What are you thankful for.....?

Sometimes in life it is extremely hard to look at the big picture and pick out the little things in life that we are thankful for. It's easy to say, Family, Friends and God.

But it's the little EVERYDAY things that get me thru this life. Don't get me wrong, I am ever so grateful for family, friends and God. But this life journey that I am on, has definately NOT gone as planned. So those little things that many tend to look past, are the things I am thankful for today on this Thanksgiving day!!
Just today I've thanked God for the laughs Ashalyn and I shared making brownies and cookies. For the giggles I heard coming from the bathtub as Nick gave Ashalyn her morning bath. For the morning kiss I got from a man who loves me unconditionally. For the chocolate on Ashalyn's nose after licking the brownie bowl. The tiny little footprints I feel on the wall of my stomach. And mostly for the ever protecting, warm arms of an amazing Father, that is holding my babies tight on this Thanksgiving day!

It is for these things that I am thankful. I am so thankful to have family and friends and God walking with and guiding me through this life...but it is the small things that come from these people that give me a reason to have faith in the unknown and in our future!!

WHAT ARE YOU THANKFUL FOR THIS HOLIDAY SEASON?????

Discouraged

Today is kind of a discouraging day. My babysitting kids came and we sat down for our circle time. Circle time is nothing real impressive. We do a simple version of calender to get counting in. And I am able to ask the kids what month it is and they are able to tell me. I have a fun early childhood calender that has many colors and cute little pictures and each day a child is able to help by putting the day's number in! Simple, but the kids love it and it is what has helped Ashalyn learn her counting! After that we usually sing a song or two and then discuss our topic for the day before we do our art project. Today we talked about thanksgiving and what we were thankful for. Then we all sat at the table and made a huge thanksgiving feast for our lunch....mashed potatoes, dressing, chicken, greenbeans, corn and warm bread!! It was yummy!!
So you might ask why I say it was a discouraging day?!?
It goes back to the topic of the day. I look at my life and I see all the things I have to be thankful for. I had one boy say he was thankful for trains, trucks and cows. Another girl said her mom and dad. Ashalyn followed suit then by saying her mom and dad. I teared up. I AM SOOOO GRATEFUL FOR MY LITTLE GIRL!! Nothing discouraging about that!!! She is my world, my life!! I am thankful I am still here to spend these days with her. I am thankful that I am a mother of not only one beautiful girl. I am thankful for my husband! I HAVE SO MANY REASONS TO PRAISE OUR MAKER FOR THIS LIFE!
But when talking about these things the memories come crowding back....the life I had before! When I could picture Ashalyn and Miranda growing up so close in age and playing with the kitchen set we had purchased before the accident and Miranda was very much alive in my tummy. When Nicholas and I would lay in bed, he'd hold my stomach and we would talk about them playing basketball together, or what we would do if they both came home liking the same boy, or if they both wanted to get married all in the same summer. They would of only been 13 months apart, so all these things were possible!
But not only do we have the broken dreams of our daughters not growing up together, there is more that discourages me tonight! There used to be a day when Nick would get home from work and hop out of his truck and run in the house to see his two favorite girls! Today was no different than any other day since the accident...I watch him crawl out of the truck and he pauses. Just from the time he gets in his truck, drives less than a mile home from work, he has to completely start over with making his leg work. He has to focus on how to get from the truck to the house and "unfreeze" his leg. Every day I watch him hobble to the house with pain in his eyes, sometimes watch him stumble down the stairs, and other times just watch him grabbed his leg to lift it as he takes a step. Don't get me wrong....I AM EVER SO THANKFUL HE IS STILL HERE WITH US....but discouraged that our life took such a dramatic turn and will NEVER be the same.
Work days are hard days for him because he is on concrete all day long and doesnt get the chance to sit down much through out the day, so it seems like those are the days that are toughest for him with his leg. He has an appointment for a second opinion because it's been over a year and his limp seems to be worse on days and he seems to still be in a great deal of pain, given the good and the bad days! It's a discouraging day because it's been a rough one for him. I HATE HATE HATE watching him limp and not being able to do anything to take care of him. So tonight I am thankful for MANY MANY things, just a bit discouraged about others.
I hope not to ask for too much, but I would be ever so thankful if there was a day that I was greeted by him after work like we wwere before the accident!! Pain free. Limp free. Where he runs in the house because he cant wait for the welcome home kiss from his girls! I sure do miss those days!!!!!

