The Fam on Christmas Day!

I am pretty sure that my present topped the list this year for the best gift of 2008.

Ellie got a scooter! Adam scored an acoustic electric guitar! Nate got a new wardrobe! Hallie scored a Nintendo DS! Hannah got a lot of character toys!!

It was a great Christmas for all of us! Especially Gin and I of course, wink wink!

Our Christmas Morning from HELL!!

So...what better to do on a blustery and snowing Christmas morning...Well head to grandma's house of course! As we opened the front door to leave for the morning, we could barely open the door the winds were so strong. We all ran to the car and began what we will now remember as the day we almost died on 7800 South trying to get to grandma's house. As we turned onto 7800 South we realized that the wind was blowing so hard that the roads were a total white out! We literally could not see 2 feet in front of the car! We were slowly making our way down the road, using the snow banks and telephone poles as guides! We are making our way down the road where out of nowhere a truck is sideways in the middle of the road...I slammed on the breaks just in time to avoid slamming into the side of the truck, only to watch the car behind us nearly slam into us! Needless to say I was shaking like crazy and everyone else in the car was near tears! As we finished our drive down the road we encountered another 5 or 6 cars that were stuck in the snowdrifts! We followed a snow plow out and were able to continue our drive to grandmas. We found out later in the day that they actually closed the road due to the conditions and the number of accidents and incidents. Thank god we were one of the lucky ones to make it out alive!! I don't think we will do that again anytime soon!

Technicalities

One thought may be in your head, "hey Ginny and Ryann...how is that supposed to work? You cannot get married ."
Our answer is: "we know this and we are looking into our options."

December 23, 2008

So, here's the deal:
Ryann and I have had a lot of banter sessions about Gay Marriage, and it's really taken some time to find where I stand on the issue. I had taken a lot of pleasure in voicing the opposing viewpoint regarding Gay Marriage to Ryann, because she really gets FIRED UP about things and there's a part of me that always likes to see her overreact.. Anywhoo, my opinion was largely based upon the fact that I couldn't get past the idea that I am not part of a societal "norm" for the pure fact that I am gay. I am not "included" in many of the things that I once was when I masqueraded as a heterosexual. My logic has been, if I am not part of the "norm" then why should I want to participate such a fundamental "norm" as marraige? Why try to pass myself off as something that I am not? Why would I endorse the institution of marriage, when by societal standards I am an outcast? Needless to say, I had some really good conversations with myself about this issue...For the most part I was content with my stance.. UNTIL the Proposition 8 debacle. UNTIL I really looked into what "marriage" is. I won't bore you with my change of heart, but sufficeth to say, I have come to understand that there are 2 aspects to marriage, the religious rite of marriage and the civil action of marriage and I am now ON BOARD with supporting Gay Marriage!

It has taken a lot of time for me to work through "my place" in society on this issue....and to figure out what would make me happy....so, here we are December 24, 2008 and I have proposed to my lovely partner Ryann....
About 2 months ago, I started looking online for a ring for my darling Ryann....I found a beautiful ring, and then began making plans for a proposal. I knew that I couldn't just "ask her" because Ryann is all about the build up and presentation.... Plus, she has done so many cute lil things for me through the years that I really wanted to knock her socks off.
It was completely ODD that Ryann didn't catch on to what was happening, because there were plenty of signs that I was up to something (i.e. missing money, strange ring fittings by coworkers, time off of work for odd reasons, and mysterious fortune cookie fortunes)..
So, I contacted friends / family and enlisted their help in sending Ryann on a scavenger hunt.
At the end of the scavenger hunt, I was there, with flowers, ring, and poetry.
Below you can see the videos building up to Ryann's arrival.

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My baby's response:

End... :)

It's Official...WERE ENGAGED!!

