Bringing you to my present... Journey of Life (might be long)

Ok... So now that I am some what up and running I thought I would bring everyone current on my life and where we are today.. Then I will move forward.

After high school I headed off to the University of Oregon. Made several great friends that will last a life time. I did not finish school as I guess my heart was not in it. I played more then studied and was not ready for that in my life. Looking back I sometimes wish that I had completed that part of my journey.. I moved back to Portland and began working at a hotel. Stayed in Portland for about a year and then transferred to a new location with the hotel in Seattle. While living in Seattle... 1994 to be exact I dated, played and was being young and care free trying to find my way. Then I was introduced, via phone, to a young man named Lorenzo.

Lorenzo and I started talking and hanging out and enjoying each others company. This would lead us to become exclusive and in love... He was in the Navy and lived across in Bremerton. I eventually moved over to Bremerton and introduced him to my family in Portland. In 1995 Lorenzo decided to get out of the Navy and head to a Aeronautical school in Tulsa, OK.. I followed. While living in Oklahoma I would become pregnant for the second time, the first resulted in a mis-carriage, Due to him only being in school and enlisting in the Air National Guard reserves and myself only making 5 something an hour he decided it was best to move back to Portland and be close to my family. Once we moved back to Portland he was offered a full time civilian position with the Portland Air National Guard... It was now 1996 and only being together a couple of years we started to disagree on things and argue over stupid stupid things.. We were having a baby and young and well... Not sure where our future was leading. I believe in working things out and fighting for what I love. So I did... While our relationship was that of a roller coaster and sometimes still is, we were working through it all.

1996.. 2 weeks prior to our son being born his job sent him to a 6 month training school in Texas. That was hard. He was not there for our sons birth and he was free from our problems. Did not solve much but we continued to stick it out and eventually his school was over and he was home. We did see each other through out and talked almost daily.

When he returned we got our own place and continued to work on us... Meeting tons of fun friends along the way and having our ups and downs we managed to stay together. Finally finally he would after 6 years propose to me.. Sometimes I think it was to get me to shut up cause I was always hinting... We were still working on getting on the same page. That was in September of 2000. By November 2000 we were once again on a down and trying to fix us. Then he was offered a transfer to Florida. We took it, a new start, new beginning might be just what we needed.

In Feb 2001 I rode with him on the road trip from Portland to Jacksonville. Having the time of our lives together and feeling great. I then was going to fly back and finish up with some loose ends and make the trip with our 4 year old son... Well I began to listen to everyone at home saying he is never going to marry you why would you move? So I said to him one day on the phone.. Marry me or I am not coming. He did not respond well to that and what we had fixed was again broken...

We went back and forth for a year before I finally moved... Prior to moving I received a message from him saying that he needed to tell me he had lied, cheated and anything else over the years and he was sorry... he wanted us to be together.

I moved to Florida with the help of my sister and we began our lives here together in 2002. In 2003 my mom received a letter for the man for paternity... Apparently his fling had resulted in a possible child. The results would point to Yes.... We continued to fix us and enjoy new adventures together as a family.. He would begin to pay child support and we respected the right of the mother to not contact her.

One January day in 2007 we would get a call stating that the child was removed from his mother for neglect and what would he like to do.. He was in currently in Foster Care and had been since November 06. Well me.. I immediately said that there was no reason or no way we could leave a child in the system knowing we can take care of him. That began our fight for Custody. We would hire a lawyer and begin corresponding long distance to the court system. Finally in February of 2008 we were handed temporary custody and the transition from foster care to our home in Florida would begin...

The end of February would come the closing of our first home and just in time as we were going to need that extra bedroom. We moved into our new home the first weekend of March 08 and the last weekend of March Lorenzo would make the trip to pick up Malik... We had previously all met him for the first time in Feb.

Malik came to us with several issues... ADHD, ODD and possibly bi-polar issues. Since March we have worked very hard with counselors, Doctors and anyone that would listen. He seems to respect his father tremendously... Women on the other hand not so much.. Mostly those in the mom role. He has an issue of them not being reliable and that means I work that much harder... It has not been easy. He fights me and just over all dis-respects me. I am not giving up on him.. I refuse to.. He is now my son as well and together we will get him where he needs to be...

Now that brings us to the Present.... We are still in Jax and now a family of 4. Finally after almost a year in our home we bought ourselves a bed frame for our mattress set. Lorenzo is a clothing and shoe whore.. Way more then me. Although always a bargain.. he has too much. Our room has a sitting area that has been over run by piles of clothing since we moved in. Well we spent this weekend cleaning it out.. Put up our new bed once we found a friend to help us pick it up... They wanted 90 dollars to deliver it 3 miles away from the store.. No thank you! and going through all the clothes. My closet is clean and organized. His is well... Clean as it can be and while he still has too much stuff We got rid of several bags of clothing and I am proud of him.. I will post pics later this morning of the pile going away and the room so you can see what was accomplished.

Here I sit now Monday morning blogging and up early with no work or school.. But the man had to go to work as they have a inspection this weekend..

So today the cleaning in other areas of the house and de-cluttering continues.. I am excited to finally feel like we are moving in...

Now you know the story of my life pretty much... Hope you enjoyed it.

Snow in Jacksonville, FL.. Yeah Right!

Blog Beginnings Part 2

Here is a picture of the boys taken right before Christmas 08.

So this is the first time I have ever done this and I thought why not. So I am giving it a try. I will try to update often. This will mostly be a place for my friends and family to see what is happening in our lives since we live so far away.

Having moved to Florida several years ago it is hard to keep in touch with everyone and while I chat often with family and friends on both Myspace and Facebook, not everyone has one of those pages.

That is all for now as I really need to get to work.