A not so Merry Christmas.

As I metioned before, I have always thought that Christmas is a magical time of year. A time of excitment, innocence, joy, family and love.  I remember so many Christmas' as a child in which I am lucky enough to say it was, all of this.
This year with the family growing up (and at that stage when their friends are just as important as their family) it seemed like christmas was being scheduled in.
Scarlett, who asked us back in October about our Christmas plans, decided to spend Christmas with her boyfriend's family at a fancy restrurant. She asked if we could reschedule our plans to fit in with their's. This hurt as we had made plans long ago. It also hurt as Scarlett is still only 17 and the BF is her whole world.
I was thrilled when Richard and James came from intertstate to spend Christmas with us. I spend most of the year missing my sons (happy that they have lives, University, work, etc  but like most mom's still missing them). They arrive and spent most of their time shut up in their room gaming on computerers right next to one another. I still don't get that. Then they come down to share Christmas with us, unwrap presents and turn on the TV and game on that.We have a very late lunch, then they decide to disappear with friends. I know, one day I will laugh at this, but right now I just don't get it.
Savannah and Caitlyn game in the lounge most of the day. Emily (6) opens all her (many) presents and says "is that all?" and (when John was outside for nearly 4 hours errecting a Christmas present swing) she keeps going out to him and saying in a very cross voice "aren't you done yet?"
Rebecca (17 months) continually finds candy that the others have left laying around and gets so hyper that she cries screams and throws a fit most of the day. When we did have lunch she decided to pick up her plate and throw it across the table.
So whilst the kids are gaming (oh, and they did set up a basketball hoop for Savannah), I spend the morning in the kitchen cooking, cooking and more cooking. They keep coming past, telling me they are starving, asking when is lunch and raiding the fridge (leaving stuff all over the benches, table, floor, bedrooms, lounge room etc). Whilst doing this, I have to stop everything and go to the other side of the city to pick up my mother. So the stuff is in the oven, the timer is on, the kids are told to take the food out when the timer goes off whilst I pick up Nanna. Nanna HATES christmas. My brother died back in 1984 at the start of December and she has never really recovered. Her depression is horrible, and comes across as bitter sacasim, self pity and when she is around my family, pure dependance. Nanna can even get up from her seat to get a glass of water, and everything has to be done for her instantly. My mother is only 63, and when she is not around me she gets around perfectly (she is not disabled). When I picked her up, she grumped and complained the whole way back (my trip took me 45 minutes there and back). She also insisted that I take her to find a store as she had forgotten to buy sugar. That was extremely hard to do as stores are generally closed on Christmas day in this State and when you do find a little local store that is open they have a 300% mark up on prices and cues of people waiting to get into the crowded store.
I was still determined to keep a cheerful mood despite all this. We finally arrived back home and the house looked trashed (general christmas wrapping and snack food everywhere), the smell of burning food greats me, whilst the kids remain gaming and John is still putting up the swingset.
I deal with it. The only slight crack I have in my mood is when I am asked when is lunch as my mother sits at the dining table watching me running trying to get everything done by myself.
Scarlett finally arrives with her BF (who looked like he didn't want to be there). So we try to have a nice meal. We only had 11 people at the table, but things were still alittle crowded. So I was hardly surprised when Caitlyn reached across her Dad to get food and it ended up being dumped on his plate, drink etc. They even refused to bless the food (this type of behaviour is NOT normal in our home; the kids are a loving, respectable group who I love and am generally proud of).  In between courses, I was shocked when the kids and Nanna decide to disapper rather than help clear the table or help at all. They TELL me to let them know when the next course is served whilst they go off to game. I told them I wasn't happy with how they were treating me like a maid and asked for help, to clear the table and some space so I can whip some cream. James desided to do dishes between courses insted (does ANYONE do that??? Especially as we didn't need those dishes for the next course) Our kitchen is small (we plan on remodeling it next year) so I was unable to get in there to do anything; not even get desert. Scarlett's BF, Scarlett and Nanna were sitting around outside smoking and talking through all of this and the BF decided he was tired and still full from the restruant so he wanted to go home. He was taking Nanna home too. All this was the final straw, and I asked if the rest of the family could give me a break. Richard (nearly 21) then decided to drop the final straw on the camels back when he told me to "Chill". He said it is Christmas and to just chill and relax. I burst into tears and asked who would be doing everything if I did this? I then went off to my room to cool down. Nanna, Scarlett and her BF left. It was the first time I saw my mother smaile the whole day. As she walked out the door she said; "well next year we can do pot luck" and I might beable to bring something. WHAT?!?!?
Was she waiting for me to fail? Was that what she was hoping for?
The day didn't end there as she forgot her handbag,keys and gifts and sent Scarlett and the BF back to get them. They said they would be right back and didn't arrive for 5 hours when John and I were heading off to bed.
Christmas is usually such a beautiful time of the year. Celebrating with family the birth of the Saviour. I love Christmas. I love my family. But this year things just didn't work out well together.
There will be no Ba-Hum-bug from me. But, I am glad this Christmas is finished.
Next year............................................................................................................................??????

