Divorce Trial

This morning came and gone, just as I prayed it would. First of all let me say, that GOD IS GOOD. And I beleive that he is the sole reason I have been able to get through this as well as I have.
As many of you know ( and some will soon learn through blog releases ) Mike didn't ever properly respond and our divorce that was originally mutual and both signed, made it all the way to trial almost 9 months later!
So today ....

I walked into the court room not knowing what to expect but prayed that it would go smooth, without drama and that there would be a knowledge of truth, and justice.

Mike did call in from Lousiana, and the Judge proceeded with Trial.
I am going to spare the ugly details cause I don't think its necissary but in the end the judgment is this :


Mike has limited visitation on a Long Distance plan - Meaning Madaya my fly to Lousianna up to 3 times per year and for the first 2 years will be only for a week at a time. Mike must pay for her to fly there, and must accompany her both ways everytime, himself.
Mike has to pay childsupport based on his previous earnings ( he has since quit jobs and isnt working ).
Mike has to pay Allimony for 18 months at 250.00 a month until he pays back what should have been my 1/2 of the money he spent from cashing in his 401k.
I took debt of the marriage in the amount of 1700.00. He took none, but his own and the truck.
Mike does have to pay the eviction from the house on Harder from August 2010.
I get to claim Madaya for Tax and School this year, and any year he is not current in his support obligations.

After 6 long hours of trial were done... and all should be said and final by November 19th.

In a nut shell there it is.

I am happy with the outcome, and so glad I didn't ask for any of what the judge gave. Instead waited it and and prayed for what was just and as fair as possible.

Let the final days count down...

A bunch of apple pickers...

Tim and I met with Selina today to take the kids up to greenbluff after church - Our mission was originally to pick apples for my fall baking, and canning ( but they were over picked ) so we ended up playing in the orchard for a bit and selecting a few choice apples for our enjoyment! Later that day we headed to the pumpkin patch to select our pumpkins... ( stay tunned )

The Ripe apples too high to reach!

Miss. Peabody showing off her choice!

Bears do know how to pick nice apples!

And Roo's LOVE apples too!

Pumpkin Pickers up next....

Pumpkin Pickers

While at Greenbluff today Tim and I let the kids pick their pumpkins out... We had alot of fun watching all four of them ( and their cousins ) scurry about the pumpkin hill looking for just the right one.
Weston was a bit disapointed, but proud, when the giant pumpkin that he packed up the hill, outweighed all the other 3 combined and he had to select a smaller, more affordable one. All in all though we had a great day and on the way home we got to enjoy our fresh picked apples too!
There's nothing better than a day on the growers bluff, than a day on the bluff with some people you love!

Here is my pic of the patch :)

Laurens pumpkin

Westons heavy pumpkin

Roo's a pro picker

Brandons choice

Our 4 wrapping up the day

A little time, and alot to say

I have so much to say and only a little time, so I will briefly sum it up how is that.

I logged in to my email today to find about 10 emails from previous blog followers. They were mainly wondering if I fell off the face of the earth. So I log in here and low and behold its been since August that I released a blog. Now, to be fair I have been blogging ( you know I use it as my journal ) and most are just kept private, esp until most of my mess is clear. So... with that here you have it.

It's been a month since I moved in with Tim. Things are amazing. He lives downstairs, and I am upstairs. The bathroom did get done, the kitchen has allot to do, and everything is on hold as we litterally have no money. In fact the house is in for closure as he has been with out work now for 6 months ( In case your counting, he lost his job right after we met ). But, in the end we are wonderful and lucky to have a roof over our heads.

as to my divorce. Nope- nothing yet. We go to trial the 25th of October, and I have no idea what to think. I think its ridicules that it has even come this far there is no reason for it, but since its here I am dealing the best way I can. And handling it with lots of prayer!

as for Madaya, she just turned 4! The growth in her is amazing. She has come so far in the last 4 months even her counselor is amazed. She truly is wonderful. She loves our home life, and is more and more stable again even to the point of wanting to work on her school stuff again, for a long time she just lost all interest. She misses her dad, and asks of him often, but is starting to see the pattern. I know shes strong and that I am doing my best by her and that says allot!

As for my health --- doing OK. My immune system has its flairs, and my blood counts are still struggling.

I FINALLY had my hernia repair, skin removal, tummy tuck and breast lift on September 23rd. Healing from that is major and I am in a lot of pain, but getting better each day. I am 13 days post op I believe today, and now just have the binders on from hips to shoulders. They say I should start to feel and use my tummy muscles again in a couple of months. It ended up being 15lbs of tummy skin, and 2.4 lbs of breast skin/tissue!! That's allot. I do have pics but am nowhere near daring enough to share here :) .

