Saturday, October 27, 2007

Brrrrr.... Winter is on it's way!!

Boy fall is long gone and the cold days of winter are upon us here in Montana. I am not sure I am ready for the days when it is dark when I leave work and the COLD. Brrrrrr.

In other news. I have been really busy working on crafts for the craft show. Just getting different things ready is taking forever. I am sure this will be our last year of doing the craft show. This year has been a lot of work.

Megan did really good at the State A cross country meet last weekend. She placed 38th out of 142 girls. I was really proud of her, but she was a little disappointed in her time as it wasn't her seasons best.

If you are a baseball fan like I am, it is GO ROCKIES!!!!! I was really rooting for the Red Soxs to beat the Cleaveland Indians, but I would love to see the ROCKIES win the world series this year.

Amanda moved back home today. It will take some getting use to since she was so eager to move out at 18 and not have to follow our rules. Now she is 20 and willing to follow the rules to save some money! Well off to watch the end of the game and than head to bed.

So what do you think of the new blog banner? I have been playing around and working on it.

Thursday, October 18, 2007

Thursday wanderings!

Well it is Thursday, October 18th. My youngest daughter turned 18 yesterday!! I am still finding it hard to believe that she is 18 years old. It seems like just not that long ago I was the one that was 18 years old. I was foot loose and fancy free back than enjoying life. Boy would it slap in the face really fast and wake me up that foot loose and fancy free isn't something that lasts very long. But a good life it has been never the less!! We had cake and had fun last night. She is so much fun to be around because she is so out going. Her big excitment was that she went and bought lottery tickets. In the scratch tickets she was excited because she spent $4 and won $2 back. There is that right of passage in turning 18. I have to say she has been such a great kid! I would have thought she would have been the one that would have given me so much trouble as a teenager. She didn't at all. She followed the rules and never has really been one to want to go out and do the whole party hang out with her friends. She would rather have her friends over to the house and that is fine with me!!

So today Megan is off to the State Cross Country meet in Helena!! They are leaving this afternoon for the 8 hour bus ride up there! She made cupcakes for everyone on the bus to celebrate her birthday!!
Good luck MEGAN!!!

Tuesday, October 09, 2007

Family and Religion

Wow my family is nuts or at least half of them are. Well my mom finally did it, she tore our family apart totally. My mother became a Jehovah's Witness shortly after I was born. I had known the JW religion my whole life. As I was growing up in a home that was very dysfunctional. My father had two children prior to meeting my mother than he began having an affair with my mother who also had a son from a previous relationship. When they were married I was the oldest, than had two younger sisters. We never got to see my dad's oldest children until I was in high school. Anyway the family was very dysfunctional with my dad drinking all the time, my mother was always spending and fighting with my dad. I grew up thinking we were a very poor family (didn't qualify for free lunch at school because my parents made too much, but we didn't get lunch at all.) I actually had friends whose parents would pack me a lunch when I was in middle school and send it with their daughter.

So my dysfunctional family was being raised as Jehovah's Witnesses. My mom's son was always in trouble. He was into drugs and drinking and would steal all the time. We were always in trouble for things he did. To make the family dynamics worse because he was not my dad's son he was very hard on him. Which made it worse because my mother gave him everything he wanted to make up for it. I never got a long with my mother, truly couldn't stand her from almost as long as I could remember. She was so mean to me (I think because my dad and I spent so much time together). Anyway I remember my mom telling me and my younger sister that if we were baptised than she would buy us each a car. So we both got baptised, only to my surprise I never got a car from my mom. But low and behold my sister did. That was when I was 15. When I was 16, I got in a major fight with my mom and she slapped me and I slapped her. That was the end for me. I left home and moved in with a friend and her family. (they were not JW's.) Needless to say I was disfellowshipped when I was 17 years old. I never really had a relationship with my mother again for a couple years. She was mad that I was living on my own, working evenings and going to high school during the day. I was determined to graduate high school. My mother was not really involved in my life at the time.

I had my daughter Amanda and ended my relationship with her father only to meet Sam that fall when Amanda was 3 months old. Amanda and I moved to live with Sam and we were married and had a daughter. My mother and father didn't come to my wedding even though I had it outside in a park so they couldn't use the excuse it was in a church. My mother didn't know her two granddaughters. She had seen Amanda a little bit before we moved, but hadn't seen Megan at all. It wasn't until I was pregnant with Jerad that I began speaking to my mother again. I had always talked to my dad off and on, but it was difficult to talk to me without having to deal with my mom afterward. So my sisters and mom came to visit shortly after Jerad was born. My mom and I never had a close relationship, but she made it clear during my children's young lives that my sisters children were her favorites. She would always try to push her religion on them. She because very upset when myself and my children were baptised in the catholic church and I was confirmed.

We talk periodically during the years. It wasn't until the separation of my parents that the trouble really began. My mom had called my husband up and asked him to write her statements falsifying information for her divorce saying my dad had given him things that were worth month and she was entitled to half that money. My husband told her where to go and she let loose on him about choosing sides. Needless to say my husband didn't care if she ever came to our house again. We still had contact off and on during the years since.

Now it has been 25 years since I have been disfellowshiped, I have had contact with my mom and my sisters. They have come to visit and my two girls both had flown up to spend the summers with them. Than boom all heck breaks loose the other day. My sister has been in Montana for about 3 weeks now with her kids. They haven't called or anything to come visit or have us drive up to see them. Well on Sunday my mom calls to say they won't be coming to see me at all because I am disfellowshipped and they can't speak to me anymore. So I let her have it. I am so sick of her games. But than she hangs up the phone and calls my oldest daughter and asks her if she wants to get together with them. She doens't call my other children at all. She tells my oldest not to tell me or her siblings about seeing them. What a crock of crap to try to cause trouble in my family like that. I explained to my oldest daughter what my mom had said to me. Needless to say my daughter was pissed because she has been hurt by my mom over the last 20 years. So she calls them back to tell them they won't be seeing her. Than my mom has the nerve to call me up and tell me I am making her grandchildren hate her and that she has a right to see them if she wants.

I just unloaded on her and told her that she will probably never see them again because it was her choice. I told her and my children that their relationship was up to them and I wouldn't stand in the way if they wanted to see their grandma. Needless to say my mother also called my brother and told him that he can't contact me anymore or my mother wounldn't speak to him. Gee he left the church way before me and did way worse things, but because he wasn't baptised it was okay!! That religion is such a cult.