This Blog

I love blogging.  I rarely pay attention to stats and such, but the other day I noticed that the blog is approaching 600,000 hits??!!  I am in awe that a little Mom blog which started on a hot August night back in 2008 has morphed into this.  (Check out how little my boys were in the first blog post here).

I remember that Mike was not exactly thrilled at the idea of a family blog back then.  Now some of my favorite posts on the blog were written by him.  Here is a link to my all-time favorite blog post by Mike-you can read it here).  This blog has documented our lives (often in more detail than my family would like) since Kyle was in first grade.  My entire pregnancy and Hope's little life have been documented on here.

Back in 2008 I could not have imagined that God was going to use this space for His glory during David's cancer diagnosis and treatment.  I will never forget the words I typed after Smyth County Ambulance  transported us late that night to UVA hospital.  You can read those words from a scared Mommy here.

Blogging takes dedication and time, but I love to scroll back through the thousands of blog posts I have documented from the highs of our family life (Disney, vacations, Miami Heat games, concerts, and precious times with loved ones) to the lows.  I am so thankful that I took the time at UVA to document the nightmare of David's cancer.  It is slowly becoming a hazy fog (thankfully) but I am so thankful that I have it all documented.  This blog is a living testament to God's grace, mercy, and blessings. 

I look back over the pictures of David bald, skinny, sick, and hooked up to tubes and such, and I get so emotional and overcome with gratitude that God not only walked with us each moment, but He got us to the other side of treatment.  His handiwork is evident all over our lives and blogging has allowed me to capture His goodness during the "busyness" of our lives. 

This blog will be used for God's glory.  I am not a preacher or a theologian.  I am not one of those gifted people that can quote the bible verse by verse for you.  God blessed other people with that gift and I am often burning up my pastor's phone after reading our assigned scripture readings for the week because I have a million questions.   I am not your girl if you are looking for a biblical scholar.  After studying the bible for most of my twenties and thirties I STILL have to use the table of contents to find certain books of the bible.  Sigh.

But what I can do is use this little space to share my family, chat about parenting a child with Down Syndrome, share David's journey through cancer and how underfunded pediatric cancer research is, and to talk about Jesus.  I cannot use this space to share a coherent sermon on the book of Revelation, but I can share first hand how Jesus has provided moments of "amazingness" when I was in the valley called chemo and radiation with my baby.  You can read aboud God's awesomeness here. 

This blog will always be real.  I will never try to gloss over hard and scary here.  Life is hard and scary that is why we need Jesus.  I will share pictures of my family because I love them and this blog is a great place to document life as our kids are growing bigger each moment. 

Thank you dear friends for visiting this little space and celebrating the awesome times with us and encouraging us during the hard times.  Your support of our family is precious to us.  Thank you also for ignoring my grammatical mistakes and misspelled words and reading through my run-on sentences:)  I write like I talk which is often dramatic and "wordy!" This blog is my safe and sacred space to process life and to point myself and hopefully others back to the One who loves us all-Jesus.

Mike

 

Today we are on snow day #9 around here in the beautiful mountains of Virginia.  The snow is beautiful and the temps have been super cold.  Yesterday we had a fun day with our neighbors.  Kyle and Tanner chose to hit the streets in our neighborhood shoveling driveways.  They were sore, tired, and had sweet little red faces from windburn, but they chose hard work over another round of xbox play which pleased us as parents.  Kyle fell asleep in our bed before 8:00 after all the shoveling:)

 

Meanwhile, my neighbor came over and we did some cooking together.  I love to cook and cooking with a friend while we got to catch up was precious. 

 

Before I launch into the next topic on today's blog I must post this disclaimer: I love my husband dearly and he loves me dearly but our marriage is not perfect at all.  He annoys me and I am sure on occassion I may have annoyed him a time or two.

 

 

Jonathan texted me this picture of my boys from Resurrection this past weekend after I shamelessly turned to Facebook Saturday night asking someone, anyone to capture a picture of my two.  I am married to a good man.  He happily chose to chaperone a group of middle school boys this weekend after being up before dawn many mornings last week making stressful snow calls. 