I have to plug Tim in here. He has been a huge blessing with the around the clock care that I need. He changes, and cleans my drains makes sure I am on top of all medicines and is even helping maintain the house while I am down. Although, he does say he misses me! LOL its allot to do and he wonders how I do it.

I just reply, its a labor of love.

Speaking of love....

Aah, its all I am going to say :) Thank you for all your love and support. We truly are blessed. I wanted to share with you all the newest step for us.

NO WERE NOT ENGAGED!!!

But!

We did start a class at our church for blending families. Its called smart step families and it teaches us to how to gear ourselves and children in a healthy direction in blending our lives. I have to say this is a huge blessing to us, even though we have it relatively " easy " with the kids, its not always easy and allot of hurt feelings do come up. So this class is a great tool. Tim and I are also in prayer and seeking direction on rather or not we as a couple should start a life group for other families in our boat. Obviously a few things have to be wrapped up first, but we are in prayer about it! Join us if you would please!

Alright well theres so much more, but honestly I have been sitting up now for about 15 minutes and its about all I can take.

Please bear with me, as I re-gain my sanity and begin posting more.

Love to you all!

Home sweet...

MESS!

Before Tim decided I would move in here, he decided he wanted to re-do a few things in the house. We then together decided it needed re-freshed before I could/would come ( No offense to his Ex Wife - I just couldnt do it ).
So ...

We painted the frontroom, upstairs bedrooms, and started to fix the bathroom ( it needed a new sink ) ...

That was 2 months ago.
This morning heres the re-cap.

We have a beutiful bedroom for the girls thats painted, and finished out we ripped the carpet out, and did their floors with the wood that was in there a beautiful oak! We have a nice room that I am living in - its all painted, new outlets and redone floors too...
We have a toilet, LOL Long story, but its not upstairs in the bathroom, its downstairs. Why? Because the upstairs bathroom needed work ( A new sink ) cant you see how the toilet would be out? HA! .... Seriously though Mr. Young decided the cracked tiles needed to be replaced which let to discovering mold, which led to discovering more tiles, which led to re-doing the bathroom. So... We have a sink in there, a newly retiled window sill, and partial floor, and soon will have the toilet again. His dad installed the toilet downstairs so we were stuck. Downstairs was plummed and will someday be our master bathroom, but for now we have dubbed it our " honey bucket " . Its a lavish black plastic incased 6x6 foot room with a porcelin throne in the middle... who wouldnt want to use it?!
The front room did get painted, but needs to be trimmed out still, the kitchen, hall way, and downstairs are left completely a mess right now... but someday we will get there.

Ill have to take some pics of this mess. Any remodel is hard but imagine doing it like this, and doing it during an eviction, school, work, summer, and LIFE.

I appreciate Tims thinking that I deserve the best, and truly know that why he has been working so hard on making all this "perfect" im quick to tell him that stuff doesnt matter - its him :).

Home sweet.. mess.

I just dont know...

Where the time goes? Maybe by the time I am done with this update it will help us all tell where some of it has been.

So lets see - Its been a little over a month ( I KNOW! ) since I have had time to sit down and do anything let alone, blog. I made the time this morning because 1.) I need it and 2.) its important that I do keep up on my journal which of course is my blog. I have been blogging privately and some still remain unpublished but theres alot I can put out here too.

Things of late, have been nutty. That's probably a huge understatement.
I do no like to talk about the Divorce as one of the main things in my life, but unfortunately it very much is. Especially since it has gotten nasty. Nothing Mike and I had originally agreed on is the same. He has yet to find a job, a place to live stably and has not been contributing for Roo's needs in over 2 months. Its been sick! I waiting in the beginning of August to meet with his attorney he was "very confident" he could get it wrapped up in a few weeks, only to find out that Mike was for sure moving to Louisiana, and that his newest proposal was to fly Roo there once a month. I almost agreed to this, thinking this is how it has to been - then it quickly hit me how unhealthy of a situation it would be for Roo. Talk about changes, interruptions and the like. I can't imagine traveling like that as an adult, let alone a preschooler.
So moving forward I decided since Mike was all talk about that and taking her there, that it was time to visit the Ex-Parte court in hopes of getting temporary orders of child support, custody and the like. While there the judge put those orders in, but also a restraint against mike that he can only see Roo while in the state, and metro area.... set a court date for 2 weeks later.... Skip ahead. Mike shows up to court to try to tell the judge his plans, and while some things are taken into consideration, over all were both unready for a hearing ( Cant set support if theres no income, Cant set a parenting plan with only 1 parent stable ) so what it came down to was the commissioner saying and signing the orders that it needed to be re-heard but for now mike could have madaya for up to 7 days while in town. This was hard to hear and do. 7 days goes against anything in WA state for a child that young, but we did it. I wont even go in to the pain it caused all the way around. There was one point after court that day, while in the hall way that Mikes dad came to me, yelled at my face everything he can imagine, and then got into a fight with Tim ( not physical ) security was called, and Mikes dad proceeded to make alligations that Tim is a molestor, and sicko through and through... it was very stressful, and the actions of that man make me ill. To think that he can be so angry as to act this way, when " hes hurting for his son " yet his son is whats caused this is crazy. When and will they ever own their actions?!
Basically here, the only good thing is she got to see her dad.

