Father's Day

We had a very relaxing and fun Father's Day this year. Movies, naps, pizza and then Jamie and Linda put on a puppet show for Jake. It was called "Hogging" and it was about a frog and a dog who go to Hogwarts and learn how to share. It was very cute, although you couldn't understand what they were saying in the last part because they were giggling so much. Sorry for the picture quality, they were moving targets. All in all it was a great day for a great father. I am so blessed that God brought me such a wonderful man to be the father of my children. He is truly one of the "hands on" dads. He can be counted on to do his share of everything from diapers, to middle of the night feedings, to baths, to stories, to playtime. His kids come before anything else including games on TV, video games, sleep. whatever. What a truly good role model he is for our boys.

Father's Day may have been relaxing, but this week has not been. I have spent the week doing laundry so that I can pack for Jamie and Linda's trip. They are going to spend a week with my mom in MO next week. My mom's church does an all day Bible camp for kids and they are finally old enough to go. We will meet Saturday in Joplin and trade Jamie and Linda for my youngest sister. My mom will bring them back the following weekend. The kids have never spent this much time away from me voluntarily before. I know that they will have fun. Jamie is already excited to go four-wheeling with Grandpa and Linda wants to stay the night at Aunt Karen's. In addition to all of this I have been getting ready to have a garage sale. I literally have bin after bin of baby and kid's clothes ready to sell. Hopefully all of the work will be worth it. Next week should be a little quieter around here.

TFC Creations

I spoke in an earlier post about the glass fusing class that Kimmie, Jordan and I are taking. needless to say, we fell in love with it. We have now expanded into making bowls, plates, windchimes, tiles, jewelry pendants and stained glass pieces. Today we had the find of the century. We found not one, but two kilns on Craigslist. We now have a smaller 110 kiln, and a larger 220 kiln which is huge. We also got a ton of ceramic molds as well. Where are we going to put these you ask? Thank goodness for the new house. In the new house, half of the basement is finished including carpet, there is also a finshed room for an office. The other half is not finished and we have decided that it will make a great work room for our projects. Finally I will have room to get back to my scrapbooking as well. There are already racks down there to store our supplies and add some tables, a radio, and a few chairs and voila, you have a studio. We have already made some beautiful pieces and I am excited to see how our venture grows. We are definitely ready to kick some glass.

Guest Blogger

From the blog "A Baby Named Nathan"

Weary


Why do we fret over the unknown? Is there some unwritten law that says once you've suffered something as unspeakable as the death of a child nothing is ever supposed to feel safe again? Why is it that I can trust God with just about everything else but when it comes to the health and well-being of my loved ones I lose all hope?

I have spent the last several weeks digesting what has been happening with everything from anxiety to full fledged panic as my mainstay emotions. I have not felt one ounce of peace and I can't help but feel somehow I have distanced myself from Him. I choose worry over faith. I choose panic over peace. I do this not because I want to feel these emotions but because they somehow give me a false sense of control over the situation. I have begged, pleaded and cried for peace to wash over me but I feel it wont happen until I'm willing to let go of control. The last two weeks have been racked with such intense emotions. I may be worrying for nothing but the waiting has given my mind time to wander every possible outcome this pregnancy could have. I have seen when things don't go right. I have read other moms stories of what can happen, and I have seen tragedy strike a family more than once. I am no longer naive to how horribly wrong this could all go. If you had told me a year ago that this would be my reality I would have said; "not me, things like that don't happen to me" Not that I felt immune to such awful things but that in my mind it was so rare. And in fact the way Nathan died was rare. I am learning more and more that no one is immune, and just because you've been through the fire once doesn't mean you cant go through it again.

I can't seem to gather or rationalize a single one of my thoughts. Somedays I feel as though my head could spin right off my shoulders. I want more than anything to feel like I'm normal and not like
I'm on my way to a little white room with padded walls. I feel like I could just scream from all the thoughts running around freely in my head. Is this my new normal? Is this the reality of the rest of my life? Will I always feel this out of control of my thoughts?

