On April 24, 1999 a man and a woman became husband and wife
On May 2, 2001 a husband and wife became a mother and a father.
Two lost little boys with no family to call their own became brothers and sons.
On March 20, 2002 a judge legally made them a family
On April 20, 2002 a father and mother and two little boys entered the
Las Vegas temple and all dressed in white became an eternal family.

Sunday, August 12, 2012

Settling in...

This last week we finally began to settle in. 

We got most of the rooms unpacked, well at least the living room and kitchen. The library/office looks like a tornado went through as I am discovering that we don't have enough room for bookshelves. For the first time in fourteen years Mike and I need a dresser, as we don't have shelves in our closet. And the boys room definitely needs something, we're just not sure what. 

The boys went back to Scouts this week and discovered that they don't have scouts together. Well at least for the next 5 weeks. Mikhail had his first scout camp-out. It was a hike in hike out, and he was rained on all night as his enclosure had a couple of gaps in it. His scout master said he was a great trooper, and never once complained about being wet and cold. He loved it, and can't wait for the next camp-out. Mat has a camp-out in a couple of weeks. 

Both boys are now all registered for school and we have a football meeting for Mikhail on the 20th as he wants to play and it's a school sport. Mat of course is disappointed as he can't play this year. 

I FINALLY got my Colorado Teaching License and have a teaching job fair this week. I've also made some lunch and coffee dates with my author friends who live here and can't wait to catch up with them. 

Mike has gotten some interest in potential clients as a personal trainer and is hard at work on school. 

This next week is a slow week for the family, but a busy one for me as I have something everyday. 

Check back next Sunday for another update on our life in Colorado. 

Wednesday, August 8, 2012

Adventures in Moving....


As everyone who has talked to us in the last eight months can attest we have been planning to move to Colorado since January. We began the house hunt in March and became more and more frustrated as time went by and we couldn’t find anything we liked or anything in the areas we wanted. We finally decided to just get an apartment while we house hunted.
After spending another month looking for an apartment we found one we liked not necessarily loved.

After talking to the apartment manager I filled out all the paperwork, sent him our REFUNDABLE security deposit and waited to hear from him. After about a week and a half I called and he told me we had the apartment. I gave him our move in date and asked him how much I needed to pay on move in day. He told me he would let me know. A week later I called again to get the exact address and to set up our utilities. He gave me all of the requested information and once again confirmed that we had the apartment.

I had all of the utilities turned on, and forwarded all of our mail. I let all the publishers know the new address as well for the The Book Reading Gals website.

We packed up our apartment in Vegas and hit the road. After traveling for two days we arrived in Denver and early the next morning made our way to Brighton where our apartment was located. When we got there we were informed there was an issue and they needed to see our 2011 taxes. Unbeknown to us the apartment was an income based apartment. Because everything was on the U-Haul and he wouldn’t let us just get it to him later after it had been unpacked we had to go down to the IRS office in downtown Denver. I then spent 2 hours waiting to get a copy of my taxes while Mike and the boys explored.

We then headed back to Brighton where we were informed that because of our adoption we had to refill out our paperwork. Why this mattered we still haven’t been told. At this point it was 3 in the afternoon we still had no keys and when I asked him if we needed to get a hotel room for another night he assured me that we would have keys that evening. At 4:55 he came to us and told us that there was an issue regarding the fact we have a closed adoption and our subsidy and they needed more information. Now this is information that they DON’T need to know. I had to email our adoption subsidy worker and ask her for a letter explaining that this was none of their business and what adoption subsidy was. I also had to explain to her that without it we wouldn’t have a place to live. Oh and he wanted  Mike to sign an affidavit stating he wouldn’t work for a year. 

Now bear in mind at this point Mike was furious and I was in tears because this guy had been stringing us along for weeks, and we were in a new state with no family and no place to live.
I told him that if it came back to bite me in the butt about me having to tell our adoption worker we were homeless no one in their company was going to be safe from my wrath.

