I'm still here..

Thank you so so much to my readers and commentors on my last post. Your support and kind words truly mean the world to me. :D Days when I miss my mom are more often than I ever admit.

I meant to get back on here before my last post but honestly I had nothing good to talk about. :P And really I don't want to bring a whole ton of bad stuff on here, because the last thing I like to do when is read about all the awful things happening to someone. But that is all that has happened right now. :( And I think I just need to vent it.

On Monday night, my family lost it's oldest and most precious member. My dearest Great Grandma, Gammy. Her real name is Ethel, but we always just called her Gammy. She was 92 years old. I wish so much that we could have taken Creedence to see her just one more time, but by the time we knew it was close, it was too late. I am happy though that she got to meet her Great Great Grandma one time. The picture below is from July 2008. Creedence will never remember it, but she will have pictures to look back on. We all know that Gammy is in a much better place, and lived a very long and full life. The real person I am concerned about right now is my dear Grandma. I wish so much that I could be with her right now, be there to support her. She has worked so hard the past 10 years or so, making sure that Gammy had everything that she needed taken care of, and when Gammy developed Dementia, she worked tirelessly to make sure she had the best medical care. This has been so much of my Grandma's life for so long, that adjusting to not having to do it will be hard. I know the emptiness she will feel. But I hope to see her soon, and help her in any way I can.

My Great Grandma passing is just the last of a list of things that have made the last almost two weeks really really hard. The truck broke down twice. The first time (Thank Goodness!) the fuel injectors were still under warranty, so to get them fixed was free. The second time, well let's just say there goes a week's wages. I was actually the one driving it when it broke down the second time. And it was the biggest pain in the butt I have had to go through in a really really long time! LOL! I don't own a cell phone, and if you don't believe me ask Michelle from PDW. ;D Anyway the power steering fluid/brake fluid box exploded in the drive thru at Jack in the Box. The truck is a lifted F250 and the tires are absolutely huge, so this means when the power steering is gone, those tires don't move. At least not for me. And this drive thru is one where you make a full 180 degree turn to get through, and I broke down in the middle of the thing. I was working on my 3 point turn to make it through, when the wheel just stopped working. My first thought was 'Oh S**T!!' I got out and ran to the little drive thru window and told them what happened, and that I needed someone with muscle to come and help me. Believe it or not the guy they sent was named Jesus. :P Anyway, with both he and I turning the wheel we finally, after nearly 40 minutes, got the truck out. I was shaking my muscles were so shot. Turning that wheel to try and get those tires to turn was hell on earth. I was so thankful that Jesus came out to help, because otherwise I would never have made it. Ever. Once the truck was parked out of the drive thru, Creedence and I went back in and got our food (LOL), and then went and called Jed from a payphone. Sidenote: I am so happy those things still exist. Although I think that there will be a day real soon when payphones are just no longer there. :P Jed came and got us and drove the truck home and then we had a tow truck come and pick it up and take it to the dealership. Needless to say I am pretty nervous about driving that thing anymore. LOL!

The next thing has both good news and bad news to it. Good news is we have finally started the speech therapy for Creedence! She had her first evaluation last Tuesday, and will have another one sometime this next week. She qualifies with this center through the school district, and they will be helping as much as they can to try and get Creedence on track with speaking. They have a Speech Therapist, Occupational Therapist, and a Psychologist at the center, and every child is required to see all three to get a more rounded idea of what we can do to help her.

(In case anyone is unfamiliar with the situation, my daughter is 30 months old and only speaks 3 words. She has her own language for everything except kitty, goodbye, and Oh Wow. She never said mama or papa or any of the common first words.) The speech therapist (hereto after referred to as SP) was very fascinated by Creedence's own language. She talks and talks and talks all day long, but besides those three words, non of it makes sense. We have come to understand a few of her words which she says for the same thing all the time. Like when she wants more of something (which is usually a sippy cup refill) she says Kabwee. We found out from the SP that from evaluating Creedence, she has been able to hear Creedence say up to 9 words in a sentence! And that if she were able to speak correctly, she would have a pretty fantastic vocab!

That really made me feel a lot better about things, because when your child doesn't talk, it really starts to make you wonder if you did something wrong. You start to worry that you are a bad parent. I had never really thought about it until after the evaluation, but the fact that I can not have a conversation with my daughter (like all the other mom's at the mommy and me class), or hear my daughter say anything that makes sense to me, has really really been wearing me down. I am so ashamed to say that, but it's true. I love my daughter with all that I have in me, but to not hear or be able to do those thing with my daughter makes me sad. And scared. The SP says that we are still a ways away from a diagnosis, but from what she has heard this sounds like it could be something called Apraxia.I came home and looked it up, and just started crying. (I especially cried when I read this poem) This told me that we could be in for a very long haul with this. And my Grandma, bless her heart, told me that if we all have to learn sign language to be able to talk to Creedence, than we will. I want so much to be able to talk to my daughter and to hear her say something back. And yet I feel like a failure for feeling this way. Like I said before, I love my daughter so much, and I am sooo lucky and blessed to have her, that I feel ashamed for wanting more and not being happy with the little angel I have. This is one of those moments that I wish my mom was here. She would know just how to comfort me, and how to get through and passed it.

And the last thing, which was the first to happen, is that I am in battles with one of my fav scrapbooking companies to try and get some of my work back. I am not going to go into any details with this, but I will say that it has made me so sad. Really ruined scrapbooking for me, and made me so scared about my work. I would like to hope that my relationship with the company will one day be as it was before, and I hope that day will be soon.

Well, on a more positive note, I am scrapping with the March Polka Dot Whimsy kit today (which looks like it is now sold out)! :D I am waaaaay behind on this (So sorry Michelle and Nicole!) but hopefully by the end of the day I will have sufficient projects to add to the site! :D The other DT members projects are up right now so go check it all out if you get a chance! :D

I will be back soon to share my March projects! And hopefully some much greater news about something! I have no idea what, but something good is bound to happen! :D *Keeping positive here!* :D Hope everyone is well! Take Care!

~Amy