After 2 years and 181 days since we met, we have made it official, and what an amazing evening it was. Yesterday started off the same as every other day, start the day, head off to work, and then head home...but my evening took a turn as I was leaving my work parking lot. Ginny called in a panic, she said "Babe, you need to pull over and check the trunk for some paperwork I need for Frontline" (her practicum employer), so I made my way to a church parking lot and got out to check the trunk. All I could find was a Walmart photo folder. I took that back into the car with me. I told Ginny that was the only papers that were in my trunk. She says "Well, did you open it", I was like geez ok...I open it to find a paper with a poem on it. Ginny asks me to read the poem outloud, and of course I can't cause I am reading it silently and crying. I make it through the poem and she says to me, "Your Christmas present is on" and hangs up the phone. I proceed with following the directions, and head for LaLuna, a mexican restaurant in West Jordan which he have dined quite a bit during our relationship. During the drive I had a million thoughts racing through my head, I was wondering what in the world we would be doing at LaLuna. After about a 40 minute drive to West Jordan I arrived at LaLuna. As I am walking up to the restaurant I can see Nathan, Adam and Ellie in the window. Right away I knew, Ginny was not going to be there. I opened the door, Ellie hands me another clue, and Adam says "Follow the clues, look for people you know". So I grumble, turn around and head for my next location. I realize that it is just across the strip mall at Iggy's. As I am reaching to open the door, out comes Ginny's brother Steve. I acknowledge him, "O hey Steve", and I think I complained about having to drive all over....He didn't say a word. Talk about awkward. My next clue was to head to Club 90. So of course on my way I am thinking what amazing peeps would be there to meet me. I arrive in the parking lot and I am scoping for familiar cars. I see nothing. So I head inside. I don't see anyone I know. I went back out to the car. Ginny texts me and says to wait a sec. A few minutes later, Shelby and Cambie made it over and gave me the next clue. Again, they didn't want to say much to me? They directed me to Memory Grove. On the way there I began thinking to myself that our special place in Memory Grove was up a dark trail. There was no way in hell that I was walking up the "our spot". When I arrived I recognized Stef's car. She was there with the next clue. Of course, she seemed a lil distant as well, but at least she took my picture LOL! From there she directed me to Tryangles. I was so excited that I only had to travel a short distance for this clue. As I approached I saw two people standing on the corner. It was Marge and Ken. The offered up some knucks and gave me the next clue. I headed toward the softball park which was our next stop. Again my clue giver was a minute or two late so I waited...Jackie made it with the next clue, Liberty Park! I finally felt like there was an end in sight!! As I was driving I had to text Ginny and tell her about this crazy horse that was in this trailer next to me. As I got closer I realized that it was no horse at all, but a camel. I was laughing to myself in my car. I made it to the park, found Gin's car and parked. I looked across the snow to see Ginny standing in of course another memorable spot for us. I made my way across the snowy grass, gaining speed as I got closer to her. Once I reached her, she grabbed me and hugged me. She handed me a dozen multi colored roses and began reading. She has 2 poems and some additional material she had added. She was crying and reading. She asked me why I wasn't crying. Hello, you just made me drive for 2 hours! No I was super excited! She proceeded with asking me to marry her and pulled a ring out of her jacket. That is the point when I lost it. She had bought her and I matching rings. It was the most amazing time! The look on her face was one that I will never forget! We made our way back to the cars. We headed out for a special dinner. Ginny took me to Spencer's downtown at the Hilton. Amazing food!! It was a super romantic dinner. We are going to make that a tradition!! We finished dinner and were going to do a carriage ride. It was so busy!! We just decided to head home. We followed each other and made it home safely. As we walked in the door, I noticed another dozen roses, red roses waiting for me on the table. What a perfect end to an amazing evening. Ok, so that wasn't the end, but that part in noneya! I feel so amazing today. I am so lucky to have the love of a woman as special as Ginny. She has made my life so complete and I can't wait for us to share the rest of our lives together. Thank you to everyone who participated in this special night for us. I was so excited to see all of you and have you be a part of everything. I love you Ginny, always and forver.

Brooke's Christmas Party...

On Friday night Ginny and I took the kids to Brooke's 2nd annual Christmas Party. I don't think that I have been around that many little ones in a long time. I think that our kids were the oldest ones there...damn, sit in a room full of that and ask yourself how young you feel? It was a fun night. All of the kids were all given instructions from Santa on what they needed to work on for the coming year. Of course the kids were convinved that we had provided Santa with the information. I think they may be on to something? Anyways, the kids each told Santa what they wanted for Christmas. Hannah wants a light pink book, Ellie wants pets shops and Hallie wants a DS. Adam managed to escape off to the bathroom right about the time Santa was calling his name, but we know he wants an acoustic guitar. Nathan was working that night so he missed out on the big red guy all together. Thanks again Brooke and Kent for a fun way to kick off the Christmas season!

Freedom of Speech...

Some people have a lot of nerve...until they see an angry teenager hanging out the sunroof of a car, screaming and yelling!! LOL! Yesterday while on our way to the mall we had a run in with a man who wanted to call us out on our lifestyle. About a year ago we placed a Human Rights sticker on our car. If you are not familiar with the sticker, it is blue and yellow with an equal sign. Anyways, as I was driving and had just turned a corner, I heard a car honk. As I looked to my left, there was a car, driving extremely close to the side of our car with his hands in the air. He had his fingers in the shape of an equal sign and his other had was puting a cross through the sign as if to say he did not support equality. Of course, everyone in the car reacted...but Adam had the strongest reaction of all. He reached up and opened the sunroof, climbed out of the roof and was screaming and yelling at the ignorant man. Of course the man was now on the run...he was making a mad dash and trying hard to avoid being along side of our car. We managed for a few seconds to get next to him....I flipped him off, Ginny gave him the univeral sign for female oral sex, and Adam was as I mentioned before hanging out the sunroof doing god knows what gestures, and Nathan was showing some gesture as well. The man slammed on his brakes to stop for a red light to avoid us and ran away....We all laughed in the car for almost the entire trip to the mall. But when we sat down to think about what had really happened, it was quite upsetting. That a random stranger driving down the road would choose to call out an innocent family, just for supporting the rights of people everywhere. I hope that one day for that mans sake that he can change his hateful ways and learn to love everyone for who they are. If not, Ginny got his license place numbers, and damn it would be super fun to call in a solid, find out where he lives and decorate his front lawn with HUMAN RIGHTS STICKERS EVERYWHERE!!!

