Charlotte's Garden: 01/01/2006

Drama

Life is full of unnecessary drama, mostly caused by very unhappy people.

Winter break, skating with family and friends...

My neice doesnt get to come around very oftensothe chance to spend an afternoon with her is a dream come true. We went skating this winter break Christmas time when Brittany was in town from Georgia. Mom was there and Johnny and I and the boys and Lizzy and then Steve and his kids and his friend John and his son Mathew (who is also one of the boys friends) along with his neice Scarlett and Hannah (Paul and Joys doughter, Joy was a friend of mine when I was younger and Paul is Johns brother) and then there was Scarletts brother and I can't remember his name...Anyway we all met at the "Skate Station" in Mandarin and we had a really great time. Tons of kids together to play with and have fun out there on the floor. And although Mom and Johnny and Noah wouldn't skate there were always enough people taking a break to keep them occupied!

Trying to get Hunter back on the floor.

Hunter isnt all that much a fan of skating. He prefers to play the video games and on the jungle gym on the side lines. Hes not really that bad at it but seems to lack the enjoyment of it. He did however go around with me for a while, I really enjoyed it, he holds my hand and doesn't even care who might be looking! And trust me at that age it really means alot to me. Hunter has a way getting threw to your heart and making you feel special, he always has. I love you Hunter!

Maddison getting sleepy after hours of non stop action!

I love this picture of Maddi sucking her thumb while she was roller skating, most of the time she was dancing and skating with absolutely NO FEAR, but she was starting to get tired and in the thumb went.I never had any thumb suckers so I think its adorable!

Colson getting Brave!

Colson didnt want muchto do with skating without holding his dads hand but by the end of the afternoon he was coming by to show us how he was skatingon his own!

Mr Personality...

Only Steve. A rare glimps of Steven actually sitting still, he was on that skating floor more than any of the kids

Ty and Brittany starting a race...

Tyler and Brittany had alot of fun racing around. If there ever was born a female Tyler it's Brittany (well technically its a female Steve but still) Brittany goes faster than any of them even though she fell at least 100 times she just sais OWW gets back up and still beats them around again!

When cousins are two of a kind...

Finally I get a picture of Lizzy!

Lizzy with Johnny.....Finally a picture of Lizzy! She never lets me take pictures of her, I had to catch her totally by suprise! This is a picture of her saying HEYYY! (she getsthat not lettingpeople take pictures of her crap form me except she hasno goood reason, she gets more beautiful every day!

Adapting to change must be easier as a plant...

If only I adapted to change as easily as my rose bushes, this is a picture of my Knockout roses. They have had their leaves back for a few over a month now but have recently started to re-bloom. Its amazing to me actually that they have recovered so quickly. I dug them out of the ground from the house next to our nursery on St Augustine rd.(we have several sites now) I lived there for a year or two and although it was not my favorite place on earth, I did like the house and the location of living right next door to work and the kids coming home from school to me right there at work. But the house was extremely old and NOTHING in it didn't need fixed! Just to give you an idea of how much trouble it was, I had sworn off fixing anything else in the house for about 2 months before I moved out. In that time period I had a hole in my boys floor right next to Tylers bed that I covered up with the rug and warned people not to step there, a hole in the floor at the end of Hunters bed that I covered with a cabinet door so snakes and other little critters wouldn't come threw into their room at least, lets see ohh and then there was the limb that fell on the roof right after cleaning the leaves and another limb off the roof one week earlier from a very old and tired tree that was actually quite large, and then there was the immense burst of water threw the ceiling in my room where I had no Idea there was a leak until the crazy storm hit in the middle of the night. Oh did I forget the electric surges that blew my husbands ridiculously huge TV.
You would think that moving away from that would be a joyous occasion, only I moved into a whole new set of problems, although mostly cosmetic, the stress from moving and the overwhelming amount of tasks undone left me, to put it lightly, emotionally disturbed. Lets just say that my hair has fell out twice in my life time and I now have one inch long hairs all throughout my head where it has begun to replace itself! I lost my hair one other time in life and it was a chunk of hair in my hand when I was taking a shower that made me decide that my first marriage truly was killing me! Anyway, even under the best of circumstances I don't take change well. I am not equipped to handle it, I knew my new home was what I needed and nicer than I had ever hoped to live in( both me and my husband work with our hands for crying out loud) I had visions of exactly how it was going to be when I was done with it and I knew it would be perfect in the end. My Dad even agreed to pay half of all of my home repairs for me,even though I have not asked him to do so, he knows it too because he finally decide to hand me a generous sum of money that paid for half of my new flooring costs despite constant attempts to convince myself that it would all be ok, I could not stop the anxiety that was just overtaking me! I ended up having to take two weeks off from work so I could get some things done and not be so stressed. It sounds like not such a big deal really, and I don't think anybody understood the gravity of what was going on inside my head at the time. But I gained all 30 pounds I had lost and kept off for almost a year in 2 months time.And the hair loss on my head was so noticeable that a friend of mine that I hadn't seen in a year was shocked as soon as he laid eyes on me! I couldn't convince him I was not actually going bald but was just under a lot of stress. It was embarrassing really. I couldn't even cook anything without hair in it! In fact my hair falling out from tension actually caused me more anxiety than my house! Granted there were other things making me stressed as well but nothing I am not usually more than able to handle on a regular basis.
Anyway... I cannot explain it but it did my soul good to see my rose bush blooming again. If I could just learn its tricks when somebody uproots me and cuts me down to a quarter of my size! To be pushed to the limit and recover more beautiful than before, life must be easier as a rose.

This red cestrum is a new addition to my Garden. I bought it from a friend of mine that owns a gardencenter near my house. It has recently decided to bloom right in the middle of January! No complaints here!

Coming to life.

Sea and Sky

I have actually been to seen the blue angels when I was a teenager. In fact,I remember actually being at the base and getting to look inside a plane of some sort, but I dont remember being all that impressed. Perhaps it was just a pure lack of interest, or maybe no understanding of what it takes to accomplish those air shows. But I have to say as an adult it is hands down the best thing Jacksonville has to offer. My boys were actually looking up at the sky for hours amazed at the planes. Not just the blue angels but the others as well. Even Noah was captivated and he is only two. And the beach invasion was awsome. Maybe due to the fact that where we were sitting was all of thirty feet away from the hovercraft coming up on the beach.