Nicaragua trip

Sorry it has taken me awhile to post pics of my trip but I have been pretty sick. I am doing a little better today. I am finally not so drowsy as I have been. Anyways, this was the most unique experence of my life. It was life changing. Seeing the poverty and filfth of this country, makes me realize how blessed I am to live in the U.S. It is impossible to meet and get to know these people and not want to help. I don't know what is in the future for Daniel and I, but we will definately continue to help these people. I don't know if we will move down there. We are just praying that God will continue to direct our paths.

Jody and Valerie with the biological mother of some of the children Valerie adopted. The background is where she lives. She has nothing not even a roof over her head.

This the family we stayed with everyday except the first night we were there. The father's name is Don Luis. He is the lawyer who helped Daniel's parents adopt the kids. They are such an awesome family. The mom, Patricia, is an awesome cook. The oldest boy name is Rodrigo and the youngest is Ricardo. They have two other children, Luis and Patricia Jr.
This is a pic of Daniel, Jalmer, and Kevin. Jalmer, the elder boy is the inspiration behind the organization Jody and Valerie have started.
This little girl is Sochi. I feel in love with her when I was there. She is five. I would have loved to take her home with me. She has no one to care for her.

Daniel and I with some orphan girls. The one I am holding is Malaysi and the girl next to Daniel is Fatima. Malaysi is five and Fatima is ten.
This is where the kids wash there clothes. They have no washer and dryer. They use washboards and linedry. There are no adults to help with the clothes.

Every child gets a little locker where the put everything they own. This is Sochi's locker. These are all the clothes she has, and she has only one doll, which all the little girls share.
Sochi posing in our rental car. I just wish I could take her home, so she could have someone to tuck her in at night and tell her that she is loved. There are so many children out there, just like her. It was so hard to leave her.

From the heart

Sometimes I get so caught up in everyday life I forget what is is important. I often find I am worrying about the dumbest things... things I have no control over. Right now we are remodeling our house to put it up for sale. We are on a tight schedule and budget. I am always worrying that we won't get it done in time or have enough money. I have no control over these things. When I was growing up I used to tell my mom all the time whenever she was worrying about some dumb thing that; "Worry is concern without faith, and without faith it is impossible to please God." Boy, do I need to take some of my own advice. I have become so consumed with worldly things that don't really matter that I am forgetting to focus on God. As I a woman I find myself worrying about if I look right or am skinny enough. I worry more about what I am missing on TV then what I missing in my spiritual life. I kind of understand why my mom didn't allow a TV in our house when we were young... what a waste of time. When I am on my death bed will I be saying, "I am so glad I got to see Desperate Housewives and Grey's Anatomy." No, I hope I will be saying what amazing times I had with my family, and I am so glad God used me to change lives. That's why we are here on this Earth; to glorify God and to do what He wants. It can be so hard sometimes. I guess why this is on my heart is that I am going to Nicaragua in less than two weeks. During this trip Daniel and I will make a huge decision on whether God want's us to help out the young people there or if we will stay in the U.S. As of right now I don't want to go to Nicaragua. Daniel has a great job with great benefits, and we are looking at buying a big house with land. Staying in the U. S. sounds alot better. However, Daniel and I both know that if God wants us to do something we are doing it, no questions asked. So please pray about making the right decision. It's good to get things of the chest.

Left to Right: Daniel in March on his trip to Nicaragua. Kevin, who is Daniel's little brother, which is still in the adoption stages. Jalmer, who is the first boy we would help if we go

to Nicaragua. He is the inspiration for the program we would begin.

Daniel with some cute little kids.

Daniel with an adorable little girl... how can you not fall in love with these kids.

The Orphanage

Daniel and Kevin

The kitchen

An Update

So after I got all my stress out by ranting about the VA DMV, the story did not end there. Daniel tried calling the auto finance place to see if his money had gone through so he could get his title sent to him. Guess what.... They lost the money. Yeah thats right they lost several thousand dollars. Of course Daniel was furious. So he got the supervisor on the phone, and they helped him out. They said they would figure it out and he should wait a few days. Anyways, the money was finnally found and applied to his account. So now we are waiting for the title. When it is all said and done we have had no car for appr. a month an a half. One good thing about it is we have saved alot of money, because we don't go anywhere.