I love Christmas; I always have. I have so many happy memories of wonderful, family Christmas',  parties,and lights. Why is it that this year just seams so....well, I am not sure of the right word. Not totally overwhelming but pretty close to it.
This past year to eighteen months has been so hectic. And now we are a week away from Christmas and I am just starting to shop. There was a time when I used to have all my Christmas shopping finished by September/October. This year it seems so different. I am totally at a loss what to buy. What do you buy for a son who is just about to turn 21? Or 19 and 18 year olds who seem to be able to get everything they want for themselves? My 15 year old just started her first job, so she has been buying most of what she was wishing for herself.  What? What? What?
I miss the days when it was easier. When Christmas morning they would sneak out of bed long before dawn and be totally in awe of all the little gifts that Santa had left behind. Now their friend's talk of iphones, laptops, and endless electrical good.
How do you get back to the spirit of Christmas? It's more than just carols, christmas music, decorations, and even church.

A lesson I've been waiting for

For many months now I've been struggling with my life. My life choices and where I am at now. I remember when I was sixteen and my parents divorced I would often go over to my best friend's place so I could escape the "drama's" of my family and be with my best friend's "perfect family". She was so much support and everything I wanted to be This friend always seemed to have every thing "just right". Her family were still together, they seemed to love each other so much. She dressed perfectly, she had a job, and she had dreams. We would lie around at night in her room or on her trampoline in the backyard chatting about how wonderful our futures were going to be. She was going to go to America, I wanted to, but no matter how hard I tried I couldn't get a job. We would talk about the perfect returned-missionary(RM) Bobby BYU that we would each marry. Even better than that we would be sealed to in the Temple. We each dreamed of our perfect families; we even started to pick out names for them. These were some of the most treasured times in my whole life; and I always look back on them with happy thoughts. They enabled me to escape the disasterous life I really had. I was sexually abused, I had parents with mental health problems (a father who could be so loving and kind one moment and so abusive the next (I later found out that he was bipolar) and a mom who was cronically depressed and abusive. This was intensified by the fact that my older brother suffered from Friedrics Ataxia a disease that would kill him by the end of that year. This reinforced that this friend was my rock.
After my brother died, I needed space. I hated God; How could God take my brother away? I had fasted and prayed for him to be cured; I was even so arrogant that I refused to believe up until the moment the nurse came in to his hospital bedside and said that he was dead. How could God do that to me? Wasn't I worth answering prayers for? I pushed her away and we had a disagreement and things were said that to some extent were never completely overcome. My life became screwed up, it wasn't that I didn't believe in God; more that I felt he hated me and that I wasn't good enough to answer any prayers for.
To cut a long story short (which I will no doubt go back to at some point) my life became totally messed up when went away to university and following a car accident which caused me to return home my Branch President told me to marry the first guy that asked. That happened in a crazy mixed up way too. I dated a guy for awhile (only to find out he was dating my sister and another friend of this friend of mine at the same time). We broke up on the Wednesday, I went to church on Sunday and an RM asked me out that day. I said no, but he kept asking. In the end I said if he was still interested in a week we would go out. He was from out of town and he spent the week trying to find out where I lived. Sunday came, we went out, and he asked me to marry him that day. What??? Crazy I here you say. Yes it was. He was a Zone Leader on his mission and he seemed too good to be true. He was. We married civilly (he said he wanted it that way and I made nothing of it at the time). We had four beautiful children together (the first of which died after a few short hours). He was ................. (I can think of so much to say here, but I won't). We divorced and he married his mistress (I hate to say; in the Temple).
During that marriage my friend and I would cross pathes once again. Maybe God knew I needed to see her again, I don't know. During my third pregancy I developed the exact same condition (polyhydrominius) that had taken away my first child. One day I just walked into church (this was in the area I went to university at) and I ran into her, her husband and a beautiful little girl. Try as I may I couldn't help but being jealous. My husband was living several hours away in a capital city (he said it was so we could save money for our family; but it wasn't.)My husband wasn't there for me. This condition I was experiencing would cause me to be hospitalised for months, and even when I was moved to that capital city, my husband wouldn't come in to see me. I remember laying in bed sobbing about my friend. Why did it have to be now that our pathes crossed again (this traumatic pregnancy meant that I was unable to patch things up with her as she and her husband moved before I returned back) and why did she seem to have everything that I was missing out on????
Following my divorce, I married again. My husband is not Lds. However, he moved halfway around the world (from California) to be with me and I love him "to the moon and back". He has taken on the role of father for the children I had (my ex hasn't even seen these children since 2000, by his choice). We have had three more children (and a miscarriage). He has been with me through thick and thin. He is one of the first to help out with service projects and would give the shirt off his back to anyone in need. He acts more like an honorable priesthood holder than many I have seen (and I treat him as such). Nevertheless, I have to be honest and say that despite all this I have been left wondering why I haven't be "worth" all those things that my friend and I had dreamed about? This has been the question I have asked in my prayers so often.
Today we had a lesson in combined Relief Society and Priesthood that seemed to answer this for me. The Bishop gave a story from an old Ensign in which he spoke about a man who had prepared to go to Italy. This man had learn the language, saved and saved and made so many plans about what he would do when he go there. Finally the day came when he go on the plane and flew for many hours. When the plane touched down the message came over the intercom, "Welcome to Holland". The man screams and trows a fit; "Holland, Holland, I am not suppose to be in Holland. I have done everything I could to get to Italy, I don't even speak the language here." He is told that they are sorry, but there is nothing they can do and that is where he is suppose to be. Over time he learns the language, finds a place to live, and see alot of interesting things in Holland; but he still comes across people who are coming back from Italy and speak of their fantastic experiences. He wallows in self pity, wishing he were there. Then one day he finially stops and realises he is still living a wonderful life, he has met a wonderful person whom he can share his life with and he is EXACTLY where he is suppose to be.
I am exactly where I am suppose to be. I have a beautiful family, a husband I love and despite many challenges I am where I am suppose to be. For all the times I have looked over at other couples/ families I have known nothing. I haven't know what challenges they have faced, or their reality is like, or where their Italy really was; and for that I am sorry. I think it is time I really start to count my blessing; and say to my special friend from so long ago, that I am sorry. I am sorry I haven't been there for you. It was never about you, but about my wishing that I could be in Italy too. I had no right to think your life was perfect; I just figured that because I was so far from perfect that you would still get all of your dreams.