At 8:30am the next morning our worker faxed over the letter explaining everything to him. When I called him at 10 he informed me he had just gotten it, as she had emailed me at the same time she sent the letter I knew that for a lie. I told him he had until noon to have an answer for us. In the meantime I went down and got the room for another night, as I had a feeling he was going to jerk us around so more. At 1 we went back to the apartment to find out what was going on and he informed us that someone at the Colorado Dept of Housing had to approve us. WTF!!! It was at this point Mike completely lost it, and went off on the guy. They went the rounds for more than an hour when Mike finally forced to the guy to make a decision. They guy told us we were denied. At which point I was outside crying on the phone to my sister Kim about everything. Mike then had the boys thank him for making us homeless. He looked at Mike and told him no we had made ourselves homeless because of our adoption. Mike told him to have our deposit ready for pickup by Friday.

In the meantime my girlfriend Janon here in CO and my girlfriend Helen in California had been on the internet and phone all day looking for a place for us to move into. As we were heading back to the hotel (about 20 minutes away) Helen called and told me I needed to call Stephanie at Belle Creek in Henderson. I called her and talked to her, and told her I would call her back after I talked to my husband. We dropped the boys and Finn off at the hotel and went and checked out this apartment she’d found for us.

As soon as we pulled into the community in the middle of nowhere, we knew we’d come home. It would talk all of the money we’d been saving to move in but we felt it was worth it. We told Stephanie our situation and she became determined to help us out. We filled out the paperwork, gave another deposit and she promised to call us the next day with an answer.
That night we all prayed that we could move in. At noon Stephanie hadn’t heard back on our criminal background check (yes this place does a criminal background check on everyone) and she told me to get the hotel for another night and to put all of our stuff in storage. At this point Mike and I had watched our six months of living expenses dwindle to two months because of having to live in a hotel for almost a week. I also called the Bishop of the ward the new apartment was in. He was very sympathetic and had us meet with him that night to discuss everything.

The four of us unloaded our U-Haul into a storage unit in 3 hours as we had to have the truck turned in by a certain time, and we needed to meet with the Bishop. Just as we were finishing up with the truck Stephanie called us to tell us we had gotten the apartment.

When we met with the Bishop, he had the Relief Society President and someone from the Elder’s Quorum with him. They told us they had been brainstorming places for us to move into to get us out the hotel, they’d even gone so far as to contemplate breaking into a member who is out of town for an extended time’s home and having them overnight the keys. They were all relieved when we told we had found a place to live, and helped us out in other ways.

We are now in a beautiful apartment in a community where everyone knows their neighbors, they have community get togethers and the neighbors all hang out on their porches at night and visit. There is grass and trees everywhere.  

We have had to deplete our accounts to get this place, and are now in a fight to get our money back from the other apartment complex, but we are happy. Everyone is slowly recovering from the stress and anxiety of last week and being homeless. The boys are acting normal, I’m no longer crying every time someone looks at me or talks to me, and Mike is no longer angry.

I have a teaching job fair for Spanish teachers only next week and another manuscript due then as well. Both boys are excited about their new school and Mikhail is heading to the temple on Thursday for the first time, and Mike is looking for a job as well. 

Monday, March 12, 2012

And we are moving again

Yes you read that right we are moving again. This time to Colorado. Both Mike and I feel that this will be our last move unless he gets a job offer somewhere else. But Colorado is it for us. Every time we have moved Colorado has been on the short list and the feeling was always not yet. Now it is yes it's time.

I will be able to go back to teaching and am in fact very excited to go back to teaching. Mike is looking for coaching jobs and the boys are excited for a new school and experiences.

Sunday, December 11, 2011

Christmas Picture

My sister Kim took this beautiful picture of us.

