Dear Daughter...A Guest Post

Today  I have a snapper who has asked me to share this beautifully written piece about stepmothers and their children on her behalf. So we have a guest post! I am a stepmother, so this hits near and dear to my heart. Get your tissues ready, this is both poignant and beautiful. Hope you enjoy! And be sure and comment to encourage this brave lady to start her very own blog, so we can follow her!

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Dear Daughter,

Thank you for making me smile, and for lighting my world with your hugs and kisses and your calls for me when I leave your sight. Thank you for every silly secret, every laugh, and every moment that you have given me that I never thought I would want or need or grow to cherish. Thank you for loving me.

I feel like I know you, but at the same time like you’re a stranger. You’re only three, almost four, although you deny to your bones that you’ll ever be anything but “THREE”. It’s your favorite number. Elsa is your favorite person, kitties are your favorite pets, and Clifford and George are tied for your favorite imaginary animals. Your favorite book is the Man in the Moon, and your favorite food is spaghetti. You also love chicken sandwiches. Your favorite color was pink until last month, then suddenly it was yellow. When I asked you why it changed, your answer broke my heart just a little bit. Because Mommy loves it.

Sometimes you mistakenly call me Mommy, occasionally you call me by my first name, but mostly you call me Stepmommy. I’ve been here since before you could talk. I helped potty train you. I helped teach you your numbers and letters. I’m teaching you to read. I’m teaching you to count. I taught you how to say please, thank you, you’re welcome, and excuse me. I taught you how to climb. I’m teaching you how to walk confidently, to speak your mind, and to respect yourself. But I’m not really Mommy. You’ve informed me of this. I’m “Just Stepmommy.”

I don’t fault you for that. How could I? I know in my heart that there’s no way you’d know the difference if someone hadn’t told you. I’m the one that’s loved your Daddy since you can remember. I’m the one who’s kissed the booboos and sang the lullabies and served the breakfasts lunches and dinners and dispensed the medicine and tucked in the sheets and cleaned up the sick and answered the questions since before you could speak. I’ve been here more than half your life. Why would I be “Just Stepmommy”? Why is there a hierarchy of matriarchy in your young mind? It’s not because you don’t love me. It’s not because you don’t like me. The shine in your eyes and the squeal in your voice when you see me in the mornings or greet me after work belie that theory. Someone told it to you, and that’s not your fault.

But I know you love me. And hopefully, you know I love you. What I see when I look at you is a stranger, but a stranger that I would do anything to protect and to nurture. You are my sunshine and my days are all clouds when you and your brother are not home. But you are both strangers. I hold your hand, and feel beyond fortunate that these little, tiny, perfectly formed fingers nestle so snuggly in my palm. And for a moment, I am happy. And then, I wonder what those little fingers felt like the first day they felt another hand? How fragile you must have been in your first days here on earth! How you must have needed someone to hold you, to feed you, to clothe and bathe and protect you. You still need those things, but from a distance, because I’m teaching you to be your own little woman, to be self-reliant, to be “Strong and Super”, instead of “Cute and Pretty”. (You are cute and pretty. Cuter and prettier than any other little girl I’ve ever laid eyes upon.) And when I watch you while you sleep, so little, but legs and arms so long, you remind me of a foal, I watch as you turn in your sleep, and kick your long little legs just like your Daddy does in his sleep, and I wonder, did you kick before you were born? What would we be if we had ever shared that closeness?

Every time you recount a trip to the doctor, I listen intently, carefully, hanging on each word. And I ask myself, were you really sick, or were you craving attention? If you really were sick, did you ask for me when you felt so bad? Did you even want me? Did you even think of me? Or am I really “Just Stepmommy”? Just a passable stand-in while the real deal enjoys her free nights? But I listen, and I ask the right questions to move the story along. And I congratulate you on your bravery against all the shots and all the doctors in the world.

We talk at night, and you tell me stories about monsters and bears, and how your Daddy will always save you, and I smile, and I contribute, and I listen to every word. You tell me things I don’t understand, and things that sound like what they shouldn’t. I help you with the words you can’t remember, can’t pronounce, and together we tell awesome stories. I read to you, and I speak to you clearly, hoping that every sleepless night I’ve spent at the computer researching speech development and therapy was for something. I make new games each week to practice our letters and our sounds and our words. We’ve made it to two syllables, and some favorite three syllable words are only slightly butchered. Your speech is improved so much in the last year, and I am so very very proud of you. But I wonder, if I had been along for the all along, would you have been so far behind at nearly 3? You’re almost 4 now, and we’ve gone from grunts and points to nonsense stories and only a quarter of the words are made up. I hope I’m doing well. I hope you’re learning and growing. I hope you’ll be smart.

