday"!! JP says "EGHH mine is a 19"! Okay just to clarify she did NOT have a clean 19 second run, I have found 1 time that she could have had a 19 but knocked down a pole because her recorded time was 24 seconds! So I call BS on that LOL!! So then the topic of polo wraps vs boots come up and Little miss sweetness says "she would prefer to use wraps because her horse tears boots up to fast and they are to expensive to go through them so fast", of course TW says "OMG NO WAY!!! If you use wraps your just asking for your horse to get an injury"! She would not take into account that Little miss sweetness knows how to put them on properly! The Hubby finally sits down and TW gets up and moves over by him and proceeds to tell him all about how WRONG Little sweet miss was about these wraps etc! And the Hubby said "I don't know why your telling me, I don't care either way"! So finally Little miss sweetness just had enough and had to walk away!

TW then looks at me and says "just so you know SHE is absolutely WRONG"! I was peeved! So I said right back at her "actually I don't have a problem with wraps and I don't think they are dangerous if put on right, Fallon uses them on her horses and I highly regard her opinion so I'll stick with them on this"!! So she says "well she wouldn't if she had REAL horses like $100,000 horses!" I spouted back "UM for your information she DOES have $100,000 horses"! Then I got up to go help DD get ready for her barrels and I really needed a breather! Then after the run she starts telling us that when the Hubby came by on Friday they were fighting because JP did something and they were in the trailer washing something so she had a wet towel and cornered JP because she was stuck and couldn't get out then proceeded to whip her with this rag and (in a really proud voice she says) "She had HUGE welts everywhere!! That's what MY kid gets if she's snotty"!! OH MY GOODNESS!!! Again I am at a loss for words! This poor child! DD came walking up right after that and TW says something to her about her run and literally DD acted like she wasn't even there! WHOA!! Daddy quickly informed her to pay attention when someone is talking to her LOL!!

Now she (TW) has a whole plan for what DD is going to be doing from now on...She is NOT going to rodeo on Krissy anymore, we are to come to her house and get this other horse that DD will rodeo on, she's 21! Then her daughter says "MOM you don't even OWN that horse"! TW says "Oh it's fine I already texted his owner and they're fine with that"! Hubby seen what she was typing and she told this guy "OH I have a buyer for your horse"....Then her daughter JP looks at me and says "if she's riding this horse and I EVER see her being heavy on his mouth I will yank her off that horse"!! Really?! Well the apple doesn't fall far from the tree I guess! Of course the Hubby was just trying to pacify her until she would leave by pretending that he'd come get this horse!

Finally she did and the Hubby looked and me and says she basically ran her mouth about everything you were saying everytime you'd get up! What the crap?! And you didn't put her in her place LOL!! He said she turns to him after I walked off once and says "UGHH who's this stupid Fallon Taylor that SHE is so adamant about listening to"? Hubby says "umm she's a well known pro barrel racer who lives in TX"!! TW says "UGHH OH I know who your talking about....She's nothing but a glorified horse trader"!! Seriously lady! You MUST get a LIFE!!!

And let me tell you PRAISE THE LORD I had a very strong feeling about this and I never gave her mine or the Hubby's phone numbers when we met her last week, I only got hers LOL! Now I know we will run into her soon at a barrel race but she'll be so pissed by then that she won't speak to me LOL!!

Barrel Jackpot Kind of Weekend~!!

2011-01-31T03:21:00.000-06:00

I am SO exhausted after these last 4 days!! The Hubby went to El Paso to visit his grandma for her 89th Birthday so the kids and I have been ridin solo since last Thursday!

We were so blessed with FABULOUS weather Thursday, Friday, and Saturday! Saturday DD, my momma and I went to a barrel jackpot and I mean to tell you the temperature was around 70*!! Holy COW it was so awesome! DD was so happy to be outside in a short sleeve shirt and not having to be all bundled up! My girl had kind of a mixed day, she faltered in her exhibitions a little so she got nerved and come time for her open run she just did of lolly gagged or something...It wasn't the best run of her life but she did win 1st place in the 2D~!! She was very excited about that, as was I!

Saturdays runs

So Sunday afternoon we headed out to another barrel jackpot but mother nature was NOT our friend today!! BURR it was cold out there!! I think we hovered around 32-34* most of the time we were out there and of course this arena wasn't fully enclosed...Not to fun! So in a nutshell today was just not DD's day. She did her 3 exhibitions and knocked over barrel one the last time in so wouldn't you know when she came in for her open run she was all tensed up coming into barrel one, teeth gritting, stiff back and literally just plowed the barrel over! Not good...Needless to say she's got quite a nice knot in her leg from hitting it so hard. I guess we all have bad days and this one was hers! The lady that owns this arena let DD come back in after the open so she could *rework* barrel one and leave on a good note, so that made me happy enough!

Sundays runs

Start of brushing to close to barrel one

And just plow her down here!

Another busy rodeo weekend next weekend! We've got some terrible weather coming this week so I'm hoping it doesn't interfere with our plans!

Hope everyone has a super BLESSED week!!

Some Updated Pics of my Favorite 4 Legged Friends!

2011-01-28T02:31:00.000-06:00

The Winter season is not my friend...As much as I'd like to be on good terms with her I just can't...She makes my life miserable! EXCEPT for days like today when we were nearing 60*!! WHOO-HOO!!!

While DD was out exercising Krissy tonight I buzzed around and got some updated pics of some of my favorite 4 legged friends! I really LOVE them all! Unfortunately the Hubby and I have decided before to long we are going to sell them off...Again...I did this last year and parted with the ones I could bear to part with and still miss 2 of them dearly! But I finally have to agree with my honey on this, we simply do not have the time to give all of them the attention they need being up and coming riding horses. There are just a couple besides Krissy that I would like to keep but the rest will go bye-bye come Spring I think..

This is H.B. she's kind of new! We bought her about a month ago!

Angel and Rita

Curious Jet

Beautiful Bella!

My most Handsome Stone!


I totally LOL'd at Krissy's face!

Good Run!!

2011-01-27T03:29:00.001-06:00

Over the past couple of months DD and I have been working our butts off getting her and her horse in sync with one another! She's been running in the Winter Rodeo association that she's runs in every year.

It is so hard this time of year trying to get their practice time in between school and other functions and the stinking sun setting at 5:30!! Slowly but surely we are getting it done! The first couple of rodeo's they were just not doing all that great...She'd pretty much blown all of her pole runs and was consistently pulling 17 seconds on barrels.

So to work harder we went! We've been pretty much flying solo this season as the Hubby and J are working practically every weekend! But it has actually worked out quite nice because we've been the ones working together and so it always causes a wrinkle when Hubby wants to come in and give his *2 cents*! But he finally agreed with me that when he's there he will run my camera for me so I can get her ready to go and still have video!

We've been working on poles quite a bit, mostly because she really needed the most work on this event and I wanted her to learn the *proper* way to run them and by golly she's finally getting it! AND she's having fun with them now!

This past weekend she finally pulled her best barrel time ever! I was so thrilled and so was she! Her eyes just lit up when I told her she'd finally broke through the 15 second barrier! She screamed "REALLY"?!?! I just laughed!! She was so proud of her 15.807 time on that run! And the best part about it is she has so much room for improvement because she wasn't even running Krissy as hard as she should have been! But we have 2 barrel jackpots this weekend so she'll be getting the work in there!!

So here is her run from Sunday! Which I might just throw in here that it was FREEZING cold and snowing that morning LOL!!

Just Gotta Go There...

2011-01-20T03:36:00.000-06:00

Oh friends...I know I have been gone for a bit and I hate to come back with a post like this but I just gotta get this out before my blood pressure causes my brain to explode!!

First off we are all doing well here, just been busy with the kids' activities and all of my *other* obligations! DD has a rodeo this weekend and we are praying for fair weather! Last week there was so much snow on the ground that there was no practice time! So this week we are hitting it hard getting ready for the weekend and of course today it spat ice on us so we are in a bit of a freeze right now with snow coming over night... BOO!!! We were lucky to get the practice done RIGHT before the icy rain started! I just cannot wait for Spring to get here! I just need a pick me up and this Winter weather is doing nothing but kicking me down!

A few months ago I posted here about my dad's widow passing away. In that post I told you about my dad's passing 5 1/2 years ago and the troubles I had with his wife after he died and really truly the whole thing just broke me...I have not ever recovered from the blow of losing my dad at my young age of 27, I know lots of people have lost a parent much younger than I did and my heart breaks for them. I am so glad that I did have my 27 years to be with him but I miss him everyday and it is a constant heartache in my life. I have absolutely been difficult at times and massively depressed at times since losing him. I honestly haven't found much to comfort me and the situation with his wife just made that pain burn even worse and I became a person that I don't even recognize sometimes. I want to be loving and fun and carefree but I seem to just get lost in all of this and feel like I'm grasping at straws just to function partly to mostly normal ;)

Some of the things that I haven't been able to get over were feeling like she had something to do with his death...I don't know why I feel that, well yes I do know partly why I feel that. The morning that he died October 14, 2005 I was traveling with my family to TX to visit my Hubby's niece as she was getting ready to undergo surgery to remove a tumor near her brain and we of course wanted to be with her. So here we are driving in the car and I get that dreadful call that will never leave my mind and we turn around to head back to KS, we were a few hours away and I had a cousin who went to the hospital for me and I was requesting an autopsy because my dad was 50 yrs old and it was a sudden death with no warning signs, to me I just needed that bit of closure to know exactly what caused his death. I told my stepmother that I wanted the autopsy and she did not allow it and had him *processed* and at the funeral home by the time I made it back to the city. I was SO very angry, so hurt because this was my dad and this was something I wanted. Then when it came time to sit down with the funeral director we had to write his obituary and this was very hard for me, especially when my stepmother started telling them what "she" wanted written and the way it came to be printed was all of her kids and grandkids listed then my brother and I and our kids after all of them... What the heck?! Literally I had to search the thing just to find my name! He was my dad, not theirs! Her kids did not always treat my dad right and they were alot of my dads frustration in his last few years (they were married about 9 years). So then within hours of his death they (the kids) were just prancing around my dads house like they owned it, laughing and carrying on having a grand old time while I literally sat on the couch just sobbing and wanting them to leave!! Literally one of my stepbrothers girlfriends said to my stepmother "well looks like now you can finally take down that deer head that you've hated for so long"!! She just laughed like it was the funniest thing she'd ever said...I was shocked and very hurt, he hadn't even been buried yet! I will never understand the frame of mind they were in to be so rude and careless to me and my family. Then came the *dividing* of my dads things, my brother and I got a few small personal things but left the rest of his things out of respect for his wife that she may have the time to grieve and hold those things to give her comfort or whatever they could do to help her through that time. Then came the time for things starting to disappear and not a word was said about any of it. Then after a couple of months came the moving in of my dads childhood best friend (who had through his adult years turned into a real piece of garbage), after he moved in my stepmother would say "I'm just helping him, he had no where to stay"...Soon after that they were a *couple* DISGUSTING!!!

After that happened we quit speaking and I tried, then my brother tried to get back dads things. Things like our family pictures, that deer head that disappeared off the wall, his tools etc...Needless to say everything that belonged to my dad was gone. They had gotten rid of, sold, or stole what was left of his things. I'd begged in letters for the things and got no response, I finally threatened to file a civil suit against her for the stuff and lo-and-behold she filed bankruptcy ASAP. Thus preventing me from filing a suit against her.

After she died her son had contacted me and said he wanted to do the right thing and "give my brother and I what was rightfully ours, the house". Well I figured out soon enough that the other siblings were not on board with this and I talked to an attorney and he told me that I had no *legal* right to anything since my dad died first...So I then decided I would not sink any money into the place and fix it to sell because they couldn't be trusted to not stab me in the back!

Recently I got a phone call from an attorney that the house was in foreclosure and they wanted my address to send me the paperwork...Well I was quite confused because if I had no *rights* to anything why do I have to be drug into a foreclosure! So this bank was opening the house up for any of us kids to come remove anything we wanted on this certain date. I basically decided it was not healthy for me to get involved with this because I was sure there would be conflict and I wouldn't be able to control my hurt and anger so luckily I had a meeting that day and couldn't go. I was contacted by my stepsister saying she had a few things for my brother and I, not sure what it could be as there wasn't anything left of dads that we had seen. Then I find out that this stepsister and her husband are taking things out of the house and selling it on craigslist. I felt upset about that but just let it roll until today, I got a phone call that threw me right back into the whole situation and wanting to scream at all of them.

My aunt is a real estate agent and she called me today and let me know that my dads house is up on the market for sell! I was furious! And so confused, because I thought it was being foreclosed on?! So I messaged my stepsister and she informed me that her and her husband put it on the market and they have until March sometime to sell it or the bank will take possession and she is going to "try and talk her siblings into sharing the profits with my brother and I"...WHAT?! Share?! MY dad paid for the house!!! Yes it has a mortgage now because they got a loan to pay off HER student loans!!! They have the house listed for $25,000 more than what is owed and I am just peeved!! If they get one penny off that house I'm not sure what I will do! It's bad enough to have watched them torment my dad, then deal with his witch of a wife and then watch them take all of dads things and now THEY get a profit off of his house and they *might* give us something UGHH!!!!!!!

