I'm Good Enough... I'm Smart Enough...

...and DOGGONE IT!  People LIKE me!!! 

At least, that's how I felt after I arrived home from work yesterday to discover that I had won a free month of rent!!! 

I suppose in order to fully comprehend the magnitude of the situation, you must first understand that I never win anything.  Like ever.  Until last year, the only thing I had ever won was a moldy fruit basket.  And believe you me, I was thrilled silly about that moldy fruit basket!  The basket itself (minus the moldy fruit) has been proudly displayed on top of my kitchen cabinets for the past seven years.

I think my luck started to change last year.  I won a prize or two playing games at baby showers and home sales shows.  Then the Christmas party at my foster care agency came around, and they started announcing the winners of the door prizes.  I was totally not paying attention.  "Why should I," I thought.  "I never win anything anyway."  So imagine my surprise when I looked up to see what felt like 1,000 pairs of eyes staring at me and the Director of the agency saying, "Tammy?  That's your name, Tammy."  :-)

That's when I did the whole jumping up out of my seat, clapping for myself, alternately giggling and crying, Miss America, waving my hand in front of my face so I didn't pass out, loudly exclaiming, "OMG!  I can't believe it!  I never win anything!" thing.  I had to restrain myself from doing the Miss America wave ("elbow, elbow... wrist, wrist, wrist...  fingers, fingers...  kiss, kiss, kiss") as I received my prize and headed back to my seat.

"What on earth did you win that had you so excited," you might ask?  A $20 gift card to Walmart...  I can only imagine what my reaction would have been had I won a high-dollar prize!  As it is, I have a feeling no one at that party is going to forget me anytime soon.  =)

Fast forward to yesterday afternoon...  I'd had a long day at work, and I was soooo looking forward to kicking off my shoes, stripping off my bra, throwing on some pj's, and lounging around the house for a few hours.  I got out of the car and rounded the corner of my building only to be greeted with a bright red, folded piece of paper with my apartment number on it on the little memo clip by the front door.  "Oh, crap.  What did I do now?"  I mentally played back the past few weeks in my head...  Had I paid the water bill?  Did I short pay rent?  Was the cat being too loud when he tears around the house after going to the bathroom?  All I could think was that red was not a good color when it comes to announcements. 

I pulled the paper off of the door and stepped inside.  I braved up and went to read it, only to discover that it was STAPLED too!  "Oh, sweet crap!!!  Am I being evicted or something?!?"  I, ever so slowly, unfolded the note and was greeted with...

Congratulations, Tamara S...!

You are the WINNER

of one FREE MONTH OF RENT!!!

I squealed and jumped around like a little girl, which in turn terrified the cat, whose hair stood up on his back as he jumped about five feet straight up from the floor.  I half expected to see him clinging from the ceiling in a desperate attempt to escape me in all of my hyperventilating glory.  Instead, he just ran and hid under the computer desk and eyed me warily until I calmed down and composed myself.

You have no idea how excited I am.  This ends up being about $900 going straight into my "Buying a Baby Fund" (as my newphew calls it)!  With this and what I already have in there from the past few weeks, I should have enough for my homestudy after my next paycheck!  I'm going to wait a little while before I do the homestudy though because it's only good for 6 months, and I'd just have to come up with another $500 to update it.  I am so happy that things are starting to pick up in the adoption fundraising area though.  This was a great little boost!  I'm still doing a mental happy dance!  =)

So go ahead and feel free to bask in the warmth of my radiant glow!  Maybe my newfound good fortune will rub off and everyone will be blessed with the "lucky bug."  We can dream anyway...  :-)

That is SO Wrong!!!

And the winner of this week's "That is SO Wrong" award is...

VELVET Bermuda Shorts!!!

I can honestly say that I have never seen anything quite like them...
and I'm fairly certain I know why...

That is SO Wrong!

Way to go, Chadwick's, for your oh-so-fashion-forward take on the short of the Bermudan...


What do you think of this $7.99 Clearance item???
(marked down from $34.99.  What a steal!!!)

