October

It's October.
The weather is nice. It's starting to get cool here.
I asked Bryant if I could turn the fireplace on yet. He said no.
I told him if it got to hot in the house we could turn on the A/C.
I love a fire in the fireplace.

One time at our grandparents house our grandfather made us a fire in the middle of July. We had to run the air conditioner on full blast for about 2 hours to get the house even remotely cool enough for it. It was fun.

This week at work has been a little crazy. Today was picture day. I love a schedule. That did not happen today or yesterday. I am glad that tomorrow I will be able to follow my schedule down to the minute. It was a great comic relief though..

Do you ever feel like the exact thing you absolutely don't want to do is the thing you need to do the most? I know that the Lord asks us to do things that aren't comfortable because He wants to see growth and sometimes needs to bring change into our life. I just don't understand it.
More about this later...

I'm tired. Hopefully sleep will come easy tonight.

sad days

I've had some behind the scene stuff going on with me the past few weeks. I'm starting to become more cautious with what I put on the blog so for now I'll keep it to myself. I've been very sad this past week. I know this may seem weird but every time I see a new month approaching it is just another reminder of how different our lives should be.
October is here this week. This is normally our favorite time of the year. Bryant and I love fall/winter and all of the festivities it brings. Not this year. I don't think we will really decorate or "celebrate" the holidays this year. I know next year will be different. This year it's too sad.

This is an uphill battle. It's a climb. It's exhausting. I'm tired a lot of days. I don't want to still be explaining myself to people. I know it's unfair but I want people to get it. I want people to try to understand. I don't want people to be shocked when we still cry and are still upset and still struggle with this. We still do.

Today is sad. I know that it may not be like that tomorrow. I'm thankful for that. A new day is such a gift.

"Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope: because of the Lord's great love we are not consumed, for His compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is Your faithfulness. I say to myself, "The Lord is my portion; therefore I will wait for Him." Lamentations 3: 21-24

wordless wednesday

man's best friend

Meet Calvin O'Keefe.
Dudley and Bauer have a new cousin in Kentucky.
Rae and Donnie finally took the plunge....
Greetings Calvin from your cousins in Alabama.
We are looking forward to seeing you soon!

another month is almost gone..

I say it all of the time but I cannot believe how quickly life is passing by...

I don't have long to write tonight. This weekend was a lot of fun but very exhausting. I love football but having to sit in the pouring down rain, wind and lightning isn't that fun.
I have pictures but we look SO horrible that I'm not going to post them.

I got to see my Mama and Daddy this week. It was nice having them here. I wish they lived closer.

Things are happening...I just don't have the time tonight to tell you about it all.

Hoping that all of you have a wonderful week.

house

3-4 bedrooms, 2 1/2 bathrooms (bathroom upstairs is jack and jill style)
2168 square feet
$279,000

Call Bryant @ 334-524-4957 if you are interested!

rain rain go away....

We have had rain everyday for the past week. I'm tired of gray skies and the mugginess it brings! I need some sunshine. It's so hard to get out of my warm bed when I hear rain beating on my windows. Hopefully...next week will bring the sun with it.

I know I haven't said a lot about my new job. It's going very well. I mean it can be stressful and exhausting but it's exactly where I'm supposed to be. I don't know that about much right now so that's good.

Ok - I promised pictures...

This is the diaper cake I made for Nicole's shower.
(so glad she is having a girl......)

The wreaths for the shower..

Auburn wreath - War Eagle!

I've been craftier that usual lately. I think it's good to stay busy. I would keep posting pictures but it would get really old and boring...
I'm going to do on post on our house...we are hoping it sells!

Thank you so much for all of the prayers for Emily. She is off the ventilator and out of ICU. She still has a long recovery in front of her but is doing much better!

friends

This is a crazy day....3 blog posts.

I just want to say that Bryant and I have some of the greatest and most wonderful friends ever.

You know who you are....

how things are

Tomorrow will be 19 weeks since Nate died. I actually had to look at my calendar because I couldn't remember what week it was. That is a healthy thing for me but it's also very sad. Life isn't as much of a roller coaster...it's more of a sea-saw now. Normally, for every bad moment there is a good moment and for every good moment there is a bad moment. Not all of my days are horrible. I normally have one really emotional or bad day a week. I don't let myself give in to the sadness most days. The deep deep sadness is still here. I'm not sure if that ever goes away. I realize that until I'm home with Jesus that my life here without Nate won't be complete. There will always be a feeling of "things aren't the way they should be". I've really started to accept that. I am beginning to accept that in our world being pregnant doesn't mean you get to bring a baby home. I am beginning to accept that for the rest of my life I'll visit a grave with my baby's name on it. I am accepting that a lot of "first time things" won't bring "first time" excitement. I know that for the rest of my life when I'm asked how many kids I have I'll probably never give the correct answer. I thought I wanted to live in denial forever. I don't. Acceptance is hard and painful at times but it's a forward step...it's moment. Denial is standing still.

So I'm doing ok. I am good with that. I didn't think I would make it to ok this year.

Bryant and I have hope in Jesus tonight. I don't say that to come off in a super religious or spiritual way at all. It's the truth that our entire life, relationship and marriage is based on. I know the ending to our story. It's hard right now...It's sad...It's tough a lot of days...but because of Jesus our ending has already been written. Nate's ending had already been written too.

