"People are often unreasonable, irrational and self centered; forgive them anyway. If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives; be kind anyway. If you are successful, you will win some unfaithful friends and some genuine enemies; succeed anyway. If you are honest and sincere, people may deceive you; be honest and sincere. What you spend years creating, others could destroy overnight; create anyway. If you find serenity and happiness, some may be jealous; be happy anyway. The good you do today, will often be forgotten; do good anyway. Give the best you have and it may never be enough; give your best anyway. In the final analysis, it is between you and God; it was never between you and them anyway." - Mother Theresa
You know when you’re a kid and as you grow older and understand the basic concept of life, you start to build in your mind how you would want your life to be when you are old enough to have full control of what you imagined.
I wouldn’t know exactly what I would have built while in imagined back when I was a kid. But I’m sure I have an idea and it would be to have kids, a safe home for them to grow up in and financial stability and of course, Superman would have to be my husband.
Everyday for the past few months, I’ve woken up with.a heart full of gratitude. I’m super thankful. I’m blessed and I do my absolute best to not forget it but to share it.
Thanksgiving is upon us and I can say wholeheartedly that I am happy and I am blessed. All that I’ve ever dreamed of is right I front of me at my fingertips.
Going into 2022, I hope I can do more. Share more and hope that those i come in contact with can find their happy and heart full of blessings.
2020 shouldn’t count anyway cause it was a pandemic year. So let’s just say - 2020 was the year of COVID-19.
I’m about to turn 32 years old. Next month. I’ve thought about my blog here and there with thoughts of how I’d like to update it. But my honest feelings when the thought crossed my mind was - I don’t think I’ll ever return back to my blog and whatever entries were there, was all it would ever see.
Today, was a little different. I didn’t make it to church today, I woke up in time that everyone would have been leaving, so in disappointment, I woke up and thought… “do what you can anyway.”
I visited the ER last night. I went in cause I couldn’t feel my right arm. In my mind, I worried I was having a stroke. My grandma Silivia had a stroke in her elder years and that dawned on me that it may happen to me too which explains the thought that I might be having a stroke.
I drove to the ER. Left hand only. Checked in. Got vitals and sat and waited for the doctor. When the doctor came in, she asked her questions of what’s been going on and I answered. She says she would like to do an ultrasound to rule out any blood clots. As she continued to examine my arm, she saw the muscle above my shoulder near the back of my neck was swollen and super tight.
She says… well here’s your problem. Your muscle is so tight that it’s pinching your nerve to your arm. 😳🤣 I asked… is that the nice doctor way of saying - you’re fat, exercise and stretch. 😂 she laughed and said, something this bad only comes from it building up overtime… and since I had two babies a year and one the following year, it’s just slowly built up.
So they threw a hot pad on my shoulder and basically massaged it back down. Told me it will be painful in the morning and sent me with a prescription for ibuprofen and lidocaine patches.
I drove home, both arms this time but right side was very painful, but this drive was different. I drove home with thoughts of each of my family members in mind.
TinaLei Ku’uAmaraAne Klailea Suluka
My Fireball.
8 months old and is the ruler of the rug. If I could say anything about my WayWay baby, it’s that she reminds me so much of my Dad. If she spent all nine months while I carried her inside of me, with my Dad, i wouldn’t be surprised in the slightest. Her laugh, Her observation to everything around her to her cry. I see so much of my dad in her.
1 other thing. She’s a little fighter. When she sees something she wants, she goes for it and anything that dares to be in her way will see her wrath. 😂
Silieta Kuuipo O Kakela Suluka
Boss Baby
18 months old and knows exactly what she wants plus she knows exactly what you want too. 🤣
She’s got a clear eye for her destinations and I love how bold she is in putting herself out there.
I’m a nursery leader at church so everyone brings their babies to me while they are in their classes. Every kid has a little phase of getting used to nursery before they are comfortable with staying.
Silieta. Had no problem of going. Let’s see if results stay the same when she heads off to preschool.
