Sharing Their Joy

I'm guessing that many of you already know Alicia from YaYa Stuff, and if you do, you know that for over 7 years her and her hubby, Josh, have been fighting the agony of infertility and subsequent miscarriages.  Then the frustration of trying to adopt a child... a child of any age... it didn't matter to them.

Over and over they've had their hopes turned up only to be let down in the end.  I've been with Alicia for over a year now, watching her fight through her emotions to stay a positive, upbeat person.  I thought she had been doing a great job.  She was still posting her famous dance vlogs and leaving us with a smiling "Lee" picture at the end of most posts.  But I missed it.  I glanced over the fact that even though she was smiling, the sparkle in her eyes wasn't quite there.


Then, the best news ever came to all of us this past Tuesday.  They'd been chosen from over 200 families to be the parents of this beautiful little boy, Alex.  I nearly fell off my seat when I read her Facebook update.

Does it get much better than that?  Red hair and blue eyes, just like YaYa.  Oh, her and Josh are going to be the BEST parents and I'm so excited to be a part of the whole process!

If you've never met Alicia, please, click on over to her blog, YaYa Stuff.  She is a wonderful, hysterical, happy-go-lucky woman and she has finally realized her dream of being a Mommy.  If for no other reason, just stop by to congratulate her or give her a {{{{{cyber hug}}}}}.  Her dance vlogs alone are enough reason to visit.

I love you Yaya.  And this, my friend, is the real happy you, and I'm sooooooo glad to see her!

Pssst! If you love me, you might love my stupid sister more. Go visit her at Jill's Believe it or Not, and tell her I sent you!

Mama Kat's Writer's Workshop: My Name

Once again I'm participating in the almost, in her fantasties anyway famous Mama Kat's Writer's Workshop. 

One of the prompts this week is, "What is your name?  How did your parents give you that name? Sounds pretty boring, no?  Well, I'm here to tell you that my name is not quite that boring.  In fact, it just may be the most interesting thing about me.  How pathetic.

As a child I really kind of hated my name.  Back then I wanted to be like all the other kids with common names like Amy and Stephanie and Erica.  But no, I had this name that everyone pronounced as "Justin".  But then my Mom told me the story of how I came to be Justine and I slowly but surely came to appreciate it.  I even got upset the few times in my life I met another Justine.  I'm just glad my name isn't very common, especially because all creativity went out the window, first with my brother, Jeff, then with my sister, Jill.  Blah!

So here's how I came to be named Justine.

My mom was born in 1945, so, many hours of her teenage life were spent in front of the TV watching American Bandstand.  She once told me that she would rush home from school so she wouldn't miss watching her favorite show, and most especially, her favorite regular dance couple on Dick Clark's American Bandstand,  Bob Clayton and Justine Carelli.

There she is, in 1957, my namesake, Justine.

Here's a little bit I found about them on the web:

Justine Carelli and Bob Clayton were the dream couple of the show, the star struck lovers. Justine started dancing on Bandstand in 1956, when she was still in junior high school. She spent almost an hour, five days a week, on the fifteen-mile bus ride from her  school to the WFIL studios just to dance. Meanwhile, in Wilmington, Delaware, a young high school school student, Bob Clayton, was watching the show and falling in love with Justine. He made his way to the show in 1957 and asked Justine to dance. Letters poured  in, and Justine and Bob became the most popular and best known couple on the show. The couple was on magazine covers, in newspaper articles, and appeared at scores of dances and shows. In 1960, they added singing to their partnership, cutting two records.

Mom told me that she decided as a young girl that her first baby girl would be named Justine, after her favorite AB dancer, and 13 years later I was born.

I look just like her, right?

Okay, not.

Anyway, I've often wished that I'd been a child of the 50s.  What an incredible time it must have been, with so many changes happening in the world and such a sense of innocence for teenagers.  Yes, that innocence was probably just an illusion of the time, but I still wish I could have experienced it.

As it was, I feel lucky that I was born at a time when American Bandstand would also become a part of my childhood, just as it was for my mother.  The styles changed and that sense of propriety was a thing of the past, but at least I can say I shared a mutual love of something my mother enjoyed as a child.

Thank you Dick Clark.  Both for my name and for the enjoyment you've always brought to my family.

Btw... people still pronounce it Justin!!!



Pssst! If you love me, you might love my stupid sister more. Go visit her at Jill's Believe it or Not, and tell her I sent you!

Sunday Scramble

Not quite sure if this will be a brand new meme hosted by Me-Me, or if it's just a one-shot deal.  Knowing me, this is all we'll get out of it.  But, because I've got so many varied and sundry things to chat about I needed a title to reflect that.

So, let's begin.