This journey of grief has been a long, painful, and at times a very lonely road. I have taken a few detours here and there but for the most part I am still very much on the path I began eight months ago. There are days where I look up to see if God is holding His hand out for me, but instead I see a dark night sky reaching down to swallow me in hopelessness. There are days when I press forward that I get a glimpse of light shining through the branches that cover me on this path. It is on those days when I can raise my chin up and shut the thoughts out if only for a moment. I haven't seen one of those days in a very long time and I'm growing quite weary on my journey. Hope seems fleeting the more I press forward. Somedays I wonder why I'm even moving at all. I suppose I do it for the hope that one day I will reach a clearing in the path and the light, His light, will shine down on me.

Wow, although I have not gotten to this point in telling Mason's story, it is coming up really soon. This blog post I felt I could have written. It shows how grief is all consuming. It shows how you want so badly to let go, but just can't. What a powerful and emotional post.

Mason's story-The Aftermath Part 5

The day after Thanksgiving was Mason's funeral. We had a dear family friend keep James and Linda because we felt that they were just not emotionally prepared to deal with the funeral of their little brother. We drove to the church, and I wept on the way. I just didn't want to have to do this, I just wanted so badly to close my eyes and have it all go away. We were the first people at the church. Mason's tiny casket was at the front. We went up their and sat in front of it, I wept some more. The lady from the funeral home came over and asked if I would like her to open the casket one last time. I said no. I am not sure why, I think I was just so overwhelmed that I couldn't take anymore. I wish now I would have said yes though and that haunts me sometimes.

We walked up to and placed our hands on his casket. We both prayed silently for Mason and for strength to endure. My family began to arrive. I can't remember what happened after that, the next thing I remember is being seated and the first song we selected began. The song is titled "Cry out to Jesus". It may seem like an odd song for a funeral, but we knew that there would be unsaved people at the funeral and we wanted to show them that even though we were broken, we still had faith. We wanted them to wonder how they could have that too. Later in the story I will not be so strong when tested. There was one line in particular that seemed like it was sang for us. I am not going to type the whole song, just the parts that spoke to us.

For every one whose lost someone they loved
Long before it was their time.
You feel like the days you had were not enough,
when you said goodbye. ....

There is hope for the helpless,
rest for the weary,
and love for the broken heart.

There is grace and forgiveness,
mercy and healing.
He'll meet you wherever you are.
Cry out to Jesus, oh cry out to Jesus.

The first stanza is pretty obvious on why we chose it. The refrain however spoke especially to me. Hope for the helpless, I felt so helpless when they told me what was happening. I knew I was doing everything I could do, and it still wasn't enough.

Rest for the Weary. I was tired in every way a person could be tired. Physically, emotionally, spiritually, and mentally. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw his precious face. In my sleep I had viscous night terrors about the trauma. I was exhausted to a level I have never been to this day.

Love for the broken heart. When something like this happens, you truly feel like you will never be able to be happy again. Love is happiness. You have to allow your broken heart to feel again to be happy.

Grace and forgiveness. Every mother I have ever talked to who has gone through a loss related to IC feels partly, or wholly responsible. It is our jobs to protect our babies, and to have a perfect baby pass away because your body did not do its job leave you with a profound feeling of guilt and failure.

Mercy and healing. I needed to accept God's mercy before I could forgive myself and begin to heal.

He'll meet you wherever you are. Wherever I was. Even if that meant in the pit of depression and anger, God would meet me there all I had to do was Cry out to Jesus. Although it would take months for me to do this, it later becomes an important part of my healing. Something so simple as crying out for my savior changed my life forever, again. More later.

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Jamie's Got Talent

Jamie was in the talent show at his school a few weeks ago. He used a puppet to act out and sing a song. He did great and we were very proud of his courage. Here are some pictures of the show. They are not very good because I couldn't get up close, but they are better than nothing. So here we go with "Jamie's Got Talent".