Henele O’Vikster Suluka
The Boxer. 9 years old.
He’s moved on from his only 1 season of little league football and found new ground in boxing. He loves boxing.
He is somewhat a preteen and with this change comes with much attitude and selective hearing.
These times are rough but luckily for me, Henele has a huge heart. If there’s one way I know I could get something stuck in his head to learn, it’s through his heart. He’s got some things we’ve got to focus on but overall, what a kid he is. I truly grateful for my one and only son.
Tamara Leethee Suluka
The Teenager. 11 years old.
Please oh please fast forward this part. 😂😂
Man I wish there was a manual for teenagers. She’s still my little girl but these changes we got going on makes me want to pull all my hair out.
Patience is more then what is seems. It’s a craft, a skill a kind of way of life that if it’s not incorporated, you’ll die. 😂
Amoni Suluka.
32 years old.
Has taught me a love that I never knew existed. A live that’s close to the sound of a just born babies cry.
I love the life we’re building together. I love every challenge, fight, argument and joke that comes with every days happenings.
We’ve got a lot of life to live and a lot to live for.
I've made it to the year 2020! I'm so excited to see what's in store for this upcoming year. I have many things on my mind and many things I want to tackle and many goals that have been placed for me to conquer.
I would say that for my family for this year, we are going to theme this year with - "Seeing Clearly" I think it's only fit because it is the year 2020, do you see the intended pun in that? lol Yeah it might be a little cheesy but "Seeing Clearly" couldn't ring more perfect for me and my little family.
This will be year 2 for Amoni and I being married and although our first year has been mostly amazing, lets be honest. We are still very human and still have our rough times.
Both Christmas and New Years this round has been rough on both Amoni and I. I can't tell if it's Satan working overtime on us or if it really is just us finding differences that are hard for us to patch or meet in the middle.
What I do know is that I'm a fighter and will continue to keep fighting until I know for a fact that I cannot fight anymore.
So here's to 2019 that has taught me many lessons that I've learned to endure and also persevere through. Many life trials and struggles that have strengthened me and helped me mind many weaknesses that I now know I need to work on for a better me.
My family I will be working on this year and hope to make everything for the better.
Here we are, December 22, 2019 and as the year winds down, I wanted to take a few minutes to simply write about all that I'm grateful for.
This year really did fly by quickly. So much happened and I don't know how I lost track of the entire year. Overall, it's been a pretty ok year with the exception of the passing of my Dad. I really do miss him so much.
I have pictures of him and the family right before he passed and I catch myself crying or feeling down cause part of me wishes I would've done more to try and keep him here longer.
The last time I was on here, I nut-shelled the whole year in one post. That sounds like me these past few years though. I have a hard time taking the time to sit and update the blog.
December 11, 2019 at 9:58 am.
Sisilieta Ku'uipo-'O-Kakela Suluka
was born. She weighed in at 6 lbs 9 oz and stretched 19 inches long. She finally arrived!!
Lets rewind a bit though yeah?
December 10, 2019. Amoni and I woke up that morning and planned our day. What we originally planned totally fell through. We had plans to fix cars that we've had lined up for some time and we eneded up going to Home Depot to rent the rug doctor and we carpet cleaned the entire house! lol Way different huh?
I wanna say maybe all that walking around the house really put some work on my body cause once we were done, I showered and went to bed about 10 maybe 11 pm. Now, being 8 almost 9 months pregnant I'm constantly going to the bathroom.
Well, its about midnight on December 11, 2019 and I get up to go pee. As I'm walking out of the room to the bathroom, my water breaks! I turn to Amoni and say, "Uh oh!" and he turns and says, "Whats going on?" and I'm like, "My water just broke! On the carpet we just cleaned!" lol Yes, I was worried about the carpet too - why? I dont know.
I tell him to wake up the kids and send them to my Mom's house. I've had the baby's bag and my hospital bag already packed for what seems like weeks... you know.. I was trying to put out to the universe that I was ready to have this baby. lol
I change, we send the kids off and we are off to the Hospital.
