The Merryman Family

Memories and perspective

2012-01-31T22:59:00.003-06:00

So tonight I got to "chaperone" pledge week activities. And that brought back a million memories.

I went to a private Christian university. As such, we didn't have national sororities. But we have "social clubs" which are the equivalents. Without the hefty dues. And being a part of that system was a really great part of my college experience. It truly taught me social graces. It taught me to value female friendships. It gave me some of the greatest female friendships I will ever have.

But watching those activities tonight reminded me of a couple of things I would have told my 18-year-old self.

1. it's not about you.
2. It's not as funny as you think it is.
3. It's not as bad as you think it is.
4. Soak it up.

Come to think of it, these are things my 32-year-old self could take to heart. Perspective is something that I think we all lack at any given time. Tonight gave me a little of that and as always, I'm grateful for the lesson.

Not willing to let a year go by....

2012-01-30T18:56:00.002-06:00

i'm pretty stubborn. i know. it surprises even me sometimes.

There are more than a few reasons why I haven't blogged in awhile. I've recently realized that the pain of Dennis leaving was kind of a lot. As an adoptive mom, it's pretty hard to deal with the idea that you chose a child and he didn't choose you back. In fact, he un-chose. Negating my own choice. And I just have to accept it and accept myself. And accept him all over again in a way that I didn't expect.

And as far as writing about it? I am learning that it is more gratifying to write the bad, but ever so much easier to write the good. It was easy and fun to share the tale of an older international adoption that we were sure would turn out well. Sharing our shortcomings as parents? Not so fun.

But. Life goes on. I have a fabulous job that is rewarding in ways I'd never expect. That is definitely a post for another day, but the basics are that I raise money for students at an institution that built me. And it came along at such a perfect time - God's time.

That house we closed on a year ago last week? it's still a work in progress but we are settling in. It's home and I'm grateful every day that we live here. It is a gigantic blessing to live so close to my mom. We see one another pretty frequently. We share meals and laughs and tears. And you don't realize that sharing is a gift. it used to take weeks to plan to share a meal. And now? Sometimes we don't even plan it. Ditto for living closer to my sister. I'm beyond grateful for the time we spend being adult sisters.

And since i last posted...Jon has transitioned into a completely new role. We both work at Ouachita, and when I tell you that this is a miracle, I promise I'm not being dramatic. It has been a year of learning God's sovereignty.

Thanks for letting me do the quickie update on the last 364 days. More to come.

brought to my knees

2011-01-31T12:21:00.002-06:00

i'm pretty sure everyone who reads this (both of you) knows that we have had some heavy stuff hanging around the Watts/Merryman house(s) as of late. it's been maddening, really. when i wasn't dealing with death or sickness or sadness or runaways or confusion, i was dealing with bankers and realtors and potential or soon-to-be-past employers.

this morning, i woke up with a heaviness in my heart. that i might never be the woman i was meant to be. that i don't love strong enough or make good enough decisions or even write enough thank you cards. that maybe i really am a horrible mother and shouldn't try that again. that i might never make it to peaceful.

and then this afternoon, i'm working. and i got a little distracted. and i read a post by a really great blogger who posted on a really great community site. and it makes a whole lotta sense to me and where i'm headed these days. click on over to (in)courage and read this post by angie.

let me know what you think about that...

moving on...

2011-01-20T21:20:00.003-06:00

we thought it appropriate to bring a little closure to the last chapter.

updates: we tried desperately to get Dennis to come back to Arkadelphia. we laid out legal, financial, educational and emotional reasons to him via letter and email. we tried to arrange a meeting. he would have none of it. jon tried "running into him" at his job. Dennis looked at turns sad, mad and indifferent.

he has since removed us as friends on Facebook and blocked us from any contact.

his pictures that we could see (before the block) did not even look like him. maybe those pictures were the real Dennis. if they were, he has been putting on one heck of a performance.

we are working through our feelings about the whole thing.

in the meantime, our Nashville house sold. yep!! so thrilled. we are here in it this weekend packing up all our stuff so that it can join us in our adorable new home in Arkadelphia. we close on Tuesday on the perfect home for us. just 2 miles from my mom. crazy. it feels good to settle into the town that grew both of us. we can totally see God's hand in the whole thing. and we are thankful to be part of His tapestry.

thank you to anyone who has had a part in our story...even if it is just reading this blog and maybe praying for us. we have no idea what the future holds for us. but we would be crazy to think that it will be boring.

a pause, perhaps

2010-11-19T23:18:00.003-06:00

i can't write this. i won't write this. i don't want to write this.

the fabulous story that began with a tornado...and progressed through college...and lasted through a plane crash...and a couple of relocations...that we thought had brought us to the beginning of a family...

...has hit quite a bump.

the story is not over. nope. not at all.

but it has a chapter that jon and i most certainly didn't see coming.

dennis left us. the child that we were called to adopt and bring to america -- the child that we helped to attain american citizenship -- decided he didn't want to be part of this story any longer.

i'll skip over the details...the ones that most assuredly would have been featured on some reality show or made-for-tv movie. but here are the facts: dennis left us on a sunday. when he should have been serving others. and took a car but left a note that said that he appreciated the experiences we gave him, but that he longed for more challenges and the next chapter in his story. that he never could see us as family. that we had more love to give than he could receive. and he left.

as most parents would, we panicked. and i am proud that we panicked. that real, raw parenting kicked in and we called the cops. and we talked through the options. should we report the car stolen to find him? maybe. should we stake out the spots where we thought he might be? no. should we breathe deeply and pray? absolutely.

and as the day grew long, we realized that we would not get him back...at least for now. jon hopped in his car and came up to nashville so that we could think as a team.

and it has been almost a week and my heart hurts as badly and possibly worse than it did to begin with.

dennis has decided that he doesn't want to be part of this daily story. and that's OK. it has to be OK. there's nothing for me to do but wait on the Lord and his impeccable timing and pray that in the meantime i might glorify Him.

i would ask that you pray for dennis -- that he comes back to our family. we pray that he understands how much we love him and want the best for him.

i would ask that you pray for us -- that we never lose sight of the call to be joyful in every circumstance and to be anxious about nothing.

i would ask that you pray for all the troubled children of the world -- that they find the answers that they need.

feeling a little food-y.

2010-10-16T20:15:00.007-05:00

so two months of being alone can take a toll on a woman. the first 7 weeks, i ate things that are almost too horrible to mention. think: a slice of bread, two string cheese sticks and a handful of baby spinach. it's just tough to cook when you are missing your chief eaters.

but a couple of weeks ago, i got my favorite thing in the mail (except checks made out to me), my real simple magazine. love. it had four weeks of menus as one of its cover stories, which tickled me pink. i am a weekly menu-maker and piecing menus from a hundred magazines, cookbooks, web pages and blogs can take a couple of hours.

so i decided to taste-test a couple of recipes to see if my beloved men (and momma) would eat them.

there's one of my first recipes: lemon tilapia with roasted potatoes (or something like that). delish. i think my fish-fearing husband would even love it.

then i made a pasta with eggplant, fresh mozz, and tomatoes. the beginning looked like this:

...and it tasted so good that i forgot to take an after photo.

but tonight takes the cake. i got the new food network magazine last week. and tonight i made ravioli with butter - sage - walnut sauce.

it started like this:

and ended like this:

luxurious was the word that came to mind. healthy i would not consider it except that it was vegetarian. but it was so luscious. i looked up at one point from devouring it and wanted someone to share my thoughts with. only it was just me and max. and i don't feed him from the table.

i really wanted to share this meal with jon and dennis. i know they would have exclaimed over it and had seconds and then they would have gotten up and done the dishes. that would be bliss.

but i'm going to make the most of my time alone. and if i cook every recipe in every medium i own, then so be it. i'd just better be ready to buy some new clothes.

what's up with the merrymans?

2010-10-03T17:02:00.005-05:00

i ran into a rolling hills buddy on saturday afternoon. it occurred to me that the only way we've documented what's going on right now is through facebook status updates.

it also occurred to me that what we're going through now is every bit as serious as dennis's adoption and that i need to enlist the help of my friends to pray us through it!

shortly after my dad passed, jon and i began to work toward moving back to arkadelphia. we prayerfully began considering our career paths, putting our house on the market and how to tell dennis. (i'll tell you about dennis in a post very soon).

we love nashville. nashville was an excellent place to begin our marriage and start our family. we love the culture here and the people here. i LOVE my job. no...really. jon LOVES his job. reconciling this with the pull toward "home" was one of the most difficult decisions i think i will make.

the first step was to petition sweet sleep to allow jon to work remotely from arkansas. miraculously (and i do NOT use the word lightly), sweet sleep agreed that it was profitable for both jon and sweet sleep for him to move south. the opportunities for expanding their ministry increase exponentially with having a staff member in a different area. we took this as God's indication that we were moving in the right direction.

next step: tell my job that i need to move. again, one of the hardest things i've ever had to do. i truly find purpose in my job and i might not be stellar at it, but i maintain pretty well. i've been stretched and grown this summer in the aftermath of the flood and the re-building of the hotel. however...my thought was...i'll stick around until we find a replacement and the house sells and then off i'll be...4 weeks, tops.

which leads us to where we are now. step #3: sell the house. in the worst market in 26 years. we've lowered the price, gotten featured on the today show...in this case, the only thing we're short on is time and that's the one thing that will make the difference.

so, on August 16, dennis and jon made the trek to arkansas so that dennis could start school. this is where faith comes in. we know we're supposed to be closer to my family (and jon's, too). we know that we are being called like CRAZY to a simpler life. we know that everything in our heads and in our heart are pointing to this move.

but right now we're in limbo. i'm still working for opryland (praise the LORD). our house is still on the market (85 days and counting). i'm learning to live alone, having really never lived alone in my life. i'm learning to wake up each morning and to place my faith and hope in the only One who can make this all end well.

please join us in praying that our beautiful home sells soon. i'm ready to live with my husband and son again. but...we will glorify HIM no matter the circumstances...who is able to bless us more richly than we can even ask.

New Sweet Sleep Video! Pass it on!

2010-09-08T11:46:00.000-05:00

remembering my dad

2010-08-22T11:59:00.004-05:00

i realize i have not achieved frequency on this blog. life just happens. and i get kind of scared of writing what's happening to us because writing makes things quite real to me.

on june 8, just a little while after i posted the last entry, my daddy passed. he left the pain of cancer, but more than that, he left a legacy.

jim watts lived his life well. when i was very young -- about four, i think -- we had to do a project in pre-school. it was a book about our family. we had to describe our life. each item or person in our life got a page. on my daddy's page i said, "my dad makes money," and i think i drew a picture of a coin. i truly believed that that's what he did for a living. in reality at that point he made ball bearings. but in the twenty-plus years that have passed since i wrote that entry, i've learned that my daddy never worked to make money. he worked to provide for his family, yes. but my dad used his occupation (whatever it was at the time) to touch people's hearts.

my dad prayed with people. he prayed for people. he did good for people. he sacrificed so that total strangers might know the love of Christ. and that is truly, truly humbling.

my dad's visitation and memorial service taught me so much about who he was. there wasn't a single person that didn't tell jessica and me how proud he was of us. how he talked about us daily. how much he loved my mama. how great of a cook he was. how much of a giver he was.

music and cooking were "our" things. we shared a love of great tunes and recipes. it's been tough for me to cook since he died because who am i going to call to brag on myself? in some weird way, i cooked to make him proud. and, Lord help me when elton comes on the radio. he taught me to love all kinds of music and that good music makes the good times even better.

i pray that i grow more like my dad now that i'm aware of what makes a life well-lived.

it's been a journey learning to be a family of all girls. we are thankful for the men in our lives. scott and jon have been amazing rocks for all of us and we are so proud of dennis. and we have been lovin' like crazy on our newest family member, baby dean.

here's to new beginnings and cherishing the memories of those who've gone before us. i love you, dad.

it's never too late

2010-06-05T18:43:00.002-05:00

i will not apologize. life for the merrymans has been a little less storybook and a lot more soap opera in 2010.

i realized that i miss the release i feel when blogging. also: for those of us that grew up wanting to be writers...it's the closest we might come. if i don't blog, i'm giving away that one shot i have for now. so...

rollercoaster. that's the only way to describe it.

i need you to pray for my daddy. about 4 months ago, my dad looked as healthy as a horse. seriously. he lamented about the fact that people didn't "know" he had cancer and when they saw him on the street, they would say, "jim, you look so good! i thought you had cancer!" and he would say, "yeah, but i don't feel good at all!"

well...his "wish" came true. because of all the chemo and treatment, he looks sick. i'm pretty sure he'd agree with me. he's jaundiced and bloated and sick.

i believe my dad will be healed. but i've learned that it is harder for people to feel better when you look crummy. for this reason alone i pile on concealer :) please pray that my daddy's cancer will LEAVE his body. please pray that his jaundice will LEAVE. please pray that his bloating will LEAVE. and then...take care of your own body.

in other news: my place of business was flooded by the horrific May 2 flooding in Nashville. i have learned to use all that crazy teaching in crisis communications from OBU. who EVER would have thought that i would be fixing the hotline at 3 in the morning?? that's the kind of stuff you hope will never happen! i still have a job (thank the Lord!), and we are wading (pardon the pun) through the aftermath. i now office out of a double-wide trailer and my days are spent waiting and hoping for the day when the hotel will open.

jon is doing really well. he is on foreign soil...some of his favorite foreign soil of all time. he is in moldova caring for orphans. oh, that we could all be so fortunate.

dennis is doing even better. he (again) logged straight a's. he netted an internship with NPR that he promptly turned down (another post for another day). he is working away at blue coast burrito and is quite the skilled fish taco maker. his mother (that would be me) hopes that he becomes a chef.

who knows what the future holds? well...God. that's who. because we're pretty sure we have NO idea. and we're excited about whatever that entails.

catching up

2010-01-29T13:47:00.002-06:00

i'm embarrassed that it's been awhile since the last post. we've been quite busy at the merryman house. january - march is jon's "busy" time in his new job (hence the lack of posts on the food blog) and my job picked up significantly after the new year. which is good, but leaves little time for reading and writing.

it's taken me over two months and i'm not finished with my current read, john irving's last night in twisted river. he's my favorite author, but for some reason this one's a bit cantankerous. if you think you've never heard of him, you probably have...he's the brains behind "simon burch" and "cider house rules." i've never taken two months to read anything ever. pretty sure that's not a record i'd like to continue to beat.

i'm behind on all my magazines, too...i've committed a cardinal emily sin and started ripping out recipes before i've had a chance to read the whole thing. there's just not enough time.

parenthood...oh, parenthood. i feel like all i've been doing lately is complaining. pretty sure the honeymoon's over -- while we thought we had the world's most mature teenager, turns out he just hit the moody phase pretty recently. nothing...absolutely NOTHING is his fault and he pretty much hates being in the same room with us.

scene 1:
me: "did you notice the black paint on the carpet and not clean it up?"
him: "yes. i just didn't tell you about it because it's not paint."
me: "even though it's right beside your paint table?"
him: "this isn't paint."
me: "mmmhhm. so, why didn't you tell me about it?"
him: "i didn't think you'd care."
me: "what happened the last time you got paint on the carpet?"
him: "you freaked out."
me: "right, so shouldn't you tell me about paint on the carpet?"
him: "i guess. if you want."

scene 2:
me (calling his celly at 5:30 p.m.): "hey, dennis...i hope you're at home because there wasn't anything on the calendar and if you're not at home that means max hasn't been out in 10 hours. call me when you get this."
him (calling 10 min later): "um, emily, i told you the other night that i had play practice probably every night."
me: "but did you put it on the calendar like we asked?"
him: "no, but i told you i would probably have it."
me: "but you DIDN'T PUT IT ON THE CALENDAR?"
him: "no."

poor max. he almost didn't make it out the door when i got home.

on the cancer front: mom is almost, almost done. she goes for one last scan next month and if she gets the all clear, they will take her port out. my dad is on round 2 of 3 on the latest treatment. his doctor says he's ahead of schedule and is reponding well to the treatment.

i think the world knows by now, but my little sister has a bun in the oven. it's been so fun checking in with her on all her cravings. she has (thankfully) not been sick so far, and her only complaint is that her clothes don't fit. i keep reminding her that at least she has an excuse. some of us can't wear our clothes and don't have a growing being in our belly.

i feel better having purged. have a great, snowy weekend.

happy new year...for real.

2010-01-01T22:28:00.003-06:00

what an amazing day. i'm pretty sure that my husband would disagree, but today was my perfect day.

10 a.m. wake up.

10:01 feed max

10:05 get a wild hair and tell hubs that we're eating paninis for breakfast

10:30 read martha stewart living AND watch the Today show...all while drinking coffee

11:00 prep sandwiches; tell hubs to grill bacon (so smell doesn't permeate the house)

Noon Eat yummy nutella-bacon-peanut butter paninis

12:14 a.m. start the TAKE DOWN OF CHRISTMAS

12:31 stub toe

12:35 stub another toe

12:39 stub another toe

4:00 put last shiny silver ornament in its holder

5:05 get in the shower (after vacuuming, mopping and putting last shiny silver ornament in holder

6:00 start dinner

6:05 put for sure last shiny silver ornament in holder

10:33 blog about it all

10:35 find one more *&%^$ last shiny silver ornament.

it really was an amazing holiday season. i feel like i'm getting the hang of working...endless parties...buying gifts...keeping a clean house. what if all this time....that THIRTY ONE was what i was aiming for?? i think i'm well on my way.

fo' real...happy new year. may 2009 be WAY better than 2010.

on account of i'm the lazy half...

