Only the beginning...

Well i suppose it's finally time to make one of these things.. just about everyone i know has one so hooray conformity! Like most of you i wonder if people are even going to read this and i just hope i am interesting enough to keep you reading.

So lets see... lets start by introducing the family... as most of you know in September 2003 i married Brian Libby and shortly after we had our son Brian aka Jujubee i would say technically he was our first son but we do have another son that was adopted before we got married... I'll get to him a bit later. OK, so we have Juju and then about 16 months later i had Michael. For a while i was making sure not to have more kids because i needed a break physically and now Mikey is 3 and we can't get pregnant... i hope i can get a girl before i am 40 LOL.

Brian and i have been steadily improving our lives as time passes... we started at the absolute bottom living with other people or in our car or in a trailer with single guys who liked to let potatoes grow in the walls... (yuck indeed) and now we are living in Jacksonville, NC. We are currently on base housing. Brian joined the marines in 2005 and this is where we were stationed. At first it wasn't so bad... we were finally in a place of our own on our own .. if that makes sense... well about 4 months after we got here, about July '06, Brian deployed to Iraq for the first time... that first deployment was really really hard..... it was very dangerous for the guys and we would go at least a month with no word from Brian. Losing him was very real and i thought about it way too much. I stayed here with the boys and we got to go home for Christmas that year. I don't think it helped very much though... i spent most of the visit crying because i missed him. He came home in February of '07 and was gone again in October '07. It may seem like he was home for a while but he was gone off and on a lot for training so I would say about 3 months he was home. This year he came home on his birthday, no joke on his birthday at like midnight. It may seem like there is a big gap i skipped but to be honest while he was deployed it was hard to do anything great.. the boys and i spent most of the time missing daddy.
The boys definately have grown up though. Juju is now 4 and he is starting preschool on Thursday. I finally got him potty trained and he has no accidents during the day and only at night when he is in my bed >< ya thanks for that Juju.. He is going to special therapy at school for speech and social stuff... he has a little lisp which makes him hard understand. One of the ladies doing his testing said he knows a lot of words, probably more than other kids his age he is just saying them funny. He learned to say his last name but he says Wibby instead of Libby, its really cute lol. The therapists also think he has some social skills that need work which i agree.. he is used to being the big brother and saying hey i want that toy and Mikey gives it to him. He also might have ADD i think he has a hard time sitting still but i am hoping that going to school and having that structure helps.
Michael on the other hand is doing well. granted he is not being tested for school yet lol but for one he speaks very clearly and he listens better. He is just really big. He is only 3 and he is wearing size 4 clothes .. the same as Juju... and actually he is in need of bigger clothes lol. He is a freaking giant. He likes being with mommy and just crowds the crap outta me lol. Did you know that becoming a mother means you are now a jungle gym? Hooray! Any who.. they are good boys and we are proud of them.
I have been struggling in NC. At first It was so nice to be on our own but lately i have been so overwhelmed that i cant get back to being me. I have gained a lot of weight here and with Brian's schedule the way it is i just don't have time to work out... not that i like to anyways lol. I just haven't had a job in almost 4 years... ok well i watch a friends little boy and have for um a year or so and i did clean houses out on Topsail beach last summer but i mean a real job you know? There isn't much i can do during the day with all the kids here the only thing in walking distance is little playgrounds and when we have heat advisories i can't take them out anyways. Ya in case you didn't know it gets really hot here. I know that these are all excuses but remember i had to be mom and dad for the last 3 years and even now that Brian is home i still can;t get relief. His battalion works him to death. So basically i am worn out and i don't eat regularly so i got fat since my body thinks it is starving to death and i am depressed to boot. Brian and i went to a counselor and were thinking we needed family counseling which turned out to be Shara needs tons of therapy so now i have 26 years of baggage to unload. Hopefully this all helps me get better though. I sure don't want to be angry the rest of my life.
Its not all as bad as i feel it is i am just overwhelmed and its hard to be happy lol i can't even manage to get myself to church and do my callings right now... Satan is kicking my butt. Brian thinks that things will all be better when we get back home which thankfully is soon. He gets out in May '09 so we are making preparations for the future. now that we finally are in a position to make big choices we are not sure which to make. We gotta figure out what to do about school and work and stuff... sometimes i feel like being an grown up is overrated lol. Ok well that's all for now i am gonna add some pics that you may have seen before but that's ok. Thank you for reading my rant =). Love you all.