We get the ER and the roll us down to the Womens Center and we get checked in. They bring us to one of the delivery rooms and start taking samples to confirm that I am in fact in labor.
The nurse runs 3 different tests, leaves and comes back maybe 10 minutes later and tells me that the tests came back negative and that my water has not broken.
I'm like - WHAT?!! (and in my head I'm thinking either this nurse is crazy or her tests are dumb and wrong.)
She says, she will give it maybe 45 minutes and re-test.
During this 45 minutes I'm starting to feel heavy and strong contractions and I'm telling myself, I am not going home feeling these types of contractions.
She comes back and takes more samples and leaves.
My Everything.
She comes back and says the same thing. My water hasnt broke. She checks my cervix and I've dilated from a 4 to a 6 since her first sample testing and says that based on this I am in early stage labor.
10 hours later. My next Princess is born and I couldn't be any happier.
Pregnancy was really taking a toll on my body during the 3rd trimester and honestly don't think I could've lasted until Christmas Day to have her. But just like Tamara and Henele, she was born 2 weeks early.
The one thing about my delivery was my Dad was there. It would've been about 4 am when my contractions were really big and really long. I felt so tired to cry or scream that I wanted to just push and get her out. But the way she was positioned made it impossible for me to push cause I could've hurt her if I tried to push too early. So I sat and took the pain.
But around this time, I saw my Dad standing off to the corner of the bed and in my head I cried out to him asking him, "What do I do?" and he would reply "Breathe Via, just Breathe!"
And for the second half of my labor time, my dad coached me through the pain until it was finally time for me to push her out.
When I was pushing her out, I turned to look for my dad in the area he was standing before, and he had already left.
Thank you Dad! I couldn't have done it without you!
We discharged on Friday December 13th. There weren't any complications after delivery. Just a matter of keeping an eye on me and the baby for the standard 48 hours.
Now being home for almost 2 weeks now, she is sooo loved!
I am truly grateful of my family and everything that I've been blessed with. So much has happened this past year and along with all that happened, many blessings too!
I love and miss my Dad and Im truly blessed to have my little Silieta in our growing family.
Here's to a year to remember and a new year to prepare for.
2020 will be a year to make bigger moves with bigger strides.
Happy Holidays and Happy New Years everyone!
Hope your hearts and homes are filled with Love and Joy!
This year has been - a year to remember.
Both good and bad and everything in between has come of 2019.
Overall, I would say, 2019 is an ok year.
Ok for the following reasons.
Let us begin shall we?
1. Year started out great. Mind you I married the love of my life last September so the beginning of this year, we would have only been a few months into our marriage.
Marriage so far has been "a dream"
You know when you're a kid and dream of that special person you're gonna spend your life with and all your future goals and how you're going to turn out when you're in your adult years? Well, all my dreams came true when I married my Honda.
Honda Meets Grandma Silivia
We are so compatible it's ridiculous. I want to say that in one of my earlier posts that could be even years back, I had written something along the lines of "if there is a man out there that is just like me, I would propose to him."
He is that man.
He's so good with Tamara and Henele. He can't wait to adopt them fully and legally. Tamara has actually sided more with him then me on most things. I love the relationship they have built.
Last night he had a meeting at the church and got home pretty late. His first place to go is down to see the kids. Totally blew me off and went to check on them.
2. I got pregnant sometime in January. We were super excited. We want more kids and were trying. So when I tested positive, we were both so very happy.
Two months in, sometime in March, I miscarried. We cried. I remember seeing the look on his face and how broken I could tell he was.
The Miscarriage
Soon, after... and no joke.. like right after. I got pregnant again. I honestly dont even think I had a period from the miscarriage to the new pregnancy. Thats how determined we were to grow our family.
Today, I am 37 almost 38 weeks and about to pop. lol I know.... this is the only reason why I can take the time to update the blog... I'm pretty much out of commission doing anything.