2009-12-30T08:58:00.000-06:00

i haven't had a moment to post lately...what with the christmas and the cleaning and the cooking and the shopping and the...

but my brilliant husband is off this week. not only has he kept the house clean, but he also cleaned out the garage.

when he wasn't putting gold stars on his chore chart, he launched his brand-new blog: eat, drink and be merryman. because if there's one thing this family does well, it's eat. head on over and check it out.

happy new year, y'all!

bits and pieces

2009-11-20T15:11:00.002-06:00

i am off today. my (fantastic) boss knew that i was just about to break into pieces and highly suggested all week that i take some time off for me. when i finally dug out from beneath a mountain of work, i could see that, yes, i could use a day off and i didn't have any meetings on friday, so here i am.

i feel a tiny bit guilty...ok, a big bit guilty... because my family is all at the hospital with my dad. he's recovering from a new cancer treatment. there's really not a whole lot i can do for them other than pray. an extra body gets in the way when you're in a semi-private room. but the good news is his doctor thinks this treatment is just the thing to kick-start the killing of more of the cancer in his liver.

jon is in atlanta with sweet sleep. i have been alone all day, and here's what i've done: enrolled in my benefits at work. took max on a long walk. drove to starbucks and was A.PALLED to find out that a triple-grande now costs $5.41. i will NOT be going back there for a while. came home and read martha stewart on my front porch in a rocking chair, drinking my million-dollar-java. and then. i tackled the "spare room."

when jon and i bought this house, we had very specific purposes for every room except one. the "nursery." we are pretty sure we want babies, but really haven't felt God specifically show us that that's the road he wants us walking. so, until he does, we have a spare room that houses the lives that jon and i led before we were married.

there are boxes and boxes of CDs, books, journals, sheet music, pictures. there are paintings and framed art that we've never hung. there are two bases to our washer and dryer. there are 43 pairs of old flip-flops. we've attempted to clean it out before, but basically, we just rearranged the crap. pardon the harsh language, but if you know me at all, i don't dig clutter. at all. this was that one room that we lock when company comes over.

most of you know that after college, i moved to new jersey to nanny for a fantastic family with three older kids. the boxes upstairs hold many of the memories i have of those beautiful kiddos. man, do i miss them. there are approximately 72 journals from that time that mostly have the first three pages filled out...the subject matter is generally (1) i'm homesick (2) i wish jon would hurry up and ask me to marry him and (3) lists. but mostly...it's the second. :)

there was also a bulletin board. the bulletin board hung in my nanny-room in new jersey right beside my bed. it's the kind with the criss-cross ribbon that you tuck things in. here is what i found tucked in:

let me break this down for you:

* 2 tickets from shrek 2

(the movie jon and i took my nanny-kids to immediately following his marriage proposal...the proposal that i didn't answer until after that movie...and dinner...and a train ride into the city. poor guy.).

* 1 ticket stub from a john mayer / counting crows concert in jersey

(if memory serves, this was the only concert i ever attended by myself. and it was awesome).

* 1 ticket stub from matchbox 20 in little rock.

(i flew all the way to little rock to see rob thomas with my friend hannah and her then boyfriend, clint. i bought a one-shouldered top and pink MAC eyeshadow so i could have "come hither eyes" and hannah says she did sit-ups for a week).

* 1 ticket stub from matchbox 20 in jersey.

(notice it was less than a month after the little rock show. i was surely a freak. a freak that had cash to burn).

* 1 disney world and 1 universal ticket

(jon and i visited orlando on july 4th weekend after he proposed to celebrate our engagement...despite the wonderful places we've gone together, this might have been my favorite vacation).

i love walking down memory lane. thanks for indulging me.

so many things.

2009-11-11T21:09:00.003-06:00

i am officially done with the 4th qtr rally. some companies do quarterly meetings. mine does "rallies." at my job, well..they're my job. yesterday, we did ours. and it was pretty good. i will try to post pictures tomorrow. but it's the reason why i've been unable to blog for a bit.

things are good at the merryman household. jon is the happiest i've seen him with his job in a year or so. he's got some good new challenges and he (as always) will be amazing at it.

dennis won second place at an art competition. good news: he won second place. bad news: because i've been working so much lately, i saw his entry this morning...and i thought about using a post-it-note to write, "great job!" this is not OK. and i was sure to talk about his good job tonight at dinner.

on that note..we decided to use a dinner a'fare this month for our dinners. and it has changed. my. life. we've used them before, but i think they've upped their game. every meal is yummy. and we saved on our budget. it is such a weird thing for 3 adults to eat. if you make a full recipe there are leftovers...but if you half a meal for 6, one of you (namely the teenager) feels hungry afterwards. so tough are my life-choices.

got word from my momma today that my dad goes in for an alternate treatment next week. after his second round of chemo, his tumor has (slightly) grown. his chemo embolation is next thursday. i totally guessed at what that means...funny thing is, my mom believed me. have you ever wished that everyone believed you like your mom believes you? that was a side-note. please pray that the treatment shrinks his tumor unbelievably. that's what i'm praying.

tonight, i'm just thankful to be watching the cma's and glee and then the crazy triple CSI series alternately. how great is it to have a family?

it starts.

2009-11-02T07:33:00.003-06:00

jessica and i used to have a nintendo 64 that we LOVED. no really - spent hours playing it. one of our favorite games was the lion king. and at the beginning of it, simba's dad would say "it starts." anyway. random fact.

this morning, dennis drove to school all by himself. i was a nervous wreck. i woke up at the crack of dawn and made a sausage lentil soup to go in the crock pot because i knew i wouldn't be able to sleep.

dennis came downstairs and i gave him the "your cellphone must be off when you drive" speech. the rule is that he has to call us before he leaves, turn it off, drive to the destination, turn it on and call us.

well, he just called. i am worry-free until 3 p.m. when he calls to let us know he's on his way home.

i am not ready for this.

October in Paris

2009-10-20T21:47:00.003-05:00

Hopefully you love a good Dennis story as much as I do, cause this one made me smile.

So Dennis has been in Disney World since last Thursday with his Mass Media class from his arts magnet. I realize this is way cooler than anything my high school every did and I'm pretty sure that goes for you, too. :)

When I left for Dallas last Sunday to tell childrens ministers about orphans, Dennis reminded me this would be the longest we have been apart since he came home from Moldova. I didn't think much about it, but I miss him... And I love that this is home for me and for him.

So I called him today, because I miss him, and wanted to make sure he wasn't doing drugs in Disney World with those hooligans he goes to school with. I know if my dad would have called on a school trip I would have been mortified - no news is good news, right?

Here's what transpired.

"Hello?" He says in a muffled, slurred voice. "Jon?"

"Yes - it's me."

"Jon, is that you?"

"Yes! It's me!" I say loudly to my foreign child. "Where are you?"

"I'm in Paris!" He says... (I giggle to myself)

"In Paris, huh - you must be in Epcot?"

"Yes, I loooove Dis-uh-ney Whirrrled!" (I'm positive that is how you phonetically say how he says Disney World.) "It is so amazing - everything they do visually is amazing - I'm watching painters paint on the street! Like in Paris! And today I went to Ireland and heard Irish music and they have a CD of all the music from all the countries and I will buy that one for sure!" (He's had this crazy obsession with celtic music - I think I mentioned that before. He calls is - Sell-tic and I make him say Kel-tic.) He listens to it as I teach him to drive... Kind of makes me crazy... :)

My next question, since his speech is fast and slurred is, "You haven't been doing any drugs, have you?"

He says: "No, that part of the park is closed." :) (He gets that sarcasm from me - it's hereditary.) :)

"Oh - for renovations, right?" I jest - and he agrees. :)

I hear kids in the background... "So, what are you doing now?"

"We are walking to the pastry! It is amazing!" he says.

I don't correct him with patisserie -- because I picture him walking towards a huge pastry and it makes me laugh. I ask, "So are you overwhelmed?"

"Yes." He says. "But in a good way. I love Dis-uh-ney Whirrrled. But I miss you. How are you? How is home? How is Emily? How is Max?"

After answering his questions, I let him go - to enjoy his last night in Disney World with his friends because, as he told me, he'll be home tomorrow, well not really tomorrow, but he leaves tomorrow and then he will see me. (He gets home Thursday afternoon.) :)

I can't wait to hear the stories, see the pictures, and hear about his trip. It's almost his birthday and in these past almost 2 years he's seen more and done more than I know he could have ever imagined. The memories that would have been heartache and struggle are instead memories of mickey mouse shaped ice cream bars and october in paris - in Dis-uh-hey Whirrled.

Parenting an adopted teenager is a wild ride but one I recommend. It can't be any worse that the Tower of Terror - and when it resembles that, I need to remind myself that if it wasn't for us, for God calling us to adopt Dennis, and for this sweet boy that came into our lives - we'd never have Paris.

driving miss emily

2009-10-13T07:59:00.002-05:00

so, jon's travelling this week. i hate it when he travels. sometimes when he leaves, i have this feeling of "ahhh. alone time," for about 3 seconds and then i remember that it's lonely being alone.

jon is the point person for getting dennis to school. i'm not sure how i wiggled out of it, but that's one duty that he just took. with that, he's pretty much taken on the job of teaching dennis to drive.

when jon left on sunday morning, i thought, "hey, let's see how well dennis is progressing. i'll let him take me to church." and that did not go so well. i got to thinking that big d is a little nervous driving me around. he kind of drifts into other lanes when he's driving. he's not so good with the lane changes. and he doesn't really multi-task that well. like he can't turn on the wipers without riding the brake.

anyway, so yesterday, he's driving home from school and i notice that he's holding his hands in front of the a/c. hmmm. he does it just about every time he's at a stop light.

and a big tahoe-suburban thing pulled right in front of us. without even thinking, d just swoops into the next lane, avoiding a collision. my first words were, "good job." and then: "did you check behind you before you switched lanes?" and dennis says..."no." at this point, i feel my heart get real big inside my chest. and my breathing was pretty shallow.

and then he stops at the light and holds his hands up in front of the vent. and he says:

"my hands get sweaty when i'm nervous."

and i almost wet my pants as i suppressed my laughter.

today, after school, i'm going to take him somewhere to teach him not to turn so wide. seriously, it's like he's parking an El Camino. only he drives a toyota.

nervous energy

2009-10-08T12:06:00.002-05:00

i have had this perpetual sense of nervousness for the past couple of weeks. do you know the feeling? my stomach feels like it has a balloon inside it that keeps inflating and deflating. my heart won't settle down. my palms are sweaty. i kind of want to cry. all the time.

i'm not sure what it is.

over the past couple of years i've gotten really good at managing stress. i suppose it has to do with the adoption and new job and working through the family cancer. but for some reason, i've lost that levelheadedness.

there were a couple of years when jon and i first got married that i recognized this inability to deal with stress, and promptly took pills to relieve it. they worked. sort of. they made me gain tons of weight, along with some other fun side effects, and jon and i decided that it might be a good idea to lay off the pills.

and i was fine! without the meds, i could handle what life threw at me and generally be pretty fun to be around.

but i feel it coming on again. maybe it's because dennis will be driving alone in 2 short weeks. maybe it's because i feel marginally overwhelmed at work. maybe its because i miss my family.

i know this post is out of character, but i just needed to get it off my chest.

thanks for letting me vent.

isn't he lovely? isn't he wonderful?

2009-10-03T09:22:00.004-05:00

i just wanted to take a moment and brag on my husband.

1. when i came home yesterday, he had picked up the house.

2. after a particularly rough morning this week, he drove home, picked up my phone that i had forgotten and brought it to me along with fresh flowers at work. he even made sure the flowers had eucalyptus to calm me down.

3. he heard on the radio (i think) that unplugging things saves money and ran around the house "saving money." except that i couldn't get anything to come on...but i admire his responsibility.

4. he made the bed yesterday without me asking him.

5. he helped me give max a bath last night at 7.30. didn't even question it.

6. he refuses to watch tv shows that i like until i come home. even if there's nothing else on.

7. without asking, he got an estimate on having someone clean the house and then offered to rearrange our budget to make it happen.

isn't he wonderful? i truly don't deserve him.

to make up for the lack of pictures

2009-09-25T08:20:00.011-05:00

i'm terrible at posting photos. really. i don't have the patience for it. but today, i am taking a day off, so i'm at home. and, although i really need to clean the bathroom, i thought i'd post some 2009 photos. also, our little boy loves to play with the camera. and somehow, we haven't been able to get our photos looking quite right since he came. bless his heart....

this is dennis at his first American job. that's right, folks.

he flipped his way through may, june and july of 2009.

i don't think i ever blogged about matilda. i had this dream where we adopted another schnauzer. and my good husband humored me and let me talk to the schnauzer rescue group. and they introduced us to matilda. as you can see, the only one happy in this situation was me. not even matilda was very happy. so she went back to live with her rescue mom and we came to know that we are officially a one-dog-family. for now.

i just love this. dennis and dad are grilling out in the rain. dennis is the official umbrella holder and jon is wearing my crocs.

the last time nana and pops came to visit, nana and i were enjoying our first cup of coffee as (we thought) the only ones awake. i happened to glance out the front window. and this is what i saw. he's painting the house. hilarious.

this is dennis and me in the nashville airport, waiting to board the plane to mexico.

poor kid is already a pro at the one-armed self portrait shots.

this is jon "dancing" in senor frog's in cancun. yes, that sign is pointing to me.

there. i feel better. once i start looking through our photos, i always resolve to pull out the camera more often. but i've always been in the "if you're present in the moment, you'll remember the memory much better" camp of photo-taking. too bad my memory's not so great these days.

Tah-key Day

2009-09-22T17:35:00.002-05:00

Okay folks, you can officially have a heart attack.

Two Merryman blogs in one day!

But I just had to blog about another experience from my day - cause it's funny. :)

At least, I think so... I'm not as great a writer as Emily, but here goes...

So... NSA, Dennis's arts magnet, is crazy. In so many ways. It's a great school but ever since they opted out of standard school attire allowing their students to wear saggy pants and trench coats - I have to admit I've stopped trusting their decision making abilities.

So NSA is having spirit week. No sports teams. They're going to cheer at their art work. Which I'm cool with. What I'm a little not cool with is "Gender Switch" day. Really? Is that still okay? Because in an art school full of children wrestling with gender confusion already I feel like dress like the opposite sex day is a ticking time bomb waiting to explode. We aren't doing these kids any favors by saying - just try this stuff on - it's fun! You'll like it! YAY Spirit Week!

Okay, so you know where I stand on that... :) So Dennis tells me the days... School Color Day (I have no idea what those are because you don't have cheers at games to teach you - probably black and black - emo kids...sheesh...), Pajama Day - (oh Lord, from what I see when I drop Dennis off, this one is going to be a disaster, too.) Then there is Decade Day - you can pick any decade. Chaos - I'm way to theme-y for that... (but I did hear dennis say he thinks he'll wear socks pulled up and his smallest soccer shorts. I told him he'd need Emily's opinion on how to dress like the 80's - knowing she would have just the right way of saying - little shorts show your business - lets keep that covered!) And finally Tah-key day.

So, then I say - "Dennis, what is Tah-key day?" He says - "You know, where people dress Tah-key." So I think (as I often have to - what would this sound like with a bright A sound? Oh, right TACKY Day!) So, without thinking I say... "Why do you need a day for that - it's like every day at NSA - why don't you do something totally wild and dress in standard school attire for old times sake!" (no response - just a look like - "oh, dad...")

So, a few days have gone by, and even after the ridiculous ride to school this morning that Emily wrote about, and me wanting to just open the door in front of the Nolensville Road Salvation Army and say - you're so smart, why don't you find your way to school... he asks as we pull up to school... "Is tah-key offensive?" I say... "Not really, it's not like saying a bad word or calling someone a name." He says, "Okay, good." I obviously have to inquire why he asked... :) He says... "Well, I was making posters after school to get everyone to dress for Spirit Week (good little student council-er like his dad) and I was drawing images on the posters to help visual learners. (He probably heard that from me, Lord...) I drew like man and woman symbols on gender switch and pajama pants for pajama day... and for tah-key day I just wrote NSA.

OML (that's oh - my - Lord!) Jesus help me! So I said... "Oh, Dennis that is kind of offensive!" He asks why. :) I say - "Well, saying someone's outfit is tacky is like saying they're an idiot because they couldn't match their clothes. " "Oh, oh no." he says... :) So I say, "Yeah - it's like saying - look - all of you are stupid and can't dress! YAY! Dress like that today!" (which I pretty much believe but should have never alluded too in front of him - I'm learning to be a dad of a teenager at 31.)

Dennis, dear Dennis says: "But when you get ready to leave the house Emily tells you your clothes look tah-key." I laughed hard on the inside and said... "That doesn't make it kind! Emily does her best to keep me from looking like a fool and dressing tah-key - but you shouldn't tell your whole school that - that's why they have mamas! (even though these mamas must be blind or have no control over their children...)

So he said he was going to go to run to Ms. Miranda, his student government sponsor, and see if he could change it. :) (And don't worry, I did let him know that the appropriate thing to draw was someone in stripes AND plaids, or something like that.)

Why can't they just have Crazy Hat Day like we did! (Man I wore that Goofy hat with the buck teeth from Disney world every year like a champ) :) Or bring back Backwards Day -- remember Kris Kross? :)

So tonight as I get ready to make a pot of chili for my family, I'm thankful that...

1. Dennis is learning, slowly, to say A like cat, hat, and tacky.

2. Dennis is opting out of Gender Switch Day. (cause, student council member or not, I wouldn't let him out of the house even if he wanted to participate)

3. Ms. Miranda hadn't hung the posters up yet.

4. Emily keeps me from looking afright.

chili. hell's kitchen. sleep. :)

have mercy...

2009-09-22T14:17:00.002-05:00

our little d will be driving soon. very soon. although not as soon as he thinks if he keeps THIS up.

in TN, you have to have 180 days of "practice" before they'll let you have a license even if you're 16.

as usual, we're down to the wire. his 180 days will be up next month, and we haven't let him practice as much as we probably should have. we live in a pretty bustling area, and quite frankly, we're usually running late to wherever we're going and it's usually my fault. and if we're late, then i probably CANNOT HANDLE a teenager driving which would inevitably make us later. it makes my teeth itch. really.

so this week, jon has taken on the responsibility of letting dennis drive to school. he's a trooper...i do not deserve his husbandness.

only dennis is acting progressively stinkier as the week wears on. take note: it is tuesday. you'd have to get jon to tell you exactly, since i wasn't present, but their conversation this morning went something like this:

DENNIS
"i think you're wondering how i know to stop the car."

JON
"um, i would hope you're watching the car in front of you to see when they brake."

DENNIS
"no. i like to look far in the distance. i can see the brakes of cars far ahead of me in the reflection on the pavement."
please note: it has been raining for 39 days here. God hasn't broken his promise yet, but he's getting awfully close.

JON
"well, that's not safe. you really need to watch the car in front of you, since that's the one you'll hit first. if you DO happen to hit the car in front of you, it will cost you at least $2500 to fix."