I take you out, to the library, to see my grandmother, we take walks around the neighborhood, and when you speak to strangers, I translate. I rephrase. I correct. I make sure that you heard every word the way it normally sounds so hopefully eventually you pick it up in the ways that my coaching fails you. And I wonder, is there something more I could do?

You go into dazes, you refuse to look me in the eyes, even when you’re telling me a story. All I want in this world at those moments is for you to make eye contact, to stop looking at the floor, to stop looking at the wall, to stop averting your gaze, and for a while I wondered, do you only do it to me? But I’ve watched. It’s always. And then I wonder, if I had the right to take you to a doctor, would they confirm my worst nightmares? But I remember, I do not have that right. All I can do is hope and coach and try to teach and all I can do is expose you to the elements and hope you come away from it with something meaningful. Those are my only rights because I am “Just Stepmommy.”

You tell me that you love your Mommy, that you miss her, that you’re waiting for her to come home. And every week, when she fails to do that for long enough for you to forget, you cry when she takes you away from us. Away from me. I don’t tell you this, but I cry, too. When you and your brother are gone with your Real Mommies, I lie in my bed and I cry for you. Because I miss you. I’m in love with you little monsters, you little animals, you little angels. I love you so much that my heart breaks for you every week when you are, figuratively, ripped away from my side. I’ve grown so attached to you two in the last year, that sometimes I wonder if it’s not superficial. If it’s not too early to acknowledge it. But you two are a part of me that burns with excitement and pride when I watch you be yourselves, and burns with searing pain when I realize that there is no little girl or boy to share my meals, or prattle on about something I do not understand.

Sometimes I think about having my own children, I fantasize about sleepless nights that are all my own, that I don’t share with someone else. I dream about the logistics of daily care and the burden of diapers and feeding and carrying and teaching. I long for the opportunity to satiate that desire to be someone’s one and only. And I hate myself for wanting it. And sometimes, in the deepest darkest most guilty parts of my heart, I resent you for that. Your love put that desire in me where it never was before. Your smile drew me into a form of love that I never knew. Your absence showed me the hole that never was supposed to be uncovered in my heart. And your youth and need and chokehold on your father’s heart prevents me from having any real hope that I will ever be whole. You break me, and every week, as soon as I learn to love my lot in life, as soon as I accept that I am and always will be “Just Stepmommy”, you’re taken away from me again, and then I’m just nothing. Just alone in a house that needs cleaned again with no little monsters to mess it up for days. Alone in a home with quiet walls and doors and empty rooms. Alone in a place littered with toys and no one to play with them.

And then I wonder, how much must your Real Mommy hurt when you’re with me? This woman who stepped into your life with no explanation, no excuse, and, almost instantly, won your adoration and affection, your smiles and your kisses, your giggles and your shrieks, your accidental “Mommy” words? How could she ever forgive me for filling a role she was supposed to be the only one to fill? If I were in her shoes, I would hate the Stepmommy for that. And I would try to be nice, and I would try to listen to the stories, and I would try to accept the fact that, through nobody’s fault, things are just how they are. But I can understand why maybe, just this once, she slipped up and said to her little princess with a mind like a sponge, who is learning to speak and address people and understand the complex world and relationships around her, that I am “Just Stepmommy”. And, while it breaks my heart, I can understand it.

My dearest, darling daughter, I hope you never have to read this letter, I hope that everything is always as good as it is now or better. But if you do, what I want you to know is this: To you, I may be “Just Stepmommy”, but to me, you are not “Just my Stepdaughter”, you are my Daughter yesterday, today, tomorrow, and forever after that.

Love, Stepmommy

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An anonymous post written by a beautiful lady.  Thank you for selecting me to share it with the world!