I have been so angry all night, my blood pressure is up, I'm dizzy, my head hurts and I just feel like I'm on the edge of a breakdown here! I know hate is a strong word but I hate them! I did message my stepsister back (by the way she and one of her brothers are not biological kids to my stepmother, she raised them from her ex-husbands first marriage) and posed the question to her "do you and your siblings honestly feel entitled to this house because I am SO confused"?!

I would also like to clarify that this stepsister and her husband I believe were the only kids that really truly loved my dad and they did treat him with respect, she even quit speaking to her mom for some years because of what she did after my dad had died. So she is not the one I am angry at...

I have such a hard time with all of this because I very much live my life with the feeling of I would never do something to someone that I know would hurt me so bad if it was done to me and their utter disregard for what's right and wrong in this situation is killing me!

Please pray for me, that I find it in my heart to let go and let God do it all for me. And just to have peace restored in my heart and closure would be an amazing gift..

Here I am Leah~!!!

2011-01-13T03:34:00.000-06:00

I am here friends!! So sorry for my lack of posting lately! For some reason life has decided to keep me overly busy...What's up with that?!?! We are doing good here and hopefully I can give you a good post soon!! But for now I'll show you some of what's been going on here!!

So take a look at this picture...The picture on the right was Christmas 2009, picture on the left Christmas 2010. I actually had myself convinced that my baby girl was just a runt and wasn't growing anywhere besides her behind...Yes I said her "behind", what can I say she takes after her daddy :) So when I uploaded our Christmas picture to FB the other day I got to looking at last year and had near heart failure when I realized how much she had grown LOL!! Can you say *momma in denial* over here LOL LOL!!! Just to put this into perspective, we measured her back on December 18, 2010 then when I was hugging her the other day after combining these to pictures I realized her head was hitting me higher than it did in the picture so I measured her again...On January 7, 2011 and she has grown over 1/2"!!! In 3 weeks! OH MY!!!

Happy Birthday to my Baby Girl!!

2010-12-23T02:21:00.000-06:00

Today we are celebrating DD's 12th Birthday! I cannot believe how fast my little girl has grown...Such bittersweet moments they are, as much as I love to watch her grow and turn into a wonderful young lady I very much miss the days of her crawling up on my lap to snuggle with her binky and blanky...Of course she is still a little snuggle bug but it's a bit harder to snuggle when she's almost as big as I am LOL!!!

So Happy Birthday to my precious miracle!!

Wordless Wednesday..Lunar Eclipse Style

2010-12-22T03:40:00.000-06:00

One hour before the Eclipse started

Just seconds before the whole moon was in the full shadow of the Earth!

The big reveal~! It was Beautiful and Amazing!!

I will even admit to doing a little *happy dance* while photographing these!!

And the stars were so BRIGHT!! I was even lucky enough to see shooting stars!

The colors were astonishing!

Last shot before it came out of the shadow!

It Is What It Is....

2010-12-07T02:26:00.000-06:00

So basketball season is upon us here in the Heartland and I gotta tell ya...I'm gonna have a stroke before its all said and done! There are many things that I am and quiet is not one of them. I actually struggle with this on a daily basis, I have no idea why it comes to me so strongly, other than the women in my family are all outspoken and tell it like it is! Sometimes to much so...

So I have come to my blog tonight in search of something...I don't really know what...I guess I am hoping one of my wonderful readers will have words of wisdom that can calm my soul when I feel like striking out at someone in a basketball game. I know, terrible!! Right?!

I am a parent whom always wants to see my kiddos excel, do their best and even be better than anyone else at whatever it is they are doing. But I am not blind to the fact that they aren't the best at everything they do. There are plenty of things they can improve on, always...J is my sports kid (as you all know). In our family we prefer football (as you all know). But THEY also like basketball, yes "they", not WE! I actually have a love/hate relationship with BB.

I also believe that we are only as good as our coaches allow us to be. If we are taught right then we will excel, if not we won't. Speaking mainly in *team* sports by the way. You see a few years ago our school district hired a new head BB coach, when he came into our system we had a massive losing streak in this sport. Literally his first season with us we had a winning Varsity team (note I said varsity). Well he took a group of kids that had been on a losing streak for some time and changed the program and helped them to become winners. That was J's freshman year. The next year we lost a couple of great players but the coach moved some JV kids up and made another winning team! Then at the end of the season last year he basically told them all that their winning streak was over due to the fact that his *good kids* were graduating...Really he said this! Not only did he say this to the players he also told us parents at what was supposed to be the awards banquet that we should not expect great things the next year (now this year) because our *good players* were gone. Umm I was pissed, just pissed! You do not tell these kids they are losers cause guess what?! They will be!! So then this year when we got our new head football coach the head BB coach makes some comment to the kids about he hopes this new coach doesn't expect great things cause it won't happen! Well needless to say I was thrilled when our boys finished with a 7-2 record and made it to playoffs!!! I'm hoping he felt the pain as he ate those words!

So moving on, we also have a freshman/sophomore coach and a JV coach. J had played for the freshman coach since junior high and they never had any wins, literally I don't think they ever won a game! So now this year he is playing for the JV coach and I am not happy...I feel terrible about this because as a person this coach is an extremely nice guy and has a wonderful family. I believe for the most part he treats the kids well, but the problem is...they don't play good...I mean ever...Like I'm not sure when the last time the JV won a game was...But yet the kids he had before moved up to varsity and they became a winning team?! So how does this happen?! And there is this really strange conundrum that all of the kids that played for the freshman/sophomore coach for 4 years straight (cause they had him as a junior high coach as well), well they sit the bench...And my J is one of them...

Is J good at BB? Yes he is, is he the best? No he's not. But for some reason the coach has made this decision to basically play these certain 5 kids and J may be lucky to be subbed in for a whole 4 minutes (max) during the game. Last Friday was their first game of the season and he wasn't put in until the end of the 1st quarter and he scored 6 points within a couple of minutes. Then into the 2nd quarter he was fouled and actually chipped one of his front teeth which caused him a bloody lip so he had to be sat out for that. Well when he went out of the game they were up by 2 points and quickly their lead was lost. J was not allowed back in until the 4th quarter after they had a 40 point hole dug! So tonight we had another game and the coach does precisely the same thing, same starting 5, same turnovers and missed baskets and he finally lets J in the game with 5 seconds on the clock at the end of the 1st quarter...What the heck?! What's the point of that?! 5 seconds!! He did play for maybe 2 minutes in the 2nd quarter and then same deal as Friday for the last half of the game, pretty much not-ta nothing! During the game when the 5 *starters* are playing and making mistakes the coach will turn to the kids on the bench and raise his voice telling them all about what the kids on the court are doing wrong but yet he never tells them?! Then he will just sit in the chair with his arms crossed and say nothing for the rest of the game! I'm just not getting it, I don't understand why we can't look at stats and see who's worthy to play and who's not! And why is it that we continue to do the same thing over and over and nothing ever changes!

I get so very mad watching this go on! Like I said I don't think my kids the greatest but I know he's better than some that are playing...Just like in football, J wasn't the best player before but with proper coaching he became a pretty big deal this year. I was saving this for another post but I'll just share it with you now, every year the coaches nominate players on the team for "All League Team" which is basically just an honors team for the best in the district between all of the schools then the other coaches from the other teams pick the winners and J was awarded with Honorary Defensive-back! I am so proud of this kid! He was so proud of himself! So in BB I know with the right coaching he could be a great asset to the team and I don't say that just because I'm his momma, it's true. Just like it's true that you will never hear me complain when he sits the bench in baseball because it's not his sport, he's not very good at it. He never played until he got into high school and really only does it to stay in shape. So if I felt he wasn't good enough to help the team I wouldn't get so dang mad!

So HELP...Please!! Any words of wisdom on how to lower my blood pressure while at the games?! I have considered Valium but I don't think my Dr would go for that ;) I just want things to be fair and right and they're not!

Okay I'm done venting now...

Busy, Busy, Busy!!

2010-12-06T04:13:00.000-06:00

My goodness it's a busy time of year!! After finally getting my new living room all in order I did get to spend a few nights relaxing watching movies and snuggling under my blanky...Yes I said *blanky*...Yes I have a blanky :) It's soft, I love it!

I have been having some computer problems here and finally decided to buy me a new desktop before my laptop officially crashed! So I invested in my first ever *nice* desktop computer, my last one was a hand me down from my momma that she got right when the internet became mainstream! So yes it was a dinosaur! Haven't used it in a few years but it did get me by for a while. Ever since then I have always owned laptops and have loved my last one that the Hubby bought me almost 2 years ago! It would usually work great *unless* I were to travel with it, or even simply move it from my desk! Real good for a LAPTOP huh! So anyhoo I got me a spiffy HP Slimline with a whole wazoodle of GB!! And wouldn't you know it as soon as I got my new computer all installed and ready to go I set up the other one and it went kaput! Won't load to save my life...Which has been just a bit frustrating beings I wasn't brainy enough to back everything up before I shut it off and was planning on doing that after...

So I had a great photo shoot Thanksgiving weekend and would love to share a few of those pics with you but they are trapped inside my dead laptop :( But on a positive note I had another AWESOME shoot yesterday!

These kids decided that for Christmas for their Momma they would do pictures to give her as a gift! Sweet kids, right?! They were such a blast and kept me laughing the WHOLE time!!

I just absolutely adore McKenna, (she's the dark haired girl) she had a hard time with this *serious* face because it's against her nature LOL!! She just needed to SMILE!!

One of my favorite's!

I loved how the 2 brother's were in step together and their arms were in the same position and then the 2 sister's were in sync as well LOL!!

Living Room Makeover Reveal

2010-11-29T04:59:00.002-06:00

Finally, finally I am DONE!! I am so excited with the way my room turned out! So I'm ready to make my big reveal to you all!!

Here's a reminder of the before...

And a little recap of everything I did! New paint on on the walls and ceiling, new carpet, new furniture, new lighting/ceiling fans, new curtains...Basically the only thing that remained the same were most of the wall hangings, TV, and the curtain rods!

And AFTER!!!

My beautiful Wing back Peacock chairs!

LOVE my new ceiling fans!

This chair created my chosen accent colors!

The back of the chairs are an ivory satin with this gold embroidery...So beautiful!!

Probably my favorite accent piece to the room!

Midst Of The Makeover!!

2010-11-23T02:02:00.000-06:00

....Part 2....

I literally spent DAYS shopping for things to put in my *new* living room but let me tell ya I am NOT complaining because I am a girl who LOVES her shopping! I basically decided that the only things that would remain in the living room from before is most of my wall pictures and my TV. Other than that pretty much everything was being changed!

I started first with the painting, I did a "brushed suede" on all of the walls in the living room and the stairwell. My living room is 29 x 15 so I knew this would be some work using this textured paint! I had to roll on 2 coats of the paint then after that was good and dry I had to go back and do an "X'ing pattern over the entire surface of the walls...Talk about tiring! I did most of it before my weekend getaway and finished when I got home. Then my next job was painting the ceiling, I thought the walls were hard...well...the ceiling was worse! My ceilings are around 9 ft tall so I had a pretty hard time rolling it on there. I bought an extension for my roller and well I'm sad to say that it didn't last very long before I bent it and it was no longer any help to me! So I drug a chair all around the room to get the job done! The next morning I quickly figured out that my painting was not good enough on the ceiling and I was going to have to do another coat. I should have expected that with as many coats as the walls took but a girl can hope, right?! I decided I could not handle another 4 hours of rolling it on so I would just skip that step and go straight into the "X'ing and do it heavy so it would cover good. Well needless to say it was taking me twice as long and I had a deadline of the next morning because my new carpet was being put in and my new furniture was coming so when it hit close to midnight that night I decided to finish the ceiling off by rolling the rest...UGH!! I was devastated the next morning when I awoke and went into see the ceiling in the daylight to find that the paint was not even and you can see splotches in places...Needs another coat! But nothing I could do about it at this point so it will get done sometime...Maybe...

At one point and time we had talked about ripping out the carpet and maybe going with the original hardwood under the carpet but the Hubby and I both agreed that we wanted carpet in there as that room can get kind of chilly and we just wanted a *homey* feeling. The Hubby and J ripped out the carpet the night before the new carpet was installed and we were SHOCKED at what we found under the carpet! There were patches in the floor where there had been half walls and patches for damaged spots so we were really thankful we'd chosen the route of carpet! I was also shocked to find out that the carpet that we were ripping out was date stamped on the back 1992!! That ugly carpet was 18 years old! HOLY COW!!! The pad that was under the carpet was leaving this disgusting sticky stuff all over the floor, you know those black spongy spots in the pad?! Well it had turned into some kind of gooey stuff! EWW!!

Finally the carpet was out, the walls were done and I was ready to get the new in! We'd scheduled the carpet to be installed in the morning and the furniture to come in the afternoon and I'll be darned if it didn't freaking rain and even SNOW most of the day! Luckily the snow wasn't sticking but I was sure praying that furniture truck would make it down our road! And it sure did! Unfortunately they could not get down our driveway because of our Cedar trees so they had to back about 1/4 of the way down and carry it ALL the way to the house! Which is a pretty good distance!

We finally got that all in and set up where we wanted and our next task was putting in the additional entertainment center and sofa table we bought. Then we put in all of the new pretty's that I bought! I was chomping at the bit for the Hubby to get my new ceiling fans in but that took a couple of days beings DD had rodeo for 2 days during this time! Finally the fans are in and everything is done EXCEPT for the last addition of a little table I am envisioning to put between 2 chairs I have in the *back* half of the room! Once I get that in I will be ready for the big reveal!