DENNIS
"it doesn't help me drive better when you try to scare me like that. and i think looking in front of you or looking far ahead of you is a matter of opinion."

You see, to teenagers, they are ALWAYS RIGHT. so if you say something that's different from what they believe, it becomes "your opinion." PLUS, we don't have any point of reference on this whole thing. by this point, most parents have worked through several milestones with their child. nope. not us. this is it.

HOWEVER. i wonder if driving isn't the worst thing that could happen at this point. i'm giving you a BONUS STORY!

last week, jon had to work a conference downtown. dennis has to ride the metro bus to jon's office normally in the afternoons, and that bus goes to the downtown "hub" first. so jon (without asking me) decided that it would be a great idea if dennis just got off the bus at the downtown hub so jon could meet him without having to pick him up south of town.

my husband. he is funny. he decided that it would FANtastic to give dennis the GPS from his car, pre-programmed with the conference's address. then, dennis could just get off the bus, turn the GPS on and then walk the three or four blocks to meet jon.

y'all. my little orphan son was walking through downtown with a GPS. i'm pretty sure it would be on an episode of perfect strangers if it were on today. only i wouldn't do the dance of joy. nope. i'm pretty sure someone reported us to DHS.

he DID make it safely to jon...even checked in, got a name badge and found jon. we really have no need to worry about him. it's us you've gotta worry about.

i'm concerned

2009-09-14T21:33:00.003-05:00

when i was little, i always knew my mother's "sound" when someone died. someone famous...not someone we actually knew. for some reason, the one that most clearly stands out was when Red Skelton died. i'm fairly sure i remember her shedding a tear and moaning, "awwww...red skelton died." and then she or my daddy would launch into a story about said dead person. if they were a big deal, the stories could get lengthy. if it was a little-known-dead-person, there wouldn't be a story. just a qualifier. like, "oh, so-and-so died. they starred in this show i watched when i was seven."

i remember thinking: i will know i am old when i know the folks that die.

so...when we were in cancun, john hughes died. i will always remember that death as the one where i thought, "awww...john hughes died. insert qualifier." i felt old. i learned how to be a teenager at the hand of molly ringwald...who was at the at hand of john hughes.

and michael jackson (i think that happened first, but for some reason, john hughes's death touched me more. maybe the lack of drama.)

and ted kennedy.

i found out about jack-o's death on facebook.

and tonight, i found out that patrick swayze died on facebook, too.

weird to think that my kids will not be hanging out around the tv when they announce someone dies. they'll probably update me on the deaths of the icons that shaped my child-and-early-adulthood.

i'm finally at the age when i grieve over icons. and i'm living in the age when the nightly news is not where....wicky, wicky, wicky...you hear it...first.

i'll get used to it. i'm sure it's just where we are. but i've gotta tell you...after someone really cool like patrick swayze dies and you hear it on facebook...you're a little scared to log on. just a little.

hearteningly, i found out about teddy kennedy's death on the today show. i am so thankful for matt and meredith...meredith, in this case. they break death to you like a good friend would...with respect for your family and the families of all involved. no 140-character posts to hide behind. in fact, matt and meredith don't hesitate to spend a couple of hours breaking the news.

....pause....

i'm watching kanye west on leno. i'm uncomfortable. maybe live is not a good idea. maybe artists should be edited.

i am sad for kanye. i don't think he's completely crazy. only a little.

good job, jay...it takes a seasoned interviewer to save that.

...and...action....

matt and meredith, after their two hours of breaking the news, they get to hand the torch to ann curry who does at least two dateline specials on the departed.

i think i prefer the nbc way of breaking the news. it helps you move through. when facebook breaks it, you kind of move on. i miss my emotions.

i've got this weird hang-up.

2009-09-13T15:54:00.003-05:00

hello, blog-world. i've missed you. you've helped me identify a serious issue that i have. the longer i put off something, the harder it is to do. it's this weird paradox that i can't quite figure out. but i've learned that sometimes you just have to take the bull by the horns.

my last post was in june. june was about the time that i was transitioning into events at my job. i was hired to do internal communications and then our company reduced our events and communications teams. no one really told me to take over events. another thing i've learned about myself recently is that i pretty much just "do." if it needs to be done, i just learn and adapt until i can complete it. so, more than being told i needed to "do" events, i just sort of absorbed it. and i love it. but it also has taken so much more of me than i thought it would.

so in the beginning of my newly-self-created position, i thought: wow. i shouldn't blog tonight. i should work. and if i'm not working, i should be hanging with my family. because my hours are long and even when i'm not at work, i'm still at work. and so, i'd skip blogging.

also, when we started blogging, sometimes i would sneak in a good post at work. only now, there's no time for sneaking. again, that curious guilt thing would creep in and say: i've got something really great to share with my little blogspace. only if i were more dedicated to my craft, i wouldn't blog at work, i'd be researching the proper number of chairs for the next big event. that way i could do work at work and then go home and do home at home. that would be great. so i'd skip blogging.

and then, this funny thing happened. i got used to working events and communications and things started coming to me during work hours, and i even took off the little blackberry holster i would sometimes wear to bed (kidding). so it would seem that i would have time to blog. but i would look at this pretty computer and think: now it would be so stupid to blog because i've neglected it so long. i wouldn't even know where to start. and people would know that i'm wishy-washy and can't keep up anything for a long period of time. and they already think i'm not dedicated because i can't daily post like you're supposed to when you commit to this blog-thing. i am a failure...ho, hum and woe is me. and i would skip blogging.

but today, my husband is napping. and my son is listening to some crazy moldovan or celtic music upstairs while painting and my dog is looking out the window. and i have no excuse.

who am i kidding? anyone who reads this post probably has just as many kooky hang-ups as i do, plus they have little kids and much more complicated lives and jobs than i do. really, this blog is for me. it's for me to practice writing so that one day i will be good enough to press print and someone will pay me for the way i string words and place commas or not. also it's for us to connect with people who care about us and who we care for as well so that we have a jumping-off place when we sit down on the patio to visit with you.

to further make my point about this curious guilt that overtakes me: i've been married for about 4 and 1/2 years. when we were wed, people loved us well. gifts came in by the boat-load. we were blessed beyond measure and well-prepared to start our life together. in the beginning of the engagement/gifting period, i wrote thank you notes promptly. there was something so thrilling about putting pen to paper that said "jon and emily."

i continued to do really well until about the month before the wedding. those of you who are married know that this is the time when most showers are thrown, but also, you're down to the wire with wedding planning and house-buying and dress-fittings. and writing thank-you notes is something you just sort of work in to the mix. and i got them all written.

and then jon and i got married and moved into our new house. there was a box-full of notes that i wrote when we were at our old house that i didn't address. this was before google was really good at finding people. it was a safer time, but also a more difficult time to just get things done. in the midst of the move, the box of notes without addresses got packed, but never sent.

about 6 months ago (or so), jon and i rearranged our bedroom. there, underneath a dresser, was the box. when i saw it, i got all queasy. this meant that people that wanted to bless us had gone without that most primal of satisfactions - the satisfaction of being appreciated. i resolved to mail them off to their rightful addresses.

only every time i go to grab that box and do what is right, i can't even touch it. because if i sent the notes now, people would think: wow. 5 years is a long time. i don't even remember what i bought them...did they even mean the thanks behind the note? and so i skip the post office.

as i write this, i know the right thing to do. and by posting it, i have admitted to the whole world that i have a problem. and i can admit to you...hopefully without fear of rejection...that i will mail those notes next weekend. period. i will buy a box of bigger envelopes and put a note in them that tells this story and slap a new stamp on them. and hope that the federal government is more timely than i am.

that feels so, so good. it's not action, but it's the promise thereof and it is good.

so, here i am, mr. blogger. i've missed you. can we talk again tomorrow? oh, you're right. it'll probably be a couple of days.

The Bloodys and The Creeps

2009-08-21T08:11:00.002-05:00

So it's been awhile since we've posted a blog - partly because our lives have been so insanely busy this summer and, well, that's probably the reason. I'm sure you're busy, too - so nothing new there...

We've had a great summer - ending in a fantastic vacation in Cancun... there are so many stories to share but I'll let Emily share those when she gets a moment - she' s a way better blogger than I am.

So what transpired on the way to school this morning made me laugh out loud - literally. Dennis doesn't really know why, I'm sure, but I laughed hard. :) Apparently with all the craziness going on in our lives and me having two late work nights in a row for orphans and Emily having a crazy busy week at Opryland, Dennis had some free time to watch History Channel. Now, we debate whether this is okay, but at least its not MTV or something way, way worse. Occasionally he'll see some story on there or the Discovery Channel that says Noah never had an ark or the Bible isn't really true and when he starts to beleive it I tell him - when in doubt, the Bible wins. :) God wrote it and he knows more than the tv. :) But thanks to our internet monitoring we know he's not watching or looking at anything shady - just downloading Celtic music like a mad man. And yes, he says Sell-tick every time even though we tell him it sounds like a K. I want to be upset that he isn't downloading american music to help make him more American, but then there aren't cuss words and booty music with the Celtics. Lord, lord... :)

So we're in the car this morning on the way to NSA (Dennis's arts magnet) and he says... "Do you know there are gangs in Nashville?" I say - "Yes, of course, why do you ask?" So he says... "Well, I saw a big special on History Channel about gangs yesterday. They are bad!" He continues... "First they talked about the "Creeps" in Los Angeles and do you know they just kill people just to prove they are man and to get into the creeps?" (minor laughter at creeps here while I say) - "Crips... like chicken strips." (we have to find rhyming words to get him to realize how to say vowels and he knows I love a good chicken strip.) So he says crips, and we move on - and as usual, the creeps return.

"So these "Creeps" - they broke into this house and killed this mom while she was having her coffee. Just having her coffee! Then killed all her kids except one who was hiding in the closet. If that was me I'd just want to die too," he says. Okay - now I think, counseling is a good idea, but just say, "Uh, huh - that's aweful!" (As I try to listen to traffic and weather together on the Fish in the background - he only tells stories when I'm hoping to hear the traffic on the way to school and work.)

"And there are the "bloodys" -- They're bad, too!" He says. :) (muffled laughter from me - I didn't correct this one - it was too funny.) Then he says, concerning the bloodys, "Can you imagine how stupid these people are! Just stupid! They shot two girls in their car just cause they thought they were the ones that called the police about a drug deal. But it wasn't them! All they knew was the one who told on them was in a red car. Can you imagine how many red cars are in Los Angeles? I mean look - there are two in front of us and we're in Nashville! Then they came back a few days later and killed one of the girl's little brothers playing in front of his house." I was trying to listen intently as the traffic report blazed by and I couldn't distinguish it as Dennis talked louder about the "bloodys." This was the kicker though. Dennis says, "Crazy white people are just maniacs - they don't hang out in groups!" I was in shock. I told him I was going to save that quote and put it somewhere to make me laugh and he says, "Don't put that somewhere, someone will think you're racist." I thought about telling him that I wasn't the one that said it so there were no worries there. But I had to share it with you this morning becuase all of it was just way too funny.

He also informed me that he had seen some of the places in Nashville where they showed the gangs but he couldn't quite figure out how close they were. I told him they might be in our backyard and he better look out. He looked terrified and then laughed it off. But I knew he was slightly concerned. He said that he had seen the club that was on tv one time. I asked - "When did you go clubbing?" He said, "I think we've driven by it." You know, we're always in the club district. :) I informed him that if he couldn't control his worry about things he saw on the History Channel I'd cut that channel off, too. (To save money we recently cut off 100 channels and he was traumatized.) He said that this wasn't scary stuff - this was reality. Hilarious.

So as you're out and about today, look out for random "bloodys" and "creeps" that may be out to get you and just shoot you to show that they are man. I know Dennis will be on the lookout, too. :)

happy endings...and such.

2009-06-01T19:40:00.002-05:00

follow up to previous post: the painters finished on FRIDAY. that's 4 days. i'm not going to say it was hellacious...but maybe. after the toilet incident, there was the floor fixer.

the floor fixer put two...count them: two floor gashes (mwah ha ha) at a length of 6 inches in floorboards that were previously untouched by aforesaid flood. and covered them with a MAGIC MARKER. but thankfully he fixed it and the 6 inch holes in the wall and everything. and it's pretty.

tonight is jon and kate plus eight. and i will be watching. whether i have to commandeer the tv in the living room or be relegated to the bedroom. because really...i need to know that they can work through their issues.

dennis went to work today with a friend who cleans houses. dennis took one look at the house-to-be-cleaned's playroom which was, to say the least, a disaster, and said, "oh. i don't think jon and emily should have kids. they would not like this at ALL."

i have managed to project my obsessive compulsive tendencies on my son.

score.

"they just don't speak of it."

2009-05-26T18:15:00.003-05:00

so...if y'all go back HERE, you can read the story of memorial day '08. i like to (lovingly) refer to that day as "the BEGINNING OF THE END." really. our house flooded...and that began the ugly cycle of flood, more flood, new floors (literally to' up from the flo' up), sick puppy, puppy funeral, cancer numero uno, papa surgery, cancer numero dos, chemo 1-f (f is for father...or whatever else), chemo 1 - m, radiation 1 - m, chemo 2 - f. my sister likes to throw in her wedding...but technically that happened before the Great Flood, so it is null and void, however happy it might have been.

so. yesterday was totally uneventful - thankfully! i literally sat on the sofa almost all day except for the time when i was (1) marinating chicken for dinner and (2) picking paint colors and (3) watching the jon & kate plus eight marathon.

which brings me to today.

the painters came. and they were a.mazing. i can't even publish the price because it was so cheap. but...lord have mercy. apparently, a paint can went on top of the cabinet in the master bedroom "potty closet." why anyone would put a can of paint on a cabinet in a potty closet is beyond me.

but my favorite part of the day? jon's account of the conversation he had with the head painter immediately following. "uh, sir...i'm really sorry, but we made a mistake and put a paint can on top of the cabinet in your master bath and it crashed down on your toilet and broke it into a million little pieces."

jon: "oh."

head painter: "do you have any idea how we might re-hang the cabinet?"

jon: "um, no...you see, sir...i'm not really handy. that's why i'm paying you to paint my house."

head painter: "oh. so...before we finish painting the house, we'll go ahead and fix that."

jon: "that would be great."

so, then jon gets the brilliant idea that we should just buy a new throne for the potty closet...in the long run, it's better for the painters...on account of they don't have to buy a new tank. and couldn't we use an upgrade? so...after a dinner of homemade jalapeno crabcakes, the whole family trekked off to lowe's.

after finding the most beautiful toilet ever (with a matching tissue holder), we came home to figure out that the hardwoods in the hall were warping. again.

y'all. this better be the prettiest. paint. job. ever.

because i can't take much more. really, i can't. i promise i'll post pictures of the results...because our bedroom? our bedroom is sharkey gray. as in martha's decorator-genius kevin sharkey gray. and it is oh, so pretty. not sure if it's worth the drama.

i apologized to dennis for being the most dramatic family ever. and he said, "i'm sure everyone has this drama, they just don't speak of it."

nope.

because i'm itching to post

2009-05-15T17:49:00.003-05:00

i just felt the need to write. this has been a long week...not for any good reason. just long. having a big girl's job isn't all it's cracked up to be. sometimes it's kind of hard.

and sometimes, you really don't have a whole lot left for your family. time...i can find time. but somehow...i just want to hit the pillow and pray for a good dream when i find that time. i think i realized that i'm in too deep when i didn't want to cook.

i love to cook...more than most any other hobby. and last night i almost called pizza hut on the way home. i didn't, because according to jon, one of the things that dennis loves most about being an american is being able to eat the food that i cook. and that makes me boundlessly happy, so i figured pleasing dennis is better than just giving up. and anyway, i always get a break on fridays on account of family mexican.

but anyway...

jon and i are off on an exciting birthday jaunt this weekend. to atlanta. only we won't be shopping in posh shops or searching out rap stars. nope...we'll be screaming our heads off on the roller coasters at 6 flags. i do love my crazy husband. i did make him promise an ikea trip...and that i could drive so that we could bring back any furniture :)

hope you all have wonderful weekends.

tagged...again

2009-04-30T17:04:00.003-05:00

i was tagged by the inimitable hannah.

first, i'm going to talk about hannah. hannah's like a leather sofa. you're pretty sure that you're not lucky enough to have one. and then you get one. and it only gets better the longer you have it. only with hannah, unlike the sofa, she speaks. and what comes out of her mouth is usually funny, sometimes poignant, and always bare naked.

here are the instructions for "eight things":
. mention the person that tagged you
. complete the list of eight things
. tag eight of your wonderful blogger friends
. go tell them you tagged them

eight things i look forward to:

1. dennis learning to drive. this means a stepping stone for him...a grocery-getter for me;

2. our trip to cancun in august...sort of;

3. having a baby some day. really. i'm almost there;

4. my parents being well;

5. going to heaven.

6. writing a book. i will do it...someday.

7. figuring out exactly what i want to be when i grow up

8. buying this new bedding from pottery barn.

eight things i did yesterday:

1. volunteered to host a cocktail party for my entire office.

2. genuinely missed my husband.

3. read a couple of pages of the mermaid chair...for the third time.

4. cried over melissa's post.

5. played wii boxing...and did 10 squats every time i k.o.'d someone. and super hula-hooped.

6. drafted swine flu memos

7. was really thankful in a sordid sort of way when my son fell asleep during the president's speech. and i didn't wake him up. i then proceeded to watch american idol instead of lost. and cheered for kris allen when he stayed.

8. wished the swine flu would go away (reference #2 above).

eight things i wish i could do:

1. fly. seriously.

2. live in arkadelphia, but keep my job.

3. convince jon that he is the best ever at what he does...both at home and at work.

4. host flawless parties every night of the week. with nothing to clean up. in a dress. with pearls. and heels.

5. find a community group.

6. work out 5 days a week and not whine about it. OR just magically lose 50 pounds.

7. have raised my son since birth. only i'm pretty sure he wouldn't have turned out as well.

8. turn my house by about 90 degrees so i'd have morning sunlight flood through the house. only then i'd be facing the neighbor's house. that would be bad. so i guess in my next house, i'll make sure that there's morning light.

eight shows i watch:

1. desperate housewives

2. grey's anatomy

3. 24

4. the office

5. medium

6. jon and kate plus 8

7. every show on the food network. marathon-like every saturday and most sundays.