This pregnancy has been such a rollercoaster. With Tamara and Henele, it was pretty smooth sails. But this one, I've had to endure pelvic pressure. Something new I learned this round. So basically, the baby has been developing close to and on top of my pelvic bone and when I hit about 5-6 months, that when the pain really started to hit. The heavier the baby gets, the more pain I have to deal with. So these past few days and what I hope will be only the next few days, I still have to do my best to do what I can but also being mindful of myself. It's really hard.
We are naming her after Amoni's late Mom Sisilieta and my oldest sister Kuuipo. =) Hopefully she comes soon. Cause I've been ready to unload for a few weeks now. lol Im actually counting contractions as I sit here and blog.
3. Around the same time we got pregnant, we learned my Dad was diagnosed with Stage 2 Liver Cancer. We were certain we were going to beat it. You notice how I've been using past tense.
My Dad passed away August 8, 2019 at about 6:30 am.
It had been such a rough few months of drs appointments, procedures, surgeries and all of the above. In the end, we left it to God and we have been coping and learning to accept that his journey here in this life was complete.
I miss my dad so much. I wish there was something more we could do to keep him here longer with us. A few months has passed and things are definitely different without him.
One Last Ride
- after my dads funeral services we asked to drive by our home one last time with him before we go lay him to rest at the cemetery. This is us.
4. The Move - This past June, Lee and Lawrence moved out of the Yellow House and into an apartment. Lets just say, they decided they wanted to venture out on their own, away from the family. When they made that decision, the Yellow House was open and we decided to move from the Back House to the Yellow House and took over the mortgage.
We are currently moving the mortgage out of Lees name and into mine and Amonis. Its been challenging. Given, Im the only steady income, I'm pregnant and during my dad cancer treatment, I was his caregiver, taxi and secretary. I took a hit on my only income. Amoni has been steady fixing cars and picking up cash where he can, but even that can be a hit or miss. Which brings me to...
5. The Calling - A few months ago, Amoni was called to be the Second Counselor in the Bishopric. He has been steadily serving faithfully and with his calling comes with MUCH ministering. When families need help with their cars, he's right there ready to serve and sometimes, they don't have the money to pay for labor, so it gets hard. But we continue to see that sometime cash flows and other times blessings flow. Either way, we take it one day at a time, one month at a time and just keep it moving.
6. The Green Card - Amoni is currently a permanent resident of The United States. We just got his Green Card earlier this week. We initially filed all his form back in March and finally got an interview two weeks ago and got approved for his Green Card. He can now, work and help out around the house with a steady income.
Since our baby will be here soon, I asked him to stay home with me during my maternity leave and will plan to make adjustments to our family as needed while I am off work recovering from the baby, before I return back to work.
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It's been quite a year. I wish I could go into detail the way I used to. But for now, this will have to do.
Christmas is around the corner and the year is winding down.
I am content with life at this time. Life is definitely blissful with exceptions of mourning my dad.
Merry Christmas! Happy New Year!
May 2020 be the year to start standing and really progressing in the life. I want to live with the goals my dad set for us in this life.
I have a lot to cover here soon once the baby is born, but I know what Im capable of and cant wait to beast!
So the below post was originally written a week after we got married.
As for my title of this post, I'm now 5 months into my marriage with my Amoni Suluka.
I know, it's time I go ahead and update. Hopefully, because I'm at the same time, trying to upload a little video on my youtube channel of our lovely little lives, I want to post it within this post too. Let me warn you though - its 18 minutes long. lol Please be advised.
A year ago, I was pretty much in my own world, keeping things simple and really just focusing on myself. After my second marriage fell through, I told myself that I've put the kids through enough, lets just move on and live our best life, alone. I honestly wasn't planning or even wanting for that matter to get married again. I just wanted to improve who I was. I DID - tell myself this...
"If my King is out there, he will find me."
I wasn't gonna put myself out there. I wasn't gonna actively date. I honestly wanted to be alone with Tamara and Henele and focus on bringing their dreams to life.