........

As for School I have been finishing up the Summer Quarter, which ended on a horrible note. I still have no looked to see what I managed to pull out of English or Acct. but I am sure its not good. Things all fell into life at one time at the end of the classes here and I just couldn't keep up. all of these factors listed in this update were literally with in 2 weeks time, and right during finals! I was doing school FT. Working PT, and dealing with just too much.

All during this I had been evicted from the house on Harder Pl. that mike and I had moved into after the last separation, remember.... Grrr. I tried to stay there, and had intentions of making it there until February when my lease was up. I just simply couldn't afford the rent and my needs on my PT job, and no child support or alimony! So... In a crazy dash to get out it all came down to being out by the 20th of August, which resulted in the 17 and 18th completely emptying out the house into storage. Madaya and I were invited to move into Tim's house with him and the kids, and this would allow us to help them out too. To this date all my stuff is in storage, and were working on getting his house fully ready to hold all 6 of us ( see my blogs on that issue ).

Ok so as if that wasnt enough - lets add in here, that I have now been ill with strep and or pneumonia 3 times in 2.5 months. In case your counting that's 3 rounds of antibiotics in 2.5 months too. You know how well I handle that! I havent been well at all.

Madaya is amazing. She has grown so much this summer, and more in the past 2 months then I have ever seen growth at all. I had her at the Nutritionist the other day, and shes gained inches, but no weight. Still a great sign shes ok, and thriving in that level. Roo's counselor thinks maybe she was depressed and feeling some of the stress and unhappiness of the past. Talk about breaking my heart to think we had the power to do that to her. She is also showing much interest in her preschool work again, and is taking a liking to the fact that she is now a part of a blended family. She really is the reason to get up most days....

As to Tim and I things are amazing. I wake up every morning just wondering if this is too good to be true. If its a temptation I should run from or what?! To this day I know the timing wasn't mine, and struggle with the fact that it was someones, and that things are here for a reason. Moving in was a really tough decision. I had thought Madaya and I would go to a low income apartment or find something else, but it was Tim who said that ultimately his home is where we belonged ( Thinking forward ) and that there is no since on running two homes if what he and I feel is correct. On top of that Madaya got to the point, where she wanted to spend much of our days in at his house anyways, and literally cried when we went to ours. So, I moved in. I reside in the big room upstairs, and Madaya and Lauren have the smaller room. The boys are downstairs, and Tim is in our new room down stairs as well. This arrangement will work until were married. In our relationship things are even more amazing. The level of love and respect I find myself emerged in and reciprocating is truly amazing to me. Most days fly by and I can't think of life before him, or after him with out him! I find myself missing his kids in the week ( I KNOW I KNOW ) and our life together is finding its rhythm. You probably caught the " after were married " in that last few sentences. Yes, there's plans to marry and this too I struggle with. I don't and haven't really thought about getting re-married for awhile down the road. I mean I am still legally married now, and I have alot of issues to sort out, but at the same time Tim is no responsible for why I feel that way, nor should be he punished because of a decision I made. I need to be in prayer about this, because as he has stated he was absolute when he met me that this was how and what was going to be. He intends to propose to and marry me SOONer than later. But I don't nor do I want to know when that day is.
I find myself fighting thoughts of it daily. I love him, and its easy to imagine our life. It would be a tough start financially, but a easy go of it mentally. It would be abundant in love, and overflowing for joy, but I worry and wonder if its all right to feel like this?! I wanted to play the single mom card for a while and get on my feet, as he found his. He says were better off together and that those circumstances are just that. Circumstances. We should fight them together.

