My Gift

Yesterday was my birthday and I received the greatest gift. I will touch on that later. The day started like a normal day in the Ortega household. Breakfast for the kids, changing clothes, naps, and so on. We bbq's ribs for dinner and had strawberry shortcake for our dessert ( a great weight watchers friendly idea!) We are in the middle of trying to find a new home and I told my folks and Joe I needed nothing for my birthday, just to know they were thinking of me was gift enough. Although Joe did treat me to a pedicure and getting my nails back on this weekend! As the night went on, Joe headed to bed and I spent my time with the kids before settling them in their beds as well. This is now when my "me" time begins. My friend Tiffany had blogged about another blog spot called A Daily Scoop, I have been looking at it for the past few day but tonight I started at the beginning and read the whole thing. I laughed and cried, and at some points sobbed while reading this blog. I recommend checking it out for sure. I drew so much inspirations from Stephanie's words. I only know her through her blog and she has already taught me so much. She suffered the ultimate loss, the loss of a child. I can not even imagine the feelings the has experienced in the past two months. I know her faith and close relationship with The Lord has gotten her through this. I have not been active in the church since I was 16, so 12 years now. I do have a relationship with my Heavenly Father and I pray every night, with my kids and alone. Recently my home teachers have begun to come over as well as my lovely missionaries who I adore! I feel I am getting closer to where I need to be but I still have a long way to go for sure. I do have a testimony and I hope it keeps growing with everyday. After reading Stephanie's words and realizing how strong she is, I have been inspired. Inspired to be a better Mom, sister, daughter, wife and friend. I cherish my life and everyday I have here, but she has reminded me to enjoy the small things even the annoying things in my hardest of days. Days when It is hard to smile and I have crying kids who wont obey. She has opened my eyes to things I thought I already knew. When I was done reading I went into Jersey's room and picked her up out of her crib and held her tightly in my arms as I rocked her. The nonstop flow of tears wet the top of her precious head and I had no control. A mothers love is like no other. I held her for an hour taking in each moment, each soft breath she took, each squeeze of her hand on my chest, each time she snuggled her head into my neck. I inhaled the sweet smell of my baby girl while having a broken heart for all those mothers who have lost their babies. I know it is all part of a master plan which we have no control over but I still wept for them. After I could finally pull myself together and lay her back to sleep in her bed, I moved on to Treyson's room. I watched him for a moment sleeping in his big boy bed the wrong direction and surrounded by pillows. I ran my fingers through his curly hair and told him how much I love him and how he has changed my life. How it makes me feel so good when he tells me he loves me, and how his humor brings me such joy in my life. I felt as though I couldn't leave the room again. I wanted to craw into bed with him and just snuggle him. I want my babies to always know how much I love them and how special they are to me. I then had to go to my room to my sleeping husband. He is my rock, my best friend, he is without a doubt my everything. I watched him sleep and the tears began to roll again. I am so blessed in my life. I am so in love and so happy. This my my great gift, a gift of thought. Time to recognize all I have in my kids and husband. This night was by far the most emotional one I have had in years. My heart swells today as I think about last night. The thought will stay in my heart and head for ever. I have learned so much about others and mostly myself lately. I am a work in progress but the final outcome will be awesome.

Ant Attack!

A few nights ago we were out in the backyard watering the lawn. It is part of our normal nightly routine. At about 7 we put Jersey in her walker an stick her on the patio to cruise around and Trace helps me water. This night he wanted to just play which was perfectly fine. he was sitting on some stepping stones and I could tell he was messing with something in the sand. After asking him what he was doing he told me there was an ant. Of course I told him yo leave it alone because ants can bite us. He was a good boy an immediately joined me on the grass. But then not even a minute later my boy was screaming, "Mommy, Help me, Help Me!!!" I looked over at him and both of his little legs were covered in baby red ants. I rushed over and with hose in hand started spraying him down and rubbing the ants off with the other hand. He clutched on to my shoulders and I soaked his whole body. I stripped him down to be sure no ants had made it up past his shorts. I then carried him over to the patio and he just hugged me, I assured him he was OK and we wold take care of all his bites. He stood there naked holding onto me and one of my hands was cradling his bum. My adrenaline rush was settling and I was taking my much needed deep breaths when he spoke these words...."Mommy, can you get your hand off my booty?" I just laughed, which then made him laugh. He was fine after that, just a bit itchy but by the next morning all bites were healed. I laugh everytime I think of his "booty" comment. He is my son for sure!

