Greetings & Salutations Faithful Stapleton Blog Readers! Although with my frequency of updates the faithful bit might be a stretch. It has been almost a year since my last update, so I thought it was time to sit down and do a post for posterity’s sake. So lets take a walk through memory lane since my last update.
Summer 2014
Over the 4th of July Jess went over to Charlotte, NC to spend some time with her family. Since moving to Nebraska all of Jess’s Immediate family have moved south, leaving her Mom & Step Dad the only ones left in WV. Jess had a good visit and even got to spend a few days at the beach. During the visit Jess also learned she was going to be an Aunt! Ricky & Megan are expecting their first child in March 2015.Â
When Jess returned in Mid-July we commenced moving. Since coming to Lincoln we had lived in a two bedroom apartment that was always meant to be temporary and that kind of turned into a little under 2 1/2 years of living there. The complex was nice and so was the community, but the last year we were there new owners purchased the property and things went really down hill. Also the complex literally could not have been any further from my office and still be in the Lincoln city limits.
After a lot of looking I was able to find us a townhouse a 1/4 mile from my office. In WV we would call this a duplex but that term is frowned upon out here so it’s a townhouse. The rent was super reasonable for Lincoln (rule of thumb, figure $600 a bedroom for any decent place to rent) and it even came with a fenced in backyard for my boy. The other side of the duplex is a second home for a couple that only use it about 6 days a month so its like we have the entire place to ourselves. The move was a little more rough than I would have liked but we got through it.Â
In July we also celebrated our 15th Wedding Anniversary but you can read more about that here.
Fall 2014
In September one of my employees left the company, at that point I literally started doing two jobs for a period of about three months, so that consumed a great deal of my fall. It just wasn’t fair to dump the work load on my other employees and mess up their goals for the year with such little time to make it up. See what a wonderful boss I am?
With everything going on I had not been back to WV since May so Jess & I went back to WV for Thanksgiving. It was good to see everyone but those short trips can take it out of you. In order to re-work Christmas this year with all the geographic challenges we went over to Charlotte the 2nd weekend in December to have Christmas with Jess’s Dad. It was a great but much too short a trip.
Winter 2014
Since we are still in Winter all I have to report is that it was cold and we went home for Christmas week as usual, you can see all the Christmas Pics below.
I’m sure you all are thinking what about Jess, how are the headaches? I’m sorry to report that Jess still struggles with Migraines on nearly a daily basis and has been unable to work. This particularly nasty period of Migraines began about 6 months before our move and has not really let up, so if you working the math she has been in about 3 1/2 years of living hell. We are not able to find anything to mitigate the migraines that still allow her to function normally. She did apply for a subbing position with Lincoln Public Schools and we are waiting to hear back. This way she can still use her mad teaching skills but without all the stress of having to maintain a classroom.
I’m blessed that I’m able to support both of us right now, but that does not mean we have given up hope in getting Jess functional again. There are some new treatments coming down the pike, that may help and no matter how many times she asks I won’t shoot her. (You know they always come after the Husband first)
That’s pretty much all that’s going on out here in the Great Plains.
Jessica & I hope that this update finds your and yours doing well, Good Night & God Bless.