In the beginning

I have had a few blogs in the past (usually for university), I always thought I'd start one again that would simply be me. The reason that it has taken so long, is that I looked at everybody else's blogs and thought, why can't mine be perfectly designed like theirs? This led to me putting it off, and putting it off, until it finally hit me; I'm not perfect, neither is my life (mostly it is just multi-tasking and craming in as much as possible until I fall asleep in a heap each night). Well, I guess there will come a time when I learn how to make it as glossy and well planned as I want my life to be; but until then- it's just simply me.
Well, who am I? I am a mom of 8 (7 of whom are still on earth- my first born, Moses,  lived for just a few short hours because he was born prematurely (I often suffer from a condition called polyhydromious (or excess fluid around the baby when I am pregnant). I have had 3 boys first up and then a tribe of girls. My youngest daughter, Rebecca is just 14 months old. The others; Richard, James, Scarlett, Savannah, Caitlyn and Emily range keep me on my toes. I am luck enough to be sharing this time in my life with my husband, Mr D. He is an amazing man who is my best friend. He moved half way around the world to be with me and 5 children from my first marriage. He has raised them as his own and is more of a father than anyone else I have known.
I have been challenged over the years by reoccuring brain tumors; I am currently on my 3rd. This can mean that at times I suffer from incredible migranes and other health conditions which has slowed my graduation from the Bachelor of Community and Social studies that I have been studying for the past  nearly 5 years (I had planned on graduating in the normal 3 years that it was suppose to take but a baby and health issues have left me on the home stretch for the past year (I am on my final assignment in my final subject, but I find my fear of failure has stopped me from even moving forward and finishing it).I guess that will be something I will blog about almost as much as my family and my faith.
Well, I have started blogging again. We shall see where it goes :o)