21 Days of Gratitude-Day 1: Friendship

Friday, the word "Gratitude" stuck in my head.  It stuck throughout the weekend and led to me doing a Pinterest search on Gratitude.  Among other things, I found 21 days of writing prompts related to gratitude.  And so today begins day 1.

First and foremost I am grateful to my mom, who has been a tremendous role model when it comes to friendship.  She has maintained friendships that have spanned almost six decades.  She has a huge circle of friends that she has fun with and would help out at the drop of a hat (and they would do the same).  She has spent a healthy part of her retirement sowing these friendships and making new friends.  She and my dad (who is 8 years her senior) went on a cruise with members of his high school class a few years ago and every few months or so she still meets the wives for lunch.  She is awesome at sending birthday cards, sympathy cards, and even just thinking of you cards.  I pale in comparison to her on many of these fronts, but it is not because I haven't had someone show me the way.

There are many shades of friendship and I am grateful that over my life I have experienced many of these shades.  I have friends whom I have known most of my life and friends whom I only met a few years ago.  I have friends who live in my neighborhood and friends who live states away.  I have friends I see a couple of times a month and friends I only get to see every couple of years.   I have friends from when I was in school and friends from the schools at which I have worked.  I have best friends who feel like a part of the family, and some of my best friends ARE members of my family (my husband, my brother, my mom).  

I am grateful for the good memories I have made with friends and the good times that are yet to come. I am grateful for ALL the laughs.  I am grateful to friends who reach out to hangout or just say hey.  I am grateful for their reciprocation when I do the same.  Most of all I am grateful that through our ongoing battle with infertility and fight to grow our family, my friends have done an amazing job of:   giving me the personal space I need,  supporting me when I am down, keeping the trite/trivial comments/advice to a minimum, and just letting me be me.

Fighting Back with Joy

Nothing

It is amazing to me the amount of time, money, and energy that can be put into something and the net result is literally NOTHING.

We have put 5 years and 3 months into becoming parents and to the best of our knowledge are no closer to being parents than we were when we began

We have put tens of thousands of dollars into supplements, medications, fertility procedures and adoption all of which has led to not a single BFP or nibble of interest in having us become adoptive parents.

We have talked, prayed, cried, problem solved, considered options, saved, spent, rinse and repeat and not a single blip on the radar nor sign of a child joining our family.

Now I have expressed before that the time has been (for the most part) well spent and we are better versions of ourselves now than we were when this journey began, but it continues to blow my logic minded-you can do anything you set your mind to-brain that at the end of the day despite a remarkable amount of effort with have absolutely NOTHING to show for it in regard to the actual pursuit.  Nada, zero, zilch, none.

I attempted to close this post with some great words of wisdom of cute graphic that summarizes how I feel, but there are only two words that continue to play over and over again in my mind-this sucks.

Halloween South of the Border

No. not that border.  The state border.  We spent last evening hanging out in SC.

We first had a delicious southern dinner at a totally cute little restaurant.  The most delicious shrimp and grits I have ever had and two yummy fall cocktails for me and chicken & waffles with a local brew for the mister.  They were having a costume festival out in front, so we still got to see all the costumes without the temptation of candy we would have by staying home for trick or treat.

Afterwards we left all that cuteness and charm behind to visit The Campground Nightmare- a slightly above average haunted campground.

Normally, these are pretty cheesy, but this one actually kept me on my toes the entire time.  Even J.T. found himself surprised once or twice;).

Fall Fun

I have lived in the south almost half my life and use the word y'all on a regular basis, but can't stand the flags and whatnot that say "Happy Fall Y'all".  Just a random thought to begin this fall post.

Nothing new on the adoption front.  We updated a few of our pictures and some parts of the verbiage on our website.  We also plan on updating our video (tentatively scheduled for next weekend).  Otherwise, until we are ready to add another agency, reach out to an adoption attorney,etc. (or dare I say it are actually matched) we just continue to wait .

We have been doing a good job of keeping ourselves busy while we wait this fall.  Last month we visited my in-laws and took a ghost tour through a beautiful and historic town nearby.

We also saw an artist who got his start on youtube.  Though I struggle with the thought that viral videos are a means of launching true talent, event I had to admit this guy was good.

We went to the mountains two weekends ago for Oktoberfest and despite rain from beginning to end had a very good time.  Last weekend I had a girls' day with a dear friend that I have not seen much of lately and it was nice to catch up and really talk.

This past week I went with our fifth graders on a three day field study to Colonial Williamsburg and Jamestown and then crashed on the couch yesterday for a Halloween Movie Marathon with JT and the puppies (I liked The Omen...Hellraiser was ok...not a fan of Wes Craven's New Nightmare... napped through the others...).

My parents are stopping for a birthday visit on their way back from a trip to Mississippi and I am looking forward to us visiting Campground Nightmare next weekend for Halloween.

So despite my daily internal battle to remain patient waiting for our turn to become parents, we are definitely having fun in the meantime.  The quote below has also helped me stay grounded:

Our Fight Song

I have been a fan of Rachel Platten's Fight Song since I first heard it this summer.  Given the fact I spent the summer fighting so many emotions I could certainly relate to the theme and heart behind the song, but the lyrics weren't quite right.

We watched a movie last weekend that had a song on its soundtrack that was nearly a perfect gift.  I actually meant to type the word "fit" at the end of the last sentence, but this song has been a kind of gift so I will leave it as is.