Things I love:

Watching my son play with reckless abandon
My little girl asleep on my chest
My husbands voice and embrace
This feeling of closeness with my Savior
My mom and my family
This neighborhood
Crawling into bed at night and back in at 5am
Building a life with my husband...looking at him and knowing that its him and me, in this together...
creating something so priceless
Talking with my girlfriends
The rain last night

A walk to the park

I rented a couple cool lenses for a wedding I shot last weekend. Of course I had to break them in a little... ;)So I forced myself to take a few pics of the fam on the way to the park on Sat! It was so much fun feeling creative again! Man I love good lenses. :)

2 Months old.

Psalm 68:19
Blessed be the Lord
Who daily loads us with benefits!

Among Gracie's many appointments this week was her 2 month check up. She is doing great! She now weighs 7lbs 6.5 oz's is 19 1/2" long and her head is 14.5". Yay Gracie. I know that is tiny, but she gained a pound in two weeks which is exactly what they would expect a baby to do! Yay. Just like any parent you compare the "stats" if you will, of your children and with ours it has been especially fun because they are on opposite ends of the spectrum. To put things in perspective Gavin was 7lbs, 21" at birth. The picture of their footprints says it all. They were both one week old when we did those prints and Gracie's is like 1/2 the size. :) Gavin was always in the 90 percentile and Gracie is in the 0 percentile...so funny. :) It reminds me of that old hymn:
All things bright and beautiful
All creatures great and small
All things wise and wonderful
The Lord God made them all.

Gavin is our little comedian lately. I mean he makes me laugh constantly. From asking me if his ankle was his foot's stomach to telling me that I'm not a bad mom. :) He is definitely a little stinker(as I'm writing this he threw a DVD up in the air and it landed on top of our armoire while running around in only underwear.) hehe

My mom and Jeff hired a friend to help us finish some of our unfinished projects around the house. It has been so wonderful and we are unbelievably grateful. So, Josh and Matt installed our new front door. Those of you that have been over may of noticed the old one that was half painted and had a hole punched into the back. The new one is so nice and what a difference it made. Next...it's on to the baseboards. :)
We finally started having play dates again and it is so much fun seeing this house lively and crawling with toddlers. A far cry from the night we came home to an empty house, with Gracie in the hospital and Gavin at my mom's. We love it. That's what this house was intended for. :)
We are having a blast with our precious little girl and our big 3 year old boy. We are loving this time in our lives and so grateful for the joy they bring us.
Come over soon!! ;)

Big Brother

So today Momma went back to work...I had a quick photo shoot and came home to find out that my son, my adorable sweet son that has been nothing but precious with our little girl, did the unthinkable. Ok, so maybe thinkable for a 3 year old little boy. :)
Josh had let Gavin hold Gracie and while holding her, he started picking his nose and without thinking twice, wiped it on her head. Yep, wiped a boogie on his little sis. That's my boy!!! I laugh every time I think about it. Josh said it was the funniest thing he has ever seen. It kills me that I missed it. :)

Glorious life!

Life is so much fun right now. We are brilliantly exhausted and loving our kids. Gracie has gained more weight and is eating even more. In fact she is eating so much during the day now, that we were able to let her miss a feeding last night. We all got to sleep! Yay! She is now 6lbs 12oz!
Daddy got our garage organized so he can finish some undone projects around the house. He is very giddy about the whole thing...as you can tell. What is it about a man and his garage...my dad and his dad are the same way? So cute. I guess I can liken it to my obsession with dishes. :)
Gavin got to play with the neighbor kids last night. It was so adorable to watch. He hated it when we had to call him in. I remember that was my favorite thing to do as a kid...play with the neighborhood kids until I got called in for bath time. I love these wonderfully long days, it reminds me Summer is almost here and I'm sure many more late afternoons with the neighborhood kids.
The amazing painting that you see was a gift from G-Pops and Mimi. They bought it at an art show to benefit Cherise's mission trip. We love it!
We are so blessed...it's ridiculous. Thank you Lord!

Today I went to the grocery store and kept everyone alive!

...That's something right? hehe

GRACIE LOVES BEING HOME!!

Ephesians 3:14-20
For this reason I kneel before the Father, I pray that out of his glorious riches He may strengthen you with power through His Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.
Now to Him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us.

We are home and I feel this verse captures it perfectly...He has done more than we could have imagined, or asked! We are home with our kids and it is absolutely heaven! The first day I walked around with a smile on my face the entire day. It was Mother's day and I was home with my two beautiful kids, what more could I ask for. The family came to our house to accommodate us and I just got to relax and enjoy being home. Thanks moms!
Gracie is LOVING it. She is looking so much healthier. I didn't realize until I looked back at the hospital pics, just how gaunt and sickly she looked. She is getting those adorable chubby little thighs and a full face. It is wonderful. Last she weighed, she was 6lbs 5 oz. That is a gain of 1 pound for the entire month in the hospital and 5 oz's in just a couple of days at home. She is showing us she is hungry more(that means crying) and taking more and more by bottle. The best part about being home is seeing her so lively. She just lights up with all of the craziness going on. She loves being in the middle of things and loves, loves her dad. She is smiling at us and connecting with us...something we pleaded with God for and can't believe how incredible it is. I'll admit she is a little spoiled and wants to be held at all times...but honestly, is this a problem? NO way...we don't mind it at all. :)
Thank you, thank you for praying us home. We love you friends and family and can't wait to start having you over to meet our little one. Ok, maybe give me one more week to settle in. :)
Oh the "I love mommy" cake was the gift Gavin wanted to get me for mother's day and then couldn't help but dive into it himself...adorable! He said, "I'm sorry about that mommy, I'm sorry about that." I've never laughed so hard. So precious! :)

More than I can handle

1 Corinthians 10:13
No temptation has seized you except what is common to man. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can stand up under it.