My *Brushed Suede* walls!!

I have had a ton of fun redoing this room and I am SO very thrilled with the results! I just LOVE sitting in there being amazed that this is even the same room LOL!!

Extreme Home Makeover~ My Edition....Part 1

2010-11-22T03:22:00.000-06:00

SO a couple of weeks ago I must have gone crazy for a few minutes and concocted this plan to *redo* my living room! I'm not even really sure what I started out wanting and how I got to where I am now LOL!!

When we bought this house 4 years ago it came it ghastly white walls and the most hideous baby blue carpet I have EVER seen! Well I fixed the wall problems with paint of course! I chose a color called "Gold Coin" which is really just glorified mustard in my opinion. But I loved it and went with it. I have always liked the color in my living room but then one day I just didn't!

I think...(remember I'm drawing a blank here on the series of events that happened in this house)...I told the Hubby I was thinking of redoing the room meaning like repainting...Then all of the sudden I started fantasizing about new furniture and new carpet and new lighting and new this and new that etc etc etc forever and ever, Amen!

And yes I did have 2 sets of furniture in my living room before...See I bought the tan set thinking I would replace the green with this but then when I got it home it was absolutely uncomfortable and WAY to shallow of seats! I am so spoiled with my green DEEP seated couches! So then my "living room/family room" was created!!

I of course picked out the color that I wanted to paint the room and decided on a special paint with a texture to create the look of *brushed suede*, a brown color on the walls and a sandstone on the ceiling. Then we headed out furniture shopping, we looked at a few different stores before we found the set that the Hubby really loved and I liked it too! Then we headed over to the carpet store and picked out carpet and pad, it was easy enough because I already I had an idea of what I wanted so it took me all of 5 minutes to find JUST what I wanted!! Then I went on to finish up some other shopping while the Hubby had to go to work that day, my goal was new lighting. We had picked out the ceiling fans we wanted so all's I had to do was go back and buy them, good thing I went that day because I needed 2 and they had 2 left!

So I spent a few days painting, painting, and more painting....I was hurting! It was so painful for me to do all of this painting and everytime I do it I say I'll never do it again?! LOL!! Luckily our 13th Wedding Anniversary was coming up on November 15, so the Hubby decided to take me on a weekend getaway and I got me 2 1/2 days of rest before I was back to work!!

The Ugliest Ceiling Fans EVER~!!!

So that was the preview of my room BEFORE....

I Heart Faces Photography Contest - Silhouette

2010-11-15T03:16:00.001-06:00

I LOVE Silhouette Photography!! It is one of my *must* haves in all of the shoots I do, most recently I took my most favorite one yet! It was a senior session and I LOVE this shot!! So thank you I Heart Photography for choosing Silhouette's this week!!!

Lot's of Good~!!

2010-11-02T02:20:00.000-05:00

My time lately has been comprised with LOTS of pictures!! I am absolutely having a blast doing them and am so ready to get busier!! Of course this cold season coming could hinder that a little...Hmm...

So last Thursday night J's team played their biggest arch rival in their football history and I am SO very pleased to say that they WON!! So not only are we celebrating an awesome win over these guys and gloating a little because they do a lot of trash talking to our kids but they have also made it into the State Playoff's!! WOW what a year for these guys!! They have gone from having a 2-7 record to a 7-2 record! This will be the first time in 8 years that J's high school has made it to the playoff's! Not only did they achieve that they have also been shattering school records like CRAZY!!! Wish I had all of the numbers but I don't yet...Maybe soon...So Tuesday night marks their first playoff game and while we are stoked to be there and playing we've got a little hitch in our giddy-up. You see we had a couple of *good* players make a bad decision over the weekend and got caught with some chewing tobacco in their mouths so per contracts they signed to play football they will not be allowed to play :( They are very upset with themselves but they must deal with the consequences. The coach has changed game play a bit so we'll see how it goes!

Breaking up a pass!!

Catch is good for a run!!

State Playoff's BABY~!!

Does that smile not say it all?!

J and his beautiful Girlfriend!!

This past weekend I had the pleasure of shooting Senior pics for J's Best Friend Russ, it was such a blast! We were out for hours and took a ton of pictures and I am SO very thrilled with the results!!

Yes...Yes this is ALOT of pictures...I just can't pick a few favorites!! Literally I have 176 good ones LOL!!!!

Wordless Wednesday

2010-10-27T01:35:00.000-05:00

A beautiful family whom I've known FOREVER and finally got the pleasure to photograph~!!!

SOOO We Said No Injuries...Right?!

2010-10-20T00:13:00.000-05:00

SO in my last post I asked everyone for some prayers that we have NO injuries at the game this Friday! I think I need to revise that request and include NO injuries at practice either!!!

NOOO J did not get hurt! But...He did hurt another kid...:( They were doing tackling drills today at practice and it was 3 kids per drill and he was tackling a freshman from the JV team and well..~~Long story~~ confusing story...He facilitated in breaking the young mans arm *insert tears*...J went down low to tackle and the boy tried to jump over him so J jumped up and flipped him over with the boy trying to break his fall with his arm and J said literally you could hear it snap...He said "it was so crazy Mom, coach asked him if he was okay and did he need any water and he said....No but can I get some Koolaid" LOL LOL LOL!! J said the young man kept good in spirits through out the whole ordeal but would ya'll please shoot up some prayers for him! And for J...I know my kid and he's gonna be blaming himself for this one...

Who Am I?!....

2010-10-19T02:00:00.000-05:00

So yes I have been ~~slacking~~, I mean busy lately...I promise I have been here and reading everyone's posts, sorry about the lack of commenting on said reading! I have been a lil bit busy lately. This is the time of year when I don't get to share much rodeo related because well...there's no rodeo'n going on! You know the drill, 2 kiddo's with different interests and the Fall season brings on Football for J which I know most of my posts have consisted of lately :) But in all truth we REALLY do love football! I love watching my kid play, it's absolutely one of the most fulfilling things I've ever felt...To watch him do something that is so rewarding and fun for him!

J's Varsity football team has had a rough many of years holding season records of 2-7 for a long time! But this year as of right now with 2 regular games left in the season they are 6-1!! WHOO-HOO!!! And truly their 1 loss was simply just bad luck and non-team playing, they really should have beat that team but they haven't let it haunt them in any way. Three weeks ago marked their biggest game of the season they went into the game against a team that was undefeated and had 2 running backs that were darn near impossible for every other team to stop! They had scores against other teams like 58-15, 28-0, 47-13, 55-7....Then we played them and WON in overtime with a score of 22-21....UH YEAH! Nail biter for sure! J's team literally stopped their runningbacks right in their tracks! The best one on their team was averaging about 220 yards a game and J's teams defense stopped him around 95 yards! Talk about amazing game play and super awesome coaching!

J's Tackle on the *BEST* runningback in the state!!

Overtime WIN~!!

So this weeks game is against the league's top runner right now who is standing at 7-0 with scores on average over 60 points to ZERO!!! SO needless to say these boys have their work cut out for them!! UGHH will be such a tough game to watch!

One of J's interceptions!!

Catch almost good for a touchdown!!

Nice tackle!

And most importantly PLEASE pray for J and his teammates for NO injury's! These boys are ruthless!! So my mommy heart is a little bit scared!

That's GOOD for a TOUCHDOWN!!

As my Boy would say "nough said"...

SO the main reason for my absence after these last few weeks of great football...That night after the super victory 3 weeks ago...We came home to find our basement flooded...Yep...Water heater blew out...I'll give all the gory details in my next post!

The Great Pig Escape!!

2010-10-08T01:52:00.001-05:00

OK so I've linked this up for TST!! Cause Rach's making me....:)

After our county fair back in August the kids' pigs returned home with us until they go to the butcher. Unfortunately it's looking like we can't get them in until November 8th or something like that! So their eventful lives here on the ranch just keep getting funner!

With daily escapes from their pen we are constantly herding them back and telling them NO-NO PIGGIES~!!! So Wednesday afternoon DD and I were leaving the house to head to a meeting and as we drove down the back drive she yells "OH NO pig in the water tank"!!! WHAT?!?! I slammed on the brakes and looked over to find this...

I was on the phone with the Hubby and nearly burst out laughing and said "let me call you right back", he's like "HUH why?! What's going on"?! I said just let me call you back! I wanted to snap that picture and send it to him right away! So I did then my phone promptly rings and he says WHAT THE HECK?! I'm like "yep, he's in the tank..." Hubby says "is he going to drown"?! I told him it appeared he'd been in there for at least a couple of hours because he was a bit sunburned on his back *the part of his body that wasn't underwater*...So I left for my meeting and when we got back the Hubby was almost home so DD and I thought it would be awesomely hilarious to see J's face when he seen this (he'd just gotten home also) so I have DD ask him if he's checked on his pig today and he says "no".. So she says well you might wanna do that! So we head out all giggles waiting for him to burst out laughing! BUT he didn't laugh! He didn't think it was one bit funny! In fact he was kind of annoyed with us for laughing as he thought "his pig was going to die"!!

So we talked about how in the heck he could have gotten in there! This is the horses tank that stands at least 3 1/2 - 4 ft from ground level! This pig weighs somewhere around 300 lbs so it couldn't have been an easy task for him to get in there! SO finally the Hubby gets home and he and J had to get in the tank with a tow strap around the pig to hoist the front half of his body up on the ledge then shove him out onto the ground! I thought he was going to end up breaking a leg or something!

All kidding aside it was a good thing we got him out when we did because he was tired! He kept going underwater trying to lay down and then popping back up shaking his head trying to figure out why the heck he couldn't lay down LOL!!!

And just a note in case you wonder~ Yes the tank has been blocked off until we can drain it. We put out another temporary water tank for the horses until this one is cleaned as it could be dangerous for them to ingest this water that has now been soiled....EWW...

Is 8 Years To Long?!

2010-10-05T02:56:00.003-05:00

Ya'll know how picture crazy I am but would you believe it if I told you the last time we had formal family pictures done was in 2002!!! Yep it's been 8 years and I can't believe it!! We used a phenomenal photographer and I spent WAY to much money on pictures...But in my defense I did purchase a lot that were used for Christmas gifts for like my parents, granny, and in-laws. So after spending somewhere in the neighborhood of $1,000 the Hubby has never been very anxious to update our pictures. But when my sons friends continue to comment on how they CANNOT believe that is us in the pictures, well that says it's time to update them! I mean I still have them all up of course :) Including a 20 x 24 in my living room! So beings that I now have the skills to do this myself I decided a couple of months ago when Fall hit I would do it! In light of my decision to take on this task I would first need to order me a remote for my camera! Of course my next task was coordinating and shopping for our picture clothes (which just so happens to be one of my favorite things to do)!!

So just to show you, this is the BIG one I have hanging in my living room from 2008!

So I went on the hunt for clothes, I found the shirts that I wanted the Hubby and I to wear and was going to order them from the catalog that I found them in but was weary of what size to purchase for me. So as luck would have it we spent a day in the city a few weeks ago and we went shopping! At one of the western stores in town I found THE shirts I was wanting! I was so very excited! I had picked this blue one for me and a red one for the Hubby, but as soon as I showed them to him he said he really would like the blue one too...He tried to sell me a million reasons why it would be okay for us to have matching shirts but I wasn't so sure about that! I mean I wouldn't mind owning the same shirt and even wearing them on the same day (cause we're kind of weird like that) but I just felt like it would be TO much in the picture. So sis and I headed off to the dressing room to decide which one looked better on me and luck was on Hubby's side because the blue did not look so hot on me, the red one looked good sissy said! So then I got even luckier by convincing the Hubby to let me buy him some retro Wranglers! OHHH I was so excited about that! He is very much just a plain ol Wranglers kind of guy but I just LOVE the *sorry gotta say it* sexiness of the distressed Wranglers UM-HMM!! I of course then coordinated the kiddo's to color fit as well!

My handy dandy remote! *picture courtesy of google*

Now I just have to say, I'm really not sure how this happened but last time we had our pictures taken our color scheme was the same LOL!! Reds and blues! Really honestly I very rarely wear those colors, so I'm not sure why I always gravitate towards them for pictures! But none the less I was so pleased with everything we got!

Finally the weekend I had planned to do them arrived! I had originally planned them for this past Saturday but we had a small disaster happen at home (I'll post later on that) and so I bumped them back to Sunday, which in all reality worked out better cause the weather was so good and no wind like we'd had the day before!! So we all get dolled up for our shoot and head on out to do them. I get us all set up for our first picture and get into position and click my handy dandy remote and...nothing...okay that must have been an error, so I click again...nothing...Really?! I tested this baby out right away the first day when I got it and it shoots up to 30 feet away so I was a bit perplexed by this. It would trigger when it was right in front of the camera but not at a distance so we figured the battery was a weak one :( And of course it's one of those tiny watch batteries that most people don't just have laying around! So I resorted to using the handy dandy timer instead LOL! Oh that was a sight! I was RUNNING to get into position every time, I was a bit afraid you'd be able to tell I was huffing & puffing in the pics LOL!! But all went well and I'm loving them!

Always the daring child!!

The guys call this the "Marlboro Man" LOL!!

Pictures of the Hubby and I courtesy of J

As you can see I am having a hard time picking favorites LOL!!!

Feels Like I'm Forever Saying Goodbye...