 

L is for Love

Today is Day 7 of my guest blogger series! As we wrap up a week filled with phenomenal bloggers and posts, I have saved my good friend for last.  Miss Cristyl from CHill Thoughts We have known each other since we were 12!  We grew up together, shared some of the same friends, went to school together for years, and even had the bad 1980's hair pic of us, and three of our friends, where we had one hand on our hips, toes pointed, and all of our other hands in the air, in some weird, pseudo-ballet pose! Bahahaha! I will spare you all the visual!(Think very late 80's clothes...acid washed jeans, sweaters, tshirts, jean mini skirts,and BIG hair! I think we all had big bangs! We are talking at least 3 inches of bangs going on!..okay okay I will stop now!)
  So we lost touch along the way, as friends often do, and we reconnected over FB.  Imagine that! Then one day there was a comment on my blog post of the day, so I clicked on the profile to investigate, and lo and behold, it was Miss Cristyl!  She had a blog, but no posts! So I wrote her an email asking why not? And the rest as they say is history, reconnected-check, rekindled friendship-check, CHill Thoughts posts-check, and her blog is fantabulous! She is an awesome blogger, well written, and an IT guru(so jealous!) She also just started a blog hop two weeks ago, which she graciously let me co-host! She was my first ever guest blogger, and now, she has agreed to do it again! She is crafty, witty, hilarious, makes baby food, has 3 kids, cloth diapers, has chickens and a rooster named Quasimoto! So of course I love her to death, and you will too! Happy Reading!

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My name is Cristyl and I write over at Chill Thoughts.  I write about my life and pretty much anything that comes to mind; I’m currently participating in the Blogging from A to Z Challenge so each day in April, excluding Sundays, are dedicated to a specific letter of the alphabet! I’m excited to be chosen as a guest blogger to celebrate W3G’s 5,000^th page view! I’ve known Ginger since we were just wee 12-year-olds; I enjoy reading about her adult life, her family, their adventures and I thoroughly appreciate her sense of humor!  W3G is one of my favorite blogs and I regularly lament that I am halfway across the country from Ginger.  I’ll surely make it back to West-by-God-Virginia some day soon and I’ll be treating Miss Ginger to a margarita for sure!  Until then, we meet up on the interwebs…

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is for Love!

I spend a lot of time talking about my take on things, Little Man, my critters and myself; but I rarely talk about DH – today that changes!  DH (aka my Dear, Darling Hubby) has stood by my side for longer than nearly anyone I know.  He’s been my main squeeze for 14 1/2 years!  His ability to not only tolerate me, but help me find myself and encourage me to chase my dreams is unsurpassed!  This is our (somewhat abbreviated) story…

During the summer of 1998 I lived in Columbia, South Carolina and was a single mom to Baby Girl and Monkey Man working as a waitress at a local bar during the evening/night and staying home with my kids during the day.  It wasn’t easy, but it was certainly easier than being in the marriage that I had left a year and a half earlier.  I had moved to South Carolina the previous summer and my parents missed the kids during the school year, so the kids went to visit my parents for a few weeks.

I was young and free for a one of the few times in my life.  I worked in a bar and most of my friends either worked there or frequented the bar.  On one of my nights off I visited another local bar and chatted with the bartender, a friend of a friend, and DH (who I didn’t know until then).  The conversation was one where I was declaring that I was mighty and strong and “I want the fairytale.”  I convincingly pretended that I had my act together.  That night I was strong and going to conquer the world!  DH fell for it…

The funny thing is, I still didn’t really know who DH was!  One night he came into the bar while I was working and he was really friendly…I was a b**ch and made it clear that his cute flirty-friendliness could just move on down the road.  I was such a fool!

A few months later I was attending a party with all my bar co-workers and friends and one of my friends suggested I sit with their roommate and share a meal because he and I were both thin and didn’t eat much! Ha ha ha!  We sat together, we talked, we drank, we talked more…and by the end of the night we were making out in front of friends!  (And I don’t do PDA!)  I gave him a ride home and my phone number and was certain he’d never call again.

He called!  We talked more.  And talked, and talked, and talked…over the next few weeks DH and I spent tons of time talking on the telephone and getting to know each other.  We talked about anything and everything, it seemed.  He invited me for a dinner date and I joked that I didn’t know if I could eat a meal that didn’t come with a toy at the end.  He took me out to dinner and just as the server was taking away our dishes, he pulled a Pez dispenser out of his pocket – my “toy” at the end of the meal!

    

After that we were nearly inseparable.  In 2000 we bought a house in Florida and moved away from everyone and everything we knew!  We were happy together.  I think we were both certain that this was for keeps, but we didn’t marry because we’d both had horrible first marriages.  He did propose eventually and I accepted, though I’m not sure if we ever actually thought we would really get married.