Virginia DMV

If anyone has ever had to walk through the doors of the Virginia DMV, then you will know that it is one of the worse places in the world. I still do not understand why something so simple like getting a driver's lisence or a new title has to be so difficult. I sure miss the FL DMV. Whenever you have to go to the DMV in VA, you better have nothing else to do for the next three hours. If you go at the perfect time you might get in and out in an hour.....but that's only if you are really lucky. So you might be asking yourself why I have such a beef with the VA DMV. Well mainly because Daniel and I have not been able to drive our car legally for a month. See here's the crazy confusing story...... As most people know Daniel's parents got divorced. His mother got pretty much everything. His father was supposed to sign all vehicles, houses, properties, etc. over to her. Of course, that's too difficult for him, so after 30 days the court in Missouri just drew up titles and deeds for everything. Well, Daniel's car was one of the vehicles that MO wrote up a new title for. When they were drawing it up they asked his mom if the car had a lien on it, so being an honest person she said yes. Now usually if there is a lien on a vehicle all kind of paperwork has to filled out to find out whose name the lien is in. However, the state of MO didn't worry about the necessary paperwork needed they just followed what the the coourt awarded her. So she signs the title over to Daniel and overnights it to him, because by this time Daniel's tags and registration expired at the end of July. So we take the title to the DMV for the first time, the first lady said it was too confussing because the lien was in Daniel's name but according to the title it was in his mom's name. So we went to the other DMV. Well they looked at it and said we can't help you to you get a lien release form filled out by Capital One. So we leave and call Capital One and fax it to them. They say that it will take three days for them to fax it back. We couldn't understand why, considering it was just a small slip of paper. However, we decided that we would wait and not go anywhere and Daniel would just walk to work. It took them 7 days to fax it back. Oh and it wasn't the correct paperwork, but it did say that Daniel's name was on the lien, so we went back to the DMV. We finally get to the front and the lady says, "I can't help you. It has to be directly faxed to us." Well they had never said that before. Anyway, Daniel calls someone at Capital One and tells them to fax it to the DMV. Now he has talked to at least 10 different people at Capital One by this time. Someone faxes it, but by this time the DMV is closing and everybody is ignoring us. Nobody wanted to finish helping us. Daniel sends me out to the car because he knows it might get ugly. He asks if he can get some help, but everyone just ignores him and begins counting their money. A special agent of the DMV comes out and tells Daniel that his has been asked to leave twice. Daniel was pissed. He said, " No one has asked me to leave. In fact, everyone has ignored me, and all I want is some customer service. I just want to ask a question." Some lady finally is like, What. He just wanted to find out if something was faxed would they keep it and they said they would. So another week passes and Capital One finally faxes all the paperwork to the DMV. After an hour of waiting, we finally get to talk to a lady. She takes one look at our information and tells us that we will probably be her last customer's of the day. There was still almost three hours until closing. She was really sweet. She did everything she could to help us, but Daniel's father's name is on the lien as well, and Capital One can't take it off. So guess what they tell us? The only way Daniel can get his tags and registration renewed is by paying off the car. Unfortunately, we don't just have thousands of dollars laying around. Oh, and by this time we had gotten a ticket. We got the ticket at 3:40 in the morning while it was parked in front of the house. Anyway Daniel's mom payed off the car and now we are waiting for a title to arrive that is in Daniel's name without a lien. In the meantime, we have been driving around a Uhaul truck, so we can get groceries and such. One good thing is we haven't spent any money since we have been pretty much confined to the house. So a word of caution..... BEWARE of the VA DMV. We know that someone could have given us new tags and registration, because Daniel's tags and registration were in his father's name. And acoording to what the DMV has been telling us is that the reason Daniel can't just renew is because they can't just be in his name they also have to be in his father's name. However, the VA DMV allowed just his father's name on them before, but they can't explain that. So that is our crazy story about the stupid VA DMV. So tune in tomorrow, where I will write yet another crazy but true story of the meeting of me and the James River. All I got to say is...... I just want to go back to worry free Mexico.

So here's to Mexico, being in my baby's arms, and the morning sunrise.