2010-09-29T02:02:00.000-05:00

First off I just want to thank you all for such caring words on my last post! I have not had any more episodes as bad as that one was, just my *normal* increased heart rate and occasional palpitations. My shakiness has been back to normal, no more violent shaking like I had last week. I do intend on going in to the Dr to get a full work up physical done. I realized that I am also having hot flashes ALOT! Now I am way to young for any meno*crap* so I'm not really sure what to think of this, other than maybe high blood pressure causing it?!

WARNING~ Long, tear stained post....

I recently shard with you about my dear friend Terry and well I come with sad news to say that Terry is no longer with us...He passed away this past Friday night. It really is an amazing story that I of course must share, I'd better go grab me some tissues...

Last Thursday we got word from the Dr's that Terry's body was starting to shut down so to expect him to pass before the weekend was over. Friday night of course we had Friday Night Football and it was the Fall Homecoming game and J was stoked! My momma obviously didn't come to the game as she has literally spent almost all of her time outside of work with Terry. So as I got ready to head out for the game Friday night I knew I needed to stock tissues in my purse as I just felt this was going to be the time. I was sitting up in the bleachers watching the team get ready and I got a text from my momma that Terry's oxygen level was down to 44%, I instantly teared up but pushed through just praying for him and watching the team prepare.

The opposing team won the coin toss and chose to receive 2nd half so they started the game kicking the ball to our team. J is always out during the kickoff but is usually blocking as a senior boy is usually the one who catches and runs it. But this night as I watched the ball fly through the air I realized it was heading straight for J and I kind of panicked! My first thought was being worried for him running with that many kids trying to get him down LOL! Not that he doesn't get tackled in other plays but this seems especially harder with them already running full throttle! Then my next thought was OH get the camera up to shoot! So down comes the ball and YES he catches it~!! I got my camera up and started shooting! He caught the ball at the 20 yard line and started running, he almost got tackled but another player did a nice block and J cut back and shot through the gap and took off! He was running SO fast and the crowd was roaring; screaming for him! I was screaming, my MIL and FIL and SIL were all around me screaming (Hubby works the chain gang so he's right down on the side line)! And a kid dives for J but he manages to shake his fingers from his shoulders and keeps running! He ran and ran all the way to the 7 yd line!!! Then he was tackled right at his ankles, barely got him! He almost made a touchdown, but I was jumping up and down screaming and SO excited that my boy just ran that! And it was strange as I was shooting the pictures when he was running past where I was sitting the sun was so bright coming through my viewfinder that I had to put my camera down, then at some point I picked it back up and snapped a shot right after he got back up with the ball. I had tears welling up in my eyes and knew I had to text my momma right away and tell her but I knew in the instant that I had the feeling to send her the message that she would tell me back that Terry was gone...So I sent her the message and she text me back "That is awesome! Sis, Terry just passed, his pain is over"....OH the sadness that hit my heart was like a 2 ton brick...I just broke down in tears, my SIL put her arms around me and covered my face for me and I just cried. I knew in that instant that God was giving me some kind of gift with that run and the light coming through. It was the strangest thing ever! I text my momma back and told her that it seemed Terry had passed at the same time J was making his run, in true Terry style. My momma agreed that it was a gift indeed.

When I got home and went through the pictures I got to the set when he was in front of me and J was literally barely visible through the light that filled the picture, it was blinding. I enhanced the picture so it's more saturated now and J is viewable.

After the tackle!

Saturday night my momma and her friends and I all got together to have some wine and share memories of Terry. Just kind of a grieving time for us all to be together. I went early with my momma and we had dinner and did some shopping and then went to our friend's house. During our time of talking about everything I found out the exact details of Terry's passing which truly left me amazed...

My momma had sent me that message that his oxygen was so low and his breathing became very violent and so sad to watch so her and Terry's daughter and his ex-wife (whom he was still great friends with) all took their turns telling Terry that it was okay to leave now, they wanted him to be free from the pain and they would be okay. His daughter who is 19 yrs old struggled so hard to say those words to her daddy but she did it for him. The nurse was in the room checking his vitals right after his daughter said her goodbye's and he flatlined, the nurse said "that's it, he is gone" then they all started sobbing hysterically and within a minute or so Terry very suddenly gasped for breath and his heart started again...The nurse was SHOCKED, she said she had never seen anything like that, but his breathing was very hard and difficult for him so they knew that he had fought his way back because they were so sad. So they then all took their turns again telling him it was going to be okay, they did not want him hurting anymore and to go meet Jesus, this went on for 10 minutes and he left again for the last time...

At that precise time my J was running the ball and that bright light blinded me, one of our other friends was driving to the hospital to be with Terry and she was blinded by this strangest light, just like I was. She described it to me as I was describing it to her and we both were at a loss and just new it was beautiful and blinding. All of this time that Terry has been sick he and I both believed that he would be healed. When he got the diagnosis back in May of the metastatic disease he told me "this will not kill me, I will beat it". I was so upset and sad that he was not cured, that he was no longer with us! I wanted him healed!!!

It was told to my momma by the nurse at the hospital that our body does what they call "modeling" when it is shutting down. Which explained his hands being purple Friday morning, see *modeling* is when the heart shuts off blood flow to the "non-important" areas of the body to protect the main organs while your body is shutting down. Even your brain, the last to go is the heart which explains why you seek God with your heart and not your brain because the heart is the strongest. One of our friends said she too was so upset because she too believed he was going to be healed and then another one of our friends said that's what we're missing. God didn't lead us astray in our thinking, he told us Terry would be healed but we just assumed it was healed HERE with us...But it wasn't that way, he was healed through Jesus in Heaven...WOW that was an eye opener!! So while we grieve the loss of our friend we are most thankful that he is HEALED and no longer feels the pain.

Terry a wonderful friend who will always be missed...

Today we buried our friend and he will be terribly missed! It was so funny to hear how many different people said one of their favorite things about Terry was his hugs! We all thought that but didn't know the other thought that LOL! He was a gentle giant, one of a kind that's for sure...

Just Because I Need To Say It...

2010-09-22T02:08:00.000-05:00

This was a very strange evening for me and as I am sitting here the only thing that makes sense to me is to share it with you! I must just say, that I believe for me I have truly the best man in the world! I cannot imagine my life without him and I am so very thankful everyday that he is my life partner and best friend!

Tonight was a very typical night, DD had gymnastics and dance. One of her BFF's came home from school with her today to stay over tonight (YES on a school night)! Her mama is out of town and her daddy works in the fields from the early hours of the morning and the girls have to be at the school bright and early to leave on a Stuco trip as they are the 6th grade reps for their school. So the Hubby will take them bright and early and send them on their way!

Our evening at the studio was fun as usual with all of us mom's chatting and laughing at each other while watching our beautiful daughters! Then when we arrived home I turned into the drive and DD's friend M shouted "they're out"!! I immediately stopped my truck and then she said "well I thought I saw one"! She was referring to the 2 puppies we have left and she was right! Just as she shouted that and I stopped the deaf puppy had run under my truck! I was so very thankful that she seen this because she likely would have been run over! I never even seen her :( The puppies had been outside in a pen and somehow knocked it over and were roaming free! We are very lucky nothing happened to them especially with DD's horse only a few feet away! But the Hubby watched her last week when he was out feeding one morning, the deaf puppy had apparently followed him and he didn't know it and after he dumped Krissy's feed she started making this grunting noise and when he turned back he realized that the deaf puppy was underneath her standing by her foot! Of course the Hubby hollered for the puppy out of instinct then realized *duh* she can't hear me! He said he was truly amazed at Krissy because she just watched him intently and made that noise while he got the puppy's attention then got her out of there. Krissy never budged an inch! Man I LOVE that horse!!

But back to tonight, the girls got the puppies put back where they belong and I rushed in to start cooking dinner. I was making bierocks and hashbrown casserole so I knew it was going to take a little bit of time and I wanted to hurry so I did! I got the hashbrown casserole prepped and in the oven, then got the meat cooked and cabbage cooked and then stuffed the dough and made the bierocks. Hubby got home just as I was finishing up and I was not feeling well! My hands were shaking violently and I felt nauseous and just really not right...The Hubby went to feed the horses then when he came back in he asked me if I was ok? I showed him my hands that were shaking violently and he said yes I noticed that that's why I asked. He then asked if my blood pressure was up and I said yes I kind of feel like it is. See when I went in for my *pre* surgery checkup they noted that I have high blood pressure and an irregular heartbeat but didn't say anything to me about it. I mean I know my heartbeat is irregular, like at a resting time it will beat around 105-110 beats per minute and gets higher than that when I do things, I also have palpitations frequently but I've had it forever so I just have never mentioned it to my Dr. The high blood pressure thing I have suspected at times because I get these feelings that remind me of when I was pregnant with DD and had severe toxemia with a top out blood pressure of 206/160, I was near stroke and could feel it. I obviously know it has not been that high ever again but I do feel it sometimes. My dad suffered from high blood pressure my whole life.

So I was trying to get the dishes washed up (because I refuse to have messy counters and dirty dishes) :) Even if I'm not feeling well and the Hubby very sternly told me to take my butt to the chair and he did everything for me and he's the one that just spent his entire day working very hard...To me, that just says it all...Having a man like that I feel so very blessed! He talked to me and helped me to get my pressure down, I have NO idea why it hit me like that but I feel tons better now!

So I thought I should just share with you why I feel so blessed tonight...I LOVE this man!!!

Wordsome Wednesday

2010-09-22T00:59:00.000-05:00

I just LOVE these shirts! Of course you know J is #22 and the senior classmen always assign nicknames to put on the guys' shirts! So here is J's girl representing at the Varsity game on Friday night!

They played a good game Friday night! Unfortunately luck was on the side of the other team as they pulled out a win of 18-14 in the end. Our boys fought hard but ultimately cost themselves the game ofter their offensive line got a bit tired and then we had a few fumbles and you know the drill...Thus is a game of football!!

Coconut Chicken...You Won't Be Sorry!!

2010-09-21T02:16:00.000-05:00

So this is the first time I have ever posted a recipe on my blog...SO here goes!! I am really more of a chicken lover than any other kind of meat and quite frankly I get so tired of always cooking with beef or pork because that's what my freezers are full of! So last week I decided to try this Coconut Chicken! This was a recipe I found online and tweaked it a bit to make it faster and more convenient to make.

My family *likes* chicken but not anywhere near as much as I do! When I made this for the family I also made an italian chicken because I was sure DD would be thrown off by the coconut and the Hubby well he has texture issues...Yep texture...Coconut is one of those that falls under the No-No category in textured food. Also the Hubby is a bit allergic to it, everytime I have *tricked* him in the past into eating or drinking something with coconut in it his throat will kind of swell and itch. BUT I did forget about this little inconvenience when I prepared dinner that night. I told him what I was making and that I knew he wouldn't eat it so I was making him and DD the other kind. But then after my first batch came up and I tried it and died and went to Heaven I told him he MUST try a bite! SO after I *shoved* umm I mean nicely fed him a bite he said "hmm yeah not bad...but I hope my throat doesn't swell in a minute"....OOPS...I only giggled a little after he said it....After I had the rest of dinner prepared I dished out DD and daddy the same chicken and J and I the GOOD stuff and then I look over and notice that the Hubby has added a *small* piece of the good stuff on his plate and I smirked just a bit ;)

J really liked the chicken and I of course LOVED it...Every yummy bite of it...Then the Hubby went back in to get his seconds only this time coming out with only the *good* stuff on his plate! And he sheepishly stated "that's some GOOD chicken"!! YES!! So then I got a little scared cause what if he ate it all?!?! I'm gonna fill you in on a little secret here...I don't eat leftovers...Nope. Sure don't. Because I don't like em. BUT with this I was planning on eating leftovers, yes sirree I was!! Luckily there was 2 pieces left and I had lunch for 2 days! YAY me!!

Okay, okay so here's the recipe!

Coconut Chicken

8 chicken cutlets, slightly pounded

Salt & Pepper

1 C flour

2 eggs

1 C Panko bread crumbs

1 cup sweetened coconut

Extra virgin olive oil

Pour a thin layer of olive oil into your pan (eyeball it, enough to get a good fry). Turn it on to a little over medium heat.

Take a cooling rack and put it on a cookie sheet and preheat the oven to 250*, you will put the finished chicken on the rack in the oven to keep it warm and crisp while you cook the remaining chicken.

Get 3 shallow dishes, in the first one put your 1 C of flour, in the second one beat your 2 eggs with a splash of water, in the third one mix your bread crumbs and coconut together.

Take your trimmed and slightly pounded Chicken strips and salt and pepper both sides then coat in the flour first, then egg, then lastly the bread crumb and coconut mixture.

Then you need to check and make sure your oil is *frying* hot and fry on each side 3-4 minutes until it is a deep golden color.

Eat and enjoy! And NO I did not devour 3 or more pieces of chicken tonight after I made it just to share with ya'll!!

Football Fun! And YES I Spoke!!