 

It would be so easy for him to use his job to get out of all the things he does in our kid's lives like coaching AAU, coaching Little League, helping with travel teams, refereeing Upward games, and chaperoning these boys to encounter Jesus in Gatlinburg this weekend.  He left Gatlinburg before communion Sunday morning to drive from Gatlinburg to Richmond, VA (8ish hours) to be there bright and early for an important meeting for his Superintendent job.  He returned home late Monday night after the meeting.  He is no spring chicken anymore and I know he was exhausted. 

 

Our kids are blessed that they have a Dad who juggles a stressful job (especially with these crazy and random snow storms that keep popping up) with being present and hands-on in their lives.  He is a tough Dad on all three of our kids whereI am usually the pushover parent with the kinder touch.  He takes parenting and faith very seriously and he feels very responsible for teaching our children to love God and to do the right thing every. single. time. 

 

The picture of Mike and Kyle at Resurrection makes me smile because they look so happy together  and I am so thankful that for Kyle's first experience at such a huge and personal encounter with Jesus his Daddy was there.  His Daddy was sleepy and dreading the drive to Richmond he still had to do,  but once again Kyle could count on the fact that his Daddy was there with him like he always is.

Full Heart, Full Weekend

There are times in life, when your heart is full, broken, sad, and blessed all within the span of a few hours. This weekend my heart has felt so many powerful emotions questioning why a few times, and rejoicing other times.

I want to respect Ashley's privacy, but I do ask that you lift her and her husband Matt up in prayer. We love them both and they are like family to us. She had to have unexpected surgery last Friday and finally got to come home today. Her heart is huge and she and Matt both know that God is in control. Sometimes, God's plan is not always on the easy and clear path and you just have to trust that His plan is the right plan. That is where they are today. We stopped by the hospital to visit them and of course David had to give her some love.

This weekend while Mike and Kyle were gone, Hope and David and I headed to Radford to visit with family. My Dad's entire family (minus a few hubbies and kiddos) converged upon Radford as sweet Memaw was transported from the hospital to her new nursing home. Hospice nurses are involved in her care now.

Obviously we all are aware that her heart is quickly weakening, but it was sweet and precious family time together this weekend. There were a dozen or so of us all weekend laughing and reminiscing with her. It breaks my heart to see how swollen she is from the fluid on her heart and lungs. It brings me to tears to see her laboring to cough up fluid. Congestive heart failure is not pretty, but she still is. My Memaw has the sweetest spirit but I heard some funny and unforgettable stories about her this weekend. She is a sweet mild-mannered christian woman, but she had a few suitors after her before she married my Pawpaw and she was a tough bird! She often laments that she is ready to see Jesus because she is tired and tired of being tired, but God blessed us with this family time together. I know we wore her out but sweet memories and funny stories ease the sting of words like "heart failure", "hospice" and "palliative care."

David chose to wear his shirt and tie to the nursing home so he could look "hot" for Memaw while he sang a sweet song to her.

While we were visiting family and dodging crazy snow storms, Mike and Kyle were at Resurrection 2014 in Gatlinburg. I think they had a wonderful experience worshipping God and learning His word with 3500 other youth and chaperones from the Holston conference. Kyle being one of the sixth graders going this was his first year to be able to go. I hear it is an experience that you have to experience to understand, but I kept up with them through the live feed on my phone and I enjoyed lots of facebook pictures from the group. I am so thankful for such a strong and wonderful youth group that Kyle is apart of and I am so thankful that Kyle has the kind of Daddy that would choose to go and chaperone other middle school boys. Mike is a little sleepy, but he too had a great time!

I had a lump in my throat seeing them off on Friday. I am still shocked I have a child old enough for Resurrection and that he is a youth now! GASP! I was also emotional thinking of all the prayers I had personally prayed for this group that they would experience God on a personal level and come home changed by His presence. Jesus is the sweetest thing in my life and I am so thankful that Kyle has this opportunity to build his own relationship with Jesus.

Sometimes life is beautiful and brutiful all within the span of a few minutes. This weekend with family was beautiful and I know it did Memaw's heart good to be with us all together even if it was in a nursing home with a visit from her hospice nurse. I am so thankful that Mike and Kyle encountered Jesus at Resurrection with 3500 of their closest "friends" while I also lift Matt and Ashley in prayer as they keep walking in faith when life throws a big curveball. I do know from my walk with Jesus, that whether you are on the mountaintop praising God, or holding your sweet grandmothers hand while she labors to cough up something to ease her lungs, God is there. He is always there.