After snaking our way out of the Arkansas mountains (hills? I dunno), we headed to Kentucky.
When J and I were first married, we were both in the Army and our first duty station together was Ft. Knox, KY. We have fond memories of there. We didn’t actually, then. But after we moved to the Ft. Bragg, NC in the pit of hell, we had a new appreciation for our time spent in Kentucky.
Our first home. Funny story: Under this window was this giant hideous bush that I tried to kill the entire time we were there. They had to have pulled it out, because I don’t think anything could have killed it. They also repainted. It was red brick with white siding.
Ft. Knox is the first place we made a real home, had our 2 oldest kids and I had to see my husband off for his first deployment as a married couple. We frequented Louisville often and went to The Old Spaghetti Factory. Often.
So we decided since we were headed to Kentucky anyway to the Ark Encounter, we’d make a detour for a few days and show the kids where they were born and see how much had changed. Elizabethtown has added a lot and Radcliff as well. We went to a movie at the little theater there in Radcliff for the memories. (I think before kids, J and I would go see every movie that came out worth watching)
We arrived at the military campground right north of Ft. Knox and it had changed a bit from the day my parents came to stay there while I had my middle. I remember being in labor when we went and met them at the park to get them checked in, then later my mom and I went shopping. In the cold, almost icy rain. Don’t worry, I didn’t have B until later that night.
We took the kids around Ft. Knox and saw our old house on post, the buildings J and I used to work in and ate lunch at the PX. Such good memories and nostalgia. I didn’t quite realize how emotional it would be. Its been what? 13 years since we’ve been there but it feels like a lifetime ago!
To finish off our time, we took the kids to downtown Louisville and the Old Spaghetti Factory to eat dinner. Jeremy’s mom loved that place and when we’d leave, she would always get a bag of Mizithra cheese to go. So of course, so did we. My favorite is the browned butter pasta with mizithra. Yummm.
I think the kids enjoyed seeing where they were born and K remembered bits and pieces of it. So excited we were able to show the kids a piece of their history.
Arriving in Mountain View, Arkansas was an adventure. The road from Hot Springs was increasingly windy and steep. I guess it makes sense being that we were going down into a valley, but seriously. We have decided that in the little towns headed down into the valley were designed by the town drunk.
Mountain View however, is a little paradise in the valley. Such a sweet little mountain town where folk music is everything. We stayed in a nice little campground right outside of town, Blue Sky RV Park, and thoroughly enjoyed our stay. Nice and quiet and the owner was super nice. When we arrived, it was still cold and everything was brown. Apparently we arrived before their tourist season started. By the time we left, everything was green and the weather was beautiful.
People will bring their instruments to the Pickin Park and play and sing. Since we are not instrumentally inclined, we listened. 🙂
We had a reason for venturing into Mountain View, and perhaps that is the reason it has taken me so long to write about it. This is the first time my husband would be meeting his sister. It would also be the first time our kids met their cousins. Its truly an amazing story. One that’s hard to fit into a blog post.
But the background is: my husband was adopted when he was about 2 1/2. He had known all his life he was and that he had other siblings out there. His mom passed away in 2014 and we had much of her stuff at our house. When our house came under contract we had 30 days to clear it and get stuff packed. It was about 5 days before closing I was going through a tupperware of his moms papers, pictures and notes that I came across his original adoption notes from the paralegal. In this, we discovered his birth fathers name, the birth dad’s family and detailed notes on where they were from and what they did. It was truly amazing. It put us on a path to finding his birth moms sister whom he spoke to on the phone, a potential half sister and her siblings and the employer of his birth father. We learned from his aunt (birth mom’s sister) that she was contacted by a female saying she was the birth moms daughter.
We had a picnic out here with us 5, Jeremy’s sister, mom and husband! Such a beautiful area!
Making a long story short, we found the name of my husbands sister and we did what we knew how to do: find people with that name on Facebook and start messaging. It wasn’t until a few months later that the correct Kimberly messaged him back saying she was the right one! What is amazing, is that she knew about her brother her whole life and her adoptive parents actually wanted my husband as well. Instead, the adoption fell through at the last minute. She had been looking for my husband under his original name, but his name had been changed when he was adopted. So this is why she was never able to find him. It wasn’t until a few years ago, my husband actually knew his given name at birth.
So, a surreal several months later, we made our way to Arkansas to meet his sister and her family. I’m not sure what I imagined, siblings meeting for the first time, but it didn’t go like that. We met at her husbands restaurant with all the kids on a cold, misty day. They hugged, we hugged, we introduced nieces and nephews ( I have nieces and nephews y’all!) and just talked. After getting the stories told, from each perspective, it seemed like they had known each other all their lives.
We were able to meet Kimberly’s mom (who had almost adopted Jeremy) and her husband. Later that week, Kim’s sister and niece came up to meet everyone. It was all so surreal and have been able to spend an entire month with them all, getting to know everyone and the kids getting to know their cousins.
Our daughter also had her Sweet 16 here! We were so blessed we got to spend it with new family!
Its truly amazing how much the kids all favor each other, looks wise and personality wise. They enjoy many of the same hobbies, they are artsy and get along so well.
God has worked all of this out in His perfect timing and plan. I shudder to think that those notes could have been packed away without a glance into a storage unit to not be found for who knows how long. Because we are full timing, we were able to spend time to get to know each other.
My husband is over the moon that he has found his sister and he is so proud of her. Being an only child and now he has 2 sisters, brothers in law, nieces, nephews, and a whole other family who already treats us like family. God is so good and it goes to show, you don’t always have to be blood related to be family. I can’t wait until we go for another visit.
