Sugar and Spice and Everything nice....

We are so happy to announce that our newest member due to arrive in March is going to be a beautiful baby girl. We are so excited.

While I was ready for another boy (which would have been a wonderful blessing, I adore my boys) my husband was sure this one was a girl and he is reveling in the fact that he was right.

Sometimes when you face a season of one disappointment after another it doesn't seem real when there is finally joy without measure. We have had to make a decision several times to agree with the joy of the season and not try to put a damper on it in any way. It's just joyful, joy upon joy!

Amazing

So the boys are getting used to the idea as well. Ethan was sure he wanted another brother, to keep the boys dominant in our family, but he has a twinkle in his eye when he thinks of all the ways she will adore and look up to him and Micah. Micah is sure we need to buy every pink girly toy we see right now.... when I assure him she won't be here for a while, and when she does get here it will be a while until she plays with toys he isn't quite ready for the wait.

We are still trying to settle on a name, but I think this time is different because there are so many that we do like. I guess we may just have to wait until we meet her to know who she really is.

One of my girlfriends put it best when she rejoiced with us and said "Beauty for Ashes".

Indeed!

In love with fall!!

Here we are at the beginning of fall and I am soo happy. I heard that fall in Central Oregon can be crazy, but I had no idea! Yesterday was 70 something and hazy from a near by fire, but today is lower 50's and hailing!!! Wow, here comes winter? or maybe this is fall....

Whatever it is I love it. Sunday was my amazing Ethan's 8th birthday. He celebrated and celebrated and celebrated some more. I love that my son has such a healthy self image. He really loves celebrating himself. So much like his mommy :o) It was also the anniversary of my original MRI and diagnosis of the brain tumor. To see how far we had come in 2 years, from devastation, having our feet knocked out from underneath us and not knowing what the future would hold, to a brand new start, a baby on the way and more joy than we thought possible. Amazing, simply amazing.

So much has happened in the last month since my previous post. I'll try to sum it all up.

• Ethan started 2nd grade in the public school system. Except for one day of tears, he is in heaven, absolutely LOVES school. We prayed that the Lord would give him the best teacher, and He certainly did! Mrs. Lence has been an answer to prayer in everyway for our Ethan.
• Daniel's cousin Paul got married. What a happy occasion that brought great great joy to all of the family. Paul married Fenny a wonderful woman from our church here in Bend. With the happy occasion brought lots of family.
• Which leads me here, Daniel's family all came in for the wedding. His parents were here along with his brother and family. We had a very very full house, but it was amazing. So much fun to finally meet Levi, the young man Neal and Diane (Daniel's parents) are foster caring for, and to finally meet Jon and Cyndi's twins. Justice and Jaxon are almost 8 months old and just a ton of fun.
• Micah and I began homeschooling again. He is doing just wonderfully.
• Daniel and Dad are still painting houses, even though work has slowed, God is so faithful and we are seeing amazing answers to prayer in our finances every single month.
• Had our second and third Dr. appointments. Saw the baby on the ultrasound, lots of wiggling and moving and then heard the heartbeat nice and strong. I'm beginning to feel movement and the majority of the morning sickness is over!!! God is so good.

So on we go with a new season literally. Looking forward to fall and all the joy this season brings. Praying your family finds great joy in this season as well.

First glance

We had our first glimpse of our little bundle this week. I was thrilled because Daniel got to be there and when they put the monitor on my belly to take a peek the baby just started dancing around. He/She moved almost the whole time she was monitoring... something I hadn't see with my other two. We just might have a wild child on our hands, at least a groove machine.

My morning sickness has been unrelenting. It "switched" off with my others at 12 weeks, but here we are almost to week 13 and I am still dealing with quite a bit of nausea all day long. It's been 6 very long weeks and I can't wait till this part is over. Seeing the baby was so helpful though because it really does give you a visual for all the problems that I'm having to endure. Soon we'll be able to feel the movement and I love that stage.

Our lives are constantly changing and "morphing" it's exciting but exhausting too. We've decided to put Ethan in public school for the first time this year. He is so thrilled and so am I. He is going into 2nd grade and he really thrives on interaction with others, I just know this setting will be perfect for him. I will have Micah home with me again this year and I'm looking forward to some one on one time with him that we've never really had. So in two weeks we'll be sending Ethan off and beginning a new school year.

Daniel's cousin Paul also gets married in about 2 weeks so we have a bunch of family coming in for that amazing event which is such a thrill. We'll have a very full house for a few days, but there is nothing more fun.

And to top it all off Fall is in the air, my favorite time of year. We are just counting all of our many amazing blessings, ones that seemed lightyears away this time last year. It's amazing how God truly does make all things beautiful in His time!!

We're grateful to be on the beautiful side of things now.

Good news

Well here we are in August already and I'm realizing how long it's been since I last posted.

We are pregnant again and life is good. All the signs are good. I'm tremendously sick with morning sickness that lasts all day long, which I wasn't with any of the miscarriages. The boys are so excited for their new brother or sister and are enjoying tracking the progress of the baby's growth on the internet.

I had my first Doctor appt. yesterday. It was just preliminary to establish care, we didn't get any information on the baby, but at the end of the month we will have another appointment that will give us the opportunity to see and hear the heartbeat.

The due date is March 8, my birthday.... very fun.

Joy is returning in measure to us all and we are just thrilled!

