Little Birthday Boy

Today is the day I had Bubblegum - only 6 years ago!
It really feels like yesterday. I have such vivid memories...In March of 2001 I announced my pregnancy. Actually, it was my mom who announced it to me.
I had been telling her how sick I felt and how my legs were cramping. I was sure it was all sympathy pain. My mother had been diagnosed with ovarian cancer stage 3. She had already had 1 surgery to balloon open a vein in her leg and insert a shunt in her chest. She had begun chemotherapy and just generally felt like hell. I liked to think that I was close enough to her to wake up in the middle of the night with pains in my legs and assume she was having pain at that same moment. It kept me praying for her, but it didn't dawn on me that I might be pregnant. I was 19!
I can remember peeing on a stick for the first time...which one do I buy? How do you do this without splashing everywhere? Are there really 2 lines or does the double line count as one? Maybe I should do another one just in case...
Anyway, when I started feeling even more sick I thought for sure something was wrong with the baby. How could anyone be this sick just because they were pregnant?
Then we had a sonogram! Bubblegum was a verrrrry active little fetus! But we finally caught a shot of his baby butt and little boy parts when he mooned the camera!
A BOY!!!
I knew it would be. I didn't even consider the fact that it could have been a girl. Neither did my mom. And she immediately started buying stuff for him!
On the morning of September 11th I sat down to watch my favorite morning talk show, and watched in horror as the second plane came crashing through the second trade tower. I put my hands protectively around my full belly and called my mom...
On December 10th at 2am I woke up with a baby bouncing on my bladder. As I got up to waddle to the bathroom I felt a gush of warmth down my legs. Did I just pee myself? Cause that would be a first for me...
Then I realized my water had broken! "Jooooooohn!"
Off we went to the hospital with an exhilarating rush! My contractions started immediately. But it wasn't to be that simple.
I had aspirations to have a natural birth with this baby. I do have a very high pain tolerance. But after 12 hours of contracting and only progressing to 3 centimeters I broke and asked for Stadol. NEVER I repeat NEVER ask for Stadol! Loopy doop! It did help me sleep though, but a tortured sleep full of visions and freaky dreams. Finally the doctors said I needed some help and started a Pitossin drip. Then I really did need an epidural. Things went quickly after that but the epidural hadn't been done correctly and had left me with a severe headache. To this day I am not sure how I pushed that boy out while suffering a severe migraine. My eyeballs were so strained that they broke all the little capillaries inside and around them!
Bubblegum was born at 7:53 December 10th at Florida Hospital Rollins just 6 floors below my mother, who was on the cancer floor recovering a full hysterectomy.
It was such a difficult time. A low so severe that depression was beginning to sink in, and a high so high! My first baby...my boy, my little Bubblegum!
I know without a doubt that even though this precious child wasn't my plan, he was God's. My mother's one dream was to have grandchildren. She had planned for it for years! Stashing toys away, planning what the kids should call her (dran-ma) and how she would wear her hair when it turned gray (in a long braid down her back).
She got to love Bubblegum for the first three months of his life before she passed away. He was among the few rare things she would always smile about through all the pain and misery. And she certainly didn't fail to impart her maternal wisdom on me as I began this new journey of motherhood!
Bubblegum was and still is such a joy. Everyday he makes me laugh - every other day he makes me cry, tears of joy at my baby boy. I don't know what I would do without him.

Back on the horse

Tomorrow I will officially be back in the saddle!
Jasper is his name and hopefully he will turn out to be a horse I can improve my riding style on. Cause right now my style is every horse hates being ridden and will try to get you off any way it can, so hang on for dear life! Then there is no relaxing and enjoying.
It has been nearly 2 years since I've even been on a horse. I really should stop getting pregnant! That seems to be the main contributing factor to this sad truth.
Anyhow, I am excited that I get the chance to expand this part of who I am. I know everyone thought I just had horse fever like so many little girls and one day it would just go away. Well, it hasn't. And it won't.
Sometimes I think I feel closer to my mom when I am on a horse. She would say that is silly. But I cannot help but feel like I got her horse crazy gene and haven't been able to put it to use until now.
I won't ever compete in the olympics, I probably won't ever even be in a horse show. But if all I ever do is learn enough to teach all those little girls, who are like I once was, how to ride a horse, then I'll be happy!

Public recognotion

I normally do not like people to notice me.
If given a choice I would not get up in front of people. No attention please!
Now you all know where my little Jellibean gets her quirks!
But yesterday I really apprecited my public recognition. In fact it seems that it was God ordained, which is even cooler because then it seems to be a message from God himself. That gives me goosebumps!
Now, please understand that I am not sharing this in order to toot my own horn.
I've seen the amazingness of God in this and how He always knows just when we need a little pick-up or word of encouragement to make it through another day.
My rule for the kids when we are all out somewhere together is to stay together. When we first pile out of the van everyone must stay right next to the car until everyone is ready to walk through the parking lot or cross the street together.
But yesterday Jellibean lost her head. She jumped out of the van and skipped into the street with her head in the clouds. My heart leaped into my throat. No cars....thank God! But I wanted to scream at her! I work so hard to teach my kids what's safe and right. When they do something so stupid as dashing into the street without a thought, it really makes me want to scream. Like maybe screaming will create such a fear in them that they will remember for the rest of their lives that dashing into the street means mom will scream.
But when I really think about it, I realize that the more important thing is to teach them that running into the street could be deadly, and that they are so precious to me I could not live without one of them if something bad happened. Somehow I know that will stick in their heads longer than any angry screaming. So, I called Jellibean in from the road and got down to her level.
What would I do without you? You have to remember not to cross the street without me! You could get hurt and I would be sad forever! Jesus was watching over you today. Do you understand?
Then we took hands and continued across the road into the store.
There was a young black women there ringing the bell for the salvation army. She stopped me. She first told me that she was also a mother and that my girls were so pretty.
Well, thank you...
But she went on. She said "I just have to tell you...I saw what just happened with her running into the street...I don't know if you go to church or not but I do..."
I felt the spirit turn...ahhh....a God fearing woman. Still a stranger but now really not so much! I told her we did attend a church.
"Oh good - then you know - the bible says to train up a child in the way they shoud go. It says they will grow up in their own ignorance if there is no training. And we all know that the ignorance of a child can get them into some big time trouble with the law, with their school, with their families. And it's our job to train them so that doesn't happen. I just wanted you to know that as a mother I really appreciated how you handled that situation with you litte girl. Most moms just scream and yell and tell that child they gonna whoop their butts if they run out in the road ever again...but you took the time to talk to her. And that's called training a child in the way they sould go."
WOW! I told her thank you for that encouragement and went on my way. But the more I thought about it the more I realized how right she was. And I really was encouraged. And I was really excited too. Because my whole calling as a God fearing woman is to stand apart from the crowd. To be noticeably different and have people say, "What does she have that I don't have...I want it too!" And thus open the door of their heart for Jesus to jump in with his still small voice. Or sometimes with the voice of a salvation army bell ringer!