8. all the CSIs

i tag: jessica, laura haywood, kristen black, dayle carozza, and heather wolfe. i have no idea who's even reading this any more!

parental updates

2009-04-28T20:06:00.003-05:00

it's been awhile since i've posted about the cancer. i think in some way, i was hoping it would just disappear.

my dad completed the 6-month round of chemo initially prescribed. he got the results of the follow-up PET scan today. and the news, well...the news was good. it wasn't what my dad wanted to hear, but it really was good.

so, initially, his oncologist told my parents there were "multiple lesions," to me, meaning numerous...too many to count. and when he got his halfway checkup, the lesions were "20% percent reduced...some as many as 50% reduced." this, to me, means that he had a. lot. of. tumors.

and today, he and my mom heard that he has 4 tumors. 2 of them could be cut out today. and 2 of them have not quite shrunk enough. since that halfway checkup, one of the tumors has gone from 7 centimeters to 6.

y'all. that is a BIG tumor. possibly TWO BIG TUMORS.

there is no way my dad should have made it this long. his liver was just plum eat up with lesions. but my Almighty Father, the Great Physician, saw fit to spare him. to shrink those nasty tumors. and put doctors in our life that know just what to do for him.

not only did those tumors shrink and all but disappear, but the CANCER HAS NOT SPREAD.

y'all. merciful days. the cancer that so easily spreads...the liver is practically a conduit for cancer. spreads cancer like cheerleaders throw candy in the christmas parade. and that cancer is contained. praise the Lord.

please join me in lifting up praise to our God for sparing my daddy thus far. for shrinking those tumors. for knitting our family together. and for teaching us all that He truly does know the plans he has for us...no matter what that entails.

so we've got six more months of chemo - 12 treatments. the other good news is that the doc released him back to work. i truly believe that will be good for him, too...being able to have a reason to get out of the bed and into the shower and into the car. it's a different drug, and i sure couldn't tell you the name of it. but i can tell you that he is NOT excited about the chemo. it pretty much just makes him feel like crap. but i'm not going to pray that it doesn't make him feel bad. basically, you're pumping poison in your body to kill the foreign stuff. and that's not supposed to feel good.

and please lift up a little prayer, that this new chemo drug will shrink those last two tumors to a managable size, so that we can whack them out of him ASAP. i'm ready to NOT count white cells.

vocabulary monday

2009-04-27T19:39:00.002-05:00

this evening at dinner, jon and i learned a new word. not really a word...an acronym. dennis is usually pretty quiet at dinner. there's usually something on tv worth watching (i know, i'm a bad mom for allowing tv during dinner, but really, we sit down and have dinner together almost every night. how many families really do that? we'll work on no tv with the next one...right.)

so dennis hollers, "oy tay! you will never believe what happened today at school." and we waited. he said, "this girl, she made a strange sound from a strange place." and i got nervous, because that sounded a little shady.

and then he said, "t.o.l."

pregnant pause.

"she tooted out loud."

and i almost shot cilantro out my nose. seriously.

easter and giving back

2009-04-26T12:53:00.004-05:00

along with the excitement of dennis's car, i also made a giant easter dinner. i even remembered to document the feast: ginger-aled ham, orange and cumin-scented carrots, smashed potatoes and deviled eggs. i was pretty proud of myself...it was fairly pretty, too.

this weekend, i took a group of STARS (opryland employees) to volunteer at the country music marathon. we served water to several thousand runners at mile marker 23. it was REALLY hard work. things i learned this weekend: (1) i need to workout. seriously, at one point i thought my heart was going to give out. and today i am 17 different kinds of sore. (2) there are some very selfless people in the world. i wish i had a picture, but there was a handicapped gentleman in a wheelchair whose brother was pushing...PUSHING him through the marathon. i started crying right there. i sat down on the asphalt and just cried. then there were the team-in-training folks. the ones that run to raise money for cancer. and they had ribbons tacked to their shirts...in memory of...in honor of... again, tears fell freely. i am so thankful that there are people in the world who will use the simple (though painful) act of running a marathon to raise money to cure this awful disease.

also: mixing sports drinks is gross. here's a shot of me and my boss. i work for the coolest company ever.

interlude

2009-04-15T18:51:00.002-05:00

when i order sushi, i always ask for two sets of chopsticks, so the tiny japanese lady will think that i'm going to share all that raw fish.

i don't ever share that bag of goodness, for the record.

today, when i did this, the tiny japanese lady...snorted. i think she's on to me.

new beginnings

2009-04-13T19:07:00.009-05:00

i concur with many of my fellow bloggers. i adore easter. for some reason this year, easter seemed to mean more to me than usual. don't get me wrong. i was raised in church and among believers, and know that the easter bunny has his place, but it most certainly is NOT in the Bible. but this year, jon and i have ALMOST found a new church. and this new church does church very well. not just on sunday or saturday, but all the time.

i went to good friday service on my way into work on friday. the service involved a congregational reading where the congregation read the words of the crowd that sentenced jesus to death. i have never felt more humbled...we're talking low, low to the ground...when i said, "crucify him! his blood is on me and my children's head!" it really brought home the idea that it was for me...and all my low-down dirty sins...that an innocent man died. as much as i wish i was mary magdalene or the woman who poured oil on christ's head...i was the crowd. the crowd that begged pilate to release a criminal instead of the innocent son of God. so easter meant more this year.

also. i could not spend it with my parents in arkansas. my mom was not feeling up to hostessing. she is not "coming off" her radiation as well as one might think, and quite frankly is feeling pretty crummy. this hurts my heart. please pray that her body continues to heal; that her spirits will be positive as she "recovers." she goes again for chemo tomorrow. chemo weeks are not fabulous weeks for her, so pray that for all the suffering she must endure that that chemo is wiping out the remaining cancerous cells. i am ready for this season in my family to be over, but for all we are going through, i have to think that it is to pray harder for the cure...that we all might be done with this nightmare that affects so many.

ok. that all seemed heavy. on a lighter note:

jon, dennis and i celebrated easter on saturday. i've posted before about how much i adore saturday services. but in addition to service, we hid eggs for dennis this year:

And we made him hunt for them:

And Max looked on (this one is a little indulgent):

And in the last egg was a key:

And the key was for his easter gift:

And the gift looked a little like this on the outside:

there might not be a better feeling than the feeling of providing for your children. it's a little tangled up in "ohmygoodnessihopethisisn'tthemachinethattakeshislife," but it's still pretty powerful.

now we just have to teach him to drive. scary? definitely.

as days go by...

2009-04-07T16:31:00.005-05:00

i am just terrible at blogging. it's just like many things in my life...healthy eating, exercising, not cursing, that i decide to do and then shortly thereafter, i fall off the wagon. i know i should document this crazy life for a couple of reasons. (1) so that i'll remember what REALLY happened and (2) so that other people can figure out what's going on with us. and also: i really do love it. it's nice to "get it all out." so, here are a few short stories to catch up:

a. hangin' tough.

jon took me to the new kids on the block concert for my birthday. my THIRTIETH birthday. it was great, and even though i was a number 1 debbie gibson fan during that era, i still knew all the words, and was even pleasantly surprised. i don't think they were lip-syncing. however, i left with the knowledge that i've aged well. or at least, i've learned to cover up what body flaws come with being thirty. seriously, i turned around when the boys sang hangin' tough and there was this sea of flabby arms waving in the air. i had worn a tasteful jacket so that no one would be exposed to that "extra" bit of skin. my counterparts in crime were wearing sleeveless little numbers and quite frankly a bit of modesty was called for. oh, well...they all had fun, i had fun, even jon had fun, and he was pretty jet-lagged from returning from moldova the NIGHT BEFORE. how great a husband is he?

b. the week without jon

i never posted follow up on this week. oh, did dennis and i bond! dennis decided to just ask about a million questions that i shouldn't have had to field alone. he was just incensed by the american red cross and wanted to donate blood at school - only he's 16 and needed parental consent. nice. and also, he decided that he wanted to go to prom with his (then) girlfriend and who should pay? oh, my. who would have thought that i would be pulling out emily post at this point, right?

c. the break-up.

we had to counsel dennis through the first break up. he broke up with (or vice-versa) afore-said girlfriend. who then proceeded to tell him that she MIGHT still want to go to prom with him. there are not words for this in mommy-speak. really. i saw red for days, i tell you. but after we explained to big d that prom was, like, the most expensive night EVER for a boy under 18, he pretty much told her that he was uninterested. NICE. here's how the conversation went:

"you know, you're going to have to buy her flowers."

"how much is that?"

"probably about $50."

"can you delete the flowers?"

*snickers* "no."

great, huh?

d. the visit from the principal.

big d's principal from his moldovan orphanage is in america for a visit. we got to see her on our soil, instead of the other way around, and it was nice. it was also awfully nice of her to explain to our little darlin that he had a pretty great life in america, and that even on his worst day, life in america was pretty sweet and way easier than life in moldova. sometimes it helps to have perspective - when you have evil parents that *gasp* make you keep your room clean.

e. our visit to miami:

here's a snapshot of jon and me on our way out to dinner. notice how relaxed! we took a long weekend to miami and had just the best time. we laid on the beach and got lost in coconut grove. we had fancy italian dinner that went on for DAYS (or at least a couple of hours). we had really fancy breakfast at the delano hotel and then noticed that rihanna had been sitting right beside us. but the coolest thing? my dear husband called ahead and had an arrangement waiting for me when we got to our hotel room:

great, right? Those are yellow calla lillies, just like i carried in our wedding four years prior. undoubtedly the best husband ever.

unrelated, but still.

2009-03-08T21:06:00.002-05:00

so, as i said before...i'm home alone (save for my teenage son...who would relish the thought of kicking the snot out of an intruder). which is one thing. and it's practically summer. like it started at 60, and got to 70. which is another.

i got two phone calls in 5 minutes. from my neighbors. at 8:45ish. telling me that my garage door was open. really?

when does being neighborly stop and being annoying start?

day one of “jon’s in moldova again.”

2009-03-08T13:54:00.002-05:00

i've cleaned the house...dennis has cleaned his room. he's watching tbs which means more jim carrey than i'd like, but hey, he's quiet. we just had lunch. me: turkey & spinach sandwich. him: leftover pasta with...tomato soup on top. what? he said it was good.

we've started to go to saturday night church and i have to tell you...it's wonderful. it's like having two saturday mornings.

when i was little, we always went to church. i remember skipping once...when i had the CHICKEN POX. that's about all that would get you pardoned from sunday school. well, my dad let me in on the best show ever -- sunday morning on cbs. he'd kind of taunt us with it. it would start and then it was off to church.

as i've gotten older...the one thing i love, love, love is being able to catch sunday morning. i don't dvr it. it's a great show, but it really must be watched on sunday morning. it reminds me of a connection with my dad, who, truth be told, back then would have rather stayed home to watch it. i don't condone missing church...usually. it's just now, i get to go to church and see sunday morning. with coffee. with max. while my teenager's still asleep.

so this morning was really great. barbie and pelican island. and a commentary from ben stein. you probably remember him from ferris bueller's day off. remember? bueller....bueller...bueller?

below, i'm going to do the unpardonable and NOT link. i'm pasting the entirety of his commentary. please read it all. i've been shouting this inwardly for the past month, and it was both vindicating and inspiring to hear it spoken. enjoy. and then go shopping, please.

Okay. Let me put on my weather-beaten economist's hat again and try to explain something important.

As we all know, we are in a recession that is bad and getting worse. So, basic question: How do we get out of it?

Well, look at it this way. The economy grows because of two factors: M, which is the quantity of money in the economy, which is controlled mostly by the Federal Reserve; and V, the velocity of money, or the rate at which it changes hands - or, as one might say, the speed with which it is borrowed, invested and spent.

Mr. Ben Bernanke, head of the Federal Reserve, has been doing a fine job of keeping the supply of money pumped up. Score one for him.

But the velocity of money has slowed dramatically.

People at every level are afraid to spend because they fear conditions will get worse and they're going to need the money in the future just to survive. So they don't spend it.

One of the big contributors to fear is the big goombahs in the society saying how bad things are. When Mr. Obama or his economists tell us how terrible things are and how they're going to get worse, they're shooting fear into the economic bloodstream and that hurts velocity and kills stocks.

Notice that recently Ben Bernanke said the recession might end this year, and the stock market rocketed up that day.

What we need, as Bill Clinton aptly pointed out recently, is more cheerleading and less fear-mongering. We elected Mr. Obama to be the National Spirit Leader, not National Scary Storyteller.

If Mr. Obama and Mr. Geithner, his Treasury Secretary, and Mr. Volcker, his well-respected advisor, and some real superstars like Warren Buffett and Jack Welch came out and said, "The recession will end within 12 months. We are sure of it," the recession WOULD end in 12 months.

It's all about confidence and the confidence of heavy-hitters means a lot.

After all, no one is bombing our cities right now or poisoning our rivers. This whole thing is about confidence. Ninety-two percent of us are still employed. Roughly 90+ percent are not behind on our mortgages. If we had some confidence, we could get this ball rolling again.

Let's roll!

updates & creativity

2009-02-11T14:07:00.003-06:00

i realize it's been awhile since my last post...and that my last post wasn't one at all. it's been a busy time at the merryman house...sort of.

a few updates: my mom is hanging out with her radiologist today. she starts a pretty rigorous radiation schedule on monday, as well as a 6-month stint with chemo. i'm sure it's going to be fine, and that this terrible monster will exit my mom as soon as he sees all the weapons we're throwing at him.

my dad went for his "halfway" exam. the lesions in his liver are shrinking...praise the Lord! he is healthy as a horse...he really does look a thousand times better than he did 6 months ago. the treatment is a' working...and none too soon.

in other news...i don't normally have a whole bunch of time to read, but i do it any way. one of the best books i've read in the last two years was eat, pray, love, by elizabeth gilbert. she's amazing.

this month, TED is hosting a big ole conference...one that i'd kill to go to, but alas, killing wouldn't make money spring up from the ground to get me there. elizabeth presented a talk there. i know that most of us don't have 20 minutes, but if you have any creative persuasion "in you," please click http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=86x-u-tz0MA to see it. if you absolutely don't have time, go to the 15:30 mark and hear her out. the synopsis is that (1) creativity is taxing on your emotions, but that (2) we have to work hard to manage the emotion that comes with it and (3) regardless of whether your work will be labeled "genius," sometimes you gotta let it out on the off chance that you might let a little bit of divinity out into the world. powerful.

additionally, my beloved has been working on ways to manage our expenses given the state of our economy. bless him. i am proud to say that over the past week, the hubs has saved us about $1200 (!) a year! seriously, he has called the cable people and bundled our services and changed our alarm company and called the insurance people. he even threatened to sell his (really cool) car to buy two mazdas. this was where i had to tell him to slow his roll, but i had to admire his tenacity.

finally, our son has been invited to his first prom as a friend. to which he said, "maybe i will wait until she finds someone she likes and then she will ask him." i said, "when a girl gets up the guts to ask you to the prom, she's pretty set on you taking her." and he said, "maybe. maybe not." bless him little heart. darn tootin' you'll get some pictures posted on that one. can't wait.

tagged in photo fun

2009-01-26T18:38:00.005-06:00

my friend hannah tagged me...and i thought this would be fun. so, here's what you do:

1. go to your 4th folder where you store your photos.

2. select the 4th photo (no exceptions).

3. post the picture with an explanation and link it back to your tagger.

4. tag 4 people do do the same.

this is a table arrangement I did three Christmases ago for a women's holiday event at our (then) church. i (as a children's pastor's wife) was asked to do a "segment" on decorating for the holidays. so I introduced the women of Rolling Hills to no napkin rings. note that this is not at our home. meaning I toted my crystal tea glasses and two (count them) sets of forks to do this. and i threw in a little shout out to martha and made place cards that could be taken home as gifts. if only i had that time these days.

what you don't see is the children's table arrangement on the other side. i toted butcher paper and jumbo crayons and put little paper napkins in tiny paper sacks for their setting. and i even put little luminaries as the centerpiece with fake tealights so that the kids wouldn't burn themselves. i was SO good back then.

i tag: Dayle, Rebecca, Jessica and Mom.

just for fun this time.

2009-01-23T09:56:00.002-06:00

jon made the decision to take our son on an outing last weekend to see mall cop. i was dubious from the start, and, as usual, my instincts were correct and it was truly a terrible flick. it had that quality that poor tyler perry is guilty of...the one where you try to mix a lesson into something that should really just be for laughs.

anyway, this post wasn't supposed to be a review, but there's a scene in the movie where paul blart (a painfully large kevin james) puts a cassette tape into his boom box and jams. i leaned over to jon and said: i think i had that same stereo. and he said: me too.

it got me thinking: kids these days have no idea. do you remember what it was like to have to search for songs using the rewind and fast forward? and if you held it down halfway, you could hear the teeny mousey music that made it easier to figure out when the song was over? how great was it when you caught the whole song from the radio and were able to add it to your mix tape without the deejay speaking before it was over? and you couldn't hear the latest song by just flipping on your laptop or flicking through your iPhone. you had to get that puppy at the wal-mart or one of those creepy music shops at the hot springs mall. and use the afore-mentioned finding methods to get to the song on the radio, because it was never, ever the first song. there was no best buy or really even target. if you didn't have enough baby-sitting money saved up, you had to buy the single. for me, that meant "blame it on the rain." and the B side had "dance with the devil." which i wasn't allowed to listen to, because no one should EVER think about waltzing with satan.

i'm sure one could make the argument that our brains are freed up by being able to skip around to whatever song we want with a couple of button clicks. that we can accomplish more by being able to save a trip to the store by downloading the latest from iTunes. but i kind of miss the intentional nature of the cassette tape. you had to be committed to find what you wanted. more people could benefit from this, i think.

whatever.

2009-01-16T18:07:00.002-06:00

fyi...jon was on whatever with alexis and jennifer tonight re: plane crashes. i'll post a link tomorrow, but according to him, he called in when they started talking about "the miracle" plane crash in nyc. and he got right on. and he was able to tell the story of his plane crash almost TEN YEARS ago (we are so old).

we are HUGE fans of alexis and jennifer. not only did he get to talk to them (i am GREEN with envy), but he got to spread some Jesus while he was at it.

i married the coolest man on earth. siriusly. HA.

drip...drip...drip...