    

In 2007, we decided it was time to make it official and marry.  We tied the knot on April 28, 2007!  In 2008 we purchased our house in Colorado and though it took several months to tie up all the loose ends in Florida, by the end of 2009 we were both living in Colorado full time.  In 2011 we became parents together when Little Man was born.

    

Over the years we did everything together:  raised kids, got pets, lost pets, bought homes, sold our home, travelled together, watched children grow and graduate from school, watched Baby Girl join the Marines and leave, watched Baby Girl marry, watched the kids go to college, laughed, cried, lived and loved.

    

And here we are, nearly 15 years later.  DH may be the only person on the face of the earth with enough patience to tolerate me and my mood swings.  He’s seen me at my worst and not only did he still love me, he carried me through it.  He supports me like no one in my life ever has.  He laughs with me and at me.  He sees my potential and points it out to me.  I’m sure he sees my weaknesses, but he overlooks them and keeps on loving me.

And that’s truly what love is about.  Being together through it all:  good, bad, ugly, and everything in between.  Growing old together.  And I plan to point my rocking chair toward the west and be grateful everyday that DH is the one rockin’ beside me!

Hope you enjoyed Miss Cristyl! She had me in tears!

 

Man Habits I Live With

1. Leaving the toilet seat up
2. Peeing on the seat
3. Not replacing the TP when using the last of the roll
4. Leaving dishes at the table
5. Leaving your socks in the living room floor every night
6. Leaving your clothes where they drop
7. Hanging suits on chair in kitchen, chair in bedroom, Why not in closet?
8. Not cleaning out the pockets of pants
9. Refusing to use Q-Tips, but scratching your ear with anything that will fit in your ear(pens, keys, etc), and not cleaning off the earwax
10. When I service you, and I can't even get a back rub
11. The crazy eyebrows that grow to ridiculous lengths, that make you look like Mark Twain, or Albert Einstein(and the 2 nose hairs that put me in trimming  mode)
12. Taking out your stressed out work attitude on me and the three year old, instead of leaving it at work
13. When they are in a bad mood and pick a fight
14. Eating spicy food, when they know it will upset their bellies, thus ruling out mommy-daddy time later
15. Double Standards ( ie. work calls..I was expected to pick up immediately in front of a group of twenty trainees I was teaching, but he always says,"I have work to do, somebody has to, I can't talk on the phone all day!")
16. Asking what's wrong, and keeping at it until you aggravate the crap out of me
17. Leaving breakable glasses in the floor every night
18. Insisting since you have to work tomorrow and don't get to take naps, that your sleep is more important
19. When trying to talk about my SAHM frustrations, throwing in my face going back to work if I'm unhappy
20. When I ask for something on the grocery list that you do not approve of, not getting it(big grrr)
21. Saying I should have more girls days out, but when I plan one and tell you in advance, you complain about it, and then planning a cookout on the same day I am having my Girls day, which prompts multiple texts and calls from you..."the baby's awake..." what seriously? Can you not handle the three year old for three hours?
22. Thinking that I can wear and walk in cute high heels knowing for 13 years now that I have messed up hobbit feet that are not conducive to walking in high heels for more than 100 yards
23. Telling your mom our business before you tell me
24. Leaving all of our Tupperware at work
25. When you are sick, the world is ending, nobody in the history of the world was ever sicker than you are right now, big baby...but when momma is sicky or hurty, oh well, life goes on
26. Back rubs are not reciprocal 
27. Leaves mowing grass shoes and associated grass clumps in and all over the house, after I have just swept 
28. When I cook, I get to cook and clean up the dishes, but when he cooks, he leaves the dishes for me, and grease and food all over the stove, part of my SAHM duties I guess...turn about is not fair play in the kitchen(he does do the majority of the cooking, since I cannot peel an apple without losing skin!)
29. Telling me you want me to be like I was when i was younger, ready to hop in the sack at anytime, wearing you out...well bucko, I am older, I am chasing around, entertaining, and teaching your child night and day, keeping your house clean, laundry done, dishes washed, and was on medication that reduces libido.  I also had un-plannable crap that free flowed outta my hoo hoo whenever it felt like it, since I had major female surgery in January, after almost dying in December.  Not to mention my mother died at Thanksgiving last year, and then five months later you moved me to Kentucky! Why wouldn't I want to jump your bones every second of the day? See above 28 other reasons...

