A History Lesson...

It's raining. No! That's a good thing!! Here in Maine, to get RAIN in February instead of snow is amazing! And this is the time of year that warmer temps than 20 degrees are WELCOME, whether accompanied by rain or not! Just curious, anybody been to Maine? I've lived here all my life, except from 1990 - 1994....we lived in MA. Want a little history? Amazing how one topic can lead to another! Anyway....I went away to boarding school for my senior year of highschool, in 1988. It was in upstate NY, Union Springs Academy. Great school. The reason for going was because the small Seventh-day Adventist school I went to from first grade to 10th grade did not offer 11th and 12th grade. I did homeschool my junior year. I wanted to experience a real high school graduation, and after looking at a few different boarding academies, my parents and I chose USA. I did not want to go to public school....had never been, and at 17, didn't feel confident enough to go to the local BIG school for my last year of HS! So off to NY I went. Wow....great experiences!! I met the DiSH there. :) He chased me, even though he won't admit it! One day before my 18th birthday (march 20) we started dating. I fell hard, man o man. The summer of 1989, after graduation, he and I both worked at a summer camp here in ME. THAT was a great summer!! In the fall, we both went to Atlantic Union College in S. Lancaster, MA. It is an SDA college. We both went for one year, and then, while he lived with his brother and I lived with some friends, we stayed there in MA. One very starry night, while we were star-gazing, talking about our senior class trip one year ago to the Dominican Republic and how we had never seen a star-filled sky like we did when there (lack of light polution), he popped the question. :) He gave me a beautiful locket. You know I said yes!! This was September 15, 1990. On April 21, 1991, we were married here in Maine. For three more years, we lived in MA, but with attempts by my new husband, trying to get a job in Maine. We got pregnant on our honeymoon. :) But, sadly, we lost our first baby at 24 weeks gestation, an unexplained miscarriage/stillbirth. I slash that because after 20 weeks, losing a baby is really not considered a miscarriage, and I also went through the whole labor/delivery process. My original due date was February 9, 1992. 17th anniversary of that was just this past Monday. Still hurts my heart.......I know that God works in amazing ways though, because looking back, I know that he used the loss of that baby to actually pull my husband and I closer together. I was quite a mama's girl back then! Once, our electricity was shut off, because I had been so sick in that pregnancy, that I had to quit my job, so funds were verrrry slim. Who did I call first? My mom! Not my hubby, at work! That was a trend of mine, and it really got in the way of so much, in our first year of marriage. When we lost Tyler (our first baby), no one could relate to us, we only had each other. Don't get me wrong, family and friends were great, at the hospital with us, taking care of us at home. But in the middle of the night, it was my DiSH that was there, to hold me and cry with me. It strengthened us so much. I cling to God's promise that when He returns, my dear sweet little baby boy will be placed in my arms for the first time, and we will raise him in the best place possible, Heaven! He sleeps in Jesus now, suffers no more. A few years later, December of 1993, I got pregnant again. This is when my hubby really jumped into action, trying to find a job in Maine. On July 15, 1994, he got a phone call.....YES!! A job in Maine! But.....I was due with our baby on August 12!! Oh no! Thankfully, the company was willing to wait one more month. So then, 8 months pregnant, I started packing. Joseph Tyler (after our first baby) was born on August 1, 1994, 12 days early. When he was 13 days old, we moved to Maine. I have never looked back! We lived with my parents for a while, house-sat for a winter in my grandparent's house while they went to Florida, and then in October of 1995, we bought the house I sit in now, writing this. :) Joey was 15 months old. It is our home. It is literally 1 minute away from that same small SDA school I attended, and that is where my older two are now! I sub there quite often, sit on the board, and am the Home and School Leader....sort of the the same thing as PTA leader. I love my little house, my little town, my little school, my little church family! My mom and dad live 9 miles away, in the house I grew up in, and my two sisters live 1 mile apart from them. We have talked a lot about moving south, more in the last 6 months than ever. The DiSH started his own carpentry business 1 1/2 years ago, and it would make more sense to be somewhere where building houses can be done year round, without having to shovel 2 feet of snow first! but alas, the economy isn't so great, is it. So we thank God for the little jobs that He keeps providing to my husband, just enough to pay the house payment and eat! We shall see....maybe someday I'll be blogging about my new home, my new state, who knows!!

So there you go, a little history!! Hope you didn't yawn too much. :)

This is the front of that little school I went to!