2009-01-11T18:49:00.003-06:00

after the great flood of '08 (see earlier posts if you're curious), jon and i joined a plumbing club. not a club for plumbers, but a club where you pay a certain fee each month and twice a year, the plumbers check all your pipes and if something goes wrong, they basically pay for it.

so we were due on friday for our second 6 month check. the plumber...JUSTIN...came in (at 10:01...we had been told it was an 8 - 10 window) and told us that everything was great...except we need a new garbage disposal (this is legitimate), and all FOUR of our toilets needed to be "rebuilt." basically, because the tank bolts (trust me, i have a whole vocabulary you don't even want to touch re: plumbing) were rusting. according to JUSTIN (picture it in script), our homebuilder decided to use "eljer" toilets which come with steel bolts -- not brass -- from the factory, and the stupid builder decided to install them with the steel bolts. imagine.

anyway, he told us that once you got in there to replace the bolts, you might as well go ahead and gut the whole thing and rebuild the inside. to the tune of...wait for it....$260 PER TOILET. the math alone makes my head hurt. i've been to lowe's enough to know that this is greater than the price of a brand new porcelain throne. please.

side bar: i grew up with one bathroom. jon calls me a "bathroom refugee." when we decided to buy a new home, my first priority was bathrooms. LOTS of bathrooms. with multiple potties and multiple sinks. so many that if one clogged, we could just play musical loos for years. so this house has four...count them...four potties. and i love it.

anyway. i played the girl card (i call it another term...named after a girlie part, but i've promised to keep this thing PG), and told JUSTIN-in-script that i'd have to talk it over with my husband...being as the tab was approaching the $1500 mark. he fed me some line about how he just couldn't tell how long we had before all four of them started leaking. keep in mind that for three years prior to dennis's arrival, we have only used one pottie consistently. now we only use two consistently. something. was not adding up.

and i began my internet search. have you heard of expert village? they are amazing. they give you videos of ANYTHING you need. including removing and replacing tank bolts.

so...jon and i...the same couple who used to spend saturdays whiling away hours in pottery barn...spent the whole saturday replacing tank bolts. it took four tries (before we got it right on the first pottie), but we did it. we saved about a grand, in my estimation, even though we lost four hours of life in the process. lost is relative, because anytime we fix something, we learn something new about our relationship. to wit: jon is sometimes right. sometimes.

but i can't wait until tomorrow, when i get to call JUSTIN-in-script and tell him that for the low low price of $250 each, i'll fix all the toilets he's found "wrong" all over town. maybe we can be partners in suckering people.

leftovers from 2008

2008-12-31T17:40:00.008-06:00

here are some belated christmas pictures...we had a rather untraditional holiday, since we didn't really know who was coming up for christmas and when, or whether we'd load the car and head to arkansas.

we did end up having a tender tennessee christmas...my parents (and charlie...that's him on the left enjoying a greenie beneath the tree) made it on christmas night, and we were joined by jess and scott (and annie) on friday

night. after a "family mexican" christmas dinner, where our wonderful friends at el sombrero treated us to their usual good eats (and drinks), we just hung out.

dennis learning to make christmas cookies

jon demonstrating how to make "blue spruces" on account of not having the patience to wait for the green icing

max strikes a pose in front of the tree

dennis's introduction to the ornament tradition

dennis enjoying his "big" gift - a ski trip with all the necessary accessories. i know his eyes are closed, but this was too cute. he was so excited he immediately put on his new ski bibs and goggles to model for us.

ready for a new year

2008-12-31T09:24:00.002-06:00

i thought i'd blog one last time for 2008. it's been one heck of a year...a brief recap:
- adopted a teenage son
- house flooded, replaced all the floors
- took first family vacation to hawaii
- started looking for a new church
- lost my little love, maggie
- almost lost max - but didn't
- found out my dad has cancer
- found out jon doesn't have cancer
- got a promotion
- found out my mom has cancer

wow. i'm going to call 2008 - "the year where i began to learn about faith." it really has been a trying year, but i know that we're all stronger for it. i am so thankful for friends that come through, for a strong marriage, for a faith that really does grow every day.

for 2009, we pray for lots and lots of good news. dennis will be starting new classes (all honors!) this semester, so let's start with that. we are so proud of our little guy. we are praying that we will be better parents in the coming year. i would love to get to a place where i lay my head on my pillow and say, wow. i was a great mom today. we'll see...

i'm sure that we'll have a new set of challenges in the next 365 days. i pray for grace and mercy, patience and strength as we live each one of them. thanks for walking our journey with us...happy new year!

the ice man cometh

2008-12-22T21:58:00.002-06:00

we're cuddled up in our living room. this morning, the little box next to the ticker on the today show said 9. that's 9 degrees. according to the newsman, that was the coldest reading since 1993. max wouldn't even go outside. he put on the skids about a foot out from the back door. i don't really blame him.

only instead of cuddling up sooner, we decided to take dennis to ICE! tonight. that means that after we waited outside in the ticket line in about 20 degree weather, we entered a building that stays at 9 degrees. the same temp that max balked at. i almost felt the same...almost.

i got the chance to hang out with my husband and son at one of the "coolest" places ever - my job. we got to see larger-than-life sculptures of the Grinch and the whos. before you could say "three sizes too small," my immigrant son had grabbed his phone to document the moment.

how fun. i have a "new" son to share the wonder of the season with. and a place to work that is, "the most christmassy resort in america." pretty neat, right?

so, for those that read this that aren't around nashville (because i know that those who are have been to ICE!, right?) the last room is the nativity. i love it. it's a life-size nativity carved completely out of ice. they tell an abbreviated version of luke's story of the birth of Christ, complete with spotlights that shine on the key-characters when it's their turn to "shine." how thankful i am that i have the opportunity to celebrate christmas. even though it looks a little different this year. even though i have NO IDEA how to please a teenager with gifts. even though, for the first time ever, my mom and dad have requested that we not exchange gifts. understandably.

thank you, God. for sending your son. for allowing him to become one of us. so that he would understand my emotions...so that i would know that when i pray for peace, He would know exactly what i meant.

things i need to blog about:

2008-12-08T07:07:00.001-06:00

1. tuna does vegas...a christmas tradition is passed to dennis.

2. dennis as buddy the elf in the christmas parade.

3. carrie underwood, little big town...and one happy little moldovan american at his first concert.

real thanksgiving

2008-12-01T07:30:00.003-06:00

i don't have a whole lot of time to write this, but i had to update anyone who cares.

my mom doesn't have cancer! that felt so good to type. she has to have a little surgery, but that is OK with me. like she said..."we can handle anything, but that sure is easy to handle."

bless my parents. they deserve good news right now.

we had a wonderful, last minute thanksgiving in arkadelphia. we drove down on thanksgiving. that confused dennis to no end...there was a parade on TV on the day before thanksgiving? since we were having our big lunch on friday, everyone stayed mixed up about what day it was.

i commandeered the kitchen and made a food network thanksgiving, which i must say i am very proud of. with help from paula, tyler and sunny, mixed with a little bit of me, i got a giant lunch on the table at 2. i had some help from my sous chefs.

dennis seemed to enjoy thanksgiving, but it was hard to explain the pilgrims and all that. he got thrown off by the weird hats.

it is so good to be part of a family. i feel so very blessed that God has seen fit to bring us through all this. i feel honored that He felt ready to show us that our faith is secure. i feel unworthy of the test, but all the same, i know we will all come through this little time so much stronger together.

shout out to the gas guys, too. we got down to the delph and back for about $45. not bad at all. what bad economy?

good stuff...and not so good stuff.

2008-11-21T16:53:00.002-06:00

let's see. on monday, i got a promotion. you're reading the words of a bonafide manager. i feel so old and grown-up and responsible. and grateful. i have a new title and a new blackberry and a new laptop. and i feel very connected. most of all, though, i'm just really glad that i have the opportunity to get paid to love on people. it's my job to make sure that people love theirs. not a bad gig, right?

we decorated for Christmas last weekend. the house really does look good. dennis likes the tree, though not well enough to put one in his room..."what if i accidentally throw dirty clothes on it?" good question, champ. let's not tempt fate.

got some not-so-great health news on my mama today. not to go into details, but it'd be great if you could pray...fervently...for a good test result on Wednesday. when the results come back STELLAR, then we can all have a cyber-laugh and prayerfully thank God.

it is not. fun. to get bad news about your parents. ever.

on the flip side, though, we got great news about my dad...see, his cancer numbers were WAY down after just two treatments, but his heart's been acting funny. so he got all sorts of tests run, and it looks like we get to resume chemo...YAY. he hates the chemo, but if it's working (which it is), then daddy says, "hook me up...fast."

mom and dad have just been spending an awful lot of time in doctors' offices and hospitals lately, and they could use some good news.

life now, well...it's just a big roller coaster ride. don't care how cliched it sounds. that's the only way to describe it.

officially american

2008-11-11T07:07:00.003-06:00

dennis didn't get to vote in this election...but guess what?! he's now an american citizen and he can't wait until 2012!

we went to memphis last friday for him to say the oath. it was an experience i'm glad we had. it's not often that you're in a room full of people who have been waiting to be americans. i'm guessing there's not a room in eastern europe where people gather who've waited 15, 20, even 30 years to pledge their allegiance.

no one could figure out how we all fit together...it makes me laugh that we're not conventional and when people like to see if they can name that birth order. "so are you the sister or the mother?"

nana and pops met us down there - we tried to make it a surprise for d, but it didn't quite work. mom and i haven't always been "ahead of the curve girls," so i was on the phone with her trying to get her to memphis, since she hadn't printed directions. the picture isn't a great one, but pops got tickled, which doesn't often happen when cameras are involved, and so this was a great picture. no one would brave the photo-op until we did it, and by the time we'd taken our round, there was a multi-cultural line forming behind us.

Then we took dennis, whose favorite american food is ribs, to the rendezvous for lunch. here he is having finished a whole rack. almost. he made pops proud. it made me thankful that pops finished a small order. he looked great. and so did nana.

so, we really, truly have an american son. and have the papers to prove it. next step? drivers license. maybe next month?

explaining america

2008-11-07T19:12:00.003-06:00

i'm playing catch up. i realized i hadn't posted about the merryman family election experience quite yet and that made me sad, because it really did impact us...

it's no secret which way the merrymans roll. we were early adopters of the huck for president campaign. in fact, the first money i ever gave to a campaign was during this election for huck. i still wear my t-shirt to target and i faithfully drink my saturday joe from his mug. that's joe - coffee not joe - plumber. anyway...

dennis goes to a pretty progressive school - it's an art school, and encourages free thinking - sort of. he came home nightly with reports of intellectual throw-downs, where kids would call each other to the carpet about to whom they would cast their vote. only if you said mccain, like dennis did, you were ridiculed. denounced for being racist and said to be a lemming. when dennis asked what the hubbub was about, why no one voted for mccain, his classmates said, 'we're voting for obama because he's black. unless you hate blacks, you'll vote for him, too."

we had many conversations over pasta about this phenomenon. that we vote for conservative candidates because of how they spend our money and because of their belief that babies have a right to live. we don't vote for people based on the color of their skin. he was torn up about why the students at his school didn't think for themselves. he wanted to know if they knew what obama stood for and why they couldn't talk about that instead of the color of his skin.

so the election happened. and...i'm not a sore loser. i firmly believe that you don't get to be a candidate for president without at least a small inkling of how to run a country (although i'd love to have been a fly on the wall when he went to his first national security briefing).

but the morning after - as i was hoping for a repeat of 2004 when we went to bed with one guy as president and woke up with another - the saddest thing happened. the channel 4 news interviewed a student that goes to d's school at the bus stop downtown. and she said, "i voted for obama. i didn't care if he was democrat or republican...i voted for him because he was black."

and this proves to me that racism is alive and well. we vote for someone because he looks cool...he probably has an ipod and talks a little like we do. we vote for someone because we want to be cool..."i voted for the first black president." we vote for someone for all the wrong reasons. and there's a country that will live or die based on the choices this man makes. and i know this is not the majority, but just to know that the thought process exists makes me very, very angry.

the day after the election, i was driving home and listening to npr. bill moyers was interviewed and basically said that if you wanted to see if racism was alive, you need only look at the electoral map. he said that people in the south clearly voted only for white men, and that republicans were so out of touch because they continue to campaign based on "values." i got so angry i ran home and commented on npr.org.

i voted for mccain because i believe what he believes. i voted for him because he stands for what i stand for. i voted for him because he's got some years under his belt and has done more than visit our enemies on a press trip. i did not vote for him because he looks like me.

it makes me happy that history has been made and my son was alive and in america when it happened. i just wish our dirty secrets weren't exposed on such a public stage.

the morning after.

2008-11-02T17:35:00.006-06:00

so...the birthday party went well. really well. i was a nervous wreck and am considering going in yet again for something medical to help me through strenuous social situations.

but, really, we couldn't ask for a better day. i made dennis his first cake, which was delicious and looked like it had been decorated by a 3rd grader. nice, right? dennis thought it was beautiful - or at least that's what he said.

all of his buddies came over and roasted s'mores and ate candy and chick-fil-a nuggets (because gourmet cooking would be wasted on teenagers, right?) i didn't order in to be lazy, i promise. i did make frozen waffle fries because chick-fil-a doesn't sell those on a platter. one little guy stayed over, and here's what the morning after looked like. Notice we're all in PJs and D has a giant mug o' coffee (and so do i). that's a birthday napkin in my hand, because the party's not really over until the party supplies are gone.

halloween witchiness...

2008-10-30T09:03:00.003-05:00

i'm finally at the point where i'm indignant FOR my son, not at him. this week is dennis's birthday. his birthday is november 1 - and we are having a big ole time teaching him what it means to have an american birthday party. i had the brilliant idea to have a party on halloween. teenagers don't trick-or-treat, right? i mean, the ones whose mamas raise them right don't. there is an age where you don't get to beg for candy any longer. there is an age when the gifts you open on Christmas morning no longer come from a guy in a red suit.

so dennis invited a few friends from school, some grown-ups he knows from moldova and his sister. he was most excited about his school friends. he told them about the party a month in advance so they wouldn't make halloween plans. on monday, he took the invitations to them, and, turns out, every little girl who said she could come has decided not to come. they'd rather trick or treat.

i. am. livid.

he is so hurt by their actions - that they lied to him. he threatened to take away their invitations, and after explaining that wasn't couth, i told him i'd beat them up. then i had to explain that wasn't couth, either.

i don't like this part of motherhood, because my heart just aches. i promised him we'd have the best darn party ever, and they'd only wish they'd come to his party. he didn't look like he bought it.

it's a good thing that i have work to do today, and a heck of a party to plan. because i want to call the mamas. and explain that where i'm from, you just don't let your kids trick or treat at the ripe old age of 16. and you certainly don't teach them to lie.

killing trees isn't always a bad idea.

2008-10-21T14:09:00.004-05:00

i need to take a quick break from posting about all the goings on to just comment. indulge me.

i've been posting recently about all the trips we've taken to arkansas. when i go by myself, i almost always get a book on tape from the cracker barrel. when we all go, jon always drives (against my wishes), and i almost always read a book (which makes not being the driver a little bit easier to take).

on the trip to pick up dennis from his two-week stay with nana and pops, i listened to Run, by Ann Patchett. normally, i get a lovely little no-brainer, something that will make me giggle as the flat fields on eastern arkansas fly by. but for whatever reason, i thought, why waste my money on nonsense? let's get something worthy of "reading."

well...one of my favorite blog spots is Real Simple. they have about 16 blogs all in the same place all about stuff i care about. you know - earth-shattering essays on what to eat for dinner, how to arrange your living room and the merits of digital scrapbooking. recently, they began the "no-obligations book club" blog where you can read along and discuss books online. right up my alley. one of the first books they chose to feature was Run. so exciting. i wouldn't even have to read to participate, since i had already "heard" it all. or so i thought.

the moderator is picking apart the layers of the story, and while i knew it was complex, it's SO much more than i thought. there was even an entire storyline that i missed completely.

so here's the issue: am i just a bad listener, or is it difficult to "get" the nuances of a story without the benefit of print?

i've been itching to get seth godin's new business book, tribes. he has released a copy on iTunes, with himself as the reader. it's only 99 cents. but here's the rub...do i spend 99 cents on a piece that i MIGHT get a little bit out of (a very earth-friendly choice, since there's no oil consumed in delivery, no trees harmed in the printing and no packing materials to kill any penguins), or do i spend $13.57 on the hardcover book from Amazon, veritably killing the earth, one key-stroke at a time? my guess is that the extra $12.58 and ensuing consequences are worth it.

there's something about print that just makes it past my ears and into my head. it's why i ran to my computer to type all the words to "Bent" when I was a junior instead of just listening to the words. they made whole lot more sense that way.

i've been tagged...

2008-10-10T17:35:00.005-05:00

i'm always the one that doesn't respond to the multiple question emails. i'm that girl...the one that loves to read others' dirt, but would rather not add her own. and never mind that in a contest with an aloe vera plant, i'm pretty sure the aloe gets the most exciting life award. but my friend hannah tagged me, so...here goes: 7 random things about me:

1. i feel extreme, uncontrollable guilt if i go to bed without removing my makeup. if i fall asleep with it on and wake up at 3 in the morning, i immediately go grab a face wipe. pretty sure this stems from a mary kay party my mom threw me once.

2. i usually speak to my dog before i speak to anyone else when i get home from work. can't help it. he's the only one that guaranteed will give me love and listen without interrupting.

3. i listen to npr in the morning so that i will have something to talk about.

4. i cry at every single gray's anatomy episode. every. single. one.

5. when i sing at church, i pray that there is a recording executive sitting next to me that will discover that i have incredible potential and will offer me a contract, or at least some free lessons. this is really not out of the ordinary in nashville. we're all praying for the same thing.

6. i could eat cheese and crackers for every meal. this explains why i can't lose weight. the stinkier the cheese, the better. i have been known to grab a pinch of grated parmesan right out of the tub. there. i said it.

