2012 thus far.

Cough cough...hello. It's me Katie. Remember me? No? Alright. Well let's pretend I've kept in touch okay? It's been a busy year.

But seriously. I hate blogging. My sister keeps telling me to start again because I have a lot to say and I say things most people wouldn't. So I guess to make her happy I'll try it again. I'm not good at this, you know. I have so much to say, and like a child with ADD it sort of comes out all at once. And once I'm finished I think "Maybe I shouldn't have just said all that." But alas, here we go. Bear with me. Okay?

It's been a crazy year. Most of you know last year, January 2011 we lost my step dad Charlie. I'll come right out and say it. He overdosed on prescription pills. I saw him lying there and there were a million things going through my mind but one of them was "Thanks a lot ass hole."  I won't go too far into it because I still sort of hold a lot of hatred and hurt towards him in my heart. I've been praying it away for about 16 years. He did a lot of damage, and hurt many people. He was a selfish drug addict. He ruined my family and hurt my mother. And the only peace I have about his death is that we're all not being back stabbed and stolen from anymore. I'm working through it..still. The good that came from all of this is the healing and friendship that formed between my mom and my dad once Charlie was gone. And now that my mom is not constantly being weighed down by the stress, and anxiety Charlie brought to their marriage she is doing amazing. After heavy and deep mourning she has come back to her old self. She is 50 pounds lighter, happier, working the job of her dreams, and in love with a person who treats her great. It is good to see her healthy again. She is so beautiful now. She always was, you can just finally see it clearly.

Shortly after he died, I ended up in the hospital 3 cm dilated at 21 weeks pregnant with a baby the doctors swore would die within 72 hours tops. Long story short, we hung out in the hospital drugged up, pooping in a bed pan, pissing in a bag, and a upside down for 8 long weeks. She was born at 29 weeks gestation, 2 lbs 10.5 oz and 14 1/4 inches long. We won that battle. Thanks to the Good Lord and His desire to keep promises. We won. Gracie LuRee is the light of our lives. She has us laughing all day every day. She loves to dance, make faces, play with the dogs, pick her nose, and play with her dolls. Her new found obsession is mimicking us laughing, closing doors every time she goes through one, and whispering. She is a hoot. And more than words can say,we love her.

I started this year recovering from a rough 2011 thinking "2012 has to be better. It can't get much worse." Welp. I was wrong. For sure. Here's where it gets really tough.

I haven't written about this, not even in my journal. Because writing it makes me think about it. And I still have trouble doing that. My dad died. There I said it. He died. He had a massive heart attack in March that took him from us. He had apparently had heart disease for many years and actually had a previous heart attack that he never was treated for. (He hated going to the Doctor.) And by the time this happened, it was too late. I thank God for letting him last long enough for all of us kids to be by his side. We stood over him and talked and prayed and sang and kissed him. And even in a coma, he responded. With smiles, and hand grabs, and pursed lips for kisses, and furrowed brows when he heard us cry. He was so perfect. As "good" as I am with words, I don't have enough to express how perfect he was. The best dad in the world. I mean it. When my parents divorced he didn't flee like a lot of men do. He stayed in a town with no jobs and worked however he could because he didn't want to change our lives more than it had already been changed. He raised three kids as a single dad and even when him and my mom weren't on good terms he always expressed to us how much she loved us and how much we needed her. He cooked us french toast for dinner, jitterbugged with us to John Couger Mellencamp on our black and white checkered kitchen floors. He took us to father daughter dances, he supported everything we did. He was our coach, our best friend, our anchor, our diary, our teacher, our personal comedian, our coffee buddy, and every single that a father should and could be to his kids. He was. He left us three months before my brother graduated. My brother who lived alone with my dad, who was coached by him, and pushed by him, and trained by him since he was 6 years old as a state champion wrestler can thank him for his scholarship to wrestle for a University for the next four years.  I'll just say his absence is felt deeply every moment of every day.I still can't swallow that he isn't here. Even when I moved away and married, he was my best friend. And whenever I was overly upset or emotional either my husband or my mom would chime in, "You need to call your dad." And I always did. I have to stop writing about him now. I'm weeping too hard.

Four days after my dad passed away my Grandpa died. On His death bed, before anybody knew about my dad's passing my Grandpa shot straight up and said "Randy died?" His daughter who was caring for him, said "No." Ten minutes later she got the call that my dad passed. That's right. My dad visited my Grandpa in the spirit. Holy Moly right? I like to think he was telling him "Say yes to Jesus. I'm going to Heaven now! Join me!" :)  He was 91 years old. So as much as I hate to say this, it was his time. And it's okay. After all the death and sadness in Montana we drove back home. Only to find that Jordan's biological father (who we had not seen since our wedding in 2009) was dying of cancer. Within a week he was gone. And then June rolled around... And Jordan's grandmother died. A women who helped raise him since he was born.

Three days later we found out we were pregnant. That's right. Baby Summers #2 is due in March. What a blessing. Life is picking back up again..right? 

Well then Jordan lost his job. After 3 years of working the same job and busting his ass for Amazon.com. Jordan got a new lazy supervisor who decided nobody needed to know Jordan was having issues with his system. Issues Jordan reported. So when Jordan's manager asked about it, his lazy and negligent supervisor said "I don't know anything about it." And bam. No warnings. Jordan was fired. After several e-mails, phone calls, and messages sent. Some moron "forgot" Jordan mentioned it. Here we are now, 25 days without a job, 12 weeks pregnant, going in for surgery in a week for my cervical incompetence (remember how I almost lost Gracie? Yeah this should help stop that from happening again.) 30 applications filled out, it's hurry up and wait. Waiting for a call back. On top of everything else we've dealt with this year, we get to deal with this too. Oh well, that's life right? There are no favorites. We all face crap. We have apparently just walked right into a raging sea of shit. It happens.

We've experienced more pain than I care to elaborate on. I'm starting to feel numb. Everyone dies don't they? I just plead with Jesus every night to leave the rest of us here. To love and live this life with each other. Bless my babies, my husband, my entire family. Let us live. Maybe that sounds a bit dramatic. But damn..it's true. 

Right now I'm clinging to a couple of things.

#1. I'm pregnant. God gave me this baby. His timing is right. So even though it might seem like bad timing, it's not. I trust that. 

#2. Heaven. I'm clinging to Jesus. I believe He died on a cross for the sins of man. All men including, my dad, Jordan's dad, my Grandpa, and Jordan's Grandmother. All men. In eternity we'll meet again. Until then..we'll miss and mourn and cry. 

#3. We only get one go round. I could die any day. Right? That would suck but it's true. I might as well try to stay positive. I have a family to be strong for and a God I can be weak with because He is strong for me. I can handle this. *Repeat to self*, I can handle this. 

#4.  In the scheme of things, it could be worse. There are people living in poverty, disease stricken children all around the globe, women and girls being sold into sex slavery by the millions, children living motherless, and mothers living childless no thanks to pediatric cancer. Right now, life for me is hard. It down right sucks. But it could be worse. And I will be thankful for every breath I am given. And even more thankful for the breaths of my husband, the breaths of my children, and the breaths of the family I still have left. Life is too short to hate. And God is too good to blame. This world is fallen. He is not. 

I guess I'm ending this blog post now. It's been over a year since I've even tried something like this. I think next time I'll try to write about something less depressing. But hey, just catching ya'll up.

I'm pretty funny, so maybe next time I'll make you laugh.

Until next time sweet friends.