Little did I know... My King would really find me.
Amoni is from New Zealand. He had recently finalized his divorce in New Zealand and came to America to visit his Brother that lives in Morgan, Utah.
Morgan is really in the middle of no where. If you drive up to Layton, and go east into the moutains you'll run into this small town, Morgan.
He came to America June 2018. He had been in town a few months before I even heard of him. Amoni is an Auto Mechanic. Amoni is a relative of Lawrence - my brother in law, Lee's Husband. Well, Lawrence's truck had broke down and heard that his cousin was in America and called him and asked him to check out his truck since he was a Mechanic.
He fixes Lawrences truck and Lee is impressed with his work and asks him to then work on her FJ Cruiser. Amoni did a huge number on Lee's car cause it really did have a lot of work that needed to be done on it.
While Lee's car is getting fixed she would post pictures of her car parts on our family chat and just give us random car fixing updates for us. I remember seeing these pictures and what was being done and thinking, jeez Les, you really don't take care of your car. Yes, I was impressed.
It was then I thought in my mind, "do i have any problems with my car that need to be done." I didn't. I actually just got my brakes done at a shop a few months before Amoni showed up. And everything was looking good with my car anyway. So I didn't have any business with "this mechanic."
Now, when my second marriage fell through, I took both kids with me and both cars. I drive primarily my Escalade and my Trailblazer, my Dad was using at the time.
I come home and as my usual, I talk with my mom about my day at work. She then tells me that "this mechanic" is working on the Trailblazer. I think, hold on... that's my car. What going on with the trailblazer and what is "this mechanic" fixing. My mom says, I dont know.
I then take it upon myself to find out what "this mechanic" is doing to my car. I walk over to the other house that he's been fixing all the cars at to find out.
I walk over there and say in a demanding tone, "Hello! I've come to audit your work on my car." He rolls out from under the car surprised and sees me and says, "oh this is your car." I then explain yes, but I don't drive it.
It was here where my audit of his work turned out to almost be a little challenge between the two of us. I had a small and I do mean small background of auto mechanics and somehow end up changing out the spark plugs to the car. While doing so, we talked and I got to know "this mechanic."
This is where his somewhat challenges were really him trying to keep me around.
Over then next 2-3 weeks, I found myself coming home from work and going straight to the garage to see him. It wasnt so much the cars, but it was him that I wanted to be around and I didn't care if I had to fix a car to do it. I just wanted to be near him.
He finally builds up the courage to ask me out on a date, and we go to Temple Square after working on the trailblazer for 2-3 weeks.
It was an Autumn Sunday and we went to Temple Square in Salt Lake City and walked. We sat near circle stand where you take pictures right in front of the Temple and watched people walk by, take pictures and this is where we opened up to eachother.
It was almost like, the prayers we had been crying to Heavenly Father were being answered through eachother. This same day, Amoni proposed to me and I froze. I kept asking questions and was beating around the bush but he was focused on his question.
I said yes and we married the following Friday!
This have been very busy and challenging. The adjustment for the two of us and also the kids have been trying. What we like to call, our transition phase. The kids absolutely love Amoni! Amoni absolutely loves them. It can be assumed that it would take a little bit of time for all of us to adjust to these changes.
5 months in and what sums this all up for me is this -
I didn't know you could be this happy.
Now, to add to all this amazing happiness is this -
A week ago today, we walked the grounds of Temple Square together and there opened our souls to each other.
Words spoke, stories told, experiences shared, history stated and above all, the unplanned and unexpected happened - love overtook.
An unexpected life turn came and steered us to our eternal commitment to each other.
I didnt see you coming, but I knew you were him when we spoke
I didn't plan on you, but you came anyway.
I wasn't ready for you, but jumped with you.
Everyone we loved questioned us both, even I did, and with how soon things came to pass, can you really blame the quesitons, no. But we were there for each other to fallback on anyway.
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Xoxo Via