7. i pluck my gray hairs in traffic.

why i'm not ready to be rachel ray:

2008-10-02T12:05:00.005-05:00

i love to cook. it's one of the few things that i've aspired to that i've accomplished. i'm pretty good at "cooking by feel," meaning i can read a recipe and execute well, but i like to throw things together and have them come out tasting much better than any recipe. if ever i have a show on the food network, my mom and i have it all worked out...it will feature "cooking from your pantry" and i'll impart my knowledge to a world of eager viewers. seriously...my family's favorite meals are the ones where i clean out the fridge and concoct a really great meal.

so, how do i know i'm not ready? please look at the photo. that's an example of cooking from your pantry gone awry. my dad had told me about this cheese that you get at walmart that melts into a fantastic mexican dip. i picked up what i thought was the right cheese, but after sticking it with milk in the microwave for about four minutes, it refused to melt. it just got rubbery. so i decided to open a can of beans and a can of corn and throw the cheese in with it. only the rubbery white stuff crumbled instead of melting. my husband said, "wow. it looks like cottage cheese." thanks. in addition to being crumbly, i didn't drain either the beans or the corn or the milk from the dip attempt. so it turned into purple soup.

it didn't taste bad, but man, was it ugly. thankfully, my husband and son know better than to comment. they just ate it. however, i'm almost positive dennis didn't ask for seconds.

also...today would have been my mimi's 95th birthday. i can't ever remember anyone's birthday, but i always remember hers. she's a hero of mine...she loved the Lord, loved her family, and had a good dose of spunk. may it be said of me.

returning to "normal..."

2008-09-18T18:23:00.004-05:00

we're beginning to remember what normal looks like. it looks a little like Dennis studying and Max looking on. how cute are they? you'll notice "the shack" on the table next to them. i read it pretty quickly, and am considering a re-read. because it can't possibly be theologically true. more on that in a later blog, i'm sure.

but we're re-learning that normal means that every phone call is NOT necessarily bad news. and that healing happens.

what's not normal? well, i get to talk to my dad now...really talk to him. before this nasty illness came into our lives, my dad wasn't really a PHONE person. to be honest, he wasn't really a talking person. not deep, anyway. we're learning to talk deeply. i'm not going to get all morbid and say that we all wonder if it will be the last conversation. it's not that at all. we just appreciate life a little more. and we're beginning to learn to be a one-dog family. although i'm pretty sure we were never meant for that. but max is pretty thrilled to get walked every night. and my cardiovascular system is thankful for that :)

thank you for your prayers and conversations over the past few weeks. it's meant the world to us that you would journey alongside us as we return to normal.

learning to live day by day

2008-09-03T08:12:00.002-05:00

about six months ago, a friend of ours asked if our blog was "true." if everything in our life was just as it sounded...perfect. and at the time, we thought, "gee, that's really funny." i mean, at the time, yes, we were in the midst of learning to be a family with a new 15-year-old child. but life was good...we laughed through trips to the grocery store and through learning to discipline. we had kooky things happen to us, but we muddled through.

this summer...we've learned to be a family that weathers storms. i should say, we're learning.

some of you know that last week, my dad got some pretty bad news. seems he's got cancer. a good round of it. liver and colon. and it came up so suddenly that we had to rally troops in about an hour. he's currently recovering at the hospital, from the removal of a softball-sized tumor. we have a long road ahead of us, but we are truly hopeful. i don't know that i've understood hope before yesterday. my dad is ready to fight, and we are ready to fight with him, and to God be all the glory regardless of the outcome.

i have to tell you that the last month of my life has been trying...i have cried more and prayed more and screamed more than ever before. i don't understand why, but i'm learning that it is not ours to understand. we just have to trust. things work together for good, even when we can't see it. sounds so cliche...but it's not.

last weekend, i got to spend unexpected time with my mom, dad, sister and brother-in-law, mostly because my sweet little maggie passed away. i needed comforting, and that seemed like the best plan. it was a fantastic weekend. we played together, ate together and fought together.

and then three days later, we get the not-so-great news that my dad's not going to be feeling that stellar for a little bit. had we waited to get together until labor day (the original plan), we might have missed out on the sweetness of all the week before. never, never think that things don't happen for a reason.

i am so thankful for the people and things that have been placed in my life...for a husband who's lived through all this before and can answer my questions. for doctors who have miraculously appeared. for surgery appointments that have just "become available." for tumors that are big, but are not so big that a body can't be fixed up. for glimmers of hope that turn into gigantic rays of healing. my life is one big miracle now, but not in the lottery sense of miracle. in the sense that i am blessed beyond measure to witness those miracles.

i know that soon, i will be able to live my life a little less "on the edge." the matters that present themself to me will not warrant immediate, drop down on your knees prayer and crying. but i pray that i will not fail to see miracles.

Missing Maggie

2008-08-20T12:57:00.003-05:00

Some of you may have already heard that our little Maggie passed away last night. We knew she was not doing well last night at the animal hospital but tried to find glimmers of hope in each push of her leg on us and the way she rested her head on emily's shoulder just desperate for rest. We brought her her favorite pillow from the house, a nice soft brown velvet floor pillow, and Emily laid her on that pillow and kissed her before we left. Emily went to visit her this morning and Dr. Bolling had to break the news that we lost her.

There are so many emotions swirling in both of us right now. Dennis doesn't know yet - he's at school... I go back and forth thinking - I shouldn't be this sad... but I am. I'll have strong moments and then cry at my desk and I only jumped into blog because I'm sure Emily's computer is fried from all the tears falling on the keys today. Maggie was definitely her mama's baby, as the picture above shows, and we are going to miss her so, so much. She was our first "baby"... We answered the ad in the paper for a schnauzer and once we met her and her brother Max, we knew they were to be part of our family. We had wonderful trips to the dog park, fun road trips to nana's, dressed her up (sometimes against her will) in isaac mizrahi polo shirts and halloween costumes from target, and we have countless other wonderful memories of moments relaxing together at home. She was a sweet, amazingly smart dog that loved us and had so much personality. She was feisty, she was a hunter that hunted down whatever it is that made her sick and she fought hard against the attack on her system. Even though she lost her fight last night, we will never forget our little maggie and we're just trying to ponder the reasons why God may have allowed this to happen today. I do know that I'd much rather her be resting and at peace then suffer from extended damage from whatever toxin her body was fighting.

We're thankful we have Max today - who is a very sweet, smart dog and knows what has happened. He licked up our tears today and I'm sure he's missing Maggie in their house today. Our life seems to be constant change these days and we're just not sure when we'll get a break. But we know there is much to be thankful for - like God's constant provision, that Maggie isn't in pain anymore, that we have Max to help us heal as we help him heal, and that we have an amazing son who has grown to love these pups like he never knew he could. We appreciate your thoughts and prayers today...

one sick puppy

2008-08-19T08:51:00.002-05:00

anyone that has kept up with our life before this blog started knows that we started our little family with the addition of two little puppies, max and maggie. they also know that we spoil them more than a little, and basically treat them like our children.

little maggie is sick. she couldn't walk on sunday night and couldn't hold her head up on monday morning. when we got her to the vet, they said that she had ingested something toxic. dr. bowling, our fabulous, schnauzer-owning vet, told us that things didn't look good.

i have spent the last couple of days in tears. i vascilate between playing out all the ways she could have gotten into something and fervently praying that she bounces back. it is not a good feeling.

she is improving (in my expert opinion). when we visited her last night, she wagged her tail (fabulous), held her head up for us and even drank some water (HUGE). we're still not totally sure she's going to make it, but i am comforted knowing she feels even a little better.

i struggled with knowing whether to pray for her healing. there are people all over the world that are suffering so much, i hate "wasting" a prayer. but as my wonderful mama told me, God made our little doggies just for us, and he's pretty OK with hearing our cries for help.

so, if you're of the same mind, please whisper a prayer for my little maggie. it would really mean a lot to me.

first day of school

2008-08-10T09:29:00.002-05:00

i'm the daughter of a school teacher. anyone who knows me well knows this. my mom is an undeniable influence in my life, but her legacy of school and education is one of the strongest pulls i feel. it was she who taught me that the first day of school was unlike any other "first day." she still gets all excited when walmart opens up those two long aisles of back-to-school goodness. she would take jessica and me to the hot springs mall and let us pick out our school clothes, usually at sears or penneys and then we'd go home and lay out our first day outfit. i mean, head-to-toe, if there was layering involved, it would be evidenced on the hangers outside our closet, and the shoes would be lined up as if there was a little invisible emily hanging outside those folding doors. now, i would continue this ritual up until marriage. jessica usually let it go after the excitement wore off.

i write all this, because this is really my first time to live through the first day with my own son. i got so excited last weekend because it was TAX FREE. that means that all the families in tennessee mob target just to save that almost-ten-percent tax on school clothes and supplies.

pause. there is nothing i like better than brand new school supplies. the smell of wooden pencils, even though i never use them, is heavenly. the crack of a notebook that has yet to get it's spirals smashed. those cute mini-supplies, like staplers, that you'll NEVER use.

so last weekend, we asked dennis if he needed anything to start school. he looked at us if we were half-crazed. "but, don't you need new pencils or something?"

"no. i have lots of pencils."

"paper? notebooks?"

"no. why would i need them? i have plenty of paper and notebooks."

"don't you need new polo shirts - isn't there a stain on some of them?"

at this point, he notices that i'm slightly pained.

"i don't need a new one. there maybe a small stain, but it's fine. maybe just one more would be ok."

and then i remember that he's from a former soviet nation. just having a pencil is fine. as long as you've got room to write, you don't need more paper. a stain on a shirt is no biggie, so long as it fits you.

there are times when i notice that american excess gets to him. and it breaks my heart and has even made me return things when i sense that i've fallen prey to the same. and i recognize that the "first day of school" is a marketing ploy like everything else because what kid in america really needs one more pencil?

what have we become?

2008-07-17T22:21:00.004-05:00

...so, tomorrow, i leave to pick up my son. sort of.

NOTE: to any would-be robbers: the house will NOT be unoccupied. just so you know.

yes, i'm going to pick up my son. but also: my sister turns 25. one of my dearest friends is having a baby shower. i have deemed this weekend, "the weekend of things that i must do, but things that i want to do...nay, things that i can't wait to do."

yes, that's a long title. but seriously. i'm going to get to celebrate my sister's birthday for the first time in probably 10 years. i mean, the last time we were together in july, i'm pretty sure we were bickering. which means it was at least when i was still living at 1039. which means it was a L-O-N-G time ago.

and, though i can still remember a time when almost ALL of my friends said that it would be a L-O-N-G time before they had kids, well...almost all of us have had them...or acquired them or whatever. i can't believe i'm going to a shower for hfp, or hff, as the case may be. i can't wait to see my buddy...the one who was embarrassed to have received a red nighty our freshman year from a beau. she is very visibly pregnant. i almost misspelled the word. because i feel like we're not quite that old.

and i have a teenager. i never thought that i'd be celebrating my sister's 25th as the mother of a 15-year-old. and i can't wait to see him. this has been one of the longest two-week stretches of my life. i can't wait to laugh with him, to hear his music blasting from his bedroom, to see his sheets rumpled again. i miss my baby boy.

isn't it funny how the world works...and how God works in it? i'm pretty sure none of the people in my sphere could have foretold the things that will be tomorrow. but i'm thankful for every event. for every person. for the very reason that i will travel 450 miles. i'm thankful for today...and for all we've all become.

a little alone time...

2008-07-14T21:06:00.002-05:00

tonight i did the following:

- ate udon noodles with wreckless abandon.

- watched gossip girl with no apologies.

- gave the puppies a greenie...and a treat.

- sat out in my backyard talking to one of my best friends.

i count it a good day. i miss my husband, and my son. i don't like this much responsibility. but, man. do i love udon noodles.

To have a nana...

2008-07-10T13:05:00.002-05:00

It's been years since my "nana" died (my mom's mom in Kansas City) but I can still remember visits to nana's house. I have no idea where my parents went when they left me at nana's house for days at a time, but it didn't matter. Fun was ahead. Pure, crazy, no rules kind of fun.

If I had not been too much of a pill, and I was one crazy wild little boy!) I got to eat at Showbiz pizza. Watching animatronic animals sing to you between stuffing your face with pizza and then grabbing that big mallet to play 'whack-a-mole' has to be the best thing on earth! Or at least it was then... Then it was off to Furr's Cafeteria for nana to get something she wanted to eat... meatloaf, turkey cutlet - you know, old lady things to eat. And if I had been good, it was off to Toys R Us to get a toy - a real loud one that would drive my parents crazy. Nana seemed to really like those...

Emily's parents are now, because of the loss of both of my parents, now my parents too by default. :) They've adopted me. They're absolutely amazing...
This past weekend they joined us in Nashville for the 4th of July. We had so much fun - we had an amazing shrimp boil Emily prepared for Dennis's first American 4th of July, spent time together as a family in the backyard escape, and as usual had lots of help from Pops on projects around the house.

But it was Sunday's departure that tugged at our new parent heartstrings. Nana and pops had invited Dennis to come spend some time in Arkadelphia since his boring old parents have to work all day every day. :) There's only so much Wii and Rosetta Stone you can take before you start making up imaginary friends (which he did!). Dennis asked if he could pack the big black bag for his journey and I said sure. I thought he meant his NorthFace duffle bag. Apparently not! He brought down the biggest suitcase we have filled with things for his time at nana and pop's house. :) I tried to squish it in nana's trunk and the alarm went off. An alarm? What is that? I opened it up to find his alarm/clock/radio in there! It is huge - and nana has an alarm! But if that makes him feel at home, by all means... :)

As they were loading up, Dennis probably hugged Emily and I about 10 times each. I could tell he was going to miss us, but he just kept waving and running back for hugs. When he got in the car he rolled down the window and kept waving and looking back the whole way down the street.

I'm not so sure he misses us as much today. :) But he told me today to tell Emily hos much he loves her and misses her... Such a great kid! He is having so much fun at nana's! He has single handedly diagnosed and revived all of nana's plants thanks to his gardening experience from the Stephanencos in Moldova, he's learned to grill ribs, and he rides his bike everyday. (But that might take a little break since he told me his butt heart from the bike today and he thought he might die!) He's been to the science center and Wild River Country with nana, and went fishing at the lake. He caught fish, and even though they were small, he cleaned them, cooked them and ate them while nana and pops cheered him on and tried not to gag. :) If it cools off, he's even going to go dig for diamonds at the Crater of Diamonds state park. I've always wanted to do that! And I'm sure he's having fun being on "Bernice Watch" - waiting to see the ghost that nana swears came to live with them after the tornado in 97. :)

On Tuesday, I noticed he had facebooked someone and told them he was at his grandparents house. Then I remembered a conversation we had at Jessica's wedding in Arkansas where he was overwhelmed with emotion because he had never known any family in Moldova except for his dad for a short time and what little he had been around his mom. He knew no aunts, uncles, grandparents - nobody. He thought it was so cool to have all this family and thought the wedding was the coolest thing he had ever seen. (But that's another blog for another day!) I thought, it is so great to have a nana to spoil you - to let you sleep till noon, ride your bike, catch fish and cook them - and while I never did that particular task, I remember fondly running around with the plastic lawn mower with the popping plastic balls that made the worst noise. That's what nana is for and I'm so glad Dennis now has a nana.....

If I had pictures to post, I would. But I think what happens at nana's stays at nana's. I'm sure we'll have more stories to tell when he returns from nana's. We've already had another flood while Dennis is gone...

And just in case you thought our lives sounded perfect and picturesque today, apparently the water problem we had recently was NOT plumbing, and thanks to the drought it hasn't rained since memorial day when the last flood happened... But yesterday it did, and water pooled in the same spot in our bedroom, and now we know it's coming from above, not below. :) But man, do we have some great new pipes! :) Dennis said "Oy Teh!" When we told him, and asked if we had to get all new floors again. Boy was he relieved when I told him I don't think its as bad this time... and we're relieved, too. But we hope whatever is causing it to rain in our bathroom and bedroom gets fixed soon. :)

Until next time!
jon

aloha and renovations

2008-06-20T20:48:00.006-05:00

so the last post was long, but apparently not long enough. can you believe i have actually had real people (a.k.a. not just bloggers) comment on the fact that my blog is a bit out of date? please. you have no idea.

let's see. in the last post i mentioned that our floors had flooded. well, true to engineered-hardwood form, they indeed had to gut my first floor and replace all the hardwoods. what that means is that while our little family took its first vacation, worker men visited my home and wreaked havoc. yep. there is a fine layer of dust covering every inch. i returned home to every piece of furniture piled in the center of my living room. but you should see my floors. courtesy of the nice folks at state farm, i have hardwoods that are my DREAM floors. i just want to stand around and look at them. but because of the "renovation" i haven't had a computer until now.

BUT. before today, here are the things that happened.

we went on vacation. dennis's first trip to Hawaii, and to any beach other than the black sea. i desperately wanted to blog about it before it happened, but i had the feeling that someone might break into the house because the whole world would know we were out of town (somehow, it was FINE to give our code to the floor men). so, yes, we were on vacation.

after 17 hours of travel, we landed on Maui, and big D commenced snapping photos of everything in sight. jon and i have been to hawaii three times now, and somehow, the highway to ka'anapali beach is not as enthralling to us as it was to him. he thought it was BEAUTIFUL...and it is. we are SO lucky to have been able to have the week of our lives in paradise with our family.

highlights: (1) dennis had surf lessons w/ the most BEAUTIFUL girl in the world. seriously. she got out of her Maui Surfer Girls van and all of us dropped our jaws. he got up after about 15 minutes. he was then promptly stung by a jellyfish. melissa (aka the goddess) told him to tee-tee on himself. he said, "NOOOOO." and then he made her hike back to her van to get vinegar. i'm pretty sure he thought we were trying to kill him.

(2) we had the most beautiful boat ride in the world. we cruised around Lanai (the home of the Dole pineapple plantation in days past), and right as we thought it was over, about 100 dolphins leapt out of the water and started spinning for us. i screamed like a little kid and clapped my hands and apparently talked like they were my children. dennis was BLOWN AWAY. we all agreed that the trip was the BEST.

(3) my husband surprised me by renting out the gazebo where we were married and having dinner catered in. how great is he? it was so special to sit in the spot where we promised to love each other forever.

