My Grown Up Christmas List

Rick, the little kids, and I were shopping for each others gifts. I took Skylar first and had her pick out gifts for Rick, William, and her best friend. Then Rick took her in to get a gift from her to me. I picked out something for William to Rick because William was tired and cranky. He's a typical male when it comes to shopping. Anyways while we were shopping Skylar said Mom the best Christmas present would be to see Mackenzie again (her older brother). I gave her a big hug and said me too baby me too! I would give up all the presents for years to come just to see Mackenzie.
So Dear Santa, That is at the top of my grown up Christmas list.. Let me babies see their older brothers. Let my husband see his sister and aunts again. My grown up Christmas wishes are that no child goes without Christmas or food. That no families are torn apart by evil, sin, and disease. If my life wasn't torn apart I wouldn't have Rick, Alex, James and William though. So if its your will.... My grown up Christmas Wish is that our military was home even if its just for one day during the holidays. That no one dies in vain or at the hands of another. That the ill could get proper medical treatment. That everyone could find the spirit that I love and believe. My grown up Christmas wish is that no one would ever feel alone that they know the love of another. So Dear Santa even though my childhood fantasies seemed to be out of reach I hope that you can keep this letter close to your heart and know that truly this is what we need here... for Christmas and every day after. Peace on Earth.
Love Bella I believe! 

Ok sometimes I am a slow starter sometimes

I was diagnosed with Epilepsy as a pre-teen so my guardian wasn't in any hurry to let me drive. I also don't think she didn't think I was responsible enough. My guardian's daughter in law took me on one driving lesson before I turned 18. At 17-18 I had many friends get seriously hurt or die in car accidents due to negligence. I knew the law in Georgia that said if my seizures were uncontrolled I could be charged with attempted vehicle homicide or vehicular homicide if I was involved in an accident. So at that point I was afraid to drive. I met my 1st husband and he happily drove me around for awhile. Then he became abusive and controlling so it was a way for him to control me. After that part of my life was over with I was with a guy that gave me some driving lessons but every time a car came in my direction in the opposite lane I would freak out and freeze. Then the next guy I dated him and his uncle also tried to teach me to drive. I had to drive to Walmart to get formula for my baby and my licensed driver was drunk. I was apprehensive about my licensed driver being drunk when I had only had a learners permit for 3 hours. Sure enough in the Walmart parking lot I was driving the wrong way and hit a 3 month old Dodge Ram.. I did no noticeable damage to the Ram since it was higher off the ground than my boyfriends Oldsmobile. I went into Walmart and had the owner paged and it turned out to be 3 grand worth of damage to the dodge ram and a huge hole in the hood of my boyfriends Oldsmobile. The cop just sat in his car and laughed at me :/ Again the thoughts of maybe I shouldn't be driving scared me into not driving even though my seizures were under control. Later (I am not sure if it was months or years) but his uncle was teaching me to drive and I hit the curb and blew a tire. I had a melt down thinking of what could have been if someone was on that sidewalk. I had my child with me so the nervousness set in again. Neither of them wanted to teach me much after that.
  In 2007 I met my now husband and he was deploying so he took on the task of REALLY teaching me how to drive. At this point I was 27 and still with a learners permit. I was finally brave enough or maybe pressured enough since he was deploying in a month to take my drivers road test. I did it! I passed. He left July.. after he left for training but before he deployed I had a fender bender in the Commissary (grocery store) parking lot because they had a huge tent sale in the parking lot. By October I had completely totaled his car. The insurance company was nice enough to comp me a rental until January and I had only taken it off post once and I was having an anxiety attack just doing that. My friends would tease me at my over caution. my grand ma driving etc. But I was really struggling with the anxiety I had most of my life with driving. Once he came home for R&R he bought another car and I was afraid to drive it but eventually I got better with that anxiety and drove it more but still avoided roads that made me nervous and stayed close to home until he came home for good.

I worked on my anxiety and began to like driving in my little Honda I call Lady. I have always loved cars just not driving them. I had to get my hubby to trust me with her after all that and get him to believe I was confident in driving. So for a few years Lady was all mine and Rick and his son James bought a old Jeep so he could teach his son how to drive. Eventually the jeep just became too expensive to repair

The former owners called him Beast so we kept the name.. He had Punisher skull painted on the top

After the Beast died we decided we still needed a second car with James and Rick working and I needed a car at home for doctors appointments and kid things.. We also knew we needed a bigger car for all our children to fit into. We found a lovely van named Belle. At first Rick was supposed to drive Belle. I mean Lady had a custom sound system that was MY Christmas present she was MY car... But Rick got tired of the in city mileage and I think just driving a minivan wore on him so he wanted to switch. I don't drive Lady much anymore I am so comfortable in her though. I was always afraid of driving a bigger vehicle.  So I started driving the van and earlier this year I had a mishap on the way home from dropping the kids off at school. It sounded like a bomb hit the van.. I got home told Rick what happened there was no immediate signs of scratches or dents. Rick assumes I hit a mailbox but when I looked in the rear view it was still there? Then I spotted the broken mirror. Which I am not legally allowed to drive if the mirror is missing so Rick took it to work and work on repairing it. I took Lady.. I was driving through a school zone that after noon and I made the mistake of after passing the crossing guard I picked up speed... too much speed... I got my first ticket (other than 1 seat belt ticket in a parking lot) I had to go to Defensive Driving school which wasn't awful and I learned a lot. SO now I am trying to be hyper aware in school zones. Hell I try to not driving during school times just because we live near 4 school zones and then there is always buses etc.. UGH

Sunday November 16, 2014: Would you mind, putting...

So we have this issue at my house that drives me insane. My husband and step son are probably not going to appreciate this post either. But my husband has some short term memory loss and overall OCD issue. Its been our entire marriage. I bought tee shirts for a particular holiday and laid them somewhere so I would know where they are. He comes behind me and puts them somewhere else (not their home mind you or even their obvious home such a clothes drawer) so comes the holiday and they are gone. I go frantic, panic, and pissed... I wasted all that money for nothing? In the grand scheme of things its not a huge deal but its just annoying and a pet peeve of mine and the lost tee shirts was just my first experience of 7 years. The most recent one was I bought a gift card and birthday card for one of William's school friends and laid it close to the door still in a bag. It gets moved. My husband acts all innocent and just mad I accused of doing what he is famous for doing. So we have this thing for coats and shoes near the front door and the bag was there about waist height... The night before he was cleaning it up looking for a key that had dropped . So he must have run into it but because he was so hyper focused on the key he forgot to grab William's coat as we were leaving for an outdoor Christmas Tree Lighting.. and he probably moved the bag so again yesterday 20 minutes before party time I can't find this bag I knew where I put it. His short term memory loss doesn't remember seeing it. He was too hyper focused on the key. So when I tell Rick or James would you mind putting it back where you found it or somewhere where it will be remembered? How hard is it to say where would you like me to put this item for you? Apparently hard and both "boys" use it as an excuse to just not do anything. My kitchen table is what Flylady would say is our hot spot.. We come in with groceries and they are put on the kitchen table.. any and all clutter ends up on the kitchen table but because "so and so" are afraid to move anything I have to constantly clean off the kitchen table instead of them just putting things where they belong. When James vacuums and mops he refuses to even pick up a Lego. He will just vacuum around it. It makes me CRAZY. So would you mind just putting things in their correct or rightful home? Sometimes as much as I have to remember things for 5 members of this house hold I put things so I KNOW where they will be when I come back to it but that doesn't mean things as ridiculous as a Lego...
Don't even get me started on the missing Beta fish.