Good sign

I wanted to update everyone who is praying for us especially. I got a call from my Dr.'s office yesterday. They received the labs back from my blood test. Everything looks very very very normal! I didn't know how much I really wanted to be normal until I wasn't for so long, and now, the word normal sounds amazing.

Daniel and I are just rejoicing because when you have something like a brain tumor and they tell you it could come back and then you have headaches and achy eyes every little thing kind of makes your heart jump and you begin wondering if things are getting bad again. Sooo, to get a blood test and have them test all the hormones produced by the pituitary and have it come back totally normal is such a relief. We are so excited.

Thank you all for praying for us and holding up our arms thru all this. Looking forward to more victories to come.

Growing up

This is a particularly exciting weekend for us. Last night we celebrated the graduation of Ethan from 1st grade and Micah from Kindergarten. Our tradition is to go bowling for their party and we had a great time. Micah outscored all of us... something he was quite thrilled about. 

Homeschooling has been so rewarding. To look at my kids and see the progress they have made from this time last year is astounding. In so many ways they are little sponges that soak up whatever you give them to learn. But with teaching our kids the progress is line upon line and precept upon precept so it isn't always measurable, but then when you finish a whole year and look back there is much satisfaction in what has been accomplished.

We are praying and asking the Lord for wisdom for next year. I want to homeschool but am asking the Lord what He has for my kids. For now I'm super happy to not have to do school everyday. I'm ready for a break.

Our second celebration is Micah. He turns 6 on Monday!!! I can hardly believe he is 6. He is such a joy. Hungry for knowledge, loves to learn, is compassionate at his core and the most devoted little guy I've ever met. He is still in love with his VeggieTales, at this point he claims he will love them until he is a daddy and can pass the love on to his children. I hope he isn't disappointed :o)

We are so blessed to have two amazingly healthy boys that are great buddies. It's times like these that I feel like I'm overflowing with gifts from the Lord. So so good to me!

Only He knows and that's ok.

Romans 15:13 

"May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit."

I think we have already established the true meaning of hope but let me remind anyone who forgot or hasn't heard......

HOPE is the JOYFUL anticipation of GOOD

Now I'm reminding you as well as me because living on earth usually means we get curve balls thrown our way and we have to remember that it isn't the end of the world, but it can become something beautiful if we let Him use it.

John 16:33

"....I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world."

With that in mind we read the scripture again.... He is the God of hope (the joyful anticipation of good) and he wants to fill me with joy and peace (the first two things to go when crisis hits) because as we trust in him (picture yourself standing under the downpour of His hope getting filled up with joy and peace, trust keeps you there, fear takes you away from there) but if you stay there long enough you will OVERFLOW with what..... HOPE!!!! (the joyful anticipation of good) Amazing!!! 

It's like this awesome cycle of going to the source of hope and all good things and saying "wow, I sure need some hope, things look bleak" and he says, "here stand under my downpour for a bit, you'll get some joy and some peace" and you say "I don't need joy or peace, I need hope! I told you things look stinkin bleak!!!" and he says "relax, this will work I promise, you just have stay there for a while" So you decide to try it out and sure enough as soon as you step under that downpour you've got all this joy and peace and you forget about the circumstances that are screaming at you to freak out and give up..... Pretty soon before you know it you are overflowing with hope, the very thing you were looking for, and when you come out your situation always looks different.

The Lord downloaded this scripture to me this morning. I needed it. We had a doozy of a week.

Actually it started last week. Our housing hunt ended for various reasons, all out of our control. We have so much peace though. We thought we'd look for a house and pursue it as far as we could, but we hit a closed door and so we stop and instead of trying to make something happen that isn't supposed to happen we step back and say, "ok, we know you've got something awesome for us, just bring it in your timing"

We got hope.

Then Monday hit. I started spotting. The familiar scenario that left my heart sick. It's happened two times before and I knew exactly what was happening. Daniel and I prayed and waited, but Tuesday I lost the baby.

I was numb.

In fact I stayed numb for a few days, I had to in order to still function as a mom to my two other guys. I went thru the motions, did what I needed to do, but I just couldn't believe it happened again. I thought we had left all this heartache stuff back in California. This was our new land, our promised land, not that everything would be fairy-tale-ish, but we thought at least things would improve....

Wednesday my sister in law came and got the boys. I didn't think I needed a break, I'm ok, I'm dealing with it, strong.... when they left I just stopped, breathed and cried. I couldn't believe another baby was gone. 

Daniel and I took advantage of the time. We went on a much needed date to Baja Fresh, one of our favorites. We cried together, we went to the top of the hill in the middle of Bend called Pilot Butte. It was a beautiful evening and watched a storm roll in, complete with thunder and lightning, it was awesome. We cried and prayed some more. Emptied out. It literally downpoured on us while we were out there. We came home and read all the promises the Lord has given us over the years. We keep a journal of the specific promises he gives us either thru our personal times with him or from other people. You can't believe what a strength that is in times like these. 

Had all day Thursday to myself, another date night with my hubby, this time at home watching Return of the King, the third movie of the Lord of the Rings series. It was amazing. Then we had a quiet day home together today, just resting, worshipping, and enjoying the peace and joy of his downpour. I thought it was interesting that it literally downpoured here the last 3 days. First time it's done that since we moved here. It was magnificent.

This morning was when the Lord spoke to me thru the scripture in Romans. It is always a choice though. Choosing to allow him to fill us and give us a piece of him as the God of hope. Or staying in self pity and depression and wasting so much of what he is giving away freely. I choose life, and I choose hope.

We have hope again. It feels amazing.