   Now let it be stated, I am married to the most wonderful, giving, caring, loving husband in the whole wide world.  I know I have habits that he too, finds aggravating.  Neither of us are perfect, but we are dedicated to making it work.  Laughing together is the best medicine. I am glad that he puts up with me, because I get bitchy and grumpy too.  My Nana once told me, you don't want to find somebody you cannot live without, but someone you can live with.  So I have made peace with these man habits of my beloved.  I can live with them and him.

*NOTE: This was written in March, and has just been given the husband seal of approval!

Lucky Birthday Girl

My last post was about the dreading of my birthday, because it was my first birthday without my mother.  I am happy to report that there were minimal tears, and I had a wonderful day filled with those that love me.  I did have a tear filled cry when I spoke with my Nana, my mother's mother, because she truly understands the loss of my mother like no one else can.  She, my mother, and I used to be a threesome.  We were all best friends.  We did everything together.

   My mother in law (MeeMee)knows what I have been through, better than anyone aside from my father, and my husband.  She has been there for me since the day my mom died.  She has been there for me and with me on almost every monthly anniversary of my mom's passing.  Yesterday was no different.  She made plans to come down to Kentucky(from where she lives in W.Va.)and take me shopping, because that is what my mom would have done.  She enlisted help and the best babysitter in the world, her mother, my daughter's great grandmother.  She is crazy about Hayden, my almost four year old.  So they came down yesterday, bearing a cake, candles, cards, and deviled eggs.  Mamaw's specialty!  So off we went to go shopping.  I found a beautiful quilted wall hanging, with our wedding scripture beautifully done in embroidery. My mother in law bought it for me along with the matching wall hanger. We had a great time, and my husband met us for lunch.  My daughter ended up with birthday presents too! Her birthday is exactly a week after mine. We agreed that it was much funner to shop for little ones!                                                                                   

 

    When we returned, My daughter had made a birthday card for me and also had a balloon for me.  She wanted to put candles in the cake and help me blow them out. I then received a rousing three year old rendition of Happy Birthday(for the third time), accompanied by my MIL and GMIL.  Mamaw(GMIL) had done the dishes, which was not necessary!  Mamaw then gave me a card and wham money from she and her husband. Then they left to go back to W.Va., to avoid evening traffic! Then I called my Nana to chat and have a little cry.
   The three year old and I had just laid down for a much needed nap, when a strange number rang my cell phone.  I answered it, and it was the local florist asking directions to our house.  So the three year old and I trotted to the door, because the deliveryman was in the neighborhood.  I received the most beautiful

red roses from my father.  Hayden, my three year old, who will have her birthday party on Saturday(three days after my birthday), also received flowers.  She received four perfect red roses from my dad, her Grandpa.  When she held the vase, she said,"oh wow...I never got flowers before!"  So sweet of my daddy!  So then I told her the story.  The story of how when I was four and my mother got flowers from my father for Valentine's Day, I said," How come I didn't get any flowers?"  Well mom and I were his special girls, so starting that year, when I was four, my daddy sent me flowers on my birthday.  He has sent me flowers each year on my birthday ever since.  So I told my daughter how very special she was to be getting from flowers from Grandpa for her birthday!  A beloved tradition for a new generation. It was so very special  that my daddy remembered and sent her roses for her fourth birthday.  Just like me when I was turning four!  It meant so much to me!  She is too young to understand the significance now, but I will tell her when she is older. Mom was smiling down on him and us from heaven. Mom and I were always my Daddy's girls. Now that my mother is no longer with us, Hayden and I are his special girls.  So my mother too, had a part in my birthday. 

  My husband took me out to dinner the night before my birthday, and he and my daughter had gotten me flowers in our wedding colors, red, orange, and yellow, earlier in the week.  He also took us out to dinner on my birthday, and bought me a new bottle of  yummy smelling perfume.  He also took me to my twenty year class reunion a week and a half before my birthday, where we spent way to much money! I must say I am definitely blessed in the man department! I have a super sweet, thoughtful , loving, husband who always puts me first, and spoils me rotten!  I also have a super sweet, thoughtful, loving daddy, who likes to spoil me too! I am also blessed to have such a sweet, caring, thoughtful mother in law, who puts everyone before herself, and takes care of us all.  It was awesome of her to plan something for my birthday in advance, without my little one, out of the house, with family who understood, who I could cry with if I needed to.  And she wanted me to have a special present that meant something to me! Thank God for her and her efforts to make sure I had a super awesome day!  It meant more than she will ever know! I would like to also mention what a sweet, caring, thoughtful grandmother in law I have.  She also, like her daughter, wanted to make sure I had an awesome day on my birthday!
  So there are a few other late night unmentionable presents that I received from dear old hubbie, that I will not mention in this blog, but they were much appreciated!  I would like to thank everyone who took part big or small, in making sure I had a wonderful birthday, this first year without my mother.  I love each and every one of you more than words can express with a simple 'thank you'.  I am blessed to have so many people who care so much about me in my life.  I am very thankful!  I am a lucky girl!
  