Sunday, April 24, 2011

Happy Anniversary

Today is Mike and I's 12th wedding anniversary. It is hard to believe that it has been 12 years. There have been a lot of ups and downs, but it has all been worth while. When I asked him the other day whether he would do it all over again and he said yes. I have to xcsay that I am complete agreement. He is my best friend, and I am his.

We also celebrated the 10th anniversary of our adoption and our sealing to the boys. When we became an eternal family.

Wednesday, March 30, 2011

Our First Broken Bone

Yes you read that right, we have our first broken bone. No id didn't happen on the rugby pitch it happened falling off his bike. Mikhail Casey was coming home from an errand last week and fell off his bike and broke the growth plate in his right thumb. Yes the child that only has one hand has broken that hand. The next several weeks are going to be fun.

Tuesday, March 15, 2011

Wizard of Oz update

They boys will be in the Las Vegas Shakespeare Companies spring production of The Wizard of Oz. They will be munchkins and monkeys.

The dates of the play are:
May 13-15 and 21-22

Thursday, February 24, 2011

The Wizard of Oz

Last month Mat brought home a flyer for a school production of the Wizard of Oz, and as I am sooo not a fan, I conveniently forgot all about it. Then I got a phone call from a friend saying that the Las Vegas Shakespeare Company needed kids to play munchkins. So I called and got the boys an audition.

On Tuesday they went down and sang the song Ireland's Call, which they did acappella, when they were done they were told that they had perfect pitch and harmony. They then auditioned for the mayor of munchikinland.

Today we got the phone call, they got a call back.

One more audition and then we will know.

Saturday, February 5, 2011

Grandpa Snyder

In October we went to Utah to visit my Grandparents, after the recent string of deaths in the family we had a feeling that one of my grandparents was going to pass soon, and that it would be my Grandpa Snyder. It was a great day, he was able to be awake for a couple of hours and during that time he gave Mikhail his steel guitar, saying that he will be able to play that much better than an regular guitar. 

3 weeks later he passed away. When we went to the funeral I wasn't sure how the boys were going to handle it, but once again they surprised me. Mat latched onto my cousin Lizzie that is a couple of years older than them, and Mikhail spent the time either holding my grandma's hand, or looking at all the things that were laid out. When his emotions got to much he went outside and threw snowballs. 

As my grandpa was in the Army during WWII he had a military funeral. When it was time to close the casket after the viewing, the funeral director had Mikhail drape the flag over the casket. As we walked into the chapel for the funeral, he had to hold my grandma's hand, and be her support. He sat beside her and held her hand throughout the entire funeral. 

My siblings, cousins and I were all the pallbearers and had the privilege of carrying his flag draped casket, as we stood beside his casket while Taps was played holding the flag over it, as he is saluted by two soldiers, one of whom is Lacee's husband Luke. 

It was one of those moments that forever changed me and my children. 

Saturday, October 2, 2010

Reflecting

As I have thought about this year and the changes that it has brought our family I can't help but think that the Lord has very much had his hand in everything that has happened.

When we left Albuquerque we knew thought we knew the road that we were on was the one that was going to take us in the direction that we had always wanted to go. I was going to be a teacher and Mike was on his way to getting on as a Marshall. How quickly those plans went up in smoke, leaving us floundering.

One year later and we have found our balance and are heading in the direction that we both feel is the one that we are suppose to be on. No it isn't the road that we thought we were going to be on, but it is one that we are very happy about.

I am not teaching I am the office manager of a seafood distributor and yes my doctor isn't happy about it as I am HIGHLY allergic to seafood. However I am really happy about working there. I love interacting with all the different people that call in.

Mike however has made the biggest change. The man that I nicknamed the anti sport has fallen in love with a sport, that he started out coaching as a parent volunteer. He has taken to coaching so much that he is going back to school and will be getting a degree in Sports Training. He has a goal to get on the national team as a coach and I have a feeling that he will reach that goal.

Overall it has been a year of changes and struggles and though I know that struggling is a part of life I for one will be grateful when this trial and struggle is behind us.