Summertime and Swim Lessons

Now, I'm not going to claim any kind of expert opinion on anything. ESPECIALLY when it comes to kiddos. They have taken everything I thought I knew and showed me I had no clue! They are such smart little critters! HA! But I am going to share with you the WHY we chose to put our babies in swim asap.

South West Louisiana has basically two seasons...rain and hot as heck! Seriously. The heat index today was 107*!! So if you play outside you have to be prepared to sweat, A LOT, or do something water related. Therefore, swim lessons. 😂

You are probably wondering why my husband and I don't just teach them ourselves. Well, that's because neither of us can swim! 😱 I know, I know! I am terrified of water that I can't see my toes in and I hate water in my face. Yes, I'm a weirdo. Haha! Mostly we just never really had a place to learn when I was growing up.

Richard is the youngest of 9 children. Yes, you read that right, NINE! Makes me want to go ahead and check myself into the nursing home at the mere thought!! He has a very interesting story, it's also sad. Maybe one day I will convince him to tell it but for now we will just say there wasn't anyone around to teach him to swim. He learned when he was little then there was an accident and he almost drowned. After that he didn't get in the water for several years and when he did he had forgotten how to swim.

All of these things combined made us decide, when Em was little, that we would put him in swim lessons as soon as he was old enough. I wanted to do it right away but we weren't able to at that time. Plus he was just soooo little!! My parents' neighbors, a sweet little Mennonite family, recommended a lady just down the road from us but she doesn't take them until they are 3.

Before Emerson started swim lessons he wouldn't get water in his face either. Like his mama...ha! But after just an hour a day for a week, he could jump off the side of the pool and swim back! I was so impressed! His teacher told me that she had between 60 and 70 kids in the month of June and I was certain he couldn't learn anything in that short amount of time. Especially in a group. But I was so wrong! He learned sooo much and talked about his swim lessons all year!

Mrs. Tammie started booking this year's swim classes in April and. you better believe, I was one of the first to call! We scheduled them for the week of June !7th. After I got off the phone I told him I had scheduled his swim lessons. BIG mistake! He was ready to go right then and I had to explain that it wasn't for TWO MONTHS! Do you know how long two months is to a four year old?? It's eternity. But I'm so thankful he loves going and has done so well!

If you think it isn't important for a child to like their teacher/instructor you are dead wrong. Children have a better sense of the good and bad in people. If my little social bugs don't like someone, I trust their senses. We used to think people were basically good, but the older I get the more I think the opposite. Maybe I've just been watching too much Criminal Minds. 😜

The first day of swim he had a total blast but when we got home I noticed his eyes were swollen and red and he said they hurt "weally bad!". I gave him a dose of Benedryl and put some eye drops in before his nap. They still weren't looking great when we went to bed that evening and I didn't know what to do! Should I take him back to his swim lessons? Should I take him to the doctor?

I finally decided on taking him back to swim and just talking to Mrs. Tammie first. I figured with as many kids as she deals with that he wouldn't be the only one to have this problem. We went and talked to her as soon as we got there and she told us that because she has so many children in and out of her pool she has to super chlorinate her pool to keep it clean. We determined that he was just having a reaction to that and the rest of the week he would wear goggles! Thankfully that has worked and we have had no more problems!!

We do have a Splash Park here but as friendly as the kids are I'm terrified that they will just go off with anyone and not figure out what happened until too late. So I don't take them there unless Richard or my mom can go with me.

We did get a little 10ft Quick Set pool for our house and we have all been enjoying that!! We will eat popsicles or watermelon then hop in the pool for awhile. It really is the best way to keep cool these day!!

Remember the Mennonite neighbors of my parents that I mentioned? Remember I said Mrs. Tammie doesn't take children until they are 3? Well, Gweny is a little fish in the water and I'm afraid that if I wait a whole year she will lose that and possibly develope a fear of the water. Ya know, a lot can happen in a year! So the neighbors have a daughter(Wendy) that is an older teen and she helped Mrs. Tammie teach swim last year. (She is the one that told us about her.) We asked her if she would be willing to work with Gweny this summer. I absolutely cannot wait to see what she learns!!

For Memorial Day this year we went on a little staycation with Nana and Poppy to a town about an hour and a half from us. They have a cute little zoo and Gwen had never been to a zoo. Emmy hadn't been since he was a year old so it was time! We rented a two room hotel suite so that we could all stay together and made sure there was a nice pool!! The kids loved the zoo and made us adults stay longer than we would have chosen to on our own. But watching how excited they were made it totally worth it and we are already planning another trip to a bigger zoo before too long. Any recommendations on the best zoo would be welcome!!

I know I rambled around in this a bit but hopefully y'all enjoyed reading and maybe it will help you if you are on the fence about putting your child in swim lessons!
Have a good day!
Much Love💕

Once Upon a Time Two People Fell in Love

I guess in order for me to make sense y'all are going to need some background. Yes, some of you know parts of my story, some know all, and some of you have never heard my name. So, I feel it best to start at the beginning! Here goes....

