10th

She has been known as MA-Sparkles for years..Her kindergarten teacher gave her that name, and it stuck..
She is also, Anni, On, Anechka, Loo-loo, bunny, and a variety of other silly names I come up with..


Today she is 10. And our day will be all about her..
American girl for lunch, maybe even a movie..

A look back can tell you so much about this soulful child of mine..

Happy 10th Birthday My Love!

Dawn

I am not sure I can even explain how a woman feels when a doctor says the word, "surrogate" to her. Especially when that woman is being dragged out from the most amazing drug induced surgical sleep...Honestly, if I remember one thing most, it would be being hungry. Starving. And even in a drug induced stupor, I remember begging my sister to go downstairs to get me a cheeseburger.  And I remember my mother's bracelets jingling as she stroked my forehead..

My next memory was arriving at my home. A home that was stripped of exactly one half of its contents. One half of the furnishings, one half of the tools and extras, and best, most of the food in the fridge. Yes, my idiot X took the food from our home. The cupboard was bare. At that point the only thing I could think of was how much time I would get in the county lockup if I were to lets say, "accidently" run him over with my car, 3 or 4 times. But thankfully, my sister was there to keep me from driving.

It was the summer and I had weeks to sit in my misery. Weeks to roll around ideas and replace what my idiot had taken. Weeks to surrender to it all. Thankfully, I did surrender to it. I gave it all up. I had fought the good fight. Some might say divorce is losing, but for me, I know I won. Not in the "I took him to the cleaners and got a hefty pay-out" more like, "I got out of that toxic, painful, lopsided, hurtful, relationship relatively unscathed."

In August I had surgery. On the last business day that December I was divorced. January 1st I mailed in my adoption application.   
I can't measure the heartache of divorce simply because the marriage was much more painful.
I never knew that adoption was a real option for me. Soon after the darkest time in my life, I found out that not only was it an option, it was to become the "dawn" that so many cliché's are based on.. It really is true,
"It's always darkest before the dawn.."

Chocolaty Fun

Since we decided to put off Disney World until Christmas, I have planned several little "stay-cation" trips around here. We just got back from Hershey Pennsylvania. And it was Swweeetttt!

I really lucked out in the hotel I chose. It was pretty much across the street from the Park and had a shuttle that took you back and forth all day. And the shuttle took literally 5 minutes to make the trip.
Mom and the girlz and I went to Chocolate World on the day we got to Hershey. It is totally perfect for young kids. There is a cool ride, some interactive activities, and lots of shopping. The best was the 4D movie. Those have become my absolute favorite. When the characters met up with the JollyRancher the whole theater smelled fruity, when the little "no-bots" came along the seats had little rubbery bands that popped out and blew air on your legs, and when the characters were in the chocolate factory the whole place smelled like chocolate. At the end of the movie, there was a celebration and confetti and bubbles flew out. It was truly awesome.  We spent a few hours checking out the activities and had lunch there. We went back to meet my sister at the hotel, and went swimming and visited. Then later we went over to see the Park for our preview night.

























Hershey Park is more "thrill-ride" centered than we are used to. So the cute easy going rides like Small World arent' there. Hershey Park reminds me of an old school amusement park. The cool thing that they do is allow you to go into the park for 3 hours on the night before you plan to come. They call it a preview night.    I was so glad that we did this. It gave us a chance to see a few things and get a feel for the park before hand.

Anni found the one ride that I wish I could still ride. The Swings! I used to ride this ride over and over when I was her age. At my age now, I can barely watch it without feeling sea-sick. She rode this ride about 5 times while we were there. It was awesome!

AugustRose was nervous and backed out of most of the high intensity rides. She chose some of the low key rides on our preview night. My sis and Annie rode a big ole roller coaster and a few other scary rides. I wish more than anything I could ride like I used to, but my tummy won't allow it.

The weather was very gloomy, thank goodness, because we would have been miserable if it would have been hot. We went to the park the next day and slowly worked our
way through most of the 'doable' rides. Midway through the day, we went to the waterpark that is inside the park. It was fun, and we could have actually spent all day there, but we just never felt comfortable leaving all of our belongings on a chair. They had lockers, but we just always had someone hanging out with our stuff so we felt better about it. The girlz did this really cool surfing thing at one point. I just knew August would back out, but because we weren't in the line with her, she couldn't. And I know she was so proud of herself for doing it.

After the water park, we went back to the hotel for a rest. Mom was sort of done and we all wanted to change out of our bathing suites. We got a chance to lay around before we went back to the park. It had been raining a tiny bit, but was overcast all day. Even still, I got sunburned.

We went back and the most amazing thing happened. AUGUST RODE A GIANT ROLLER COASTER! Mom didn't ride it, but I did. So we all had a blast! It was called the Comet. (The video is not us, just a point of reference!) It was amazing. August said afterward, "I feel so alive!"  We were all so excited that she did it!

The evenings are not crowded at all, so we got a chance to play endless games, ride any ride with a short or no wait, and the cool evening weather was lovely. We stayed until almost closing and left with wonderful memories. I highly recommend Hershey for local families. It was a great first "stay-cation" destination!

The GreenGirlz