I am a 30+ mom of two who has been married to the love of my life for the past 12 years. We met when we were only 19 (boy, that seems so young now) and were married just 2 1/2 years later. Our son was born 2 months after we celebrated our first anniversary. At that time, we were also raising our nephew who, after 6 years with us, returned to his father's house. It was a difficult start being so young and learning to grow up together but we managed to weather the tough times and build a strong foundation on which to build our family. In 2000, our daughter was born and was a handful from the start! We practiced attachment parenting with all of the kids and were very pleased with the bond it helped to form within our family.
I returned to college to pursue my degree when she was just 14 months old. At first, my husband and I tried to have opposite schedules to avoid childcare but that was NOT conducive to a happy marriage so we began having friends and then family care for them. While finishing up my junior year of undergrad, our daughter was diagnosed with high risk, slow responding acute lymphoblastic leukemia. It was a very tough 27 months of treatment but she is now in remission and despite battling the long and short term side effects of treatment, she is doing very well. Feel free to check out her blog at www.courage4kennedy.com. Rather than rehash all of that here, that is a good place to discover our journey and keep caught up on that front. This blog will NOT be about our cancer story.
Her experience has caused some spiritual turmoil for all of us except her. She has had an amazingly deep faith from day 1 and often times been the very thing that has carried us through. My understanding of my relationship with God has changed dramatically and, had this not happened, my faith would probably have been on a serious path of destruction. I have come to see Him as He really is and understand that He is ALWAYS with me wanting the very best for me and my family (Jeremiah 29:11). My husband continues to struggle. We are learning that QUALITY of life far out weighs QUANTITY.
Since then, I have returned to school to finish my degree and have less than 1 year (and only 5 more classes!!!) left.
So, let's see...we are a homeschooling family. My son attended a wonderful charter school through 3rd grade but we have been homeschooling since. My daughter has never attended any kind of school and can't even imagine what that would be like...nor does she have any desire to do so. She struggles in many areas with a variety of challenges due to treatment, so homeschooling is a fantastic place for her to be as we can modify her schoolwork allowing for more multisensory learning and a lot fewer distractions. My son plays soccer, snowboards and has played baseball but his first love is rodeo. He has his own rodeo blog at www.onerisingstarcowboy.blogspot.com. Our daughter also does rodeo but is much less competitive than her brother. She also dances ballet and looks forward to playing soccer this fall.
As a family, we enjoy camping, rodeo, and just being out in the country. We have a dog, a cat and 4 horses but will be adding a few more animals soon as both kids are doing 4H. I LOVE to read, write and enjoy politics and history in addition to my hobbies of scrapbooking and learning to knit on a loom. Reading, however, is my first love. My husband is a truck driver who was born in Texas but raised in the northwest where I grew up. He loves our horses, being with the kids and family, basketball, football, his poker nights with the boys and mudding. His Scout is in the process of being rebuilt so he is without a 4x4 for now...that won't last long!
I created this blog as an outlet to discuss whatever is floating around in this brain. While I have enjoyed updating my daughter's blog and will obviously continue to write there, I desperately needed a place to share my story that did not necessarily have anything to do with her cancer (which has at many times felt as if it was our whole life). It is possible that I will write regarding that here but do not expect this to be a regular occurance.
So, I LOVE quotes...expect to find them at the beginning, middle or end of every blog. Most if not all will come from www.quotegarden.com and all will be attributed to the author unless anonymous.
So...let the fun begin!!
"It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are."
~e.e. cummings
Mel