2010-09-16T03:10:00.000-05:00

So I thought I would just update on the situation from yesterday with the coaches. But first I want to talk about a concern brought up by one of my loyal readers. Ian said "In previous posts I read about multiple concussions. Are the effects from that worth continuing to play"? To answer this and clear the air, yes J had a severe concussion his freshman year from an incident he caused at a *no pads* practice where he tackled an upper classmen and caused himself a severe concussion. He was hospitalized for the day for observation but had no lingering effects from that. He has had a couple of hits to the head in basketball both times resulting in a broken nose and it was said by the Dr at the time *possible minor concussion*. SO when he had his physical this year the Dr said IF he had another major concussion he would likely be done with football for good. Our state has really beefed up the laws in this area and only allow so many concussions before automatic disqualification. At the first game of this season J had that episode where the EMT thought it was a concussion but also found his blood sugar to be low, and stated that too could have caused the symptoms that he was having. So after a trip to the ER and much research I found what I think is the real problem he experienced. I believe he has hypoglycemia, after the coach described his symptoms that night I thought about how almost every night after practice J would have that *ghost eyed* appearance and often be lethargic and a bit sickly feeling but always equating it to just hard practice. At that point I bought him some special protein bars and have been making sure he eats well before games and practice. Low and behold NO problems since! Literally he has felt great and had NO ghost eyes after practice or games! Until today...Guess what he did...Did not eat his protein bar and BOOM he had ghost eyes, although he said he did feel fine. So at this point I will continue to watch him of course and he himself is being very cautious in what he does.

Nice tackle!!

So moving on to today. I feel like I should also say that part of the reason I am hesitant to say anything to the coach is because I am President of our school's booster program so I try to mind my P's & Q's better than I used to ;) So tonight I had my weekly meeting at the school and talked to J after he got out of practice and he said that nothing else was said today about the trip. So I asked him what his plan was and he said basically he intended on seeing how the next couple of weeks play out and if they are still holding their winning streak then he will stay for his team, but if they have been losing he will not miss the trip. So me I was a bit frustrated just because I hate waiting! I'm such an impatient person!! Then while we were finishing up our meeting the coach walked by and I just instinctively hollered to get his attention and asked him if he had a minute to speak with me. He said yes sure he did. So I basically told him I was a bit upset with how things went down yesterday and I didn't know what he was trying to accomplish but I think his plan backfired because now J has a sour attitude towards football. And I told him that I thought it was low to throw in his face what the coach did to him last year because that caused him a lot of heartache and cost him his Varsity letter. Coach responded to say that J would not lose his letter this year and I told him well it wasn't just about lettering it was about being dropped to the JV team as a personal vendetta by the coach; and he (coach B) basically told J that it was justified thus sealing how J felt about the situation from the start; that he wasn't worthy of playing on the Varsity team. Coach responded to say that was not his intention, that he did not know ALL of the details of last years deal but he was simply trying to tell J that if he chose to go on the trip he would forfeit playing time because he would have to move someone else up and that person would have to be up to par but he didn't think it was possible for anyone else to fill J's shoes. And he said the reason J doesn't play on JV and never will again is because he's a starting Varsity player because that is how important he is to the team, that they need him there. So I told coach that he did not relay this to J in the right manner, that J was taking it as he was dispensable and not cared about. The coach was truly apologetic about that and said that when he approached J yesterday it was because he knew he was scared to come to him about it cause the Ag teacher had told him so and when he first started talking to J he didn't really want to talk back about it. He went on to say that he didn't want J to feel like he was being forced to choose and choose football over FFA which may lead to a resentment towards football so he tried to say it in the manner of if this is what you chose this is what we will have to do to fix the problem. I explained to him that J is the kind of kid that needs to know he is needed and respected and that he would not have answered back to him yesterday because he would see that as arguing or being disrespectful so therefore he doesn't speak. And this I know because that is how he is with everything, the way I taught him to be but he never got the part about it's okay to *talk* about a problem just don't argue with an adult...Anyhow the coach feels extremely bad about making J feel like this and is going to talk to him about it tomorrow, he also said he is the one who told J to wait and see how the next couple of games play out, if they are winning then they surely need him if they are losing then don't choose football over FFA it wouldn't be worth it, and J said yes coach did say that.

Start of Saturday's game

Paving the way for our running back!!

Onto the game played this past weekend and yes I do mean *weekend*, what should have been Friday night football turned into Friday and Saturday night football!! We started out the first quarter of the game strong and scored a couple of touchdowns but then in the second quarter they kind of fell apart, it was like nobody was in sync with the other...At halftime the score was 21-14 with the other team in the lead, but during halftime a storm rolled in and the game was rescheduled until Saturday afternoon.

J Breaking up a pass~!!

He did it!! WHOO HOO #22~!!

INTERCEPTION BABY~!!!!

Saturday afternoon these boys were on fire and so pumped when they got there. We had also planned a tailgate party last minute so that they would have food to eat after the game since it wasn't scheduled therefore no parents were bringing anything. They picked up the game at the 3 quarter and let ME TELL YOU! They brought it, and I mean BROUGHT IT!!! WOW it was an amazing game to watch they literally held the other team from scoring at all for the whole second half of the game and we ended with a score of 44-21!! YEAH BABY!!! It was such a victory for them!! They have now a 2-0 record so far and are facing a tough opponent this Friday night...It's going to be a nail biter for sure and I can't wait!!!

HOO-RAH!!

To Speak Or Not To Speak...

2010-09-15T01:33:00.000-05:00

So I'm a little annoyed tonight...Okay maybe just a hint more than annoyed and really perplexed on what to do!

J is an active member of his high school's FFA chapter and really does a lot of things and experiences a lot of things through FFA. He has been a member for 3 years now and truly LOVES it! He has even considered becoming an Ag teacher when he gets older so that he can share FFA with so many other students...

But J is also a football player...With football obviously comes team dedication, I mean this kid dedicated his entire summer to weights and football and has worked SO very hard to earn his starting position on the Varsity team.

You would think that as teachers and coaches at a mutual school they would encourage these kids to be involved with different high school activities whether they be sports or academic clubs. But nope that's not always the case...Especially not for J...

Last year in October J went to the national FFA convention for his very first time in Indianapolis and had a blast!! This trip was not all fun and games either, they had a girl from who lived just a few miles from our county and was in a different chapter die on the trip. She was well known and loved by our local kids. She had a heart condition and had unknowingly been infected with the H1N1 virus which then caused her heart to stop. Another kid not from our area at all fell from a ledge and lost his life. So this trip wasn't the funnest experience for him but none-the-less he is ready to go again this year.

Last year J was the only sophomore on the Varsity team and when he went on the trip his football coach was very livid. Actually livid enough to take J's starting position and move him down to JV. It was extremely hard as a parent to watch this happen because he never imagined in a million years that his coach would treat him that way. He did miss a game while he was gone on the trip and yes it was a game they lost. But it wasn't like they had a winning season, I mean their season total was 2-7, so it wasn't like he cost them the game! I might add those 2 wins were both when J was still playing Varsity ;) So maybe he did cost them the game?! HA HA just kidding!

Needless to say he lost a lot of respect for his coach after that. And then this coach was forced to resign and one of the reasons that happened was because of the way he treated the kids. He was very partial to some and not so much to the others. J had always been one of the "good" kids until that trip. So fast-forward to this year and J is again starting Varsity and really proving to be a great asset to his team. Our new head coach has been great thus far and I have had no complaints! The only thing J has mentioned is that he tends to use a lot of foul language at practice (I'm no angel either BUT I'm not sure that's right) and he doesn't give praise the way he claimed he would. He basically told these kids he's a motivator and wouldn't try and make them feel bad as a way to motivate. But on occasions it has happened. Which I told J that he can't expect it to be all roses, this guy is coming in to a group that needs a lot of guidance so sometimes things will be tense. After their game this past weekend and their WIN the coach was super towards them. The way I expect a coach to be, not complaining still while they had just won. He gave them all great words of encouragement and told J just something to work on but didn't make him feel stupid about it. To me that means alot!

SOOO Friday night at the football game J's Ag teacher comes up to me and says I told Coach B about J going to convention this year because J is afraid to talk to him about it thinking he'll get the same treatment as last year but this coach isn't *that* kind of guy. So I was kind of glad that his teacher had taken the initiative to push J along to tell coach. THEN today happened...

Getting a little peck on the cheek from sis after a nice win!!

J comes home this evening after practice and was pretty ticked. He said that after his weights class today coach B said to him "so I hear your thinking about going to the FFA convention this year" and J tells him yes he is considering it. So then Coach says "well just so you know if you make that decision, you'll lose your starting position and your playing time will be reduced BIG time...AND I totally agree with what the coach did to you last year, you deserved it for leaving your team" this discussion continued for a while with the coach basically saying those same things and J just saying "yeah okay"...OH MY GOSH...Are you SERIOUS?! Then the assistant coach says to J after school today "I hear your thinking about going to convention" J says yep thinking about it, coach Z says "well that could be a bad choice for you"...OMG!! Are you freaking kidding me!! Oh maybe I should throw in here that J will not actually even miss a game this year but he will miss 3 days of practice so they technically couldn't start him but he could still play after the clock started. UGHH!!!

So needless to say J has said that they can kiss his behind and he will quit football over this. This kid lives and breathes football! Just goes to show you how backing someone into a corner and threatening them will cause them to act! Seriously folks, I told J tonight that I am in agreement with the coaches about not leaving his teammates high and dry. They have only played 2 games this year but they have won both of them, already breaking their win records from the last 5 years at least! So I told him to imagine if JW their quarterback chose to leave and go on a trip thus leading to his ineligibility to play, he would be so disappointed because they wouldn't have a chance without him. So while I'm in agreement with the necessity of needing him to play I am NOT in agreement with how the coach went about it. Seriously to make him that mad that he wants to quit simply to prove *his* point...Not good...

I think the coach should have sat down with him and said all of those things in a non-threatening manner and J would have immediately thought of what is best for the team and chosen to not go on the trip. So I really feel like telling this guy, our coach that his method of communication outright sucks!! Especially to dredge up last years coach's vendetta! So that's my dilemma...To speak up or not to speak up...At this point I do not know what J's decision is going to be. Both the Hubby and I think he should stay home and do what he set out to do but yet I feel so bad that he has to miss a trip that means so very much to him!

Always Cherish Those We Love...

2010-09-13T01:33:00.001-05:00

I had such a great weekend and I couldn't wait to share it with you all! Unfortunately that great weekend is a bit of a memory now after today. Almost a year ago I posted about numerous sad things that were going on and in that post I mentioned my friend Dennie, at the time he had just been diagnosed with cancer but it was unknown what type and stage it was. Shortly after that post it was found that Dennie had a very aggressive cancer that started in his pancreas and had metastasized to his liver. It was a very odd cancer in origin as it wasn't an actual "pancreatic cancer" it had actually died off in the pancreas and had been spreading for many years the Dr's said. It was likely to have been there close to a decade before it moved into the liver and took on a life of it's own.

I should tell you here that this is not the same friend I told you about here, that is a different friend who is currently fighting his terrible battle with cancer...

Let me tell you about Dennie, he was 40 when he was diagnosed and was the husband of my lifelong best friend Shanna. I was the Matron of Honor in their wedding. He was a great Christian man who dedicated his life to God's calling, was he perfect? NO! He fought trials just like us all. Dennie was actually a very good friend of my other life long best friend Trisha and they had met through church. He had a daughter (whom he pretty much raised) and my friend had 2 daughters so they spent alot of time together with their girls. Dennie had a best friend named Mark and he helped get Mark and Trish together who have now been married for 7 years I think. After that they always felt so bad for Dennie because he was single and would make an awesome husband! That's where Shanna comes in, they introduced the two and they pretty much hit it off from the start. They were married within a year, Shanna had 3 kids from her previous marriage and Dennie had the 1 daughter. Then after being married for a year or so they got pregnant and had a son of their own.

Such a handsome man!

Dennie and Shanna shared a somewhat hard life together. Even though they were both awesome people who loved each other dearly they had problems they couldn't get past. After about 5 years of marriage they ended up separated which was around the time that Dennie was diagnosed. Their divorce was actually finalized after he was getting fairly sick...In any case Dennie had a great support system and first tried chemo but then after the Dr's decided that the cancer was not responding to the treatment they gave him an option, they told him that he could have surgery to remove half of his liver and with that scenario he had a 50% chance of dying on the table and there was no promises that it would work. He chose not to do the surgery and decided to try a natural healing clinic in Colorado. I am not sure what the clinic did for him, but I do know that they teach you about taking care of your body and trying to kick start your body to fight the cancer itself. Unfortunately this did not work, so Dennie was then left without any options.

Dennie with his little sidekick ;)

He fought this battle for almost a year, the cancer ravaged his body. He no longer looked like a man in his late 30's, he looked like a very sick man in his 60's. He spent months in so much pain from the cancer spreading and growing massively in his body. So big that he could point to the area that was forming under his skin. His quality of life was not something good it was terrible, the last few months of his life he couldn't even stay awake longer than a few hours a day and needed constant care to do even the simplest of things...I bring this up because there is so much confusion among some people where they think that only chemo treated patients will lose all ability to do anything and lose precious quality life time. It is simply not true...Not that ALL cancer patients will go through what Dennie did, but patients with cancers of that nature will.

Dennie sharing his last Father's Day with his kiddo's

I am so saddened to share that Dennie passed away early Sunday morning with friends and family all around him. They knew he was getting ready to leave them as his system started shutting down Saturday, however they did not expect it to be so quick. Dennie left behind 2 children, 1 daughter who is the same age as my DD of 11, and 1 son who is 3 1/2...He also left 3 children who still considered him their stepdad and my other friends 2 girls that considered him as an uncle. He will be missed deeply but he will never be forgotten.

A smile that will never be forgotten...

So my message today is simply this, treasure those you love and never take a single moment for granted. I think we are all guilty of it, I know I sure am!