Sorry so long

It has been awhile since I have posted. So much has gone on since I have posted I don't know where to start. First, of all I have finished school. I have not gotten my degree yet because I still have some paper work to finish and it just takes them awhile to send out the diploma. Next, thing my mother-in-law got remarried to a wonderful man named Jody on July 7 in Port St. Joe, FL. My husband and I flew in to Panama City for a worldwind weekend. The wedding was very small and informal, but it was very beautiful. It was on a gorgeous beach in the evening. I will post pics below. What else.... oh Daniel got a Harley from his father in the divorce agreement, which we are trying to sell right now. I will also post pics of it. It is beautiful. It is a 2002 Fatboy, red, and it only has 6500 miles on it. It is like brand new. Anyway hopefully we can sell it. We both love riding but we want to invest the money into our future, so many later in life we will get a new one. We are also fixing up our house in order to sell it as well. Hopefully, we will be gone from Lynchburg by next summer. The most recent thing we have done was this weekend, we went to a pistol shooting class. It was alot of fun. We both really enjoy shooting. Before I met Daniel I used to go skeet shooting. Well, Daniel and I have both shot shotgun and rifles but never handguns. Anyway, we have been thinking about getting our concealed handgun licenses. It is kinda dangerous where we live and alot of times I am by myself, so we wanted to make sure that we are safe. So we took this class because we are required to take a safety class before we can apply for our license. After the class we got to go in the teachers back yard and shoot handguns. I got to shoot a .22 revolver, a .38 special, and a Glock 23, which is a .40 caliber. The Glock is what law enforcement carries. Daniel just got one and he wanted to try it out. It is a powerful gun. I didn't know if I would be able to handle it because I was afraid the recoil would be to much. But I tried it out after Daniel begged me to. I loved it, and who would have guessed...I'm a pretty good shot. So nobody better mess with me, lol. It was alot of fun, and if anyone is looking for a stress reliever go to gun range and shoot some rounds. It is great. Well, I guess that is the only news I have right now. I will be posting a lot more regularly.



This is Valerie and Jody after getting married. They are such a good match.




This is Daniel and his momma at the wedding. He was being goofy.




Here is a pic of Daniel and I at the wedding. What a cute couple;)




And last but not least... here is our beautiful Harley that we have to sell.

Honeymoon

So I thought I would post some pics from my Honeymoon in Mexico.

One of the beaches we went to called Miramar. It was beautiful. We had so much fun that day. There was a huge flea market on the beach with tons of things to buy. Daniel was so great with bartering. He could speak Spanish so when people would try to up the price like they do to other tourists he would tell them....Do you think we are tourists? We are Nicaraguian. When they heard this they would be like aww you guys must really be poor. So they would give us a great deal. We got 2 hammocks for about 35 bucks and some beautiful china for super cheap. Oh and in the background of the picture you can see a sprite bottle behind Daniel. Let me tell you soda is so much better in Mexico. It is made a little different than the US. It tastes so good. I just want to go back I loved it so much.

Daniel and I got all dressed up to go to a 5-star restaurant called Legazpi. I didn't know how to act. The food was amazing. This was the fanciest restaurant I had ever been to, but it was so much fun.

This is one of the beautiful sunrises from our balcony in Manzanillo, Mexico. We got up every morning on our honeymoon to watch the sunrise. They were so beautiful...absolutely breathtaking.

This is the best taco stand in Manzanillo, Mexico. Daniel and I stopped at alot at little places like this. They were so cheap and the food was great. This taco stand was run by a lady and her 2 daughters. They loved the fact that Daniel and I stopped by for lunch. I even talked in Spanish to them. It was fun. I just love the Spanish culture.

For my Grandma

I know my Grandma wanted to see the rooms in my house I painted, so I am posting some pics. I have been trying to fix up our house. When I met my husband, Daniel, he had this beautiful 1904, 2500 sq ft house. I love it, but it takes lots of work to keep it up. I am leaning as I go along. It is so much fun decorating this old house.

Our master bedroom. It had boring white walls before, now its this relaxing blue.

Our bathroom that we tiled. It was a nasty white vinyl before. We still have a lot of work to do.