Keep Your Hands Inside The Vehicle At All Times

A few days ago, my mom was carrying her makeup mirror down the patio steps on her way to have a cigarette (the things she was supposed to quit smoking after the stroke, but didn't) and she tripped.  She landed on the cement, hit her head on her car, the mirror broke and sliced through her palm from the base of the fingers, all the way to the wrist.  Mom is on a blood thinner so this was not a good thing.  A trip to the ER and 11 Frankenstein stitches later her hand is basically useless for now, unable to even feel two of the fingers.  She didn't just cut the thing, she nearly cut her hand in half.  The mirror went right through to the bone.  Ugh, so disgusting.

When talking to my dad the next day he said, "I think her hitting her head on the car did her some good.  She's making more sense today!"  Heeheehee.

Two days later Jill lost her balance, knocked the shield off a fan, her hand went into the moving blades and she nearly lopped off the tip of her thumb, while simultaneously bending it back way beyond where it should have been.

Human?  Or Other?

Sometimes, after spending time with certain people in my family Jill and Dad I seriously wonder if I'm truly from the same gene pool.  I've questioned whether they're maybe a different species, but no, although the two of them are slightly furry, they do walk on two feet and last I checked they don't feel inclined to throw their poo at people.

So maybe they're a hybrid of human.  A Humid?  No, that doesn't work.  A Hyman?  For goodness sakes, if we change one letter there that'd be thoroughly disgusting.  I suppose I'll just stick with stupid.

(Btw... it has been brought to my attention that some of you are slightly offended by my calling Jill stupid.  If that is the case, you obviously don't know the two of us well enough, as it was Jill who helped me re-name my blog and wholeheartedly loves it when I refer to her as stupid.  Okay, slight exaggeration, but she doesn't mind because she knows that I know that she's smart and I know that she knows that I love her and respect her and it's all just in good stupid fun.)

Jill, The Hybrid Human

We're on the phone the other day, in the middle of a conversation, when out of the blue Jill says, "I just plucked a goose feather out of my ass a little while ago."

Me:  *crickets*  Long pause.... "WHAT?????"

Get this.  She tells me she had been having a dream that a doctor was giving her a shot in the butt and when she woke up her butt was still hurting in that spot.  She turned over and felt a quick jab.  Reached around and plucked a goose feather out of her ass that was stuck in there like a dart.  I shit you not.  I couldn't make this stuff up!

Good Dog, Bad Dog

Lately, I've been trying to remember all the good things about Strudel so that when she eats something else non-edible, like my flesh, I have something positive to fall back on.

Bad:  She's really furry and leaves evidence of it everywhere she goes.  Jimmy got out the furminator the other night and got this after only 10 minutes.

 

Jimmy has been warned never to do this again in the family room.  When I woke up the next day it looked like my couch had 1/2 a golden retriever stuck to it.  I had to vacuum the couch, then vacuum the damn vacuum.

Good:  All that fur keeps my feet warm when she lays on me.

Bad:  Eats everything that's not tied down, including glass Christmas balls, remotes, computer chargers, cell phones, bottle tops, cups, paper, paper towel, pens, pencils, paper plates, magazines (she loves People), books, cat poop and many many other things.

Good:  We left her in the kitchen for four hours a couple of weeks ago, not realizing we had an open and full garbage bag on the floor.  She did not touch it.

She has never destroyed anything that's actually part of the house.  Never ripped up rugs, or chewed cabinets or woodwork.

She doesn't beg at the dinner table, although the second even one person stands up, she thinks any leftovers are fair game.

Even if her bowl is filled with little pieces of steak, if I tell her, "Wait." she will not touch it until I say, "Good girl!"

Bad:  She bites us.  A lot.  Not exactly playful, not exactly aggressive.  More a dominance bite.

Good:  She plays great with other dogs. Check her out with this (Pit Bull?) handsome pup!



 
Bad:  She loves to lick Mommy.  Okay, that's not really bad, except for when she's done the following.

Good:  She licks all the crumbs and such off the floor, making vacuuming much easier for me.

Good:  She has finally found her golden retriever-ness and is not afraid of water anymore!  Woot woot!  Look at her go!




Bad:  This is what she looks like after playing and swimming at the dog park.

Exhausted

And FILTHY

Favorite Blog Snippet Of The Week:

Comes to you from Gloria, over at Happy To Be.  (While explaining the workings of a Victorian music box/Christmas tree stand)

"The top and that post you see is where you would put your tree on and it would spin around as you played the music box....Very clever for so many years ago....
WARNING Do not try putting light on your tree...I did this the first year I got this sat it on my dining room table for a dinner party I was having plugged the lights in and turned the box on...well the whole tree got tangled up and fell on to my table of food...ha ha!! so much for trying to set a pretty and unique table for my guest to enjoy...I had a tree full of mashed potatoes...tried to tell my guest it was snow ha ha!!"

Ah, gotta love that gal!
Pssst! If you love me, you might love my stupid sister more. Go visit her at Jill's Believe it or Not, and tell her I sent you!