I think 1 Corinthians 10:13 is one of the most misquoted scriptures ever, and yes I am guilty of misquoting it as well... "God will never give us more than we can handle." Yes, God will never let us be tempted beyond what we can handle, meaning there is always a way out. But when it comes to more than we can handle...that is never something we should think we have to bare on our own.
Frankly, everyday is more than I can handle. I was made with the need for Him and made to lean on Him, made to cast my cares on Him.
Psalm 55:22
Cast your cares on the LORD and He will sustain you
1 Peter 5:7
Cast all your anxiety on Him because he cares for you.

I'm so grateful that He didn't just create us and leave us here to fend for ourselves. I'm glad that He wants to be actively involved in my day to day life. All we have to do is ask. In fact, Gracie's situation is so much bigger than me that in some ways I think it's actually easier to give it to Him and say, "Help"! It's the small issues that I think I have some sort of control over that are actually more difficult to yield. What's amazing to me is the way He lightens my load. He sends me amazing friends who call at just the right time, who listen, and cry and laugh with me. He sends me emails from people that have experienced similar things with encouragement and knowledge. He listens to prayers of dear friends who spend the time to care about us and our kids. He loves me so much that He cares to meet the needs, I don't even know I have yet.
It's too much, it's the most amazing love I have and will ever experience. I mean He died for us, so that we could have the hope of heaven, and getting out of this crazy, sad world. And as if He needed to give beyond that, He does. Crazy love.
One of the emails I received this week had a great little poem about the special needs child and I thought I would share it. I have to say, I'm glad we are in Holland...

"Welcome to Holland"

By Emily Perl Kingsley, 1987. All rights reserved.

I am often asked to describe the experience of raising a child with a disability - to try to help people who have not shared that unique experience to understand it, to imagine how it would feel. It's like this......

When you're going to have a baby, it's like planning a fabulous vacation trip - to Italy. You buy a bunch of guide books and make your wonderful plans. The Coliseum. The Michelangelo David. The gondolas in Venice. You may learn some handy phrases in Italian. It's all very exciting.

After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives. You pack your bags and off you go. Several hours later, the plane lands. The stewardess comes in and says, "Welcome to Holland."

"Holland?!?" you say. "What do you mean Holland?? I signed up for Italy! I'm supposed to be in Italy. All my life I've dreamed of going to Italy."

But there's been a change in the flight plan. They've landed in Holland and there you must stay.

The important thing is that they haven't taken you to a horrible, disgusting, filthy place, full of pestilence, famine and disease. It's just a different place.

So you must go out and buy new guide books. And you must learn a whole new language. And you will meet a whole new group of people you would never have met.

It's just a different place. It's slower-paced than Italy, less flashy than Italy. But after you've been there for a while and you catch your breath, you look around.... and you begin to notice that Holland has windmills....and Holland has tulips. Holland even has Rembrandts.

But everyone you know is busy coming and going from Italy... and they're all bragging about what a wonderful time they had there. And for the rest of your life, you will say "Yes, that's where I was supposed to go. That's what I had planned."

And the pain of that will never, ever, ever, ever go away...because the loss of that dream is a very very significant loss. But...if you spend your life mourning the fact that you didn't get to Italy, you may never be free to enjoy the very special, the very lovely things ... about Holland.

CHOC

We were so blessed to have incredible people working with our daughter while we were in the hospital. They truly became our family for the 6 weeks that we were there. All though we are so happy to be gone, it's these people that make us glance back with gratitude. Jen was our friend from the developmental team. She took the time everyday she was there to see Gracie and work with us on feeding. She was the glue, the familiar face we saw everyday. She has kids that are similar ages and I loved getting a chance to talk about normal life, while working with a not so normal eating problem. :) I craved her opinion everyday when I was obsessing about the days woes and she was there to encourage me and give me confidence in taking care of Grace. She was so knowledgeable and cared about Gracie and we will miss seeing her everyday. We had 38 amazing nurses while we were there, including our two that took Gracie as a primary, Monica and Victoria(we love them). We had 2 residents, Zac and Taryn and 7 attending Neonatologists that took care of Gracie consistently, 2 Neonatal Neurologists, 2 Metabolic Dr.'s, 1 Genetisist/Craniofacial Dr.,1 Gastroenterologist, 4 lactation consultants, 2 dietary specialists, 6 Developmentalists, 2 social workers, and a partridge in a pear tree.
What a gift to have received such amazing care and amazing kindness? Thank you CHOC NICU East! :)
"There is one who scatters, yet increases more . . . . The generous soul will be made rich, and he who waters will also be watered himself" (Proverbs 11:24-25).