Gimp Girl on the Mend

I've been fracture boot-free for the past three months, and I'm STILL having problems with this stinking leg!  I ended up going back to the broken leg doc this morning.  He took more x-rays, and came up with the following brilliant analysis:

The doc thinks the reason I’m still having problems with my leg is that there’s a nerve that runs right along the break site.  My leg is healing, but there’s kind of a “hook” where the bone is calcifying.  He thinks when I move in certain ways, that pointy “hook” interferes with the nerve, causing the stabbing sensation that pretty much brings me to my knees. He wants me to give it ANOTHER six months before we talk about doing surgery though because he said that it is healing, just slowly.  He’s hopeful that as it heals more, it will start feeling better.  (You're hopeful, Doc?!?  What about me?!?  I'm the hopeful one!!!)  If not, he would “just” remove that section of bone where the break is. He said that the fibula is the bone that they take away from to do bone grafts because it’s non-weight bearing so by taking away the jagged portion where the break is, it would just be like I’d had bone removed for a bone graft.

His words of wisdom… “The bone and ankle are stable, so you can try to do whatever you want, but if it hurts, don’t do it.”  Thanks, Doc! You’re so smart!  I was like, "Wow, Dr. P.! Your wisdom is astonishing! That $300,000 paid for med school was well spent!"

So I guess this means that my leg is healing, just very, very slowly...  He said it was a bad break, and that it could take up to a year for it to heal completely.  (What happened to the fracture being "inconsequential" like you had initially said, huh?)  I wish I had been able to get copies of today's x-rays though.  You can definitely see why I'm having some trouble.  At least he reassured me that I didn't re-injure it when I was playing with the kids in the pool a couple of weeks ago.  I moved in a way that nearly brought me to my knees it hurt so bad.  Turns out it was most likely just my "hook" and nerve.

"Buying" a Baby

It's amazing what kids overhear when you think they're not listening.  It's also interesting how they interpret what they hear.

My sister told me on Saturday that my 5-year-old nephew came to her the other day and told her that he wanted to save all of his money for Aunt Tammy.  When she asked him why, Buddy said, "So Aunt Tammy can buy a baby and she can be happy."  She said that he keeps putting his change in envelopes and writing my name on it, and that they have a basket full of envelopes for me.  It was the sweetest thing I've ever heard, and I almost cried when she told me!

(For the record, I have absolutely no intention of purchasing an infant!  He had to have overheard someone talking about how I'm trying to save money for the adoption.  At 5 years old, you use money to "buy" things.  Hence, "Aunt Tammy is buying a baby."  I'm going to legally adopt.  Nothing questionable here.  I promise!)

I'm still busy looking into adoption agencies.  So far I've found one or two that seem promising as far as working with singles.  I still have a lot of researching to do though.  I didn't get to work on it much this weekend.  I had a good weekend though... Christy, my brother-in-law, and the twins came over on Saturday so the twins could practice in the pool for their swimming lessons.  Christy came back that night for Craft Night and we got a bunch of stuff done.  Father's Day was a busy day too.  I actually went and watched golf on TV with my parents.  Golf is so not my cup of tea, but it was fun hanging out with them.  :-)

Today, it's back to the hunt!  Hope you all have a great week!

"Loving One of These"

Though she longed for her own children,
God supplied a steady flow;
And her life was filled with youngsters,
As the years would come and go.

Gently taught she of the Savior,
Little hearts received with joy!
Steadily, she wisely counseled
With a young and wayward boy.

Little ones, with no attention,
Fell into the lady’s plans
And she loved and guided gently,
Trusting God would understand.

Children need a loving Mother
Who has time to listen well;
Who can watch their face intently,
As their stories they do tell.

Though her loving arms were holding
Children other than her own,
Still, the mother love was given;
Still, the seeds of love were sown.

Not to one was she blood mother;
But I wonder how God sees.
Does birthing make a mother,
Or is it loving one of these?

© 1980 Joan Clifton Costner


Thank you for sharing this, Tasha!