Change has come

Last night our country made history! Barack Obama won the Presidency. I feel so hopeful today. How wonderful that our country no longer sees black or white. We just see who is the best person for the job. Obama will surely help us gain back respect in the world, improve our economy, assure that everyone has basic healthcare. I just looked out my window, and there is a beautiful rainbow in the sky! This is what I saw. The picture is not as good as real life, but there is a faint rainbow visible between the trees. In real life, it was bright and clear.



What a wonderful sight that was. That gave me a sense of peace and hope. Now we must all come together and work at making this country strong once more. Obama's speech was wonderful and he reached out to those who did not support him. Let's hope they will reach out too and we can all work together to get out of this economic crisis. I feel so blessed to be raising my children in a time like this. My parents raised us to believe that all people should be equal, but we still noticed that wasn't really happening. My children can now see, that all people really are equal, and every child has a chance to achieve whatever dream they dream. Change truly has come!

6 years ago

6 years ago today I went to my last OB appointment before my daughter was born. It was the 1 year anniversary of the 9/11 attacks and it was very surreal. I drove into the parking lot of the doctor's office and where normally I had to circle around the parking lot to find a place to park, this time I had my choice of any space in the lot. It was deserted. It looked like I had come there on a Sunday. I guess even in Kansas, people were worried what the 1 year anniversary would bring. I went in to my appointment, not knowing it would be the one where my doctor decided that she had to be born this week. My blood pressure was getting too high. My doctor said I could schedule my repeat cesearean section for later that day or on Friday the 13th, her next surgery day. I chose Friday the 13th! I didn't want Juliana to always have the shadow of an awful event clouding her birthday. Her birthday would not always fall on a Friday,and this way, she could look at what most people see as an unlucky day, as her lucky day! I went home knowing that our lives would change in two short days, and worried a bit about what that would mean for my 2 1/2 year old Charlie, who truly was the center of our world at that time. I spent the rest of that day, and the next on "bedrest" cuddling with Charlie, reading to him, and watching movies with him. I tried to avoid coverage of the anniversary of 9/11. Today, I forgot it was 9/11 until I read the news online. Amazing what time does. Today it is business as usual, unlike 7 years ago when the world stopped for many, and 6 years ago when everyone was waiting for something else to happen. I hope time has been kind to all those who lost loved ones, and that they have again found a bit of happiness in their lives, even though the pain of their loss will have forever changed who they were.

Democratic Convention

I have really enjoyed watching the speeches at the Democratic National Convention this week. There were some really great moments. Hillary did exactly what she needed to do with her speech in making her supporters happy and at the same time endorsing Obama, and hopefully finally convincing those of her supporters that were not sure about Obama, that he is the right choice for our country. Bill Clinton also did a great job. I have always thought that no matter his bad personal choices, he was an excellent president. He gave us the strongest economy we have had in decades, and left us with a huge budget surplus. George Bush took that surplus and turned it into the largest deficit we have ever had. I wonder what our country would look like today had Al Gore gotten his rightful chance to lead our country. It still angers me that he won the vote in 2000 and yet never got to serve because of the corrruption of the Bush administration. Al gave a wonderful speech last night, and I think Obama is the person who will help us to achieve some of Al Gore's dreams of finding alternative fuel and energy sources, and helping our country be more environmentally conscience. Joe Biden's son made me tear up with his introduction of his father. I wasn't sure about Biden as a VP candidate, but after hearing his son's speech and then his own, I think he is a good man, and can be a great leader as well. I think Biden has the foreign policy experience that Obama needs. And then last night Obama's speech! WOW! He really is a great orator. And while I do not think he can begin to achieve every one of his goals while in office, I am thrilled that he has goals, and they are good ones! That is so much better than McCain wanting to keep the status quo! And now that I have seen McCain's choice of VP's, I wonder, what??? Really??? Who ever heard of Sarah Palin before today. He thinks Obama doesn't have enough experience to be president and he chooses a woman who was mayor of a small Alaskan town for a few years and has been Governor of Alaska for not even 2 years. Before that she was a sports reporter and commmercial fisherman. Alaska is a very small state in population. Obama was a state senator in Illinois for 7 years before becoming a US senator 4 years ago. Before that he was a community organizer and civil rights attorney. He has also taught Constitutional law. Illinois is a much bigger state than Alaska in population. Obama is very qualified to be president, without being jaded by too many years in Washington. McCain probably picked Palin to try to swing the vote of women who are upset that Clinton did not win the primary, and that Obama did not pick her to be his running mate. But those women who supported Hillary should know that Palin, in addition to being very inexperienced, is very conservative. She is Pro-life, Pro drilling for oil in the Alaskan Wildlife refuge, and she is against the rights of homosexuals to marry. I don't see how McCain can complain about Obama's inexperience when he picked Sarah Palin to be his successor should he die in office. I think Obama chose wisely when he picked a man whose strengths help where Obama may be lacking in experience. McCain chose very poorly. What can Sarah Palin offer his campaign, other than being a token woman on the ticket. Surely there were many more qualified Republican women he could have chosen.