Then to just top everything off this Sunday afternoon J's 9 month old Australian Shepherd was struck by a truck and killed...Struck by a truck that was driven by a friend of his! She was never a dog to go in the road so we don't understand what she was doing out there! J's friend had passed our house a few minutes earlier and was not driving fast like people usually do down our dirt road and when he came back down the road he said she just flew out from beside the mailbox that sits on the other side of our road, I was very thankful that this young man at least came to our door and told the Hubby what happened, he felt extremely bad about it...She was a sweet little girl and incredibly loving! She also liked to bark...ALOT...J is very upset over this, I wish I could just take the pain away! What a crappy way to end a previously great weekend...

Chevy at 3 weeks old...I'm sure I have more current pics but I just love this one of her!

J's Little Trip...To The ER That Is...

2010-09-08T03:37:00.000-05:00

Right from kickoff the game was awesome! J played both offense and defense and I just love watching him play! We scored a touchdown within the first few minutes of the first quarter and that just paved the way for our boys' 31-12 win!!! What a great start it was...Well so I hope...

Let me back track here a couple of years....Going into his freshman year J was on the JV team, so they started their 2 a-day practices before school actually started then on the very first day of school at practice before school they were still no contact (so no helmets, pads, etc) and J was having a hard time with one of the coaches and basically got mad and had a temper tantrum...Coach screamed at him to do something so he takes of running through the football dummies and plows into one of the junior classmen who weighs somewhere in the neighborhood of 200 lbs and lays him out. He said instantly ALL of the guys started cheering for the freshman who just took out a junior and he thought it was pretty funny until he stood up and started blacking out then couldn't hear out of his right ear. Coach asked him if he was ok and then had him sit on the sidelines to rest. After a bit his hearing came back but his vision was a bit blurry but he was released to head on to class. Within the first few minutes of class his teacher knew he didn't look right and asked him if he needed to go see the nurse, he said yes maybe so. Just as he was leaving the class he felt sick, like he might throw up so he's running trying to find a trashcan and well found one but a bit late and ended up wearing it trying to avoid getting it everywhere else...So I get a phone call that he's "not feeling well, bumped his head during practice". So I rush to the school to find my kid sitting in a chair in the office NOT WITH THE NURSE covered in throw up and barely conscious....I WAS PISSED!!! I proceed to ask what the heck is going on in here and why is no one taking care of my kid and WHY did they not call an ambulance if he's obviously in bad shape?! And why the heck did they not give him some clean clothes?! They then tell me that "oops sorry...We've been having trouble with our computer system so we didn't notice"...So they then call his coach who helps him get changed and tell me what happened. I then zoom him to the ER and my boy had a pretty bad concussion, he spent all day there under observation and I had strict observation guidelines for a while after that. So since then he has suffered a couple of mild concussions in basketball so I'm a bit worried about this..

Our school doesn't have the best of equipment for our boys and we were going to buy J a new safe helmet this year after last year one of our boys on the team was lifeflighted out of a game with a massive concussion and never allowed to play football again, and a lot of this kids injuries to his brain were due to the crappy helmet he had..So sad for him! So luckily our new headcoach insisted on some new equipment and basically the top 10 kids that showed dedication to the team were awarded this new stuff and J was one of those kids! Score one for my pocket book LOL!

So he now has a Revolution helmet that is designed with superior safety features! So back to the game...He was playing an awesome game and during the 3rd quarter he got tackled and I noticed when he got up he kind of stumbled and bit and my mommy heart flopped, but he bounced right back and went to have his leg stretched so I guessed that was the problem. Then right before the end of the game he took a running back out of bounds and when he went to hit the kid the kid dropped his head and hit J helmet to helmet (so he told me later, I couldn't see it). After their little victory celebration on the field the team walked through and he stopped to give me a hug but seemed a bit funny to me. He just seemed a bit tired I guessed, I mean he had just played almost the entire game. He went on to shower and then some of us parents were going to be feeding them after the game so we were getting ready for that when a freshman girl comes up to me and says they need you by the locker rooms J is getting checked out by the EMT's. I was like WHAT?! She showed me where he was and the EMT said he was being checked because when the coach tried to talk to him he didn't know where he was or what he was doing. He looked at me and I saw something very familiar in his eyes, I see this alot and have always thought he was just tired when he came home from practice. They had checked his vitals and all was good but when they checked his blood sugar it was low, which is not abnormal after just having played a hard game but a little bit lower than it should have been. And with his prior concussion history they wanted him checked out. So I told them I would take him in but I wanted him to eat (he had not eaten since lunch) and see if this helped at all. So they had someone go with him to shower and then he came out to eat and within minutes of eating his lethargy subsided...BUT he still had a slight headache so off to the ER we went.

After we left I asked him what exactly happened with the coach that brought this to his attention and J said the coach thought he looked "ghost eyed" which to me made total sense because that is exactly how he looks after practice many times, but when the coach asked him these certain questions about the date and where he was and what he was doing he said J did not answer correctly but J says he did. He says the coach was being over-reactive, but I agreed that he was being slow to answer when I first walked up. The ER DR seen him and basically told us to treat this as a very minor concussion and so we did; we followed all the rules but I am not so sure that's what it is. I really truly wonder if he doesn't have something going on with his blood sugar. After thinking back on all of these times I have thought that his eyes looked *funny* or he seemed really tired he always says that he's "just tired" or "he's weak", and many other things. So he is now going to be on a stricter diet and eating special protein bars before practice and 2 before games to see if they help. Yesterday they practiced for 4 1/2 hours and he did 10x's better than he normally does and he had his bar before he went! So we will continue to watch him and pray that this helps!

Gotta LOVE It!!

2010-09-02T02:23:00.000-05:00

Is anybody else ready for football season?! I am SO ready!!! More for high school football but I love big kid football too ;) J will be playing for his 3rd year at his high school, he's a JUNIOR this year OH MY GOODNESS!!!! Kind of makes me sad....Oh anyhoo....Last year he was the only sophomore starting varsity and that was a big deal for him! Let's just say that my boy is small...Well he's 5'8 and 125 lbs so he's pretty much outweighed by everyone in the league! But he is awesome at football! He plays WR and Cornerback. Last year he kind of got jipped out of his varsity letter and I was extremely ticked!! J is very active in FFA and he attended the national FFA convention and missed a game so after that his coach was ticked because he "chose" FFA over football and well basically didn't let him start the rest of the season. He still played Varsity but coach would throw him in after the start and you have to play a certain amount of quarters to letter, I think he ended up 1 short by those guidelines. We had so many parents talk to us about this and even school staff that didn't think this was fair as J also had played in a summer passing league representing the school and that should have counted towards his letter, but well the coach got what he wanted...And then...After some other *things* that the coach wanted by not recognizing other well deserving kids for all league awards etc. he lost his job. YEP...They forced him to resign! J truly was sad about this because as a teacher and coach before all of this J really loved him!

So since then we now have a new head coach and new assistant coach and well the team's spirit is renewed! Actually the whole county's spirit for our school has been renewed! This new coach comes with a lot of experience and has already in the few short months that he has been with our school brought so many ideas for us to use in many areas outside of football! I am the president of our booster club at the high school and he comes to us with ideas to raise funds for the school, really great ideas that have been a HUGE hit! So we are very thankful to have him join our school!

So with his new arrival is a whole revamp of the team! J is starting Varsity again this year and I am so excited for him! Our school has been recognized by local sports magazines and media outlets as "the school to watch out for this season"!! What a compliment for our boys! They held their annual scrimmage game last Friday and will have their first game this Friday and we are SO very excited!!! The scrimmage game went good! Of course the coach had a million complaints, but that's his job! To show them what needs fixing! So here's to a great football season for all!

That's mine #22~!!

I missed the catch but got the run!!!

Not the greatest picture but that smile is worth more than money can buy~!!!

Okay I am just throwing this in here....It has taken me 2 DAYS!!! to get this posted! Thank you SO much Blogger for these ridiculous changes! UGHH!!!

Newborn Photo Props Giveaway!

2010-08-31T14:00:00.003-05:00

So I see this as rather fitting since I just did baby T's newborn session 2 days ago! I found on Suna Photography's Blog a super awesome giveaway!!! Them partnered with Darn Fanciful are giving away a $45 gift certificate from Darn Fanciful's Etsy store!!!

I promise you I looked EVERYWHERE for one of these Jester hats for my session and I couldn't find one! All local shopping of course! I should have planned better and shopped online! So I have entered this giveaway at Suna Photography!!

Newborns...Precious...

2010-08-31T01:53:00.007-05:00

NO newborns in the title does not imply that I am having one! Just in case your mind wandered!!! Newborn photography!!

New born photography...Where to start?! Tricky would be a good start! I did my very first newborn shoot last week and well let's just say that it had less than desirable results. It was just not a good day for the baby, she was 10 days old and I really should have scheduled the shoot for her first week but I was a bit afraid of putting to much stress on the momma.

This newborn is the baby that was in the belly of this momma when I did her shoot about a month ago. So the first night we tried the shoot baby T she was just NOT wanting to sleep! I felt so bad for mom and dad, I think I was there somewhere around 5 hours waiting while they tried feeding, rocking, walking, *everything*....Finally I told them that I was totally fine with shooting on another day. So we decided for Sunday which would put baby T at 13 days old and boy did that have me nervous! Babies are most flexible in their first few days and sleep the most then so close to 2 weeks was pushing it! My SIL and I talked about my shoot before I went for the first one and she gave me some great pointers about keeping the baby warm during the shoot, using a space heater or heating pad and just some other ideas. But I really need to work on my assertiveness when it comes to stuff like that. I kind of feel uncomfortable telling someone else what to do with their baby! So I did the best I could the first night by *encouraging* them to do these things. Of course hind sight is 20/20 because while I am thinking I am being pushy by telling them these things they wouldn't see it that way because they don't know what the heck to do with a baby for a photo shoot! If they did they wouldn't be hiring me, right?!

Results from the *sleepless* shoot!

SO after much thinking I did a lot of research in how to make babies most comfortable to achieve the results I wanted. I emailed mom the night before the shoot and told her that we really needed the house to be about 85-90 degrees and that truly the baby would work best if she was about 90 degrees, keep the baby up ALL morning, and then feed her as much as she'll take before I get there. Then a couple of things I didn't say were that the baby should not be able to smell mom during the shoot because their natural instinct is to want them and for mom and dad to not try and help because if they do their worry about how the baby is acting will actually make it worse. And I would be bringing a space heater...

So mom did perfect for getting their house good and hot! She fed baby T and put her to sleep while I was setting up and then when it was time to start the shoot I got her positioned where I wanted her and almost instantly she started to cry. I immediately thought we were gonna have a replay of the prior shoot. So I kind of *took over* from dad and started rocking baby T and put her closer to the heater (oh and I said a little prayer *smiles*) so sure enough once she got good and warm and dad wandered off she settled right down. Then from there it was pretty much a breeze! I was so HOT and SO excited! I literally had sweat pouring into my eyes and couldn't do a dang thing about it LOL!! I kept the heater on the whole time and I promised mom I was NOT overheating baby T! I think she was just stunned at how well it was going!

You can click on any of the pictures to get a better look!!

So the final results were amazing! I am so very thrilled with how everything turned out and I am pretty proud of myself for getting the job done!!

The end...

Update 5,386,209 on Krissy of Course!

2010-08-26T01:35:00.003-05:00

Sooo yeah...Another relapse...SIGHS...Seriously I am just tired! So tired of this not working! Monday evening we pulled her out for her evening treatment and I got her eye-drops in then the Hubby says "uhh she's got granules in her eye"...Yep sure enough there they were 3 very large granules that I could see in her left eye and a couple in her right eye.

So I immediately called my Vet who I now have on speed dial directly to his cell phone! Such great service I tell ya! His words "DAG GONE IT!! You gotta be kidding me"?! Nope Doc I'm not, wish I was but I'm not! So he said shoot her with 5ccs of Dex, flush heavily with saline, put in ointment, and worm her again with the ivermectin. Then he said give her 5ccs of Dex again Tuesday and do the other treatment 2 x day.

So we have been strictly following orders (again) and have managed to be pretty much swelling free so that is good. He thinks this is just residual Habronema and hopefully it will subside. If anything changes she will be going back, but I really don't want to have to do that! I just got my $805.00 bill from the last 12 days she spent there! OH PLEASE OH PLEASE no more!!!

Thanks all for the many prayers!

Wordless Wednesday

2010-08-25T03:45:00.001-05:00

This is SO Cool!!

2010-08-24T02:05:00.004-05:00

About a month ago I stopped by my Momma's house and she said she had a serving bowl that she'd picked up from an estate sale and thought I might like it. So she brings it out and YES I LOVE it!!! Absolutely one of the coolest pieces I have ever seen! Then she told me that this is a vintage piece as it was made in 1952! Then I was even more excited LOL!! So it has proudly been on display in my kitchen!

Tonight we headed to the city to celebrate my twin cousin's 17th Birthday and their Momma, my favorite Auntie text me and said that when I got there she had something to show me. She had been at my Great Aunt and Uncles house helping them pack because they are leaving us and moving to Washington to be near their daughter. They are both elderly and my Uncle is in a wheelchair which is getting to be way to much for my 84 year old Aunt. So while my Auntie was there she found this serving platter and a gravy bowl and thought to herself that it was something I would probably like to have as I would probably never see them again after this weekend (I am a very sentimental type person) so she got them for me and was so excited to show me when I got there! So we go into the house and she runs over to where they are and is like "do you LOVE them"?! I was in shock!!! I couldn't believe what I was looking at!!

