Stressed....

....enough said!

He will see you through....

....IF....you let him. Our kind and wise Heavenly Father has given you the resources and the support to get through your darkest moments and your most difficult trials. This life is a test, and it wouldn't be a test if it was easy. We can be of a mindset that we are hard done by, an act of selfishness. We have but to look around to see how truly blessed we are. I can't count the people who look at my son and say he makes them want to cry with the lot he was given....and then the magic happens....he smiles. He was given in this life a body that is broken, that doesn't work, that is very different than what is considered normal. He was also given a mind that works perfectly in this body that doesn't. He was given physical limitations, keeping him from walking, keeping him from talking, from eating in the usual way....but, he was also given a devoted father, a loving mother, caring siblings, a birth in a time where the technology exists that would see him through events that surely should have killed him, resources to treatment that would make his situation more comfortable. He was also given a choice....he could be miserable or happy with his lot....he chooses to be happy. It is all in your attitude. You can look at your troubles and see them as barriers or you can see them as opportunities for growth. I could have been bitter about the fact that I will spend the rest of my life in servitude to this same child, but rather, I consider it an honor and a blessing. I can look back at how much this experience has helped me to grow, and I can see all the talent, resources and tenacity that my Heavenly Father gave me just for this task, this test....he gave me what I needed to get through this, and not just to get through it, but to triumph in this. Life is about choices and attitude. We all have what it takes, but in the end it is up to us.

Life isn't fair....

If it were fair, we would never do anything significant, for this, I am grateful for the injustice in this world, because it is that injustice which gives us the opportunity to shine.

Seeds of Truth

This morning, Tuesday is always my very early morning as Terry has to be to work early to help the school with morning traffic, my mind was on Aaron as I finished up a memorial doll of his brother Michael who died at just a few months old. Aaron had a broken life and hung in precarious unbalance when Terry's mum passed away in 2004. Aaron had been in her care from the age of eighteen months when his own mother could no longer cope with him, I imagine due to a number of reasons. Terry's mum and step dad were raising this very young child, in ill health themselves, raising a child with a plethora of developing problems. Needless to say, at the age of 10 1/2 when he arrived to our family he was a mess. I look at this massive difference in habits, attitudes and behaviors, between Aaron then and my own son Ethan at 9 1/2 and the difference is unsettling, though at the time our Ethan was only 3, and we had no idea what parenting a preteen/teen would involve, what was normal. At the time we let Aaron go, I felt like we had failed him, that we had just made his problems worse, but this morning as I thought on Aaron, I realized that in the three years that he was here, we gave him every opportunity we could, we gave him the guidance he needed, taught him life's lessons that he had somehow missed in the years before arriving to us, we had done our part to put him down a better path, and we HAD to let him go, let him use his agency to forge his own way. We planted the seeds in his heart that one day they might grow and blossom. I wonder if he was sent to us during this time to be that beacon of light that his family will need at some point, if it is his mission to bring them simple and beautiful truths when they need them, when they are ready. I was thinking about the path of sorrow and anguish this child is traveling right now and feeling unreasonably responsible....I think this is a common mistake that parents make during their childrens' adolescence, and then it cam to me Our vision is so limited, we tend not to look at the bigger picture, of the hope that we have given them and take there mistakes as our own personal failings. I do hope that one day, maybe many years from now that Aaron will think on the things he learned here and that he will treasure them and exemplify them and share them with those he loves.

Favorite Pictures of the Kids as Toddlers

Prayers for our friends....

Our friend Konner is back in the hospital, his cancer has come back after 20 months of being cancer free, and our friend Kate is not doing so well either....please pray for healing for them, and comfort and peace for their families!

Sunday morning solace...

I truly love my Sunday mornings when the house is asleep, a time for me to reflect and prepare spiritually for the day.

Yesterday ended up being a pretty lazy day, but it is on my mind, reminding me of just how very blessed we are.

Yesterday one of the families from Ethan's Make a Wish trip were holding a blood drive. We went down to support them, not intending to donate since they won't take Terry's British "mad cow" blood, and I figured I might be anemic because I have been pretty tired the past week (I know, who wouldn't be with a child with pneumonia getting albuteral treatments and being super hyper). They had an empty slot so I figured I would at least do the finger stick....well, I ended up donating. It wasn't bad at all for my first time, having had four kids I wasn't a stranger to having a needle stuck in my arm and the phlebotomysts are WAY better at it than the nurses in L&D! I did get a little woozy at the end, but a little juice and crackers and it was all good.

We sat and talked with two of the families from our trip and it was awesome to see how well their kids were doing.....Alex is almost two years post transplant, and Dana will be finished with treatment for leukemia in just a couple months.

I was not prepared for how I would feel when we left the cool air conditioned room and slammed with 104 degree heat. I was so sick I thought I might need to borrow Ethan's wheelchair. And the rest of the day was spent recovering.....but I KNOW how worth it it was....I may have spent 1 day sick, not able to do much, but it reminds me of how much time these kids spent sick, and how much these blood donations mean to their lives.....they wouldn't have made it with out people willing to go through what I did, it is SOOOOO worth the day sick to save a life. And I am so grateful for my health, for the health of my husband and children and that even though limited as Ethan is, he is healthy and we don't have to live in a hospital for any length of time. We are so very blessed!