Emotional!!

Lately I have been feeling so many different emotions and moods. As to be expected with all that is going on in our lives right now. Each day I wake up with all intentions of having a wonderful and positive day, but there are those days when no matter what I tell myself I just cant get myself to feel good. We, like so many others, are losing our home due to an adjustable rate which we can no longer afford. There is a long story of how we even got into this mortgage in the first place, and it is not a happy story, so I will leave that out. Life gives us challenges and unforeseen obstacles to face everyday and I think this could be my hardest so far. Joe and I have worked very hard in our lives to have what we have, never being late on any payment we have ever had and for sure not missing any payments. Our credit scores are higher than most and we have been able to help many family members buy vehicles, ATV's, get credit card and so on because of our credit. We were happy to help anyone we could in their hard times. This will all be ending though. I have been working with our mortgage company for over a year and a half to help us out, the option they gave us was to freeze our rate for one year so we could do home improvements and refinance to a fixed rate. We of course jumped at this opportunity! We took all the money in our savings account and put on a new roof, scraped old popcorn ceiling and re textured, painted, did crown molding, baseboards, picture frame windows....you name it we did it! Unfortunately that was all work that has made no difference. The housing market has dropped so much that all the work we have done and all the money we have spent has made no difference. The value has dropped so much that we now owe more than our home is worth therefor no one will refinance us, and we cannot sell our home for what we owe so we are left with only one option, foreclosure. We have a second mortgage n our home as well, and when you foreclose it only gets rid of a first. So now we are forced to file bankruptcy. It is even hard for me to say it. I guess it is a pride issue to some degree. I am trying to find the good in all this. It is hard to know the first home we bought, the home we brought our children home to will now be taken from us and there is nothing we can do to save it. But on the other had, we have always wanted to move back to Boulder City and now we can. We are looking for homes to rent and praying we find something within the next few moths. I am so grateful for my friends and family, I have a husband who means more to me than I could ever express, two beautiful and healthy children and we are all happy. I guess I just felt I needed to vent on this issue and it helps to remind me of what really matters in life. We can make any house a home as long as we are in it together and it is filled with our love for one another. For now I continue to try to see all the positive things in my life and I look forward to looking for a new house, back in my hometown!

Big Brother

Treyson is growing up so fast, he gets smarter everyday. He is a wonderful big brother to Jersey. He wants to be near her all the time. We call her "Jersey Girl" and when Trace talks to her he tells her, "Hey Jersey Grill".

Posing with Baby sister. He makes sure there are always plenty of pictures with the two if them together!

Trace wanted Jersey to play Wii with him, so he was strapping on her controller for her! I hope they keep this special bond forever!

Another special picture of the two of them. I cant get enough of my kids! I am crazy!!!

Jersey was fussy and Big Brother came to rescue her, only he couldn't quite get to her in the chair. So he just loved her form the side.

The many looks of Jersey Shea

Jersey is now almost 5 months old, how time just moves so fast! She has such a personality and she shows it in her expressions! Her little eyebrows crack is up!

Happy Birthday Babe

Yesterday was Joe's birthday....the big 29!!! It seems like we were just 17 years old and planning our future and now here we are living it! Anyhow, he got Nintendo Wii and Oh My Gosh is it FUN!!! We have been playing it non-stop. It is seriously the best workout I have ever had and you don't even realize it until you cant move the next day! Here are some photos from playing and cake. 29 Candels makes a lot of smoke!

Memorial Day Campout

We had no major plans for Memorial day so we decided to go camping....in the living room! We moved all the furniture out of the living room and Joe set up the tent. We had every pillow and blanket we own in there so there was lots of padding. We ate popcorn and watched movies. Treyson though this was the coolest thing ever. These are the types of nights I want my kids to remember!