Baby number 2

It really wasn't that much longer and we realized we were expecting our second bundle of joy. This pregnancy seemed to go a little better as far as being sick all the time, but God is not without a sense of humor. When I was about 6 to 7 mos. along I noticed some tingling  in my face, mainly on the left side. Within a few hours my left side of my face was paralyzed. I could only do a half smile, I couldn't blink my left eye, and everything sort of drooped on the left. Weird huh!
Dave took me to the Dr. and I was told that I had a "Bells Palsy". It was caused from retaining water from my pregnancy and it was putting pressure on a nerve in my brain that controlled the left side of my face. Yeah, I'm pretty sure thats what he said. I told him to please fix it!!!! he said that because I was pregnant, he couldn't give me any medication. He was confident that it would resolve itself as soon as the baby was born.  I was mortified to have to go through almost 3 mos. of not being able to smile at my son Ryan, or the thought of someone watching me eat and food falling out of my mouth (more than usual).
The day came when our new baby entered the world, this one was only 10 days late, and I was so happy to have another son. Welcome baby Adam. Eventually the Bells Palsy went away, although, I still have food fall out of my mouth once in a while but that is usually because I am talking with my mouth full.
While Dave and I were busy at the hospital having Ryans little brother, Ryan was at my sister Phyllis's house.  I was told by her that her was a very good boy while there. On our way home from the hospital, we stopped to pick Ryan up and he got his first look at his brother.  From there, we stopped at Ryan's favorite restaurant, McDonalds, and picked up lunch  and headed home.
Ryan was just over two yrs. old at the time and I had tried really hard to get him potty trained before the new baby came. He was doing great with it too. So, when we got home, he was sitting at the table eating his hamburger, and he announced that he had to go potty. Hurray Ryan!! He got up from his seat, walked into the bathroom, and promptly flushed his hamburger down the toilet, he then walked over to me and wet his pants. I was shocked. I immediately called my sister and said "What have you done to my son??" "He was only with you for a night and you ruined him!!".  Phyllis told me, once she stopped laughing about what he had done, that it was normal for the first born child to react to his parents bringing home another child. That he was probably wondering when this new kid was going to be taken back to his own home because we certainly didn't expect him to share us with him did we? She said "think of it this way, imagine that you and your husband love each other and things are going really great. Then one day your husband says "honey I love you so much that I thought it would be great to have another wife too, here she is." How would you feel about the whole deal? Hmmmm, that actually made sense.  My sister is very wise. Don't tell her I said that!!

And baby makes 3

Dave was working as a machinist working the 2nd shift. I was working at a card shop at the mall and we didn't seem to see each other much. Which is why I was so shocked when I found out that I was going to have a baby. Finally, I could have a family of my very own. I was so happy. I was also so sick. I threw up at every opportunity. Once we were going to look at houses with a real estate agent that Dave knew. I was in the back seat of his car. It was one of those big cars that sort of float down the road. Like a boat only with wheels. I could feel myself getting ready to blow. I tapped Dave on the shoulder and said quietly, "I m not feeling very well". "OK" he said, and kept talking to the agent. Again, I tapped him on the shoulder only a little harder and said "I REALLY don't feel well". At that point Dave told the agent that we should maybe find a bathroom. I am now in the backseat of this guys car and I am turning Green!!!!! I yelled "PULL OVER".

He did and I jumped out of the car and everything I had eaten for breakfast that morning ended up on some guys lawn while he stood there watching me with the hose in his hand not knowing what to say. As quickly as I had jumped out of the car, I jumped back in and we drove away. I felt bad about not cleaning up after myself, but I figured, hey, he had a hose.

After I got through the morning sickness phase of my pregnancy, It went pretty well. In fact it went so well that it didn't seem to ever want to end. I thought God must be playing a cruel joke on me and I am not really pregnant, just really fat. My due date came, and went. After one week of being late, I was getting upset, then two weeks late, I was getting desperate. Finally after three weeks of pleading with God to either let this baby be born or kill me, Little Ryan decided to make his way into the world. But not until after 14 hours of labor. You would think that after being in the oven for so long that Ryan would have weighed at least oh I don't know maybe 15 pounds.  Nope, he was a little guy. He weighed in at 6 lbs, 6 ozs. He was a whopping 19 in. long. Little man with a BIG attitude. He is still that way .

He is all grown up now with a wonderful wife and 2 beautiful boys. The boys are a lot like him.  Sweet revenge!!!

Good Bye High School, Hello ?????

High School was not great for me. I had a hard time concentrating and so I did only what I had to do to get out of there. What surprised me the most was I ended up with a B average when all was said and done. Go figure. I had thought about going to the local community college, but it never happened and I was so anxious to move out and be on my own that the thought of more school was not appealing to me at all.
The day after I turned 18, I moved out.  Finally, I am on my own....at my sisters house.  I told myself it's only temporary and besides, I had a boyfriend now and I could spend time with him and life was good.
Dave and I met at a BBQ. My Niece Peggy and her boyfriend invited me to tag along with them to this event and at first, I didn't want to go. I felt out of place. They convinced me it was fine and I would have a great time.
It was at a park. Someone brought a frisbee. We tossed it around for a bit, but I noticed that one guy kept throwing it at me. I think he actually hit me with it a few times. It was annoying. Peggy and I decided to play a game of chess. I was pretty sure he wouldn't throw any chess pieces at me and so I thought it was a safe game. I was wrong. He was throwing advise at me. "You don't want to move there" or "are you sure you want to do that?" "Do this instead". Again, annoying!!!.
The day ended and we all said our good byes.
A few days later, Peggy called me to say that the guy at the BBQ named Dave wanted to know about asking me out. Peggy said that her and her boyfriend would double with us if I said yes. I told her that he had to be the one to ask me, not her. So, she gave him my phone number.
Later that day I got a phone call from Dave and he said "Hi, so I guess we are going out".  I said " Are you asking me or telling me this?". I could almost feel the heat of his embarrassment over the phone as he tried to explain that Peggy had told him it was all set up.  I felt a little sorry for him, but mostly I was still annoyed.
Again, no long details, but after knowing Dave for a total of 3 mos. we got hitched.  This is not something I recommend to any of my children, or anybody else's children.