Yep that's right they are matching pieces to the bowl my Momma got for me!! I was SO excited I said "OH MY these are the same pattern as the one I just got from my Momma"!!! I think I might have started jumping up and down to LOL!! I absolutely cannot believe how much my mom and her sister think alike! And how much they both know me!! I was beaming from ear to ear and am now on the hunt for more pieces to add to my *new* collection!!

With a Sad, Heavy Heart and Tear FIlled Eyes...

2010-08-23T01:37:00.006-05:00

I have had so many friends and loved ones fight different battles with cancer that I am just so sick of losing people to this nasty disease! I think the majority of us has all lost someone to cancer and how I wish that wasn't the case. A very close friend of my family's is fighting a terrible battle with Metastatic Melanoma. I used to work for a cancer center and it was a common thought among those highly educated with the different diseases that Metastatic Melanoma would be one of the worst cancer's to have.

Terry has worked with my mother for probably somewhere around 20 years and is such a superb man. I actually in recent years have secretly (well and not so secretly LOL) hoped he and my mom would date! He is just such a neat guy and pretty much one of the most amazing guys ever! So about a year ago he was diagnosed with Melanoma and he had removed it but for some reason his Dr didn't see it necessary to undergo any further treatment. I wasn't very happy with that answer but he trusted his Dr...Then about 4 months ago he called his Dr's office because he had a mass growing out of his shoulder, their response to him was "it would be best for everyone involved if he would just wait to see the Dr at your re-check appt that is coming up"...I was floored!! I mean seriously I cannot believe they would say something like that to a patient! So he obliged and when he was seen they sent him in for some further testing and was then diagnosed with the Metastatic disease. Terry was very optimistic and very adamant that he was beating this thing, it would not kill him. Then his knees started to hurt within a week of finding out and he was then sent in again and was found to have the metastasies in both knees. The Dr gave Terry the treatment options of going to a specialist hospital in TX or staying local and doing a chemo/radiation combo, when Terry asked him if he would benefit from going to the clinic the Dr told him no he would treat him the same here! WHAT?! NO YOU WON'T!!! I was SO upset, I talked with my mom at length about it and why he should go and she truly tried to convince him to do it but he "trusted his Dr". So he stayed and started the treatments and continued to have intense pain in both knees, at the wedding I shot back in May he was just a couple of weeks into diagnosis and he could barely walk!

This continued over the next few months, I cannot even tell you the number of times I have felt like his level of care was well below standard as far as the Dr's reactions and performance. The combination of chemo drugs that he was on was a standard treatment but there were a couple of other immunotherapy drugs that he should have been on to ward off any new cell growth and he was not put on it. He also needed blood transfusion due to low white counts and the Dr failed to order that as well. Terry continued to work even when he could barely walk, he was in so much pain that the meds weren't even touching it! Finally last week he was told that he needed to go on disability because they were needing to put him on a Morphine and Oxycontin mix to try and control the pain. Still he found no relief, so they ordered a CT scan to "investigate" the pain. Wednesday afternoon he was told they could no longer treat him and he needed to contact Hospice care...The cancer had spread from his knees up into his hips and had literally eaten through his hip bone to the point that it was nearly fractured. Let me just add here that Terry is 6'5 and built pretty solid so that was a huge blow! They also basically said the cancer has spread to multiple areas but didn't name anything specific. I was devastated when I received the call, this man that I want so badly to beat this disease is losing this battle at a rapid speed! I had held out hope and faith from the beginning that he would be spared and he would have a heck of a testimony to share. I wanted so badly for him to be okay, I don't know why but this saddens me to the point that it physically hurts! You all know my dad is no longer with me and somehow I guess I hoped he would fill that hole. Terry is SO great with my kiddo's, he loves to watch DD ride and thinks J is a super young man, so much of how my dad was.

I guess I started losing hope really about a month ago after I got a phone call from my mama saying she had a HUGE secret that I could not share with anyone!!! Big time, like I think she threatened my life LOL! But Terry told her she could share the news with me and ME only! He had been praying that if he was going to die from this battle with cancer that he win some money so he could pay off his debts and not leave his 19 yr old daughter with any financial trouble *insert tears*, well he did it...He played Keno and won $100,000...My momma was so happy for him but she said "I was heartbroken inside when he told me because that means he's going to die"...So after he paid taxes he walked away with $70,000 and paid his debts clean.

Terry had one wish to fulfill this weekend before this disease completely took over and that was to go to a local fair and watch an annual rodeo that DD runs in every year. He has grown up around this town and has never missed one yet. It would be his last time to see her run and he and my momma and their friends had it planned out that they were getting a wheelchair from another friend and they would wheel him up there. Well when Hospice came out on Friday they decided that they would just get him a wheelchair so they left and returned with it and Terry was in the chair with his roommate and roommates wife along with the Hospice RN and he went to adjust his position in the chair and Mike (the roommate) heard a terrible pop then Terry was in TERRIBLE pain so the RN immediately called 911...He broke that hip, the one the cancer killed. WHY?! I don't get why he couldn't have had just one last thing to make him smile....So Terry lies right now in a hospital bed waiting for Monday morning for his Oncologist to decide if he should have surgery and have a pin put in or not. Apparently the Dr told him at his appt last week that if they operated the cancer *could* spread. Which is true but the other choice would be to be bed ridden until he dies, so what is the lesser of two evils?!

My sweet J came up with an idea for DD to paint TT in a heart on her horse for the rodeo Saturday night as a tribute to Terry and we would of course record it and take it to show him. DD was thrilled with this idea but was having a case of nerves Saturday morning and started saying maybe she didn't want to run because Krissy had been off so long and they'd only been practicing for 4 days. I said to her that it was her choice but if she didn't she wouldn't be able to pay that tribute to Terry so she said YES she wanted to do it!

*And yes my artistry skills leave alot to be desired!!

So Saturday night we headed out for the rodeo with awesome friends and family to support her (my momma stayed with Terry) and my Hubby said she was a ball of nerves before her run. See last year at this rodeo was the one where she did the 360 spins off Pete and crashed into barrel 2 with her back and head. BUT she has been back there to a fun show on Krissy and did really well...So anyhow the Hubby says she was grunting and making all sorts of noises trying to get her nerves out LOL! But she came in shining like a star and ran that pattern! It wasn't a perfect run but it was clean and my family and friends were hollering for her, it literally brought tears to my eyes...I was SO very proud of her and she was proud too...I took a picture of her and Krissy before the run and sent it to my momma who showed it to Terry and he just loved it!

So now we wait, wait and see what the Dr will say. And we pray, pray alot...

DD's Tribute run

12 Days in Equine Lock Down

2010-08-18T01:13:00.002-05:00

A couple of weeks ago I posted about our trip to Gainsville and Krissy having some kind of infection pop up in her eyes. We took her in on Friday August 6th and finally 12 days later we were able to bring her home today. It has been a super stressful time and I am thankful that she is doing better now.

As much as I wish I could say that we know exactly what's been going on with her, I can't. She has baffled all of the Equine specialists at the hospital. The best answer they have come up with is that it was a parasite in her eyes, there is a specific name and of course I cannot think of it now. But basically fly's layed eggs in her eyes and from there an infection formed like something they have never seen. She has had abrasions on both cornea's, bite marks in both eyelids, ulcers in her eyes, and abscesses that had to be drained on her bottom lids. Really truly my girl has gone through Hell! She was kept in a fly free safety zone while at the hospital until a couple of days ago when the Dr started letting her out for a few hours each morning. He had intended on putting her on a daily dewormer but later changed his mind as he felt like she was losing weight and he didn't want to exacerbate that issue.

So she is home now with instructions for daily eyedrops and ointment, but with no stopping date right now. He just doesn't know when it will be safe to take her off of them. We will start with everyday for a week then every other day and see if she can handle that. If not she will have to be re-evaluated for further decisions and of course if any of her symptoms return I am to call Dr ASAP.

Can I just say here that there is no words to describe how much this Dr has done for her. He literally treated Krissy like she was his own special horse. He spent time with her everyday treating her and evaluating her and calling me constantly with updates. Matter of fact when we picked her up today he asked the staff to keep us there until he got back so he could make sure and speak directly to us about everything that has happened and should happen. I am blessed to have such a great Equine Vet available! Oh and his last instructions were to get DD back on her and barrel race away LOL!!

Thank you all for your prayers for Krissy! Please keep her in them as she will need them!!

Just one more note today. I would just like to ask everyone to say a prayer for me. I'm having a really rough time right now and I just can't seem to snap out of it. I was scheduled to have my disc replacement surgery next Wednesday and I received a phone call Monday afternoon that my insurance company has denied the surgery because it's "investigational" whatever that means! I called the insurance company to find out why and was informed that a "medical director" made that decision and NO I can't speak with him as it is against the rules. I was told that he received the request on August 6th and made this decision about my life in a matter of days! What the heck?! How can someone take 3 years of my pain and decide my future?! My family and I carry 2 insurance policy's because we want to be well covered and so far that hasn't benefited us a bit! They are constantly fighting over who pays what and neither pays anything! I'm SO very sick of every kind of insurance company that exists!! So there is my pity party that's not likely to go away anytime soon...

Update on Krissy

2010-08-09T02:55:00.003-05:00

Krissy is currently an inpatient at the Equine Hospital about an hour from us. We took her Friday afternoon as the swelling had returned after having 5 days of Dex, eye flushings, and triple antibiotic ointment put in them.

When the Vet examined her on Friday he was checking her eye sockets and was finding little yellow granules way up deep in there. So then they did the stain test on both eyes and both eyes held quite a bit of stain, meaning she has abrasions on both cornea's, which then means she can't have anymore Dex as the steroid won't allow her eyes to heal as quickly as they needed to. So they could not decide still if this was an allergy induced thing or if it is indeed parasites in her eyes.

The decision was made to leave her there as she needed to stay in a fly-free, dust-free environment in order to protect her eyes and hopefully heal. So Saturday afternoon the Hubby talked with the vet and he said that both cornea's were looking better but now the bottom lid was swelling on her right eye...UGHH!!! Also during one of her checks on Saturday morning they found what appears to be little bite marks on the inside of her eyelids. So they are now thinking that it is a parasite in her eyes. SO she was to stay there and continue sterile eye flushes and watching and we should hear more Monday afternoon...

The Down-Side of Our Trip to see Fallon

2010-08-04T02:37:00.005-05:00

Yesterday I posted about our trip down to Gainsville to Dynasty Equine for DD to get some riding time with Fallon Taylor to iron out her barrel problems! The time there was awesome! We had such a blast watching DD do these things that came so natural after Fallon explained them to her. Nothing like having a Pro Barrel Racer teach your kid!

So we dropped Krissy off at Dynasty Equine late Wednesday night and had DD's lesson on Thursday afternoon. When we got there Thursday Krissy was doing great, she did have a little bit of drainage in her eyes but I kind of felt like it was *normal* for her as she is a pretty sensitive horse. We took our own hay and feed for her but in the stalls they have trofts to hold the hay and in that troft under the hay we put in was remnants of Alfalfa hay, and not just a little....but a LOT! My thought process on this was she came from this ranch so I felt like she should do fine even with the different hay in the bottom of that troft.

So Friday we did not make it back to Dynasty as we spent the whole day at Six Flags with the family (that was the vacation part of our trip LOL)...We were originally scheduled to leave for home on Saturday but our family in TX wanted us to stay and barbecue/swim Saturday night. So the Hubby and I decided that would be great and made arrangements for Krissy to stay another night at Dynasty. DD was already scheduled to ride with Fallon or Haley on Saturday but the original plan was to have her ride one of their horses so we didn't get Krissy all worked and then drive for 6-7 hours. But since we were not leaving that day I decided she could just ride her so when we arrived at Dynasty on Saturday I went to get Krissy out of her stall as DD and the Hubby unloaded her saddle etc.

I walked into the stall and Krissy had her head hanging down so I leaned down to put her halter on and when she turned her head to me I nearly fainted at what I saw! Her eyes were SO swollen she could barely see! They were nearly swelled shut! So I halter her quickly and then *thank God* that she trusts me enough to lead her blind! I take her out and the girls and I are looking at her and basically decided she's had an allergic reaction to the Alfalfa. Fallon also mentioned that it was possible that fly's had gotten up under her eyelids and deposited eggs but either way they needed to be flushed.

Saturday after 2 flushings

So the Hubby and I flushed her eyes for about 45 minutes each 3 different times while DD was off filming video's with Fallon. I was disappointed since I couldn't watch cause she apparently had a full force run on Postman, Fallon's horse! They said it was AWESOME! So anyhoo, we then went and bought benadryl for Krissy as we didn't have any Dex or access too any. The benadryl did seem to calm her for a brief time while we flushed for the 3rd time but I didn't have much faith that it would help her issue.