(4) i got to teach my son how to snorkel. and then, once he had the hang of it, and once i, (aka fatty mcfatterson) had grown tired, i hiked the beach, found a perch, and watched my son paddle above the reef. it occurred to me that probably at no time in recent remembrance had someone just watched Dennis. just let him do whatever and made sure he was safe. and i was so happy to be a mommy. mommies are the ones who, despite the beating sun, and their freckling skin, keep watch on their babies. and i feel like i might have just joined the league.

don't get me wrong. the next day, in a flight of fancy, i sent Sam and Dennis down to the beach with the promise that they would see giant turtles while snorkeling. and i enjoyed about an hour of blissful solitude.

so, we're home. and i have pretty floors. and my freckles have almost run together to make a tan. and it's on to the next big thing. i'm almost scared to ask :)

no more vacations for the merrymans

2008-05-27T12:50:00.002-05:00

well...lest anyone think that our lives are wine and roses, here's what happened to our family on memorial day.

jon took our son to pick up his sister in brentwood, and then to a movie. my idea of a great vacation is neurotically organizing everything in sight, so i stayed home. i murphy-oiled my front porch rockers, stacked my tupperware by size and color, alphabetized my teas, and filed all the adoption papers i had been leaving out "in case we should need them." (like some moldovan judge was going to call and ask questions or something).

i had volunteered our home and our son's oil paints to anastasia's family for the afternoon. she's trying to get into an art school for college, and one of her portfolio requirements is an oil painting, and her family doesn't have the goods on hand. so, it only made sense, since dennis is so well-outfitted in the paint department, that we should let them bond over blank canvases and turpentine.

so everyone invaded my space around 3:30 p.m. jon and i settled in to watch a movie and left the kids upstairs to paint. when jon went upstairs around 5 to check progress, he noticed a large green splotch on my spotless linen lampshade. he came downstairs and told me about said spot, and said, "you probably shouldn't go up there." and so i went upstairs. well, friends, it appeared that jackson pollock had made a stop at our house. there was blue paint on my custom sofa, black paint on the Berber, and green paint on the walls. i have never been so furious.

well, my brilliant husband herded the kids to the car and made dennis grab his wallet. one trip to pottery barn later, and we had a brand new lampshade, sponsored by my son. he was a little appalled at the price, though not nearly as appalled as i was by the mayhem that had ensued and the fact that his sister did not have a painting to show for all of that trouble.

while my boys were in cool springs, i began noticing that a spot i had earlier thought was where one of my precious, well-house-trained puppies had pottied had grown to a 2' x 6' puddle on my bedroom carpet. knowing there was no way that the dogs had drunk three gallons of water during the day, we had to call state farm - especially when we noticed that the hardwoods were buckling.

so...at 10:30 last night, the nice plumber came and tightened a valve. at 11:30 last night, the water extracters came and set up giant spaceship looking devices to suck all the water out of the house. around 1 a.m., jon and i settled in to the soothing sounds of an airplane taking off. these sounds will continue for 5 days, when the floors "should" be dry and the nice floor repairmen will come and rip out my hardwoods to replace them with new ones.

i couldn't really sit dennis down and have a chat about the oil paint disaster in the middle of that. what i can't figure out is how God knew that a flood would be one of the few things that would take my mind off my anger!

reflections on motherhood

2008-05-22T08:40:00.004-05:00

this is a little late in coming, but i wanted to post about my first mother's day as a mom. my little family is so sweet. after a friday of deliveries at the office (one of which was a cookie bouquet with little jon, emily and dennis cookies in it), i was pampered beyond belief. my new son wrote me a card...and while it wasn't eloquent, it called me mom, and that was enough for me. this picture is part of my gift. jon hired a fabulous photographer, hannah westphall, to take family pictures at our home. she's amazing...click here to see her work.

this long, strange journey has taught me so much about being a woman. how strange that God would give us such wisdom and insight...and then wrap it up in an emotional package. i can handle the biggest things, but the little things can undo me.

last night, we heard a sad story about a teenager who accidentally ran over his adopted little sister. my heart is weeping today about this. i know God has an incredible plan for our little boy, but today, i was reminded that "His ways are higher than our ways."

it might not be that my son paints a picture that will hang in the MoMA. do you remember the way you felt the day you graduated high school? when someone gave you the "Oh, the Places you will Go" book and sent you on your way? when you thought the world was your oyster? that's how i felt about my son until this morning. that the world was so big a place and that by him coming to america, things were a little more attainable for him. that he could cure cancer or at least evangelize a small third-world country.

i am reminded that our wildest dreams sometimes fall short...because they're just that...ours. i pray that the plans God has for my "little" one are ones that i can handle...and if i can't, i pray i turn to God for strength.

the end is nigh

2008-05-07T19:34:00.003-05:00

well...we've conquered almost three months of american public school. and we think we've done pretty well. i mean, big D made the honor roll last nine weeks and is tracking to repeat this nine-weeks. WHAT?! i have a kid that is old enough to make honor roll.

tonight is a bit traumatic because of the following:
1. i forgot that monday was cinco de mayo and had to throw together an impromptu potluck salad for work which (a) depleted my side supply for dinners this week, but (b) reminded me that i CAN COOK even though i'm a mother of a teenager. after tonight's supperthyme meal, we are plum out of anything to eat, which sends me into a panic that i MIGHT have to grocery shop in the middle of the week (CRISIS in my book, for sure).

2. dennis is studying for his gateway algebra I exam. yup, you read that right.

3. dennis has his very last soccer game tomorrow. it will be the city championships, and it looks like they might WIN!

4. both 2 and 3 add up to one grumpy kid. we have no idea why our precious one is a bit on the moody side, but we assume it's because (although he's not our biological son) he has a tendency to internalize things and get stressed out. and also, he equates the end of soccer season to the "end of life as he knows it." yikes.

i'm sure we'll make it through all the drama. we have so far, anyway.

spring

2008-04-19T09:58:00.002-05:00

our little family is busy. dennis was recently accepted into nashville school for the arts. this is a BIG DEAL. because his teachers are amazing, they let us know that there were options we should look into. so glad we did. dennis will be able to focus on drawing - something he does really well. he's interested in graphic design, and the school has classes in this. you have to understand that since dennis is only just now joining our little family, private school savings are not really part of the picture. because we live in a fabulous city, he will be able to go to a public school that allows him to do what he loves. crazy.

we are so very thankful for all of the people who have poured into dennis already. i mentioned his amazing teachers. let me tell you about a couple of them. mr and mrs ling are this lovely couple who both work at dennis's school. mr ling is his social studies teacher as well as his soccer coach. the other night, they offered to take dennis to a track meet, just so he'd be able to see what it is like. they took him to chic-fil-a, and brought him home. although the quiet night at home was relaxing and welcome, it didn't compare to the look on his face when he got home. his smile touched his ears, i swear! he couldn't stop talking about this and that...

in moldova, we know that people poured into him. those people are some of our dear friends. but it is awe-inspiring to feel that ordinary people who we didn't know just two short months ago, are willing to take a chance and spend their evenings exposing our new son to things he hasn't seen. incredible.

sometimes, its easy for me to miss the blessings when i'm wrapped up into the day-to-day. (who's going to pick up...what are we going to do about summer...why is our hot water running out so quickly). i'm thankful for times when i'm overwhelmed by God's provision for my family.

Happy 1st Americanski Birthday, Dennis!

2008-03-11T14:46:00.002-05:00

So many of you have said - Hey, update your blog already! You're not in Moldova anymore! And you're right. We've been home for a month! I picked this picture of Dennis at the zoo to try to capture the essence of how wild our life has been since returning from Moldova! Get it? Wild? :)
Where to begin... So much has happened since we returned! Maybe I can just list some highlights for you... This may be stream of consciousness since I'm a parent now and don't sleep near as much as I used to....

We've been to the Frist, the Nashville Zoo (Dennis loves him some monkeys and meerkats), the movies, the mall, Target (a family favorite), Pump It Up, church at Rolling Hills, Kairos at Brentwood Baptist, a Predators game (thanks to our amazing Dentist Dr. Wallace) RHCC youth group at the YMCA, and so much more!

We've survived the first trip to a real doctor and walked out with a clean bill of heath and survived first trip to a real Dentist - that didn't go so well. 2 cavities. Not bad for not seeing a dentist till 15, right? One cavity was so bad all the peach flavored happy-gas and 3 shots in the face couldn't numb poor Dennis enough to endure that filling.

Dennis started school at McMurray Middle School a week after arriving, went to school for 2 days, tried out for the boys soccer team and made it! You should have seen me at 9 o'clock at night picking out shin guards and soccer cleats. Dennis wondered why so many places we go everyone knows me but why nobody knows me at Academy Sports. Hilarious. It's a whole new world... We've met his teachers, worn everyone out with our questions, cheered him on at every soccer game, and probably embarrassed him a million times. Next week is Spring Break and Dennis signed up to go on a mission trip with Rolling Hills youth group to Kentucky. Amazing that he is ready to give back and serve Americans living in poverty. I can't wait to see what God does in and through him next week...

Funny Dennis-ism's so far.
"I'm flying with Peaches!" Dennis on the gas at the dentist...
"I was singing and I totally lost control!" Dennis at the dentist singing a song about Stefan Cel Mare - a king from Moldova or Dacia at the time...
"So many Spanish girls talk to me at school. Everyone wants to know who I like."
He loves fruit. He doesn't "like so much" hamburgers, although as to not make me feel bad he says, "I like the way you do, I just don't like so much." Hotdogs, same category. Homemade chili from dad? Not so much. Anything Emily cooks? He loves. I'm not sure what that's about. :) He loves ribs from Chili's and you can probably hear him groan with happiness wherever you are on Sundays at lunch when he's face down in some ribs.

And some things just aren't like Moldova...
Dennis still laughs when people pull off the road when a fire truck is coming. He says, "Oui Te! That would never happen in Moldova!" And yes, he says that every time. :) He laughs when you stop at a school bus with the sign out. He doesn't know why we throw salt on our sidewalks in the snow when dirt worked just fine in Moldova. He doesn't understand arch supports in shoes or why one needs to wear a different outfit everyday. He also can't believe he is in America. The other night he told me that he loved Moldova but even when he was little he would hear about America and he knew deep down inside he would be here one day - he just had no idea when we met 4 and a half years ago that it would be in our family. :)

So... Just some random fun info about our first month as a family. Most of our days look like this... Emily or I take Dennis to school, we work, he goes to school, we get home and have dinner, Dennis puts on Emily's apron and tries to help cook, we eat, I clean up, Emily helps with 3 hours of Algebra homework (I am no help there) and I take over for Social Studies homework - teaching my child from a former Communist country about the battle of big horn, western expansion, slavery and civil war battles. I never thought I would need this information again - and definitely not so soon! And in case you're wondering, this is a lot different than an average day, say, before February 1st. :)

So thanks for your thoughts and prayers and for asking us to update our blog - that means you care enough to read it and for that Emily and I are very grateful. Parenting is hard work we've learned, and we're starting to realize the reason everyone said, "Wow, a teenager? Out of the frying pan, into the fire!" We appreciate your continued support and prayer as we learn how to be the parents God created us to be and as Dennis continues to learn what it means to be a son and to be able to come home each afternoon and fall into the loving arms of a mom and dad. It reminds us each day of our need to run into the arms of our Father, too.

Thanks again for joining us on this journey! We'll try to update this more than once a month. :)

jon (and emily)

First Family Conference

2008-02-04T02:08:00.000-06:00

So let me tell you about our sweet son -- he makes his bed, listens to American Christian music as he falls asleep, he holds the door for people, he uses his knife and fork (unlike me), and he is excited about what breakfast with a family looks like. We just can't wait to get him home.

But our Sunday didn't quite turn out as planned.

Even though we said our good-byes to Ms. Galina - the director of the orphanage where Dennis has lived and gone to school - on our last trip, we had a special called meeting there at noon yesterday. We think it was just an attempt for our adoption friends to get free lunch for themselves, their kids, strange passersby - but I won't go into that now... We'll save it until I write my Jerry Maguire report to the agency in America when I get home. :) But we had a lovely talk with Ms. Galina where she told us Dennis is amazing and talented, he is strong like an ox, and he is smart and will fake being sick to skip class so look out. :) All good to know. Then in true Moldovan adoption fashion, we were whisked away to the one of the most expensive restaurants in Moldova where we chewed on tough chicken and ate chicken soup with bones floating in it.

But it was at lunch where things turned south. The phone rings and its dennis's mom. We had planned for her to go to church with us and out do dinner. But although it wasn't yet 5 o'clock anywhere, she was unable to join us. She was rude and mean to Dennis and said hurtful things. He was sad but when we asked if he was okay he just said yes and looked down. We went to church and he just wanted to be alone and then wanted to stay with his friends at church one last time. So emily and I left and went and had pizza with the treadways - whom we now adore. :)

But when we all reconvened at home last night we had our first family conference where we explained that its okay to tell us when you are sad or happy or whatever. He just said he wasn't THAT sad... he was okay. And then he told us what happened on the phone. Emily explained that we are a family and we tell each other when we are sad so we can help each other and be sad with each other and when one of us is happy, we are all happy - we're family. He looked at us sweetly and said - I haven't had a mother since I was 5 and I haven't had a dad since before that. I usually have to get through problems alone. I am still learning what is a family. So we had a sweet moment and said there is much more learning to do - let's get on home to America. I have an amazing wife - who is and is becoming an amazing mom. She leaned over to me after our sweet little talk with our son and said. "I feel like Wanda Beaver." After a few moments of confusion she said - you know, like that show with the perfect family? I finally figured out that was shear exhaustion speak for June Cleaver and we had a big laugh before bed.

Right now, Dennis is off at school saying good-byes and then off to visit his mother. Then he is meeting us at the Embassy and we leave for Romania in the morning. He is having a guys night at church tonight that they are throwing for him. I think it involves "shoot-em-up" video games at an itnernet cafe... Wow. We are parents of a teenage boy. :)

Thanks for your prayers. Today is a big day! We hope to update you again after the embassy visit.

jon

here we go again...

2008-02-03T03:28:00.000-06:00

we're finally here! it feels like this trip has been a long time coming, but now that it's here, it doesn't feel real!

we met the treadways, who are adopting a 15-year-old girl named Olga, at the Frankfurt Airport. we're all hanging out here at the team house, getting ready to go to the embassy tomorrow. today, we have church, and dinner with d's mom, and i think lunch with dennis's principal, Mrs. Galena. that was kind of a surprise!

we're trying to get all of dennis's visiting done - with his friends and his mom and his church group. we have that "we're in moldova" feeling - no schedule, but you have to be ready at a moment's notice to go running around. but we only have two nights here, and then it's on to Romania. we're really looking forward to that in a twisted sort of way...apparently, it's more developed than Moldova (there's even a Starbucks!), but we will be moving very quickly through there. The good news is that it involves a 7 hour drive, which equals a nap for me :) Jet lag is a bummer already.

Anyway, we're busy being parents and trying to figure out rules and regulations and how to teach this beautiful child how to be part of an American family. it's a little overwhelming, but i promise we can feel your prayers all the way across the ocean. thanks for remembering us...

Back to Moldova!

2008-01-31T09:27:00.000-06:00

Hey family and friends!

Just wanted to post our travel info so you can be praying for us and keeping up with us along our journey this next week! We hope to be able to blog along the way but we know this trip is fast and furious, so we'll see what happens!

Here is our schedule. If you can make it the airport in Nashville on Saturday the 8th, we'd love to see you! Feel free to bring Bread and Salt for Dennis. He told his friend Galina, who lives here in Nashville now, to bring him Bread and Salt - it's how you welcome a Moldovan. Galina said she would bring him bread and peanut butter - he's an American!

Jon and Emily

Friday, February 1st

Depart Nashville 1:20pm Arrive Chicago 2:55pm

Depart Chicago 7:30pm Arrive Frankfurt 11:10am

Saturday, February 2nd

Depart Frankfurt 3:00pm Arrive Chisinau, Moldova 6:20pm

Jon, Emily & Dennis!

Friday, February 8th

Depart Bucharest, Romania 8:35am Arrive London 10:00am

Depart London 12:15pm Arrive Chicago 3:05pm

Depart Chicago 6:20pm Arrive Nashville 7:45pm

Thank you for your continued thoughts and prayers! Please pray that the process with the American Embassies goes smoothly. :) We've made it through the Moldovan government, now onto our own folks! :) See you soon! We can't wait for you to meet Dennis...

When home just isn't home...

2007-12-17T15:42:00.000-06:00

This is a picture of Emily and I leaving Chisinau Friday morning. If we look tired, it's because we survived one of the craziest weeks of our lives and it's 3 in the morning and we're posing for a picture. Dennis needs one more redbull in this picture to fully show you how happy he is to be our son. :) We promise, he smiles. And we promise, he loves him some redbull. Thanks Jamey!

It's official!
We're home.
Back to life... back to reality.
But something just doesn't feel right about home.
For months, we've talked ourselves out of believing that Dennis is truly our son just in case the judge said "no." We would get ready to pick out furniture for his room or pick out paint colors and then stop -- wondering if it was really going to happen. I made Emily watch "Martian Child" because I thought it would be sweet -- about adoption and family and such -- but when the government tried to take the boy away from the new adoptive dad, it made us put on the skids a bit...
But something changed the minute the Moldovan judge said, "His name will be Dennis Merryman. His father shall be Jonathan Merryman and his mother shall be Emily Merryman. The location and date of birth will not change." Something changed inside of each of us...
It would be hard to think that we could feel more connected and more like a family than we did just moments before court - riding around in Moldova at the speed of light with Victor, following crazy Albina making stops and parking illegally all the way to the courthouse... But the moment we heard the ruling we knew our lives would never be the same -- and it made us smile. We had a baby. A big, wonderful 15-year-old boy, Dennis.
There was a lot to process in the few hours we had between court and our 3am cab ride to the airport! We had to make sure Dennis had luggage to pack his things in, make sure he had "allowance" to survive until we came back in February, and we had to prepare to leave our "son" for the first time. When I have gone on mission trips with mothers and fathers before they get so sad when they leave their children. A day or two goes by and they miss their voices. They don't think they can go on without seeing them. Part of me said - "Buck up, people! It's not that long to be away!" But that's how Emily and I feel today. It's been three days and we miss our son.
The jet lag still hits at funny times.
A picture or a thought make us miss our son.
We sit on the couch with the pups wishing Dennis was there - knowing Max and Maggie will love him and hoping he loves them back. :)
We think of all he will get to experience for the first time.
We think of all he's experienced as an orphan that we wish we could take away.
We wish we could sit and have tea together.
We wonder if we will make it to February.
We miss Dennis.

