Happy

Hoping that after September, we'll be like this all the time.

A little dirt

don't hurt. The boy loves a good sandbox! (Taken over the summer at the local rec park in my childhood neighborhood.)

Nearly here

Yay! I get to pick up my little boy this weekend. He will be a much-loved Christmas gift. This is him being a goofy monkey in one of the few pictures Emerson was able to get with us looking at the same spot at the same time and with my eyes open, LOL. We're gonna try again with a photo studio when Jen's here. He was a bit distracted, and our friend hadn't had any experience taking shots of kids. Still, there were some fun ones, this included. Jensen is such a stinker sometimes!!

Your love

is better than ice cream. Better than anything else that I've tried.

Thrilled

With my boy. Isn't he gorgeous?

Lonely

wanting more of this...

Sunshine

Just missing my little sunshine and blue skies. Jensen really is my whole life, and it feels pretty lonely without him.

Ultimately, I have to keep reminding myself that him being with me, in a place where I can support him and give him a network of friends and family is the best thing, and that's why I'm doing what I'm doing. The short-term separation will be worthwhile if it can result in us being together everyday after the decision is made.

Right now I'm stopping off to visit family. My uncle is on a work assignment near Dallas, so I've met up with him and we're going to pick up my aunt at the Dallas airport in a little bit. She's flying in from Reno. I'll stay with them until Friday, drop her off again at the airport on my way home, and hopefully be back in Round Rock by dinnertime.

In the meantime, I'm working really hard to be busy, and my best distractions are books and the internet. I've already finished Mockingjay, and picked up The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. The first few pages of that last one were pretty dense for me, so I watched the movie through Netflix to see if I should continue the book. I haven't made an offiical decision yet, but it's hard for me to ignore a book lying around. At some point I'm sure I'll make another attempte.

Well-meaning people keep asking me how it went at court. Really, there's nothing to report. It was mainly just getting to know the players and exactly what was being asked for. Both Michael and I have spoken with a new social worker who was assigned just for the custody case, and I've been told to expect a home visit in RR sometime before the next court date. I'm not sure if the judge can issue a ruling at any time, or if there can come a point where she feels like she's heard enough even if we haven't jumped through all the hoops yet. Apparently at some point, Michael and I will sit with our lawyers and try to resolve things based on what direction the judge might already be leaning or how tired we are with the whole process. If that doesn't work, we'll be ordered to go through psych testing and who knows what else. So far, we are still early on in the process, and it might be several months after our next meeting before there is any resolution.

Right now, it is most important for me to find a job, make sure the house stays "visit-ready" and stay as optimistic as possible.

Until I can visit him again, I'm making sure that I call Jenny every day and send him little packages every few days. I think he understands they're from me... I just hope that we'll be able to be together again sooner than later.