stain of grace

I wondered how to come to You,
I did not dare believe it true, that You regard the orphaned ones:
beloved daughters, worthy sons,
the broken and the barren too,
I heard I could find some rest in You.

What kind of love in injury's place,
would leave instead the stain of grace?
So I come in sorrow and I come in shame.
I come to the cross with my pain.

Just as I am, without one plea,
but that thy blood was shed for me
and that Thou bidst me come to Thee,
O Lamb of God, I come, I come.

I am so thankful tonight for the "stain of grace" that the Lord left on me.

friends

Bryant and I have such great friends. You know who you are and we love you!

I have a lot to blog about but my laptop decided to die tonight. (bye bye dell...) I am using Bryant's laptop right now and he is giving me a look. Thank you so much to all of you who have donated towards Team Baby Nate! I had a meeting with one of the division heads for the March of Dimes. I am so happy to be working with this organization. They love babies and are so passionate about all babies being born healthy..and in our case alive. We are so excited about helping in whatever way that we can.

We had a great Spring break. I think I was the only one excited about being back at work on Monday. It was so nice to have time off but I was glad to see all of my sweet kids! So I'll write more later.....pray for my sweet husband. I am starting to take a lovely medicine twice a day that makes me not so nice! It will all be worth it to have a healthy baby here....

Love to you all!

hello blog friends

You all are a faithful bunch of people. I forget sometimes that there are a few people out there that must think my life is somewhat interesting. You have been so sweet to send me messages and emails asking about how my visit with the R.E. (Reproductive Endocrinologist) went.

Things went well...

I found out several things:

1. I have a girl of steel! (I refer to the V. word as a "girl" - You would think that after everything I've talked about on here I would be able to type the V. word but I can't.)

2. I have a pretty uterus. (Everything looked great...)

3. The verdict is still out on my cervix. (The R.E. wants us to see a M.F.M. doctor once we are pregnant and get to at least 9 weeks to determine if I'm going to need a cerclage.)

4. It looks like I am going to get to take more of the fun and exciting hormones that make me love my husband so well....

So that's the update. This week is my Spring Break and it could not have come at a better time. I love those little precious angels but it will be nice to have a week away from preschool.

Hope everyone has a great week. More to come later...

ATL

Bryant and I are heading to Atlanta in the morning to see the specialist again.

We would appreciate your prayers so much!

funny conversation

I thought we could all use a laugh.

Walking past a store in the mall that is known for super small sizes of clothing, Bryant saw an outfit he thought would be cute on me...this was the conversation that followed:

Bryant - "You would look so good in that outfit."

Courtney - "Um that would be a NO...nothing in that store would even remotely fit me."

Bryant - "Why don't we go in there and see if they have it in really big!"

Courtney - "Seriously! Did you really think about that sentence before you said it!"

(Yes, my husband decided to completely bypass large or x-large and make up a size of his own for me called "really big". - FYI..I am not that huge...this store makes all of their clothes out of spandex and even people that are a size 4 would have to buy a large.)

Here are some pictures from our Snow Day in February

another Baby Nate..

Thinking of my dear friend Trisha and her beautiful family.

They are missing their baby Nate. He would have been two yesterday.

Happy Birthday in heaven Baby Nate!

March

March is here. I have no clue why but whenever a new month starts I get incredibly sad. It normally takes me a few days to get over it.

I have been very busy lately. Busy is good for me. It takes my mind off being sad.....yes, I still get sad. Some people are amazed that I still get sad and upset over losing Nate. I am beginning to understand that people really can't understand our situation unless that have lived through it. I am doing better at not being angry when people say the absolutely wrong thing to me. The anger just ends up hurting the healing process.

I finally went and saw Nate's grave marker. I went by myself about two weeks ago. I have been to the cemetery a lot since Nate died. I normally don't get upset. It's odd. I've gotten a hundred times more upset walking through Hobby Lobby than I have at the cemetery. This time was different. I saw his name.....It was too much. The process of picking out his name was not something that was taken lightly. I spent days, weeks & months deciding on his name. Bryant wouldn't let me use any name that wouldn't sound good over a loud speaker at a baseball game. (Obviously, a lot of name that I like are not good baseball player names) I was diligent to think about everything when it came to his name. I made sure there couldn't be a horrible nickname or that his initials didn't spell something weird. I thought about what his monogram would look like on his wall or what his name would looked like on his clothes. I never imagined I would have to see it on a grave marker in a cemetery. It was so real and final standing there in the cemetery. I haven't been back since.

Nate's birth/death date (yes, in our world babies can have birthdays and death days on the same day) is coming up soon. May 6 will be here before I know it. I had told myself it would be easier because I would have another baby here by that day. I know another baby will never replace Nate or take away the hurt that we have felt. I definitely think another baby will help us move forward and bring a lot of healing to our family. I never dreamed this process would be as difficult as it has proven to be. A lot of days I don't see the plan. It's very easy to sink. I try very hard not to let myself but there are some days it's just all to much. Every month I try to stay positive and believe and I will continue to do so......or at least try my best.