Coffee, Anyone?

Spotted on one of our Jeepin' trips earlier this summer. Read the words on the building...


"Would you like a plunger with that Double Skinny White Mocha?"

"No thanks... maybe a Screwdriver, though?"

Only in small town America. I love it!

Waiting Room Encounters

During our first big Jeep ride with the kidlets at the end of May (I love our Wrangler… all 3 carseats/boosters can fit across the back seat!), my husband injured his back from the routine motion of lifting the littlest up and into the back seat. Gil’s disability from the Army is due to issues related to his back and knees so he’s been injured before, which seems to always lend itself toward future injuries. I ended up driving home that day… and when he got progressively worse through the night, I bundled the kids up the next morning, called in to take the day off, and drove my husband to the nearest VA clinic.

I just love working with the VA (not). I really think the health care given to our service members and vets should be much better than it is, but it’s just like any other government-run operation. Slow and with too many hoops to jump through. We should’ve just gone to the ER but we’re of the mindset that unless you can’t breathe or have a severed appendage, you’re wasting the ER’s valuable resources. Anyway, not to get off subject...

We went to the VA. And sat there all day. With 3 little kids. Oh! The unspeakable joy!!

(The above is not an actual picture of our VA waiting room but is pretty darn close.
It's a good thing I'm learning how to be a prepared mom and had crayons, paper, books and even some snacks in my purse!)

Waiting rooms are never fun but in a VA waiting room, we’re often the oddballs… we’re so much younger than many of the older vets who receive their care there. I was left alone in between Gil’s many trips into the exam room (once for a supposed colonoscopy – oops! Wrong patient!) and people always seem to let the conversation flow when I’m alone. First up was a middle-aged woman, looking a little worse for wear…

“Are those your kids?”

Yes.

“Are they triplets?”

No, they’re ages 2, 3 and 4.

“Wow! Don’t you know what causes that?!”

Excuse me?

And then there was a guy, after also asking the above questions…

“2, 3 and 4? Where’s the one year old?”

I think I was caught off guard and probably with my mouth slightly agape.

“Are you working on that?”

Always.

“Oh well, you’re good then!” And he laughs as walks out the door, exclaiming about how cute and well-behaved my children are.

When I’m with Gil, people never assume our children are our biologic children because, honestly, how could two obviously light-skinned people have three dark children? But when I’m by myself, no one ever assumes that they’re NOT biologic. Upon learning they are not triplets or even twins and a single, they always give me the shocked look and exclaim about them being so close together in age and ask me what in the world was I thinking. Like I had a choice. Like I would’ve had a choice even if they were biologic! The miracle of life is in God’s hands, not mine!

And my children are a miracle, no matter how they came into our lives.

Jeep Ja.mboree

Gil's and my vacation this year was Jeep related, not Harley. A local 4x4 group in the city we recently moved from hosted a first annual Jam in a mountain range close by. We had hoped to be trail guides for the weekend but with moving, we weren't able to make any of the pre-Jam trips to learn the trails. Oh well. We were so gosh-darned excited to go as regular participants, anyway! What Stur.gis is to bikers, Jeep Jam's are to Jeepers. It was so cool to be with so many various types of people sharing a common interest.

It feels funny to classify my Jeep with a feminine pronoun, but here she is in all her glory!

One of the lakes we skirted. A month ago, we'd have been driving right through it. We heard that stock rigs would be susceptible to floating and possibly going down the waterfall. Due to the lateness of the season, the water level had gone down too much.

Following the leader.

The picture doesn't do the obstacle justice... it was actually one of the tougher ones we had to traverse and you can see a little bit of her awesome articulation. The stock rigs had difficulty going through the deep ruts and boulders.

After all the mud of the day, we had to wash the Jeep. If you don't want to get wet, I suggest putting your top on first. We didn't and we got drenched. Then we turned around and did it again so I could have someone take a picture. It was awesome!

Testin' the Upgrades

We decided to head north Saturday afternoon to do some drive-by's of potential house/property purchases and ended up driving down and across the river to test out my JK's ability with its recent 4" lift (in addition to the 2" it came with stock) and the 35" BFG Mud Terrains. I wish I would've grabbed my camera but I truly wasn't anticipating going off-highway, much less off-road. My brother had joined us and it was his idea to go wheelin' when all the home searching fell through and ended within about a half-hour.