Some people are just not worth my time...

What a crazy night we have had! It is quite a long story so I will just try to stick to the highlights, or low lights as they should be called. The drama actually began on Sunday afternoon. We have been trying to sell Nathan's 1990 Honda Civic for the past couple of weeks. The engine ceased due to lack of oil (I guess it is not common sense to 16 year old drivers that cars need oil, just for future reference) and the car is really no good to anyone unless they know how to replace the engine. Ginny's niece decided that her and her husband would like to purchase the car, her husband had an engine that would fit the car, seemed like the perfect deal, right?? WRONG!! Ginny made the deal with her niece that they could pay $400 for the car. All parties agreed and were to pick up the car on Monday evening around 7. Jump to Monday night, 11 p.m., yes, I said 11 p.m., not quite sure what happened to 7, but yeah. So the husband of the niece shows up to pick up the car. As he inspects the car and the title, he realizes that the car is a 1990 and he had thought it was a 1991. He was concerned that the engine that he had would not fit the car. Ginny assured him on 3 different occassions that he did not need to purchase the car if he was unsure. He pondered the offer and decided to purchase the car anyways. Ginny at that point received what she thought was the $400, signed over the title. On her way inside she counted the money, revealing that she was only given $300. She text her niece and was assured that she would receive the rest of the money this next week. Ginny's niece began texting her around 10 a.m. on Tuesday morning, stating that the engine that they had did not fit the car and that they wanted to return the car. Ginny was at work and was attempting to distract from the phone calls until work was over and she could process what needed to happen. She was called and text over and over until finally she was off of work and able to respond. She gave in and agreed to let them return the car, even though we had already notified the DMV that the car was no longer ours and that ownership had been transferred to someone else. After coming home and us discussing things more, we realized that it was not really our problem that the engine they had did not fit the car...we began to think that we should let them know that a deal was a deal and we are not ok with taking the car back. And after all, they are family. But today, Ryann took the reigns. I was completely against taking back a car that had been out of my possession for 3 days now. I have no way of knowing if the engine had been removed from the car, what condition the engine was in now, and if the car had had parts removed. At this point, I decided to text the niece and let her know that we would not be willing to take the car back. That a deal was a deal and we are sorry that the engine they had did not fit the car, but the deal was final. And LET THE DRAMA BEGIN. For the last 3 hours this evening we have been fielding a barrage of phone calls and text messages. We have been listening to their empty threats of they are coming to drop off the car no matter what, that they are taking us to court, that the family relationship is over, blah, blah, blah. At one point Ginny's niece stated that "as long as Ginny is in a relationship with me, that she is writing Ginny off as her aunt", um...are you serious??? All of this over a car and $300? So, Ginny and I discussed and decided to call them and tell them to bring the car back, we would give them their money back, and that if all of this is worth losing a family relationship over then so be it...Ginny's niece made one final call and attempt to talk shit about me....Ginny quickly put her in her place and stated that their relationship was over. I don't know why really I am blogging about all of this other than maybe for some feedback? Did we handle this situation right? Would you have allowed them to return the car? Or am I just being a hard ass? Needless to say, I have a 1990 Honda Civic for sale with a blown engine, if you are interested, ALL SALES ARE FINAL.

This picture says a 1000 words...

BUT MY FAVORITE IS BEAUTIFUL!!

Gobble, Gobble....

This year the kids were with their dad's for Thanksgiving. Ginny and I went back and forth on how we should spend the day. We thought about cooking a full meal, just the two of us, but that seemed like a lot of work, and way too much food. We made a reservation at Marie Calendar's and thought we would take the easy and no dishes producing route. But finally on Thanksgiving morning, while at the movies, Ginny's mom called and invited us to join her and Ginny's dad for Thanksgiving dinner. Ginny and I decided to accept the invitation and headed over. What a great time we had!! The family had just given Ginny's mom a new computer for her birthday on Sunday, so Ginny and I spent a couple of hours setting up the new computer. Needless to say, it is not a good idea for us to work together on things like that. So, I quickly left Ginny to the computer and went in to visit with her dad. I have always been a little intimidated by him but after an hour or so of conversing with him, we really had a great chat. We had an amazing dinner. We finished the evening with a slice of pumpkin pie. It was a wonderful holiday and I am so honored that I was able to spend it with such a special family.