Voting!

I came across this video on CNN.com today. I love Daughtry, and I am a huge advocate of using your right to vote! I couldn't wait to turn 18 to use my voting power, and I have not missed an election since. I still like to go to the polls on election day (rather than doing the more convenient advanced voting) because there is something special about going to the polls, standing in line, and getting in that booth! I take the kids with me and tell them how important voting is. This is an important year to vote, we need to make sure our country gets out of the war in Iraq, rebuilds our terribly broken economy, and gets out from under the horrible mess Bush has gotten us into. Enjoy this video and use that right to vote in November!

Cub Scouts and School Supplies

Today Charlie and I went with some of his Cub Scout den, to an organization called Crosslines to sort school supplies for kids whose families can't afford them. They help people in poverty or on the verge of poverty to help keep them above the poverty line. They plan to distribute 1700 backpacks full of supplies to kids. When we got there we saw boxes and bags stacked nearly to the ceiling (not kidding, I wish I would have had my camera). Our job was to go through the boxes and bags and sort them by type of supply. Crayons to one area, pencils to another, etc. There was a group of college students there whose job was to organize what we handed them into easily countable boxes. Then other adults were counting them. When they are all sorted and counted, the Crosslines staff will buy whatever else is needed to add to the bags so that each child will get an age appropriate backpack filled with supplies. They thought it would take 3 hours. There was another Boy Scout den there with older boys (about 13-14), a girl scout troop (they seemed about Charlie's age, 8) and some other volunteers. We got done with our sorting in an hour and half. I was so proud of our boys, they did a great job, and never complained. The adults still had to count, but they were making fast work of it as well. I organized this project for our den, because Charlie has been wanting to help kids ever since he watched American Idol Gives Back last winter. I think we will try to do it every year. It felt good to see all the supplies that had been donated. I hope it helps ease the burden for the families who receive them.

Expensive trip to the library

We have been going to the library frequently to save money on books. I used to always buy them, but it is so easy to find a book online and have it held at the library to pick up, it is a much better way to go. This time around Charlie had 6 books, Juliana had 5 books, and I had 2. Our 1 year old dog, Sam, decided that library books are very tasty, and decided to eat 3 of them! One had very little damage, but two had big chunks out of their spines. They were still very readable, but I couldn't just turn them back in. I took all 3 to the counter. The guy said it happens all the time. He said sometimes people bring back dog training books that have been eaten. Isn't that funny? Anyway, he said he could pretend he didn't see the damage on the one that wasn't too bad, but I did need to pay for the other two. So now we own two partially chewed up books for the wonderful price of $25! We are going to be very careful where we keep our library books from now on. Sam gets no more tasty library books from us!

Kids are too funny!

Juliana was just doing some "homework". I have a bunch of workbooks with basic math, grammar etc. The one she was working on was where she had to cut out numbers from the bottom of the page and paste them in the right spot on top where they were missing from. I was sitting at the computer and heard her start singing. Then I realized what she was singing. She was singing "One way or another, I'm going to find you, I'm going to get you, get you, get you, get you. One way or another." She was singing it over and over as she was finding the numbers. I had no idea she even knew that song. So appropriate for her task, and she was very in tune, and sang it perfectly.