Let me tell you... it was pretty darn suh-weet! We turned off the ESP and anti-sway bar and truly tested the lockers, hit some hills that dirt bikes and other off-roaders put to good use. Got in some good climbing and rock-crawlin' before we decided to venture further down the "road" and hit a heavily treed and rocky mountainous area near the river where I thought even my Jeep was too wide for the trail. Though the soft top was on, the windows were down and we had plenty of shrubbery and dust end up inside. We had to wind our way down-river to the next bridge/crossing, so we ended up going through some open range with deep gulches, big bumps, and lots of sagebrush. One of the dry creek-beds we crossed that Gil used for his "angle of approach" lesson ("big red truck" obvious - duh!) was so deep that when we stopped and straddled it, the passenger seat hit level with my brother's nose when he jumped out.

Due to my inability to be a proper camera-carrying-at-all-times outdoorsperson, I tried finding a video showing terrain similar to what we were playing on but came up empty. This one is sort-of similar to the hill-climb area we traversed, though where we were was more of a dry, compacted clay surface with a dusting of loose dirt rather than sand. We were really bummed that, even though it had rained real good the day before, there was no mud.

So, to all those other hard-core Jeepers who say the JK's are a joke and not "real" Jeeps... shame on you!



This video is here only to show a loosely-similar terrain to what we dealt with Saturday. What we tackled was tougher and Gil definitely went at it harder. The way this guy drives is - ahem - kinda wussy! :)

A-hunting we will go...

Gil and I spent all day Saturday looking at houses. Our realtor sent us a huge list of about 90 possibilities that fit our criteria the closest (there were many more that fit most our criteria). Of those, we came up with a list of about 10 that we wanted to look at right away. Saturday morning dawned with a few raindrops falling but that didn't deter us as... we rolled up the soft-top on the Jeep, threw on a sweatshirt, and took off. By the time we got halfway to where we were supposed to meet R (our realtor), we stopped for a frappucino and put the top back down. We spent all day (8 hours) going from house to house to house, taking pictures and jotting down notes. R was a great sport and hopped in the back of the Jeep to ride along with us rather than making us go in his car. He even bought us an early snack and a nice lunch afterward.

The house I wanted to see more than any others was probably the biggest disappointment. I almost started crying the moment we stepped out of the Jeep to go up the walk. The owners were building it themselves and waaay over-extended themselves. Even I could tell - with my unprofessional eye - they knew not a whole lot about construction. Measurements in stair areas were so horrible that we'd have to duck in places to avoid hitting our heads and there was water damage everywhere. They tried saving money by cutting some corners but you could definitely see the dreams they had for it. If they would've done it right, it would've been absolutely gorgeous and to-die-for. It could've been worth half a million dollars, at least, but now will probably go for less than $200 thousand... and whoever gets it will have a LOT of corrective work to do before they can even complete what was left unfinished. Sad, sad, sad.

After much deliberation weighing all the pros and cons - and much regret for not wearing sunscreen while going topless in the Jeep - we narrowed it down to two choices. These two had about a $40 thousand difference in price tags! Sunday, we signed a buy/sell and put in an offer on the lesser priced one and are now eagerly awaiting news. We should hear if the bank accepts or declines our offer by the end of this week (fingers crossed). There are two other offers on the table for the same place. It's a short-sale... Not because the sale takes place in a short amount of time, that's for sure. This is essentially the last step before the bank forecloses on the property. It's still in the seller's ownership but the bank is going to be getting less than what they're owed, so they have to approve any and all offers. It's definitely a lesson in real estate. So... we wait.

In the meantime, we are thinking and planning as though it's already ours. We're brainstorming new flooring and wall colors, we're prioritizing projects (fencing is going to win so the dogs will have a place of their own without being in our way), and softly penciling in our weekends so we can make sure to also get in some fun play times (and the Jeep Jam.boree!). It's really hard to focus on anything else.

All Jacked Up!

Most of our "big" Jeep upgrades are now completed. While I was laying around recuperating from my surgery, Gil busted his hiney in the garage trying to get everything done in one short weekend.

For a reminder, here's what the Jeep looked like on the day we got it:

Here he is putting the 4" lift kit on. He also did some other things under there, like a new pitman arm and other small things to make sure everything worked out.

The new steel front bumper we purchased was supposed to allow use of the stock fog lights. Unfortunately, the holes were about half as big as they needed to be. Here you can see Gil working on expanding the hole size and making custom light brackets. He also rolled his own "grill guard" on the pipe bender (I know, honey, this is justification for purchasing a "tube" bender now) and welded everything together. He even "custom" designed and welded guards to encase the fog lights.

And here's the final product! We also added 35" tires which give a total lift of 6" from stock height. We're waiting on some black rims that have been back-ordered twice... won't those look sweet when we get 'em on? I love the all-black accents.

Yes, I know... my baby spoils me. But hey! It's just as much for him as it is for me. And I honestly think he gets a kick out of people's reactions when he tells them it's his "wife's Jeep".

New Bumper

And the upgrades begin...