Speaking of Miracles...

I guess my dad actually paid attention to how I was feeling and how my life had been turned upside down because I had a friend who actually had a real horse (not a pretend horse like mine), and she was looking for someone to lease her to part time. When I mentioned this to my dad, he decided it may be a good thing for me. So we went down to the stables where my friend and her mom met us and I was introduced to "FROSTY". She was the most beautiful horse I had ever laid eyes on. She was part quarter horse and part apaloosa. She was grey with black spots on her rump.  I was in love. My dad agreed to pay for the lease and I was now on my way to at least in part, realizing my dreams.
Something else that I thought was really cool is that Frosty had a baby. A little filly named Boo-bay. She was a handful.
Remember, I had no real horse experience so I did things on Frosty that I would never do now. Things like riding her backwards, bareback. Sitting on her in her stall, with her baby trying to jump up and knock me off. Jumping her over barrels that were laying on their side. I was kicked, bitten, stepped on, and bucked off of that horse so many times I can't count, but it didn't matter to me. I loved her. Did I mention that she was so barn sour, that I couldn't ride her on the trail more than say 10 mins.  and trust me it was a fight. She would eventually bolt back to the stables and more than once leave me to pick myself up and dust off my pants and walk back only to find her happy as could be with her baby.
I really loved that horse.  I was happy to spend my every spare second with her.
 One day my dad decided he was tired of paying the lease and so he stopped and I could no longer ride my Frosty girl.   It broke my heart.
I was more determined than ever to someday own my own horse that no one could ever take away from me.  Unfortunately, life seemed to get in the way.

Thanks Mom

I really have to give a lot of credit to my Mom for raising me the way she did. We went to church every Sunday, unless you were deathly ill. I tried to pull that one off a few times, but she saw right through me. I resorted to whining and complaining a lot. She resorted to bribery. "If you go to church, I'll take you to Newberry's five and dime and you can get a slice of custard pie while I look at fabric".  It worked every time.
Even though I complained a lot about going to church with her, after she died, I continued going. It helped me get through things knowing that it helped her get through things in her life. I remember being afraid at night and not wanting to tell my dad, I would fall asleep hugging my Bible. I knew there was peace and comfort to be found there. To this day, I still go to church and I still read my Bible. I believe in miracles and I know I will see my Mom again some day.
My dad never went to church.  Which explains a lot about him.

Fancy Dreams

Even as a small child, I dreamed of owning a cow. I was born in Los Angeles and lived in a nice middle income neighborhood. It was not cow property. So I did the next best thing, I pretended I had a cow.
I also pretended I owned a restaurant, Had horses, and dogs and lived on a farm. I guess when you really think about it, it wasn't really pretending as much as it was a dream of mine.
I would get up in the morning and go to school, come home and play with my dream animals. All except the dog, which was real. We started out with a Basset Hound named Maxine, and When she left us, we went on to a poodle named Tinker. I taught Tinker how to sit and shake. He was brought into our home after I had been bitten by a neighborhood dog and became deathly afraid of them. Tinker gave me back my confidence and showed me there are no bad animals, only bad owners. I will forever be grateful to Tinker. I went from wanting to be a farm girl to wanting to be a Veterinarian.
When I was 14 yrs. old, we sold our home and moved to Orange County. It was back in the day when you could still see plenty of Orange groves and strawberry fields.  I loved how open it was. I remember going to the strawberry fields and picking strawberries with my nieces, bringing them back to my sister Phyllis's house and she would make the best strawberry jam in the world.   Good Days.
Sadly, and suddenly after only living in Orange County for two months, my Mom passed away.
I was so lost. I wont go into the details of her passing, but let's just say there is a great chance that my Father had something to do with it. He was not a nice man and he drank way too much.
I went to live with my sister, Eileen, her husband, and their three boys while my Dad went to "find himself". He landed in Dana Point, which is in South Orange County near the ocean. I guess he had always wanted a boat, so he bought one.
It was a really tough time for me. Moving from my home and friends, loosing my Mom at 14, having to start a new school, and living with my sister, who at the time really had her hands full with raising her boys. She wanted to be my sister, my friend and my mom all rolled up into one and I just wanted her to be my sister.  I love her very much, but it was a hard time for all of us.
My Dad bought a house that was two doors from a brand new High School and told me I was to now live with him. Another move, another change, I retreated back to my dream farm in my mind. That is how I coped. I went from living with my sisters very busy household to being alone with my dad, who worked all day, came home and drank himself to sleep. So I was basically alone.  I cried a lot.