A lil' bit of EVERYTHING

It has been awhile. I will be honest, I did NOT think many people read my blog. Just in the last week I have had two very random people come up to me and say, "sounds like there's some good things happening in your life" and "I've been reading your blog..." WOW! And about a month ago a mom had asked me if I would consider blogging different kids ideas! So...here's a little update on pretty much everything.

Let's start with Ashalyn's surgery. All went well. She ended up having lots of bleeding and scarring in the ear so the surgery was an additional 45 minutes where they took her tubes out, cleaned it, removed some of the yuckiness, and put a brand new set of tubes in. In addition to the tonsils and the adenoids being removed! It took her a week, but she is back to eating and drinking and back to her happy self. We sure did miss that personality of hers. However, it got to the point where the doctor told us whatever we could get her to eat.....I thought I tried everything! Finally I thought, maybe if we took popsicles over to her cousins house and shared with them she would want a popscicle! Well, they were eating cookies when we got there and sure enough, that stinker went straight for a chocolate chip cookie and downed two of them. Didnt eat for 3 days and made mom and dad look silly!! But the problem is....we started a VERY bad habit! Every night before bed, for breakfast and at lunch time she begs for cookies! On occassion she gets her way and we make hot cookies and milk for bedtime snack...but this mommy isn't sure how long that will last!! (she literally is asking EVERY NIGHT!)

Next topic: our foster care. We found out the week of Ashalyn's surgery that there was a few month delay on our paper work...which puts us back to February in getting our license. (baby is due early april late march) We figure that might be a little too much all at once, so we slowed down our speed on trying to get everything done by November. We have all but 12 hours of our training done. And most of our home study. However, we are going to hold the rest of that off til after the holidays and then start back up. We will then still get our license in Feb. but are going to wait til a few months after the baby to take our first placement.

Which leads me to the baby! A friend of mine called me up and told me that the CPC was doing ultrasounds for free one day for a training of the new machine...so...we got an early sneak peak of our little GIRL!! Yup, we are expecting another girl. Kynzie Caraline! Ashalyn stared in amazement as she watched her little sister move around on the u/s machine and now if you ask her what the baby's name is she says, "baby sister!" And then goes on to say her name, "Kynzie Line" She seems to be pretty excited for as much as she understands at her age. I've had a few ask how we came to pick Kynzie for her name, which we have found to be a very neat story!!

Ashalyn's name really had no meaning behind it. It was a name we both loved and agreed on. Faith (A's middle name!) is pretty self explanatory...we as parents made the commitment to raise Ashalyn in knowing our Christian faith and our prayer for her is that she comes to know and except that same life!
Miranda's name didnt come as easy. We already picked out one girls name and had a very hard time deciding and agreeing on another. A few months before she was due to be born we agreed on Miranda, but could not agree on the middle name. Nick wanting Lyn so we could stick with the "yn" names and me choosing Irene, after his grandma Edna Irene, and my great grandma Irene. So when the accident came and Miranda was born, I was SOOO out of it, I'm not even sure if Nick was in the room with me at the time, and they asked if the little one had a name yet, I remember not even thinkin about it, and the name Miranda Lyn Irene Rice flowed from my mouth. We knew before hand that the name Miranda meant "miracle". Now, that sure did not seem like any miracle to me....but looking back at how bad it could of been, we have seen some miracles in our story!
Briley Jordyn, with Briley we were not far enough that we could tell the gender of the baby, so Bryleigh being our girls name and Jordyn being one of our boy choices...we decided Briley Jordyn could be very gender neutral.
And now to Kynzie Caraline...We went through name after name. And both very much liked Kenzie. However, like I mentioned...we wanted to stick with yn names...so we debated and we even asked an english teacher if we spelled it Kynzie if that would change the pronunctiation. She told us that she believed it would change the pronunctiation to Kinsey...so, we thought about it and we actually couldnt decide then which name we liked better, but we knew we LOVED the KYNzie spelling best...so we looked up the name meaning of Kinsey and sure enough that spelling was there....and the meaning....it just BLEW US AWAY. Brought instant tears and goosebumps to both of us.
Kynzie: the kings victory over the evil one
WOW! Take our entire story and put that meaning into a Christian content. When we felt like we had been beaten to the ground over and over by Satan....our amazing Redemer and Lord picks us up and defeats him!! We have a healthy pregnancy and each day are one day closer to holding our baby, our living miracle!!
HOW AMAZING AND AWESOME IS THAT?!?!?!