Saturday

So Sunday morning we rose bright and early to get there and get Krissy away from whatever was bothering her. When we got there Sunday they were actually worse! I didn't think it was possible but yep it was...Literally they were swollen shut! She looked like she had a few golf balls stuffed under her top eyelids! So we flushed again and gave more benadryl and started our trek back home. Once we were on the road I called one of our Equine specialists and told him what was going on and he said he felt like I was describing a severe allergic reaction and she would definitely need a heavy dose of Dex but if I didn't want to travel that extra hour from home to take her there she would probably be fine to wait until my regular vet was back to work Monday morning (they weren't taking emergency calls as they were on vacation for the weekend). I told him that I would check her when we were a couple of hours from home and then decide. When we finally stopped to check on her the Hubby and I decided that we weren't taking any chances and wanted her seen as soon as we could get there. We were feeling SO very bad for her as she was obviously miserable and we were afraid she would injure her face or eyes trying to scratch as she had already scraped her face scratching a few times.

Getting a good flushing Sunday morning

I called the Dr and he met us there. His response when he saw her was "Holy COW I have never seen a horse with their top eyelids SO swollen"!! He said he was very glad we decided to bring her in because he too was afraid she was going to scratch her cornea or injure herself with it like this. So he aced her first then flushed her eyes out with saline, flushed her tear ducts, checked her cornea's for any scratches with those green dye strips, put triple antibiotic ointment in her eye, and gave her a good dose of Dex!

We talked about her sensitivity to these things and he sold me a bottle of Dex to have on hand for this type of thing in the future. He said had we been able to Dex her Thursday when the drainage started it wouldn't have gotten this bad. My instructions were to flush with saline and put the ointment in her eyes 2 x daily for a few days and give her 5 cc's of Dex Monday for sure and Tuesday if needed.

Monday was a bit eventful since the Hubby was out of town and I had to do all of that by myself...Not so easy to squirt saline into a horses eye while trying to keep her head down, not to mention trying to put the ointment in....Then for her Dex she wasn't really thrilled about the needle going in, which was a bit strange for her because she doesn't typically throw fits, but she kind of did that day! However I probably would have to if I felt as badly as she did!

So Tuesday she was looking much better and the Hubby was home again so doing the routine was a breeze with his help! We got her all fixed up and expect her to look great in the morning!

Mini Vacation...Or Horse Lesson?!

2010-08-03T00:00:00.002-05:00

After DD's off and on runs this summer the Hubby and I decided we wanted her to go spend some time with the gal who owns the ranch we bought Krissy from. The ranch we bought her from is Dynasty Equine and the gal who owns the ranch is Fallon Taylor who is a multiple time NFR qualifier and champion Barrel Racer. The first time she qualified for the NFR she was just a wee 13 years old and she was ranked 2nd place amongst women who were twice her age! So we decided we would take us a little vacation to TX and take Krissy (DD's horse) with us!

We arrived there late Wednesday night and got Krissy all settled in her stall before we made our last hour trek to the Hubby's sisters house. Thursday afternoon we had our appointment with Fallon and her assistant Haley to see what DD could do to tweak her runs (I guess I should add here that when we bought Krissy Fallon was out of town so she never seen DD ride). As soon as DD mounted Krissy and took off at a trot Fallon turned and looked at us with eyes the size of granny smith apples and said "WHOA I didn't realize she KNEW how to ride, I'm gonna have fun with her and teach her lots"!! Fallon and Haley were both so impressed with DD's seat and just how well she handled herself on the horse, they asked how long she'd been riding and Fallon said if she "could only have 25 riders with DD's skill for lessons her job would be SO much easier" LOL!! *Proud Mommy here*!!

Fallon had DD trot the pattern so she could see where her hang-ups are. First off she noted DD grabbing her reins with both hands to quick after making a turn, so they worked on one hand on the horn and one on the rein. We talked about this issue and have determined that the reason DD is doing this is because of riding Pete, he was such a manual horse she had to use everything to turn him and she's just not tuned to riding barrel trained horses. The first time she pulled out of barrel 3 the way she's "supposed to" the look on her face was CLASSIC!! The power that they pulled was awesome and she was having a blast! Fallon went over a lesson plan with DD to use at home for about 3 weeks and then we will step it up a notch.

So after her lesson she was pretty stoked and talked the girls' ears off! They were so sweet to ask her if she wanted come back again before we went home to ride again, even if it was the day we left. They planned to just throw her on one of their horses and spend some time practicing her next step.

The dirt was really deep around these barrels!

Friday we took the family to Six Flags so we didn't make it up to the stable to see Krissy. We had originally planned on coming home Saturday but the family wanted us to stay and have a barbecue and swim party Saturday night, so we decided to stay until Sunday! So Saturday we went back on the hour drive to see Krissy and have DD ride again. When we arrived I went to pull Krissy out of her stall and was horrified to find her with her eyes swollen shut...I will post on that tomorrow.

I pulled Krissy out and proceeded to flush her eyes out and Fallon asked DD if she wanted to come ride a couple of their horses for a video she was shooting (she makes youtube videos of all of her horses for sale), DD was elated and practically ran out to the arena LOL!! I did not get to see everything that she was doing but Fallon said when they came back in that DD had a better lesson than she could have hoped for and she rode a power-house of a palomino on the barrels and had a blast!

This is a video of Fallon, DD, and Haley riding Postman! He is an AWESOME 5 year old gelding.

This video is also of Fallon, DD, and Haley riding Fred who is a grandson to Freckles Playboy!

Something Great in my Few Weeks of Craziness!!

2010-07-29T23:42:00.006-05:00

So it's been a while since I have had time to post anything! I have been trying to keep up with everyone so even if I don't comment to often I am there, reading! Pretty much the last few weeks have been full of death and not so fun times...I will catch everyone up maybe after the weekend. But one great thing happened to me and I am SO thrilled about it! One of my Hubby's and mines oldest friend and his wife are expecting a baby girl in August so he called a little over a week ago and asked if I would do their Maternity Photography for them! I was SO thrilled!! Not only was this my first Maternity session but his wife is cute as a button so how could it go wrong!! I was thrilled with the outcome and so were they! And I got the greatest compliment EVER when I showed my Hubby the first of the pictures, he said "WOW you really ARE good"!! LOL!! I have always felt and known that he likes my work but it was just so sweet to me for him to say so!

So here's some to share with you all!!

Now the next greatest thing is they are going to give me the privilege of taking "baby girl's" newborn pictures!! And I got another booking with a friend of her's for her Maternity Shoot!!

If There Is A Bull Running Rampant....I Didn't Do It!

2010-07-19T02:29:00.004-05:00

Somehow the Hubby always manages to get us into some different situations! Saturday was spent chasing a bull out of a herd of steers *no, no innocent cows were violated* that he wasn't supposed to be with! This bull belongs to a friend of ours who has recently sold off his herd and has this lone bull left. He turned this bull out on some acreage with a pasture horse but he wasn't happy in the presence of outsiders so he jumped ship to the next pasture!

SO the Hubby gets himself into this deal to go pick up this bull for our friend (while the friend is on vacation?!) and deliver it to a city about an hour away from us. So after a not to much trouble Sunday morning the Hubby and his brother get this bull loaded and we head to deliver it to it's temporary home. Now mind you I find out while on our way to deliver that the man who will be borrowing the bull is too on vacation...Again WTH?!?!

We find the property as it was described to us as "the farm in the middle of the city...The one with cows...Across from the High School"!! Oh yes that's right, we arrived to find this property that yes has some cows and yes is in the middle of the city...With not so good fencing! And across from one of the city high school's!! OH BROTHER!! I had a flash of the nightly news about a rampant bull ravaging the city LOL!!! But so far no news! So now news is good news...Right?!

He is on the hunt for the *girls*...

He picked one fairly quickly!

This poor girl was running for her life ;)

And there is the high school!

Does It Ever Really End?

2010-07-12T01:46:00.005-05:00

I wish I was writing to say that I have had a fabulous weekend but I'm not...This has been the strangest most emotionally challenging weekends for me maybe ever. Most of you know that my dad passed away 5 years ago this coming October. I posted a memorial post for him on the 4 year anniversary of his death and told you all about him.

My brother and I a couple of years ago...

But what I did not tell you was about his wife...My mom and dad were married when I was born, but divorced when I was 1 year old. I lived with my mom until I was a teenager then I left and went to my dad's. My whole life my dad stayed single, his whole life revolved around myself and my brother. After I had J he met a woman and married her when I was 17. After they were married and she moved in we had some issues, she did not like the fact that dad was so close to us kids and me especially. So one night she had been drinking and got mad at me cause J (who was 1 1/2 at the time) was watching TV at 10 pm, big deal I said! So she proceeded to bust my door in then came after me trying to attack me. My dad quickly ran and dragged her out into the hall where she tried to reach around him to hit me and he held her back. Ultimately she kicked J and I out that night and we went and stayed with a friend. The next day I came back and the house was destroyed, my dad informed me that she would never come at me again as she has been warned. He was right she never did try again and she seemed to try hard to like me. I left home shortly after that as it was not good for us to be in the same house, for me it was my house and for her I was an intrusion.

I should mention that the house we lived in was paid for by my dad before he ever married her. But after being married to her and putting her through nursing school he mortgaged the house to pay for her student loans. After she graduated school my dad lost his job of 27 years over a mistake of taking off work to go help one of her kids that needed him and he did not clock out when he left. There was a transition going on in the company and no room for mistakes so he was terminated immediately. After that he had a rough time as that was all he had ever done and was devastated to be in that position. Things just got worse and worse to the point where his wife "C" wouldn't even give him money for anything...He was only allowed a gas card to get gas. He came to TX to see me a few times when we lived there and would come with no money as she wouldn't allow it and he would usually leave without even saying where he was going. This is why he had to tell me what was going on because he had no money for food or anything else. He was so ashamed and I was so heartbroken for the greatest guy on earth!

My daddy

So fast forward to his passing away, maybe someday I can share with you what happened to him. Actually I kind of think now I will never know. But after he passed away, about a month and half later his wife moved in his "best friend"!! Into my dad's house! This man was a chronic drug user and my dad always had a soft spot for him as they grew up together (that's why he was even in his life). But his wife C "felt sorry for Marty" and decided that she needed company anyhow...WHAT?! Pretty much shortly after that I wasn't speaking to her anymore. To be honest I was very bitter about the way she treated my dad after everything he had done to support her and now she was living in a house my dad paid for and with his best friend!!!!! I asked her numerous times to please let me have my dad's personal belongings such as photo albums from my child hood but she wouldn't respond. I sent her letter after letter, even certified and they were returned. She soon after that filed bankruptcy, with a debt of around $140,000 which was astounding considering the house was only mortgaged for $40,000 and she didn't get any new vehicles or anything! So after she filed I couldn't file a civil suit against her and I just left it alone.

I knew that in that house there were illegal things going on. There was covering over the garage door windows and I knew he was a drug user so I suspected she might have fallen into it as well. I have a family member across the street who would periodically tell us there were strange things going on over there and he tends to keep a watch out. So Saturday afternoon he called my granny's and spoke to my cousin who then called me to tell me that C had been arrested...They were told she was abusing prescription meds and drinking. So after many calls to the jail we finally found out she was being charged with Domestic Violence Battery and Domestic Violence Assault. So I messaged her daughter and asked what the heck was going on and she informed me that the relationship C had with Marty was out of control and he "beats her all the time" and well she tries to kick him out but he came back with his kid who is very badly behaved and she tried to get him to leave and he refused then something happened and she proceeded to chase the son around the yard and hit him on the back of the head. WOW, this did not surprise me as I have been that kid...However her daughter claimed that she was not taking the meds and drinking and found it very hard to believe her mom attacked that kid or me. I responded that I have a letter from her mom apologizing for that and that she felt like her actions ruined my dad's love for her. All of which she wrote me after his death. So needless to say last night I was MAD! I wanted vengeance on this woman and all of the hell she has caused for me and my brother and especially my dad! I of course did not say that to her daughter I just simply told her that what I said was true and I was glad she never harmed them.

So today (Sunday) early afternoon I get a message that says "well you will never have to worry about C again as she committed suicide last night"?! WHAT?!!! I was shocked! And saddened and angry that now I'll never get the truth about things. My heart breaks for her kids and grand kids, I'm at such a loss for words. After speaking with her son whom I have not spoken to in almost 5 years I learned that she knew the cops were coming to arrest her and so she proceeded to take a whole bottle of aspirin, he other son told the police but she lied and said it wasn't true so they sent her to the jail, she later complained of stomach pains and by the time they got the jail nurse down there she was asleep so they left her alone only to find out she died in her sleep. Again WOW...

Her son called me (which by way she told her kids that my brother and I were harassing her and breaking into the house stealing things...Only today did he finally think that just maybe she lied) because he says he believes that my brother and I should have everything of my dad's that we have been asking for and he also believes the house should go back to us. I told him I have a hard time taking his word as I have been waiting 5 years just to have simple pictures that we now know had been thrown away. Her son confirmed to us tonight that C had in fact been on numerous different drugs including crystal meth, crack, cocaine, heroine and something else...I am not good with drug names..Her daughter also messaged me again today and said "she lied to me last night when she said her mom was clean because she was trying to defend her but she had in fact found out last night that she was on meth". So I guess I am going to be hiring an attorney over the house thing. I'm thinking if she has this huge debt I won't be able to take the house but I'm not sure at this point where all of that stands. I am under the impression she had not been working either. I was informed tonight that the house is FULL of drug paraphernalia; needles, broken needles, syringes, spoons, coffee cans full of needles and such etc etc etc...Her son said he actually had to leave the house as it was about to make him throw up it is so bad. I am really upset by this, my dad took such care of his house and now I hear the whole thing is trashed!

Please pray for me...