So for now we pray and look forward to all the fun, challenging, exciting, and crazy times we will have as new parents of a 15-year-old when we pick him up and bring him home in February. Thank you for continuing to pray for us and for Dennis. We can't wait for each of you to meet him.

it's a boy

2007-12-13T12:25:00.000-06:00

i feel like i've been in labor. i know i haven't, and i know that until i have a baby, i won't know what that's like, but today has been one of the most painful, beautiful, maddening days i've ever had.

this morning, we were ready for court at 8:30. we were taken to the courthouse for a 10:00 hearing, only to be taken to court at 9:15. remember that all week, everything has been 2 hours LATER than we've been told, so this was really weird.

the hearing was so painful. we knew that in order to adopt dennis, the child protection services rep would have to explain dennis's situation. that meant saying out loud that dennis's mom is an alcoholic, and that she'd abandoned him. in america, we tend to gloss over things, even when we're being truthful. we probably would have said, she has an issue with alcoholism, and is unable to care for her child well. not in moldova. they just flat out say that she up and left her child. that's when i lost it. i kept thinking, dear God, please, if we're not his family, there must be one for him somewhere.

they continued to plead our case, since it was so "different." we are so young, and he is so old. they told the judge about his sister, who is already in america, and how they needed to be together. this went on and on.

finally, the judge announced the finding of the court. and this is what he said. "the birth certificate will be changed to dennis merryman. the parents will be jonathan merryman and emily merryman. the birthdate and place will remain the same." not, congratulations, you're parents. not, congratulations, you have a home. but the government will recognize you as the parents of this child, and his name will be changed.

one funny thing - the judge did get a bit upset because we wanted his full name to be Dennis Morozov Merryman, so that we could honor his heritage, and maintain his last name as his middle. in moldova, they don't have middle names. the judge said, this is illegal to have two last names. you must choose one. and in that moment, i think i knew that it was real. dennis would be a merryman forever more - he was ours.

anyway, the day progressed, consisting of the following: 1 hour in the parking lot of a baby orphanage inside a car with no heat (it's 30 degrees today); 15 minutes of sitting outside a grocery store while someone took our money to buy MORE cake for the orphanage to celebrate with; 45 minutes of searching for dennis's mother's house, and finding she was not home; 2 hours in a french coffee shop in downtown chisinau telling dennis about algebra II; 2 hours waiting in a fancy restaurant for everyone else to get there; 2 hours of eating foreign food in the fanciest room in moldova; 1 hour of explaining things like "allowance," "car insurance," and "airplanes."

it's been a long day. i have seen more of an un-american government than i care to. and i have a son. a precious son, who ordered tiramisu at a restaurant just because i said it was my favorite.

thank you all for praying and thinking of us during this time. i can't wait until you all can meet my beautiful 15-year-old.

The Judge Said Yes!

2007-12-13T10:55:00.000-06:00

Well, it has been a crazy day, and for a country where time doesn't seem to matter to anyone, court started early. :) 45 minutes early! And while there were tough times, and tough questions about how young we are and how old dennis is, the judge recommended the adoption. :) YAY! We had wonderful people fighting for us -- especially an amazing woman - Tamara from Child Protection - who spoke on our behalf. Denis's official new name will be Dennis Merryman. Cool, huh? He gets to add an "n" to Dennis so people don't call him Denise. :) We tried to make Morozov his middle name - but the judge says that is silly - he can't have two last names. So for now, just 2 names for Dennis - Dennis Merryman. :) We told him he could add "chuck" as his middle name, but he didn't think that sounded good... :) maybe bob... we'll see...

We went to the french coffee shop to celebrate and ran into a friend from Nashville - Bekah Beasley! Just one table over! Then we went to a nice restaurant - Pani Pit - and waiting for 2 hours for all of the parties to show up. We had a wonderful celebration with the adoption folks, Ms. Galnia - the director of Internat #2, and the other American family who were approved for the adoption of their 14-month-old boy Marin. It has been a long, exhausting day but all is well and we are finishing up last minute details and making sure Dennis is set for the time being - we'll be back in Moldova mid-February it looks like to pick him up and bring him home.

So even with all the stress, the uncertainty, and the crazy drivers who made us fear for our lives -- we are a family. The situation is definitely unique -- as the judge told us -- but we know that it's okay to have 2 moms. It's okay to have lost your dad and to have a new dad. Family doesn't have to fit into some kind of mold that we create. And after 4 years of writing, loving, supporting, and praying for this amazing young man, he is our son.

God is amazing and if I would have tried to map out his plan for our family 4 years ago or even 2 and a half years ago when we got married, there is no way we could have guessed that God would bring us together. But as we look back, every word of this story has been written by God since the beginning of time.

I have to go shove tons of dirty clothes into a suitcase now -- so thank you for praying... We can't wait for you to meet Dennis soon.

Noapte Buna. :) (good night)

jon, emily, and dennis merryman

waiting for victor

2007-12-12T12:31:00.000-06:00

i'm beginning this post knowing that at any moment, i will have to sign off. i am in a house in chisinau, moldova, trying to adopt a son. we are waiting on a driver/translator who will take us to an orphanage to do something. mostly, we wait and do what the agency tells us to do. it isn't often that we know what that is before we get anywhere.

the best part of being here is that we've spent a lot of time with dennis. we've gotten to teach him monopoly, which when you think of it, is a great way to introduce america. you get to buy things, run out of money and borrow money from the bank. we also introduced him to mexican food, which exists even in eastern europe. he loves fajitas. here, the people bring them out on sizzling pans, just like in america, only they dump some kind of alcohol on them and light them on fire. his eyes got enormous. we can't wait to take him to a japanese steak house. can you imagine what will happen when they spin the egg on the hibachi and then light the whole thing up?

and while it's novel to hang out with your (hopefully) soon-to-be-son, it's kind of disconcerting, too. you notice your language and your facial expressions, and you have to speak really good English, because you are an example. that's probably the most overwhelming thing that i've felt - that someone is watching me like a hawk, just to figure out how to be an american. and i want him to be a good american.

i notice the things that we'll have to work on, like cell phone etiquette, and patience. and i think of the things he'll teach me, like patience and honesty and dependence.

we've taken him into town alone, just the three of us, for two nights now. the funny thing is, he has to take care of us, because he speaks the language. he has to get our taxis and order our food and get our bowling shoes and get our coats from the coat check. how strange it will feel in about a month when we have to do all that for him.

i can't wait to be a mom. i can't wait to be the wife of a dad. and i can't wait until tomorrow, when hopefully we will learn that dennis will legally be our son.

i'm on pins and needles.

All Systems Stand By!

2007-12-12T01:50:00.000-06:00

So yesterday was a good day... It started out with no power but then the IMB kicked it in with the generator and all was well. I could see to fix my hair and brush my teeth and emily could use the blow dryer. :) We slept late and were then whisked off to a Bulgarian food restaurant. It was the choice of our translator. He was not paying, we were. It was the most expensive restaurant I have ever been to. Move over Radius 10! But we survived and had a great dinner and then went speeding off with Albina. She is crazy and our translator/pastor/betesda orphanage director called her a "car killer." Hilarious! She sped through town, illegally parked us in front of the flower market, grabbed some flowers, threw them to me to hold, sped off to the grocery store, illegally parked blocking in a very angry man who yelled at us in a foreign tongue to which I replied "Sorry - Amerikanski!" Then she ran out hopped in the car and we arrived at the Child Protective Services dept. We met some very nice women who know and love Dennis and who are supportive of what we are doing. The head of the dept. said we were brave and she wished us God's granting of health and patience. :)
Then we went back to the team house and met up with Dennis for a night of bowling and fun before playing Monopoly with Jamey, Liz and Amelia. Dennis is competitive - so is Jamey. :) That is what we have learned. :) Then Emily and I walked back to the team house in the fluffy, slushy snow.
The good news is, the Child Protection folks gave us their blessing. Ms. Galena at the orphanage gave us her blessing. Everything is going well. We are being whisked off again this morning in 15 minutes to go to the orphanage and as usual have no idea why. But we'll find out!
Court is tomorrow morning at 10am - that's 2am Thursday am for your amerikanskis. :) If anyone wants to wake up and pray, it would be much appreciated. :) While we have heard court is somewhat of a formality, everything rests on this judge's decision. We did find out that the judge said our ages were not a problem, Dennis just has to write a letter stating he wants to be part of our family. :) We can't tell you enough how sweet he is - how mature - how good his english is getting and how much fun it has been to see him eat fajitas for the first time -- his eyes got so big when they lady lit them on fire at our table! I can't wait to take him to Shogun. :)
Anyway, off to Internat #2 orphanage. Thank you each for your love and support! We'll update you soon!

jon and emily

Learning the Moldovan Way

2007-12-10T09:01:00.000-06:00

I thought the best way to update everyone on our adoption process would be to post this. It's my first note-posting so bear with me. :) Emily and I arrived in Moldova on Saturday night to a warm greeting from Jamey, Liz, Amelia and Dennis. Our adoption contact - Albina - was late, drove way too fast, and dropped us off at dinner after just a few minutes of information. Then we spent time with our friends and had pasta at a restaurant called "steak and pasta." Creative, huh? Sunday was had a little family conference and then went to God's Design church for their Sunday service. It was really fun. Dennis said the following: "I love serving at the church -- it's not work. It's working for God - that's different. " He also said: "Saturday night there is a cafe - lots of drunk people come off the streets. I like to be part of the group that talks to them and shares God with them. Sometimes they come in drunk and leave with God in their hearts." He is a bright, sweet, caring boy and we can't wait to bring him home.
Today we woke up and were driven around very fast. We went by the court and the judge was busy so we went and met with Ms. Galina - the principal at the orphanage where Dennis goes to school. She knows us well from our work here with Rolling Hills and was glad to see us. We brought her some harry and david chocolates from Orpy Mills. She was a very happy woman. We saw lots of pictures of her daughter's wedding and laughed a lot. She approves of our adoption and told us how it would be when we got home - we would write her and write her and write her and then visit. And she wants to visit us. :)
Then we came back to the team house where we are staying and took a nice nap. I woke up craving a big mac and fries - which I never do in the states - so I called a cab. That was funny and took a long time, but it worked. We went shopping at the grocery store and then hailed a cab back. Dennis is visiting his mother tonight so we are just relaxing at the team house.
We should go to court on Thursday, so tomorrow and wednesday don't look very eventful. We'll go visit the kids at the orphanage that we know from camp, spend more time with dennis, and pray thursday goes well! Then we'll head back on Friday. Actually, we'll head to family Christmas in Missouri on Friday, but that is another story!
Just wanted to update you all - we would love your prayers this week! It is a very interesting court system and we don't even want to know all that is going on. We just smile and nod and let our friends here take care of it, and take care of us. Dennis is excited about America and we are excited about America with Dennis. Another update soon.

Blessings --
jon (and emily)

i'm fulfilled

2007-10-25T12:32:00.000-05:00

i’m fulfilled

so, i have a new job. and i never imagined anything could ever possibly be better than working for a non-profit. only the thing is, that even though i work for "the man," i can now more easily go to bed knowing that i've helped someone.

this week, we had an event where, basically, the higher-ups ("bosses," if you will) serve food and chat with everyone else. and i had to man a station because, well, when you're in an EVENTS and COMMUNICATIONS position, you have to go to the EVENTS and COMMUNICATE them. so i spent three hours in the company cafeteria and ran the "guess the weight of the giant pumpkin" game and took employees' lunch trays and generally greeted everyone by first name as if my job depended on it (i'm pretty sure it does).

i got bored running the pumpkin game. even though a group of employees got together and thought they'd pick it up to figure out the weight...thereby almost knocking the 110 lb. pumpkin onto a woman's table...or her head, i'm not sure which.

so i went to collect people's trays and take them to the tray return (which is exactly what you're picturing, the thing that carries your mess to the people that are paid to clean it up). and i went over to a table of two housekeepers. i said, "may i take your trays?"

and one said, "i'm not done."

but the other, she said, "do you really WANT to do that?"

and i said, "it would be my pleasure."

she said, "no one's ever done anything like that for me in my life."

and i said, "well, i'm happy to."

and i did it. and it pretty much made my life. i mean, come on. i got to make some one's day...and get paid for it. not bad. and one nice little housekeeper, she got to save a couple of steps.

i love my job. already.

hard work

2007-09-11T16:37:00.000-05:00

today was ADOPTION TUESDAY. which luckily coincides with election tuesday here in nashville. jon and i got up (relatively) early, even though we both had taken the day off. we had to go to our beloved doctor, Dr. Holmes, to get checked out.

i was pretty nervous about this visit, because there's been this guy on tv who was too fat to adopt. granted, he weighs 500 pounds. but, i thought, maybe the rules have tightened since fat people can die young and all. but, luckily, we both got "good" ratings from Dr. Holmes, and were cleared for the next step.

we then attended the first three of thirty required hours of pre-adoption eduction. we went to a phenomenal class that quite frankly freaked me out. it was called, "nurturing boys," and it was scary, scary, scary. don't get me wrong. it was the most my brain has absorbed in at least 4 years. we learned all about the development of boys. i have never thought more highly of my friends who are parents of boys than in the two hours i was at the class. boys are complicated and complex, and i don't know how on earth i am going to raise one.

after a brief lunch, we went to get fingerprinted, where you think of everything you've done, and whether or not your prints were left behind a place that could have been later investigated, CSI style, for a crime.

and then we had to go to the police dept. to figure out if we had a record in nashville. luckily, we're clear.

finally, feeling scared out of my gourd, i went to vote for nashville's mayor. except the mayoral election is now a BDD to me. i mean, i'm about to have a kid in the nashville metro school system. and i certainly care about everything a mayor can or can't do for a city. so, with shaking hands, i pushed the red vote button and prayed that others had voted not in their own interests, but in those of their kids. because their kids and my kid will be classmates and even best friends, and i really need the schools to be good.

anyway, i'm feeling pretty weighted down with the idea of being a parent. to all that may read this who are parents - i don't know how you do it. and i don't really feel worthy to do what you do, especially since we're picking up where someone else left off. but i feel like i'll bet you feel - that it's all worth it in the end, that you'll figure it all out when you're in the middle of it, and that God really will not give us more than we can handle.

new addition...

2007-08-19T17:37:00.000-05:00

We have been really busy lately...with home and work...and adoption. Yep...we're expecting. A 14-year-old. He'll be 15 in November. And he's amazing. And we're thrilled...and nervous...and anxious.

Denis lives in Moldova. He goes to Internaut 2 (that's an orphanage). He loves math, science and reading. He loves to play what I think is a baritone. He's adorable. And I'm pretty sure that God wants him to be part of our family. He already is, really.

Denis, along with his friends Gleb and Yuri (that's the American spelling) have been our sponsor-kids for about 3 years. This year, when Jon and I visited Moldova, we both felt that God was asking us to make a bigger commitment to each other and to Him by being obedient. Even though we're not really even old enough to be Denis's caretakers. Even though we can't always balance the checkbook or keep up with the laundry (that's me), or always have a real dinner that doesn't consist of take out or cheese and crackers. We don't even know if Denis will end up in our home. We do know, though, that if we're obedient in taking the step, we're doing what He wants us to. And that makes us pretty excited.

Yesterday, I was walking out of the movie theater, and there were all of these kids, and I automatically thought, "wow. I'm going to have one of those really soon. YAY!" Crazy, huh?

So anyway...just wanted to keep you posted. We're adopting.

it starts...

2007-07-14T18:19:00.000-05:00

so we're joining the bandwagon. this is our first attempt at family blogging, so bear with us. we have two dogs, max and maggie, and a house in nashville. that about rounds us out.

there's nothing really exciting about us, but we are pretty busy, and at times, we can be pretty funny. we're not very funny when we're very busy, unless we're delirious, and then we're hilarious...

recently, we returned from 11 days in Chisinau, Moldova. i think we both found our hearts there. jon's been 7 times; i've been twice. last time i went was not so good, but jon convinced me to give it one more go, and i think i had a better time there than at a luxury resort.

don't get me wrong - it wasn't about comfort. cold showers, no showers, 100 degree weather and no a/c...hawaii, it ain't. but i found purpose there...a reason to live that i haven't found yet. somehow, the sleep that comes on foam mattresses after holding children who don't regularly get hugs is very, very sweet. and the words exchanged when you don't know the language mean a whole lot more than normal.

so that wasn't very funny. but it's pretty raw. hope everyone is well!

leaving on a jet plane

2007-06-27T12:34:00.000-05:00

27 Jun 2007

leaving on a jet plane...
Current mood: anxious

so i'm off to a foreign country in two days. i am going to offer help to the helpless and a hundred other cliches. i have been battling myself over my "call" to do this for sometime. like my mom said, i've only convinced myself this week that i'm going.

i really am excited. i struggle, though, with the idea that i will be loving on kids who, when i leave, and when all the other well-meaning teams leave, will be left with not much. a tote bag with a memory verse; some new english slang; a fresh admonition to stay away from fifty cent. what will i leave with them? will God speak through me, loudly enough, that when teamed with the voices of a hundred other people, that a child will not allow herself to be trafficked into the sex trade? will i be able to stifle my not-to-well-hidden urge to yak when faced with the...unique...smells of this land in favor of showing that i appreciate a culture in a place that so desperately needs to be thought of as "western?"

i feel like i am learning the meaning of faith. that faith is more than knowing God offers a better life than I have, but knowing that He has a plan for those orphans. i struggle when i hear the all-american, Dave Ramsey answer that "God doesn't want harm for you, so stop using credit cards," that he means that to have this American life, full of "fulfillment," which always means wealth - I don't care who you are - is not the life that I hope for my orphan boys in Moldova. i want them to know love. i want them to know that even a little is more than enough. that the goal is to be better than you were yesterday. that i want them to make a difference, and i will do what it takes to help them make that difference?

but do i believe that? i don't know. i believe that i WANT to be better than i was yesterday - otherwise, why am I going to this hot, tiring, lovely place? i want to make a difference. but again, i want the best. i want to make a LASTING difference, and i have to believe that somehow, my being with these kids will show them the love of Christ. will show them that a sacrifice is worth it - that love is worth the sacrifice.

and, if i'm willing to show the love of Christ to those that don't even speak my language, why is it so hard to be loving in the fast lane of I-65?