First to arrive and be installed: the front bumper. Here's what the front of my Jeep looked like last week:

Here's Gil taking off the stock (plastic) bumper this past Sunday...

And bolting on the new steel Ran.cho bumper.

Here it is, tow hooks and everything . However, the tow hooks have since been removed and painted black.

I didn't think I would, but I really like that the whole tire is exposed. We will have to get the fog lights re-installed. The holes on the front of this bumper are supposed to allow function of the stock lights but the spaces are quite a bit smaller and don't work. There's some additional work needed to make them work. We'll add a winch and Gil will also bend and weld on a grill guard.

M.I.A.

Yes, I realize this is the longest absence I've had from posting since I began this blog. I apologize for those few of you who follow faithfully... things have been absolutely crazy. Here's a summary of a few things to catch y'all up to date:

Throughout the month of February, Gil and I were waiting hopefully on a promising adoption lead. After 3 weeks, we knew it was a lost cause. It would've been a private adoption, completely separate and unrelated to our journey with the state's DCFS. I know I'm just now admitting this publicly as we've been trying to keep a low profile on what's been going on until something actually happens, but this is actually our second adoption loss since the first of the year. We had another lead during the first two weeks of the new year that ended up falling through because we live 400 miles too far away. I've never been pregnant but I would liken the feeling of an adoption loss to a miscarriage... you try so very hard to attain your dream and when it's just barely reached fruition, it's snatched out of your grasp to leave you mourning. It's been difficult, dealing with these losses and trying to understand the reason, especially after having to deal with the loss of our fertility, also. And two losses already. Ugh.

We had Karma spayed on February 19th after dealing with her first heat throughout the whole month of January (yes, 4 full weeks of changing panties on a dog). On Feb. 20th, just an hour after picking her up from the vet, we left to spend a week with my family, so we had to be careful about how much running, jumping, and getting dirty she did. Now that we're home, we've noticed some quirky attitude changes in Karma... she started crying (read: screaming) for about an hour after we'd put her in her crate to sleep at night or when we'd leave in the morning... she stopped eating her food (or rather, started spilling her it all through her crate)... she's been really clingy when spending time with us in the house, wanting to sit on my lap. Last night, we discovered the cure to her crying at night: we let the furbabies sleep in the bedroom with us. This is something that we allowed until Karma outgrew her baby crate; when she was a little puppy and we tried having her sleep inside, she would only ever want to play with Mojo all through the night so we began crating them all at night so she wouldn't be alone. Last night was successful - no crying AND no playing... she's apparently calmed down enough in her old age of 1 year!

I am officially a member of the Jeep community again! We've been wanting to get back into a Wrangler since Gil got rid of his a year and a half ago... and I've wanted my own for a long time, long before I met Gil even. Last week, we were drooling - yet again - over Jeeps and found too good of a deal to pass up. We've been wanting to get out from under my car for awhile and were able to do it! Now once Gil gets his Willy up and runnin', we'll each have our own. Until he can start working on his, he's talking about putting a small lift on mine. We're already talking about taking in a Jamboree or two with our other Jeepin' friends! Here's a picture of MY Jeep:


There is more going on right now (not Gil or myself specifically) but for confidentiality reasons, I cannot disclose anything at this time but please just keep us in your prayers for a special intention. After reading through my post, it feels like I should have more to say because we've seriously been running our hineys off for the past three months... tonight is the first night in two weeks Gil and I have had more than a single hour together at home during the evening hours. These next few weeks will be just as busy but I hope to be better about squeezing in a quick post every day or two.

Jeep Fever

One day, while at work, Gil saw an advertisement for an orphaned Jeep. Willy is 53 years old (meaning a 1955 Jeep Willy M35A1) and was abandoned in a field full of rusty, broken down equipment. Gil received "the calling" to rescue him. Is anyone truly surprised?! Ever since we made the decision to get rid of his Wrangler a year ago, he has been trying to figure out how to get another Jeep in the garage. Of course, this Jeep will remain in the garage for awhile before it's able to run. Yes, it has an engine, but there is no steering... heck, there's no interior at all! Otherwise, the body is in excellent condition and the lift already on it is more than sufficient for the ideas Gil has to make a rough-n-ready 4x4.

Can you see Willy peeking out from his hiding place?

Profile view once loaded on the trailer... getting ready to come to his new home.

Proof that there is no steering.

Even the seats in it were not attached to anything!

Oh happy boy!

Yes, he's a happy boy but the work on this one will have to wait. I told Gil that all mods and upgrades would have to wait until the #1 project on our to-do list is completed: we're planning to sell our house and build a new home sometime after the new year. We're still drawing the floor plans at this point but it's going to be a HUGE project that will take all our extra time. When I'm no longer painting new house surfaces, he can spend whatever time he wants on the Jeep.