Freaking Fabulous

Today I am going to write about love.  Unconditional love.  My oldest daughter, who is 20, in the last two weeks has had her car broken into, and her purse stolen.  The culprits got her license, registration, social security card, debit card, and all the cash and gift cards that she had just received for her birthday, out of her purse.  Needless to say, she is having a crappy adulthood so far.  The oldest daughter had promised the youngest daughter, who is almost 4, to take her to see a movie.  Big Sissy had to cancel her little sissy date because of the theft, and how her days off happened to fall that particular week.  She had to go to the DMV twice, to get all of her document and ID's reissued, because without ID, it is like an act of congress to get anything that has been stolen, reissued at the DMV.

     She, exactly one week later, just picked up her little sister for their date.  The little sister was so excited!  She was excited that her big sister thought she was special enough, to drive to Kentucky from West Virginia, just to take her on their "sissy date."  This is a shining example of having family at the top of your priority list.  I am so proud of my oldest daughter.  Proud that the thefts did not knock her down, that she kept her chin up and kept on going.  Proud that she is such a loving, caring human being.  She is not my biological daughter, but she is mine.   She is a daughter of my heart.  She was the first one I got the privilege of practicing parenting skills on, she was the trial and error child(just ask her about the birds and the bees conversation), and she and I have had our ups and downs like any parent and child.  I feel like I had some small part in the beautiful woman she is becoming.  She has always had the biggest heart in the world.  She used to say when she was 10 or 11, that she and her cousin were going to adopt all of the starving kids in the world.  She has a heart big enough to do just that, when she gets a little older.  My heart bursts with pride and joy that she is such a loving young lady, because she has seen more than her share of adversity and heartbreak in her young life.  I am so very proud of her I could just burst!
     I just want her to know how very much I love her, and how very proud of her I am.  I am so very proud of her for making her little sister and our family a priority.  When most kids her age are in college, partying, etc., she is a full time manager of a local retail store, makes her family a priority, and still has time for the other people and passions in her life.  She makes time to drive an hour and a half to take her baby sister to a movie and lunch, what 20 year old does that? Seriously? She is a published writer, and an excellent artist.  She is witty, kind, loving, sweet, compassionate, dedicated, devoted to those she loves, intelligent, and hilarious.  She makes me the proudest "Ginger" ever. (She has always called me by my name, because when she was small, 'mom' had a bad connotation associated with it.)  I cannot express all of my love for this wonderful child on paper.  She always remembers birthdays, mother's day, writes me very eloquent letters expressing her love and gratitude for me, even from a young age, I mean come on, what mother wouldn't die for those?  They are some of my most cherished possessions!  I love her so very much!

     I am so very blessed to have this child in my life.  The picture above is when she was 11. The second one is an example of the unconditional love she has for her little sister. Taking the time to explain something to her. She will always be my beautiful little girl, not the grown up others see.  My partner in crime tickling her daddy, putting sticky creepy crawly things above the bed with her brother, to scare her father and I in the middle of the night, trying on her first formal dress, her first marching band performance and every one thereafter, her church plays, her school plays, trick or treating when she was a teenager, her first love and heartbreak, her first slumber party on the boat, and so many other cherished memories!  I am so glad that she loves her little sister so very much!  My littlest one is lucky to have such an awesome big sister!  I just wanted to share with you, and her, how very special she is to me, her father, her baby sister, and all those who know and love her!  It is always nice to hear how awesome someone thinks you are, especially when your hit with so much unpleasantness all at once.  So, I am taking this opportunity to tell the world how freaking fabulous my 20 year old is, and how grateful I am that she is mine!  I love you to pieces Alexandra Kyle Harris! And if you feel like a little zombie reading, here is the link to her current blog...The Undead Journals.