Support the fight against Leukemia

all leukemia is a nasty disease that took my mom back in 2004  -17 days before her first grandchild was welcomed into this world.  To this day I believe she hand picked Nathaniel Craig Backus out in heaven just for us - if not him in body and all - his spirit was chosen by her.  We were never able to "see" the gender and I tell myself that she realized we (Craig, me and my dad and Marcus) needed a beautiful bald little boy!  He brought so much joy into a very sad time.

Anyhow tomorrow night our team - Loretta's Love will do our annual walk at the  Light the Night event in Troy, MI.  If you are able, please go visit our new website - www.lorettaslove.com and donate.  Or even come support the cause and walk with us tomorrow night (walk starts at 7 in Troy, events start at 5) - and enjoy glow in the dark balloons.  Rain or shine - the walk goes on.  So bundle up.

If you ever noticed the archives on here - they data back to May 2004.  Yes my dear husband Craig created this long ago (and a few looks back) to help us communicate with family and friends as the stress and cost of calling everyone every day became too much!  I think our phone bill that one month was well over $400.  And then dad and Marcus had high ones too.  It was hard to tell the same story all over and over.  So this was our way to communicate to everyone that wanted and/or needed to know.

Anyhow - reading back you can feel the emotions and stress of a pregnant me wrote about things close to every day or so.  I don't handle things very well - and it was very hard the last few days in June.  But then go to July 8th and the start of the waiting for Nate came on and brought a ray of light to this family!  And over t he years you can read about our family, losing my in laws, grandma and then our adoption!  This is a blog created out of love and information and has continued that on and hopefully helped people looking at adoption.

Yes - it is bitter sweet - and we're hoping for a good turn out at the event this year.  Tomorrow is Curt's first walk in honor of his angel grandma as well!

I will bet everyone that reads this will have ONE connection - even a small one to someone that has fought leukemia, lymphoma or some sort of blood disorder -  lets go fight for those people now!

Thanks - and check out the great site - www.lorettaslove.com.
Love
Gail

Happy New Year - Welcome 2005

Today is the Ethiopian New Year - 2005.  yes they have a different year  they use a totally different calendar.  I won't put it all here - but Google it and you can read all about it.  So in theory I realized both boys were born in 2004!  ha - pretty funny.

We didn't do any big celebration - but hope to next year. I've been in touch with an Ethiopian pastor and they are hoping to do more in Ann Arbor next year!  yeah!  Can't wait.  Very important to keep the culture in our lives - at least it is my thoughts.

So I realized I haven't posted in a while - things are just busy.  School started for Nate at the end of August, Curt and I have been fighting a cold the last week.  His is mostly teething and me allergies -but still NO fun.  Labor day weekend was just a busy time.  I hope to do pictures one of these days -but too tired and icky right now.

So a quick (probably not but I'll pretend) update on life.

Curt is 17 months old. Tomorrow will be 6 months from Gotcha Day!  Wow - 6 months as a family of 4.  It seems like he has been with us forever and it is perfect.  yes we have our ups and downs.  He still wakes up at  night lately  Last night we let him "cry it out" and it went well.  Craig may not agree, but it was 15 minutes,  and he slept till 7 and woke up in a great mood.  Curt loves to talk, walk, run and play!  he's all over and it is great.  He's definitely got a personality!  We love it.

Nate started 3rd grade at St Paul's and we are just so proud of him.  His reading compared to last year has advanced so much.  Tutoring really helped. But we are done with tutoring for now and going back to soccer starting Saturday.  And maybe something else.  WE were hoping the Lego Robot clubs, but need to be 9 years old.

Me - swamped like crazy at work, but love it.  It is just a good fit.  I was actually able to have Nate in for two weeks to help me out.  Yes he worked and got paid to help me scan MSDSs!  He's great.  I'm having little medical stuff happening - possible ulcer related to my stomach surgery (3 years ago).  Yikes.  But good to get it checked out NOW before it gets bad.

Craig - busy with the store - but enjoying Saturday's with us again!  yeah.  We love it too!  He's just into football season and taking walks with the boys.

We also found a new church this summer.  It was not an easy decision but attending Genesis we realized we needed to grow more.  And we have found the opportunities here.  Very excited to get involved and doing more.  A sermon this summer inspired us both so much it was amazing.  a real GOD moment!  They do a lot of out reach and I can see us doing more here in the future!  I can't wait!  Yeah -

Dad was here for a while in June/July - gave us a health scare - but doing well now.  We were even able to get pics of him and the boys AND had family pics taken too!  They were food too!

What else?  Oh - I"m going to be an aunt!  Yeah - can't wait - my brother is expecting next year - so thrilled for them too!

Other than that - through all the life struggles,we just feel blessed to have the boys and the family we have. I love my boys and just enjoy what life is bringing us.

I love talking about adoption, Ethiopia and what we can do to help the people there someday!

That's about all for now  - I can tell it is very disjointed  sorry about that
Gail