The Very First One

Hello and Welcome to the rollercoaster! I'm Karla, married to Sparky. Happily for going on 12 years. In fact we will be celebrating our 12th anniversary this weekend. In honor of the milestone, well, lately it seems like a milestone, we're having ourselves a party!

We are currently not trying to conceive. We're taking a break. Just biding time in life while Sparky looks for a new job. He's been looking for a long time. A long time. Over a year. We were hoping to have something new, be somewhere new, by this summer. That didn't happen. So, we signed our lease and we're essentially stuck here until next spring.

I don't want you to assume that we're fully unhappy about that. Honestly, we love where we live. The problem? No job. Not the one that Sparky's looking for at this point in his career. So we're looking throughout the world for a new opportunity, the right opportunity. Now, how the hell do we find it?

I have a theory. Life is NOT at all what I'd planned. Nothing that I've dreamt of, planned for, worked hard for, has happened. Except for the hunky hubby, of course. So, anyway, back to my theory. I do not find my life, my life finds me. Why? Because we talked about getting a dog. For years. But he wanted this and I wanted this. Well, our Chessa found us. We weren't looking. In fact we told our friends NO, we did NOT want her. And then we fell in love. Ches is 9. She is the BEST dog ever. We adore her. Love her. And now I cannot imagine my life without her. She found us when we needed her most.

My theory came into play again on a cold December night in 2007. Sparky went to the garage to find something and came back in with a starving, abandoned kitty. Even when she found us we didn't want her, that sounds awful doesn't it? But we didn't. Our lease states we're not supposed to have cats. Alas, we fell in love and named her Woobie. That's a story I'll save for another time. And so, it seems, that this is the way we're meant to build our family.

Great things come in all different packages. When I met my husband he wasn't "the one" for me. How wrong I was. His package wasn't what I was looking for, but the gift inside was more than I could have hoped for. No, our journey hasn't been smooth, it's been a rollercoaster. I've always hated rollercoasters...but I might have to change my mind.