Sigh... I dont know what I did to deserve this man, or his love and respect and the chance to share his life and children, but I am sure glad they are all here! I never in 7 lifetimes would have thought I would be in this situation. In love with one man, and married to another. How many times have I passed judgement and here I sit.

Ok, enough mush.
We havent done much of anything we planned this summer cause again, I just don't know where time has gone.
We have been playing on the weekends when we can, and for the most part just trying to learn each other, along with the children and move one day at a time.
Tim is still looking for a teaching placement, and I am working PT, and returning to school in a few weeks for fall.
I also have surgery coming up ( See post ). A trial for divorce in October, and then sounds like maybe a wedding ;) But we wont go there yet....

Ok stay tunned. Ill remember I need this more!

My Life : Major Update

I simply cannot sit here and pretend that I have the time to go back and blog all that has been going on so I decided to do a Major update -- thanks guys for pestering me to get on it too!
I forget some of you who are so far away, and even close, still want to know whats been happening.

Well... lets start with today and work back a month!

Im in love. Yeah you heard the L word. Seriously I cannot explain it any other way. I hoped for a bit it was a "fling" a " void " a selfish need... ANYTHING but this, but it is, I am happy to say Love. It has to be. I have never felt this way before -and each new day is amazing. The connection on so many levels drives me crazy and I sometimes do get caught up in the wow - how do I deserve this?! Is it always perfect oh heck now! Infact I would say we have our struggles pretty well carved out for us. Financially, physically... theres just alot! But so worth it. Its amazing. I hate not being near Tim, and him I. We have spent just about every evening together, and often times end up talking late into the night. Can this be real?

More than just Tim, I am in love with his family! His children are amazing, his parents I am pretty sure are my ideal inlaws, and his sister is simply my long lost sister! NO LIE when I am with each of them I feel like I have always been there, or should have always been there, and that everything is natural. I love that feeling, and just the acceptance of Madaya and I.

Which brings me to Madaya...
Wow - the changes Ive seen in her are amazing. She loves having Tim around, is enjoying settling back into a routine again, and is acting more and more like herself each new day. We still have alot of melt downs and the typical 3 year old drama but taking it all in stride.
She misses her dad, and its getting harder and harder to encourage her connection to him, simply because she gets so angry when she does get to communicate with him!.

Hanna --- well lets see shes still a puppy and keeps me ( and now Tim ) super busy. Shes chewing EVERYTHING right now. Grr. It drives me nuts. But soon will grow out of it I hope. Ill have to post a new pic but shes so cute. Shes growing fast too! Shes 7 months old its hard to beleive! Besides being a pup shes loving spending time with Tim's dog " MIA " . Mia, is an english mastif and they get along famously as if they have been raised together. Mia is 3, so she is deffinetely showing Hanna the ropes!

Work - I am still working PT for Pediatrix Medical Group. For the most past it keeps me about 20 hours a week. Im loving it and praying to advance soon!

School - Its been 4 weeks and I am still struggling to get a good routine down. By some miracle I am maintaning a 97% in 2 of my classes ( English Comp & Word ) but, sadly have had to drop Accounting. I didnt get the book until 4 weeks into the class, at which point the instructor wanted all 4 weeks worth in 1 week and current lessons. JUST NOT DOABLE and I am not the only one this happened to!
I am planning on trying again in the fall though.
Speaking of fall for school - i want to go FT. BUT struggling with the financial aid side of it still. The divorce isnt final so they still count mikes income and say I cannot get help! It drives me nuts! I may have to take loans but again all in time. Im working on it.

Fun - I really havent had too much excess time honestly but when we do get out its been to the lake, the park or for a ride. Its been fun, but not near as much as I am used to or like... I need to be out more!

Home front... well theres big news. As things are right now Madaya and I cannot stay in this house. I have fought to afford it but simply cannot. My mom is helping with 1/2 the rent but shes struggling too and its just not working out. Right now we have a tentitive plan to move to Tim's in a couple of months, but that comes with great struggle so I am praying for the right direction!

Divorce : Well.. some will and some wont be suprised to learn its still not final! Court has come and gone, and mike has not done anything on his end that needed to be done - so... I am the one stuck waiting. If it goes to trial I plan on asking for 50% of all assets and re-doing the parenting plan to revoke joint offers. I hope he comes to his senses soon and realizes how easy and nice he has it but .... so far, oy, im going to reserve most comments!

Alright I need to get some things updated on here, and then return to the real world. I will try to keep up more. I miss blogging.