"Yet I still dare to hope when I remember this: The faithful love of the Lord never ends! His mercies never cease. Great is His faithfulness; his mercies began afresh each morning. I say to myself, "The Lord is my inheritence; therefore I will hope in Him!"
Lamentations 3:21-24

pray

Please help us pray for a dear friend of ours sister. This is from her CaringBridge site.




Friends who love Emily,

Here's some background to bring you up to speed with her story.

Last Tuesday, Sept 1st, Emily came home from school feeling ill. She went to her doctor on Wednesday and found that she had developed acute Bronchitis. After several days of being on antibiotics and other meds she was showing no improvement. She went back to her doctor on Saturday and recieved a breathing treatment that offered some temporary relief.

By Sunday she was having significant trouble breathing and went to the East Alabama Medical Center ER that afternoon. After x-rays and some tests they discovered that she had developed pneumonia in one of her lungs and tested positive for H1N1 flu. She was admitted that night and has been under the care of Dr. Steven Presley since then. In the next days Emily had little response to a mix of antibiotics and other treatments and by Wednesday night the pneumonia was in both lungs.

Her condition digressed through the night and by Thursday morning her breathing had become very rapid and shallow. Her lungs simply were not able to receive oxygen and thus her organs were in jeopardy of being compromised. She was immediately moved to ICU, sedated, and put on a ventilator.

While things like "ICU", "sedation" and "ventilator" may sound really bad, these are actually good things for Emily right now. These last days have been very tough for her, miserable and exhausting. She's now resting very well, not coughing, calm, and completely zoned out (won't remember any of this). She has stabalized on the ventilator and her vitals are improving. Her condition at this time has classified her as having ARDS (Acute Respitory Deficiency Syndrome). Our family will continue to put updates in the journal as much as possible.

Thank you so much for your prayers, love and support for Emily. We are very hopeful for her recovery and are trusting Jesus to do his healing work in her body right now.

Good Morning Blog.

I am busy. I didn't realize how crazy it would get once football season started. Sometimes busy is very good.....
I am enjoying my job a lot. It is nice to have something to fill my time. It's a lot of work though. I feel like all I do is lesson plans. I'm fine with that though.
Football season is in full force. All of Bryant's family came up last week for the game. We tailgated. It was fun. Also, a bunch of our dear friends were in town. It was great being around so many people that we love so much.
I will post pictures from the last two weeks when I get home today from work.
Several people have e-mailed me and wanted to know how Bryant and I are doing. I'll update that later today too..

Hopefully everyone is having a Good Morning...

-26-

Happy Birthday Bry.
I love you.

gameday on the plains - war eagle

I cannot believe that football season has started. Of course, it's another bittersweet, happy/sad thing for me. I kept thinking last during the game that I shouldn't be there. I should be in the hospital having a baby. I know those are thoughts and emotions I'm going to be dealing with for awhile. We were able to see a bunch of friends so that part was fun.
Here are some pictures from yesterday. (I know you will be shocked that I'm actually posting pictures...thank you Heather C.)


War Eagle!

thank you

Thank you for all of the kind emails, comments and messages.
I appreciate you all very much.

9-3-09

Sweet Baby Nate,

We miss you everyday
Miss you in every way
But we know there’s a
day when we will hold you
We will hold you
You’ll kiss our tears away
When we’re home to stay
Can’t wait for the day when we will see you
We will see you
But baby let sweet Jesus hold you
‘till mom and dad can hold you…
You’ll just have heaven before we do ...


If we live, we live to the Lord; and if we die, we die to the Lord. So, whether we live or die, we belong to the Lord. - Romans 14:8

due date eve

"What do you want to do on Thursday?" I've been asked that question by a lot of people. What do you do on your supposed to be due date after your baby dies? Bryant has suggested everything and nothing sounds right. My answer is that I would love to go to the hospital and have a baby. Of course, that will not be happening.

It's very very hard not to think about how things should be right now. This should be such a happy and exciting time. I should be packing hospital bags and getting last minute things done. I should have a nursery full of gifts and furniture and baby blankets.....All of Nate's stuff is still in his nursery. I'm sure all of it will need to be dusted by now. The wall still has 4 different colors of paint on it. (We were trying to decide what color to paint the room the weekend before I went into the hospital)

Nate's grave needs new flowers. I'm sure that is something I'm "supposed" to do tomorrow. The irony of that gets me. Instead of going to a hospital and bringing a new life into the world.....I'll be at the cemetery looking at his grave. I hate seeing the tiny little plot of grass that covers his grave. It is so small. I'm ready for the grass to blend and for it to look like all of the other plots. I got the design layout for his marker about a week ago. I'm not sure how long it will take me to order it (1. because we can't afford it at the moment and 2. it is unbelievably hard to see my baby's name on a grave marker). His name was supposed to be on blankets and clothes and sippy cups and diaper bags.

It's been 17 weeks since our baby died.

I'm sad but I will try not to feel defeated today.
I'm waiting but I'm extremely anxious about the future.
I'm determined but I'm very confused.
I'm exhausted but I know I must be stronger.



"He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain." Revelations 21:4

..................

Today was a really bad day. I don't even have much to type. This week has been so much harder than I imagined. I cannot believe it's September. September is here. The month that I have been waiting for since last December. It's here and everything is different. Things are not as they should be. I feel like that will forever be the motto of my life.

I'm too sad right now to finish this post. It would just be really depressing and make me sound crazier than I actually am.

I feel like I've taken 10 steps back. That is how it goes. 1 step forward...10 steps back......

I'm ready for this week to be over. I'm ready for Thursday to come and go. Maybe I can arrange to just sleep through the entire day...