June 1981-Little Rock, Arkansas. 7 years before I was ever even a thought (or a "gleam in my parents eye" as some say) Leon and Lois Southerland told an almost 19 year old Don Steele(My daddy) about a girl in Louisiana. Debbie Mallard, 22,(My mama) was living in DeRidder at the time and was quite certain God had lost her husband some where along the way!! Little did she know that within just two weeks she would start planning her wedding!!

Dad came down that summer just to meet her at the Bible Missionary Church camp meeting. Mom swore she would never date someone younger than her and wasn't too thrilled that this young punk was coming to meet her. She was positive he would be too immature for her and her ideas of what a husband should be.

But God. Aren't those amazing words?! So many times in my life I didn't understand things...why they happened,what the purpose was, why things didn't happen, how any good could come from it....But God!  He is always working things out for us, even when we don't understand. This sounds like I have a lot of faith. I don't. It's probably one of my greatest struggles. I also struggle with a lot of anger from not understanding why. But God, once again, is helping me learn to take things one day at a time and fully rely on Him and that it isn't necessary for me to understand everything. I'm just too nosy sometimes. Ha!

Okay, I got sidetracked...

I'm pretty sure Dad was already in love before he even met Mom! Ha! Once they met it didn't take long for them to fall in love, obviously. Two weeks later he came down for another visit and while out on a drive along some back roads, he stopped at a stop sign, and asked her to marry him. She, of course, said yes and they had a smooch. Then Dad promptly opened the car door and threw up. This is seriously my favorite part of my parents love story. It cracks me up!! Haha! 😂

A short 6 months later, on December 5, 1981 they got married in Little Rock and began their life together. 💓

I know this isn't MY story but there are relevant facts that apply to my story. And had they not met and gotten married, only God knows where I would have ended up. So, see? Even 7 years before I was born, God was writing my story...

I'm not positive on when exactly it happened but not long after they got married, I think within the first year, Dad got electrocuted. They lived in a small mobile home and on their bed they had an electric blanket. They went to bed one night and had the blanket folded down at the foot of the bed. A bad storm had come in and there was lightening. I don't know the specifics of how it all works but somehow the lightening traveled through the wires and into that blanket. Dad had his feet laying on the blanket and that is how he got electrocuted. The ironic thing is he was a lineman at the time and still works for a power company today! Thankfully he wasn't hurt too bad but it did cause problems with them being able to have biological children.

Along with this happening to Dad they discovered that Mom had endometriosis.  The combination of his accident and her illness caused them to suffer from infertility. They tried for many years and went through some treatments. However, this was more than 30 years ago and they didn't have the options we have today. So, after many disappointing months, as those of us in the infertility boat understand, they started considering adoption.

Now, I told y'all in my first blog that I am adopted and my children are/will be. This is a subject that means so much to me and I am very passionate about it. I may have some strong feelings come out on this subject! 😀

Here's the first one....why is it so dadgum expensive to adopt??!! Y'all. It's insane!! When we started looking for an attorney for Emerson's adoption there were some that quoted us upwards of $40k. Like what?! Obviously we didn't use them but a lot are around that price. Especially if you use an agency. Who can afford that? Not a regular ole Joe, that's for sure!!

So, here you have all these people that are dying to have children and can't, people that don't want to have children and are, and no one who can afford to do what the child needs. I've talked to people who have said "We would love to adopt but we just can't afford it." And I totally understand!!

Mom and Dad were in this boat and didn't have the option to go through an adoption agency, so they begin to pray.

And God answered. 💓

Getting to know me!

Let me start of by saying, I have no idea what I’m doing on this blog thingy! 😁 I thought it would be a good form of “therapy” for me to get my thoughts and feelings out. So if you’re interested, follow along with me! I’ll probably be just as surprised as you are by some of the things we discover about me. 😜

Hi! I’m Aimee Marks. I’m a thirty something year old mom in small town Louisiana. I, myself, am adopted and my son is adopted. We have sole custody of his half sister and are hoping to be able to adopt her in the near future. I’m not going to go into detail right now about any of our adoption stories but we will in later blogs.

I was born in Michigan and my adoptive parents lived in Arkansas so shortly after birth I moved to the south. My dad became a preacher and we lived a lot of places! Mostly in the Midwest. We finally settled here in LA where I met my husband, Richard, and 5 and a half months later we got Emerson. 2 months later we were married in November of 2015. In April of 2018 Miss Gwenyth joined our family and we haven’t been the same since! 😂😍

I am now a stay at home mom and I love it! Most days. Some days I can feel my hair turning gray and the wrinkles forming. 😁😜

There are going to be a lot of raw, honest emotions on this blog but I don’t want anyone to think I am laying blame on someone. Not. At. All. These are just my thoughts and feelings. I have had a wonderful life and I am so immensely blessed! But we all have those days....this is my way of sharing my story. For my benefit and maybe for yours.

I’m also not a writer nor have I fully mastered the English language so please don’t judge me on it! 😁😁 Feel free to contact me with any questions or let me know what you would like me to write about first!

Have a wonderful day!
Much Love💕