5 am stream of ramblings

I'm not sure I am really thinkin' straight at this point. Blogging is my last attempt at trying to get a little bit of shut eye before my annoying alarm starts sounding. The buzz is set for 5:45am and I have laid awake watching it since about 2 o'clock. My thoughts are beyond comprehension at this point. In just a few short hours I will send my little girl into the arms of the earthly physicians where they will prep her for what is thought to be a simple surgery. She will be getting her tonsils and adenoids removed, as well as a possible set of new ear tubes. So you might ask, "if it's so simple, what keeps you awake tonight?"
I don't know if it's pregnancy hormones or just a motherly reaction, but I'm worried sick for my baby girl. Really, she's no longer a baby; she's very much so a growing toddler! But tonight before bed, I admit I catered to her much more than normal and I ENJOYED EVERY MINUTE OF IT!!! After bath she insists on lotion. High maintenance? Maybe!! However, it spoils mom just as much as it does Ashalyn. That bonding time is amazing where she gets so relaxed and mommy just gets to massage her legs and pamper her. I don't know the details of it all but I do know that baby massage is wonderful for stimulating parts of baby's brain and it's something I've done from day one! I said extra prayers with her tonight. And I cuddled her more than ever. And now I sit there and watch her sleep.
Her previous ear surgery went well. We no longer were seated in the waiting room when they were coming out to get us to go back to recovery. I'm assuming that's a little how this will go. However, now I will admit...I live this life with a little bit of fear. It was all a matter of seconds in the past that my dreams of being a mother were shattered. All these true and happy moments I have with Ashalyn were ripped away from me before I could even beg God to give me another chance with my sweet baby Miranda. I arrived at St Vincent's Medical Center on life flight knowing my baby girl had a heart beat still and not long after that I was looking in the eyes of a very unfamiliar OBGYN asking if there was any chance of comign out of surgery with a live baby girl in my arms. So yes, my biggest weakness in this life is FEAR! I've tried over and over to lay that at the cross, but it's something I still struggle with on a daily basis, as I look at those beautiful blue eyes and see all that I could lose in her.
I cherish EVERY moment I have with her and I find so much in her that I love and that just brings the biggest smile to my world. Matter of fact, she IS my world! The past few weeks she has not felt well and it has been stressful at times. All I want is my little healthy and happy girl back. That's the goal of this "simple, normal" surgery....but I dread anistesia taking her from my arms and watching her walk down the hall, peering back over their shoulder, watching mom and dad struggle to fight back the tears. I dread every second I will be away from her, waiting for them to come get us to go back to recovery. And I CANNOT wait, til I can go pamper her more and craddle her in my arms, brush her hair with my hands, and just watch her sleep!!

Lord, watch over Ashalyn (and baby on the way) tonight, tomorrow and forever!! Thank you for my little blessings!!! And you know my final request for the night before I fall asleep.....kiss my other two babies for me! AMEN!!